My name is Arashi Toshinori, my mother was a hard-working seamstress, and my father was a Navy officer stationed here. I come from The Land of the Rising Sun. Japan is a land of warriors. A land of tradition. A land of change.
The fleet relocated when I was thirteen, I never saw my father again. Mother left soon after. There was only one family for an outcast, Yakuza.
The big boys played in Tokyo, and eventually I became one of them. The rules were simple, no drugs, no theft, and no indecent acts. Especially with the boss' daughter Yuri. I broke that last rule…
We named her Natsu, our little secret grew fast, as did my influence and fortune. I was running up a hill to regroup with my men after a heist had gone sideways. The cops were right behind me, we had gotten the money so all we had to do was leave but when I finally made it up the hill, my men all had their weapons pointed at me?
The betrayal hurt more than the bullets.
After two decades I accepted my fate, it was raining the day I was released. I went home expecting to see my family but only silence greeted me when I walked in. They had been murdered shortly after my imprisonment. Whoever was here took the bodies but left the house as it was. Furniture destroyed, every cabinet and container searched, but most heinous of all, they didn't bother cleaning up the blood. Dark brown stains polluted Natsu's crib and the shower in our bedroom…
I may have accepted my fate, but not Natsu and Yuri's. It didn't take long to tear down the order I once served. I kicked a bodyguard through the door to the boss' penthouse and stepped inside. I had a submachine gun in my left hand and a katana in the other. The first bodyguard charges and I empty the magazine into his body. The second charged when I was out of bullets, but he seemed to forget I still had a sword. With one low swipe I slashed across his soft belly and watched as his innards spilled out of him. Last but not least was the big boss himself, he tried begging, bribing, he offered me the organization itself. Maybe once I would've taken that offer, but his prattle ceased once my blade relieved his head from his body. With a flick of my wrist, I cast off the blood and as I turned to leave, I heard clapping.
Suddenly I was faced with a man in a purple suit and behind him were two of the emperor's angels. They were clad in the purple and gold armor of the Third Legion. I was at a loss for words.
"Relax Toshinori." The suited man casually smiled at me even with all the carnage, "Please take a seat, you've more than earned it."
I looked at the boss' chair and tipped it over. I kicked it back up and sat down. I lay my arms on the desk, not that they would do anything against his angels and their plate. Even the suited man was taller than me by a few feet, his chest wider than my whole body, he was clearly just an angel out of armor.
"Do you know who I am?" The suited man asked taking a seat across the desk.
"You specifically? No. However, there's not a man alive that doesn't know an Angel of the Emperor when they see one. Purple, gold, and an eagle. You're part of The Third Legion: The Emperor's Children."
"That's correct, and do you know why we're here?"
"Not a clue, sir."
"Well, we believe in second chances, and sometimes we offer one to the convicts of our beloved Terra. Imagine our surprise when not only did we find you, but when we ran your DNA, we found out that you, have a 98% compatibility with our geneseed."
"Are you…?"
"Yes Toshinori, we are."
"Will my age be a problem?"
"We are hoping that your 98% will make up for your age."
"I don't have much of a life here anymore, I'd be a fool to say no."
"Excellent, our ship is waiting on the roof. Bring your weapons too, I bet our techpriests can turn them into something you can really let loose with."
Yuri always said that when one door closes another unexpected one was waiting for you. I didn't really have a plan after this, becoming an angel though, that certainly wasn't on my list, why not? What was waiting for me back home? I took the elevator to the roof where a Storm Eagle was waiting for us. The ramp lowered and we stepped inside, the angels pointed me to a row of seats against the wall where a few more humans were sitting. They left for another part of the ship while I took my seat with the rest of the recruits.
Well, this was awkward, I had to be at least twice the age of everyone here…
"I like your tattoos." A boy next to me said, he was a smaller, scraggly kid. The runt of the litter one could say.
"Thanks…" I couldn't blame him for admiring them, they were beautiful, he was young he didn't know the meaning behind them.
"Uh…I'm Jaune, Jaune Arc." He extended his hand to me.
I fiddled around with my gun placing it in my lap before awkwardly extending my hand to his, "Toshinori." Something about about Jaune was off, "Are you a Terran, Jaune?"
He shook his head, "I'm from a recruit world called: Remnant."
"Really? What Legion uses Remnant?"
"A lot of them!" Jaune's eyes lit up like a fireworks show, "I've seen at least one of every angel come to Remnant! My family's special too."
"Oh yeah?" I raised an eyebrow, "How so?"
"We belong to one legion." He puffed his chest out with pride, "The oldest male of my family are selected to be Luna Wolves. My uncle was one, and now it's my turn."
"A legacy, huh? Can't say I've ever met one before. Did they say how much of a match you were?"
"99.9 percent." he said almost smugly.
"Careful." Another recruit had his arms crossed in a chair, "That .1 percent might bite you in the ass."
Looking over at him my eyes nearly jumped out of their skull, he was supposed to a child?! He and the others he was sitting next to were huge! His voice was certainly higher than and the acne on his cheeks were dead giveaways but their chests were almost wider than the seats.
"I'm Logan, this is Rowf, Snitter, and Tod. The boys and I are gonna be Space Wolves."
I snorted but that earned a glare from the pups.
"Something funny?"
"No, no, I love Plague Dogs."
That didn't seem to calm them down any, "Excuse me?"
I held my hands up, "I meant no offense, it's an old children's book. I used to read it to my daughter. Two dogs named: Rowf and Snitter escape an animal testing facility with a fox called: Tod."
"Sounds pretty drastic for a children's book." Jaune said.
"I skipped over the darker parts."
"You got a copy?" Snitter asked.
I pulled out a small device that kept books digitally. Snitter pulled out one of his own and I instantly sent him a copy. The rest of the ride was in silence.
…
I woke up when someone was shaking my shoulder, "Huh?"
"I think we're here!" Jaune practically squealed.
Unbuckling, I stood up to stretch my legs, I paused. Somehow, I could tell how artificial the gravity was; there was just something off about it. I followed Jaune to an observation deck where Logan and The Plague Dogs were.
"It's so big!" Jaune gawked pressing his face against the glass.
"That's what she said." Rowf snickered.
"What is it?" I asked. The space station we were approaching was larger than a continent. It was stark white and didn't bear the colors of any of the legions.
"It's a medical hub." Logan explained, "If someone's injured and can't make it to a proper facility in time, you can coordinate with one of them to meet up somewhere inbetween. My guess is that we'll get our geneseed here then go off to our respective planets."
Geneseed, if I'd known what it took to become an Angel of the Emperor, I probably would've given it a lot more thought. I had no idea I'd be getting extra organs shoved inside me while having my brain whipped clean, practically shredded, and then rebuilt to accompany them. I started writing a journal of my life to read once everything was complete, hopefully whatever comes out of this remembers to read the damn thing.
A creeping thought started to worm its way into my mind, what happens if I'm part of that two percent like Logan said? What happens to those selected to become angels but fail? Oh, that's not going to bug me the rest of the trip.
The space station was sterile white, I saw angels in white armor with red trim and several additional tools attached to their power packs. I'd also just realized I'd seen more angels in the past hour than I'd ever seen my entire life.
We were led to a room with enough beds for all of us. However, there was something off about it. Jaune and others didn't notice it, but the room was clean…too clean…the metals and the sheets had a much lighter tint to them than the other's I'd seen. As if they'd been scrubbed with bleach several thousand times over. I'd lay in my bed and could smell the faint residue from the last cleaning. I'd like to say we got a full night's rest, but new system, new star, new orbit, new rules. An angel in white woke us up and said it was time for Phase 1.
…
I've been shot, stabbed, set on fire, and even run over; none of that compared to having a second heart, an ossmodula, and whatever a biscopea all shoved into your chest simultaneously. I couldn't feel the two I could barely pronounce, but I could feel the second heart beating faster than my original. I had to focus…I used to meditate back on Terra…I needed that now.
Close my eyes, breathe in slowly through my nose to the count of four, hold to the count of four, slowly exhale to the count of four, pause to the count of four, repeat. Slowly but surely, I could feel both my hearts finally slow and sync up. I heard someone inhaling loudly; looking over I saw Jaune trying to copy my technique.
"How's it working?" I ask pulling myself up. My bones felt heavier, and I felt taller?
"Better now…" Jaune frantically nodded, "I was starting to freak out until I heard you breathing like that."
"Meditate."
"Huh?"
"It's called meditation, my wife taught me, its supposed to calm your body and focus your mind. Keep at it, control your new heart." I say before going over to Logan and his boys. "How about you guys?"
"Nothing we can't handle." Logan puffed out his chest, but his smile was forced, he was putting on a good show at least.
"Snitter's taken the worst of it." Rowf said.
I looked over at the smaller pup, I knelt beside his bunk, and took his hand.
His eyes shot open, and he squeezed my hand, "It hurts Toshi…" Snitter stammered through rapid breaths.
"I know it does, Snitter, you can't think about that now, come on, tell me where you're from. Are you from Fenris like the other Space Wolves?" He nodded on his pillow, it had been soaked in tears from the pain, "Who's your favorite?"
He stammered for a bit before finally getting out, "Jorin Bloodhowl."
"I'll admit I don't know who that is, but I can tell you this. He went through the exact same thing you are right now. Yes, it hurts, and its probably going to get worse, but Jorin got through it, and so can you, right?"
"Yeah…" he whispered.
"Is that it?" I looked down at him, "Is that all a son of The Great Wolf can muster?"
Snitter growled, "Yeah."
I scoffed, "Wow, I'd say that's more Pathetic Welp."
Snitter roared in my face, "Yeah!"
…
Finally, I'd gotten used to this star system, we'd been here one Terran year. We'd doubled in height, and our ribcages had fused into one massive piece of solid bone. If we weren't sleeping we were in the facility's gym getting used to our new bones and heart.
"I hear we finally go into phase two tomorrow." Snitter dribbled a basketball.
"You said that last week." Rowf dismissed as he tried to block Snitter from moving up the court.
"This time I'm sure of it."
"I've heard that one before too." Tod said as he threw a punch at me.
I didn't much care for sports, so I decided to spar with Tod. I side stepped his punch and countered with a cross to his cheek. Jaune was on his hands doing laps around the court.
"Do you at least have proof this time?" Jaune asked walking on his hands.
"I do." Snitter jumped back and lobbed the ball into the net. He laughed at Rowf before putting his hands on his hips. "I was dumping my tray in the cafeteria, and I saw one of the apothecaries pointing at me. I read his lips, and he says we're about ready for the next phase."
"Well, that is something." Jaune lowered his legs and stood up.
"True." Tod and I paused our match, "Did they happen to say what it is?"
"No." Snitter shook his head.
"I say we rest up, who knows what they'll to us this time."
We went to bed that night and sure enough the next morning just like last year, an apothecary woke us up and said it was time for Phase 2.
…
"This feels funny." I said sitting on the edge of my bed.
"Yeah…" Logan agreed, "I was expecting some more torture or something."
"My blood feels funny." Jaune said gaining all of our attention, "I get chronic nosebleeds, but when this one happened it lasted barely a second and my blood was brighter too."
"So, they did something with our blood." I thought it over.
"Sounds like they gave us a healing factor." Logan mused, "I mean if nosebleeds don't last as long, maybe…" he looked around and went to the closet. He put his hand in the door and slammed it shut right on his fingers. The skin split open but the bones didn't break. We watched closely as the wound almost instantly stopped bleeding. Rather than 'healing' the wound scared over in less than a minute.
"I'm guessing that's not what you were thinking?" I mused thinking of an old comic book of a mutant with a metal skeleton.
"Not entirely but it is still cool." Logan admitted.
…
This time it was only six Terran months before our next implant, it was called the Un-Sleeping. It was our first brain surgery, and it was not fun. I had a migraine that never seemed to end, Logan, Tod, and Rowf seemed to get more aggressive, Snitter started having seizures, the only one who wasn't going nuts was Jaune.
"How are you doing it?" I asked Jaune gripping my skull.
"I have a gift from the emperor." He said calm as ever.
"Bull!" Logan roared.
Jaune took a deep breath, and he was coated in a golden light, it lasted a few seconds before dissipating.
"Emperor's balls, what was that?!" Logan barked.
"My people call it an aura, it's a manifestation of our soul. It can heal us."
"Can you heal others?" Rowf asked getting Snitter in bed.
Jaune shrugged getting up and going over to them, "Everyone on Remnant has their own, no one's ever tried using it on someone from another planet." Jaune's hands began to glow, he gingerly held the sides of Snitters head.
His head began to glow with the same golden light and his breathing slowed back to his normal state. Rowf was about to jump when Snitter started to convulse, but Jaune kept his hands steady and the convulsions soon stopped.
"H-Huh?" Snitter opened his eyes and Jaune pulled his hands away.
"How you feeling, Snits?" Tod instantly sat up.
"Good." Snitter rubbed his head, "Real good! The best I've felt since the implants started!"
"By the throne…" we all stared at Jaune.
He moved toward me, but I waved him off, I pointed to the younger ones first, they needed it a lot more than I did. Tod was next, his face instinctively formed a glare, but that didn't stop Jaune. Tod gripped his sheets when the glowing started but eventually his hands relaxed.
"Emperor be praised, you are truly gifted!" Tod jumped out of bed, "I'm…I'm calm!"
Jaune turned around only to immediately fall, I leapt up and caught him before he could hit the ground. I heaved him back onto his bunk and listened to his chest.
"He's still alive," I said raising my head, "He probably used that gift too much too fast."
"He said everyone one his planet has this gift?" Logan got up and watched Jaune sleep. "Are they psykers? Like the Thousand Sons?"
"Nah," Tod shook his head, "That didn't feel like any psyker energy to me, I think he really does have a gift from the Emperor!"
"What's wrong with you?" I asked Logan as he began to growl.
"What makes his planet so special?" Logan scoffed, "This Remnant of his?"
"Well, he said it's a manifestation of his soul."
"So?"
I rolled my eyes, "Last time I checked we had souls too! Maybe he can show us how to do it too!"
Several hours had passed since Jaune passed out, I almost thought he wasn't going to wake up. But just as I thought that he let out a big yawn before sitting up.
"How long was I out?" he asked.
"Most of the day." I answered, "You missed lunch."
"I took it." Logan raised his hand, "Since you passed out before healing me or Rowf or Toshi."
"Dinner should be served soon so don't worry about it Jaune." Rowf reassured.
"Jaune we were wondering about aura." I asked sitting up on my bed.
Jaune cleared his throat, "According to my dad, it's the manifestation of our soul. He said The Emperor himself came down when Remnant first began and gifted us with aura."
"How does it work?" I asked while the others gathered around.
"Usually, it comes naturally when one comes of age, but my dad did tell me that we can use our own auras to force someone's aura to unlock."
"Are you saying you can give us this aura thing? I mean, we all have souls as Toshi pointed out." Logan asked.
"Well…I don't think anyone's tried it on someone who isn't from Remnant."
I simply shrugged, "We don't really have anything to lose then?"
"I guess we can give it a shot." Jaune shrugged, "Everyone put your hands in the center."
We did as he said, and he put his palm on the side of all of ours making sure he could touch all of us at once. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath.
It is by his will that we achieve immortality.
Through this, we become a paragon of hope and light to rise above the grimm darkness.
Infinite in potential and bound by duty.
I release your soul, and by The Emperor's shoulder, bless thee.
A blinding light flooded the room and Jaune passed out again. I didn't catch him this time, we were all dumbfounded by the golden light covering our bodies. I swore I felt the awe of The Emperor around me. The light receded into our bodies and the warmth was in us as well. My migraine vanished in a matter of minutes; however, the Space Wolves' teeth began to grow into fangs.
"Huh." Logan poked at his new teeth, "I heard the Great Wolf's geneseed came with some side effects."
…
The apothecaries told us we had finished growing into our new bodies and it was time to begin weapons training with arms that were fitted for our new size. We were given a blank set of scout armor, they said it was what we were to be given when we were to join our legions. It felt like modified carapace armor worn by the guardsmen. The fatigues were ballistic nylon, while the armor was layered with ceramite. The helmet barely fit my head and the chainsword we were given didn't even power on, not like it mattered, the teeth were removed anyway.
"They expect us to fight like this?" Logan scoffed.
"Its only sparring." Jaune shrugged, "I mean we can't really swing active chainswords at one another for practice."
"Why not?" Tod asked.
We were led to a new area of the medical facility; the walls had the same bleached hue our room had. The floor had a large mat in the middle of the room taking up at least seventy-five percent of the total area.
Standing on said matt were three women. Each one varied in height but one constant was, they were all taller than the boys. Each of them were wearing tight training tops, loose pants, and their fists were wrapped in white tape. One had long red hair almost reaching the ground pulled back into a ponytail, another had black curly hair reaching just past her shoulders, and the last also had red hair but this one was kept short just barely covering her head.
"You're our trainers?" Logan scoffed stepping forward, "They aren't even armored, what can you even…"
His words became a single grunt as the black haired one shot forward with lightning speeds and delivered a single punch to his chest. His breast plate shattered against her fist and Logan was sent flying into the back wall.
"Emperor's Balls…" Jaune gasped seeing what just happened.
"Guys wait…" I tried holding back the other wolves, but their pack mentality sent them into a rage seeing their brother treated in such a way. Even Snitter was snarling like a wolf. My words fell on deaf ears as the three remaining charged the one who attacked, but the others didn't move, and after a minute I saw why. She effortlessly dodged their attacks and didn't bother fighting back.
"Look out!" My train of thought derailed as Jaune shoved me while the other two were leaping toward us.
I fell back into a roll and quickly got to my feet; their attack was deliberate as they were now in between us. I was facing the redhead with a ponytail while Jaune faced the one with the bob.
"You're not used to that blade." She said raising her hands and dropping into a fighting stance.
"You'd be correct, I'm trained with a katana, not the longsword." I admitted.
She nodded and walked to the edge of the mat, she turned around to bow, then went to the wall. After pressing a few buttons, the panels reversed and revealed all different manner of swords and weaponry. She took a katana off the wall, bowed back onto the mat, and offered me the handle. I took the training sword and gave her back the chainsword. She tossed it at the wall, and it magnetized into place.
"Better?" she asked as I took a few practice swings.
"Much." I answered before leaning back to avoid another punch.
Judging by their outfits, I could only assume they were part of the same unit, and if anything else, meeting one of those fists was a death sentence.
Don't engage, not yet, I had to analyze her fighting style, spot any gaps in her defenses, then I could attack. As of the moment her attacks reminded me of boxing back on Terra. She threw a lot of straights and jabs, all the while trying to close the distance between us. Something was bothering me though, the way she bowed when she left the mat, that was something martial artists did. Something didn't feel right…An opening! She threw a right cross and I ducked lower to dodge it, then while lowered I stepped forward with my blade raised to slash against her stomach.
She was just as if not more graceful than a leaf in the wind.
She leapt over the blade just before it could even touch her. The second one of her hands touched the ground, she rotated with enough force to kick my helmet off my head and embed it into the wall across the room.
There wasn't a doubt in my mind that that would've been my head if not for that helmet. But before I could even revel in that fact, a fist uppercut me, and sent me flying into a pile made of the other recruits.
"Hello there!" the curly haired one greeted when I landed.
"What are you?" I asked trying to cling to some form of consciousness.
"I've give you a hint." The redhead with the shorter hair spoke up with a very thick Terran accent. "We are three out of ten thousand."
"No way…" I looked up at them before I could pass out.
"What?" Snitter asked from the pile, "What's that mean Toshi?"
"We just got our asses handed to us by three Custodes." I gasp before Snitter and I both passed out.