Ferrus Manus
From Warhammer 40k
| {{{image}}} | |
| Ferrus Manus | |
| Race | Human |
| Gender | Male |
| Homeworld | Medusa |
| Allegiance | Imperium of Man |
Contents |
[edit] Overview
Ferrus Manus is the erstwhile Primarch of the Iron Hands Space Marines, a master smith known for creating weapons that were able to inspire awe in any who saw them, such as a blade he created for Fulgrim, Primarch of the Emperors Children, or a Boltgun he created for Vulkan, Primarch of the Salamanders, said to have a barrel designed to look like the gaping mouth of a dragon.
His hands were metallic and he needed no hammer or flame to create beauty through metallurgy.
[edit] Youth
Ferrus was stolen away by the forces of Chaos just as his brothers, and spent his first years on the planet Medusa.
Medusa was a harsh, unwelcoming planet inhabited by a tough and stoic people. Ferrus would not join these tribes, as many of his brothers did. Rather he would seek out physical challenges, to make himself stronger and more resilient. These tests ended with his battle against Asirnoth, the Great Silver Wyrm, a metallic beast impervious to harm and Ferrus had to drown it in magma to kill. The melted flesh of the wyrm fused into Ferrus' flesh, giving him the true metal hands his Legion would take its name from.
Ferrus now returned to the tribes and started lecturing to them on technology. The clans advanced at a stunning pace and Medusa prospered. But Ferrus took care to leave the inter-clan rivalry and fighting by never taking sides, as he saw the competition between them as healthy and good.
The Emperor eventually came to Medusa, and Ferrus Manus tested himself on him as well, in a cataclysmic battle that is said to have laid waste to entire mountains. Finally having found someone equal, Ferrus accepted the Emperor as his master and took command of a legion of Space Marines.
[edit] Great Crusade
It was said that there was no closer bond during the Great Crusade than that between the Primarchs Fulgrim and Ferrus Manus, and thus between their chapters. They often fought side-by-side during the crusade, both styles of combat used by each chapter complimenting each others weaknesses. This ended tragically when Fulgrim fell to the poisoned whispers of Chaos and Horus, and failed to talk his brother into open rebellion. The first resulting combat between them left Ferrus Manus unconscious and his battlefleet crippled, however Fulgrim was not able to bring himself to strike down his brother.
[edit] Horus Heresy
Rumor has it that Fulgrim approached Ferrus Manus before the Heresy and tried to lure him to join Chaos. Ferrus Manus was so enraged at this proposal that he attacked and almost killed his brother. Fulgrim managed to teleport back to his own Battle Barge and escape, although barely.
The Iron Hands was one of the loyal legions the Emperor called to Istvaan V. Given the large distance, Ferrus Manus took the Legion's fastest ships and departed to Istvaan V With only his veterans, who almost all died during the battle following the loss of their Primarch they were struck down by the traitor legions, caught between the hammer of the Emperor's Children and upon the Anvil of the Iron Warriors and support from the other three legions of the second wave.
Some say Ferrus survived Istvaan V and now resides on Mars, but the Iron Hands strongly refute this. The truth of the matter was that Fulgrim personally decapitated Ferrus during the battle at Istvaan V, using the chaos infected blade that he found in the temple on Laeran (indeed, the blade was responsible for Fulgrim's descent into Chaos). Fulgrim was distraught with the sudden epiphany that he had just killed his closest brother, at his own hands, eventually giving into the whispers of Chaos, who spoke promises to ease his pain, to send him into an oblivion of which nothing existed. Sadly he gave into the request of the Daemon inside the blade, which repossesed his body trapping Fulgrim within in his own mind to watch the Daemon do the evil will of Slaanesh, turning him into the Daemon Prince he is now, and thus it was this Daemon that brought the mutilated head of Ferrus Manus before Horus.
[edit] Death
Ferrus Manus was killed during the Drop Site Massacre of Istvaan V at the hands of Fulgrim, beheaded with the daemonsword his brother-Primarch Fulgrim took from the Slaanesh temple on Laeran. His death shocked Fulgrim out of the depths of his betrayal of the Emperor, but his anguish made him ripe for possession at the hands of the very same daemon-tainted sword he picked up during his own battles during the great crusade, essentially ending the existence of Fulgrim as a separate entity.
