“Commander. They are moving,” Dayvan said almost too quickly as he burst onto the bridge of the Infidel Class Raider. He turned and made a motion to two robed men escorting a human female draped in a soft white cloth that was barely visible. They roughly brought her onto the bridge and lay her across a navigation console, binding her at the throat and ankles as the computer beeped in an ignored protest.
“Subcommander Dayvan… are you forgetting something?” inquired Commander Talshak in a calm voice. Dayvan started as if struck by an open handed slap to the back of his head and immediately brought his heels together and stood at attention.
“Commander, my apologies, but the importance of this is paramount” began Dayvan. Commander Talshak was not really upset at the breach in decorum, but discipline needed to be maintained. Even though Dayvan was a powerful sorcerer, blessed with the fell powers of Chaos and second in command of the army, Talshak’s word was law on this vessel, and wouldn’t let anyone forget it, even an old friend like Dayvan.
“You may proceed.” Talshak calmly ordered, gesturing in affirmation
“The prize that has eluded our lord for a century… it is moving! I’ve felt it!” exclaimed Dayvan.
“Where? How?!” Talshak asked incredulously. He was still an Initiate the last time their warband made an attempt to recover the artifacts from the patchwork space hulk adrift near Zanatov’s Harbor. Hundreds of lives were lost on that mission, lost to the insatiable hunger that slept there.
“I know not, I only know that it moves, and that it moves quickly,” Dayvan replied.
“Quickly?” Talshak pondered how a derelict vessel could possibly move quickly. “I… believe I interrupted you… your ritual was it?”
The young woman writhed on the navigation console. She made muffled noises that would have been screams, had her mouth not been sewn shut crudely with what appeared to be electrical wire. Dayvan pulled at her coverings and exposed her naked, bruised flesh to the cold air of the bridge.
“Ha-mok. Ha-mok be shai,” Dayvan began to chant. The girl mustered all of her strength and punched Dayvan in the chest. He shook his head with disapproval at the robed Initiate standing closest to her head, and he quickly grabbed both of her hands and held them together above the bindings that held her neck against the console. She bit him fiercely, and he bled, but did not move, and did not cry out, for there were things far more fearsome in the universe than the bite of a young girl with unchecked psychic powers, and his master had already shown him plenty of them.
“Ha-mok. Ha-mok be shai,” Dayvan continued, as a pale green mist appeared above the young girl. A short, broad blade appeared from beneath the sleeves of his robe. He licked the blade provocatively, and with enough force that his tongue was split about a half an inch, and bled.
“Ha-mok. Ha-mok be shai,” Dayvan said louder, spitting a mouthful of his blood all over the girl’s bare midriff. In a flash he raised the knife up, and brought it down with enough force to pierce the stomach of the sacrifice, and through her back where the tip bounced off the navigational display, prompting another protesting series of beeps from the console.
Dayvan slowly pulled the blade across the girl’s stomach, exposing her entrails. Her blood intermingled with his, and he ran his hands through it.
“Ha-mok. Ha-mok be shanon-ma,” was the final incantation, made as he twisted his fingers into cryptic gestures. Dayvan’s entire body tensed, and his feet rose about 6 inches from the floor. The green mist started to dissipate, and then.
Nothing.
Dayvan slowly lowered back to the floor. At first a quizzical look appeared on his face, a look which quickly changed to realization, acknowledgement, and rage. He quickly walked to the communications console, angrily pressing the “All Hail” button.
“MESHECK! BRIDGE! NOW!”
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