The daemon-dropship shrieked into the ash-choked sky, its wings tearing through the atmosphere like blades through parchment. A wound opened across the heavens, and the corrupted machine descended onto a dead moon that drifted listlessly in the orbit of a long-extinct planet. Once a site of ancient, forgotten wars, the moon bore the scars of voidfire and time. Blackened craters yawned open like screaming mouths, and ruined fortresses, long since stripped of allegiance, lay half-swallowed by stone and dust.
Through the swirling mists of warp-fog and dust storms, a figure emerged—a towering silhouette clad in obsidian armor that drank the surrounding light. His approach was silent but seismic, as if the very fabric of the world shrank before him. Cloaked in the absence of light and the silence of dead suns, Darth Vader stepped down from the dropship like a god descending into a forgotten purgatory.
He had no entourage, no heralds, no daemons leashed by warp-chains. Only the moaning wind and the hum of his breath accompanied him.
Behind him, six figures followed—twisted parodies of the Emperor's once-loyal Custodes. Each was eight feet tall, plated in tarnished gold corroded with runes of Tzeentch. Their weapons shimmered with impossible geometries, and their movements were both graceful and wrong. Their presence was a heresy of its own—a desecration of the Imperium's most sacred guardians.
As Vader moved forward, the Custodes fanned out behind him in absolute silence.
He paused.
In the distance stood a spire—sleek, pale, and organic, utterly unlike the gothic cathedrals of mankind. Its structure rippled faintly, as if breathing. It was not of human design. Vader extended his perception into the immaterium, and there it was again: the psychic signature. Serene. Still. And utterly alien.
Not Xenos.
Not a daemon.
Something else. Something ancient.
The signature shimmered with tranquility, but it was no passive peace. It was the peace of unbroken harmony, the peace of balance—of acceptance. It grated against Vader's soul like holy fire.
Hope.
He hated it.
He despised the clarity it carried.
"Hope had led him to ruin. Hope had betrayed him."
The presence at the spire offered no resistance. No traps. No warp-storms or daemon hosts. It simply was. A silent beacon that invited understanding without surrender, and it terrified him more than any weapon.
His voice broke the silence.
"Report."
A Custodes stepped forward, armor clicking like chitin. "Resistance across the sector is faltering, my lord. The adherents of the Windwalker have retreated to this system. Our oracles report that he meditates in the structure ahead."
"Alone?"
"Always alone."
A glimmer of disdain flared beneath Vader's helm. He strode forward.
Each step crushed centuries-old dust. The spire loomed taller. Its surface shimmered faintly in the warp, pulsating with life untouched by Chaos. It was… calm. The kind of calm that once filled Jedi temples.
He had destroyed those temples. Burned them. Left them in ruins.
And yet this… this thing still echoed the teachings he had once abandoned.
"He once preached peace too—before Mustafar, before Padmé, before everything burned."
The presence inside stirred, not in fear, not in defiance—but in acknowledgment.
It knew he had come.
Vader stood before the spire, black cloak twisting in the still air. He extended a gauntlet, and the surface responded, rippling like water touched by darkness. No locks. No runes. No defenses. A door opened.
The light inside was soft and gold. The air warm.
He hated it.
The Custodes remained behind as Vader entered. They would not be needed.
Within, a single figure sat in the lotus position at the center of a chamber sculpted from crystal and bone. Aang.
He had aged—but not corrupted. His eyes were closed, but a faint smile played on his lips. Around him, the warp was silent. No daemons dared enter. No voices screamed. The Warp here was tamed, stilled by his presence.
Vader stopped.
The two were opposites.
One, forged in agony, fed by hate, driven by control.
The other, born in suffering, sustained by peace, guided by balance.
Aang opened his eyes.
And he smiled.
Vader's hand twitched.
For a moment, the future wavered—like a candle caught in the breath of fate.
Then Aang spoke, voice calm as rain.
"Why do you fear peace, Darth Vader?"
The dark lord did not answer.
The lightsaber hissed to life.
Outside, the Custodes waited.
Inside, gods watched.
And far beyond, in the twisting dark of the Warp, something smiled.
The chamber was golden.
Not in the gilded sense of royalty, nor the opulence of power—but golden in the light of a setting sun preserved beyond time. This cathedral-like chamber rested atop a dead moon orbiting a shattered world. There were no stars beyond the stained-glass dome above, only the slow swirling aurora of the Warp leaking through microscopic cracks.
Darth Vader stood at the center of the chamber, unmoving.
He had come here after the Tomb World. After the Silent King. After the whispers of immortality and the cold logic of Necron minds. He had walked among lifeless giants and forgotten gods—seeking power, yes, but something more elusive: understanding.
Here, he found neither.
Or so he thought.
"Hello."
The voice was soft. Youthful. Human.
Vader turned.
A boy no older than sixteen stood near one of the crystal pillars, his hands folded behind his back, his gray eyes steady. He wore orange and yellow robes, simple yet elegant, and bore no weapons.
"I didn't expect to see you here," the boy said, smiling.
"You are not real."
"Does it matter?"
Vader's grip on his lightsaber tightened. The hum of the red blade ignited, painting the golden chamber in blood.
"I do not suffer illusions."
"I'm not an illusion," the boy said calmly. "I'm a memory given form. A will made manifest. Like you."
The Force rippled. Not in warning. In acknowledgment.
Vader stepped forward, blade still ignited. "Who are you?"
"My name is Aang. I was once an Avatar—an arbiter of balance between the elements and the world. In another life. A forgotten world."
"I do not know your world."
"But I know yours," Aang said. "I've walked among Jedi. Felt the flow of the Force through stars and souls. Your kind once stood for peace. Now you are a blade with no hilt."
"There is no peace."
"There was. There can be again."
Vader's blade flickered. "You do not understand what I've lost."
"I do."
And in that moment, something strange happened. Aang stepped closer, unafraid. His gaze was not challenging, nor pitying. It was knowing.
"You lost her," Aang said.
The red blade extinguished. The air was heavy.
"She died," Vader said, his voice raw, almost human. "I killed her."
"No," Aang replied. "Fear killed her. The same fear that chained you. That made you believe only strength would save you. That made you think pain was power."
Vader turned away, but Aang followed.
"I fought a war too," Aang continued. "I was told to kill. Told peace was naïve. I chose another path."
"I had no choice."
"There is always a choice."
The air in the chamber shifted. Vader raised his hand and unleashed a wave of Force energy, meant to crush the boy's body and will.
Aang stood firm.
The energy washed over him like wind over stone. Not resisted—accepted.
"You won't break me," Aang said. "Because I've already accepted who I am."
Vader advanced, blade drawn again.
"Then you will die."
Aang bent his knees.
Air moved.
He weaved with the wind, gliding past each saber strike, not in evasion, but in flow. Fire flared beneath his feet, not burning, but propelling. Water shimmered in arcs, and stone answered his call.
Vader fought with the wrath of Khorne behind every blow. Rage became a weapon. Yet nothing struck.
Aang never attacked. He only moved. He only endured.
The chamber echoed with clashing wills until Vader's breath grew heavy. His movements slowed. And then—a moment of stillness.
The blade stopped inches from Aang's chest.
"I should kill you," Vader whispered.
"You already did," Aang replied. "In another life. In every child you burned. In every temple you razed. In the eyes of every Jedi who begged for peace."
Silence.
"You hate yourself more than you hate me."
Vader dropped his blade.
And for a moment… he wept. Soundless. Tearless. But the Force felt it.
Aang placed a hand on his armored gauntlet.
"I forgive you."
The chamber pulsed with warmth. Golden light intensified, not from outside—but from within.
"I don't deserve forgiveness," Vader said.
"No one does. That's what makes it real."
They stood there in silence.
And far beyond that dead moon, across the roaring tides of the Warp, gods watched with interest.
Khorne sneered. Tzeentch tilted his ever-shifting head. Slaanesh purred with curiosity. Nurgle remained unmoved.
They had no hold in this place.
Yet they watched all the same.
In this chamber, no soul was damned.
Not yet.
But the storm waited.