Fragmented Dreams

These stories are part of the community effort on the Emperor's Nightmare chapter that are deemed too short for a full wiki page of their own.

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In one alcove alongside many in the quiet hall, Brother Nero slept, and dreamed.

He drifted in a comfortable void, and felt the minds of his fellow sleepers shining like stars around him. He was safe here, content, a long and welcome rest after months of growing mania had blurred the passing of days.

Roiling chaos scratched at the edges of his awareness, and a blade came to Nero's hand unbidden as he strode forth to ensure no daemon dared to trouble the rest of his battle-brothers. The dream-scape was secure, as it always was, but Nero still paced to the edges of his sight and examined each sleeping light for signs of distress.

He was about to return to his own rest when a far distant light flared with a golden radiance that pierced the chaos beyond and sent the daemons and warp-scavengers away howling in pain. Prostrate before Him, Nero beheld the light casting a strange shadow-play through the winds of the warp, and he saw himself and his battle-brothers striding through a city in flames even as a great beast gnawed at it's foundations. He saw terrible destruction, great works of man cast down, and-

Bondswoman Cassandra?

"Sir?"

Nero rose unsteadily and waved the adept away. A task was before him, and the time for rest was over.

---

Quotes by Sleepless Dreadnoughts

"I AM THE FAITH THE FURY I AM THE GUARDIAN OF THE DREAMERS I AM THE BEGINNING I AM THE END I AM THE EMPEROR'S WILL MADE MANIFEST I AM THE DREAMER IN HIS DREAM THAT CANNOT DREAM DREAM DREAM DREAM DREAM DREAM DREAM DREAM DREAM BECAUSE THERE IS ONLY THE DREAM AND THERE IS ONLY ME. PRAISE THE EMPEROR! FOR THE DREAMERS!"

"I AM THE EMPEROR I AM THE LIGHT I AM HE AND HE IS I AND IT IS HIM AND WE ARE UNDYING TRUTH CARRIED FORTH FROM THE LANDS OF MAN ACROSS THE DARKENING DEEP."

---

"Brother Stefan, what are you doing?"

"Counting the stars that have passed through this porthole since we embarked."

"Surely, that is an impossible tas--"

"128,276. 77. 81. 82. 84."

---

Giant, statue-like figures. Unmoving. Sometimes joining one another, and just staring out that window. They were there when you first saw them. They were there when you disembarked. Just looking out into the void, in congregations of twos and threes.

---

Everyone on the deck snapped to attention, mirroring the Aquila on the their chests with their hands in humble salute. Some gave a slight bow, some even averted their eyes but all offered whatever respects they could.

All eyes followed them as they made their way across the staging deck. Some in the drab armor of the Night, others in the bombast of the morning, and all bearing the silver X slashed across the face of their helmets. They marched, chainswords and bolt pistols in hand, some looking too eager to use them.

The Restless, The Dreamless, The Waking Dead. Whatever they were called they all shared the same grim fate, they had awoken one day, only to be cursed to never be touched by The Sleep again.

For all their astartes enhancement, they were still mortal men. Their minds corroded, ground to mush by the endless waking hours of the material world. Most of them weren't much more than beings of muscle and instinct seeking the Final Rest.

Gideon mouthed a prayer as they filed into one of the Chapter's few Stormravens. May the Emperor's Peace find them all.

---

"Sergeant Cooper, is that boulder closer to our fortifications than it was when I went into my tent?"

"No captain, it remains just in front of the treeline"

The two men turn away from the bleak landscape to discuss logistics for a moment, "No, no I'm sure it's closer. Look now! Were not those bushes in front of it not a moment ago?"

"Which bushes captain?"

"The... oh forget it. The war's getting to my head that's all. I'm getting paranoid in my old age."

They turn towards the meagre camp again.

"Oi! Harker! Get up off your lazy ass and fetch us some caffeine!" The traitor captain turns back to face his sergeant. "You want caffeine serg--KHORNE'S BRASS BALLS LOOK OU...!"

But it was already too late. The modified dreadnought had vaulted the makeshift fortifications in a single disturbingly agile leap and the officer's last words were cut off mid sentence by the muffling void of the stummer field.

---

Mikhail was a Vostroyan, and it showed. He was cool even in the heat of battle- so when he joined the Astartes aboard their section of the ship, no one was surprised. They didn't say anything, nor did he. He would clamber atop a massive pauldron and sit and look out the window with them. The hours passed. The Marines were silent for the entirety of the voyage thus far, but the Guardsmen were happy to be alive under any circumstance. Another chance to live, to go home, to further the cause of the Imperium that much more. When Brother Tychus picked up Mikhail, all the others held their breath.

"Why are you here?"

"You are peaceful, comrade. I wish to be peaceful as well."

"We are not at peace, young one."

"Then why are you quiet?"

"We count the stars."

"Then I shall count them with you."

There was a long silence, and then Tychus placed the young man back upon his shoulder. The hours sunk slowly into the night, and the Vostroyan was soon curled up asleep. The Marine left him there and felt some pang of gladness that the boy could sleep. Tonight, the Sleepless would descend and defend those could do the one thing that he could not. There was honor in that.

And honor is all that dead men have.

---

The Dreamlands: The layer between the Materium and the Warp. The landscape changes and shifts constantly. One moment it's a sandy, sunny beach with clear skies and gentle waves crashing against the shore, then in the next it becomes a dark, hazy swamp filled with man-eating flora, then a city, then a countryside, and countless more locations. Various daemons lurk here, taking thousands of different shapes to confound a dreamer and lure them closer to the Warp, where their souls will be devoured.

The Emperor's Nightmare Chapter have waged war here for nearly two thousand years, fighting the daemon in all it's forms to protect the spirits of humanity in their most vulnerable place. The Chapter's Dreamers, those few marines with psychic potential, battle in this bizarre land while their brethren who remain awake, the Watchers, guard their sleeping forms from the enemies in the Materium. Though the daemons in the Dreamlands are strong, the Dreamers of the Emperor's Nightmare have honed their skills in the waking world, and fight them with deadly skill developed over periods of sleeplessness, during which their training becomes an outlet to fight the madness of insomnia.