The Tithes (2024) s01e01 Episode Script
Sacrifice
[metallic rumbling]
[dramatic music playing]
[dark music playing]
[metallic skittering]
[metallic rasping]
[thunderous footsteps]
[static]
[Sa'kan] How it hated us.
[Brutus]
Hatred is the only virtue they possess.
[electric crackling]
[Sa'kan] One of my Chapter's loremasters
believes these creatures were once alive.
If that is true, I wonder what they lost,
in becoming what they are.
Was it a willing sacrifice?
[Brutus] The losses suffered
by aliens are meaningless.
As are their sacrifices.
[Sa'kan] No sacrifice is meaningless.
[Brutus] Hmph.
[solemn music playing]
[heavy metallic footsteps]
[Sa'kan] Lieutenant Vayla.
Recovery mission proceeding as planned.
Thus far, we have found
no trace of our brothers.
Minimal enemy presence,
but inceptive evidence
of Necron colonisation.
[Lieutenant Vayla on radio]
I hear and acknowledge.
Sixty-five hours until final
withdrawal of our forces
my lord.
[Brutus] Your question vexes me.
Regarding the aliens.
They fascinate you.
[Sa'kan] To defeat your enemy,
you must know your enemy.
[Brutus] So the Codex says.
But I hear more than
that old axiom in your tone, Salamander.
I hear the taint of empathy,
and empathy
is a blade's edge from sympathy.
[Sa'kan] Are we to trade axioms now?
To endure in this galaxy
requires sacrifice.
The Imperium demands it of us.
Worlds are tithed for resources.
Willing or unwilling,
it is the price
humanity pays for its empire.
And we make sacrifices ourselves,
do we not?
[Brutus]
The Tithe is a necessary oblation,
that our gene-seed be tested for purity.
And lest you forget, Salamander,
the Ultramarines ensure
the Imperium's survival.
Three in four Chapters
descend from our gene-seed.
Our blood matters.
[Sa'kan]I speak not of the Chapter Tithe.
I speak of our home worlds.
[Brutus] They tithe nothing.
[Sa'kan] Of course they do.
They tithe their most valuable resource.
Us.
The men we will never be.
Our humanity,
offered up on the anvil of war.
[Brutus]
Regret is a sin in the Litanies of Hate.
[Sa'kan] I regret nothing.
I merely acknowledge what we lost.
And if the tales are true,
what they lost, as well.
[Brutus] You are too
too human, Sa'kan.
Your Chapter, as honourable as it is,
is riven by this weakness.
[loud metallic scraping]
[ominous music playing]
[robotic shriek]
[Brutus grunts]
[Brutus yells]
[Sa'kan] Are you wounded?
[Brutus] Where were you?
[Sa'kan]
I was circling around to the west.
I did not abandon you, Brutus.
[Brutus] Many are the tales that tell
of the Salamanders' lack of zeal.
I never believed them.
But I ask myself if I am witnessing it
with my own eyes now.
[Sa'kan]
I have watched entire worlds ignite.
I have breathed in the char
of incinerated cities and known
known I am inhaling
the ash of those I failed to save.
The proof of my honour
is in the wounds taken and scars earned.
And still I fight.
[air whooshing]
I know the necessity of your mission
and I will fight alongside you
to secure your brothers' legacy, but
Do not question my zeal again,
Ultramarine.
[flames crackling]
You have my Chapter's gratitude.
And my apology.
Forgiven and forgotten.
[dramatic music playing]
[Brutus] This was the site
of the Ninth Reach offensive.
But
They are not here.
It has been five hours
and nineteen minutes
since the commencement of infiltration,
and this is the second confirmed
node of apex conflict.
Where are our fallen, Sa'kan?
Where are my brothers' bodies?
[Sa'kan] The most obvious answer
is also the most abhorrent.
The enemy has taken them.
[Brutus] To what purpose?
[Sa'kan] I have encountered
the xenos' lord overseeing this invasion.
It would be in keeping
with this creature's behaviour thus far
to experiment on our fallen.
Its vileness knows no limit.
I swore a blood-oath to see it dead.
[dark music playing]
[mechanical whirring]
-[Sa'kan] Five.
-[Brutus] We can deal with five.
We do not know how many
lie beyond that gateway.
It does not matter.
This foulness ends today.
-Lysander's Gambit?
-A little bold, given our situation.
I counsel Bellerophon's Fourth Approach.
Let it be so.
Courage and honour, cousin.
[Sa'kan] Into the fires of battle.
Unto the anvil of war.
[metallic footsteps]
[heroic music playing]
[Brutus panting]
[robotic screeching]
[electric crackling]
[Sa'kan] Sacrilege
[electricity crackling]
[Brutus] Four bodies.
All beyond reawakening.
Terminal sus-an via trauma.
I will need time.
Forgive my hasty ministrations, brother.
[metallic grinding]
[Sa'kan] What of these unfortunates?
[Brutus] With respect, Salamander,
their lives and deaths
are equally irrelevant.
Most appear gravely wounded.
We cannot save them.
[laboured breathing]
[whirring and squelching]
[Szeras] Ah, the most persistent anomaly.
In pursuit of elucidation,
I ask the following:
What is it you hope
to achieve by reaching this--
Cease.
You are clearly dedicated
to committing some kind
of genetic amelioration
upon these corpses.
But did you not swear vengeance, anomaly?
Did you not make an emotive promise
to engage me in battle?
This gateway will bring you
into my presence.
Abandon your companion.
Come to me.
[Brutus] Sa'kan
[Szeras] Fulfil your tawdry little oath.
[dramatic music playing]
[gauss weapons hissing]
[Sa'kan] Sword!
[tense music playing]
[Sa'kan breathing heavily]
[grunting]
[Brutus] Sa'kan
[Brutus grunting]
[gentle music playing]
[Sa'kan] I will get them home.
[soft dramatic music playing]
[Sa'kan]
Brother Sa'kan to Lieutenant Vayla.
Sa'kan to Vayla!
[Lieutenant Vayla on radio]
Sa'kan? Come in.
[Vayla distorted with static]
We cannot track you
We are moving reinforcements
to your last known position.
[Sa'kan] Say again. Interference. Repeat.
[male voice] This is Captain Ixiom
of the Ultramarines' Seventh.
Get to high ground, Sa'kan.
Thunderhawk inbound.
[dramatic music playing]
[explosions]
[dramatic music playing]
[dramatic music playing]
[dark music playing]
[metallic skittering]
[metallic rasping]
[thunderous footsteps]
[static]
[Sa'kan] How it hated us.
[Brutus]
Hatred is the only virtue they possess.
[electric crackling]
[Sa'kan] One of my Chapter's loremasters
believes these creatures were once alive.
If that is true, I wonder what they lost,
in becoming what they are.
Was it a willing sacrifice?
[Brutus] The losses suffered
by aliens are meaningless.
As are their sacrifices.
[Sa'kan] No sacrifice is meaningless.
[Brutus] Hmph.
[solemn music playing]
[heavy metallic footsteps]
[Sa'kan] Lieutenant Vayla.
Recovery mission proceeding as planned.
Thus far, we have found
no trace of our brothers.
Minimal enemy presence,
but inceptive evidence
of Necron colonisation.
[Lieutenant Vayla on radio]
I hear and acknowledge.
Sixty-five hours until final
withdrawal of our forces
my lord.
[Brutus] Your question vexes me.
Regarding the aliens.
They fascinate you.
[Sa'kan] To defeat your enemy,
you must know your enemy.
[Brutus] So the Codex says.
But I hear more than
that old axiom in your tone, Salamander.
I hear the taint of empathy,
and empathy
is a blade's edge from sympathy.
[Sa'kan] Are we to trade axioms now?
To endure in this galaxy
requires sacrifice.
The Imperium demands it of us.
Worlds are tithed for resources.
Willing or unwilling,
it is the price
humanity pays for its empire.
And we make sacrifices ourselves,
do we not?
[Brutus]
The Tithe is a necessary oblation,
that our gene-seed be tested for purity.
And lest you forget, Salamander,
the Ultramarines ensure
the Imperium's survival.
Three in four Chapters
descend from our gene-seed.
Our blood matters.
[Sa'kan]I speak not of the Chapter Tithe.
I speak of our home worlds.
[Brutus] They tithe nothing.
[Sa'kan] Of course they do.
They tithe their most valuable resource.
Us.
The men we will never be.
Our humanity,
offered up on the anvil of war.
[Brutus]
Regret is a sin in the Litanies of Hate.
[Sa'kan] I regret nothing.
I merely acknowledge what we lost.
And if the tales are true,
what they lost, as well.
[Brutus] You are too
too human, Sa'kan.
Your Chapter, as honourable as it is,
is riven by this weakness.
[loud metallic scraping]
[ominous music playing]
[robotic shriek]
[Brutus grunts]
[Brutus yells]
[Sa'kan] Are you wounded?
[Brutus] Where were you?
[Sa'kan]
I was circling around to the west.
I did not abandon you, Brutus.
[Brutus] Many are the tales that tell
of the Salamanders' lack of zeal.
I never believed them.
But I ask myself if I am witnessing it
with my own eyes now.
[Sa'kan]
I have watched entire worlds ignite.
I have breathed in the char
of incinerated cities and known
known I am inhaling
the ash of those I failed to save.
The proof of my honour
is in the wounds taken and scars earned.
And still I fight.
[air whooshing]
I know the necessity of your mission
and I will fight alongside you
to secure your brothers' legacy, but
Do not question my zeal again,
Ultramarine.
[flames crackling]
You have my Chapter's gratitude.
And my apology.
Forgiven and forgotten.
[dramatic music playing]
[Brutus] This was the site
of the Ninth Reach offensive.
But
They are not here.
It has been five hours
and nineteen minutes
since the commencement of infiltration,
and this is the second confirmed
node of apex conflict.
Where are our fallen, Sa'kan?
Where are my brothers' bodies?
[Sa'kan] The most obvious answer
is also the most abhorrent.
The enemy has taken them.
[Brutus] To what purpose?
[Sa'kan] I have encountered
the xenos' lord overseeing this invasion.
It would be in keeping
with this creature's behaviour thus far
to experiment on our fallen.
Its vileness knows no limit.
I swore a blood-oath to see it dead.
[dark music playing]
[mechanical whirring]
-[Sa'kan] Five.
-[Brutus] We can deal with five.
We do not know how many
lie beyond that gateway.
It does not matter.
This foulness ends today.
-Lysander's Gambit?
-A little bold, given our situation.
I counsel Bellerophon's Fourth Approach.
Let it be so.
Courage and honour, cousin.
[Sa'kan] Into the fires of battle.
Unto the anvil of war.
[metallic footsteps]
[heroic music playing]
[Brutus panting]
[robotic screeching]
[electric crackling]
[Sa'kan] Sacrilege
[electricity crackling]
[Brutus] Four bodies.
All beyond reawakening.
Terminal sus-an via trauma.
I will need time.
Forgive my hasty ministrations, brother.
[metallic grinding]
[Sa'kan] What of these unfortunates?
[Brutus] With respect, Salamander,
their lives and deaths
are equally irrelevant.
Most appear gravely wounded.
We cannot save them.
[laboured breathing]
[whirring and squelching]
[Szeras] Ah, the most persistent anomaly.
In pursuit of elucidation,
I ask the following:
What is it you hope
to achieve by reaching this--
Cease.
You are clearly dedicated
to committing some kind
of genetic amelioration
upon these corpses.
But did you not swear vengeance, anomaly?
Did you not make an emotive promise
to engage me in battle?
This gateway will bring you
into my presence.
Abandon your companion.
Come to me.
[Brutus] Sa'kan
[Szeras] Fulfil your tawdry little oath.
[dramatic music playing]
[gauss weapons hissing]
[Sa'kan] Sword!
[tense music playing]
[Sa'kan breathing heavily]
[grunting]
[Brutus] Sa'kan
[Brutus grunting]
[gentle music playing]
[Sa'kan] I will get them home.
[soft dramatic music playing]
[Sa'kan]
Brother Sa'kan to Lieutenant Vayla.
Sa'kan to Vayla!
[Lieutenant Vayla on radio]
Sa'kan? Come in.
[Vayla distorted with static]
We cannot track you
We are moving reinforcements
to your last known position.
[Sa'kan] Say again. Interference. Repeat.
[male voice] This is Captain Ixiom
of the Ultramarines' Seventh.
Get to high ground, Sa'kan.
Thunderhawk inbound.
[dramatic music playing]
[explosions]
[dramatic music playing]