'Okay, okay, don't freak out. I mean… what's so hard about saving the human race…'
Ajax's heart rate was spiking to the point where he was struggling to keep up with his company. He started his 4-count breathing again to calm himself. The breaths were deep enough that he had to struggle to keep them in before releasing them after four counts had passed. The difficulty forced him to focus solely on the action — it left no space for his mind to spiral.
'Alright, I'm tripping out on the pressure and scale of the task. I can't allow myself to think about the whole thing. I can only focus on taking one step at a time. Let me organize what I know, and from that, let me figure out my next step.'
Ajax's knowledge of the Warhammer 40,000 universe was broad and deep — too vast to hold in full conscious thought at once. The broad strokes of its history extended back at least sixty million years, to the time of the Old Ones and the Necrontyr, who became the Necrons. But he chose to narrow his focus. It was better to begin with humanity.
Ostensibly, Earth — as Ajax knew it in the 2020s — had existed in this universe just as in his own. The period between M2 and M30 was fragmented in both lore and memory, but he recalled the major arcs.
Sometime between M2 and M6, humanity began leaving Terra and expanding into the stars. Initial interstellar colonization was slow, but between M6 and M12, three revolutionary technologies ignited explosive growth: the Warp Drive, Standard Template Constructs, and Abominable Intelligences — or AI.These technologies fueled humanity's rapid conquest of the Milky Way, bringing about what was once called the Golden Age of Technology.
But it wouldn't last. Between M20 and M25, the Men of Iron — humanity's own artificial creations — rebelled. The ensuing war devastated civilizations and eroded trust in machines. The Golden Age soured into the Dark Age of Technology.
Then came the worst blow: the Age of Strife. A tide of warp storms surged across the galaxy, severing interstellar travel. Warp drives became unusable. The great web of human civilization, reliant on exchange, collapsed. Factory worlds received no food. Agri-worlds had no tools or protection. Cultural hubs, full of scholars and artists, starved or devolved into savagery. Only self-sufficient worlds had any chance — but even those faced alien raiders, the first widespread birth of human psykers, and cultural collapse.
On Terra, the Age of Strife didn't end until late M29 and early M30, when a mysterious being — soon to be called the Emperor of Mankind — rose from obscurity. He unified Terra through blood and science during the Unification Wars, then launched the Great Crusade to reclaim the scattered remnants of human civilization.
The Emperor had not acted blindly. Ajax remembered: he had waited, hidden, biding his time until the warp storms calmed before beginning his campaign.
From the information at hand...
The current time had to be during the Unification Wars or the early Great Crusade. The fact that he wasn't on Terra, and that his deployment had been treated without ceremony by the Uxor, ruled out the Unification period. The Geno Five-Two Chiliad had only ever left Terra during the Great Crusade. And they had been disbanded after the Horus Heresy. So this had to be before the Fall — before the burning of Prospero, the betrayal on Isstvan, the Siege of Terra.
'The problem is, shit happens really quickly in the Great Crusade. If I don't know exactly where I am in the timeline, I won't know who to try and help — and I won't know who is already a lost cause. I guess I'll dive into the Anathema System until I can get my hands on an intel packet or something to figure out the date."' Ajax willed the interface of the Anathema System to appear before his eyes.
> INITIALIZING NEURAL HANDSHAKE...
>> COGNITION BOUND... [ERROR: SOUL-BODY MISALIGNMENT DETECTED]
>> SYSTEM COHERENCE: 67%
>> TEMPORAL STRAND LOCATED: [≈M30.???]
>> PERPETUAL TRAIT CONFIRMED
>> ACCESS LEVEL: PRIMORDIAL INSTINCT GRANTED
═════════════════════════════════════════════════
⇌ THE ANATHEMA SYSTEM ⇌
"There is no safety in ignorance.
There is only memory and will."
═════════════════════════════════════════════════
> CURRENCY: [AP = 0]
> SYSTEM STATUS: AWAKENED — LIMITED ACCESS
✦ SELECT MODULE ✦
1. AUTOMIZED INTROSPECTION
▪Determine the state of physical and mental abilities
▪ Understand abilities on relative and absolute scales
▪Check what metaphysical resources are available to host.
2. MEMORY TAP
▪ Reclaim lore from origin consciousness.
▪ Categories: Lost Primarchs, Horus Heresy, Xenos Threats…
▪ Access: FREE — Recollection-Only
▪ WARNING: Gaps may exist. You were not omniscient.
3. MIND LEECH
▪ Extract knowledge from slain or subdued targets.
▪ Current Banked Memories: [0]
▪ Note: Higher-quality minds yield deeper truths.
4. PSYKANIUM AND OTHER ABILITIES — *"Anathema Lineage"*
▪ Path Status: ACTIVE — Limited Access
▪ Detected Affinities:
• Psyker [Current Grade: Kappa+]
⤷ Upgrade to Iota — [50 AP]
⤷ Unlock Psyker Disciplines — [100 AP]
• [REDACTED] — System Not Ready
⤷ Unlock Conditions: HIDDEN
• [REDACTED] — System Not Ready
⤷ Unlock Conditions: HIDDEN
▪ You will not choose. You will *become*.
5. QUEST ARCHIVE — *"Divine Duties"*
▪ Active Quests:
• Integrate into the Geno
⤷ Alleviate the Uxor's suspicions
⤷ Reward: +10 AP
• Purification
⤷ Find and remove the cancer among the Geno
⤷ Reward: +25 AP
• Synchronize
⤷ Complete Soul/Body Alignment
⤷ Reward: Unlock Bio-Memory
▪ Quests evolve with your actions.
▪ Note: The System favors action, not passivity.
6. SOUL ALIGNMENT — *"Entanglement Protocol"*
▪ Status: PARTIAL DISSOCIATION DETECTED
▪ Action: Align soul with host to gain:
• Full genetic & engrammatic memory
• Cultural instincts, language, loyalty cues
▪ RISK: Personality Bleed Possible
▪ Begin Entanglement? → [Y/N]
7. SYSTEM CORE — *"Metacausal Armor"*
▪ System Version: 0.6.3-b
▪ Origin: [REDACTED] | [FORBIDDEN KNOWLEDGE]
▪ Protective Shell: ACTIVE
• Memory Armor: Auto-defensive protocols enabled.
• If violated, system will attempt memory shielding.
• If shielding fails: SYSTEM SELF-DELETION INITIATED.
'Damn, it may make me a giant nerd, but this is cool as fuck! It would've been nice if this system was like the ones in those novels where you sneeze, kill a goblin, and become the greatest swordsman or some shit. But this is 40k. Did I really think it was gonna be that easy?'
Looking at the options, Ajax noticed the Soul Alignment module. It seemed to imply that he and his host body were out of sync — which didn't really convey much to Ajax other than "bad." Without thinking too much, he entered the mental command Yes to begin Entanglement. Then, as the command went through, he realized he probably should have asked the system how it worked first.
>> ENTANGLEMENT INITIALIZING
>> LOSING CONSCIOUSNESS IN 3
>> 2
'I SWEAR MY HEAD MUST JUST BE THERE FOR DECORATION!'
>> 1
>> GOOD LUCK.