Daemonculaba
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"I'm going to be sick."
- – You, very shortly...
"Each vast, bloated creature in these cages was female, their bodies swollen beyond all resemblance to humanity... they gurgled and drooled in mindless torment, their vocal chords having long since been cut. Their swollen bellies rippled with numerous tumescent growths, giant squirming things, easily the size of a Space Marine."
- – Uriel Ventris, seeing the Daemonculaba for the first time.
The Daemonculaba was the epitome of sickfuckery in Warhammer 40,000. It was a HOLY FUCK tier mad science project which, using stolen gene-seed, allowed for the rapid creation of new Chaos Space Marines. It was first conceptualized by Dark Mechanicus geneticists who were sponsored by a faction of the Iron Warriors Traitor Legion, with the Warsmith Honsou overseeing it.
So what made it so fucked-up and evil?
The Daemonculaba process began by rounding up some human females as slaves. Once corralled, they were shackled naked within iron cages and force-fed nutrients causing their bodies to widen and bloat to unfathomably grotesque proportions, rendering their limbs semi-atrophied and leaving them almost incapable of movement. (Note that none of this probably would have even been possible were they not in the Eye of Terror).
Next, absolutely fucking mad scientists called Savage Morticians (former members of the Adeptus Mechanicus' biological division corrupted by Chaos[1]) utilized surgical and chemical techniques as well as Chaos magicks to radically alter the slaves' insides and embed them with stolen gene-seed, thus completing the process of turning these women into what were known as the Daemonculaba. These living, agonized 'birthing-wombs' were thus readied for "impregnation".
This process involved sealing a captive adolescent human male within the unfortunate Daemonculaba's womb by performing what was essentially a reverse c-section; specifically, the Daemonculaba would be cut open (without anaesthetic, of course) and the teenager shoved inside, before their limbs were stapled, sutured, and otherwise attached to the inside of the womb, followed by the initial cut being stitched shut once again. The candidate would then be left to gestate - over the course of several days, tentacle-like appendages would burrow their way into the teenager's flesh and dispense geneseed-carrying parasites into the body, forcibly infusing the Marine-aspirant's body with geneseed and often mutating them heavily due to the power of Chaos.
Some days later, the candidate would be reborn -- without any skin and with the mind of the scared child who was implanted in there. The candidate was then inspected to see if he had could pass as a Chaos Space Marine. While this hothousing method could provide Honsou's Iron Warriors a recruitment rate that would be outright miraculous under any other recruiting methods, it had a high attrition rate, with side-effects like acute death and horrible mutations while still developing within the womb; notable changes included overgrown or atrophied limbs, parasitic conjoinment with other subjects within the womb, or just being so horrendously mutated that the only things they could do were howl in constant pain and twitch weakly.
If the candidate passed the inspection, skin would be cross-stitched onto its body and its new life as a Chaos Space Marine would begin. Where, you might wonder, did they get the skin? Well... the Iron Warriors under Honsou had literal farms of people, where human slaves were forcibly bloated to immense size (in the same manner of the Daemonculaba), then had the fat removed from them via industrial-strength liposuction devices, leaving them with their skin stretched to horrific proportions (as in, "literally having to hold up sheets of their own skin to prevent them from tripping on it"-proportions).These unfortunate slaves were then forcibly marched to a platform and flayed alive, with the skin being stretched between large poles to dry out and tan in the desert conditions of Medrengard. This skin was when cut to size and sent off for use on the candidates.
If the candidate was found to be unsuitable (or didn't survive the process), they were literally flushed down the sewers to die in the barren wastelands surrounding the fortress laboratories. Occasionally though, the rejected pseudo-Astartes survived being cast out. These survivors were hideous, skinless mutants the size of a Tyranid synapse creature that banded together as tribe of scavenger-hunters known as the Unfleshed. Ironically, despite their intended purpose, the Unfleshed were still Loyalists who built a crude effigy of the Emperor from scrap for worship. Just how freaking brilliant was the Emperor, that mutants would build a shrine to Him before the gates of Hell!?
While this system mostly utilized loyalist gene-seed (probably exclusively from Imperial Fists stock taken from Hydra Cordatus), it could also use genetic material extracted from recycled Space Marine corpses of any Chapter or Legion, which was extracted from the bodies by a series of crushers, rollers, and other unpleasant devices before the resultant geneseed-rich paste was 'fed' into the Daemonculaba by IV.
As for the Daemonculaba themselves, if they happened to survive the birthing process the cycle would begin anew days or even hours later, with them again being used as surrogate birthing-wombs. This would be repeated until the Daemonculaba finally died from trauma, blood loss, or botched surgery, upon which they would be unceremoniously replaced (and potentially 'recycled' in the same manner as the Marines' corpses, depending on how much geneseed the Morticians could extract from the body).
(And then Slaanesh is just looking at all this with interest, their eyes narrowed, and it says; "hmm, that's an interesting act, what do you call yourselves?" and Honsou sticks his chest out and goes; "The Aristocrats"!)
It is rumoured that the idea for the Daemonculaba wasn't actually Honsou's, but that only someone as evil as Honsou would ask for advice from the /d/arkest place in the galaxy and actually take it seriously.
TL;DR Tleilaxu Axlotl Tanks with extra Grimdark.
Destruction[edit]
Varro Tigurius of the Ultramarines had a really horrible nightmare about the Daemonculaba, and Marneus Calgar ordered the then recently dishonoured Uriel Ventris and Pasanius Lysane to go and destroy it. With the help of the Unfleshed, Uriel and Pasanius succeeded, but Honsou was left filled with such butthurt that he started gathering an army to wipe out Ultramar.
This is still roughly twice as romantic as Breaking Dawn.
Gallery[edit]
YES Though it must be noted that this is only one artist's interpretation (and a loose one at that, considering an adolescent is very much removed from being a baby). And a censored one at that. If you've ever seen the movie Slither, there is what would probably be a more accurate depiction of the Daemonculaba there. Except with alien worms. Emperor have mercy upon us all.
And here, you can find a (rather inaccurate but still pretty good) terrain/mini of Daemonculaba to print and use in the games! You sick fuck.
- ↑ They were also cannibals, outright butchering at least one captured Space Marine like an animal (which is described with a disturbingly detailed commentary by a DarkMech mutant on humans' unsuitability as a meat source) before hacking off chunks of meat for later consumption. It's a rare time that the experiments of the Dark Mechanicus are described in detail, and it's heartily recommended for anyone interested in their characterization.