Novels2Search

Starchild

"Purity is also here, Father." Patrocles wrote on the ancient matrix.

The timeless particles vibrated from blue to red, as the message formed on the holoscreen. "Tell her she looks taller." the message arrived, then the hologram distorted and decohered into regular photons. 'Tachyon Network shutting down. Temporal horizon is closed.' the Blade sent to his implant.

Purity's eyes glowed with golden light as she turned towards her brother. "He knew I could read the words on the screen!" she exclaimed in outrage.

Patrocles sighed inward and told the Machine Spirit to hide, and the holoscreen turned off. "You are an adult now, little sister. And a Living Saint by any measure. That father spent his last time bottle to tell you this..." he muttered as the glowing light of the Astronomican began piercing the walls of the Lancefire Spire.

"I know. He loves me. I should be scared..." Purity mused in a low voice, as her hand waved though the golden light, yet left no shadow.

"It has begun. Ahriman and his band of empty armors are knocking on the door of the Imperial Webway." Patrocles disclosed as his dimensional vision pierced the mystical veil of the Astra Telepathica million-psyker ward.

Purity glanced up, as the Imperial Palace lifted off and flew away from Terra, with the Emperor and her sister Janice on board.

The largest ship she had ever seen, glowing with Warp wards and the energy of a thousand engines.

"And thus the Aquila flies." she answered in a prophetic voice, while Patrocles was tapping invisible keys on the noosphere, displacing stasis fields and guiding the Chaos traitor into the temporal traps of the Golden Throne.

"I'm going, the Child will need my help." Purity spoke in a grave voice, as giant golden wings appeared behind her.

Patrocles doubted the Starchild would ever need help, but he nodded anyway. Even a gram of Divine favor would be worth a billion lives, especially Lancefire Clan lives.

Purity flew into the light of the Astronomican, leaving Patrocles alone in the command center of the Spire.

'Genestealer purging, Tech-marine Lancefire?' the Blade proposed on his implant, just as a hundred million miles away, Holy Mars vanished from the real universe.

Patrocles took out a bottle of expensive Amasec, and took a big gulp. Perhaps humans were meant to feel fear, after all. No wonder his father was always so cool and casual.

'There is no need, Blade Lancefire. The light of the Child is purging all that already. The sky is turning blue as well.' Patrocles answered as billions of genestealers all over Terra evaporated inside the glowing light of the emergent Divinity.

An old Grey Knights' Prognosticar teleported beside him, and just observed in silence for a minute, before grabbing his bottle and taking a long gulp. "Your Blacksoul is glowing darkly, Patrocles.

And the Thousand Sons are returning home." the old seer spoke in a sad voice.

"Prodigal Sons indeed. Returning home at the crucial time." Patrocles added with a casual tone, when a moon of Saturn sunk into the Warp and vanished as well. Titan, the home of the Grey Knights hid in the last place anyone would look for it.

The Prognosticar finished the Amasec and grimaced. "You Nobles find pleasure in the strangest things. Bitter drinks?"

"Well, at least we're not bathing in the blood of innocents, Grey Knight. I take it you're a Horusian ?" he asked with a glance at the Grey Knight.

"A Magnusian, perhaps. Primarch Magnus will make a fine Vessel for the God-Emperor. I believe that would make me a Thorian instead. Not that it matters anymore. I can feel his Divine essence in my blood, restoring youth and strength." the Grey Knight revealed with a smile, as golden light emerged from his eyes.

Patrocles frowned, as his father's prediction was coming true with every passing second. The Second Crusade was inevitable now, with the fanatics in power and empowered by Divine might.

Pillars of light exploded from a million cathedrals on Terra, and heavy rain began falling after 10000 rainless years.

The underhives would drown first, which is why the Emperor made sure to empty the underhives first, and sent those people away on Exodus ships. The Second Flood, to wash away the sins of previous generations.

"You better get below and secure the crypts against flood, Prognosticar. I'll be here, drowning my fear away." Patrocles quipped in a light voice, and took out another bottle of Amasec.

"Funny words, from a Lancefire. An ocean of Amasec will not drown a fear that doesn't exist." the Grey Knight answered with a smirk, and teleported down to Floor -666.

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"In Vino Veritas." Patrocles spoke softly, and drank another sip. Damned Ahriman still escaped the temporal stasis and reached the Golden Throne, and faced off with Purity.

Patrocles grinned and deployed a low-tech bear trap just as the Chaos Sorcerer took a step forward. The left leg this time.

"Lancefire! You could never let it go...even as I came to offer my services to my gene-father. Lord Magnus and Crimson King! Please save your foolish sons!" Ahriman pleaded as he fell to the floor, with a missing knee.

Primarch Magnus opened an eye from his high-rise throne. "What's a King to a God, Ahzek Ahriman? Why are you here?" he asked in a deep voice, filled with immeasurable pain.

"The Blue Janitor betrayed me and your other sons, Lord Magnus. The Great Hunger is assaulting the Crystal Labyrinth. I believe Tzeentch will die soon. You can take his power and use it to finish the Rubric. Eternal life, my Primarch." Ahriman pleaded, still on his knee.

"Excellent plan, Librarian. But you're too late. My father likes reading too." Purity commented in a mocking voice, and her glowing hand caressed the forehead of Magnus, wiping away the pain and smoothing the wrinkles of the Primarch's face.

"Lady Purity! Pef Lancefire entered the Hidden Library? That's a disaster!" Ahriman yelled in a desperate voice.

"Thank you, Purity. I will remember your kindness." Magnus spoke in a different voice, as his body began to change, and turned into a child form, comically small on the huge auramite throne.

Purity smiled kindly, and ruffled the white hair of the child. "Your meal is ready, Starchild. Eat and grow up." she invited the Child God while nodding towards the frozen armors of the Thousand Sons.

The Starchild drew a single Divine Breath, and the Thousand Sons crumbled into shards of broken armor, their trapped souls flowing into the gestalt pyre of the Golden Throne to be purified and fused into the essence of the God-Emperor.

The light of the Astronomican expanded a hundred times, while Ahriman vanished again, leaving a bleeding left foot on the floor.

"You missed one!" Purity noted and poked the Divine Child in the temple with a finger.

"You're going to annoy me for a long time, aren't you?" the Child groaned while standing up and growing to a normal human size in a single step.

"I could also whisper in your ear that you're only human, but I don't like lies that much. You're a god now." Purity proposed with a careless voice.

Reality shifted and Patrocles found himself in front of the Emperor Child, bottle half-full in his hand. Spying on gods was entertaining, but it came with some risk. Like being detected.

"Another Lancefire. What's a non-believer to a God?" The Emperor asked as flakes of the Golden Throne flew into a golden armor around him.

Patrocles shrugged, and offered his bottle as a divine offering. "Amasec, sire?"

The new Emperor took a sip from the bottle, and grimaced at the bitter taste. "I should be drinking milk, not vine. Still, since I don't have a mother, we better get solving that deal with Lady Justine."

"And better do it before Father meets Cegorach and finds out the truth. Father might kill two gods again." Patrocles spoke with a warning tone.

"You're serious?" the Emperor wondered, just as a Brotherhood of Grey Knights appeared all around.

"Father wouldn't beat up an innocent child. You're safe, Starchild." Purity spoke in a calming voice, making the Grey Knights take up arms and glance around in a protective manner.

"Eat the leg, Grey Knights. We still have a leg up on that crazy Sorcerer." Patrocles pointed with a mechadendrite at the bleeding leg.

"We don't take orders from you, Lamenter!" A Grey Knight Librarian yelled, then fell to his knees as the Child-Emperor turned his golden gaze on him. "Be so kind and trace Ahriman for me, Librarian. We don't have long before the galaxy breaks in half." the Emperor ordered and took another sip from the Amasec bottle.

"Dark Cells now, Sire?" Patrocles proposed as the Grey Knights shared a human leg between their Omophageia glands.

"Yes. Isha has suffered enough in Nurgle's Cauldron, let's not give your father another reason to snap her pretty neck." the Starchild decided with a merciful voice, and relocated the party to a laboratory deep below, where thousands of Blank children, and many more failed creatures were locked inside glass and stasis cells.

"Took you long enough, grandchildren!" Lady Justine spoke from a hospice bed.

Patrocles ran to release the binding clamps, and took the weak woman in his arms.