Rogue Eldar: Malcula

by WyrmWyrld

15,000 years of blissful ignorance comes to an end as the planet Malcula is rediscovered by the Imperium of Man. To Walter, a lost young man who struggles with understanding his forgotten past, these strangers and their God-Emperor may provide the answers he's been looking for or bring destruction to his entire world.

5. There is

Chapter 5: There is…

Walter's head burned as he tried to recall what happened. There was a ship and a man with a powdered wig and robotic eye. Kara was talking with him, but then there was a gunshot. Kara! Where was Kara? Walter tried to open his eyes, but he couldn't. His body was numb as he felt like he was adrift in darkness.

"Let go. It will be alright." A choir of voices called out from the darkness. Some sounded masculine, while others sounded feminine, all of their pitches changing.

Walter thought about saying, "Who are you?" but he couldn't move his mouth.

"I've been watching you since the day you were born. I've been by your side on your happiest and most painful days. I've fed on your desires, but oh, how you've teased me by avoiding all those parties. At least we had last year. You were almost mine!"

At that moment, Walter felt pain and pleasure throughout his body. It was like being hugged and stabbed everywhere all at once. His nose was enflamed by foul and beautiful perfumes, creating an aroma that was impossible to describe.

"I know you!" Walter screamed, even though his mouth remained frozen. "You were the woman that chaced me last New Year! You've been stalking me? What do you want with me?"

The darkness disappeared, but Walter soon wished it had remained. All around him were swirling pink, purple, and black waves of smoke and flesh. Horrible figures emerged and twisted into worse forms all around Walter as he heard distorted laughter and screams.

"I am so much more than that," said the mysterious voices. "I am the Dark Prince, the Lord of Excess, She Who Thirsts, and I have come for your sweet, delicious soul!"

Then, there was darkness. For a moment, Walter thought he was dead and that whoever that thing was had managed to steal his soul. But to his joy, he heard the comforting tune of Jerry's wristwatch ticking. He was lying down and could bend his fingers and toes. Walter opened his eyes only to be met with a large-nosed green creature staring back at him. It was the size of a small child but had a disproportionately large bald head with yellow jagged teeth and tattered ears. The creature winced when it saw Walter looking at it and jumped away.

"Boss, 'da knife earz is awake," the green person squealed.

Walter sat up but clutched his chest. The pain was horrible but not even close to what he had felt in his vision, and at least this pain was fading fast. Figuring out who the Dark Prince was would have to wait. First, Walter needed to learn where Belvedere had brought him. He was on a medical table without his shirt but had red bandages around his torso. The room was messy, with rusty tools, strange bones, and papers with crude drawings, all scattered on the floor and shelves. The rust-colored walls were stained with dried splatter marks of various colors that smelled like old copper. Looking around the room, Walter spotted six more green creatures and felt terrible for them as he noticed some were missing limbs or eyes. Walter was about to greet them when he heard something stomping behind him.

"Well, look 'oo decided ta wake up, an' 'da fun was jus beginn'n," said a voice in the same accent as the smaller creatures but sounding much louder and guttural. Walter turned around and saw a massive beast of a person examining him with red eyes, one organic, the other mechanical with a cracked lens.

"Who are you?!" Walter asked.

"I iz yer doctor. Kall me, DokChoppa," the supposed doctor said through the jagged metal plate that made up his lower jaw. In many ways, DokChoppa was like the smaller creatures. Green with sharp yellow teeth and tattered ears, but DokChoppa was much larger, only had two slits for a nose, and somebody had replaced his left arm with a mechanic's nightmare. It had three massive claws and dozens of haphazardly attached saws, scalpels, drills, and blow torches. Part of DokChoppa's scalp was missing, with only a filthy glass dome covering his visible brain. He wore only a blood-stained butcher's apron, baggy trousers, and torn boots.

"What happened to you? Are you alright?" Walter asked.

"OI, WHO ERE IZ DA ZOGG'N DOCTOR!? I IZ 'DA WUN ASK'N 'DA QUESTIONS ERE, KNIFE EARS!"

Walter flinched and nodded his head submissively. He watched DokChoppa silently as the strange cyborg walked around the table. With his good hand, DokChoppa put on a pair of battered glasses with no lens, which he pulled from a pocket in his apron. It was impossible for Walter not to notice the Imperium's two-headed eagle burnt on top of DokChoppa's hand.

"Right, question wun. Do ya feel like yer're dying?"

Walter felt another tight pain and let out a sigh. "Not anymore, but it still hurts."

"Den toughen up, ya git!"

The smaller creatures chuckled at DokChoppa's response as he prepared his next question.

"Okay, question two. Wot kolor am I?"

"Green."

"Gud. Green iz best kolor. Now, question tree. Do ya get da spiritual urge ta krump someth'n when ya shout WAAAGH!?"

Walter was petrified with fear and confusion by the doctor suddenly screaming. Unsure what to do and shaking uncontrollably, Walter thought back to all the doctors he had visited back home. All of them were so friendly and patient, unlike DokChoppa.

"Do you want me to say ahh?" Walter said, sticking his tongue out.

"No stupid. I want ya ta scream WAAAGH!"

"Waaagh?"

"Yer're not even try'n. WAAAGH!" DokChoppa roared in Walter's face, spraying him with spit.

"WAAAGH!" Walter cried out, eyes closed and red from stress.

"Betta. Do ya feel anything?"

"No! I want to go home!"

DokChoppa backed away and shook his head. "Da blood transfusion was an utta failure. Not even ork blood kould turn ya into a propa git. Oh, well, always next time."

Walter tried to roll off the table, hoping there would never be a next time, but DokChoppa pushed him back with his metal claws.

"Last question. Question numba five."

"Do you mean question four?"

"Oi! Wot did I say about 'oo ere iz ask'n 'da questions?"

"I'm sorry, I'm so sorry!"

DokChoppa snorted and then scratched his brain dome. "Right, onto question numba umm…six. Wot, do ya remember before all dis?"

Walter blinked as he tried to recall the events that led him here. He considered correcting DokChoppa's counting again but decided it was better for his health if he didn't.

"I had a scary vision. There were these voices, and…and-" Walter couldn't finish. Just thinking about what he had experienced while he was unconscious made him feel violated. He just wanted to curl up somewhere in his house with his mom and dad.

"I ain't ask'n about ya bad dreams. Iz jus ask'n if ya rememba be'n shot!"

"Not much, but that's another issue. I do remember getting shot. It must have been a mistake. I think I frightened Lord Belvedere."

"Right, so ya rememba da important stuff. 'Umiez sure iz stupid, dough. Normally, when ya shoot something, ya keep shoot'n it. Neva known a 'umie ta shoot an' den fix up a knife ears."

Walter blinked in confusion. Not wanting to upset the doctor with another question, Walter tried to choose his words and inflections carefully. He hoped to phrase his questions as statements.

"A 'umie, means human," Walter began.

"Yez," DokChoppa confirmed.

"And you called me a knife ear."

"I did, 'dat's wot ya are."

"So I'm a human with knife-like ears."

DokChoppa gave a long, heavy sigh and wiped his face with his non-robotic hand. "No stupid. You iz a knife earz, also known as pointy-eared gits. Medically known as eldar. Grots, bring in da X-rays."

The smaller creatures raced into another room and came back carrying parchment papers. DokChoppa sorted through them until he pulled out two pages. One had a crudely drawn stick figure man, and the other was also a stick figure but slightly taller and with two triangles for ears.

"While on 'da surface, both gits look similar, 'da eldar got plenty uv more gifts dan da average 'umie. For starters, an eldar's heart beats much fasta dan a 'umie's, so much 'n fact, if we was ta put yer heart 'n a 'umie's body, da 'umie would krump demselves from gett'n too much blood flow'n throo 'em. I know, I've tried 'dat before."

Walter placed a hand on his chest and felt his heartbeat. It was fast, but that was expected; he was scared. Not to mention, all this stress could not be good for his OCD, ADHD, autism, and whatever other mental disorder he hadn't been diagnosed with yet. Walter was so busy trying to think of excuses he didn't realize he had stopped trying to count how many beats his heart had done in a millisecond. He listened to DokChoppa's report, paying close attention as the Ork pointed to various parts of the stick figure drawings.

"Ya don't develop fat, so no matta how much we feed ya, ya will always be a skinny git. At 'da very least, ya got dense muscles, so ya kan at least drow a gud punch or karry a nice big shoota and choppa. Not as much as an ork, but orks iz da best at everyth'n. Ya also got more lumps 'n yer brain. Dis doesn't make ya smarter, but ya do sense fings betta dan anyone else kan. We all look slow ta ya. However, it also means ya kry about fings more dan 'umie gits. On da plus side, yer've got lots uv kontrol ova wot yer body duz. For 'ample, when I rip off a 'umie's arm, he kries an' screams like a little grot an' den diez. But when I rip an eldar's arm off, dey kan ignore it an keep fight'n'. Da blood hardens into flashy rock-like fings, stopp'n more blood from kom'n out an' fall'n off easia dan scabs on a 'umie."

It didn't make sense. Doctor Rains was the best doctor in town. He had three diplomas and graduated from the best university in the country. How did he miss all this? He couldn't have missed any of this. This thing, this ork, was just making stuff up. DokChoppa couldn't even count, so how could he know anything about medicine? What did it matter if Walter wasn't fat from eating pancakes every morning? He worked out a lot! So what if he was emotional and everything looked slow to him? That was just a side effect of all his mental conditions and drugs. As for the blood, that was just nonsense…right? Walter tried to think of a time when he bled to disprove DokChoppa's theory. It was then that Walter realized that despite being shot at with a laser gun and having just woken up from a messy surgery, he didn't feel the pain anymore.

DokChoppa either didn't notice or care about how well Walter took the news because he continued his report.

Lastly, ya will live longa dan any 'umie on dis ship, provid'n nobody krumps ya.

"How old am I now?" Walter asked.

"For an eldar, I sayz ya is still a little git. Not the littlest, but ya still got a wayz to go." After scratching his metal prosthetic chin, he gave an answer. "I iz not so gud wit' 'da kounting, but i'd say close ta a hundred."

"No, I'm nineteen! I'm nineteen years old!"

DokChoppa looked at Walter with a slack-jaw. He tried counting on his fingers and mumbled something under his breath until Walter felt something inside him snap. This doctor, this monster, had tormented him, injected him with blood that definitely wasn't compatible, and called him stupid when he couldn't even grasp the concept of two-digit numbers! Walter jumped out from his table and reached for one of the smaller creatures carrying parchment papers. DokChoppa tried to grab Walter, but he expected that. The ork's mechanical arm was too big and cumbersome to pose any threat to Walter now that he was serious. He danced around the claws as the ork growled, seemingly in slow motion to Walter. The small creatures tried to run away, but Walter was much faster and grabbed exactly nineteen pieces of paper from them before returning to DokChoppa. Walter grabbed each piece of paper, crumpled them up, and threw them at DokChoppa's face, counting out loud as he did.

"Seventeen, eighteen, nineteen! That's what nineteen is! I'm not an eldar, ork, or alien; I am a nineteen-year-old human!"

Walter was seething at the Ork, imagining what else he could do to hurt this bully. It didn't matter that DokChoppa was twice his size if Walter was twice as fast. He prepared for DokChoppa to retaliate, but to his shock, the doctor laughed.

"Ha! I ain't wun for kounting, but even I know an eldar like you iz much olda dan nineteen. But it looks like some uv ma blood did give ya some propa WAAAGH! energy 'n ya afta all."

No pain anymore. Walter had a hole in his chest, yet he just avoided a giant monster's claw without feeling anything. Walter looked around and noticed a battered door at the other end of the room. What happened next was a blur; all Walter could think about was running away.

"Kome back, we need ta schedule yer next blood transfusion!" DokChoppa's voice echoed through the dim hallways as Walter kept running. Past events flashed before Walter, but he struggled to identify facts from reality. In one moment, Walter felt like himself running towards the barn to escape a monster, but in the next, Walter was playing nuffle ball with Max and Gus trying to tackle him. Later, he was charging at a giant dog with a rake before clearing a strange obstacle course with slender and pointy-eared people like himself. What was real, and what was a dream?

He didn't stop running until he found himself on top of a steel bridge over a river of some foul-smelling liquid. Walter sat down, dangling his legs over the bridge as he looked at his bandages. They were red, which must mean he had red blood. Humans had red blood, so Walter must also be a human, but that was never in question. DokChoppa was a dangerous combination of insane and stupid, so he likely messed up the stitching. Just to see what the damage was, and for no other reason at all, Walter started to remove his bandages. All was normal until he got to the last few strains. Tiny red crystals fell off them as he peeled them away, and there were more of them on his chest where the doctor had stitched him up. Walter patted them away to see the wound had already mostly healed, with just a few stitch markings left. Walter let the bandages fall into the muck below. He considered throwing himself down there and sinking to the bottom until he heard a cat's meow.

A large, red, and thick-furred cat was sitting beside him. Its blue eyes stared at Walter with the same intensity as DokChoppa.

"Are you going to examine me too?" he asked.

The cat meowed back, and Walter could not help but laugh at its perfect timing. He slowly reached out his hand, paying close attention to any signs of distress from the animal. Thankfully, it felt comfortable enough to let him scratch it behind its ears. The purrs it let out were the most satisfying noise Walter had ever heard.

"Back home, on my planet. We have a couple of cats to catch pests. You'd probably like it a lot better there than on this ship. Everything is so big, confusing, and scary."

The cat continued to purr as it listened to Walter's ramblings.

"I guess I'm not human, but that's okay. I always knew I was different, but nothing changed. It just means I'll have more time to figure out what I will do now that I've graduated. I can probably help Mom and Dad on the farm for the rest of their lives."

Just as Walter was starting to relax, the cat scurried off. He considered chasing after it, but his mind was exhausted. All Walter wanted to do now was find a quiet place, away from the putrid sewage, and listen to his father's watch tick away. Then he would find Kara, and they would head back home to Malcula, and this nightmare would end.

Belvedere paced back and forth in front of the massive fireplace in the marble-floored meeting room. As he waited for his senior staff to arrive, his eyes kept peering at the mosaic portrait of the first Romulius. He was a grim man, thin and savage, wearing tattered rags and armor to protect him from the Ash Wastes he called home. He wore a coal-colored gas mask with glowing red dots where his pupils should be. To this day, Belvedere still wondered if it was a device in the mask to make him more intimidating or if he had a mutation strain that, by the Emperor's mercy, didn't get inherited. No Romulius, for the last twenty generations, knew what his face looked like as there were no other surviving photos or portraits.

"What would you do?" Belvedere asked his ancestor. "Would you even care?"

His attention was diverted when he heard the doors to the room open. He didn't have time to process who had just entered as a beautiful woman attempted to wrap her arms around Belvedere and jumped at him with so much force that he almost fell over. He hugged her back and lifted her as they spun around before he set her back down.

"Father!" The ship's high factotum and Belvedere's only child, Aphrodite Van Romulius, cheered. "Your return was so fast. Oh, could this planet be the one? Is this the one we're going to live on?"

Belvedere laughed as he tried to pull himself away from her. "Humans already inhabit it, but it's nothing like a hive world. These people have been on their own since the Age of Strife. It's a rare find and a fine addition for the Imperium, but it's not the paradise world our family has sworn to colonize!"

Aphrodite let go of her father and stared up at the first Romulius. In Belvedere's eyes, she was a lot like him in that both of them had nothing in common with Belvedere's appearance. Her hair was natural, silky, and as black as space with diamond hair pins. She had her mother's amber eyes and deep olive-toned skin free from warts, fat, blemishes, scars, or stitch marks from augmentations. However, no one could doubt she was his daughter. Her elegant high-collared dress, sewn by the finest seamstress on Holy Terra, had the same exotic and eye-catching shades of reds and blues that Belvedere wore. She also looked at the image of the first Romulius with the same fear and awe that a younger Belvedere once had when he used to look at it.

"What do you see in him?" Belvedere asked her.

"He's terrifying. It almost reminds me of Karl, but at least Karl keeps his uniform clean and doesn't have glowing eyes."

"Do you see any of yourself in him?" Belvedere asked.

Aphrodite tilted her head, trying to see if there was some hidden image or message within the mosaic, before she shook her head in defeat.

"Was he handsome under his mask? Did he have an eye for quality? Were we around the same height? I don't like tricks, Father. Could you please tell me what I'm supposed to see?"

Belvedere laughed, thinking back to when his mother, the rogue trader before him, had asked him to find any similarities between himself and the first Romulius. His answer was identical to Aphrodite's.

"Do you know what those tiles are made of?" Belvedere gave a hint, pointing to one of them.

"Glass and various stones," Aphrodite answered.

"Iron tiles from factory floors and refinery plants, sheets of metal from crash spaceships, bombshells and bullets, glass from storehouse windows, melted sand from the Ash Wastes—these were all things from the first Romulius's homeworld of Necromunda. His crew were all natives of the planet as well, and they each took a piece of their home with them. To honor their captain, they made this mural. Each piece represents a crew member. So when you look at that, what do you see?"

"A captain who was beloved by his crew. One who never forgot his homeworld, even though he traveled so far away from it and never returned. Someone who saw beauty in what others would write off as scrap for peasants. Is that what you want me to see in myself, Father?"

Belvedere smiled proudly. "It's what every Romulius should see in themselves!"

"Oh, Father, may we go to Necromunda someday? How poetic would it be that the first planet I set foot on should be our ancestral homeworld?"

"Necromunda will have to wait, but I promise we'll both go together once we've honored our family's ancient promise to find a new paradise world for the Imperium. Once we do that, the great houses of Necromunda will hold parades and celebrations for years in our name."

"Nobody will celebrate anything if you keep wasting resources like this!" Came the booming voice of the ship's seneschal, Grolsch. The man was nearly the size of an unarmored Astartes, and he shocked the floor with each step as he made his way to his oversized seat at the table. As he spoke, the various cybernetics implanted on the sides of his head whirred, and his blue bionic right eye flashed.

"The aquila has to be refueled and have its two RX-40-08 rocket engines recalibrated after you only spent less than an hour on that planet. Your ork pet used 34 staples on that eldar that could have gone to our officially sanctioned xeno mercenaries. And now we have to deal with that girl the Inquisitor is interrogating. I told you we should have observed the planet longer before establishing contact!"

"You brought new people onto the ship, Father?" Aphrodite asked.

"Yes. It wasn't planned, but an eldar surprised me, and I injured it. I had to bring both of them to the Titanborn to ensure their safety, although Inquisitor Hathorne has taken an interest in Kara."

"Will Kara and the eldar be okay?" Aphrodite asked.

"All will be handled in good time."

"I know they will!" Grolsch interjected, "Because I'm the one who always has to fix your mistakes!"

"So you've already been brainstorming. Several steps ahead as always, Grolsch!" Belvedere said, hoping to lighten the mood. He should have known better than to do that with his seneschal.

"Emperor, protect us," Grolsch said as he slowly dragged his mechanical left hand down his face.

The door opened as a man with even more cybernetics than Grolsch entered the room. Archmagos Talos was less of a man and more of a jumble of wires, gears, servos, claws, lightbulbs, and other devices all slapped together in the rough shape of a man wearing a red hooded robe. Talos's one green eye zoomed in and out as he observed everyone in the room before he took his seat. It was only for show as he no longer had legs, a back, or a bottom that could grow tired anymore.

"Request:" Talos began in a robotic voice, "I must be excused from this meeting in approximately 30.256 minutes. I have scheduled counsel from the prophet machine spirit."

"You mean the same thing that's only been accurate 25% of the time?" Grolsch asked.

"Defense: Do not question the prophet's powers. I have not fully connected with its machine spirit. Perhaps it senses the 1.25 percent of organic matter I still possess."

"Unfortunately, that 1.25 is your mind," a hoarse voice telepathically said to everyone in the room. The doors opened up, and two older men entered. One was tall, bony, ashy-skinned, bald, and had grey, unmoving eyes that looked like dust was covering them. He wore a dark cyan hooded robe with oversized sleeves and used a large staff with a golden eye symbol at the top of it as his walking stick. The other man was stocky with light skin covered in wrinkles. The only things whiter than his hair were his liturgical vestment and triregnum.

"Astropath Phlamel, Father Stewgart, welcome! Please take your seats".

The two elders went to their cushioned chairs, although Phlamel struggled to find his place until Aphrodite helped him.

"Thank you, Lady Aphrodite," Phlamel said to her in his unmistakable hoarse voice.

Father Stewgart ignored everyone, content to snack on some purple fruit he had brought. Just as Stewgart had finished his sixth fruit, two more people arrived. One was a woman in her forties with light-golden skin, raven hair, and a scar from the bottom of her right cheek to the bridge of her nose. She wore the standard commissar uniform: a black coat with red lining on the collar and cuffs, gold epaulets, a peaked officer's cap with red lining, and black pants and combat boots.

The sixty-year-old pink man behind her was a tall gentleman with a thick mustache covering his mouth, and that was the only hair on his head. A few cables stuck out from the back of his scalp from the various brain augments Talos had gifted him over the years. His white gloves were stainless, his boots were polished, and his navy uniform was pressed and covered with medals, some of which Belvedere fondly remembered awarding his void-master.

"Arch-militant Stone, Void-master Sullivan, any updates I should be aware of before we begin tonight's meeting?" Belvedere asked.

"Addam and Karl finished transporting the eldar," Stone answered. "Thankfully, the inquisitor didn't deem them as a threat. They're in the barracks awaiting orders."

"As for that eldar, he's sulking in the lowest decks," Sullivan added. "Now, can we please get this meeting over quickly for once, Romulius? I must closely watch the crew with an inquisitor around."

"Wait," Grolsch interrupted. "We should wait until we're all here, even if our navigator is running late…for the 125th time in a row."

"Why bother?" Father Stewgart asked, now paying attention to the meeting. "The mutant never contributes anything meaningful, and I doubt he even pays attention to matters that do not relate to himself."

Phlamel nodded. "I must agree with Stewgart on this. Leontius can be rather difficult, and I'd like to rest this headache of mine. It's been growing more intense since we last left the Warp, and Emperor knows dealing with that inquisitor didn't help it."

Sullivan and Stone had taken their seats, and after waiting ten more minutes, Belvedere felt his knuckles begin to sweat as he began to imagine what Hathorne could be doing to Kara. He looked at Aphrodite. She was around Kara's age, so Kara was likely still close to her parents, too. If Hathorne had so much as pricked off a strange of hair off Aphrodite, Belvedere knew he would fight the Emperor's custodes to be rid of that inquisitor. They needed to get this meeting started now. Belvedere sat on his large, cushioned throne, which hovered slightly over the round table his senior crew members surrounded. Sensing their master was ready to give a speech, his servo-skulls sprung to life and began recording.

"Valued members of the Titanborn, you have been summoned by your captain to help decide the fate of the first two people I've encountered on the planet of Malcula, soon to be Romulius Prime. As some of you are already aware, during my historic landing on the lost human world below us, I was greeted by a young lady named Kara, who was followed by an eldar. These are our first contacts with the planet, so I, therefore, believe they will be crucial in establishing an efficient merger of this planet with the Imperium."

"Inquiry: The adolescent woman is logical, but why does the aeldari matter?" Talos asked. "Have they been trading with the humans of this world?"

"No. This eldar's been living with the humans and believes to be one himself," Sullivan answered. "I've been watching him over the cameras running around the lower decks in duress after DokChoppa told him he wasn't human. If this is all an act, it's very good."

"I'm beginning to believe it's genuine," said Belvedere. "No eldar would ever tolerate living with humans, much less acting like one." Belvedere sighed and looked down at the laspistol in his bejeweled holster. "With all this in mind, I now feel guilty for shooting him."

"Father, why did you shoot an eldar?"

"Why didn't he just kill it?" Stewgart asked, spitting bits of fruit skins as he became more impassioned. "As is one of the tenets of the Ecclesiarchy: 'purge the heretic, beware the psyker and mutant, and abhor the alien.' It is the right of humanity to rule the galaxy, so why, captain, do you allow this vile creature to live?"

Belvedere felt his mouth dry as he and the crew glanced at the ship's psyker astropath, Phlamel, who was uncomfortably scratching the back of his neck. Depending on who you asked in the Imperium, psykers were some of the most dangerous mutants, but they were too useful to be rid of.

"Why don't we just go around the table and hear everyone's thoughts on the Eldar? All voices are equal here after all," Belvedere said from his massive hovering throne. "Grolsch, then Talos, and Phlamel. Stewgart's already spoken, so we'll finish with Stone and Sullivan."

Grolsch began by groaning and tapping the side of his head. "If this eldar truly thinks he is human, then I doubt he is in contact with the rest of his kind. His value to us is diminished, and as long as we have an unsanctioned xeno on this ship, we're at more risk from Hathorne or eldar corsairs, who might want him back with his kind. Either you put him to work as a sanctioned xeno, or we cut our losses and get rid of him."

Talos followed. "Advice: The aeldari are protective of their own. Even if this is a defective one, we could use him as leverage to acquire samples of aeldari technology. Perverted though it may be, it can be purified if studied and reverse-engineered by human hands."

"I'm very curious about this eldar," said Phlamel. He appears to be an adult or sub-adult. This means he could be almost a century old, yet he still thinks he is human. What could have affected his mind to such a degree? As for what we should do with him. While I admit we've had unpleasant incidents with the aeldari before, a trained one loyal to the Imperium could be helpful for you and your daughter and descendants."

Father Stewgart muttered something insulting about psykers, another about how all this seemed heretical, and numerous other insults. Nevertheless, he had spoken his peace earlier, and while Belvedere was a pious Emperor-fearing man, he didn't feel like listening to another sermon. It was Stone's turn now.

"I've fought against eldar before, but I've also fought alongside them once. This eldar is a unique situation that I don't think we should ignore. However, he is still a xeno, and if you deem him a threat, I will execute him myself."

"No!" Sullivan blurted out. "The Titanborn is a trading ship, not a battleship. If other eldar find out we killed one of their youths, we could be attacked. I am not putting this ship at such risk. Therefore, I strongly suggest you put that thing back on the planet and be done with this nonsense."

"I take it you don't want Walter as a sanctioned xeno?" Belvedere asked Sullivan.

"Who's Walter?"

"That's what the eldar calls himself."

"It's quite a charming name," Aphrodite mused.

"It's an insulting name!" Stewgart yelled. "The human form is divine, sacred, blessed by the Emperor. This eldar is mocking the human spirit by pretending to be one, and now he mocks us even further by appropriating a human name!"

"Wait, wouldn't it be flattering if he wanted to use a human name?" Aphrodite asked. "Also, human names do vary a lot."

"Back to my point," Sullivan said, raising his tone. "The eldar doesn't have to die, but he can't stay here. Bring in too many xenos, and they could start rebelling, kidnapping humans, or Emperor knows what else. I'm not fond of our current ones, and we don't need another defective one."

Various crew members nodded, shook their heads, and chattered with themselves. Belvedere was ready to make his decision when Grolsch pointed to Aphrodite.

"What are your thoughts, High Factotum?"

All eyes turned to Aphrodite as she sat on her chair, looking like someone had just smacked her. "Oh, thank you, but I am only here to observe."

"Quiet right, and you're doing a marvelous job, Aphrodite!" Belvedere said, almost dancing in his chair. At this, Grolsch slammed the table with his iron fist. The already massive crack in front of him grew a few more centimeters.

"She's a grown woman, Belvedere, and will be the future captain. She needs some responsibilities besides appraisal and proofreading your accounts!"

"But…she's so young."

"She's twenty-two Terran years old, Belvedere!"

"That's still young. One of my great-great-great grandfathers lived to be 400."

The crowd unanimously criticized Belvedere. Aphrodite gave an uncomfortable smile, unsure if this was good or bad. All the while, the servo-skull scribes wrote every comment in the chaotic ramblings. Even Talos beeped a long string of binary, unintelligible to everyone else in the room. Nevertheless, the servo-skulls still recorded his response.

"01000101 01100001 01110100 00100000 01110011 01101000 01101001 01110100 00101100 00100000 01000010 01100101 01101100 01110110 01100101 01100100 01100101 01110010 01100101 00100001"

Despite all the feedback, Belvedere desperately wanted to say no and move on with the meeting. It was bad enough that she had to listen to such unpleasant talks and hear people question her father's authority and judgment, but he didn't need harsh criticism thrown her way now. These people would likely be her future advisors, so it was best to avoid turning any of them into potential enemies. However, Grolsch had a point, and it was hard to turn down the idea now that Aphrodite was looking up at Belvedere with eyes like stars. He nodded and motioned for her to give her opinion. She stood up, straightened her dress, and cleared her throat.

"Well, if Father thought Walter was a threat, he wouldn't have healed him. Therefore, I see no reason why we shouldn't treat him as a friend."

The room went quiet as everyone waited for more details, of which Aphrodite had none. Belvedere forced a smile, as while he admired his child's golden heart, she had yet to witness eldar diverting a ravenous hive fleet of tyranids to an unsuspecting human world, have an entire ship destroyed just so the xenos could collect some shiny rocks, or hide away from a dark eldar raid and pray to the God-Emperor that they didn't take you alive. Everyone, even those who offered mercy to Walter, knew friendship with a xeno was out of the question. Belvedere had to change the subject and move the meeting along to save his daughter's reputation.

"Very good. To form a temporary alliance, we shall make Walter a sanctioned xeno and keep a watchful eye over him."

"Fine," Grolsch said. "I'll schedule his branding and fill out the documents. It's best to do it soon. Hathorne is no doubt already planning to discredit you for having a currently unsanctioned xeno on board."

"Oh, about that. I mentioned earlier to her that he was a corsair. You may want to add that to the paperwork."

Grolsch strangled the air and gritted his teeth but still managed to nod. Right on time, Talos rose from his seat and made his way to the main door.

"Do you have to leave? We need to discuss what to do about Kara!" Belvedere asked.

"Reminder: My meeting with the prophet can not be ignored. It's machine spirit calls to me."

Right after Talos left, the door opened up again, and a young-looking man entered. He wore black robes with blood-red emblems, dark details, and jewels embedded throughout. Deep violet hair rolled down from his unnaturally shiny skin. He reeked of burnt musky lho-sticks. The most notable feature about him was his void-like eyes. They were pitch black, save for his purple ring-like irises. A silver piece of jewelry covered his forehead, where the Navigator's third eye rested.

"Lord Leontius of house Minodoya, you finally arrived," Grolsch said, tapping his fingers on the table.

"I'm surprised the meeting hasn't finished by now," Leontius answered before approaching Phlamel. "I'd like to sit here."

"What? But you have Talos's seat as well as your own," Phlamel argued.

"Yes, but my chair hasn't been warmed, and Talos's has oil stains. Yours will do. I need to be at my most relaxed to navigate the Warp."

"Lord Leontius, that's not-" Aphrodite started to say before Phlamel raised a withered hand.

"It's not worth it. I'll change seats. Let's move along with the meeting."

Once Leontius and Phlamel had sat down, Belvedere straightened his wig before moving on to the second portion of the meeting. "Now that the fate of the Eldar has been settled, we can-

Belvedere stopped when an alarm flashed in his augmented eye. Grolsch and Sullivan lifted their heads up as their various bionic implants alerted them as well.

"By the Throne, now what?" Grolsch said, dripping with annoyance.

A wall of information passed by Belvedere's sight, but the most important part was highlighted for him.

[Planetary-based ballistic missile approaching]

Everything else involved calculating the missile's speed, trajectory, and size. Belvedere felt his staff was better equipped to understand this information.

"Oh, I think someone on Romulius Prime is trying to attack us," Belvedere said, mainly to inform the non-augmented crew members present. "I didn't think they had missiles capable of orbital flight."

"Warhead with a yield of approximately fifteen kilotons from the looks of it," Grolsch replied. "It was only a matter of time before they noticed us and tried something. We've been hovering over the planet for days. Did Kara and her eldar suspect anything when you found them?

"No, and I landed in a remote spot. They were ignorant of the existence of the Titanborn."

"Then the planet's leaders probably want to deal with us quietly to avoid widespread panic. I also doubt the average citizen has access to advanced telescopes. Sullivan, can you handle this?"

Sullivan nodded and pulled out a disc-shaped vox-caster from one of his pockets. "Set void shields to full power and direct them to the starboard side of the hull." Once he gave the order to the crew on the bridge, everyone waited quietly for a few seconds.

[Impact to shields. Estimated damage to ship: 0.00%]

"All cleared," Grolsch confirmed to the disinterested crew.

Stone shook her head before commenting. "Firing a warhead into an Imperium ship with an inquisitor on board. It doesn't matter if it was ineffective; if we don't act, Hathorne will."

"Quite right, Madam Stone," Belvedere replied. "Sullivan, I wish for you to send a message back."

"Should I target the origin of the Malcula missile?"

"No. Find someplace remote, but make a spectacle."

"Ah, a big message then. You know this will rattle the ship?"

"Come now, using it this one time won't hurt. Besides, it will speed up the process of integrating the planet."

Sullivan rolled his eyes. "Very well. I'll see to it."

"Good," Belvedere said, clapping his hands. "Now, as I was saying before being so rudely interrupted, we must focus on preserving the first human contact with Malcula-soon to be Romulius Prime. Her name is Kara, and she is a bit younger than Aphrodite. She no doubt has family waiting for her. She is the first person of Romulius Prime to witness the glory of the Imperium, but right now, she is being interrogated by Abigail Hathorne. While she is merely doing her job as an inquisitor, she has no reason to be this aggressive to young Kara. As humans, we must come together, and what does it say about the Imperium if we allow Hathorne to terrorize or kill the first person of Romulius Prime? So I ask, how can we save Kara?"

Belvedere waited for a response, but no one answered. Not one of his advisors could look him in the eye.

"Let's go around and share our thoughts again," suggested Aphrodite. "Grolsch, why don't you start?"

The giant man rubbed his temples and looked down. "I reviewed the monitors before this meeting. I got a good look at Kara. She wears plain clothes, is slightly malnourished, and carries no identification. This all points to her being low on Malcula's social hierarchy. On the other hand, Abigail Hathorne answers only to the Emperor and anyone with enough guns and soldiers to make her reconsider, which we don't have."

"Grolsch, normally you have a plan. What's your plan?" Aphrodite asked in an unsteady voice.

Grolsch looked at her. "People die across the galaxy every nanosecond. One common-born human from a planet not formally part of the Imperium is not worth risking our assets. The plan is to let Inquisitor Hathorne do her job and leave Kara to her fate."

"But. What if Kara gets hurt?"

"Then we work around it. Her planet has a population of over five billion. They won't notice one going missing, and with the Imperium's strength, it won't matter if they do. Besides, once they receive our message, they'll realize how merciful we are."

"If we interfere in Abigail's work, she could kill all of us under the excuse that we were traitors to the Imperium for getting in her way," Phlamel added.

"Not all of us," Lord Leontius said smugly. "Some of us are too valuable to the Imperium."

Father Stewgart spoke next. "The Inquisitor is merely performing her duties. The girl has already committed blasphemy by being so close to a xeno."

Sullivan followed suit: "I've already had Abigail kill several good crew members for disputable reasons. I will not risk any more lives by provoking the inquisitor who already hates you, Belvedere."

"Father," Aphrodite asked with misty eyes. "Why does the inquisitor hate you?"

Belvedere could only shrug. "She's harbored a grudge against the Romulius family for as long as she's been an inquisitor. I don't know for what reason, but this is my ship, and she can't just go around messing with our affairs."

"She can if she has good reason!" Grolsch sounded nearly out of breath as he spoke. "Your family's Warrant of Trade can only go so far, and I'm sorry to say this, but we don't have enough money or powerful friends to get Hathorne to back off."

"I can't believe what I'm hearing!" Belvedere said, almost falling off his floating chair as he tried to stand up. "We just agree to save a xeno, but we're just going to let a fellow human die for being in the wrong place at the wrong time?"

"I don't recall all of us agreeing to help the xeno," Stewgart groaned. "Emperor, have mercy on all of you."

"I've seen thousands of men and women die for being in the wrong place at the wrong time," Stone said coldly. "As a human with compassion, I would like to say we should stand up to Kara. I would like to share a few personal words with Hathorne too. But as your arch-militant and former commissar, I must remind you that the Inquisition answers only to the Emperor, and sometimes you have to accept a loss as a loss."

"How old is this Kara?" Leontius asked.

"Uhh…just a little younger than Aphrodite," Belvedere guessed.

"Is she cute?"

There was a long pause, and Belvedere felt a twist in his stomach, knowing what happened to the last girl Leontius found cute. "Scribe, scratch Lord Leontius's previous remarks from the records. He is still under the influence and doesn't know what he is saying. This meeting is adjourned. Back to your stations, everyone."

As the senior crew members left the room, Aphrodite looked around, lost and confused. "What about Kara? Father, what's going to happen to Kara?"

"That is out of our hands now, dear. Why don't you follow Grolsch? He'll teach you how to format sanction paperwork, and you can even pick out which symbol we'll brand Walter with."

"But is Kara still in danger? Should we tell the Inquisitor that Kara isn't a threat?"

"My dear, it's not that simple. One day, you'll understand the harder parts of being a rogue trader."

Aphrodite sniffed. "What would the first Romulius do in our position? Would he even care?"

Belvedere went silent. Kara might have been a nobody on her planet, but once upon a time, so was Romulius. However, Romulius didn't have an inquisitor breathing down his neck. He also wasn't a father before he became a rogue trader.

*Note from the author: Grammarly hates me for writing in ork, but it feels like a fandom sin to not write orks without a bad cockney accent. This chapter was going on for too long so I'm splitting it in half. I'm just going to leave this link here in case anyone wants to find out what Talos said in binary . .*