Author's Notes: This is a crossover one shot while I was thinking of how similar the two Emperor's where. The idea was simple. What if the God-Emperor and Palpatine switched bodies? Assuming the Force was the same as the Warp of course.

EDIT: 11/04/2012.

I have set up a poll trying to see whether I should continue this story or not in my profile. Please vote if you are interested.


Somewhere…..

A man awoke upon a throne.

Then he took his first true breath in ten millennia.

The Emperor of Mankind blinked as he looked out around him. To either side was a pair of red-armored warriors holding ornate pikes. They were cloaked and armored, with impassive helmets and stoic bearing.

They reminded him of his Custodes, similar in pose and function, yet radically different.

Before him a grey-haired man in a uniform the color of his hair was speaking to him in a strange language. He was reading off some sort of data-slate, gesturing to a holo-field which showed some sort of dagger-shaped ship next to a planet.

The room was darkly lit, casting shadows everywhere. The floors where made of black-veined marble and a purple banner hung from above, bearing a strange cog-wheel symbol. The place spoke of a stark military might.

The Emperor ignored the man and closed his eyes. He stretched out his mind for the Warp…

…..Strange, the Warp here was…clearer. There was darkness, but no Gods of Chaos or ravening daemons. It was similar, yet different in shape and function, yet he could access it easily as he did previously.

He looked over his body and hands. This was not the ruined corpse-shell he inhabited for the last ten millennia. Nor was this the perfect golden godly form he had donned during the Great Crusade and his son's Heresy.

This was the body of a shriveled old man, twisted and corrupted by darkness. It would take years for him to properly cleanse the body of the immense corruption within. He felt disgustedjust inhabiting this body.

But it was a welcome change from before.

He reached out with his mind. He saw the planet in his mindscape. He took in the thoughts of a trillion people. He was on some sort of hive world, except every square inch was covered in cityscape. A trillion souls moved on this world.

And many of them were alien. Strange. Very Strange.

He scanned their minds, finding a common language. He swept the central palace he was in. He took in many thoughts and memories. A normal psyker, let alone a normal human, would have been driven insane by the onslaught of information.

But the Emperor was no normal man. He assimilated an entirely new language in under a minute. It was called Basic.

His eyes snapped open as the man in front of him finished a report. He knew him know.

''Tarkin.'' his voice spoke, it sounded dried and hoarse.

''My lord?''

''Everyone, leave me immediately. I am taking the next six months off for contemplation of the Empire's future. No one is to contact me for any reason. Not the Grand Admirals, not the Moffs, not my Imperial Guard, nor my Hands and not even Lord Vader himself. There is to be absolutely no exceptions.'' He stated.

The Emperor felt Tarkin's surprise as he changed his tone slightly.

''My lord-''

''Do I make myself clear?'' The Emperor added a hint of menace to his voice. Tarkin got the hint.

''Yes my lord.'' he left hurried. The Emperor sent a brief glance to the red-armored guards that sent them too scurrying away.

Then when he was alone the Emperor took a deep breath and thought it over.

He was stuck in the body of another man. Another Emperor in another galaxy somewhere. This was another Empire, centered on human supremacy and ruled by a dictator. So it was similar to his own, different in many ways.

He had tried to make an Empire for humanity before, and he had failed. He had been betrayed by his own sons and had been bound to a Golden Throne as he watched his Empire of Humanity rot around him.

But now…..

He accessed the HoloNet point in his throne. Before him an entire galaxy's worth of information before available to him. Before him lay an immense amount of information. No normal man could hope to learn it all in a mere six months.

But the God-Emperor of Mankind was no normal man.

He pulled up information on something called the hyperdrive and a slow smile spread across his features. A reliable faster-than-light drive without having to travel through the Warp? Superior information relay and faster-than-light communication? An empire already conquered and subjected for him?

His superhuman mind began to churn with the possibilities.


Somewhere…..

A man woke on a throne.

And Palpatine screamed.

He could not move a muscle. His body was twisted, mutilated and broken far beyond repair, scarred on the astral plane and well as the physical. Before him, out of jaundiced eyes, he watched golden armored warrior-gods stand guard over him.

Custodes…

Before him, a line of screaming psykers where fed into a vast mountainous machine. The same throne-machine he was bound to. Their souls entered him and fed him life. But Palpatine could not enjoy any of it.

His soul was torn and screaming over hundreds of thousands of lights years powering the light that led Imperial ships over the Imperium of Mankind. A galaxy's worth of suffering, despair and hate was suddenly thrust upon him.

Palpatine was a creature of the Dark Side. He fed off hate and death. But this….

….this was too much. He was like a drug junkie overdosing far beyond his limit. He knew nothing but pain and absolute horror.

The Force was twisted and strange. There was no Light, no Darkness. Only the laughter of demented gods who looked his soul-form over and realized they had a new plaything. He was on a city planet similar to Imperial Center was, but it was a dark mirror of the former Coruscant.

Across the galaxy Guardsmen died in their billions in the Cadian Sector as the hordes of the Despoiler rampaged. On the Eastern Fringe the Tyranids devoured entire sectors as they approached Holy Terra. Across the galaxy a primal green-skinned force of destruction tore down countless worlds. Across the galaxy, metal killers billions of years old awoke, ready to harvest life.

Palpatine desired an Empire totally under his thumb, a place where hate and suffering would rule supreme under his immortal rule. He got that, but not as he imagined.

He was immortal, but in a way that made him desire death more than anything.

He had his Empire, but it was an Empire of mockery that served only to prolong his torment.

He had his suffering and hate, but he would never be able to enjoy it.

He could not move from where he was, his soul half in and half out of reality. He could not turn his gaze form the eternal nightmare. He could not move his soul form where it was fixed into an eternal scream of pain.

Palpatine was in hell, now and forever.


Author's Notes: This is just a short one-shot. It's more on an excuse to get this plot bunny out of my head. I'm considering the Force and the Warp to be effectively the same thing for both Emperors.

I might plan to continue it, if I have the time a motivation to do so. But it would quickly result in a massive AU for the Star Wars universe as the God-Emperor is inserted a few years before the original trilogy into Palpatine's body. Safe to say he starts changing things slowly to his liking. (I'm assuming he's good enough to fool any Force-user who knows Palpatine, like Mara Jade, Vader, etc, etc.)

Regardless, it would be interesting for the Emperor to get this hands on a FTL engine and communication that does not rely on the Warp, or a Warp that's much calmer compared to his own home universe.

As for Palpatine he's pretty much screwed.