Gorgar: Voidborn

Nobody can hear a scream in the vacuum of space, or so they say.

Fools!

Even now, light years away, the mournful howls of the Voidborn reverberated through Gorgar’s steely bones.

Gorgar; Lord of the Dark Sector, Tyrant of the Nightmare Armada and Slayer of the Star Drakes. The Archfiend. The Great Subjugator; Annihilator of a Thousand Worlds. All of these and more, Gorgar claimed an ever lengthening list of self-imposed titles.

Of these screaming horrors, he knew nothing. He had never even seen them. Yet he named them, and already coveted adding “Vanquisher of the Voidborn” to his list of trophies.

The bridge of the World Grinder bustled with activity. One thousand senior crewmen manned the same number of survey stations, each tasked with the duty of overseeing a certain aspect of the megalithic battle station’s functionality. Two hundred stations wide and five rows high, the network bastion swept backwards like the staggered benches of an amphitheatre. They blinked and flashed, occasionally buzzed in warning, and lit the command room with multitudes of strobing lights.

Gorgar ignored them, they were none of his concern. Shirking his command throne in favour of standing, as was so often his want, he stared into the void. The great viewing window was one of the few structural flaws he allowed. Most ships of the age relied entirely on visual feeds and environmental scans from the safety of their fully armoured bulwarks. Gorgar on the other hand, held a certain romanticism for shipmasters of old, and preferred to survey the great emptiness with his own eyes. One hundred meters wide and ten thick, the plasti-glass screen provided a tempting target for torpedoes.

Let them come, he always thought. Let them stand before me and look me in the eye. He who has the nerve to take his shot, deserves one.

Before him, the void was not empty. An orbital mining station filled the viewing screen, and then some. The megastructure almost rivaled the World Grinder in size, but where it should have been a busily trafficked hub for thousands of ore transportation shuttles moving to and from the planet, all was quiet. There were no shuttles, not even dead ones floating listlessly between the two. Nor were any life signs showing up on the World Grinder’s scans upon the station, or its parent planet.

Either the entire mining station and planet surface were deserted after some mass exodus, or everyone was dead. Gorgar knew the latter to be true, just as it had been at the last five locations.

Motor-assisted tendon wires whirred and groaned as the warlord clenched his armoured gauntlet in frustration. His right hand, comprised of three enormous slashing fingers and one crushing thumb, remained impassive.

“Six facilities,” he rumbled to himself. A speaker shaped like an upturned horseshoe amplified every spoken word and filled them with enough bass to rattle bones. “Six. So many wasted resources.”

“Captain!” Gorgar raised his voice to bark across the bridge.

A hulking armoured figure snapped its head around instantly, then hurriedly tramped across the deck to answer the summons. Though he stood no less than seven feet tall and five across the shoulders, the captain was nonetheless dwarfed by Gorgar.

“My Lord,” said the captain, bowing his head respectfully.

“How many do the records show were present?”

“Just over two million, my Lord.”

Gorgar seemed as though he was about to thump the viewing balcony with his fist, but stopped himself short and stroked it instead. “Which brings the total to...”

“Almost eight and a half million, my Lord.”

“Damn these things!” Gorgar whirled away from his captain, took one heavy step away and then circled back. “Tell me you can pinpoint them.”

“My Lord, I’m sorry, we are struggling,” the captain spoke deferentially but plainly. He had served long enough to know that Gorgar appreciated honesty slightly more than he hated failure, so it was best not to beat around the bush. “These screams-”

As if on cue, a fresh wave of howling washed in from the void. The screaming was ever present as an ominous background noise like waves breaking upon rocks, but every now and then a particularly excruciating frequency would rise and cause chaos. Gorgar was considering calling them “tidal screams”.

The captain dipped his helmeted head to clasp it between his own monstrous, armoured hands. Gorgar swept his gaze around the command room, and saw all those hundreds of overseers similarly affected. Claxons blared, and red warning lights flashed on almost every monitor screen. Fortunately, none of the crew were foolish enough to scream their own discomfort in Gorgar’s presence. As usual, he was almost entirely unaffected.

“Indeed, these screams.” Gorgar teased.

Once he had recovered, the captain continued. “Aye, my Lord. As I was saying, this howling does not show up in any way we can track. They do not record. We cannot measure decibels, and nothing shows up on our ultrasonics. They are no more or less intense here than any of the past five locations. Shortly, my Lord, us hearing them is the only evidence for them existing.”

Gorgar looked back out into space and took some quiet moments to think, again running his fingers along the balcony rail.

“Then they are in our minds,” he decided. “They are a psychic attack.”

“No, my Lord. They are not psychic, nor telepathic. We have exhausted those tests as well.”

The captain watched Gorgar shake his head slowly and noted that he was beginning to bounce a closed fist on the railing.

“My Lord, if I may,” the captain leaned in, as if meaning to speak confidentially. “You don’t feel the screams like the rest of us, do you?”

Gorgar shook his head again. A great mane of mechanical dreadlocks comprised of nano-tools, miniature weapons and electric connector cables swayed with the motion. They framed his glowering bronze mask, which was fixed in a permanent expression of anger due to his U-shape speaker grill and down-turned, frowning eye lenses. Despite his furious appearance, the captain knew him to actually be quite reasonable, as far as Dark Lords go.

“No,” he answered. “I don’t think so. I hear them, and the intensity can change, but they are not crippling as they seem to be for you.”

“Then let me explain what they are like, my Lord,” the captain hushed his tones and leaned closer still. “We don’t just hear them, we feel them. They screech in our minds with agony, yes, but it’s a chill, my Lord. An emptiness. A hollowness. It gets into our bones, our insides, our hearts. I’m not one to think much about souls, but-”

At the mention of souls, Gorgar threw back his head and released a thunderous barrage of static-laced laughter into the air. When he returned his attention to the captain, the light glowing in his eye lenses seemed twice as intense, and the sub-commander shrank beneath his gaze.

“Souls? You think these things are demons calling out for our souls?” Gorgar laughed again. Fortunately for the captain, his laughter was in good humour. Gorgar clearly enjoyed the idea. “Oh! And of course being the big, bad Dark Lord, I don’t have one, so they don’t affect me! Such a quaint notion, captain, it amuses me. Very good, well done.”

The captain was clearly ruffled at being rebuked so dismissively, but kept any further thoughts to himself as Gorgar turned away to stare through the viewing screen once more. Admiral and captain stood in contemplative silence for several long, anxious moments before Gorgar spoke again.

“Let’s imagine for a moment, that you are correct and a horde of void-faring demons is out there somewhere, wailing for our souls. We can’t track or trace them because they don’t exist as far as our technology is concerned, and even our onboard telepaths and psychics cannot resonate with even a hint of them. What should we do?”

“Logically,” he continued without waiting for a reply. “My next order would be to jump not to the nearest facility, but to the third nearest, or fifth, even. Jump until we get ahead of them, and then wait. Makes sense to me, but why should demons be conquered with logic? Perhaps we too should seek a more esoteric answer.”

“Fight nonsense with nonsense,” Gorgar whipped his head around, swishing his techno-locks with the motion. “As it were.”

The captain shifted his weight uncomfortably beneath Gorgar’s intense gaze, performing all manner of mental calculations as to the Archfiend’s seriousness.

“Sincerely, my Lord?”

Gorgar emitted something rough and grinding, which might have equated a chuckle. “Why not? Did we not make war with sun-devouring celestial dragons? Souls I do not believe in, but why should demons be any stranger.”

The captain straightened his posture and placed is hands behind his back, puffing out his chest. It was reassuring to be on the same page, at last.

“In that case, my Lord, I would suggest finding some kind of seer, or sage. A medium, perhaps. Someone who can talk to the dead, or see into the future. At least sense the ethereal presence and plot us a route to them.” The captain seemed to realize that every word he’d spoken had been complete fanciful nonsense, and his shoulders slumped in embarrassment. “If there is such a thing,” he added uncertainly.

Gorgar cocked his head, considering the suggestion. The captain braced himself for a vicious dressing-down, but to his surprise the towering cyborg instead nodded thoughtfully.

“Indeed there is,” he rumbled. “Though finding them would be quite a detour. A quest in itself, I would say. There is no telling how much damage would occur in the meantime. I don’t know if it would be worth the distraction.”

“If I may, my Lord,” the captain interrupted politely, unable to contain his long-brewing curiosity any longer. “Why do these attacks concern you so much, mysterious as they are? Every dead facility so far has belonged to the Aggregate, and now we patrol Aggregate space pursuing their attackers as if we wish to protect them. Would it not be prudent to sit back and let the carnage unfold? I am sure that whatever this invading force is will show itself eventually, and when it does, we can swoop in and put it down.”

Gorgar again shook his head, and sighed like a disappointed father. The Lord of the Dark Sector raised his mighty, four-taloned claw and placed it heavily atop the captain’s head. It creaked upwards sluggishly, tendon-wires whirring and internal pneumatics hissing with the effort of manipulating the oversized appendage. Gorgar held it upon the captain’s helmet and twisted his talons as if ruffling a young boy’s hair; though presently it was a purely degrading gesture.

“Oh, you young ones,” Gorgar scolded in a voice thick with warning. “Always so shortsighted. This is the long game, captain. It’s all mine. Never forget that. This galaxy is mine, and everything in it belongs to me. The current colours on the banner are irrelevant. Every resource destroyed is one that I will not conquer. Every defeat the Aggregate suffers by any hand but my own is an affront to my eternal rule.”

“No, captain, the enemy of my enemy is not my friend. They are intruders upon my domain, and vandals of my property. Past, present, or future; it matters not.”

It was all the captain could do not to tremble beneath Gorgar’s palm. He was under no illusions that he was but one clenched fist away from losing his head.

“My apologies, my Lord, my apologies. I was foolish, and naive. Forgive me.”

“I do not command the Nightmare Armada with forgiveness and gift baskets, captain.” Gorgar released his sub-commander and turned away. He began a slow, steady trudge towards his command throne and prepared to sit. “But fear not, our journey will be arduous enough without the hassle of finding a new captain.”

Gorgar lowered himself into his scarcely used seat and struck what he imagined to be a domineering pose. His fingertips dug tightly into the brows of furious metal skulls, which leered down from each tall armrest upon whomever might stand before the throne.

“Set course to the Unknown Sector,” he said. “We will find our witches there.”

“Yes, my Lord.”

The matter was settled. The captain bowed and took his leave, marching away to begin conveying the relevant orders. In truth, he had no course to set. The ship herself would see to that.

Oh yes, Gorgar thought. My beloved World Grinder. My Goddess of Destruction.

Gorgar reclined against the back of his throne, which loomed even taller than his own lofty head. With a sigh born of complete satisfaction, the Archfiend surrendered to the sensation of sinking into the warm embrace of an old friend. The living wires of his techno-mane squirmed and writhed into action like a nest of snakes, slithering out to root themselves into dozens of ports contained within the throne’s headrest.

“Getting soft, my love?”

A coy voice soft as velvet and hard as steel sounded inside Gorgar’s mind.

“Ah,” he responded in thought. “You mean the captain?”

“You should have crushed his head, I thirsted to feel his blood splash my deck.”

“If I slew my crew as frequently as you wished, I would have none left. Besides, you know well enough that I consider murdering those who offend oneself to be a sign of weakness.”

“But it is so satisfying.”

“Exactly.”

“Boring.”

Gorgar winced internally. The feeling of cold pins stabbed into his artificial brain. It often felt this way when She was dissatisfied.

“Where exactly,” the World Grinder asked after an unhappy moment of silence. “Am I heading?”

“The Goreswill Nebula. It is a rancid stretch of space supposedly ruled over by an alleged ‘Blood Goddess’, if you believe in such hocus pocus. A planet somewhere within came to my attention some centuries ago, rumoured to be a charnel world, dedicated purely to sacrifice. Oceans of blood, deserts of dried offal and mountains of bones, so they say. All this, presided over by a coven of flesh witches.”

As he spoke, Gorgar could feel those cold pins being replaced by a warm rush, like thousands of tiny bubbles coursing through his metal body. She was becoming excited.

“And they will help you?” She asked.

Gorgar laughed in his head. “Gods, no. Can you imagine a matriarchal coven of powerful witches being happy to see me turn up, pooh-pooh their religion and demand their servitude? They will be as hostile as the screaming demons we’re chasing, and I have no way of knowing whether their supposed magic exists at all, never mind whether it is the kind we need.”

The air within the World Grinder thrummed with rising energy, and the decks beneath millions of boots vibrated in response to the battle station’s titanic power generators steadily increasing output. They were about to jump.

“Blood, bones, magic, witches and demons,” the seductive machine voice cooed in Gorgar’s mind. “Perhaps you are not getting quite so boring after all, old man.”

“Perhaps not, my Queen,” he laughed. “Perhaps not. Take us away, and let the denizens of the Goreswill Nebula brace for the arrival of Gorgar; Witchbreaker!”