Angels Vermillion

Angels Vermillion
Battle Cry	"Hey kids, you want some candy?" and/or “DON'T TELL ON US!”
Founding	Second Founding
Successors of	Blood Angels
Chapter Master	Kuldoth Moar
Primarch	Sanguinius
Homeworld	Corinal
Strength	600-700 Marines (following the Devastation of Baal)
Specialty	Being kidnapping scumbags/feasting on innocent civilians
Allegiance	Imperium
Colours	Vermillion (surprise) Red, including their Sanguinary Guard.

The Angels Vermillion is a Second Founding chapter of the Blood Angels and one of the oldest chapters in the Imperium, alongside its brother chapters from the original legion.

Unlike its brother chapters who have maintained close ties with each other and their parent chapter, the Angels Vermillion are aloof snooty bastards who prefer to keep to themselves, whether it be from fellow marines from other chapters or non-marine humans. This is because every 50 years or so, the chapter steals away mortals during a time called "The Sorrowing", where they render the kidnapped people unconscious, and place them in specially-prepared body bags in their Chapter monastery - charmingly called "The Bloodspike". They would then exsanguinate the doomed mortals, draining them of their blood completely and methodically on specially prepared conveyor belts with special machines built to extract blood. At least the victims are unconscious during the whole ordeal, and the depressing name implies that the Angels Vermillion honestly feel bad with committing such an atrocity regularly... which is more than can be said about nearly anyone else in this fucked-up galaxy.

Now for the longer version!

'Eminence Sanguis' short story

This article contains spoilers! You have been warned.

Basically Astorath, a captain, two of his guys, and the (at the time) High Chaplain Hereon (it's set in the 400's of M41 and Astorath isn't the High Chaplain yet) go to investigate the disappearance of civilian ships and refugees of a world liberated by the Angels Vermillion. The Angels Vermillion only very reluctantly only allow Hereon down to the world, and it was very tense. The chapter master of the AV says he'll send the ships back, but the people (in fact everyone in the fortress monastery) are missing. Hereon basically demands to know why, and so he shows him. They have all of the civilians and chapter serfs put in an industralized slaughterhouse where they are all drained of blood in a ritual that happens once every fifty years called "the Sorrowing". Hereon freaks out, kills two of the Sanguinary Guard (who are painted red, not gold, and take on a more daemonic aspect) and then gets stopped. The chapter master says he doesn't want to do it but they found right after the Heresy that they had the thirst. They originally thought it was just them, and that's what started their seclusion (it was and is out of shame). But they fall to the thirst and rage less than most of the others.

Hereon criticizes him, and the chapter master basically says they are all doomed anyways, and that they save more than they kill, and that the Blood Tithe is a small price to pay for their greater service. He then explains how much they honor those that give their blood and they even kill a Sanguinary Priest to add the Blood of Sanguinius to the big pool of blood as a huge honor. Hereon once again freaks out and says he and Dante will expose them, and the CM basically says, "do that and I'll tell the Inquisition all about our flaw, and they'll kill us (all the sons of Sanguinius)." He then lets him go and tells him to never return. He (the CM) continuously emphasizes that they ARE monsters, but that they aren't as bad, and they do it so that they can continue to save people and bring light to the shadow.

The Sorrowing is the chapter's solution for the Red Thirst, as they gather so much blood to drink that it lasts them until the next harvest. This is the reason for their secrecy. Only the Blood Angels know of the true modus operandi of Angels Vermillion.

So he just tells Dante.

Unfortunately (or perhaps fortunately for the Imperium), Hereon never realizes that the Inquisition either A) already knows about the flaws (because both are stupidly obvious, especially with the whole Death Company thing) and B) the Inquisition would only kill those who embrace their mutation in a way harmful to the Imperium. On the other hand, the Inquisition may well agree with the Angels Vermillion that the Blood Tithe truly is a small price to pay for Blood Angel descendants who are at a far less risk of ripping and tearing the wrong side of a battlefield.

Of course, the Angels Vermillion are too stupid to realize they don't have to take so much blood it kills anyone and could simply gather blood from volunteers or serfs over the course of that whole fifty years and then they'd probably have more blood than ex-sanguinating a bunch of people would give anyway.

TL;DR It's like the Blood Drinkers, except less severe and less frequent BUT sans the Daemonic influence so they don't have an excuse for it. At least when the truth was exposed to the Chapter Master Caedis of the Blood Drinkers, he didn't try to cover it up, he tried to kill the High Chaplain for the duplicity.

They're a bunch of whiny babies that can't cop to their misdeeds I.E.-- Telling Dante, "if you snitch on us I'll personally see to the destruction the entire legacy of Sanguinius!"

So naturally Dante is half an inch away from Exterminatusing them off the face of the Imperium

Like most post-First Founding chapters, they have had almost no fluff until recently, with the release of the book "Dante" by Guy Haley. What few lore we have includes them being bullied by the Order of the Argent Shroud for no reason, which is rather lulzy considering the usual treatment of the Sisters next to the SM.

Devastation of Baal

Unlike almost every other Blood Angels-descended Chapter, the Angels Vermillion (officially) chose not to answer their parent Chapter's call to arms during the Devastation of Baal, presumably due to their isolative tendencies and Dante officially banning them from any such multi-Chapter meeting. Or maybe their new Chapter Master was just salty over nobody really liking them at all. Despite this, three companies of the Chapter broke away (against their orders) to help the Blood Angels at Baal.

Their arrival at Baal was initially... less than welcome, with Dante demanding what the hell they thought they were doing and Ordamael (Astorath's stand-in as High Chaplain) declaring them unwelcome, a view echoed by many of the other commanders present. The Angels Vermillion, however, managed to explain the reason for their presence: they all disagreed with their Chapter's practices (which are stated to have been becoming more extreme under their new Chaper Master, Moar), and disobeyed their Chapter Master's orders to leave Baal to its fate; no more than a single company survived to reach Baal, with the Tyranids destroying the rest at various stops along the way. The remainder asked to be placed on the vanguard of the battle, so that they could serve as best as they could and redeem their Chapter through their deaths.

After hearing their tale (despite his misgivings and the dissent of Ordamael), Dante agreed that they could fight with the Blood Angels and their successors in the Battle for Baal. The force itself was viciously mauled and may have been wiped out entirely, with Captain Fen (the leader of the Angels Vermillion detatchment) falling to the Red Thirst in the final hours of the battle and assisting Dante by distracting a Carnifex during the last, desperate charge of the Death Company.