Tumgik
#40k writing
ellierenae · 2 months
Text
write unpublishable things. it's good for you.
12K notes · View notes
castielsprostate · 1 year
Text
having talented friends is so wild!!!!!! like. YOU!!!!!!!!!! YOU made THAT. YOU DID THAT?!?!?!?! YOU created!!!! THAT!!!!!!!!!!! WOAH!!!!!! praise!!!!!!!! praise for one thousand years!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
43K notes · View notes
backalleymerchent · 1 year
Text
Huffing softly as the thick hair dropped back over their eye, the armored figure gave up in trying to do anything to keep the unruly locks out of their eyes. Drawn back from the mild annoyance, their sleepy eyes scanned their surroundings and the crowd. Lightly tapping the side of their head to switch over to heat signatures as their arm stretched upwards a long yawn escapes them as the sound of popping joints muffled by their well worn over coat crackle out. It was time to set up in a new spot. At least till the probing enforcement stopped looking too closely at the various crates of other merchants. Scratching at their chin they close their biologic eye as they scan over the map inlay on their cybernetic. Colorful array of the cityscape rolled out as they started their slow meandering walk forward.
Didn't want to be too close to the heavy crime areas where who knows what dark creatures dwell. Cultists, Eldar, Dark Eldar, Tau, kroot, ork and other unsavories. But on the other hand most people may be looking for not so legal weapons and the like. Trade for non imperial items to boost the stock yet again. Actually probably better to be there then sell off those xeno objects to the rich, rebuild clientele and attract those that already know the quality of goods one can get. Quality over quantity. Less its for drugs then well what ever is more credits.
As the aimless wandering continued, an silent process of decisions are weighed and considered. A light thump drew the sleepy eyes merchant from their musing before a distressed chaffing noise escaped their lips as hands gripped the front of their coat. Wretched and putrid breath washed over as they are pulled up onto their tip toes. Snapping out harshly of their thinking, the dull brown eye focused on the scummer that grabbed onto them. "Ah! Moab didn't see you there."reaching out in a sigh of platitude the mefchent brushed off the towering figure's leather coat and armored rapidly. "Was just having a-"
"Wuz you doing Eban? Da boss wants to have a word."
A quirked smile plastered on their face as their over sized armor let them slide down a bit in the large man's hold to rest more of their feet on the ground. "Oh really now? He knows I'm a busy woman could of given me a message about his request a-"
"He dunn't have time to play your stupid games. He wanted yah in person slime git." Forcing a smile as she started to scan the man for weapons she waved her hands in surrender.
"Cheh cheh. Ok ok. But I do this in protest of being handled roughly." Light gripping the man's hands, she tugs herself free of the goon's fingers. Or attempts to as she just rattles about in the armor for a moment. "Keep this up im going to charge Da Boss extra. So take your hands off me. I can walk just fine." Breathing deeply as the putrid breath of the large goon moved away from blowing into her face, she gathered her composure and wiped her hands down where she was held as if to rid her self of new filth on the already worn and off colored armor. Ambling along the side of the goon she picked up the other larger figures sinking back into the shadows of nearby alley ways. Sighing to her self she looked up at thee goon and grinned lazily at him as he looked to see where she was. Hopefully it wasn't anything interesting and just an item since she was not set up for any information broking as the information she had was a bit out if date with the big move.
1 note · View note
choccy-milky · 21 days
Text
the place me and my roommate were supposed to move into today was so disgusting and uninhabitable we just took our stuff and left and now we're gonna be staying at airbnbs and hotels until further notice/until we can find a new place hopefully quickly...........im in my homeless drifter era y'all!!!😍😍so if im not as active then thats why LMFAO
Tumblr media
1 like = 1 prayer
340 notes · View notes
whereserpentswalk · 11 months
Text
Imagine what neoliberal propaganda articles look like in various evil empires.
"Women in Sauron's army. How female orcs have helped create a more inclusive global conquest." - The Mordor Examiner
"How the death star program is revitalizing the galactic economy." - The Coruscant Times
"Despite progressive cries to "Free Arrakis" situation with House Harkonnen more complicated then most people think." - The Corrino Fund
"How the anti imperial rabbit hole can easily lead to people to pro choas views." - Ultramar Today
2K notes · View notes
suntails · 5 months
Text
Tumblr media
hijo de la luna
467 notes · View notes
the-wip-project · 2 months
Text
Tumblr media
Writerly friends, we're starting a new project! (think nanowrimo but not)
New WIP Project:
40k in 42 days.
We'll start on the first Sunday in August, that's the 4th. And we keep writing our hearts out until September the 14th, which is a Saturday.
If you write 1000 words per day, you already have two grace days built in to finish at 40k.
Is 40k a full novel? Well, it's a short one, but it can work. Maybe it's half a novel and you'll write the rest later.
To keep track of your wordcount, I encourage you to register at https://www.mywriteclub.com/ and make a project with the goal of 40k. You can friend me, I'm barbex there. I haven't used the site in a while but it still works and it gives us a simple graph for our project and lets us see how our friends are faring. It even has sprint rooms!
Are you ready?
Start: 4th of August
End: 14th of September
40k
Let's write.
261 notes · View notes
cursed-40k-thoughts · 5 months
Note
Do Necron Warriors have any semblance of sentience left in them? Are their minds simply locked behind powerful inhibitors or are they just irreparably wiped clean?
So, this is a cool question. Necron warriors are not supposed to retain anything in the way of real sentience. At all. The biotransferrence involved the effective digitisation and transition of Necrontyr consciousness onto engrams (basically fake brains) with the quality of engram and amount of personality and memory being retained coinciding with your position in society.
Nobles, Crypteks, Lychguard, Triarchs, and individuals with perceived importance or connection were usually given their full approximated suite of mental faculties and personality. Middling soldiery and servants (like Immortals) received a fittingly middling amount of engram quality. Basic soldiers, civilians and those without perceived merit were turned into warriors, their memories and personalities consumed forever.
At least, as I said above, this was the intent.
Necron engrams are one of (if not the most) advanced and complex pieces of technology in the entire setting. The complete and effective translation of the mind into data is unthinkably sophisticated, to the point that not even the Crypteks, the masters of physics and material science, fully understand how they work. It's not like the intelligence cores the Admech use, it's not like the AI the T'au construct. It is almost the synthesis and digitisation of the soul. It is properly fucking nuts.
So, are necron warriors supposed to be wiped clean? Yes, basically. Are they? Demonstrably no. Some will let out horrific screams when they're properly killed. Some will display tiny little ticks and flickers of personality or inkling. Most notably, warriors that become flayed ones have been known to target specific Necrons/people, as if holding unbound grudges or desires.
Between these events, and things like the destroyer virus and the assorted quirks and emotions that all Necrons can develop, it is abundantly clear that the full extent of the consciousness and wherewithal granted by engrams has exceeded function and intricacy beyond the comprehension of even the most gifted Crypteks.
Bit of a long answer, but I hope you found this helpful!
322 notes · View notes
squishyowl · 5 months
Text
Nostraman Writing
i went feral a day or so ago and made a simplistic runic writing system for Nostraman to be used for drawing/mini painting/what have you
sorry for the massive watermarks, just don't wanna see this shit stolen and reuploaded on Pinterest in 3 years
Tumblr media
My take on a Nostraman writing system. I used the runes from the Forgeworld NL transfer sheet as a start. It's based off English with a loose inspiration from Japanese/Chinese writing.
It's mentioned in the books that Nostraman is made up of words and phrases being represented by one rune/symbol made of complex marks, like Talos' rune on his helmet. I wanted to work off that and make a simplistic runic writing system.
Feel free to use! Would love to see something like this on minis or in art
212 notes · View notes
izel-scribbles · 4 months
Text
Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media
gguys faroeverse has seized me by the throat and shaken me until i drew this
blame @jashiethh for introducing me to this concept
272 notes · View notes
pheedraws · 3 months
Text
Rogue Trader Character Building Questions
With the DLC approaching, I thought I would put together a list of 25 OC building questions to ask yourself or have others ask you! Mainly just background stuff, not much in the way of in-game choices, but I hope they can maybe inspire someone or help shift the ol' writer's block if applicable 🧭
Tumblr media
BACKGROUND:
1. Where are they from? What is their homeworld like? Do they miss it? 2. What is their Origin? Who were they before they became a Rogue Trader? 3. Do they have a good relationship with their family? Who were they closest to growing up? 4. What does their name mean? Is it significant? 5. Describe a memory from childhood they think of fondly.
CHARACTER & CONVICTIONS:
6. What is their Conviction? How adherent are they to it? Does it change at all over the course of the game? 7. Was there a defining moment in their life that influenced their Conviction? 8. What was their Triumph? Do they take pride in it? 9. What was their Darkest Hour? How does it affect them today? 10. How do they feel about becoming a Rogue Trader? How easily do they take to being the head of the von Valancius dynasty?
RELATIONSHIPS:
11. Who amongst their retinue are they closest to? 12. Who amongst their retinue do they clash with the most? 13. Are they romantically involved with anyone? Do they wish to be? 14. Who was the most important person in their life prior to becoming a Rogue Trader? Is that person still in their life now? 15. How do they feel towards Theodora? Had they met before? Were they close?
SKILLS & EXPERTISE:
16. What is their Archetype? 17. What are their strengths in combat? What are their weaknesses? 18. How do they approach conflict? Do they tackle problems head-on, or is coercion favourable to them? 19. Which three skills are of the most value to them? 20. Do they have a talent or hobby that would surprise others?
APPEARANCE & PERSONALITY:
21. Do they have any notable markings? Scars, birthmarks, tattoos, etc.? 22. Do they have any augmentations? Were these installed out of necessity, or as a cosmetic choice? 23. How do they hold themselves? Is the persona they show the world different to who they truly are? Who is privy to the ‘real’ them? 24. Do they place value in how their protectorate sees them? Does this sway their decisions at all? 25. Wildcard: Share a fun fact, random thought, or headcanon about them!
188 notes · View notes
kit-williams · 3 months
Note
An interesting idea recently came to my mind… and I just can’t keep quiet about it.
Imagine Horus suddenly realizing he's falling in love with a remembrancer/serf who's… pregnant.
Who the father is unknown. Either he died or abandoned you. And yes, this whole situation really pisses Horus off. He is delighted with the way you look, the way you smell and understands that he wants you to bear his child, give him blood sons.
You are cared for, you are cherished. Even too much. But he hates this child from some mortal. And then… heresy comes. After giving birth you are informed that your child, what a horror, has died. Horus consoles you, as if it was not he who crushed your son.
You will definitely become a mother. Do just let the primarch take care of you, okay?And please stop crying for your child, it's annoying. Oh, do you have any milk left? Well… :)
Yes, this whole plot and details are simply replete with horror, manipulation and perverted breeding kink. But Horus Heretic is supposed to be scary.
I don’t know if you will write a post about this or not. It would be a great pleasure to read. Unfortunately, I am not strong in Luna Wolves and Horus. Anyway, I hope all of you liked my absolutely disturbing idea.
So Momrad normally avoids stuff about hurting babehs... BUT this hit me like an Iron Warrior with a trenching shovel. Probably gonna do serf because obligatory momrad is in love with horrific power imbalances
Also ya'll have a lot more faith in me than I do myself about how I'm writing the primarchs and the legions so thank you!
tw: manipulation, breeding kink, discussion about a pregnant womans body, talks about miscarriage, child death (PLEASE someone let me know if I miss a tag)
@bispecsual @egrets-not-regrets @moodymisty @bleedingichorhearts @liar-anubiass-blog
@thevoidscreams @barn-anon @gallifreyianrosearkytiorsusan @squishyowl @ms--lobotomy
@nekotaetae @sleepyfan-blog
Tumblr media
You had such a glow to your skin when he first saw you. He was told that pregnant women had a glow to them and you certainly glowed. It was more of a passing interest in his serfs he was always a nosy and gregarious one and you had mentioned how you'd have to be transferred to lighter labor soon not realizing the primarch was listening to your conversations.
The hesitation upon your dark lips when the other serfs, in their gossip, had asked about the father. The tight line that your lips had become... "I'm having this child by immaculate conception." You said causing the others to laugh but Horus could tell... he could tell that you were on your own not by your own choice. And that thought caused him to roil. All of his sons were someone else's son at some point and then they were made to be his... sometimes there was a choice to be made into an Astartes... and sometimes there was no choice. Perhaps it was his inhumanity or perhaps hyper-humanity that caused him to be confused as to why you continued on... and why it sounded like you had been abandoned.
Perhaps Horus was glad in some sense that you had been abandoned by the uncaring father as you made something itch in the back of his skull and eventually even he could no longer ignore it. You wilted in his presence under his gaze, like all mortals did at first, to be in the presence of a demigod... the hand pressed over your slightly swollen stomach to protect it. But Horus simply played innocent in his intentions asking about the child... what it was like as he had been handmade by the Emperor and so this aspect of being human was lost upon him and his brothers.
The glow to your skin returned with each visit he made, his fingers caressing your stomach and eventually the poisoned thought latched like a newborn to the teat... what if you could bear his sons? You try your best to not be a burden to the Primarch, your request to transfer denied, he simply says its all from curiosity... but that lie dies quickly as your body goes through more changes... once you enter your second trimester.
Your breasts leak, he can smell it... the slow dribbling from your engorged breasts. The grunts from you as you press your hand against your rounding stomach... the fascination from other serfs and even his sons and the sparkle in your eyes as a tiny foot kicks against the hand. You had other side effects and had tried to run from him during one of them... spikes in arousal and sensitivity. You once more wilted under his gaze when you realized the Primarch could smell you... and the lie for why he kept you around died.
You were far too fearful to take his cock, far too sensitive... his fingers were almost too much and yet you rode his hand... riding his digit deep inside of your fluttering cunt with the vigor of a sex starved woman. Horus' mouth latched to your breast suckling on the tasteless discharge and he could feel the way your cunt gripped around his finger with each suckle. He could feel the tiny foreign body inside of you when he pressed against your swollen stomach. And he wanted it gone. He felt kinship in the way that certain males in animals will commit infanticide to try to get the mother fertile again as it was slowly becoming clear that simply hoping you would miscarry wasn't going to happen. But still... he should have warned you to not partake in his food... you didn't know what things he could ingest.
He loved seeing you like this, his hands supporting your weight as his cock slowly pushed in and out of you as tears were rolling down your face as it was too much yet not enough. You cried out his name in weak whimpers trying to close your legs one moment and the next trying to open them wider. He could pretend for a moment that your swollen belly was full of a child that was his. He wanted an actual son of Horus from you. He wanted to create the human chimera that all humans were to be made of... that biological mashup of his DNA mixed with yours... he wanted that. He was reminded once the haze of lust had passed, and as he stole succor from your breasts that the life inside of you wasn't his. It was from a man who abandoned you without a second thought... it confused the Primarch as to why you would raise the offspring of a man who did not care about the life you were bearing? Why reward him for his genetic duty of passing on his genes? Why would he have to wait up to a year before you would be ready to have his son?
It was doubtful that he would be there... be there to snuff out the life that came from you but he told the midwife what he wanted... and who was she to disobey? And he was right as he had been called away to bring the heel of the crusade onto the neck of some fool who thinks they could withstand the might of the Emperor. When he came back you were withdrawn... having to be ordered to come to him as the depression had claimed you. He did his best to sooth you and not revel in satisfaction that seemed that the child upon leaving your womb was far too weak... you did not hear that triumphant cry of life and that was the last you saw of your babe.
Your breasts were swollen with milk for a dead child... you still cried for the life you had grown to love... cooing lovingly to the thing inside of you. Horus soothes his anger with the fact that if this had been your child with him you would have still wept so greatly. You hardly notice your back in his bed as the Primarch pulled open your front and latched onto your breast feeling the liquid dribble out as your hand instinctively went to the back of his head as he nursed. He would say it was to relieve the pain your breasts were in... but he wanted to distract you. He drained one breast dry before moving to the other drinking up the meager amount of milk meant for a tiny stomach.
Sniffling weakly as your fingers move over his scalp as he kisses you soothing you asking you if you still want a baby. The tears that fall from your eyes as you answer your primarch truthfully... you still wanted to hold the tiny body that they wouldn't let you see... you never got to say goodbye... "Yes." You say so sadly as he kisses you with that charming look in his eyes.
"Then I will make it so my dear... recover and when you are better I swear that you shall have a healthy child by next solar year." Horus says kissing you softly... and soon enough he will replace his father and bring actual peace to the Imperium. And you will help bring about such change now that your womb is empty... and once it is ready... he is certain to fill it once again with his brood.
181 notes · View notes
moodymisty · 3 months
Text
Tumblr media
Someone in the ask box requested more Luna Wolves, and I decided to make a full oc for it, but for some reason I had an itch to actually doodle something as well. Enjoy, his name is Artyom. And yes he is wearing pants, you dirty degenerates.
181 notes · View notes
vyzz-undercover · 2 days
Text
the voices have made this happen
[cato/f!ambassador]
(1) (2) (3)
(5,900ish words) (OUUGHHHHH)
CONTENT WARNINGS:
•slight dubcon
•hints of size kink (obligatory)
•vaginal fingering
•oral (f receiving)
•mild possessive behaviour
•the consequences of ignoring important medical devices
•mentions of (hypothetical) torture
•tumblrs recurringly cancerous formatting
———————————————————————————————————
im back on my bullshit after having to do overnights so as payment to the dark gods of whoring and degeneracy i humbly offer this taglist of sweet darling who've indulged my insanity: @the-raven-lady, @gallifreyianrosearkytiorsusan, @bispecsual, @lemon-russ, @kit-williams, @passionofthesith, @egrets-not-regrets, @moodymisty, @sinistermojo, @justeverythingnothingelse, @pluvio-tea, @thevoidscreams, @beckyninja, @yestheantichrist!!! if you wanna be tagged (or not) in the next let me know!!! also it may take me longer to do a part four to this namely because ive got more wageslaving ahead of me soon but alas i'll definitely have rowboat girlyman catch em. also maybe give cato some top. myehehehehe,,, AND THANK YOU FOR READING AS USUAL ILY ALL!!! :3
———————————————————————————————————
Cato is just about leaving.
After having spent the better part of an hour discussing the predicted destruction pathway of a hive-fleet on the system's rim with his Father; it sends his balls into his throat when you nearly run into him in the chamber's huge archway.
It only takes a fraction of a second to catalogue your presence.
You're wearing the same utilitarian blue robe as you had been last week again.
Last week, when he'd been pounding you insensible on a lounge in the library—Cato promptly quashes the insidious memory, smothering down any sort of reaction. But there is a change in comparison to the dizzying reminder: there's a new addition to the reoccurring outfit.
You've brought a navy, high-collared turtleneck into the mix, layered below your lapels.
So, the efforts of his mouth hadn't gone unheeded, then.
Throne, if he's not smug, he's got no bloody clue what he is.
Cato steps aside and turns to allow you entrance first before his exit.
"Commander Sicarius," you lilt with a soft voice and a small downward tip of your chin, all while holding his gaze.
He's transfixed periodically at the honeyed sort of warmth in your eyes.
Despite himself, he lingers and greets you with a slow, "Lady Ambassador."
The left side of his mouth twitches upward in a half-aborted smirk that he quickly tries to mask as a stern, frown-nod combination.
You break the staring match and Cato's confident he's salvaged his slip-up without detection.
Or not—because oh, fuck—if he doesn't feel the burning focus of a Primarch's eyes boring a hole into the side of his head like a brand.
It only lasts an instant, but the second is an eternity to him.
Of course, you're oblivious to this subtle exchange—and promptly trot past him to his Father's vast desk.
"My Lord Primarch," you say with a curt little bow; and then Guilliman's attention is solely on you, his favourite little pet project. "I read the data-drives you instructed from the preceding article logging. I've arranged them back to the most recent mark counts."
You're looking for an empty spot to lay them on his table, but with all the meticulously arranged stacks, it's none too easy to find one.
"Perfect," the Primarch breaths, "Just on the side there is fine, don't worry."
Obligingly, you lay them atop a small mountain of paperwork.
"Do you need anything else of me, my Lord?" You chirp brightly, the tone of your voice so very painfully sweet—Cato is nearly overwhelmed fighting a pitched battle against the urge to run over, pick you up and shake you around suddenly.
Guilliman chuckles, waving one massive hand about vaguely, "You've done more than enough for me today, why don't we leave it at that for now, hm? Go on."
"Of course; thank you, and have a good evening, my Lord," You say, bow once more, and turn on your heel from the Primarch, and—and smile at Cato as you walk back towards the exit. That's—that's the first time you've smiled at him. His twin hearts lurch, slamming forward against the inside of his fused chest cavity. It's perfect abominable. You rotten temptress, he's—he's going to rectify that audacity later. Or now, if you're... possibly heading the same direction he is. Which is whatever direction you're going, purely by chance.
It's merely coincidence, he swears.
He's certainly not planning on hounding after you like a dog tailing a bitch in heat.
He's certainly not going to drag you into a side room the second he's sure no-one with a credible opinion's around.
He's certainly not going to indulge in anything heretical, like bending you bare over his knee for daring to taunt him.
Cato makes as if to fall in step behind you as you pass the threshold before him, but is quickly halted by his Father's curt, "I do not believe you have been dismissed, Cato."
He's never been subjected to such sinking dread quite so nonchalantly.
"Approach."
Cato complies stuffily, sparing a glance at your figure disappearing down the corridor before acquiescing. He's practically dragging his ceramite boots across the intricate rugs as he nears the Primarch's seated but colossal form.
Guilliman isn't looking at him, having had returned to notating a miscellaneous form.
The scritch-scratch of his gene-sire's preferred, yet archaic method of manually writing on the parchment is like someone grating a plate with a fork to his ears right now.
"You've gotten over your petty grievances regarding the Ambassador at last, I take it?" Guilliman asks, without looking up.
It is not Cato's duty to like or dislike. Nor is it to be biased without reason—his opinions are to be intellectual, not emotional. His duty is to assess, analyse and provide feedback, so that his Primarch can take it into account when making rulings and decisions.
Cato swallows around the proverbial hunk of drywall lodged in his throat and answers, "She has proven herself... useful, yes, sire."
Guilliman finally meets his eyes but says nothing for a short while. There's dark bags under his Primarch's eyes, and the deep, stern crease permanently between his dark blonde brows is a slight bit harsher, but the only thing Cato can parse out of the expression's intent is a vague sense of knowing. Because, insofar, he's thought himself quite adept at reading his Primarch; and rather well versed in deciphering the intricacies of his moods.
And right now, he feels like he's being read like an open manuscript.
The daunting prospect Cato's caught sinks it's teeth in his gullet. It's impossible, he's not left any room for suspicion, he's covered his tracks—there's no logical reason why he should be getting raked with such a look.
His gene-sire isn't a psyker nor omniscient, just impossibly intelligent—and so absurdly good at the mathematics of plotting and planning that it only appears superficially as if he is all-seeing. He can't possibly know what Cato has been doing—or rather, who he's been doing.
"It's about time," his Father hums abruptly, suddenly disinterested. "Now you're dismissed."
Cato nods, turns on his boot heel, and nigh bolts marches out the room. His proverbial tail definitely not between his legs.
The hall outside Guilliman's apartments is a central domed area that functions as a meeting area, where people go to one of six looming hallways. It's the bottom of a series of levels; and above, three echelons encircled by arcades and balustrades, framed on the exterior by engaged columns.
But the structure itself is immense and ancient, even by Imperial standards. One of the few still-original, unaltered parts of the great Gloriana-class warship's innards. It is doused in long swathes of red carpet and great standards of Magcraggian note, alongside glorious, heroic frescoes depicting Legiones Astartes in their thousands, crusading across the heavens with the Emperor their head.
Cato keeps his head down as he passes them, uneasy with guilt. Feeling as if their lenses are following him—intent on venturing into the lower layers to brood.
Several Astartes are hovering about amongst the personnel and serfs. The baselines look up at him in awe, and his Brothers nod in respect, but he pays them all no mind.
The furthest corridor beckons him, and so he goes; down the complex system of broad walks with high, barrel vault ceilings, mazing through the vessel's higher clearance reaches like arteries through a body.
Cato is seething, and self-admittedly itching to take a howler of a swing at the next thing that speaks to him.
He cuts down the southern channel and sees one of his subordinate Victrix Guard lingering in the middle of a groin vault intersection.
The younger Astartes is about to continue straight, yet he pauses.
Brother Marcellus meets Cato's eyes for a second, clearly notes his Commander's absolutely stinking mood from a hundred meters off; nods, swallows, takes a step backward—and changes direction to go left rather than pass him.
Cato's too pissed to even linger on the strangeness of the action.
Still, he doesn't rightly blame him.
Cato strides on, back straight, chin up—the red shawl pinned beneath his pauldrons swirling behind him.
His thoughts are eating at him the whole while.
He's sure his Primarch is just trying to innocently divine his sudden change of mind regarding you. There's no way his Father's aware of why. And yet, guilt is a big black wolf nipping at his ankles, making him hasten; and unease clouds about his heart. He's mortified, for lack of a better word.
The full implications of the situation are too enormous to be faced all at once; so he picks the smallest, most banal facet he can think of.
That being, you.
You, who he'll never see again if his Primarch finds out.
You, who's practically damned him without knowing it.
You, who he's now valiantly trying not to imagine in a hundred different circumstances where he gets away with it all. Each one more heretical than the last—it's like it was before he'd managed a hand on you: his body giving in to suffocating delusions, sleepless in his cot; lapping at whatever scant, lust-soaked morsels his mind offers up.
One of his favourites remains you scantily clad beneath a moonlit night sky, on the parapet of his ancestral fortress on the coastal edge of Perusia.
He likes to fantasise you like it there.
He suspects you would.
He knows just about all there is to know about you on paper, and wonders if you know much of Talassar. Or if you've read about Castra Tanagra. He assumes Guilliman would share the tale of that famed old battle with you as a part of your readings.
Each impossible reverie is a new shiny nail in his coffin, or dreadnaut—it depends where and how he dies, and if there's anything scrape up of him when he eventually goes down in a blaze of glory and duty, and honour.
If his Primarch catches him, there's going to be none of that.
He'll be struck from living record, like Titus had been. Cato would be lucky to get a little plaque in the deepest pits of the Fortress of Hera. Reduced to a whispered memory of his achievements passed solemnly between Captains, followed up with words of disappointment. Of waste. Until his memory dies with them and his deeds fade into obscurity, lost to any new brothers.
The fate that awaits you would somehow be worse. Cato was always going to die in war, as was his right—but you—you were not fashioned for such things. Yes, Guilliman enjoys you, but that fact won't save you. Just like it won't save Cato for all his usefulness. You'd be tried as a heretic, as a source of corruption upon the Legiones, and you'd be made to suffer; because torture ever comes before execution. You're so very soft weak in so very many ways. Your life lived in a gilded cage, without pain nor discomfort that extends further than grating professional grievances—he doesn't want to imagine the sound of you screaming, but he does.
He cannot stand the thought.
The sudden urge to barricade you in his chambers for permanent safe keeping is all-consuming.
It's suddenly all he can think about.
He has to find you.
The amount of serfs passing and parting to allow his passage thin out to nothing.
Even from the sterile confines of one of the many winding hallways, Cato abruptly swears he can hear the echoed rush of sandals—your sandals—reverberating off the floor.
He hadn't notice you following behind immediately because, damn it, he's spiralling thinking.
He chances a confrontation, and rounds about-face.
You stand there in the middle of the empty hallway like you've got a bolter aimed at you, frozen.
"Come here," he says, clipped.
You do not.
"Come here."
Again, no compliance.
"Do you pride yourself on being a idiot?" His voice is scathing now, taking a heavy step into your space and being met by you staying stock stiff, still. "Do you have any idea what that stunt of yours earlier might incur?"
"What?" You blink, finally animating. "I didn't do anything—"
"You know what you did," he hisses, accusatory. "You're hollow between the ears, but you're not blind."
Lips pursing tightly in mental deliberation, you make a fey noise of annoyance as a little frown graces your features, apparently not deigning to offer a comment back.
"Do you not understand that... this," he gesticulates between you both and his voice falls to a whisper. "This... is not common allowance?"
"It's not?"
Are you being intentionally dense at this point, or is it just second nature?
Cato raises a hand to knead the crease between his brows, "No."
"That explains a lot, actually," you say, seemingly without any real comprehension on the gravity of the matter. "I couldn't find any notes or references on it."
He's genuinely stunned, "Is that what you were doing when—"
"When I was rudely interrupted," you cut in, the comment is nigh a spat insult.
Cato isn't sure what to say to that sudden display of spine, and grumbles.
He surmises the optimal action is complete disregard.
Therefore, he has no problem turning on the heel of his sabatons and starting his pace on again.
"So... this isn't normal by Astartes standards?"
He's taken aback at your abrupt want for conversation after all that. Namely because it's atypical. You never attempted small talk with him. You never do anything but scurry off when he's accosted you for you flagrant overstepping—wait.
He feels as if the paradigm between you both has shifted again since the last time for some reason. More than last time, actually. More than you just simply having the audacity to backtalk him.
It's like some symptom of a deeper sickness rising to the surface.
It makes him unreasonably curious suspicious.
He wants to see just how much ground you'll give, so he plays along and answers, "Not as far as I am aware, no."
You hum, and immediately are at it again, posturing, "Surely you have heard of cases of it happening?"
"I have not," Cato says, and you hum in consideration.
You're satisfied at that information for a brief while, but then he remembers you cannot shut your mouth for more than five minutes, and purses his lips. He's already tiring of your incessant questioning.
"But you'd done it before?"
And that's just great.
You've expertly found an exposed nerve.
More kindling on the bonfire of him having an aneurysm before the cycle's end.
Cato can feel the hint of pressure behind his eyes as he begins increasing his walking speed. "I don't think that is a relevant question."
You haste to stay in step, "It definitely is."
"You ought to learn a civil fucking tongue when you're addressing me, woman," he bites out, nose crinkling into a sneer.
Unperturbed by his short-tempered comment, another thoughtful little 'hmm' slips out of you.
"So, to conclude... you where as inexperienced as I was at the start, and all those gloating insults back then were just projection?" You suddenly blurt out at rather impressive speed, like a politician possessed—before finishing with, "Sorry, 'all those gloating insults back then were just projection,' Commander Sicarius."
Cato grits his teeth and feels his eye twitch.
He stops, turns to look over his pauldron, and stares bloody murder.
He can't even imagine the idiocy in your brain that gave you the imprimatur to say that aloud.
But Throne, the sly little glint in your pretty eyes suddenly has his face thudding with heat.
Then you smile at him for the second time ever.
Cato bites back the urge to ogle you dumbly, and actually feels himself thicken in his body-glove in real time, because oh, fuck—his hind brain practically pelts him across the jaw with the mental pict of that sweet mouth lathing up the side of his cock.
Mentally unseated for a moment, his brows furrow; and he quickly turns away, applying himself entirely to the task of trudging down the stagings.
The silence is a breath of fresh air.
Even if he can still hear your laboured breathing a few steps back him from him. You're straining to keep up with his pace, and it's an excellent punishment for you. His heavy sabatons clank-clank-clank on the steel decking, and your little boots practically pitter-patter in contrast. It's a syncopated rhythm that he's absentmindedly trying to match—and when he lingers for a step he manages to even the beat out.
He hangs a left, and scales the wide stairs to the open intersection platform above two at a time; trying not to snort amusedly at the little groan you let out as you hurry up them behind him, heaving.
Cato realises abruptly that you're actually, really, seriously following him—and pretending you're not.
He makes a right at the top and then waits for you to fall in step.
And, pointedly, he then turns and doubles back around.
You stand there stupefied for a moment, before grumbling softly and continuing down the thoroughfare without him.
If his observation skills hold any weight, he heads straight into the nearest open room and waits for you to follow.
He doesn't activate the locking mechanism on the other side in on purpose when he strides in, and lets the sliding door close behind him.
This particular room is forgettable in its ubiquitousness, though unusual. He has no idea of it's actual intended purpose. It's fitted with screens and database terminals as if it's for debriefing purposes, but he has no real way of confirming. What he can catalogue is that there's wraparound surfaces littered with candles. A few strips of harsh lighting and scant furniture—a tallish counter and a few long benches. They're thankfully Astartes sized.
Which means he can sit down and pray for you to walk right into the metaphorical snare he's just laid.
Not a minute later, the door's sliding mechanism triggers and you scurry through—only to promptly go stiff.
You stare at him like a rat he's just found by lifting a crate.
The mechanism shuts automatically behind you and it apparently spooks you enough to jump a little.
"You're disgustingly predictable," he harrumphs, unimpressed.
A flush rises to your face as you scowl, "You're disgustingly predictable," you shoot back, echoing his words.
Of course, that audacity of yours leads to a short stalemate.
He huffs out a sigh as he concedes out of sheer frustration and says, "Three-seven-five-eight-eight-two-nine-one."
You blink dumbly at him, "...what?"
"It's my locking code," he growls, and Throne, you must be acting stupid just to grate him; because there's no way your brain is so smooth as to not connect the dots. "It's for the door, moron."
A soft 'ohh' leaves you as you turn and step aside to the key pad fixed into the frame.
"Three-seven-five-eight-eight-two-nine-one," he's agonisingly forced to say once again.
"Three-nine-five-eight-eight-two-seven-one..." you mumble to yourself.
Cato hears an angry beep and suddenly wants to smash his head into a wall repeatedly.
Grinding his molars, he snarls, "Three-seven-five-eight-eight-two-nine-one," and then adds, "If I have to repeat that one more time, I'm going to throw you out of the nearest airlock."
And it seems the threat of violence works wonders, because you don't bungle the input this time.
Cato sighs, exasperated, and leans back against the lip of the table behind the bench.
He ought to start carrying around a correctional stun rod. Just for whenever you annoy him. If it's good enough for a Neophyte to suffer, it's good enough for you, he supposes.
Or it'll send you into a seizing fit.
He's not to sure of the maximum voltage a baseline can take without their singular, puny little heart giving out.
One disciplinary option scratched out, then.
But he can think of many, many more to make a model Ambassador out of you. The wonders of carefully applied violence are plentiful. A little roughing up never hurts, or at least, not for long. And fuck, do you need some lessons on proper manners. He could have you smacked into shape like a show pony in no time—even if it'd be more like teaching a grox to trot lateral movements. Then again, he also believes if he stuck a frag far enough up a Carnifex's ass, he could probably get it to play Regicide.
And then pointedly, he starts thinking about your ass.
Cato is so utterly lost on the tangent of hypotheticals that he's flabbergasted when a small mouth lands on his own.
He hadn't even been paying attention.
He hadn't even noticed you'd neared.
It feels like the breath has been knocked out him at the sheer unexpectedness of it.
The kiss is hasty, your eyes scrunched shut and cheeks flushed, scowling with focus.
All the while, his mind reels because Throne, the contact of his lips to yours doesn't really feel particularly profound aside from how soft your skin is—but the intention of it is the real reward.
Cato's genuinely infuriated when you pull away.
You blink owlishly at him, giving him a cautious look like you're trying to gauge his reaction.
There are a thousand things he wants to ask, to say, but the foremost among them is but one.
"Again," he huffs, lessening the distance between you just enough to invite you back.
And he thinks that perhaps he’s abusing his station over you, but when you tentatively find a hold on his gorget to steady yourself to give him another kiss—those thoughts are all but erased from his mind. It's a curious weight off his shoulders to have you initiate and to show you want him in return, especially since it's as new to you as it is for him.
Nonetheless, he can't even imagine finding a reason to stop you, so he starts blindly mouthing; trying to coordinate around the fact he's so much larger than you.
The angle is difficult, but he's willing to follow your lead. Your body is even more fragile when he's in full armour. The risk of actually hurting you is realer than ever, but he can't help the desire to wrap an gauntlet around your waist and pull you closer to him. Thankfully, you let him when he urges you to, trembling hands flitting across his chestplate like you're unsure of what, exactly, you should be holding—and he catches the tiny line between your brows smoothing out as you risk a peek. Only for you to yelp, nervously wrenching yourself back in flustered surprise upon meeting his unwavering stare.
It's as if you expected something else.
He senses he's made a mistake of some kind.
Then he remembers from the motion-picts he's not supposed to keep glaring at you when kissing.
Regardless, he studies your face, memorising the lingering want still clearly there like his life depends on it.
He pulls you in and kisses you again, just because he can, this time brief and chaste. And then he goes for a third, fourth—fifth, each time slightly longer, until finally he rears back; and when he does you push up on your toes just a little, trying to chase him, but lose the nerve; although to Cato the reason for your faltering is, frankly, irrelevant. Because just like him, you lack the practical capacity to really know what next step you should take. Still, you look down at his armour, as if there's a latch to pull that magically undoes all his wargear.
He knows he's not going to get himself out of his armour in any reasonable way or amount of time.
There's no way he's getting the satisfaction of having you on him right now—but he still wants to keep you near.
He thinks he hears you ask for something, but he's too distracted to catch it in time.
"What?" Cato scowls, "What do you want now?"
It's clear you've been struck by your own embarrassment, strung up somewhere between shy and wanton, "I.. uh..."
"Spit it out," he rumbles.
You wince, hesitant as you mumble, "You, uh... i-in me."
Cato's brain skids to a halt. And it's the gall of that request alone that has him sweeping you up off the ground and spinning you around to sit in his lap.
It's obvious you're overwhelmed at being held to the formidably larger size of himself in full-plate. But as usual, you're yet to actively complain. Using his vambrace as a leg-bar to scoop under your thighs, he folds you in his grasp—your knees pressed to your chest as you're tucked back against his pauldron and chestplate.
The angle forces the hems of your robe aside, and he can see the underside curve of your ass; along with the plump mound of your vulva under the white of your small-clothes.
Cato's suddenly offended by their existence. You didn't wear any last time, so why now? The irritation of there being one more thing between you and him is enough justification to yank at them, tearing them loose—before throwing them aside.
You grumble sourly, which he chooses to ignore.
The palm of his gauntlet smooths across your hip, and you make a small hugg as you shiver, goose-bumps suddenly covering your exposed flesh.
Cato lets the pads graze closer and closer to your sex, content to watch you impatiently glare at his armoured fingers from between the gap of your thighs.
With little preamble, he's stuffing his middle in. You're already so wet it's practically a cake-walk. Your cunt swallows down each articulating segment of his armoured finger down to the knuckle. The fact he's going to have to personally scrub your slick out from between the joints, instead of a lowly serf, is infinitely worth the shrill whine he receives as tribute.
"Would that my wargear had a zipper," he breathes, and fuck, he grins behind the obscurity of his gorget at the mournful mewl that remark earns. "I'd have you on your knees sucking for all the cunted trouble you've caused me."
You're making a warp-awful attempt at keeping yourself together, high-strung as you evidently are. Little more than a minute of him pumping his finger in and out of you has you red-faced and panting. All it takes to get those heavy breaths of yours to change into proper whines is his large thumb-pad adjusting to rest on your clit, applying pressure. You jerk, reflexively trying to buck into every motion. Fighting and failing to withhold the stuffy little moans escaping you—trying to stave off the inevitable by scrambling at the thigh plating of his power armour with one hand and tugging at his couter with the other.
Some part of Cato wants to stop solely out of spite for you being so grating earlier, or some other stupid mercurial justification of his; but instead, he simply continues, letting you squirm on his fingers.
And squirm you do.
It's clear to him the tide of it all is becoming too much for you to resist. Your sandal'd feet kick out where he's got your legs secured, joining in on the struggling as it begins anew when his thumb starts circling. It's a good sign, so he adds his pointer into you to bolster the stretch, curling in; before letting his fingers fan out inside you, stretching rather than stabbing. Your hips try to stutter forward in time with the quick thrusting of his digits, broken whimpers resonating off the room's walls. He promptly stuffs down to the knuckle and curls them again—and you all but bleat his surname as you're dragged into a fast and apparently exhausting orgasm. Just knowing he's you got you beat has his erection ache where it's trapped under the suiting and plating of his navel.
Cato can't feel you clenching through all the layers separating his skin from yours, but he knows from experience that you're seizing in fits internally—tight little cunt trying to milk a load out of an Astartes cock that should've been stuffed in you.
Just to allow himself one last bit of smugness, he scissors his fingers; giving a final swirl for good measure.
The shivered sob is worth every possible future disciplinary action he'll receive.
He pulls his gauntlet away slowly, and the wet shlick of it leaving you is almost amusingly alike pulling a blade from sinew. It's a degenerate comparison, he knows, but it's true.
Nonetheless, he splays out his hand and swallows dryly, eyeing the sticky, clear liquid webbing out and thinning between each ridge of his gauntlet'd digits.
Suddenly focused entirely on the fluid on his fingers, he pulls his vambrace barring under your knees up away. Now limp, and without the support, you slide off his lap and onto the floor in a slow slump.
"Nn-ngh," You groan weakly, face-down, legs still juddering a little.
Seeing as you're preoccupied, Cato doesn't even dignify the concept of hesitation, and promptly jams his fingers in his mouth—lathing the aftermath of your orgasm from them. And Throne, the taste of your hormones make him groan. He's absolutely stunned, unsure of how to act. He's so fucking stupid, why didn't he do this earlier? He's practically drugged by the omophagic aftereffect—getting off on your second hand bliss. Some sort of fey feedback loop in his brain catalysing his next decision solely on instinct.
He clambers to the floor and gets to his knees guards, securing a mitt on your bared thigh to roll you onto your back.
Apparently boneless with afterglow, you're easy to manhandle.
You barely have the strength to do much more than crane your head up at him and whine as he arranges your thighs apart, settling on his front between them with a warp-awful clank; before lifting your legs up to rest onto either lip of his gorget.
You try to scud back on your ass suddenly, but are quickly halted when he holds you fast by the hip.
He raises a confused brow.
"I-Isn't—" you start, still gathering the scraps of your brain together so soon post-orgasm, "Isn't y-your saliva acid?"
Cato suddenly wants to cuff you on the ear, "Who the hell told you that?"
"M-Master Calgar," you mumble.
Oh, of course, the gossiping hen.
He's going to have words with the Lord Defender of Greater Ultramar the next time they meet—words like 'for fuck sakes, stop scaring the woman he's trying to eat out with talk of Betcher's gland, Marneus,' come to mind, but then Cato realises that doesn't sound like he's not fucking you, so he quickly settles on: 'stop dignifying the Ambassador's hundred-and-one insane questions.'
"Not Ultramarines," Cato manages not to snarl, "It's a vestigial organ in most of us."
Your voice is shaky as you parrot, "Most of us?"
"Yes," He grunts, and promptly buries his face in your cunt.
The disproportion in size is painfully apparent when he realises his whole damned tongue is able to drag a stripe up the entire splay of you with minimal effort.
The pitched gasp he wins out of you is pure sin, and he's on the brink of swooning; but then you're running your trap again.
"Please, d-don't tell me you're one that can spit acid—" you manage to warble, seemingly still stuck on the topic.
Cato sighs as he's forced to pull away from your vulva, "I think you're forgetting I had my tongue on your tonsils in the library."
"Th-that's different," you stammer. "That's not as sensitive."
A long, unimpressed deadpan paints itself on his face.
"So," he starts with a bated hiss, "And let me be perfectly clear in this—you believe your vagina is more susceptible to burns than your mouth?"
Your face transforms into a strange mix of embarrassed and angry.
"I didn't say that—"
"Yes, you did," Cato grumbles.
"Did not," you huff.
"You—you just fucking did," he snaps, frustrated enough that he can feel one of the veins at his temple bulge. "The implication is obvious, you insufferable little whore."
You snort, but stay silent.
The argument appears, for all intents and purposes, to be finished.
"Did not," you say abruptly once more, pouting.
Cato's eyes roll back in his skull as he grits his teeth.
"Throne of Terra, if you don't drop the subject, acid in your cunt will be the least of your worries," he all but snarls, and that apparently quietens you enough that he can get back to lapping at you—the flat of his tongue running over your clit and earning a jolt.
He wraps his lips around the pink little nub and sucks. And that's all it apparently takes to make up for his amateur career in the practice.
You siphon down a sharp breath and let out a garbled cry, hips canting forward into his mouth—to which he obligingly stuffs his tongue into your slick entrance.
There's a satisfaction well beyond simple pleasure that swamps him at the way your thighs shake either side of his head. His own breath is hot about him, stuffy and dizzying; and the skin pressed against his cheeks is warm and smooth.
You're panting when he goes back to lapping over your clit, perching yourself up on a bent elbow and reaching out a hand.
Your fingers card through the messed brown hair atop his head. And he stiffens without realising—but he realises something: like this, the touch is ecstasy—pure, golden ecstasy. Every bit of higher thought in his head evaporates when you stroke him again.
A long, rumbling subvocal moan tears from him.
The infrasound vibration makes you buck weakly into his mouth again, teary eyed afore him as he adjusts his grip on you and crawls closer.
He's suddenly acutely aware that in this new, much more prone position, he's able to grind his body armour into his groin guard pressed on the floor. And as soon as the action bears results—namely a scorching burr of pleasure racing up his spine—he's deadset on rutting against the ground like a slavering beast.
He's frotting himself at a pace so rabid it'd cruel to subject your cunt to. It's brutal, and the harsh scraping sound of plasteel on steel only further proves that. It's just frantic lust—he's desperate.
It's complete insanity how close to finishing he is so quickly.
Not as close as you, though.
He can feel how your legs jump with each pass of his tongue; and then you're unraveling in front of his very eyes.
"I-I can't—I can't, S-Sicarius, I-I—" You ramble, dazed, trying to get away as he works you right through it, sobbing and oversensitive while he's rutting himself closer and closer to his own end.
It all comes to a head when your fingers dig into his hair, tugging—and his brain is overrun with static. A drawn out groan scathes from his maw as any sense of rhythm scatters like light through a prism. For a fraction of a second, the pleasure is serene.
Then it's abject agony, he feels—he feels like Roboute Guilliman himself has just taken a running start and kicked him in the balls.
"F-Fuck–ing—gh—" he chokes, vision swimming, straining against the tide of the torment. His back arches up, and he curls inward on himself; white-hot pain clocking his nervous system into overdrive. Every muscle in his abdomen is doused in acid. He's tolerated being shot, stabbed, burnt without so much as blinking—but this is an entirely new and entirely different sort of wound. It's like he's pissing promethium. It's—it's the catheter, he realises. He'd forgotten about the bloody catheter jammed up his cock.
Through the searing ordeal, he manages to force his armour's facilities to finally abide his impulses and dose him with a pain dampener.
And then everything's fine.
He opens eyes he wasn't aware he'd closed and finds your face has suddenly gotten far closer to his.
"S-Sicarius?" You stammer, and there's an honest panic in your voice. "Sicarius, p-please, please—a-are you okay?"
He realises he's on his back, and you're sitting beside him, half draped on his chestplate, frantically trying to figure out what's wrong with him to no avail.
You've leaned in so close he can feel your rushed breathing.
"I'm fine," Cato groans, and you sputter out a sigh.
"I-I don't know what happened, I-I—" you're still wildly confused and raving, and he inhales deeply; only to be greeted by the sour animal stink of fear practically dripping from you.
Cato rolls his tongue around inside his mouth and cringes knowingly at the foaming side-effect of the chem he'd self-administered, the acrid taste mixed with your slick is certainly not an ideal cocktail.
The sincerity of concern behind your reaction is baffling. He's not made of glass, for fuck sakes—and he's a bit pissy about the fact you'd actually fallen victim to the idea of him suffering some grievous injury so easily. But he supposes where there's a will of baseline overreaction, there's a way.
"You're acting like a child, woman. Pull yourself together," he sighs hoarsely, hoping the comment jars you out of your hysteria—or at the very least scares you off.
It does exactly neither, and you sidle in closer and rest your cheek on his jaw.
It’s an action so overwhelmingly horribly affectionate that it would’ve been a crime to not press into it with a lean of his head. Or, at least, that's the half-assed justification he tells himself.
Because he's loving enduring your attention, not seeking it; and therefore only humouring you when he lifts a hand and settles the wide splay of it on your flank as a comfort.
He shouldn't be, but he is.
106 notes · View notes
deadwooddross · 2 years
Photo
Tumblr media
Took me two months to nail how she looks, and then another month to pick away at this Beast, but here they are! Thavu through the years! As you can tell she is perfectly well adjusted and doing Just Great in the grimdark future of 40k PATREON
2K notes · View notes
sculptorofcrimson · 6 months
Text
Yandere! Valdor
Valdor, the most loyal, the greatest of the Custodes, a Primarch in all but name. Who else can obsess more than him, whose every function besides loyalty was beaten out? A/N: Playing “fucked up obsessive twinks” on easy mode here, aren’t I? I’m sorry, SCP-XXXX who requested this, but you told me Valdor was a twink, and evil twinks are the best kind of men, so therefore this is your fault! Full throttle ahead, let us be damned together! ψ(`∇´)ψ
Relationships: Valdor/Gn!Reader, mentioned Valdor/Emperor Mentions: @kit-williams would you like some food?
Valdor does not love. 
The Custodes simply can not love. Their love perished beneath treachery and fire, ten thousand years ago, and they simply cannot piece the remnants that was a heart back together again. 
The Emperor took away their ability to love any but Himself, and what else could be left but a hollow void, an immortality without substances, a heart that beats while it lacks its other half? 
There was simply nothing left of him to spare when the Emperor had brought down his claws. His love, his joy, his dreams, all gone, wiped away like sand upon the sea. Leaving behind nothing more than a hollow without sustenance, a phantom vestige of a dream crushed long ago, its corpse entombed within perfected flesh and bone and blood. 
He loves no one, not even himself. When the Emperor died ten thousand years ago, he lost his way. He lost his tether to life itself. And for ten thousand years he wandered for the corpse of his master. There was a poem once, a poem so long ago about the loyal dog that stood guard before his master’s bones, who licked the once-petting hand once, and laid down to die. 
Valdor’s loyalty is no weaker than that dog’s.
He loves no one, not even himself. But he loves the Emperor. He loves Him, so brokenly, so obsessively, so utterly insane in his adoration, the First Custodian would have let Him tear him apart if He wished. 
He loved the Emperor. 
And that is why he loves you. He thinks you to be his Emperor. If not Him, then at least a shard.
He doesn’t care who you were, he doesn’t care whether you were once a captain, a Chapter Master, a Thunder Warrior even. He thinks you to be his master, back from the dead, one of His shards caught in life and flesh. 
He thinks you’re Him. Or, if not Him, at least a fragment of His former glory.
Valdor calls you his Emperor, his shard, his beloved, he ignores any name you had once in favor of calling you his master. A name is only a word, after all, and you are nothing but his Emperor reborn, in his mind. A guardsman, an Astarte, a Thunder Warrior, you are all mortal beneath his eyes. He only smiles that cold, humorless smile of his when you attempt to correct him, when he brushes off your words with the same cold, humorless disinterest. 
Valdor thinks you to be his Emperor. And he doesn't care that you were once someone else, you were not always his beloved, you were not the master he imagined, that you are not the master he built from memories and bones. 
You were nothing before his master, he reasons, you will be nothing after his master, and you were his Emperor once upon a time. It is doubtful if he can even know love, if he had not projected his own delusions of his Emperor upon another. Valdor failed Him once and only now the fates have judged him fit enough to protect a shard of Him, one that is so frail compared to himself, so unspeakably mortal, his atonement for the master he failed so long ago. 
He failed the Emperor once, and watched Him die. He will not do so again.
Protection. You will never walk free again, never without his cold presence by your side, that effortless, confident stride as he accompanies his master. You will never know the taste of sunlight, the easy voice of another conversationalist before their words taper off into uncertainty, and then fear, beneath the jealous glare of your bodyguard. How their sentences trail off, how Valdor looms like some ancient, murderous harpy, his shadow constantly overcasting yours.
He knows nothing of love, of human emotion. But he knows protection. And he knows obsession. 
Valdor is not a passionate man. But he is neither a cruel one either. Of course, Valdor will never raise a spear nor blade against his adoration, to strike his master would certainly mean death, but he will slaughter your loved ones without even horror. He will whisper litanies of loyalty on his knees while his Custodes sink in the knives. He will speak ironclad promises and gilded oaths when they label your soldiers traitors and slaughter them upon the snowfields, when they hail for unity, and hear the blade fall. 
He seems to like walks in wintery fields. It reminds him of what he lost long ago, when the Emperor took him atop Ararat, and he enacted His first vengeance upon the Thunder Warriors. He sometimes brings you there, to altitudes higher than even what a Space Marine can withstand, and gathers you beneath his cloak, whispering memories that were never truly yours, asking for your orders, asking for your forgiveness, asking if you can remember what it felt like ten thousand years ago.
(Sometimes, you can nearly believe him when he says you’re a shard. It’s flattering, almost, to be under the eye of the captain-general.)
He can kill. There is nothing left of him if he could not. Nothing but the Emperor’s spear, a sharpened tool meant to kill and to serve, and to be cast away when its function is complete. You have nothing to fear from him, of course, he would rather end himself than raise a blade against his master. But he loves no other. He does not know how to love. And that makes him dangerous. You know it when you gaze into his eyes, you are sure you could imagine him covered in the blood of your loved ones, guardian spear flashing as he hacks through them without even the shadow of hesitation. He will take no fear, no regret, no relief, barely even satisfaction in the grim act, and yet that is somehow more profane than joy in slaughter. Not even a single hint of joy, wild and unfettered in the sheer cruelty, not even a single hint of an ambition for why he would lay such altars of blood before his master’s feet, only simply because He wanted it to be so, and simply because he loved Him. 
In his eyes, you are his Emperor. But he does not always obey you. He does not kneel as he would’ve knelt before his master. Because he knows, Valdor knows that to protect Him, to serve Him properly, sometimes he must smother Him for His own good. It’s the twisted rationale of a dog who has lost his master, whose death had rocked him so thoroughly he was willing to kill to save Him again. 
Valdor kneels, of course. He’ll kneel before you and speak his words of loyalty, he’ll give you his names one by one if you only ask. Valdor has never considered himself eloquent with words, but he’ll listen to you, he’ll even let you command him as the Emperor would have done. Rank be damned, he cares not if his Emperor had been reborn as a guardsman or an Astartes or even a Thunder Warrior. 
But he does not hide his obsession. To obsess is the only way he knows to love, after all. He’ll smother his beloved with his protection, with his adoration. He’ll hack his way to be their only protector, their only bulwark before the madness, the only man they can trust to defend them. Gaze upon his Emperor once, he’ll tear them apart. Love the Emperor more than him, and he’ll bury their bones beneath the snowfields. 
And be loved by the Emperor more than him….and he’ll betray them as he had betrayed the Thunder Warriors. He’ll sink in golden knives and golden spears in turned backs without even the hint of remorse, Valdor will remind his beloved that it is he who is the servant, it is he who serves to be praised for his duty. Valdor can take you from your family as the Emperor took him from his, he’ll so effortlessly ensure the utter protection of his new Emperor, all for himself. 
No one will protect you more than I, my liege. 
It is he who should be the favored servant.
No one can love you more than I, my Emperor.
He’ll croon those litanies of loyalty to you. He’ll whisper those promises of protection, of ambition, he’ll promise you an eternity while standing atop the frozen ashes of your loved ones. He’ll promise you a throne if you don’t cry, if you’ll love him as his master did. He’ll bring you a crown of gold, he’ll strangle the living storm for you, if only you promise to let him protect you, if you promise if you’ll be his Emperor. 
You died once. I will not let you do so again, my Emperor.
And his obsession would never be checked, and much less ended by the true power behind the Imperium.
You are his Emperor. In that mind He broke so thoroughly long ago, you are the Emperor, reborn. Heavy is the head that bears the laurel, bloodied is the hand that holds this mad dog’s leash.
It is Valdor who should be the favored servant. 
No one will protect you more than I, my liege. 
He will protect you. 
He will protect you, obsess over you, guard you with the hollow that is a heart. He’ll bring you a throne, a crown, an army, an eternity, if only you promise, if only you’ll be his Emperor. 
The Emperor died ten thousand years ago. And in turn, he casted you in His corpse.
195 notes · View notes