"My psyker colleagues do not wish to speak of the Enslavers, but I must. The Ordo Xenos is aware of the horrible means that Enslavers use to gain a foothold in our realm, and I share their determination to prevent such an event from ever coming to pass. I do not wish to delve into details; all that is necessary to know is that these things present a peril beyond imagining, and must be crushed at all costs wherever sighted."
–From the journals of Inquisitor Felroth Gelt: 780.M41
Also known as Psyrens, Krell, Dominators, or Puppeteers, the mysterious Enslavers are possibly one of the greatest threats for not only the Imperium but all living beings. While they live at least part of their lives in the Warp, they have material bodies and can also exist naturally in the material realm. Their very existence is a closely guarded secret, with only a select few knowing what these beings truly represent, and the hideous fate that could befall the Imperium should they overpower mankind.
Descriptions of Enslavers are rare and fragmentary, but most detail a grotesque, sickly pink–brown bulbous body. Tentacles writhe underneath them, assisting in movement as they hover through the air, while grasping mandibles are used to grip their prey.
Inquisitorial Scholars are divided as to whether Enslavers are sentient. While they seem to act in an intelligent manner, they make no attempts to communicate or use tools of any kind. Instead they use psychically controlled slaves to conduct any physical work, and it is this power which gives them their name. Enslaver victims become complete puppets to the alien’s will, performing even the most self–destructive or heretical acts without hesitation. While the Enslavers themselves can be felled by regular weapons fire due to their corporeal forms, it is their dominated thralls that often pose a greater threat, for few can bear to kill their comrades even when clearly under alien control.
Enslavers travel on the currents of the Immaterium and are drawn to the psychic emanations of living creatures, especially from unprotected psykers, who they can detect from many light years away. Once a psyker is found, three Enslavers form a dominating mental bond with the target and bring about a sickening transformation. The host is distorted and twisted over a period of days, falling into lethargy and finally becoming a living warp portal, a pulsating arch of ruptured flesh which permits the trio of Enslavers ingress into the material plane. Once Enslavers have appeared on a world, they seek out and transform more psykers so that more and more Enslavers appear, thus often heralding the end of that world.
Enslavers can bind living creatures, including non–psykers, to their will, using them to defend their new masters and attack any who have not been enslaved yet. While some few have resisted or thrown off this awful shackle, most victims are dominated for the remainder of their pitiful lives. Enslaved subjects usually bear no outward appearance of their domination, but after time the lack of proper care and nourishment leave them sick and desiccated, though this could be a side effect of their alien oppression.
Once an Enslaver infestation has begun, it is very hard to stop; soon thousands of the horrific creatures are breaching the Warp, binding millions to their will and dooming the planet. While their presence is still a very rare occurrence in this sector, those worlds which have seen Enslavers appear are now often Exterminatus, as the Holy Ordos have had no other recourse but to unleash unrelenting death on the planet. Only by catching the initial enslavement is there much hope for stopping an Enslaver Plague from claiming a world.
The Enslavers were famously involved in a terrible conflict that proceeded the current war on Protasia. When the planetary governor planned secession and kept the tithe of psykers from the Black Ships, rogue psykers became vessels to bring the Enslavers into reality. The fleshy portals poured forth an army of Enslavers, who quickly took over the majority of the planetary population. Only the intervention of the Grey Knights, Battlefleet Calixis and other factions were the xenos put down.