Le Puits de la Nuit
“The greatest gift Mankind is blessed with is an inability to conceive
of its true place in the universe—that of a pitiable shred of matter
lost in an endless sea of crushing darkness—a gift without which the
entire species would have slit its collective throat at birth.”
–The Arch-Heretic Elak Sarda
History
he Well of Night is the name the first Imperial probe ships
that passed through the Maw-side aperture of the Warp Gate
gave to the stellar dead zone that awaited them on the other
side. An immense swathe of chill nothingness devoid of stars or
worlds, its empty wastes are broken only by drifting invisible
dust clouds of particulates that can shred hull armour as surely
as a missile salvo and deadly null-energy reefs that can leave
a ship floundering and powerless before the merciless cold
void. At the heart of this killing darkness, seemingly static
and unmoving, stands the Jericho Gate aperture.
Since the Warp Gate’s discovery, repeated attempts have
been made to fashion a permanent base in proximity to the
Jericho aperture. This has met with repeated failure, both due
to the transitory perils of the Well of Night itself and the
infrequent but deadly gravitic distortions and energy waves
put off by the gate. As a compromise, the Adeptus Mechanicus
maintains a warship, usually of no less than cruiser class, on
rotating station near the gate aperture to monitor it and serve
as a relay point for ships transiting through. Although the
nominal tenure for these ships is ten months, it is rumoured
in Imperial Navy circles that no single vessel during the last
decade has lasted more than seven months before having to
send for relief and quit its post thanks to hull degradation and
mounting damage. In fact, an orbital dock above the Forge
world of Lathe-Het in the Calixis Sector is now set aside
permanently to attend to this ongoing need for repair.
Suffice to say, once passing through the Warp Gate, ships
seldom tarry long in the Well of Night before travelling on
under normal warp drive to their selected destination.
Type
Star System Sector
Included Locations
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