So many voices, all filling the world beyond with their seemingly chaotic babble. Each one spoke its own story, defiantly declaring its presence into the cacophony that is the warp. Some sung songs of magnitude, actually capable of affecting the ebb and flow of the maelstrom of warp energy. Others made barely a whisper, almost drown out completely by the booming voices surrounding them. Each voice, though, was being drawn towards a central call, something ancient and powerful, some siren that drew in those who heard it, even if they did not realize they were under its spell. So much was happening, and it all made Urgrugg shudder with anticipation for what was to come.

As he sat amid the barren halls of some small, abandoned barracks, he allowed the sounds to come into him, to fill him with their meaning. It was the place of a shaman to guide his people, to cast himself into the world around him and read the energies it emitted to foresee the future. On his home world, orc shamans believed the visions they received from divination spells they cast to be given directly from the great, green gods. While it was impossible to say whether any one vision came from the orc deities, Urgrugg knew that many were simply the natural result of such spells. Unlike his fellows, though, he knew well how to properly use said magics, and use them he did. Normally, use of his warp powers was dangerous, and even spells of divination generally tended to be. However, the ancient spells of his people held no chance of harm, as they did not call upon the powers of the warp, but instead opened the shaman's mind to them, allowing him to read them in ways no other race could.

The spells were ancient, not even taught but instead something the shamans of his world simply knew, a birth right of his people. It was told in legend that these spells had been written on the very elements with which the smart-boys had created ork kind. Though he could never be sure, Urgrugg suspected this legend to be true, as no being he had ever met could read the waves of warp energy as those spells allowed him to, now that his spirit was able to fully grasp the subtleties involved. For this reason, he was able to see far more than any ever believed he could.

What he read both excited and disturbed him. The most obvious presence almost made him giddy. He had interacted with the insectoid race that the humans called 'tyranid' only a few times before, but those encounters had left an impression. Their energy within the warp was as obvious as a neon sign, and he could almost feel the heat from that sign, they were so close. Beyond that, though, he felt more. There were many things aboard this mass of floating metal, and even more were arriving. The energy that emitted from those dedicated, and thus scarred, by the powers of the warp were unmistakable, and there were so many that had arrived so suddenly from out of the warp itself. Some other things, though, he did not recognize. Strange beings, daemons of a kind he had never encountered, some odd curiosity handling powers it did not fully understand, and even a faint whisper-so small he almost missed it entirely-of a scale he had never before encountered.

All these things were good omens, though. Each one represented a unique, and potentially beneficial opportunity for Urgrugg to take advantage of. It was those voices that sang from beyond the hulk's outermost hall that gave him pause. Humans, mostly-which he cared little for-including the sudden influx of energy he expected from the arrival of the army the woman on the vox had promised him. The voices which gave him unrest were those that reminded him of the strange, elf-like things which had rescued him so long ago. Though not entirely the same, and despite the fact they had ultimately helped him, Urgrugg had no pleasure with the thought of potentially facing such beings, in any capacity.

Ultimately, though, none of that mattered. What he had to do was still set before him, and the approach of the tyranid served his needs quite well. As he had sat, his mind open to the flow of energy around him, his staff had sat as well. It acted as the anchor which drew his mind back to his body, once it had finished exploring the world beyond. More than that, though, it acted as a beacon, a single, fixed point of unmoving, unchanging energy in a world where the only constant was change. Such a thing would not go unnoticed, and indeed, he could feel it had drawn the attention of the being he had intended it to.

Opening his book, he began the incantation. The spell was in a language long unheard by the ears of men. He filled the words with power, so that they could reach across the veil and into the world beyond. As he drew the circles of power into the metal hull of the ship with a piece of broken steel, he smiled as he heard the sounds of his enemies drawing near. At the center of the circle, amidst sigils and runes that radiated power, was his staff, held upright by some unseen force. Glowing at the top, the crystal hummed with the warp energy stored inside, illuminated Urgrugg from behind when he turned to face the incoming threat.

Three half-breed mutants rushed around the corner, each brandishing some crude piece of broken metal as a weapon. Their faces were disfigured, their mouths covered in blood that smelled of vermin. Even as the closest lunged forward to strike, Ugrugg's long arm shot out, gripping the thing's head in one massive hand that crushed it in an instant. Still chanting those ancient words, he tossed the corpse down to his side, where its blood began filling the circle and symbols Urgrugg had carved. Without hesitation, the other two split, coming at him from either side. Ducking back at the last minute, Urgrugg slammed his fingers talon-first into the soft flesh of the two creatures' chests, literally tearing their hearts out in the next moment. One he took and squeezed, using it almost as a sponge to smear blood like paint on the walls around him, making more strange and ancient markings. The other, he took a bite out of, before stabbing on the gem of his staff, letting the blood coat the large crystal.

As expected, he felt the presence of the daemon he had invited into this world as it left the warp. The creature was covered in pink, green, and blue feathers, with a long beak for a nose that ended in a spiral pattern that looked almost like a drill. It had three arms, wore a loin cloth split down the middle in such a way that revealed it had no genitals, and carried a gnarled staff that appeared to be some kind of orange metal shaped to look like bone. Urgrugg stared into the pure white eyes of the daemon of Mork, and smiled as he heard the approach of more tyranid mutants.

Just as they rounded the corner to see their brothers' dead and desicrated bodies, the second daemon made his presence known. One of the seals on the wall burst into a ring of flame, from which charged a red, spiked humanoid creature, wielding a blade made of black flame. It rode a massive beast, that appeared to be made of living metal. The beast slammed into the midst of the mutants, tearing one to shreds under its bulk, as the flaming blade of its rider sliced through the air, the last of the mutants bursting into black flames as they were struck down.

The daemon of Mork turned to him, from atop his steed. Glaring at each other, the creatures nodded to one another, the two knowing well by now the usual bargain. "Oi, gits," Urgrugg yelled, getting the two creatures' attention, "you know da deal. Oi calls yuh for da big scraps, and yuh brings yer boys ta da foight." The two creatures hated being treated like servants, and Urgrugg knew that. In fact, the only thing they hated more was each other, and the thought of letting the other have Urgrugg's soul when he finally perished. To that end, Urgrugg had managed to get them to work for him countless times, each one going to great lengths to ensure the ork owed the larger debt to them, so the other had a lesser claim to his soul when he died.

Each was an envoy of one of his gods, and had the power to call on an army to fight for him. The blue daemon could simply summon creatures, slowly building up his forces as he first summoned lesser creatures, they sacrificed some of them to summon yet more powerful beings. By contrast, the red daemon did not call on allies, but simply waded into battle, the fight itself acting as a call to others to join. Both represented different interpretations of traditional ork battle tactics, which Urgrugg knew would please his deities. With their blessing, he knew that their servants would provide him the army he needed.

________________

Outside the hulk, yet another ship arrived. Commanded by High Lord Inquisitor Marcus, and transporting a full preceptory of the Order of Our Martyred Lady, the [i]Witches' Bane[/i] was an Imperial cruiser-class ship ready for war. Even as it was leaving the warp, Lord Inquisitor Marcus was calling for communications with any and all Imperial craft in the area. Though she would be loath to admit it to the filthy xeno, she was under strict orders from a senior inquisitor to take the ork psyker alive at any cost. While she normally would not have to worry about such things, the inquisitor in question held more sway in the Ordo Xenos than any other she had ever met, or even heard of. If she did not want to make an enemy of nearly a third of the entire Inquisition, then this was one order she had to follow. Why he wanted this one, specific ork so badly he would be willing to level such a threat at her, she had no idea, but was determined to find out if possible.

For her own reasons, she had decided to make the hulk the rendezvous point with her war-band after learning it would be exiting the warp in this area from her diviners. The plan had been to take him into custody, and used the amassed force she had at hand to guard him. Various reports had suggested that the hulk was some kind of hide out for heretics, looking to sneak into the warp. Something had given her the feeling that there was more to these reports, and it had been a happy coincidence that her war-band could so readily meet her here with the ork.

That said, she could not risk anyone else storming the hulk and coming across her target first. She would have to take some degree of command over the situation, to ensure that her plan did not backfire on her. After what she heard over the comlink, she knew the ork was headed into the hulk, and had to hurry to catch him before he ended up so deep inside they'd never have any reasonable chance of actually finding him in the hulk's labyrinthine interior. Of course, she could not let on about her secret objective, or some fool looking for a promotion might find some way to steal her prize. It would be difficult, but she was going to have to take control without giving herself and her goals away. So long as she didn't give them a reason, no one should suspect her of foul play. After all, when all was said and done, she was just an inquisitor, come to eradicate a reported nest of heretics. [i]'Ah, and here comes Armond with the vox now. Perfect timing.'[/i]