Death Company
The Death Company is a special unit unique to the Blood Angels and their Successor Chapters, consisting of former Battle-Brothers who have succumbed to the Black Rage.[1a][1b]
Contents
Overview
On the eve of battle, the Blood Angels pray and remember the sacrifice of their Primarch Sanguinius while the Chaplains bless and study each battle-brother for signs of the Black Rage. Those who collapse into the Chaplains' arms during the chanting of the moripatris are taken away to form the Death Company. Their Power Armour is repainted black with a blood red saltire symbolizing the wounds of Sanguinius and hung with devotional scrolls and records of honours earned before the madness took them. From this point on, these battle-brothers are considered dead men walking.[1b] It is known that before the battle members of the Death Company gain access to the Chapter armoury so they may fight their last fighting with a weapon of their choice.[3] Captains who fall to the Black Rage, are granted the use of relic weapons and violently slaughter their foes as they seek death in battle.[14e]
Consumed by the Black Rage, the Death Company fights without fear, heedless of the quality of their opposition or the wounds they suffer. Under the watchful eye of their Death Company Chaplains,[1b] or particularly strong-willed scions of Sanguinius,[14c] the Death Company fights terrible odds to claim one last honour for the Chapter.[1b] They are known to fight even more ferociously under the command of the Blood Angels' High Chaplain Astorath and the Chaplain Lemartes. While the High Chaplain fights besides them to ensure they meet a deserved glorious end, the Chaplain provides the Death Company with inspirational leadership and direction.[14d] Many of the Blood Angels' finest victories have come after the Death Company devastated the enemy forces.[1b] These include the battles they fought on Truatas, Antax, Hollonan, Armageddon,[14c] and Venerax.[14d] The Death Company's fearsome reputation has even spread to worlds that have not seen the Blood Angels in battle.[1b] However, it is not unheard of for entire strike forces to fall into the Black Rage. These terrible moments become marks of shame in the Blood Angels and Sanguinary Brotherhood's history, with names such Nycoth, the Scadden Atrocity, the War of Broken Wings, the Stenarr Massacre and the Battle of Lenikhe Reach bringing about mournful silence.[14c]
Those few members of the Death Company who survive an engagement usually perish shortly after, either from their wounds or by the hand of the Redeemer of the Lost.[1b] The members of the Blood Angels' Death Company that escape those fates are sealed within the Tower of Amareo on Baal, where their madden screams ring out of.[14c] Since the Red Thirst inevitably follows the Black Rage, the Blood Angels consider death better than turning into a mindless flesh-hungry beast.[1b] However there are some who undergo the Lestrallio Procedure instead and are encouraged to describe the visions the Black Rage is afflicting them with. Named after the Chaplain Lestrallio, who pioneered the process and later underwent it himself, the Procedure sees the Death Company members shackled in adamantine, as their rantings are carefully recorded, analyzed and compared with others. The Blood Angels have learned invaluable data of how the Black Rage afflicts them through the use of the Procedure, but it always ends in death for the Death Company member. They inevitably die after their bodies begin suffering body-shattering spasms.[14b]
Initially, it was thought that the new Primaris Space Marines were more resistant to the Black Rage. However this is not the case, and multiple Primaris Marines have now succumb. They too have been put into the Death Company, organised into Intercessor Squads.[5]
Origins
Whatever caused the Black Rage seems to be inherent to the Gene-Seed of the Blood Angels and their Primarch Sanguinius, with it appearing in isolated cases even before the Horus Heresy.[2] After Brother Alatros succumbed to the Thirst on Melchior, Sanguinius was forced to execute him, Raldoron applied the paint himself, swore the Apothecary, Meros, who had removed his geneseed, to total secrecy, and remarked to the corpse, "you are in the company of death. I hope you will find peace there."[2]
The advent of the Black Rage is associated with the end of the Horus Heresy, caused by the psychic shock felt by every Blood Angel when Sanguinius died at the hands of Horus.[1a] Prior to then, the Red Thirst was a rare but dreaded phenomenon, known only to Sanguinius and some members of his inner circle, including First Captain Raldoron, Sanguinary Guard Commander Azkaellon, High Warden Dahka Berus, and the Legion's Master Apothecary on Baal. On the rare occasions when a Battle Brother was lost to the Thirst, his armour's company markings were blotted out by black paint, and his gene-seed was removed for analysis, rather than being returned to the Legion's stores.[2]
Variants
- The Flesh Tearers have a more positive view of their Death Company, viewing it the Black Rage as a core part of their identity.[15a] Much of their Death Company was wiped out during the Devastation of Baal and chaos of the Great Rift, but Chaplain Dumah is overseeing a raising of a new force.[15a] This new Death Company decisively turned the tide of the Battle of Cretacia for the Flesh Tearers.[15b]
- The Angels Encarmine colour their Death Company in alabaster white with black backpacks.[1c] While it has been stated that the Flesh Tearers' Death Company follow the same colour schemes as the Blood Angels'[1c], their Death Company have been shown coloured pale grey with red helmets, backpacks and pauldrons.[7] The Lamentors, who for a long time did not suffer from the Black Rage, have been shown painting their Death Company in quartered black and yellow colours.[8]
- The Angels Numinous are known to have little regard for their Battle Brothers afflicted with the Black Rage[8], as the Chapter believes that only the weak fall into its embrace. As a result of this, the Angels Numinous refuse to honour their Death Companies as the Blood Angels do, and instead consider them to be nothing but a shameful embarrassment to their pure and noble Chapter.[9] When the Angels Numinous go to battle, the Death Companies are hurled into the fray with no concern for their lives and are simply used as a blunt instrument to break enemy front lines.[8]
- Within the Angels Sanguine, the brothers who enter the Black Rage are strapped to the Tablet of Lestrallio, in the Chapter's Fortress Monastery. Those who regain their senses are presented with the Shroud of Lemartes, as a symbol of their mastery of the Black Rage.[10] Those who fall within its grasp are imprisoned within the Tower of the Lost, which is located in the Angels Sanguine's Fortress Monastery.[8]
Notable Members
- Daenor — Death Company Chaplain
- Galleanus — Killed during the battle on Amethal with Chaos Space Marines of the Crimson Slaughter.[4]
- Naiulus — Death Company Chaplain
- Carnarvon - Flesh Tearers Death Company leader[9]
Notable Vehicles
Images
Miniatures
Death Company Assault Intercessors and Jump Pack Assault Intercessors (10th Edition)[12]
Death Company Intercessors (8th Edition)
Death Company with Jump Packs (5th Edition)
Death Company (5th Ed.)
Death Company (3rd Edition)[13]
Death Company (2nd Edition)[6]
Related Videos
Sources
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- 1: Codex: Blood Angels (5th Edition):
- 2: Fear to Tread (Novel), Prologue: Melchior
- 3: White Dwarf 85 (2015) - Squad Raphen, The Doomed Brotherhood
- 4: Black Crusade: Angel's Blade, pg. 18
- 5: Warhammer Community: Blood of Baal Chapter Focus: The Blood Angels (posted 25/11/2019) (last accessed 25 November 2019)
- 6: Codex: Angels of Death (2nd Edition), pg. 53
- 7: White Dwarf 251 (UK) pgs. 28 — Index Astartes: Blood Frenzy: The Flesh Tearers Space Marine Chapter
- 8: Index Astartes: Death Company, pgs. 6–7
- 9: The Devastation of Baal (Novel), Chapter 15
- 10: Warrior Brood (Novel), Chapter 3
- 11: White Dwarf 229 (UK), pg. 51
- 12: Warhammer Community: Embrace the Red Thirst in a New Blood Angels Codex and Army Set (posted 29/07/2024) (archived from the original, last accessed 29 July 2024)
- 13: Games Workshop 2002 catalog, pg. 32
- 14: Codex Supplement: Blood Angels (10th Edition)
- 15: Wrath of the Lost (Novel)
- 16: Flyers of the Dark Millennium, pg. 15
