Dark Eldar question?

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**gilamonster**

Ive read that when a Dark Eldar dies he or shes soul is consumed by "She who thirst" but ive also read that if there is littile bit of a Dark Eldar body remains that they can be brought back so my question is how is that possible if there soul is consumed.

**Psienesis**

Because Eldar souls take a long, long time to "die" in the Warp.

**Animus**

The soul clings to the body for a bit.

**gilamonster**

Whats a bit? A day week or 5000 years whats the time frame for having once soul consumed chaos god.

**chromedog**

HUMAN souls get torn apart quickly.
ELDAR souls (all of them) retain self awareness and can exist for quite some time (which is why having their souls eaten by she-who-thirsts is so horrible - they are aware of it as it happens. Like being eaten alive.)

**Animus**

gilamonster wrote:
Whats a bit? A day week or 5000 years whats the time frame for having once soul consumed chaos god.

The codex says "a day or so."

**Furyou Miko**

I just figured that, because of how Dark Eldar immortality works, the souls 'snapped back' to the next body back in Commoragh. Since there's no such thing as the linear progression of time in the Warp, transit times are negligible.

**Redseer**

Time is irrelevant in the warp, so one moment The Prince of pleasures could be torturing a soul and the next that soul could return to where it was when it entered the warp. Plus I imagine She Who Thirsts has to track them down. Lastly Cegorach is said to attack and rescue Eldar souls. So I imagine there are alot of ways a soul can be returned to the body. Though truly ancient souls run the risk of being contaminated with daemons. (read Path of the Renegade for more info on that.)

**oddworx**

From what I can gather from "The Path" books is that if they get a piece of the body to a regen chamber quickly the soul can cling on to that piece during the healing process.

**Iron_Captain**

I imagine it take a few days. During that time, the heamonculi can restore a Dark Eldar's soul to his body.

**Happyjew**

It takes a while because Slaanesh likes to play with his/her food first.

**gilamonster**

If thats true wouldn't that make slaanesh more likely to stop playing with his/her food and eat it before it "walks away".

**Psienesis**

What's a day in the Warp?

In fact... what's a day in the rest of the galaxy? Planets don't rotate at a universal constant. Some planets don't rotate at all!

**Jimsolo**

gilamonster wrote:
If thats true wouldn't that make slaanesh more likely to stop playing with his/her food and eat it before it "walks away".

Presumably, Slaanesh gets more out of playing with it than eating it.

**clively**

how does the soul know which piece of meat to cling to?

What if two haemonculus tried to resurrect the fallen eldar at the same time. Would it inhabit two bodies or neither? Would it roll the dice and just pick one? What if it picked one and the the haemi decided to flush it while keeping the other? Would it then be a space elf zombie?

**Psienesis**

These are questions to which there are no official, canon answers.

**Furyou Miko**

clively wrote:
how does the soul know which piece of meat to cling to?

What if two haemonculus tried to resurrect the fallen eldar at the same time. Would it inhabit two bodies or neither? Would it roll the dice and just pick one? What if it picked one and the the haemi decided to flush it while keeping the other? Would it then be a space elf zombie?

This is pretty much how the majority of Dark Eldar children are born, I think.

**knas ser**

clively wrote:
how does the soul know which piece of meat to cling to?

What if two haemonculus tried to resurrect the fallen eldar at the same time. Would it inhabit two bodies or neither? Would it roll the dice and just pick one? What if it picked one and the the haemi decided to flush it while keeping the other? Would it then be a space elf zombie?

Well this is the Universe of WH40K. It really doesn't care about protecting you or enforcing your arbitrary expectations. If the DE dick around with the body and don't get things right, your soul is probably ripped apart in the Warp and devoured by She Who Thirsts. Tough gak - there are a billion more DE souls. No-one cares about you or resolving metaphysical issues of which body part your soul clings to. Resurrections probably fail every day.

**Iron_Captain**

This part from the DE codex is pretty much all we have about the process, but I do believe it answers some of the questions here.

Most Dark Eldar warriors, including each Kabal's ruling elite,
will at some point enter into a terrible pact with the
Haemonculi that lurk beneath the core. The pact states that
the Haemonculi will regenerate the warrior's body should he
die, and in exchange, the seeker will leave the Haemonculi a
permanent portion of his soul. Even a corpse that has been
all but destroyed in the crucible of war can be restored to
its former glory -the Master Haemonculus Urien Rakarth
once crafted a perfect new Archon Vriech from a single
withered hand. Provided this process is enacted within a day
or so of the warrior's demise, and his will is strong enough
that some of his spirit still resonates within his remains, his
animus will slowly regenerate along with his physical form.
Hence Kabals upon realspace raids take great pains to strike
hard and fast, returning before the night is out with the
remains of their deceased in order that their strongest
warriors- barring the occasional ever-so-unfortunate
accident- can return to life.

**gilamonster**

Thanks iron captain thats what I wanted to know.

**3rdGen**

Just imagine what will happen when (or if) Vect dies

**Gogsnik**

Could we say then, taking the line 'the animus regenerates' from the quote above, means that a [dark elder] soul can actually be damaged, perhaps even partially devoured given the context, but that if some of it clings on to what's left of the body it can heal? Regenerate implies to me that the soul is actually reduced/damaged/wounded.