When the Boy was young, the world turned mad.
He was too young to understand the perversions of Chaos or the meaning behind it, so when the refugee trucks exploded, he ran.
He ran for a long time, tears streaking down his face and anguish in his heart. He ran home.
The world was a so-called Imperial World, without the towering magnificence of a Hive World or the endless plains of an Agri World. As such, the Boy's home was a house, situated in an old logging town around thirty or forty kilometers outside of a major city.
Chaos attacked quickly, with a force too large to be a mere raid but too small to be an invasion. The Boy didn't know if they were there for a particular reason or if they attacked because they just felt like it; he was told to never try to comprehend the forces of Chaos, lest he go mad in the attempt.
So he ran home.
The Town was destroyed, ruined, and empty. As the Boy quietly snuck through the remnants of the buildings, he saw and heard nothing other than echoes in the dust.
There were corpses a plenty, however. Armored shells of tanks and vehicles in the streets, fleshy gore and skeletal bones in the buildings, and the rare shell of Space Marine armor, be it loyalist or corrupted.
As the Boy lightly stepped past the side of an armored vehicle, he thought he heard something, though.
Pausing, he turned to glance around, but the noise stopped.
"BOY."
Jumping in fright at the harsh monotone so close, the Boy took off running, only to trip on rubble and fall to the ground.
"BOY." came the voice again, clearly coming from some form of vox or speaker. "COME HERE, BOY."
The Boy, frightened and trembling, looked back at where he had been standing, and his breath caught at the realization. What he had mistaken for an abandoned vehicle was a Dreadnought! One of the holiest of weapons used by the God-Emperor's holy Angels of Death, the Space Marines, a Dreadnought was even rarer than a Space Marine!
Slowly and carefully, his fingers shaking at the sheer volume of the voice, the Boy walked up to the Dreadnought, his eyes looking at the numerous signs of damage that the Dreadnought bore.
Great claw marks were split down the chest of the great machine, as if a mighty beast had sliced it, while pocket-marks and slagged metal adorned the more fortunate spots. The upper half of the Dreadnought was covered under a colossal amount of debris from the upper floor of the house, and the narrow vision slit was covered up.
"TELL ME BOY, HAVE WE WON?" the Dreadnought asked, it's voicebox booming in the shattered woodwork of the Boy's house.
"I-I don't know, holy Lord." the Boy answered shyly, ducking his head.
"HOLY? I AM NO MORE HOLY THAN YOU ARE, BOY." the Dreadnought rumbled. "HOW LONG HAVE I LAID DORMANT HERE?"
"I do not know, my lord." the Boy said again, sniffing at the address of the intimidating machine, buried under debris though it was. "I do not know anything, my lord. My mother said that I was only good for the manufactorum."
"IT IS NOT OFTEN A YOUNG LAD SAYS THAT." the Dreadnought noted idly. "I CANNOT SEE, BOY. TELL ME, WHERE AM I?"
"You are in my house, lord."
"I DID NOT MEAN TO INTRUDE. MY APOLOGIES, BOY." the Dreadnought replied.
Lifting his head, the Boy looked at the Dreadnought in confusion, before glancing around the wartorn landscape before him. Ducking his head again, the Boy decided not to talk, just in case he offended the great machine any more. This holy Dreadnought was not acting like the heroic Space Marines from the vids, the ones that posed dramatically and spoke with flowing rhetoric and fiery words.
"BOY, MOVE AWAY."
Frightened again, the Boy fled with all haste, running as fast as he could from the Dreadnought he had offended.
With a great roar of mechanical protest, the Dreadnought flexed it's legs, straightening it's chasis and shifting the load of wooden beams and other debris off of it's back. The pile of debris shifted off of the Dreadnought's back with a thunderous cascade of noise.
The Boy stared as the Dreadnought stepped out of the shell of the Boy's house, twisting it's torso-block and shaking the loose wooden shingles off it, almost like a dog would. Eyes wide, the Boy fell back onto his backside as the Dreadnought took two stomping steps forward.
"I CAN MOVE ONCE MORE." the Dreadnought boomed, inspecting it's arm and then looking around for the Boy. "BOY. WHERE ARE YOU?"
Panicking, the Boy scrambled to his feet and ran, but the Dreadnought's deep voice stopped him in his tracks before he could get more than a few meters away.
"IF YOU RUN, YOU WILL DIE, BOY."
The Boy stopped, but did not face the metal monster that stompedcloser. Perhaps it was the emotion of seeing his home destroyed by one of the Emperor's servants, but he could not bear the weight of his emotions anymore. Shoulders shaking, he burst into tears and collapsed to his knees.
"OH." the Dreadnought muttered (as much as a machine hardwired to be loud could mutter). "I MEANT THAT CHAOS WOULD KILL YOU, BOY. I DID NOT MEAN THAT I WOULD KILL YOU."
Standing behind the small Boy like a behemoth, the Dreadnought considered the annoyance of it's physical shell. If it were still a Marine, immortal or not, it (he?) would be able to kneel down next to the Boy, lay his hand on the Boy's shoulder, and reassure him with comforting tones.
All of that (particularly the kneeling and the warm tone of voice, that wasn't fucking going to happen) was no longer possible.
"DO NOT WORRY, BOY. I WILL PROTECT YOU, NO MATTER WHAT HAPPENS."
Undeterred, the Boy continued to cry.
"WE SHOULD MOVE." the Dreadnought continued, awkwardly breaking the silence. "THE ENEMIES OF MAN WILL NOT LET US REST. WE MUST FIND THE IMPERIAL FORCES, OR AT LEAST SOME SHELTER FOR THE NIGHT."
Sniffing, the Boy clambered back up to his feet, wiping away his tears and hardening his face. Despite the vast difference between the Boy and the Space Marines he had know, the Dreadnought could not help but compare the Boy to one, as an example of true human courage.
Off they went, moving towards the nearby city, which should have some form of Imperial forces in it. If not, they would be able to find a vox or some other communication system, as the Dreadnought's vox system had been destroyed in the fight that left it wrecked in the Boy's house.
The Boy didn't cry afterwards. Though the Dreadnought had to keep his attention on the shell-cratered highway, he kept one of his visual sensors directed on the Boy. The Boy seemed to have dealt with the hardship well, not complaining despite being clothed in little but torn clothes in what must have been a cold wind.
The hills were once the target of vast logging operations, the Boy knew, but they had been bare for a long time, and the old dark stumps only made the numerous craters in the pavement seem more gloomy.
Neither spoke for the first hour, the only sound being the thumpingof the Dreadnought's steps and the shuffling steps of the malnourished Boy. The Dreadnought matched his pace to the Boy's, and nothing more needed to be said.
Then, the Boy slowed. For a moment, he paused, his breath hard and his internal temperature chilled.
"BOY." the Dreadnought said, breaking the silence.
The Boy turned to look at him, his face still and emotionless.
Unable to form the right words without scaring the Boy away, the Dreadnought simply bent one of it's knees, lowering the barrel of it's heavy bolter to the pavement.
The Boy, confused, looked in askance at the multi-ton machine.
"I CANNOT HOLD THIS POSITION FOREVER, BOY." the Dreadnought rumbled.
Hesitant, the Boy placed a foot on the side of the Dreadnought's arm, grabbing further up it's chasis and hauling himself up.
The Dreadnought, content and silent, resumed his movement.
Nothing else needed to be said, and both of the travelers understood that.
And so the Dreadnought lumbered on, striding past burnt-out vehicles and shell-craters with the ragged Boy riding atop his shoulder, lulled by the repetitive motion of the machine's treading steps.
"...Lord?" the Boy said quietly, his voice barely picked up by the Dreadnought's audio sensors.
"YES?" the Dreadnought replied, lowering the overall volume in a doomed attempt to sound softer.
"Do... do you think we'll find anyone in the city?" the Boy asked shyly, his tone indicating that he was thinking of his family.
For a moment, the Dreadnought did not respond, unable to formulate the proper words.
"...I DO NOT KNOW, BOY. BUT IF WE DO NOT, THEN WE WILL CONTINUE OUR SEARCH." the Dreadnought answered slowly, unable to gauge the Boy's reaction.
It had been too long since the Dreadnought had interacted with his fellow Man, and though he may be a genetically-engineered superhuman confined to a metal coffin/warmachine, the Dreadnought was still a Man.
"...Alright." the Boy stoically agreed.
Off into the evening the pair travelled, both content to stay silent.
Sometimes, nothing needed to be said. The Dreadnought had oft wished his annoying Space Marine brothers would stop pestering him to tell the tales of the old days, hoping for some maturity or stoicism, and he found that very quality in a Boy, of all things.