Champion of Nurgle

Part 1

“As you can see the hospital is made of three combined towers, one for amputations and their recovery, one for disease and one for other maladies. We have a central courtyard with the stone of remembrance where we etch the names that have fallen within our grounds.” I listened to the nurse and what she said, unable to speak as the strange disease I had contracted had caused my tongue to wither and fall out. From what I could tell she would have been a lovely looking woman, but the nurse’s all being sisters and covered from head to toe in a heavy cassock, habit, and face mask to stop breathing in the disease all around, but her purple eyes, like that of a new born were very entrancing. We walked in silence to my tower, I say we, she walked whilst I was pushed; a leg falling off followed by the other withering will do that. We arrived at the door to the tower and a monk waited for us. His cassock’s hood completely covered his face and he picked me up as if I were a child and began to climb the stairs.

At the third floor he turned off and laid me on one of the beds.

“Hello there, what’s the matter with you?” A cheery voice coming from a fat and swaddled man in the next bed. Sores all across his exposed flesh and the fat beneath the sheet wobbling with every movement.

“He cannot talk, the disease has removed his tongue.” The nurse said patiently.

“Well I can talk enough for the both of us, I’ve got a little story you can hear all about a man that loved diseases.” I cringed inwardly.

“I am very sorry” she turn her purple eyes on me “But Mr Galen loves to tell his story to everyone he meets” she continued kindly.

“It’s not just my story it’s a story for everyone, for the things they lay beyond the despair of disease. Now what’s your name? I know you can’t answer, you’re as mute as that big one there” he gestured to the monk lumbering away “So come on nursie, what’s his name?” He rolled over to face me now.

“He is Mr Cluunnuucs.”

“That’s a lot of U’s I’ll just call you, U. Simple, nah too simple, I’ll call you...UU, no... double-U, no...Mr C. It is that, makes things easy.” Mr Galen said.

“I shall leave you to get acquainted. It is possible to drown out his voice.” The Nurse said directed the last point to me, she looked back at Mr. Galen and he winked.

“Well we’ve got some time before lights out so let’s begin, it was a dark and stormy night...” the he broke into masses of laughter. “Only joking, it was a dark night, which was the way he preferred to work, no moon to show his illicit deeds. He was a tomb robber my dear friend called Jared. With a sack, crowbar, knife and few other bits he’d set to robbing the dead after all they were in the ground and rotting away they didn’t need what they had. So that night he went to what he thought was an ancient tomb, as it was all covered, in moss, and lichen and falling apart. If he’d spent a moment looking up he’d have seen the chaos symbol for...” he looked from side to side to see if anyone was listening “Nurgle” he whispered the word and I felt twinge in my gut.

“He set to work prying the rotted tomb open, and once that door opened, the rotted stench flooded him, he almost fell of his feet it hit him like a sudden wave. Holdin’ his bile in, he moved down the corridor. He had a simple lamp to guide his way but wouldn’t light it till he was far enough away from prying eyes. Now what was my old friend doing in a place like this, well he was a tomb robber, he’d been a grave robber as well but thanks to the corpse he’d caught Tomb Rot, horrible, so he went to breaking in tombs and selling whatever he found in there. Well he got more than he bargained for when he went into this tomb. Now let me say this to you, I don’t know for sure what they said but when I saw my friend again, well at least I thought it was him, he look’d a bit different. He told me what happened and a few other bits so I’ll continue. After he’d walked a little way and looked at the dead on their shelves he began to descend a flight of stairs. Deeper and danker with a fetid smell; I reckon he was sick part-way but he’d never admit it.” Mr Galen let out a small chuckle