Secret War: The Annihilation Plague (Part1)

Chapter 2

Slowly, his eyes opened, and instantly it took all his willpower to prevent them from slamming shut again.

He groaned and clenched his fingers through the silver sheets; then, everything became black. Despite this, Attelus still didn't know he'd fallen asleep until his eyes opened again. He had no clue how long he'd been sleeping for. His eyes hurt; his throat felt like he swallowed magma. Attelus was meant to be an inhuman immortal who could dodge bullets, but he was still too damned human. He laid on his side, watching the darkened wraithbone wall a few metres away and thinking for the hundredth time how strange it was that his bone structure was made from the same alien material.

Attelus cursed Faleaseen's name, but it croaked from his mouth so quietly even his enhanced hearing struggled to find the syllables. But, perhaps...Perhaps he was lucky in a way? In that, he still had his humanity to an extent? He thought of Kalakor how the...Space Marine seemed almost embittered by losing his. Perhaps it was better this way? If Attelus lived for hundreds if not thousands of years, it would allow him to remain empathetic to the rest of mankind? Attelus was finding more and more that we are defined by our limitations as much as our strengths.

And in rare times, a limitation can be a strength or even an advantage in some regards. Countless times an enemy had underestimated Attelus because of his height and build, and countless times they'd paid the price for that.

He sighed and reached with a scrambling hand for the wrist chronometer on the bedside table. It was 3 am sidereal, not that mattered much in the webway, but that meant he'd only been asleep for four hours, and he knew he wouldn't be able to go back to sleep, not for hours more, anyway. Clenching his teeth, Attelus forced his form to sit upright; as he did, the silver sheets slid off his torso, revealing his washboard abs and muscular chest. They didn't need a duvet; the Eldar controlled the environment inside the ship far beyond anything an Imperial vessel could manage.

"They"? The word made him look down at the supine form lying in bed beside him. The sheets coated her smooth, beautiful body in a way that just accentuated her curves and nuances rather than detracts from them. Her back was to him, as she slept on her side, which made him wish to see her hypnotising face as he'd always been a face guy. But the alabaster nape of her neck and the shape of her shoulders the sheet kept naked almost made up for it, and she could stay that way almost indefinitely due to the extensive and expensive rejuvenant she could access. He fought the sudden urge to wake her up, not just for the sex again, but because of the puerile spite and envy which boiled in his chest. That she could still sleep so soundly after everything she'd done was beyond him. Was it because she was stronger than him? Because of the crutch of her damned "faith" in the God-Emperor? Or was she just a psychopath incapable of feeling guilt like his father? Was it because she was a psyker? And a powerful one at that. But Inquisitor Enandra had taught him, due to their connection to the warp, psykers were prone to having the worst of the worst of nightmares. Or perhaps it was because of some sort of training?

Or perhaps...Perhaps she'd fallen so far into the depths of insanity and emerged as someone or something else?

He didn't know, and he would likely never know.

Any man, himself included only a few years ago, wouldn't have wanted anything more in the universe to have a woman like Estella Erith in their bed beside them, but Attelus just felt numb about it.

No, she was no longer Estella Erith, the beautiful, kind, if a prideful, woman he'd fallen in love with as a teenager in the ruins of his home-world so long ago. But now, she was Karmen Kons, the ruthless pragmatist who pushed the philosophy too far even for him. Perhaps that was the reason why. That, and that he wished...He wished it was another woman.