"So bright..."
The pain wracking his body seemed to have significantly subsided.
Sevatar's consciousness gradually coalesced from fugue, yet he maintained his recumbent posture — motionless, breathing shallow.
"Awake?"
An unfamiliar voice. His respiration hitched, then he forcibly composed himself.
—Still pretending?
Nyx shook his head, a playful smile tugging at the corner of his lips.
"Congratulations. You're a girl now!"
Sevatar shot upright from the cryo-medicae slab. His hand instinctively flew to his lower anatomy — and only after confirming everything remained in its proper configuration did he exhale, heavily, in relief.
CLICK!
A crisp, crystalline sound registered in his auditory cortex.
He turned his head. Nyx was aiming a curiously shaped pict-capture device directly at him, his expression radiating mischievous satisfaction. Curze, standing to one side, had concealed his entire face behind his palm, as though he could not bear to witness this debacle.
"Who are you?"
"Why did you save me?"
Sevatar scratched his still-throbbing cranium. As he spoke, his fingers drifted, unconsciously, to his cheek — at the precise location where the monster's lightning claw had left its mark. His memory now supplied an additional detail: a scar.
He harboured no particular sentiment regarding the disfigurement. He was, however, secretly relieved that his left eye had not suffered the permanent impairment he had anticipated.
Observing Sevatar's post-reanimation self-examination, Curze murmured to Nyx: "...Is he... compromised?" He gestured, subtly, towards his own temple.
"Rest assured. I have performed a thorough assessment." Nyx dismissed the concern with an airy wave. "No trace of Warp-corrosion. The cognitive sluggishness is a transient consequence of acute haemorrhagic shock — perfectly normal under the circumstances."
"Regarding his enquiries... I shall leave the exposition to you, brother. No difficulties?"His tone carried a faint, teasing undercurrent. He had, after all, witnessed Curze's agitated haste when he had first delivered Sevatar to the laboratory.
A Primarch could ascertain, at a single glance, that Sevatar's condition was not immediately life-threatening. Curze had nevertheless sprinted the entire distance.
Nyx departed the subterranean sanctum, leaving the chamber to its two occupants.
Following Nyx's exit, Curze and Sevatar regarded one another in mutual, speechless appraisal.
The atmosphere froze. It suffocated.
Fortunately, Curze's taciturnity was a product of prophetic torment, not constitutional ineloquence. His Primarch cognition completed its analysis in short order. He delivered his conclusion:
"Sevatar. I am your father."
Sevatar: What the hell are you talking about?!
Thirty minutes elapsed.
Curze signalled that Nyx might re-enter the laboratory. The moment he crossed the threshold, Nyx very nearly collapsed in paroxysmal mirth.
PFFFT——!
The recently-revived Sevatar now exhibited fresh periorbital ecchymosis. His left eye was, once again, swollen shut.
Nyx's gaze drifted, deliberately, towards Curze. Curze averted his eyes with studied nonchalance.
Curze. Are you quite certain this is an appropriate father-son reunion protocol? Immediate corporal discipline?
"Ahem. Nyx... Sevatar has accepted my proposal." Curze attempted to breach the oppressive silence.
Accepted? Are you certain he wasn't simply intimidated into submission?!
Nyx and Sevatar — who had, mere minutes prior, been total strangers — achieved, in that instant, a profound and inexplicable telepathic accord.
"Well. Though I suspect Curze has already apprised you of the essentials, I am nevertheless compelled to reiterate." Nyx's expression grew serious. "The Astartes transformation procedure carries a non-negligible risk of mortality. Are you certainyou wish to proceed?"
"I am certain, Lord Nyx." Sevatar's response was immediate, absolute. His fingers traced, unconsciously, the fresh scar upon his cheek. "I must finish this. With my own hands."
The scar was etched into his very marrow — a perpetual reminder of the day his family was annihilated. Everyone he held dear. Slaughtered.
"In that case... Very well."
Nyx approached the laboratory's storage vault. He donned his white coat with fastidious care. He withdrew an apparatus of truly alarming proportions: a hypodermic syringe roughly the size of a small child.
"Nyx. What do you think you are doing?!"Curze's voice cracked. He perceived, with sudden, terrible clarity, that his brother's predatory gaze was not directed at Sevatar.
It was directed at him.
"Ah, my dear brother. Surely you are aware that the nineteen iterations of the Astartes implantation protocol require, at minimum, several standard years to complete?"
"By which juncture, Nostramo will have been reduced to orbital particulate by vortex torpedo."
"Thus, these inefficient processes are fundamentally incompatible with our present operational requirements. I have, however, devised an accelerated solution. Simply..."Nyx's eyes glinted with barely-suppressed avidity. The curvature of his lips provoked in Curze a sensation of profound, visceral dread— this expression bore an unsettling resemblance to the Ruinstorm entities who coveted the Primarchs.
"Utilise... Can you not simply employ your own...?!" Curze struggled to maintain his composure, mounting a final, desperate rearguard action.
"Assuredly." Nyx nodded, pleasantly. His tone shifted, almost imperceptibly. "Unless, of course, you have no objection to Sevatar subsequently transferring his allegiance to me."
Curze. Surely you would not wish Sevatar to address me as 'father' in the foreseeable future.
Curze's expression froze. His gaze, when it drifted to Sevatar, acquired a novel shade of... gratitude.
"...Proceed." Curze gritted his jaw and extended his arm with the resolution of a martyr ascending the pyre.
Observing that his primary research subject had been successfully acquired, Nyx's affect underwent an immediate and complete transformation. He gestured for Sevatar to await his convenience by the threshold, and advanced, step by deliberate step, upon Curze.
Curze: Do not approach!
Another thirty minutes elapsed.
Nyx exited the sanctum, his expression one of profound professional satisfaction. The hypodermic apparatus was no longer in evidence.
Sevatar observed that Curze — who had, until recently, maintained an imposing and authoritative bearing — was now curled foetally in a corner, exhibiting every symptom of catastrophic existential depletion.
That villain Nyx! He actually employed that grotesque implement and extracted an entire syringe-full!
Curze perceived, with cadaverous certainty, that his vital essence had been severely compromised. His not-yet-fully-matured physiology would, in all likelihood, cease further development entirely.
"Proceed. Assume the supine position upon the slab. I shall initiate preparatory procedures; the modification will commence directly." Nyx's instructions were brisk, businesslike.
Sevatar hesitated, momentarily. Then, he complied.
The instant his dorsal surface contacted the slab, restraint mechanisms erupted from its perimeter, securing his extremities in unyielding adamantium grapples.
"Lord Nyx! What is the meaning of this?! These were not present previously!" Sevatar's composure shattered.
"Ah. These are required to prevent involuntary movement during the procedure, which could otherwise compromise surgical outcomes."Nyx's expression remained serenely untroubled. "Apprehension is unwarranted. I am, after all, the Eleventh Primarch — pre-eminent among my brothers in the biological sciences. You need only concentrate upon envisioning your future, enhanced aspect."
"I see... Then, Lord Nyx, you have, assuredly, performed this procedure on numerous prior occasions?" Sevatar, observing Nyx's manifest self-assurance, experienced a marginal attenuation of his terror.
Nyx's subsequent utterance instantaneously resurrected it, exponentially amplified.
"Well. In a certain sense, your case represents my inaugural clinical application of this particular protocol. But have no fear — I am confident it will proceed satisfactorily."
"WHAT?! Nyx, you cannot be serious — NO!!"Sevatar commenced desperate, futile attempts to liberate himself from his restraints.
Nyx, unperturbed by his subject's agitation, disrobed Sevatar's lower extremities with clinical efficiency. Beneath his subject's horrified regard, he positioned the apparatus — an instrument universally dreaded by the male of any species — at the appropriate anatomical locus.
[Geneseed-Implantation Apparatus No. 1]!
He extracted the specially-cultivated 'gene-seed' from its stasis container. He fused it with the harvested genetic fragments obtained from Curze, generating a novel Saint Egg. He introduced the composite organelle into the subject's body.
Having repeatedly verified the equipment's nominal functionality, Nyx activated [Saint Egg Transformation Engine No. 1].
Instantly, the apparatus engaged with formidable, sustained aspiration.
"HYAAAAAGH——!!* "*
The young Jago Sevatarion emitted a series of pterodactyl shrieks wholly unbefitting his future reputation. Froth accumulated at the commissures of his lips. He lost consciousness instantaneously, his countenance an indelible portrait of abject betrayal.
The spectacle was genuinely distressing. Even Curze averted his gaze, silently repudiating his brother's barbarous methodologies — entirely disregarding the inconvenient fact that his own explicit consenthad rendered the entire operation feasible.
Nyx, meanwhile, depressed the shutter-actuation mechanism with febrile, affectless precision.
This priceless moment. Preserved. For posterity.