The recognition between father and son is one of the most profoundly affecting scenes in any narrative — provided, of course, that the father does not, immediately prior to this affecting recognition, propel your beloved fraternal associate through the planetary crust to reincarnate in the magmaticprofundity.
The laboratory's supernumerary personnel had, by this juncture, expedited their egress. Only the two unfortunate specimens upon the experimental receptacles continued their expressive vocalisations.
The Emperor, with perfunctory psychicagency, 'pacified' these two individuals and erected a perceptual barrier between their sensorium and the external environment.
"Konrad Curze. My son... How do you fare?"
The Emperor's tonal modulation was saturated with paternal solicitude. His affect was that of an aged progenitor, anxiouslyanticipating the homecoming of a protractedvoyager.
"Father. I am... well. My brother... His assistance has been considerable."
(Though it might, perhaps, appear injudiciousto invoke Nyx's appellation at this particulardiscursive juncture, Curze was constrained to authentic testimony.)
It was, after all, Nyx who had authenticallytransfigured him.
"...I am cognisant of this. Though his essentialsubstrate is somewhat heterogeneous, his influence upon your existential trajectory has been..."
"Yes. He has furnished me with an unprecedented comprehension of my foresight... He has emancipated me from the compulsion to flee from it."
The prophetic certitude of his own existentialtermination had pursued Curze throughout his entire post-natal trajectory. It was a shadowthat even the Emperor had been impotent to dispel.
Nyx's manifestation, however, had been as a fulguration of illumination lacerating the perpetual darkness. It had recalled him from the precipice of auto-annihilation.
"I have registered this transfiguration... It corresponds, precisely, to my anticipations. Accordingly, I am disposed to interrogate you, my offspring..."
"...Are you prepared to repatriate yourself to the Imperium and contribute to humanity's renaissance?"
This was not an imperative. This was a supplication. A paternal enquiry.
The Emperor, on this rare occasion, exhibitedthe affective modulations characteristic of baseline humanity. His own tonal deliveryastonished even himself.
"Father. I affirm this aspiration!"
Curze's assent was immediate, unreserved.
Nostramo was saturated with transgression. He was consumed by the imperative to adjudicate its every manifestation. Only the Imperium could facilitate the consummationof his judicial vision.
His foresight had disclosed to him that certainpredestined catastrophes remained ineluctable.
He was, however, now cognisant that he possessed agency.
"You have occasioned in me profoundpaternal gratification, Curze."
The Emperor's affective investment, upon receipt of this intelligence, was comprehensively assuaged.
(His affective investment, upon encounteringa certain canine degenerate, was, by comparison, exclusively composed of homicidal ideation.)
"Adequately** adjudicated, my offspring. Withdraw to the periphery. I am constrainedto confer with your fraternal associate."**
Curze's regard traversed to the profound lithicaperture in the laboratory's substratum — which perforated the planetary crust and extended to unascertained profundities.
He then pivoted and expedited his egress.
Approaching Nostramo's planetary core —
Nyx was, at this juncture, occupying this geological station.
**Yes, children. When one's paternalprogenitor propels one into the terrestrialsubstratum, this is not hyperbolic figuration.
The Emperor had, literally, impacted him into the planetary core. He was, at present, swimming through magmatic effluence.
His entire osseous infrastructure had been fractured into innumerable particulatefragments.
Nyx had not anticipated that the Emperor would inflict such comprehensive corporealcompromise upon his person.
His autonomic reparative facility was, however, exceptional. He commenced his ascent of the crater's perimeter with accelerating velocity, eluding the magmaticeffluence that threatened to submerge his corporeal configuration.
You geriatric degenerate... One day, I shall detonate your Golden Sanitary Appliance with a single percussive event!
Nyx's ascent of the lithic substratum was strongly reminiscent of the protagonists of 2nd Millennium 'terrestrial wildernessexistential continuation' documentaryarchives.
By the juncture of his egress from the substratal aperture, his corporealcompromise had been comprehensivelyremediated.
We persist exclusively through volitionalexertion!
His egress effected, Nyx dispensed with preliminary discursive protocol. He immediately launched himself at the Emperor.
"VILLAIN! Huang PIZZA! Your filicidalinvestment is GROTESQUELYdisproportionate! You derive AMUSEMENTfrom OBSERVING my protracted substratalascension?!"
Magnetic field rotation: 100,000 HORSEPOWER!
HEAVEN-SLAYING PATH! FRACTURED TIGER PATH!
Fulgurant golden electrical dischargeserupted from his palmar extremity.
Nyx was determined to reciprocate the Emperor's oppressive 'paternal affection' in commensurate currency.
"Hmph. INSOLENT DAEMON!"
"It appears the chronological instant for definitive adjudication of pre-eminent martialsuperiority within the Imperium HASARRIVED!"
The Emperor dispensed with discursiveelaboration. He immediately retaliated with a commensurate magnitude of psychiceffluence.
The two fulgurant configurations collided.
Nyx sustained catastrophic attrition.
(Again.)
Following this second comprehensive martialrefutation, Nyx's respiratory apparatus was somewhat pacified.
They could, at last, confer with equanimity.
"...I acknowledge that my preceding conductwas injudicious. I should not have assaultedyou immediately upon your egress."
The Emperor's psychic effluence coalescedinto a seating configuration. He gestured for Nyx to assume this furnishing.
(His gratitude and his authority remained, however, uncompromised.)
"It is gratifying that you register this acknowledgement."
Nyx was not, however, deceived by this affectation of paternal benevolence. His subsequent enunciation occasioned in the Emperor a pronounced manual tension.
The Emperor, with considerable volitionalexertion, suppressed his homicidal impulseand exhaled.
"What is the purpose of your intervention on this occasion? Has the Imperial ExpeditionFleet finally attained its celestial station?"
Should the Imperial Fleet intervene with timelyalacrity, the collective opposition — the canine, the spectral, the serpentine, the divine— menacing Nostramo would be renderedinnocuous.
Observing the Emperor's affectiveconfiguration, however, Nyx's visceralapprehension intensified.
"Its translation to this celestial station is imminent. Its intervention, however, may not coincide with the commencement of hostilities."
"That crimson martial enthusiast can nolonger contain His importunate appetite. I have translated myself to this locus to appriseyou of this intelligence."
"The Fleet is projected to arrive severaldiurnal cycles subsequent to the inaugurationof combat operations. At that juncture, I shall commit my comprehensive martial investmentto interdicting the Warp's obstructiveeffluence."
"Several cycles... I am capable of sustainingopposition for this interval... Barely."
This was not the optimal strategic dispositionNyx had anticipated.
It was, however, preferable to completeImperial absence.
"Do not prematurely exult. I shall, in all probability, be constrained to engage Himdirectly."
"Your commission — should you accept it — is to preserve this planet from transfigurationinto a Daemon World prior to the Fleet's intervention."
Within the immaterial dimensionsuperimposed upon Nostramo, an authenticdivine conflict was imminent.
The Emperor would expend his comprehensive martial investment to containKhorne — to preclude His terrestrialmanifestation.
The renegade Eighth Legion and the occultedKhornate cultists — these were Nyx'scommission.
Nostramo's existential trajectory was contingent upon Nyx's capacity to furnish it with even a vestigial quantum of hope.
Should he fail — he, and this planet, would be reclassified as Khorne's acquisitions.
Should he prevail — the existential trajectoryof the Warhammer universe itself might be transfigured.
"...Apprehension is unwarranted. I anticipate, at the appropriate chronological juncture, returning to Terra and contesting for the designation of 'Supreme Chancellor'."
"Adequately** adjudicated. Your confidenceis registered."**
"A modest temporal interval remains prior to my re-immersion in the Warp... I presume you would have no objection to conferring with me regarding your 'Saint Egg' transfigurationprotocol?"
The Emperor approached the experimentalstation, accumulated with comprehensivedocumentary archives. He acquired one such document and scrutinised its contents.
"An innovative technological paradigm... This resolves numerous critical proceduralimpediments!"
The Emperor's ocular organs progressivelyilluminated as his scrutiny intensified.
His affect was reminiscent of the chronological instant of his inauguralconception of the Primarchs and the LegionesAstartes.
"Indeed. Relative to the conventional Astartes transfiguration protocol, the Saint Eggexhibits accelerated gestation and enhancedprocedural security."
"Its dissemination, however, necessitatesrigorous regulatory supervision. In the absence of such supervision, it could constitute the fulminant catalyst for intra-human civil conflict."
The Emperor was acutely cognisant of this technological paradigm's considerablepotential — and its commensurate existentialhazard.
"I shall appropriate these documentaryarchives for further scrutiny..."
He accumulated the entire contents of the experimental station's documentaryrepository.
His regard traversed the laboratory perimeter. He registered, with pronounced pulmonaryrelief, that Nyx's 'Little South Adepta SororitasReformation Programme' — which had, on a prior occasion, occasioned in him acutehypertensive crisis — was conspicuouslyabsent from this documentary accumulation.
"Ah...?"
"What is this...?"
The Emperor's psychic effluence had detected, within an interstitial crevice at the periphery of the experimental station, a document Nyx had assiduously concealed.
"WAIT——!"
Nyx's maxillofacial configuration underwentcatastrophic recalibration. His superior extremity extended in a futile interceptivegesture.
The Emperor immobilised him with comprehensive psychic agency.
"Heh heh. Compose yourself, my offspring. The commission of blasphemous formulationsis an occupational idiosyncrasy common to all investigators of esoteric scientificdisciplines."
"Furthermore — I have, on a prior occasion, scrutinised your 'Reformation Programme'documentation. You may be assured that my susceptibility to affective perturbation has undergone considerable attenuation since that unfortunate incident."
(The Emperor anticipated that this concealeddocument was analogous to the 'Little South'programme — another blasphemousformulation concerning Adepta Sororitasreconfiguration.)
His affect, accordingly, was one of benevolentcomprehension.
Until his ocular organs registered the document's title.
"...'GRAND... HORNED RAT DEITY — OPPORTUNITY CREATION'...?!"
Instantly —
A cataclysmic effusion of golden psychiceffluence suffused the entire laboratorycompartment. Its momentum was that of a tectonic tsunami.
"Fa... Father... FATHER...!"
"PAPA——!!!"
"YOU** INSOLENT WRETCH——!!!"**
On that day, Nyx accomplished an unprecedented existential achievement:
He circumnavigated the entire planetaryperimeter of Nostramo — in his baselinecorporeal configuration — while sustainingcomprehensive paternal pursuit.