Recongregator

“The future of mankind is not something that is bought with mouthed reverence to the past. The future is bought with violence and the execution of all that we hold most sacred.”
–Xaius Orel, The Dictates of the Future
Another Radical faction, the Recongregators believe that only
through change can the Imperium hope to prosper, believing
that the greatest threat that humanity faces is its lack of
progress and terminal stagnation. Working quietly behind
the scenes, the Recongregators seek to influence or engineer
events that will lead to change and progress. It is a subtle
game, and of all the major factions, they are counted amongst
the least visible, keeping to the shadows whilst others charge
into the fray.
Of particular interest to the Recongregators are the
Amalathians, whom they perceive as their primary opponents.
In many parts of the Imperium, vast silent struggles are
carried out between the factions as they both strive to change
local events and bring about either a dramatic alteration or a
return to the way things were. In recent times a number of
Recongregators have been drawn to the Calixis Sector, their
interest aroused by the notion of the Hereticus Tenebrae and
the change that it may herald.
== Recongregator Domains ==
Just as the Amalathians have agents spread throughout the
Administratum, military, and planetary governments of the
sector, so do the Recongregators. Of special interest to them,
however, are the worlds of Scintilla and Sepheris Secundus. It
is believed that only in the sector’s seat of power can the true
seeds of change be planted, and, as a result, Recongregator
Inquisitors pay special attention to the hives of Scintilla.
Equally, the mining powerhouse that is Sepheris Secundus
has been identified as having a unique significance within the
sector, and the faction suspects that there is something hidden
on or about this world of great importance to the progression
and reform of the Imperium.
== Recongregator Operations ==
Much of the faction’s time and resources are spent in opposing
the Amalathians; where they try to halt a cascade of events that
would bring about change, the Recongregators maneuver to
ensure such events occur. At every turn, they seek to break
the Amalathians’ control, attempting to let events progress
“naturally” or, when necessary, to give things a “little shove”
to ensure matters come to a head. On the feudal world of
Acreage, this very dance has been played out for countless
years. The Amalathians try to suppress progression and
reform, maintain the line of the high king, and heavily restrict
off-world contact. At the same time, the Recongregators seed
new ideas, hopes, and practices with the locals or smuggle
in off-world technology in the hopes of altering the world’s
destiny. All this, of course, is conducted during the execution
of their Inquisitorial duties through discreet means, and it is
unlikely that any, even within the Conclave, are aware of this
silent conflict.
It is known that the Recongregators have taken an interest in the affairs of Iocanthos, specifically in Seth the Voice and have sought to ally with his cause. So far, this has been prevented by their enemies.
==Recongregator Inquisitors==
Drawn to the ideals of the Recongregator, Inquisitor Lucius Fulcio is a
notorious firebrand of the Ordo Hereticus and a flamboyant
voice within the Conclave. His righteous zeal, however, hides
a subtle and cunning mind capable of charting the course of
events from a single happening and determining their ultimate
outcome. This canny knack first became apparent during the
fall of the Golden Despot on Sisk, where his action in saving
key individuals from the fire and ruin of that time lead to
the world being reborn years later into a paragon of Imperial
service. Actions like this have earned him great respect and
trust by other members of the faction, a respect he uses to
manipulate other Inquisitors and their acolytes to unwittingly
do his bidding.
Also counted among the ranks of the Recongregators is
Inquisitor Llor, a minor, though long-serving, member of the
Conclave and the Ordo Xenos. Llor was first drawn to the
sector because of its proximity to the fringe and of the exciting
possibilities such closeness could offer. Through his time in
serving the Holy Ordos, he has come to realize that the Calixis
Sector could well be even more important to the future of the
Imperium. He believes the appearance of the Tyrant Star is
a sign that events are about to unfold that will spread across
the segmentum and beyond. It is therefore his intention to
wait, watch and learn how these ripples can be mastered and
ultimately turned to the favor of the Inquisition.
==Recongregator Secrets==
The greatest secret the Recongregators possess is not their
own at all, but rather the secret that the Amalathians have
uncovered about the Tyrant Star. Unlike the Amalathians, it is
a truth that they have only glimpsed and one that they suspect
would not be favorable to any of the Inquisition’s factions
should it become known. Thus, they are mostly concerned
with further investigation across the sector, gathering what
pieces of information they can. They are not merely trying
to counter the Amalathians’ ambitions, but are attempting
to discover whether behind the secret there lurks a darker,
sinister, hidden truth.
==The Doctrine of Mind, Flesh, and Iron==
The predominating doctrine amongst Recongregators
within Ordos Calixis holds that the roots of the
Imperium’s stagnation can found in three primary
places: in the conformist minds of its rulers and
citizens; in the stagnant blood and wasting bones of
its people; and in the fear of its own technology. The
tri-fold Doctrine of Mind, Flesh, and Iron diagnoses “a
disease of repetition and dwindling variation amongst
all manifestations of man’s endeavour.” The ideas and
understanding of even the greatest minds is weighed
by tradition and convention. The blood and bodies
of humans have become shackled by drudgery, and
the blood of its elite has become poisonous through
inbreeding. Once mankind created wondrous machines
which subjugated the impossible to its will; now, all is
consumed by fear of new knowledge and innovation.
Though not all Recongregators accept the
implications of the Doctrine of Mind, Flesh and Iron,
it has inspired a number of undertakings by those
who do, including the genetic manipulation of House Koba of Malfi, the protection of The Great Library of Knowing, and the supply of forgotten data fragments to the Cult of Sollex, the full consequences of which
remain unclear.
== The Rise of Drusus ==
Drusus---warrior, visionary, saint, whose rise to greatness is the
story of the birth of the Calixis Sector itself. The history wrote
in seminaries across the sector tells of how Drusus came to
the untamed stars and nebulae that would become the Calixis
Sector as a general in the staff of Lord Militant Angevin in his
crusade to carve a new domain of the Imperium of Mankind.
The stories tell of how the enemies of the Emperor sent
terrible assassins against him and dragged him down amongst
the dead, but the Emperor, not accepting the death of his
servant, destroyed his assailants and allowed Drusus to live
again. His return from death remade Drusus, and from that day
his story is one of triumphs, brilliance, and inspiration. In the
decades that followed, Drusus threw the enemies of mankind
back, took command of the crusade in the wake of the great
Lord Militant Angevin’s death, and forged the Calixis Sector
by his will.
There is another story, a story that is known in part by few
and in whole by none. It is a story bound with lies, so that
even the great Lords of the Holy Ordos Calixis do not know
where truth begins and lies end. They know only that it is
made of both, of truth and lies bound into a knot. It is a story
of an old man of weakening health and a mundane mind given
command of a mighty Crusade by virtue of old blood and the
favour of dusty traditions. Under his failing will and weak
strategies, millions died for little gain, and the forces of the
Imperium were shamed. It is said that among the Inquisition
were those unwilling to see such blood split to no end, who
watched the pitiful scrabbling of a so-called crusade amongst
dead stars and hateful worlds and decided that it could not be
allowed to continue. These watchers picked another to be the
hand of destiny, one with the will and personal power to forge
mankind’s future amongst the unforgiving reaches of space.
These Recongregators, it is said, made a deal with the darkest
of powers in order to meet their ends. If this is to be believed,
it was they who saved Drusus and began the whisperings of
his favor in the sight of the Emperor, they who wielded the
knife that removed the old and made space for the new. The
story says that the Calixis Sector was born of their will and
that Drusus was a saint not of the Emperor’s making but at the
hands of hidden powers who charged a heavy price for their
aid. Others respond that if the future need be bought by a lie,
then it is a small price to pay.
== The Manipulation of Malfi ==
The hands of Recongregator agents are filthy with the stinking
blood of dire mistakes that have been made in trying to wield
Malfi as a tool for sector-wide change, but the faction’s
manipulation of the bloodlines of the Malfian nobility remains
its greatest work---and its most dire shame. The nobility of
Malfi has always been rotten, ancient, and wicked long before
the coming of the Angevin Crusade. Since the rise of Scintilla as
the dominant capital of the sector, Malfi’s nobility has become
increasingly bitter and resentful. In this darkly brooding feud,
the Recongregators saw an opportunity to create a force for
change in a sector becoming too comfortable in its newly
acquired stability. The key, they felt, was in the old blood of
Malfi, a lineage and stock with a vast history of scions great
and terrible down the years. The Recongregators saw in these
dynasties a tool they could use, and in doing so embraced a
vile heresy long forbidden. With the aid of rogue elements
within the Adeptus Mechanicus, a powerful Recongregator cell
poisoned members of several noble families with gene-locked
viral agents that would release their potential by augmenting
their genetic makeup and sowing the seeds of the same in
the next generation. The intent of the manipulation was to
breed a great line of charismatic and powerful individuals who
would wrest control of the sector away from a course doomed
to stagnation. Matches between various infected bloodlines
were engineered, and the resulting progeny were monitored
over the years. Each generation was more changed than the
last, but without warning, the experiment slipped from their
grasp. Records were destroyed, adepts were killed, and those
Inquisitors closest to the project were found dead or missing.
The culprit responsible remains unknown to this day.
As the years progressed, it became patently apparent
that the results were, sadly, not what was intended, and too
late the Recongregators began to realise the grave error of
their choices. They had unwittingly committed a sin from
humanity’s ancient past.
The products of Malfi’s manipulated noble bloodlines were
monstrous. Though they bore no marks of mutation, these
men and women were near genius exemplars of cunning and
viciousness and the guessed-at names of those noble lines most
affected ring now with infamy: Sinderfel, Belasco, and Koba.
None outside a few Inquisitors know of this secret atrocity.
The Recongregators have taken great pains to cover up this
sin over the years, and to combat the evil it has wrought, but
even they cannot guess at how many have been born of the
tainted blood of Malfi.
== The Riddle of the Logicians ==
The Logicians are a conspiracy of so called progressives inspired
by a proscribed doctrine outlined in the pages of In Defence of
the Future: A Logical Discourse. An agglomeration of merchants,
hereteks, and nobles, the Logicians hold the heretical belief
in the importance of progress. They pursue technology and
forbidden knowledge in the hope of restoring mankind to the
god-like state it once held in its lost “golden age.” The cult’s
activities in the Calixis sector are centered on the hording of
power and exploration of forbidden knowledge. The riddle
of the Logicians is whether it is the Recongregator inspired
creature it seems; even to those of the Recongregator doctrine
do not know whether the Logicians are one of their untamed
monsters loosed on a wounded galaxy.
The great mystery in the matter is whether or not the
Logicians are a creation of a Recongregator’s scheming.
The spread of the tech-cult through the dissemination of an
idea rather than demagogues and fanatics is one favored
by Recongregators and seen in the corrupting proliferation
of the text In Defence of the Future: A Logical Discourse. The
overt doctrine of progress at any price and obtaining lost and
forbidden technologies through dealing with hereteks, the
most ambitious and mercenary of the Commercia, and the
nobility all reek of Recongregator influence. The only problem
with this view is that it the evidence bears little chance of it
being true, no matter how much some in the faction might
wish it so. It is a riddle that grows all the more knotted when
it is considered that even powerful Calixian Recongregator
Inquisitors like Astrid Skane, Lucius Fulcio, and Lhor know
of no influence their kind have exerted over the Logicians.
Also the past actions of the heretical tech cult have proved
to be both damaging to individual Recongregator plans, and
served as an open case in point for rival factions of the perils
of such revolutionary thinking. The solution to the riddle
must therefore be either that the Logicians are the product of
parallel evolution---a cult whose doctrine is something akin
to an extreme form of the faction’s own---or that it was once
a cat’s-paw grown to a power and life of its own. Some feel
that the Logicians are perhaps the product of some unseen
and unknown Recongregator plan of unparalleled subtlety,
although others in the faction condemn this theory as no more
than dangerous hubris.
==Current Conspiracies==
“You spit on me and call me mutant, twist, freak and what of it! Have I not strong arms to serve the Emperor, have I not a heart that beats, a mind that wills, have I not the soul He gave me, pure and clean beneath this rough flesh? Insult me and mock me if you will, but it is for Him I fight, not you. And in my death before Him I shall go, loyal servant of the Throne with His enemy’s blood on my hands!”
–“Sergeant” Urak Ironback, 17th Penal Legion, Leader of the Forlorn Hope at the battle of Smeltery Complex Gamma, The Tranch War
The nature of the Recongregator philosophy spawns endless
plots and endeavors, and the presence of a number of
powerful Recongregators in the Calixis Sector means that it
teems with manipulations and grand designs of change, many
of which are inevitably stymied by inertia or thwarted by
the machinations of other power groups. Chief amongst the
concerns of Calixian Recongregators is the fate of the seat
of Imperial power on Scintilla, and stalwart Recongregators
seek to thwart the activities and dominance there of their
arch-rivals of the Amalathian faction.
The Lucid Concern
The chief focus of most Recongregators in the Calixis Sector
is Scintilla, nexus of governance and focus of the power
and traditions of the Imperial rule in the sector. By their
nature, Recongregators tend towards working alone without
coordination with like minded peers, but the concentration of
tradition and power draws the attention of Recongregators
like insects to a naked flame. They devote special attention to
the infiltration of the Lucid Court and the circles of influence
around Sector Governor Marius Hax. As the embodiment
of Imperial authority in the sector, Hax is a disastrous ruler
from the perspective of Recongregators, being both highly
conventional and obsessed with the maintenance of order and
Imperial tradition.
The fact that Hax’s authoritarian streak and reasoned
loathing of change has seemed to drift into paranoia and
despotism is of critical concern. Desperate operations to
destabilize Hax’s power base amongst the planetary defense
and enforcer forces have so far proved fruitless, while the
sphere of influence around the Lord Sector has proved
impenetrable to infiltration. A number of Recongregators are
becoming increasingly desperate to loose Hax’s stagnating
grip on the sector and have banded into a cell known to its
hidden membership as the Lucid Concern. Though they have
yet to determine a course of direct action, the Lucid Concern
is united in the absolute belief that the longer Hax’s rule
is allowed to calcify into immobility, the more extreme the
solutions that can and should be contemplated to end it. So
far, the group has been held back by the fear of accidentally
destabilizing the entire sector in the process.
The War Within
The war fought against the stabilizing influence of Amalathian
Inquisitors has been waged in the Calixis Sector since the
sector was founded. It has been a long and bitter struggle in
which the Amalathians have the upper hand at present. The
conventional and change-resistant rule of Sector Governor
Hax and the relative stability of Imperial rule throughout
the sector has smothered the potential for change. While
many Recongregators focus on breaking Hax’s power base,
others have focused on areas distant from Scintilla’s influence.
A key secret battlefield between agents of Recongregator
Inquisitors and servants of their Amalathian rivals is the
feudal world of Acreage. Lone agents and hidden Acolyte
cells have thoroughly infiltrated the populace and slowly
begun to spread new ideas. With the ground laid, they have
begun to smuggle technology and weapons into the hands
of elements resistant to the rule of the high king. In return
for these manipulations, enforcement cadres trained by
Amalathian Acolytes root out sympathizers of the new ideals
and drag away rebellious elements---while the high king is
watched over by bodyguards sent by Amalathians within the
Ordos Calixis. Unknown to the Amalathians, though, is the
fact that among their Acolytes in the king’s court are a few
who wait the command of their Recongregator masters to
remove the barriers to change and let the transformation of
Acreage begin.