I opened my eyes, and all I could see was darkness. It was like being at the bottom of the ocean, with a weight pushing down on me from every direction, and a deep cold setting in, seeping into my skin.
I tried to conjure heat, yet it continued — like blades sinking deeper, seeping into my very bones. It felt like I was being ripped apart, piece by piece. The pain grew to be too much, and I opened my mouth to scream, but no sound escaped.
The silence consumed every sound...
And in the next moment, the cold pulled away, and I felt my legs give out — like a puppet whose strings had been cut.
"Still alive, I see... good, good."
That voice — that voice I now knew — was the Horned Rat.
Two green lights appeared, bringing a new weight pressing down on me: madness, anger, paranoia — all wrapped in one.
And yet again, that voice spoke with a pressure that pushed down on me.
"What will you be? Pawn... pawn... knight... knight... or bishop?"
And in the next moment, an explosion of light overtook me.
What I saw was a chessboard that stretched for miles. But what was of most interest to me were the fingers that loomed over the table. There were ten, twenty, maybe more — all of different sizes and shapes.
I watched as they moved their pieces — sometimes one, other times a hundred at once. Pieces of all kinds: some looked like elves, some dwarfs, and others human.
And in the next moment, I felt my feet leave the ground. I could feel a strange power flow into me as I was moved forward and placed near a group of Skaven, separated from the biggest clusters. I heard the piece in the middle speak. I stared at the Skaven piece's back.
And I realized the voice...
It was Skrull.
And in the next moment, I opened my eyes, and I was back in that cell. I could still feel that power flowing through every cell that made up my body — and it made me angry.
I was being played, I was just a piece on a board — one in thousands, meant to be moved forward, to die, and to be forgotten.
An inhuman anger emerged from within me, flowing through every cell of my body.
No! I would not be a mere pawn. I would not be another piece to be used and cast aside.
I would rise, climbing a ladder built from the dead who tried to use me. I would be a poison to all who stood above me — or who dared to climb over me.
I will claim a chair at the High Table of Thirteen.