Omega Vault

The Omega Vault is a sealed series of ancient engines, catacombs, and chambers that sits at the heart of Watch Fortress Erioch. The Omega Vault has been part of the Watch Fortress since it was established in the Jericho Reach, though what it contains at its centre remains unknown to any now living. The vault itself is a broadly cylindrical portion of the Watch Fortress that spans many levels running through its core. There is only one entrance into the Omega Vault; a single door forty paces high. The door is sealed and armoured by layered void shields and adamantine plating as thick as a warships prow. Engraved upon it are the symbols of the Deathwatch and the elder Terran rune 'Omega', surrounding an image of the Emperor strangling a coiling serpent. Above these great doors are words in High Gothic that read, "And The Last Fortress Is Truth." Each Battle-Brother freshly stationed at the Watch Fortress is brought before these words to take his oath of vigil.

No living being can open the doors of the vault; they open themselves at the command of mysterious ancient devices at the heart of the vault itself. Those who have been inside pass along corridors and down spiralling stairs lined with catacomb sub-vaults, each barred with its own blast door and surrounded with dust-dry parchment fragments and archaic marks etched in silver. Through each door awaits a secret of the Omega Vault held in an armoured chamber, each protected by powerful automated defences and locks of unfathomable complexity.

The Omega Vault is known to yield up a portion of its cryptic artefacts and information in direct response to events unfolding within the Jericho Reach. There is also evidence that the central data-reservoir of Watch Fortress Erioch is bound to something deep within the Omega Vault. The vault has, on occasion, responded to new information sent in from Watch Stations or operational reports from Deathwatch missions by revealing a portion of what was placed within it many millennia ago.

Only one chamber has ever been discovered and unlocked each time the Omega Vault has opened itself. Once whatever waits in the open chamber has been removed, the Vault seals itself again, sounding a sonorous bell to warn of its closure and of the fatal consequences that follow should anyone tarry over-long.

At the centre of the Omega Vault lies another, inner vault: a secret of secrets, bound with scores of locking mechanisms which have slowly opened themselves, one-by-one, down the centuries. The Chamber of Vigilance believes that sealed within this chamber is the final truth and, perhaps, the last weapon the Deathwatch will have need for in the Jericho Reach.