Jaq Draco

Not to be confused with the character from Harry Potter

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"Though no daemon I, I feel in my bones that it might prove inauspicious to utter my own name overmuch in my own voice, lest I may be summoned and bound - by hostile human forces. Therefore, I shall become he. I, Jaq Draco, will tell the story of Jaq Draco as witnessed by a fly upon the wall, committing Jaq Draco's experiences to this data-cube in the hopes that the masters of the Ordo Malleus or the Inquisition itself may authenticate the truth of what I report and determine to take action."

– Jaq Draco, already going off the rails in the third prologue of his first book.

Let's take a trip back, shall we? Back to the days of Squats and non-Tyranid Genestealers, to a time where the Tau were not even a glint in the eyes of any of GW's dev team, and to the times of Ian Watson's Inquisition War novels.

This is where the tale of Jaq Draco resides. Once an Inquisitor of the Ordo Malleus back when they were focused on being watchdog to the other organizations, Jaq was then caught up in a massive scandal that sought to enslave humanity itself through use of the Illuminati and the Sensei. In an attempt to defy this, Jaq decided that, among other things, he had to go to Terra to pay the Emprah a visit. Because of how the Malleus in this era had vows against going to Terra (and another detail involving unsanctioned Exterminatus), this rendered Draco a renegade and heretic whom the Inquisition at large has disowned. Though whether it is because he was a loose cannon, his exploits being too improbable to be believed, or because he was too much of an embarrassing /d/egenerate (seriously, he goes on and on about how he wants his female companion's coochie WHILE IN GENESTEALER FORM) is up for debate.

Yes, this shit is a wild ride and a half, even considering this is a Squat-era 40k novel, much less the very first one.

Early History

Jaq was originally born on the planet Xerxes Quintus, which had become a hotbed for mutation and psykery since the Age of Strife. His parents were colonists who were tasked with researching the genome when they were murdered. Jaq was then shipped off to a missionary school, which was pretty much the Schola Progenium but before all the fluff about Commissars was fixed. He was eventually discovered to be a psyker on top of being too curious for his own good, so off he went to the Black Ships to become Emprah-chow...or so it would have been if he didn't manage to ingratiate himself to the Inquisitors on board, who took to him and thus kick-started his education as an Inquisitor. Again, his curiosity comes into play and led to him entering the "Inner Order", a secretive organization purposed with keeping watch over the Inquisitors.

The Inquisition War

During one op where Jaq watched over another Inquisitor's genestealer purge, he discovered (through his Emperor's Tarot) the presence of a Harlequin Man - a man dressed like a Harlequin - by the name of Zephro Carnelian. Believing him to be a threat, Jaq and crew began a big cat and mouse chase across the planet which ended with them hijacking the Planetary Governor's pet astropath and declaring exterminatus upon the planet because it inhabited some new strain of warp-monstrosity. Shortly afterward, Jaq uncovers the Ordo Hydra: a ultra-special-secretive cabal of Inquisitors (including Carnelian, the Inquisitor he was keeping an eye on, and his own mentor) who were planning on using this warp-spawned entity to fuse the minds of all mankind into one massive gestalt in order to stamp out the forces of Chaos for good and replace the dying Emperor. Though Jaq gets inducted into the Ordo, he still has serious concerns and thus mounts an expedition to the Eye of Terror to uncover the warp-spawn's origins and then to Terra to warn the Emperor and receive revelations of his own.

Once finished, he shoved everyone into stasis-crates and got shipped off to another world so as to escape any further patrols. They end up on Luxus Prime, which was in the middle of a heretic cult uprising, sans the team Squat (they eventually find him, he was just separated and had himself a helluva time) and lose their Navigator to some latent corruption. After pretty much guaranteeing that the cult was crushed and that the Planetary Governor was punished for his negligence, he helped himself to the Governor's astropath and booked it. He then came across unsettling news that Stalinvast (that planet he exterminatus'd) was now being occupied by Eldar (Harlequins, specifically) with not only Carnelian being assumed active again, but the assassin's superior went rogue and Jaq's own mentor (who was mind-scrubbed some years ago) was going to investigate the case.

Retinue

• Meh'Lindi: A Callidus assassin who, for baffling reasons, was experimented on to only turn into a Genestealer, much to her horror. Being the only woman on this team, it didn't take much for everyone to get funny ideas, including the author himself, to the the point of fixating on her form multiple times, even when she's transforming via polymorphine and cramming herself into ducts. Naturally, Jaq's the only person she slept with, and even then it wasn't all that enjoyable. Was the focus of a short story explaining this procedure and how it came into perfect use in blowing up a Genestealer Cult (this was before Genestealers had a hive-mind and could just sniff her out instantly). We're specifically told that Meh'Lindi even grows an artificial fuck-hole for her genestealer form. Honestly, we were better off not knowing that. Also somehow an expert in operating several forms of Jokaero tech.
• Grimm: A Squat. Later editions of the novels decided to retcon him with a deviant Techpriest named Grill. He was the focus of a short story about his time in the retinue of another Inquisitor whom he helped (alongside some Ogryns and marines) rescue a nascent psyker from a Chaos robot (hey, this was pre-Men of Iron and pre-Necron). He gets some of the best lines, such as "[There are] millions dead, and here I munch," followed by the inquisition's victory being "sugar on the porridge of death." These are real lines, folks.
• Vitali Googol: A Navigator with a fascination for poetry and wine. Got a bit corrupted during their trip to the Eye of Terror, which led to bigger issues including his eventual death.
  • Azul Petrov: The replacement Navigator Grimm dug up on Luxus.
• Moma Parsheen: Originally the Astropath of Stalinvast's governor, and a literal crazy cat lady. She "forgot" to cancel the Exterminatus order for Stalinvast to get revenge on the governor, but regrets it after Grimm reminded her that she left behind her cats. Gets blammed by one of the Ordo Hydra inquisitors for messing with his plans.
• Fennix: Astropath to the Planetary Governor of Luxus Prime. He's a rather strange sort of mystic hampered by his hyper-sensitive senses and his monkey-like anatomy.