He was an eighteen-year-old killer, and the sniper rifle felt heavy in his hands.
He had observed for an extrely long ti. He had received training for this; he knew how to slow his heartbeat, how to control his breathing and the natural tremors of his body, until he was as completely motionless as a statue.
Predator.
Prey.
His mind gradually grew cold, and his focus was absolute. The prayer silently recited in his heart beca his only thod of viewing this world.
Predator.
Prey.
Apart from this, he had no other thoughts. He pulled the trigger, and two thousand ters away, a life passed away.
Hunter.
Hunted.
"Target eliminated."
He said to himself.
——————
He was a twenty-year-old man, sleeping on the exact sa operating table as before.
The chemicals flowing through his blood vessels caused him to fall into a deep slumber, and once again, he dread of that scene.
His thoughts hung suspended in silence, entering into the dreamscapes of two worlds.
In one world, his brain was in a deep sleep, but his thoughts tumbled and echoed within constricted mories.
In the other world, his eyes observed the intersections of corridors, while his thoughts skipped slowly, just like the pulse of his blood.
His eyes were open, and his pupils dilated and contracted, trembling as if seeing sothing moving in front of him. But there was nothing in front of him, only three long, dark corridors.
He had already stayed like this for fifty-six hours, conscious for more than half that ti. The remaining half was spent in a semi-waking state and the sleep he could now control his entry into.
In the real world, needles and dical probes drilled into the flesh and blood of his back, injecting various fluids directly into his spine.
He coughed once; that was his slumbering body reacting to the invasion of foreign objects. The acidic saliva that sprayed from his mouth hissed where it landed, etching several deep pits into the tiled floor.
When he woke up, several days had already passed.
He could feel the sockets lined up along his spine, as well as those scars, those tallic nodules...
He knew that in a universe with only endless war, only by infinitely approaching death could one ultimately achieve sainthood.
The gray-eyed Apothecary was watching him, like an artist examining his most perfect creation, and for the first ti, revealed a smile that ca from the bottom of his heart.
——————
He was a Recruit, currently gazing into his own eyes.
He stood naked in a dark room, lined up in a row with over a dozen other individuals. The other newcors gathered beside him were similarly stark naked, their pale skin covered everywhere with the scars left by surgery.
Lust was a forgotten concept that did not exist within his mind, and that was nothing more than a re one of the tens of thousands of human desires discarded by his consciousness.
He could no longer clearly rember the faces of his parents. He only rembered his own na, because the Chapter's instructors had never changed his na.
He gazed at the pair of eyes that now belonged to him, and that deep-set, slanted pair of "eyes" stared back at him—those were a pair of eyes inlaid into a helt whose faceplate was painted an ash-white color.
As he looked at that combat helt, as ghastly white as a skull, the helt was also looking at him with a ghastly reflection.
This was his face now.
Through these eyes, he would witness the entire galaxy.
Through this helt, he would issue furious roars at those Traitors and Xenos who dared to despise the Emperor.
"You are Soshyan Alexei."
A Chapter instructor said this to him.
"Attached to the 7th Company."
——————
He was a champion, born for victory.
"Status confird—"
Soshyan transmitted a ssage to the other two individuals through his vox-caster.
"Intersection Twenty-One is secure. No movent, just like before."
"They're right outside."
His squadmate Axel responded like this, his voice transforming into a low growl over the comms.
"They are coming. Didn't that rotting sinkhole of a Hive City that birthed you teach you to be patient?"
"Oh, it taught , but sohow it didn't teach to enjoy drifting in the vacuum waiting for unknown enemies to appear. Besides, the place I lived in wasn't a Hive City."
Soshyan's voice did not hold too much extra emotion, yet the other party burst into laughter. That sound transmitted back through the silence, resembling a flurry of canine barks.
"Things won't end like this—"
The cautious tone of the other person in the squad ca through. His na was Ned; he ca from the sa planet as Soshyan and was also in the sa batch of Recruits.
"If we are here, then the enemy is too."
"What if this isn't what's supposed to be taught?"
Soshyan asked as he spoke, shifting his posture to stare down one of the three corridors.
Several power cables hung down from beneath upended inspection box covers, and conduits spilled from their protective casings like severed blood vessels. They were in a hazardous zone within a transport ship that had been torn open and left stranded in the void. There were other scout squads scattered throughout the hull, each with a different mission, but no one knew where the other squads were, nor the details of their missions.
The mission for Soshyan, Axel, and Ned was to monitor a dead-end corridor. All of them were wearing only a void suit, equipped with a Bolter and a Chainsword.
"What do you an?"
Axel growled lowly. Soshyan carefully drew a breath before answering. This youth could shift from being straightforward and generous to erupting in fury in the span of a heartbeat. All those transformations to his mind and body had not only failed to polish away this trait, but instead made his temper even more pronounced.
"What if waiting is the wrong course of action? What if there isn't any danger? The only thing trapping us here is our belief that there is a threat."
"Wrong, Soshyan."
Ned retorted, cutting in before Axel even had the chance to open his mouth.
"We have a mission, and we are going to see it completed."
"But what is the mission?"
Soshyan was still questioning. He turned to look down the second corridor. That motion threw him off balance, to the point he had to rely on gripping the safety tether connecting him to the wall in order to steady his posture.
That second corridor was empty, just like the first one.
"What if we haven't understood it correctly?"
"This..."
Ned still wanted to speak but was interrupted by Axel cutting in.
"What do you an?"
"I an perhaps there are no enemies here. They might be sowhere else, and because we are pointlessly standing guard here, a bitter battle is taking place elsewhere."
"This is fulfilling our duty, not being afraid."
"Is it?"
Soshyan issued a sharp cross-examination, unable to catch himself in ti, but as soon as those words burst from his mouth, he regretted it.
He noticed this situation was happening more and more often. Emotional impulsiveness and impatience would suddenly pop up out of nowhere, as if another person were living inside his brain—so guy who was cold on the outside but anxious on the inside. He had absolutely no clue as to the reason for this matter.
"I am sorry..."
"Enough."
Ned's voice was very calm. It seed he did not have such troubles.
"We are Brothers. You don't need to say anything more, just don't speak like that again."
Brother. To his world, this word was still as unfamiliar as those organs added into his body.
——————
He was a demigod, a complete and absolute superhuman, ageless and immortal.
He looked at the surface of this world through his crimson eyepieces. A string of data, represented by sharp, clear white Runes, cascaded across his retinas. He watched his Brothers' vitals displayed in nurical form, he felt the temperature outside his hertically sealed combat armor, and he watched the target-lock reticles flashing in tandem with the movents of his eyes.
He felt his hand—the hand gripping his Bolter tightly—and the tension transmitted as it attempted to follow every target lock.
The ammunition counter let him know how many enemies had already died today.
Xenos fell dead all around him.
Ten, a hundred, a thousand. His Brothers carved out a bloody path through this garbage-dump-like city.
"Brothers!"
He shouted this word at the sa ti he fired a bolt into each corridor. The recoil, enough to shatter an ordinary person's arm, was as light as a feather under his hand.
"I'll be right with you."
Axel was issuing a roar.
"I am moving toward you!"
Ned's voice was filled with the crackle of electromagnetic static.
He fired again, cycling from one shot to another, and he also saw those enemies.
They crawled along the walls like spiders. Articulated, linked tallic limbs replaced arms and legs. Their heads were raised on necks composed of steel rings, and weapon pods protruded from their spines, attached to devices resembling scorpion tails. And there were dozens of them.
"I see you!"
Axel's voice ca through.
"I have so shootable targets."
Muzzle flashes illuminated the distant corridor, flickering as shrapnel tore through the air.
Soshyan also fired again. Three shots rang out, and four masses of tal and flesh exploded. He glanced over his shoulder. Axel was ten ters away, jamd between the wall and a swarm of machines, firing at the Xenos nearest to Soshyan.
"Hey!"
In the gap in the fighting, he still had the mood to holler over the vox.
"This ti, at least we found the enemy."
Soshyan also burst into laughter along with him.
Bolters bood, Chainswords roared. Amidst the chorus ford by the noise of battle, the Battle Brothers issued furious roars at the enemy through the loudspeakers inside their helts.
The sound was always the sa.
Bolters always bood, Chainswords always roared, and Astartes always shouted to vent their fury.
He shouted those words etched into the deepest parts of his brain, those words that would very soon, for him, beco his lifelong value of existence.
And now, he and his Brothers shouted loudly together, those words they had never pondered over, those words they had never gone out to feel.
For the Emperor!
(End of Chapter)
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