A Dream of the Warp

Fu Qinghai once again entered Ogedei's personal armory.

This time, however, he had come with Ogedei.

From his wheelchair, Ogedei reached out to stroke the bone-white Power Armor. His eyes held a complex mix of emotions.

The Power Armor had the cold, simple, massive style unique to technological military equipment. Yet its edges, chest, pauldrons, and other details were adorned with ornate Gothic religious metalwork. The two contrasting styles blended together organically, creating the distinctive gothic-punk aesthetic of Warhammer 40K.

The same style could be found in the warships, Titans, and architecture of the Imperium of Man in Warhammer 40K.

Ogedei turned to Fu Qinghai and asked, "The only suit of MK4 Maximus Power Armor in the entire brotherhood. Are you ready?"

Fu Qinghai nodded firmly. "I'm ready!"

"I don't need to explain its functions to you, do I?"

"I know them like the back of my hand."

He wasn't bragging. Though he had never worn Power Armor before, Fu Qinghai had been trained by Master Kunto according to the standards for a Forge Master, a more senior Techmarine. His training had been brief, but he had thoroughly studied Power Armor, the signature equipment of the Space Marines.

"Good," Ogedei said. "Come with me to the training cage."

Inside the training cage, several Servitors surrounded the towering Fu Qinghai.

Before putting it on, Fu Qinghai had carefully polished and maintained the Power Armor. He had also painted the red emblem of the Adeptus Mechanicus of Mars on its right pauldron: a skull surrounded by a cogwheel.

It identified him as a Techmarine.

In truth, this emblem wasn't the real mark of a Techmarine. The true insignia should have been the enormous servo-arms extending from either side of the power pack. The mechanical arms sprouting behind him were the real sign by which Techmarines could be recognized.

Unfortunately, the Sword's Edge had no Power Armor specifically made for Techmarines.

So Fu Qinghai had to make do.

After all, Ogedei had already given him the newest suit of Power Armor aboard the Sword's Edge.

The left pauldron bore the lightning emblem of the White Scars Legion. Specifically, it depicted a red lightning bolt piercing a gold bar edged in red.

Fu Qinghai thought the emblem looked a little like Shazam's symbol in the DC Universe.

He wondered if raising one arm and shouting "Shazam!" while wearing the Power Armor would make a bolt of lightning strike him and turn him into a muscular hunk wearing a red bodysuit and a white cape.

Fu Qinghai took off his robe, revealing his powerful physique, clad only in shorts.

Two round, iron-gray metal ports were embedded in the skin of his chest, abdomen, and back.

They added a hint of menace to his already powerful body.

These metal ports had been formed by the Black Carapace beneath his skin, and allowed him to connect with the Power Armor.

With the help of the Servitors and mechanical arms, Fu Qinghai put on the full suit of Power Armor.

Fu Qinghai picked up the helmet with both hands, slowly lowered it onto his head, and gently turned it until it sealed against the gorget.

The view through his lenses changed abruptly.

A small green arrow appeared above Ogedei and the Servitors in front of him.

The friend-or-foe identification system was at work.

Fu Qinghai focused, and the view before him changed again. The formerly clear image blurred, and Ogedei and the Servitors became outlines edged in yellow and filled with dark red.

This was the thermal imaging view.

There were also a shooting-assistance system, vehicle fire-control systems, and more.

Fu Qinghai moved his arms, getting a feel for this "second skin of a Space Marine." Satisfied, he nodded.

As expected of equipment designed specifically for Space Marines, the suit fit him like a glove. Just as the stories claimed, he hardly needed any time to get used to it.

Over the next few days, Fu Qinghai used sparring with his battle-brothers as an excuse to get to know them better and strengthen their bonds. He challenged the other Space Marines in the company one by one.

Trained by Albuslang, the best close-combat fighter in the Falcon Brotherhood, Fu Qinghai occasionally lost at first because he wasn't familiar with his opponents' techniques and habits. Soon, however, he was overpowering them with sheer skill, and no one aboard the Sword's Edge could beat him.

The Sword's Edge was a small escort vessel, with no racetrack where the White Scars could race. But when the ship occasionally slowed as it passed through an asteroid belt, Fu Qinghai could put on his Power Armor, ride his Jetbike outside, and enjoy the thrill of racing through space. Banking around asteroids offered a truly three-dimensional racing experience.

Before long, the ship's announcement system told everyone to return to their quarters and workstations.

They were preparing to enter the Warp.

Fu Qinghai returned to his cabin, washed up, and sat down on the edge of his bed.

He couldn't see anything outside the escort vessel.

Suddenly, he felt the floor, ceiling, and surrounding fixtures tremble.

Ogedei had told him that this happened when the ship's core reactor was outputting energy at full capacity.

It usually happened when a warship needed to unleash a full broadside or accelerate to maximum speed.

The tremor came and went quickly, and the cabin was soon quiet again.

Nothing happened.

Fu Qinghai shrugged and lay down to sleep.

Fu Qinghai slowly woke from a deep sleep.

Frowning and mumbling, he rubbed his face in a daze.

Ever since becoming an Astartes, he had almost never felt this way.

He had never slept so poorly.

His head felt heavy, and there was a dull ache.

Fu Qinghai shook his head and walked into the washroom.

He cupped some cold water in his hands and splashed it onto his face.

Fu Qinghai raised his head and looked at himself in the mirror. His eyes were bloodshot, his bags were dark, and short stubble covered his exhausted face.

What was going on?

Fu Qinghai was about to examine his skin more closely.

Hm?

His eye twitched.

Out of the corner of his eye, he had just noticed a spot in the mirror flicker.

Fu Qinghai reached out and pressed the spot. The mirror clearly reflected his thumb.

Nothing was wrong.

He turned and looked behind him.

There was nothing there, either.

Strange... Fu Qinghai muttered to himself. He was sure something had flashed in the corner of the mirror, but he hadn't been able to make it out. It had been like playing a triple-A game on an old graphics card and an antique monitor, the image obscured by an indescribable, pixelated blur.

Fu Qinghai returned to the bedroom. Just as he reached the bed, he heard a low voice calling from outside the cabin door.

Fu Qinghai frowned and went to the door, listening closely.

"Qinghai... hiss... Qing~hai..."

The vague voice seemed to pour into his eardrums, both distant and near, as if someone were breathing against his ear.

Fu Qinghai jerked away from the door.

For some reason, it never occurred to him to ask himself one question—

In the Underhive and on Chesilatan, his name had been "Locke." After his ascension, it had been "Qingshan." No one here knew that his real name was Fu Qinghai.

Fu Qinghai felt dazed, but the reflexes honed by long training still kicked in. He immediately opened a box by his bed and pulled out a boltgun.

He swiftly racked the bolt, chambered a round, and aimed at the cabin door.

Holding the gun in one hand, he pressed the door-open button with the other.

The door slid open slowly, revealing a spotless corridor with no one in sight.

A breeze blew in from outside, raising goosebumps on Fu Qinghai's calves.

Cold.

Even though Fu Qinghai was wearing nothing but tight athletic shorts, the sensation still surprised him.

Ever since becoming a Space Marine, he had not felt cold in a long time.

This seemed like... a chill that came from the depths of his soul.

Fu Qinghai stepped out of the cabin, sweeping the corridor with his gaze and following it with the muzzle of his gun.

On the left, a figure in a Legion crew uniform, white with red trim, was walking slowly away from him.

The fitted uniform outlined a graceful figure, and short black hair fell behind her ears.

Fu Qinghai narrowed his eyes. There were only a few female mortal crew members aboard the Sword's Edge, and he didn't remember anyone with such a tall, slender figure.

He aimed at her back and called out:

"Stop, soldier."

The figure stopped.

"Turn around," Fu Qinghai continued.

The crew member in uniform didn't move.

"I'm Space Marine Qingshan. I order you to turn around, soldier!" Fu Qinghai raised his voice.

The crew member slowly turned, revealing a face with a faintly mocking smile.

The moment Fu Qinghai saw her face, his eyes widened.

It was a delicate, oval Asian face, with a slender nose and long eyelashes... but no pupils in its eyes.

It was his ex-girlfriend from his previous life on Earth.

The woman grinned. As she did, her face began to twist, as if someone were stretching it with different lasso tools in Photoshop.

"Outsider..." A deep, raspy, inhuman voice came from the woman's mouth, which stretched almost to her ears.

"Who are you?" Fu Qinghai tightened his grip on the gun and forced himself to stay calm.

"Outsider..." The monster in front of him ignored Fu Qinghai's question and continued speaking to itself.

"I chew on your memories. Your soul doesn't belong here..."

At that, Fu Qinghai stopped thinking and pulled the trigger without hesitation.

"Bang!"

Fu Qinghai jolted awake in bed.

He was drenched in sweat, gasping for breath.

Fu Qinghai looked around at the familiar bed and walls.

It had been a dream... Before Fu Qinghai could gather his thoughts, a loud pounding came from the door.

"Bang! Bang! Bang!"

The noise was so loud it sounded like someone was hammering the door with a pile driver.

Before Fu Qinghai could get up, the cabin door slid open on its own.

Ogedei and Talal entered, bringing with them a young man with blond hair and a white bandage wrapped around his forehead.

The three of them looked at Fu Qinghai, drenched in sweat on the bed. Ogedei asked, "Vanriel sensed a powerful psychic surge from your cabin. What happened, Qingshan?"

Fu Qinghai looked bewildered. "I just had a dream..."

"A dream? What kind of dream?" Talal asked.

"I dreamed about a woman, a woman wearing a White Scars crew uniform. She looked strange, and she said..." Fu Qinghai faltered. He truly didn't know how to explain the rest.

Unlike his dazed state in the dream, his thoughts had cleared the moment he woke. Words like "your soul doesn't belong here" and "outsider" clearly meant the monster had learned from his memories that he came from Earth.

There were two other clear signs: the monster had called him "Qinghai," and the face it had taken on belonged to an ex-girlfriend from his past life on Earth.

"...I forgot."

"Forgot?" Talal and Ogedei asked in unison.

"Yes. My head hurts so much right now that I can't remember anything." Fu Qinghai put on a pained expression and rubbed his head with both hands.

The two Space Marines didn't know what to do, so they both looked at Vanriel, who had remained silent.

Vanriel stared at Fu Qinghai for a moment, then said:

"Qingshan is physically fine. I can't sense any psychic energy from him, and there's no trace of Aether here. It's all gone."

Ogedei and Talal exchanged glances, uncertain what to make of it.

In the end, all Ogedei could say to Fu Qinghai was, "Get some rest. Then go see Master Kunto and have him check your condition."

Then he left.

After the three of them were gone, Fu Qinghai got out of bed and "returned" to the mirror in the washroom.

Apart from the sweat on his face, his reflection had no bags under his eyes, no bloodshot eyes, and no stubble. He looked clean and healthy.

Fu Qinghai braced both hands on the sink and began to think.

The escort vessel was traveling through the Warp under the protection of its Geller Field. As someone from beyond the stars who had read official Warhammer 40K novels, Fu Qinghai knew more about the Warp than Ogedei, Talal, and the others.

The Warp was, in essence, a reflection of the emotions and consciousness of the universe's intelligent life.

It held not only endless torrents of wild energy, but also consciousness, creatures, and even... gods.

The Aeldari had their gods, and the Orks had theirs.

Humans... might have theirs, too.

Until the Horus Heresy tore away the Warp's fearsome veil, the Imperium of Man had possessed only a rather crude understanding of the Warp and how to use it.

Its knowledge was limited to Astropathic Communication and Warp Jump.

Other species—the Aeldari, the Old Ones, the Orks, and even humans from the Golden Age, which the Imperium officially called the Dark Age, along with certain human colonies lost in the universe—all had a far deeper understanding of the Warp.

So Fu Qinghai's own interpretation of the dream was this: some powerful Warp entity had noticed him and forced its way through the Geller Field's protection to speak with him.

That entity probably wasn't on the level of the Four Chaos Gods. That would have been giving himself far too much credit. Those four usually only paid attention to outstanding human heroes or those guilty of the most extreme villainy.

But it couldn't have been an ordinary Warp creature, either. Lesser beings like Astral Spectres or psychic hornets, which had no intelligence, were basically incapable of penetrating a Geller Field.

It had to be some kind of lord-level Warp entity.

With no way to make sense of it, Fu Qinghai decided not to think about it. The escort vessel would be leaving the Warp soon anyway.

The three men walked side by side down the warship's corridor.

Ogedei asked again, "Vanriel, are you certain Qingshan has no psychic talent?"

Vanriel nodded. "I'm certain he doesn't."

"So how do you explain what just happened?" Ogedei asked immediately.

Vanriel fell silent.

The tall, thin young man with yellow hair and a blindfold seemed unsure how to explain it to Ogedei—or perhaps he was just trying to find the right words.

After a moment, he asked, "Do you believe in magic and sorcery, Captain Ogedei?"

Ogedei didn't mince words. "You don't need to put it that way, Vanriel. The White Scars have plenty of Librarians. To ignorant mortals, even the great Stormseer Yesugei is just some so-called sorcerer. We Chogorians aren't like certain willfully blind people on Terra. We know the Heaven's Way exists, and we revere it."

Vanriel nodded and said slowly, "That's good. Then, Captain Ogedei, do you think... there are creatures in the Warp?"

"Well..." Ogedei was at a loss for words.

If Ogedei had been asked when he first joined the Great Crusade, he would have scoffed at the idea that daemons and monsters existed in the Warp.

But as the Horus Heresy unfolded, as Qin Xia and the others witnessed events on the surface of Prospero, and as fragments of astropathic messages about the Battle of Signus arrived, all sorts of rumors had gradually begun to spread through the ranks.

Vanriel didn't wait for Ogedei to come up with an answer. He simply said:

"When I was a child, I came across vague accounts of Warp daemons in ancient texts kept in House Riel's library. I don't know whether those accounts were true... But if you're asking me for an answer, I think that's it."

With that, Vanriel turned and headed back to his quarters.

He left Ogedei and Talal standing there, pondering the meaning of his words.