The Emperor of Mankind brought stability wherever he went. Regardless of if it was upon the battlefield, on a planet, or in the void itself – wherever he went, things went just as he predicted. A calming presence radiated from him, into the entirety his ship, the Imperator Somnium. Quiet, precise, and well-thought actions were the ideals that every man under his command, from lowly crewman to his most trusted Custodian Guard, all acted without fear, panic, confusion, or impulse.
It might as well have been a universal law, Hykanatoi Naris Pullo thought as his beliefs were challenged by the swarming crew on the hangar deck. Having been summoned to investigate the lower hangar as reports reached the Emperor's ears of something so wild and unbelievable that they were tantamount to insanity, Naris walked with purpose, his auramite power-armor demanding silence from the mortal crewmen who scattered and bowed at his presence.
It was not strange, being treated in such a way by those of shorter stature, and lesser importance in the Emperor's vision. Often, he, or his superiors were treated as though they were either living statues, or an extension of the Emperor's authority. Often, both of those beliefs were in fact, true.
Here though, as he looked at what the Fury Interceptor pilots had hooked and dragged in, he was an investigator. Acting as the eyes, ears, and judgement of his captain, Naris now was ordered to be reflective, critical, and analyze the situation for what it was, and then act in accordance to his beliefs.
Although not yet speaking, many began to intuit his intent. Crewmen, uninvolved to the situation, began to flee from the hangar. The pilots whose scouting sortie had brought the rumors to his master's ears stood front and center as he knelt down beside the fallen Adeptus Astartes they had seemingly found in the void. Radiating their own concern and confusion, the two men would wait as he analyzed the black ceramite, the strange, unseen iconography, and the injuries the man below him had succumbed to.
Naris did not touch the body of the Astartes, even though his curiosity willed him to. Wanting to examine the strange alien blades, nearly chitinous, broken and embedded within the plating of the dead man, Naris maintained himself as he looked at the patchwork repair job on the warrior's armor. Taking in the scars, the battle-plate having suffered all manner of damage, only to be repaired and cobbled together, Naris could not help but feel disdain for the one who had fallen in such an ignoble state.
Yet what confused him most was the armor's model, yet the barely damaged helmet. Staring into the dead lenses of someone who had patched together their armor to the point of being unrecognizable to him, Naris paused… and then looked up to the two waiting mortal pilots that stiffened as he shifted his helmeted head to them.
"This was what was creating the distress beacon?"
"Y-yes, lord." The first pilot stated, confusing him greatly.
"Where is his vessel? Was it left in the void?"
The two men glanced to each other. Naris, annoyed at the unspoken words being said between their eyes, would speak again.
"Well?"
"L-lord, he… he didn't have a vessel."
Nonsense.
But… the two wouldn't so blatantly lie.
He stood up, sensing these two pilots were being truthful.
"Refuel, and search for it. He might have been catapulted from his cockpit, or… launched, towards us." Naris ordered, activating his internal communicator and speaking his orders to the medical staff aboard the vessel through his helm's vox. "I need a medical team in hangar Secundus. Immediately."
Having been put in charge of the continued investigation of the mystery Astartes, Naris felt quite annoyed that he would not be present with the Emperor as he stepped foot on the planet's moon. Knowing his duty demanded him finish what was assigned to him, despite his every instinct demanding he accompany and protect the Emperor from any potential threats, Naris stood sentinel as the mortal scientist and doctor worked to investigate the currently naked Astartes.
In this moment, he wished that they had an Astartes Apothecary aboard. These mortal men, specializing in medicine for those who shared their biology, had to make several references to normally classified information to make sense of the dead warrior's injuries. Slowing their work greatly as they took several imaging scans, collecting the serrated blades that had punched through the ceramite that Naris had to help tear off, the doctors tiredly made their prognosis to him.
They had at least beat the technicians that were still hacking into the armor's security footage, Naris silently complimented as he was spoken at to.
"Subject has died of injuries sustained in both hearts, and three lungs. Organ failure caused suffocation, and… well. Brain death."
Naris approached the table for the first time… and looked down on the corpse that was missing both of his legs. Looking at the aged, weathered, horribly scarred, and broken face of the warrior… Naris could not help but feel jealousy, at the amount of scars the dead man had earned well before his death. Wondering what kind of torture this warrior had suffered, or what war had caused so many mending issues, Naris eventually tilted his head in observational confusion.
The Astarte was smiling.
The warrior had died smiling, his rigor mortis locking the soft crease of his lips into place.
"What should be noted is that substantial gamma radiation is laced all over his left flank. Non-harmful, but… still, very noticeable, sir." The scientist informed him… and as he paused at that, he would be given an alarming comment. "As well as another, unknown energy reading."
"Unknown energy?" He asked, getting a nod from the scientist who had access to tools capable of identifying all matters of energy particles. Confused by such a statement, Naris reflected on the alien nature of this case, and questioned the man. "The blades that punctured him. What of they?"
"I am unsure." The biologist of the pair stated, hazarding a guess. "They look vaguely insectoid. Definitely alien, but… currently, I have nothing in my records showing anything like this."
Nodding to the scientists who had access to all of the information on the ship, Naris thought for a moment… and then was satisfied with their work.
"Write up everything you've done. The Emperor himself may read your reports." Naris ordered, and then moved towards the door – but was halted as the biologist cleared his throat.
"Ahem. Sir?"
He waited, and would get the most mysterious commentary from the man so far.
"Although we are unable to identify the gene-seed from which this Astartes comes from, we have identified his age."
"His age?"
"Y-yes." The man started… but then hesitated. Staring at the one who had lost his nerve to speak the truth, Naris made his demand.
"Tell me if you think it important."
"It… is, but…" The biologist stated, his current partner speaking for him.
"But it is nigh unbelievable, my lord."
"Why?" He asked, the biologist finding his nerve once more, and making an insane claim.
"For… he is just over six-hundred years old."
Naris blinked at that.
"That's impossible." He bluntly stated.
The Astartes had only been around for four centuries. There wasn't a way for this one to be two centuries older than that.
Let alone would they allow an Astartes so ancient to be in a combat role. He would be an experiment, on the mental capacity of the augmentations and of personality degeneration an Astartes went through as they aged.
"How were you able to date this?" He asked, the man giving a quick response.
"His sinew coils, sir. They are the only cybernetic placed inside an Astarte during mid-stage augmentations. We were able to pull its usage data."
Naris hadn't even known the implant had that sophistication, he noted as he spoke… still having doubt in their words.
"Double check your work, then. Machines can always fail." He ordered… but looking at the aged, war-torn warrior that truly looked his age, Naris… shook himself, unable to believe that this warrior was three times older than the entire Great Crusade.
"Naris." His captain-general stated as he arrived to the hall. Having found out that Valdor had pulled the mortal machinists from interacting with the Astarte power armor, Naris saluted his superior with his spear, and come to attention, remaining there even as he was spoken to. "Your investigation seems to have become quite the mystery, hasn't it?"
"Yes, captain." He stated… and then looking at the helmet that Valdor had connected to a computer in their briefing room, Naris spoke up. "I was hoping answers could be found through the combat footage of the man."
"We are of the same mind… however, the mortal technicians have struck a wall in terms of the security of this man's helmet. It is quite something, compared to the easy-to-access recorders of other Astartes, even with those of similar models." Valdor explained, before shifting his eyes to the subordinate that he had ordered to take on this investigation. "Yet, why did you not check the recorders of the Fury Interceptors who claimed the body first?"
He paused at that.
"I sent them back out to search for the man's vessel. Did they return?"
"Yes… and had you checked their footage first, you would have seen that he did not arrive in a vessel."
What?
He believed his captain-general, but… that was impossible, wasn't it?
His posture must have spoken for him, as Valdor turned the monitor of his computer towards him, and pulled up the recorded footage.
Naris had to squint and approach to truly make out what he was seeing, but…
"What?" Naris whispered as he saw a zoomed-in, blurry, but very obvious picture of a humanoid latched onto the body that had been recovered. Seeing a helmet with two, shining eyes of silver behind the protective face screen, creating a sharp lens flare in their ship's camera, Naris leaned backwards as the vaguely feminine, or perhaps child, form turned towards the clearly dead Astarte, and then… simply vanished after producing a static pulse in the imaging system.
Repeating him, Valdor let out a scoff. "'What,' indeed. Wait until you see the message that was left for us on the planet's satellite, and things just become more confusing."
Alarmed at the news that something had occurred on this planet's moon without him being present, Naris turned to the one who seemed rather pleased with the investigation, or at least the mystery of it.
Naris had accompanied Valdor when their computer had alerted him that the combat footage of the Astarte had been properly processed. Having been surprised that their captain-general had remained on the ship while the Emperor descended upon the planet he had now named, 'Hisperia,' Naris glanced at the expressionless face of his superior as they continued to watch the last hour of the Astarte's life.
Starting at the end of the Astarte's combat footage, Valdor had proved the recorded imaging from the Fury Interceptor had not been manufactured. There really had been a feminine creature that had stayed with the warrior until he had expired. A modified human perhaps, the creature reminding Naris of the assassins that the Emperor employed… but it was being far too emotive, he decided. Having watched from the perspective of the dying Astartes, his view holding onto the entity that freed ceramite plaster from his tactical belt, trying to desperately save the life of one that now lay dead on a slab of metal, he…
Naris felt a pang of jealousy, as he watched the creature hug into the torso of the Astarte whose recording ceased upon the end of his life. Knowing that neither he, nor Valdor, would ever be grieved should they die, nor would they grieve for a fellow custodian, Naris… looked at the still face of Valdor that contemplated what they saw.
Until he started from the beginning of the man's last hour of life.
Again, the figure. Standing in a hallway of… unknown substances. It's eyes, obscured behind it's helmet face-shield, looking up at the warrior. They clearly spoke, although no audio came from their computer… and then the Astarte broke combat doctrine. He took off his helmet, perhaps for less than twelve seconds. Unable to take his eyes away from the screen as he studied the interaction, he watched as the warrior handed off… an aquila.
Naris glanced to the helmet that was missing its insignia, having assumed it had been broken off in combat. Realizing the warrior had removed the symbol of the Emperor as a parting gift, Naris shifted his head back as Valdor spoke up.
"They have a nuclear device."
Pausing the footage, Naris would confirm what was being shown.
This warrior had indeed carried a nuclear bomb, held together by an ad-hoc metal contraption. Unsure what suicidal operation demanded that a boarding crew of Astartes detonate a nuclear bomb anywhere, Naris paused as he watched the marine's perspective change, leaping down into… a strange, tubular, muscular hallway.
"What are those?" Naris asked, as he looked at the man's companions, each Astarte slightly taller and lither, and in different models of power armor than even the one they had freed from the body below. Completely foreign, Naris was beginning to believe that this human was not even related to the Astartes, but some other human civilization that had been conquered… but the fact that the helmet itself was from this generation of power armor that their Astarte's used immediately discredited that idea.
It was confusing… but more so, as he watched these unknown Space Marines begin to combat with a truly alien xeno race. Having believed himself knowledgeable on all hostile xeno races, he now leaned backwards as Valdor took a seat, and leaned forward towards the monitor in unspeaking concentration.
He had rewatched the footage three times, pausing several times, making commentary to his captain-general that was preparing to brief the Emperor planet-side. Wishing that the combat footage recorded audio, or at least the short-range communicators that the helmeted warriors had used to speak with one another, Naris would be given a final question from Valdor as he stood up, and gathered the helmet.
"What did you think of that creature? The one in the beginning, and the end?"
"The… teleportation device it must have had was… something." Naris stated, unsure just how far the creature had teleported the Space Marine to avoid the detonation of the nuclear bomb. "I cannot hazard a guess how far it teleported… but it must have been several light-years, despite being man-portable."
"Light-years? What makes you say that?" Valdor questioned him, which Naris had to make an unfounded assumption for.
"It teleported the pair of them here, didn't it?" Naris asked, never having seen the Astarte armor, weapons, nor their foe before despite having access to all knowledge of known hostile xeno races. Doubting the swarming, insectoid creatures would be missed in their Empire, regardless of these… unclassified Astartes combating them, Naris had to make his assumption with what little facts he knew. "Until we find their ship, or the xeno-craft they destroyed, it… why are you smiling, Valdor?"
"It is very logical, is all."
"Do you have a different answer then, captain?"
"I do… but one that will not be easily accepted."
Naris spoke, unsure why the man was being evasive now, after they both had come so far.
"Well, what is it?"
"What if… they did not teleport a great distance, but a small distance?"
That didn't make sense.
"That doesn't make sense." Naris stated bluntly, his captain's words suggesting something truly nonsensical. "Are you saying that the combat we witnessed took place… here?"
"Yes."
Naris had to be missing something, as Valdor showed more expression in this moment than he had ever seen the captain-general ever express before. Seeing a near mad light enter the man's eyes, knowing Valdor to be a beacon of serenity, calm, and surety through the training of their master, Naris… felt uncomfortable by the one who was arguably the most trusted warrior the Emperor took council from.
Yet, Naris also didn't like it when the calm, stoic expression of Valdor returned, as if… disappointed in him.
"You don't understand, do you, Naris?"
"I apologize, captain."
"You need not." Valdor dismissed, placing the Astarte's helmet in a careful security bag as he prepared to depart to rejoin the Emperor. Giving out his final orders, Valdor would lock eyes with him… which Naris accepted without question. "Ensure the body remains untampered with. He will be brought to Terra to be properly studied by the Magos Biologis there."
"Yes, captain." Naris confirmed, getting a nod from the one who placed his own helmet on his head. Standing at attention as his captain-general lifted his mighty weapon, Naris's would be given an implied warning as Valdor departed with the evidence the pair of them had studied for the better part of four hours
"I need not tell you that this mystery is best kept between us, until the Emperor makes his decision on how relevant it is to our mission here."
Taking the censure for what it was, Naris lowered his head in acceptance, and silently bid farewell to his captain…
But as he wasn't informed of what their master was even doing on the planet, he supposed that Hisperia would be a planet of secrets.
Or mysteries that he wasn't supposed to know the answer to, Naris thought to himself as he went about performing the next task he had been given.