unfinishedlibrary | late night reading

Entry tags:

late night reading

Who: Konrad Curze, Kaiisteron, later on: you?
What: Making Mistakes
When: sometime after 'night', it's obligatory (several days before Storytime)
Where: Somewhere in the Stacks, it's a big library. Probably time-out later. Maybe worse places.
Content warnings: Violence, daemons, primarchs, gratuitous bodily harm, the problems with uncontrolled powers, making a mess.

Sooner or later, someone in power is going to regret the group of misfits that have been taken here as Editors.

Like Konrad. He's been more or less behaving since arriving, aside from commandeering ALL cardstock of a particular color and texture, collecting singing bowls of a dozen sizes and leaving them in little clusters in the kitchen and bunks, and leaving a trail of fine, tiny glitter for several days on everything he touched. His efforts to find a way out of the Library are ongoing and unfruitful, prowling the Stacks without bothering to sleep more than once in several days.

But this time his path through the endless shelves of books is for a different purpose in simply putting as much distance between himself and the other people dragged here as he could. He has no control over when his 'gifts' chose to strike and drown him in the worst outcomes possible, but he does know when it's coming, and here there's no locked room with reinforced doors to make use of. Distance will have to do. There is a point, in the rending pain of things that haven't even happened yet, where Curze can no longer tell where he is now in favor of where he will be then.

It makes for a pathetic sight, something his size on the floor with his head in his hands in the shadows between towering shelves scaled towards his height and not human average, back pressed against the cold rows of books.

The sharp scent of blood is probably fine too. Ignore it. Everything's fine here.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

They are as completely normal a human as SecUnit is! "A primarch. As is my brother." That's an answer that's not going to explain anything at all. And now he sounds amused, for all that he's not grinning about it. Nothing has changed, Sanguinius would die on Terra. This ... is temporary.

The moment SecUnit twitches in a way he doesn't like he'll do something about it, but until then he has other things to keep him busy. At least he's beginning to run out of heavy golden plate to set aside. "Our own medicae struggle to determine what to do with us. You may not have much better luck, father didn't see fit to print medical textbooks."

It takes an entire 1.4 seconds to keep staring at Sanguinius.

(In the background, it's 'What the fuck' code is still running. It's not going to be stopped anytime soon.)

"I don't know what the fuck that is," it says. And at this rate, it's not expecting to get a decent explanation. So it just starts assisting with the removal of the armour. "There's apparently a medbay here, behind the door that keeps changing. We'll have to take him there and hope it shows up."

"A mystery for the ages." One that could tip rapidly philosophical, and he doesn't usually indulge in that unless absolutely necessary. Philosophy never gets anyone anywhere.

So long as SecUnit accepts directions, Curze doesn't have much issue with pointing out where to find the releases and seals to separate bits of armor from Sanguinius and add them to the golden pile of discarded armaments. "There was no such location when I tested that door before." If there was now, fine, that's better than nothing at all.

If the medics here could heal having a hole punched into a human's chest, they could certainly figure out why Sanguinius was unconscious. "Mind the wings," is added as an afterthought when he hooks hands under his brother's arms with every intention of hauling him right off the ground. He can still lift his own weight, but Sanguinius is heavier yet, and it's not as easy as it should be.

It's the touch under his arms that rouses him, somehow, maybe because it's Curze touching him. Maybe because it's Curze's hands on parts of him normally covered with armor. Maybe it's the unique scent of blood.

He has no idea what it is, or what's going on, or who is touching him. His mind is full of conflicting thoughts and memories--the bright ochre of Baal Secundus, the heavy oppressive darkness of Nostramo, and memories of flight and running and fighting.

He has no words, erupting from motionless to action, wings flailing, slapping at the anything within range, hands reaching like fast, unaimed claws, looking like someone clawing their way up from drowning.

SecUnit had moved to take the legs, and was just about to pick them up when Threat Assessment suddenly spiked. But not from Curze.

"Get back!" it says, as jumps back and away from the flailing wings. Shit, it can't push Curze out of danger, not when he's still literally holding onto Sanguinius...

It probably doesn't help that Curze tends to run cold temperaturewise and his hands are probably like ice. Things other people might think of. He doesn't, not even when Sanguinius goes from dead weight to putting up one hell of a struggle like a bird finding itself unexpectedly caught in a trap.

Instead of hanging on, Konrad lets go simply to get out of range of the striking edge of those wings, perfectly capable of staving in the side of tanks. Getting buried in feathers and not muscle and bone is merely disorientingly fluffy, though there is somewhere in the struggle of white feathers and limbs, a string of colorful curses the library automatically helpfully translates from Nostraman to something more intelligible.

Something about inventive ways pigs can be used on a person. It's probably for the best it loses something in the translation.

If getting picked up hadn't shaken Sanguinius awake thoroughly, being dropped again might.

It's true: icy fingers were part what pulled him back, like dumping ice cubes straight down his back.

Some of the downy feathers probably detach in all the ruckus, adding a white flurry to all the other chaos, sticking to anything fabric, and probably sticking to sticky bloody skin.

Sanguinius wasn't trying to hurt anyone, just try to figure out where he was and why gravity felt wrong--pulling him down, hard, again, suddenly.

He clocked the strange voice, yelling 'get back'--the words stabbed through his awareness and he twisted, flapping one powerful wing to help move his bulk, and suddenly, faster than normal and even Astartes eyes could track, he was in a crouch, on his feet, looming over the speaker, eyes red and wild, stopping his hand about an inch away from grabbing the other's throat.

Threat Assessment spikes, hard. If it weren't a SecUnit, it wouldn't have had any chance to react at all.

(Later, it was going to have to watch the recording of this back later and analyse it in slow motion, just so it could get a better idea of just what these freakishly tall humans were capable of.

Right now though, it was too busy frantically calculating speeds and trajectories and potential outcomes.)

Turns out, Sanguinius is fast - so even though SecUnit is quick, it's not quick enough to dodge backwards. It is, however, able to bring up its arm, point it at Sanguinius, and engage its energy weapon. Neither Sanguinius or Curze will see the weapon deploy - but they might hear its high-pitched hum.

Thankfully, before its force to fire, Sanguinius stops.

SecUnit stays dead still.

"...Sanguinius," it says slowly. "I don't want to hurt you."

(It also hopes he doesn't want to hurt it. Fuck.)

This has escalated in the most interesting of fashions. Konrad probably should do something but he isn't, as soon as Sanguinius turns on SecUnit instead of himself. There's a few feathers stuck to him that definitely aren't part of the blackfeathered cloak he wears, these are much larger and suspiciously white, and as things go from flailing to sudden stillness and stalemate, he observes.

Sanguinius' inhibitions were still firmly in place, or SecUnit might not have a head anymore, and or someone might be getting shot full of holes.

He steps with deceptive delicacy around the scattered golden armor on bare feet, mindful of the books and the overturned bowl, and the only time he reaches out again is when he knows he's in Sanguinius' line of sight, to push lightly. Nowhere near the force needed to actually move that wild-eyed shape. "He won't harm you without worse provocation," he mutters under his breath, sounding a little sour. "He's revoltingly decent."

For a long moment--or at least it seems long--Sanguinius does nothing, and there's no movement from him, only the wafting down of white down feathers, like little avian tumbleweeds.

Is it the sound of the...not quite las fusil charging up, or is it the icy touch on his arm from his brother that snaps him out of it? Even he wouldn't know, but he snaps out of it, hard, as fast as an eyeblink, his eyes clearing, hand dropping to his side.

"I'm sorry," he says, abruptly, pushing back to his feet, and to clear some distance between them, more white downy feathers swirling into the wake of his motion, as his eyes focus and realize...who he had almost attacked. The poor young human who was already so traumatized. And he had just made it so, so much worse. "I would not harm you." Unconvincing, but sincere.

(Oh Sanguinius. It's not violence that traumatised SecUnit. At least, not in the way he thinks.)

Over the stretch of Sanguinius's long silence, Threat Assessment steadily ticks down. Then a little more, after he moves away. SecUnit lowers its arm, disengaging its weapon.

For 3.2 seconds, it stays silent.

"You realise that you two are a problem," it says finally. "Both of you are at least twice of the size of anyone else here. More than that, for quite a few people. You can't react like that. You're going to kill someone."

Its eyes flicker over to Curze, for the briefest fraction of a section.

"Apparently he already did." Doesn't matter that Kai somehow made a miraculous recovery; it still shouldn't have happened in the first place.

There's an opportunity here that Konrad decides suddenly to take advantage of. Sanguinius is now going to be thoroughly preoccupied with SecUnit, and SecUnit's focus is going to be mostly on the angel that nearly attacked it.

An excellent time to choose to be somewhere else.

Instead of addressing any of that, he stoops to pick up the still bloodied singing bowl and heads in the other direction, disturbingly quiet for something his size. SecUnit is right, of course, but not much can be done about untraining weapons to be less deadly.

But. No? No! "I am not a problem." He's a primarch. They start with the same letter, but that's the only similarity!

He slow blinks at the next because, yes, of course, he has killed someone. Many someones. Probably in the thousands. That was his job. That couldn't be what the other meant, which left...the question. "How do you know I am going to kill someone? Do you also have the gift?"

Hey it could be a very miserable and unhappy club of prophesiers.

"I was speaking to my brother. That situation has already been handled." No, it hadn't, because Curze kept slipping away from answering him, but this was a matter between primarchs.

Perhaps Curze's tactic would have worked, if not for the fact SecUnit has two drones keeping a close eye on the both of them, and it's a SecUnit. It was literally designed to be able or monitor multiple locations at the same time.

"Don't you fucking go anywhere!" it snaps, before Curze gets too far.

(For fuck's sake.)

"And no, you have not handled it," it says, scowling. All they'd done was talk their weird fucked up family, where they all murdered their own offspring. And then drank some blood (ew).

It isn't that Curze thinks even for a moment SecUnit has either the authority or ability to stop him from leaving, though he's wrong about one of those. It's that it's going to get Sanguinius' attention too.

The tiny flying things are certainly helping it, aren't they.

He turns on one bare heel, gesturing with the dark-stained bowl. "You wished to help, there he is. Render aid. He should not need to be carried now."

Sanguinius's head is clearing from the overlay of Curze's memories atop his own. It had been overwhelming--perhaps it would reveal itself to him, in time, in bits and pieces, and not the tidal wave of sensation, memory, and dark emotion that had hit him this time.

He draws himself up to his full height, the impression of which would probably be more impressive if he wasn't handprinted with little daubs of blood like a cave painting, flecking his wings, and with at least one pinfeather bent out of line. Still, he mustered all the authority he could. "It has been handled. It will not recur. Steps are in place. You need not concern yourself." Could he throw a bit more passive voice into there? He'd surely try if he could.

That was to SecUnit. But Curze? You better concern yourself, because Sanguinius is going to glue himself to your hip for the immediate future, if only so his words do not become untruths. "I need no aid. I was...momentarily overcome." So he's fine now, all of this isn't necessary, let's just all go our separate ways.

(Was SecUnit intimidated? Okay, maybe a little. From what little it has seen of these two, it was starting to get the sense that it didn't really know whether it could take them.

But it was still a SecUnit. It was built to take hits. If it couldn't survive an encounter with these two, no one else was going to be able to.)

"No. It's not," it says. "Because you can't spend every minute of every cycle making sure he doesn't kill someone. You," - it nods its head towards Curze - "were just about to walk off without him. And you..."

It pauses, as it returns to addressing Sanguinius. It has the inkling of an idea that might help. Not a perfect solution, but better than 'Sanguinius follows Curze around forever', which was a stupid fucking plan. But it a solution that's going to require that these two know a bit more about how its drones work.

Like, say, the fact that one of them was watching their whole conversion earlier.

Yeah.

"...You let him distract you about your whole blood drinking thing, then fucking knocked yourself out by drinking his."

"You are a bold little thing, aren't you." SecUnit is, if nothing else, very persistent. And eavesdropping, it seems.

Curze didn't much like people knowing about his foresight, even among his legion it was closely guarded. Not because of the visions themselves but the side effects. He'd gotten lucky over the decades that it hasn't gotten him killed. Sanguinius being aware was bad enough.

And if SecUnit overheard the issue of blood, it could have heard the rest of what has been said.

...The little flying machines.

He says nothing else. He was in fact going to ideally walk off alone, yes, and still intended to do so; there's no display of inherent command and authority, Sanguinius has that covered. The assessment that he'd probably kill someone was fair and accurate, he would. Actively planning to, in fact. There were xenos here, mutants that were not permitted, and...

... Well, whatever SecUnit is. Some form of cyborg perhaps. Not illegal, but it had heard things it shouldn't be allowed to. Not just about himself, but both of them.

Just ... not right now. Not when he isnt moving as fast as he should be, weaker than he should be. There is very much the sense Curze isn't going to linger long. The moment he has sufficient distraction, he's going to see about escape again.

He shared a look with Curze, that the SecUnit would probably not like if it understood the meaning of: this one is a danger, and might need to be neutralized. Like the flying things. He debates, idly, within himself, the value of snatching one of those out of the air, just to prove a point.

To the other, though, he cocked his head, with a half smile. "Perhaps you could remind me. Under whose authority, exactly, you deign to position yourself to judge us?" Only their Father could truly pass judgment on them, and his judgments were swift, brutal, and final.

He almost admires the moxie. If the situation weren't so dangerous, he might.

"What you saw, what you think you saw, was my brother indulging me in a local custom of my tribe, because he is kinder than you seem to be capable of thinking he is." There, two birds, one stone: Curze has good qualities (shut up, Curze) and the SecUnit simply...miscontextualized what he saw, which was, after all, freely given blood.

"The authority of not wanting anyone else to fucking die," it says. Except despite its hard words, its face is twisting in a way that looks...upset.

(SecUnit doesn't know the meaning of that look, specificially. But Threat Assessment spikes, suddenly. So it knows that one or both of them is considering violence now, in a way they weren't before.

It's fucking all of this up. Why did it think it could convince anyone of anything? It doesn't even know how to talk to humans like a normal person, let along like a negotiator like Karime. This is all going wrong and it's its own fucking fault.)

"I just want to program some drones to alert for him," it blurts out. "So if he has another episode, other people know to stay back." They couldn't lock him in a room somewhere, they couldn't expect Sanguinius to spend every moment watching him. But they could at least make sure people had warning.

"And I don't care about your customs or dietary requirements or whatever," it adds on in a grumble. "Though you should try to find the stupid medbay and do a proper blood draw for it. Don't just slice yourself open, that's not safe."

That's a thoroughly disgusted noise at Sanguinius' proclamation. "Brother, slander doesn't suit you." 'Night Haunter' and 'kind' are not synonyms, and it's almost .. almost insulting. For all that Curze agrees implicitly with Sanguinius' decision that SecUnit is potentially a threat in need of silencing, he makes no move to do anything about this.

Fate had other plans in store for it than an end at their hands.

The idea of anything eaten not being safe for a primarch draws a humorless chuckle.

"When. Not if. They are a lifelong plague, my last will be the night I am assassinated." And sooner or later someone else is going to be caught in the crossfire. His scribe. Dorn. Sevatar. Some would live. Others.. "Warnings draw the curious more than it repels them. Will your drones know what is happening? Do they know what to watch for? How clever are their machine spirits?"

His few trusted captains did. But they were astartes, not little automated devices.

"I speak no slander." Sorry, Curze, but he remembers you offering the blood, without any sort of prompt or grand gesture. If you want to slap fight about it, find him later, when they're not...encumbered by this stranger.

"And again, on what authority do you draw for this...impressive invasion of privacy you propose? You, who do not even trust us with a name, and whom either of us could dismember with half a thought." 'Just trust me bro I'm a good guy' doesn't quite cut it, at least in this place.

"Why should we trust someone who has already engaged in base espionage? Your methods are malign--who is to say your motives are any better?" What the SecUnit is proposing would violate privacy more than it already has, shattering basic rights to self-autonomy. Sanguinius was at least a brother, kin by blood and making, who could be trusted with privacy and secrets, as he trusted Curze with his own.

He dismisses the last, about what he ate, and how he did it, with a handwave that shows that he was, at one point, a protege of Horus himself: dismissive, marking something as not even worth time to consider. He will manage himself just fine. Or at least, it is not a stranger's, an outsider's, concern.

"I wasn't engaging in espionage. I was engaging in security monitoring." Which, you know, basically looked like the exact same thing. (Ugh, they were going to be like the Preservation humans on this, weren't they? All these stupid concerns about privacy or whatever.)

"But...fine. You don't trust me. Whatever." (It was fine. It didn't care that they didn't trust it. It was fine. Absolutely fine.) "Since it bothers you, I can cut off my inputs. Once it's set up, it won't need me to actively monitor it."

Then it pauses, and looks at Sanguinius. (It's not really bothering to crane its neck, so its kinda just...staring at his stomach.) "Though someone should still receive the alerts. I can program it to send them to you. But you'd need a drone too. Or something else that can connect to the feed."

"My questions were not scorn, little hunter." It's easier to tell what Curze is actually looking at when he tilts his head to study the drones instead of SecUnit and Sanguinius. "Their capabilities are unknown to me."

It's also not trust, but mostly because he has no idea what those flying bottlecap sized things are capable of. Having one follow him around when it might not actually be able to do anything is not ideal. "I ... have no interest in killing those who have not earned it. Order must be upheld." He absolutely, fully intends to kill again. It just can't be whoever happens to stumble across him.

Kai can get killed when Curze finds out he's a daemon. Then he'll have earned it! "But it seems we have no choice but to trust you. The things those little devices may have overheard could lead to the extermination of over two hundred thousand lives." His smile is thin, brittle. "Be careful who you share it with."

"I have no patience for your wordplay. You were eavesdropping. Without consent. Whatever you call it, it is a poor foundation upon which to build trust." And it hasn't escaped Sanguinius's notice that the SecUnit has, even when gently prompted, refused to give a name.

"'Won't need you to monitor' is a far cry from 'will not be monitored'." People have underestimated Sanguinius's intelligence before, and realized the mistake.

He's surprised Curze is willing to go along with this humiliating process, especially after refusing Sanguinius's more respectful offer. To be honest, it stung, more than a little bit.

"If a single member of my legion suffers so much as a bruise from your laxity, you will discover levels of suffering at my hands that will surprise even the Night Haunter." Sanguinius is nice, until he's not nice. And harming his men would make him very, very not nice.

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

noooo how dare you abandon him in his minute of need?

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject