Vulkan's Quiet Departure

The Departure

Vulkan did not die at the end of the Heresy. He had been killed many times during it — by Curze's torments, by environmental hazards, by the daemonic — and had risen from each death because he was a perpetual. After the Scouring, he forged Nine artifacts, hid them across the galaxy in places only a Salamander could find them, and left a prophecy: when the Nine were gathered, he would return.

Then he walked away. The Salamanders have not seen him conclusively since.

I made nine of them. I will know when nine are gathered. That is the day I come home.

— Vulkan, attributed Promethean record M31

The Trail

The Forgefather — a chapter-unique office charged with recovering the Nine — has been working the trail since Vulkan's departure. Three of the Nine have been recovered (Eye, Spear, Gauntlet of the Forge). Six remain. The hunt continues across millennia.

The prophecy structure is, by Imperial Inquisition reading, somewhat unusual. Most primarch-return prophecies are conditional on some external event — the rise of a threat, the failure of a mortal Imperium. Vulkan's is contingent on a chapter project. He has, in this reading, given his sons control of when he returns.

The Question

Where Vulkan is during the gathering: unknown. Perpetuals do not age. They can travel anywhere a body can go. Vulkan could be on Terra under another name, could be on a Forge World working alongside Tech-priests who do not know what he is, could be in the wilderness of a recently-Compliance-d world doing manual labour for reasons of his own.

The minority reading: he is on Nocturne, hidden in plain sight, living among the chapter's home world's ordinary population. The chapter has not searched there in the way the reading would require. They have, possibly, declined to.

The Token Sequence

The Vulkan Tokens — the nine ceremonial objects Vulkan crafted before his departure and distributed across specific Imperial worlds — function, by Salamanders chapter-internal doctrine, as an external recovery sequence Vulkan must complete before returning. The Tokens are not magical artifacts; they are practical engineering objects. The sequence is therefore not a quest in the conventional Imperial Cult sense; it is, by the chapter's interpretation, a physical inventory completion that Vulkan is conducting in person across the galaxy.

The Tokens' specific locations are known to the chapter's Chapter Master and his First Captain only. The chapter has not published the locations. What the chapter has published is the Token-type identity for each location: the chapter knows that one Token is a hammer-blank, one a forge-anvil, one a quenching-pail, one a tongs-pair, one an apron, one a sledge-mallet, one a chisel, one a leather-bench, and one whose specific type the chapter has not disclosed. The undisclosed Token's location is, by chapter rumor that the chapter has not confirmed, on Terra itself.

The Documented Appearances

The chapter's published record of Vulkan's post-departure appearances includes seven specific incidents. The first, in M32, was Vulkan's brief attendance at the dedication of the chapter's mobile fortress-monastery Prometheus. The second, in M36, was his attendance at the closing ceremony of the Sebastian Thor reforms (which the Ecclesiarchy has never officially acknowledged occurred but the chapter's internal record places at the Convent Prioris on Terra). The third was at Sephandros during the Calixian Sororitas Lucia's iconoclast suppression (his role in the suppression is undocumented; the chapter's internal speculation is that he was retrieving a specific Token). The fourth was at the dedication of the Salamanders successor chapter the Storm Reapers in M38.

The fifth was during the Macharian Crusade's halting in 399.M41 (his presence at the halting is the chapter's only documented Vulkan-appearance in a major Crusade context; his role was as a private observer rather than as a commanding officer). The sixth was at the Cadian Sector's defensive consolidation in the 980s.M41. The seventh, in 040.M42, was his brief appearance at the funeral of Captain Thessian, a specific Salamanders Captain who had served on multiple Token-recovery missions across the post-Heresy era.

The Salamanders Hypotheses

The chapter has, since approximately M36, developed three competing internal hypotheses about Vulkan's actual purpose. The first is the Token-completion hypothesis: that Vulkan is conducting the physical inventory completion described in the chapter's published Token-doctrine, and that the return will follow naturally upon completion. The hypothesis is theologically simple and operationally workable.

The second is the corruption-hunt hypothesis: that Vulkan is conducting a specific long-term operation against the Word Bearers warband that escaped the Scouring with his hammer Doomtremor, and that the Token-completion is a secondary cover-story to allow the chapter to operate without compromising the hunt's operational secrecy. The third is the prophetic-preparation hypothesis: that Vulkan is preparing for the Pyre-Saga's prophesied "Time of Ending" by visiting in person every location where the Pyre-Saga's specific provisions will require chapter action, and that the Token-completion is a calendric marker for the chapter to track the proximity of the Time. The current Chapter Master, Tu'shan, has indicated in his classified briefings that he considers the third hypothesis most likely.

The Reserve Force

The Salamanders' current operational posture, since the Indomitus Crusade began, has been to maintain a specific reserve capability that the chapter has not committed to standard Crusade engagements. The reserve includes approximately one-third of the chapter's senior officers, their personal companies, the chapter's most-advanced wargear (including weapons-class artifacts forged by Vulkan personally during his pre-departure period), and several specific Salamanders-pattern ships that have been refit for unusual mission profiles.

The reserve is maintained in readiness for what the chapter's classified internal doctrine calls "the Lord's return-march" — the eventual moment when Vulkan will appear in person with instructions for a Crusade-class mission that the chapter's standing strength alone could not adequately support. The reserve has not been deployed. The current Chapter Master, Tu'shan, has indicated in his quarterly Indomitus briefings to Guilliman that he expects the reserve to be deployed "within a decade or two." Guilliman has, by his published responses, accepted this expectation without further comment. The Salamanders have, by their own assessment, the only chapter-level reserve in the Imperium that is being held specifically against a future appearance of their primarch.

The Lord is on errand. The reserve waits.

— Standing Salamanders Chapter Master briefing, every cycle since 028.M31