User blog:MockingJester/Women of Iron

200.M42 It was...a tempest. A tempest of fright, fear, violence, and...lust. The last one, a particular fright for the man who, moments ago, was merely walking across a cave. A passage sparking his curiosity.

And now...chaos. From the gold-obsessed horned creatures leaping at what were essentially colonials, unable to wait, quick to 'process' them as they tore away their uniform...

To the violet and scarlet side, featuring purple snakes and winged demons, breathing what looked like aphrodisiac perfumes on many more, if not outright injecting it deep into the colonials unlucky enough to fall in their grasp...

Or the pink horde pulling away at ever more settlers, wearing ramshackle armor, looking like seconds away from falling off. Their bodies, oppressively toned, hunger in their eyes. For the bonus...and those they had caught.

Or even the tide of insectoids looking content to swarm those they glare at, immediately looking to 'harvest' them in the way the rest was.

All of it, while they fought each other off. Alas, more interested in violating the defenseless colonials, men, women, monsters with no affiliation to the intruders. Madness. A banquet of madness, paralyzing Jeremy like anchors to his knees.

They drop to a reverberating echo drowned by the screams. Terror. Laughter. Lust. All of it, encroaching in his mind as the few spotting him encroached to his view. A tide of incomprehensible onslaught...fixated in time. In time?

Jeremy's eyes catch the suspension of stars around him. Around them. Around the others. Stars tethering invisible webs. Webs of time, frozen in place.

"They are frightening, are they not?" A voice calls to his left. A visage to attach that voice too. A woman's. One sporting red, gentle eyes, pigmentations of gold on her skin. And hair. And armor. All subtle variants of gold. All different enough for him to notice. It was as if she was supposed to be a machine. Yet, his eyes convinced him of her deep humanity.

By her side, two more. One with silver hair and blue irises, her style, shorter, tied to a ponytail, and different variants of silver.

The other, a sand-like texture to attach to her magenta irises, looking over the time stopped 'carnage'. She was...less than thrilled at the sight "Wow, they're really not holding back are they?"

"Of course not". The silver looking one retort, pulling an orc from a man who's top outfit was ripped apart, throwing her to the cradle of frozen time "They seek what we've long acquired, but are blind to their desires. As they have for the last millennia and would rather force it".

"Of course..."

"What is your name? You do not need to be afraid. Neither do your fellows. You are all safe now..." Her voice echoes a crimson broadcast, shimmering every one of the colonials in its dye. The conception of time becomes irrelevant to them, enabling them the strength that would never have come in the coursing stream.

One by one, they lift themselves, confused as Jeremy was from their captors, all looking to the trio of golems. Ancient legends said to have vanished from the galaxy from another age. A few are aided by these beyond machines, all while the golden one remains fixated to Jeremy.

"Hum...Jeremy". He finally lets his initial shock pass through, allowing him ample room to get up.

"Jeremy. I apologize for this...sudden turn of event. For a reason or another, you have been doomed to this poor first impression. Surely this display must have had you frightened".

"Well, when this..." His hands rise, broadened to the frozen scenery of horrors "...is the first thing you see, well, yes, people tend to panic a little".

"Indeed. But, we can bring you somewhere far from here. You and those in this colonial ship. Far from the wars they sought to escape, far from the self-made woes of the factions present. If you would only allow us..."

"I..." Jeremy stops, looking over to the other colonials. Judging from the words of those he heard, they wanted nothing with this. Nothing with the frozen cacophony of violent lust. Shimmering gates, windows to...somewhere else. Somewhere benign, bleeding its serenity outward.

The ship he was on certainly was impressive, seeing one like this for the first time. But their gate...even a technological newbie like him could recognize the incomprehensible calculation that birthed it. Nothing that the frozen in time had, nowhere close.

The others walk in, promises of the peace they sought alongside ancients. Old legends whispered as murmurs. It was his best possible path. The only one amidst this horrific tide.

His mind made up, he looks back to the golden woman, machine, beyond a machine, her hand, now visibly reaching out to him, to drag him away from this unending mistake ten thousand years in the making.

His palm feels the very human warmth of hers, pulled upward in perfect strength. Not too soft as to struggle. Not too hard to bring discomfort. The last one present...besides his would-be captors, still idly frozen, unaware of the trio's presence and their actions.

He passes through the gate, the golden golem the last to cross it before it closes. A landscape of energy courses through him, bathing his sight insights unseen to the majority of this galaxy. The language of reality, attempting to make itself comprehensible to his mind. A beautiful dance he could not decipher yet further drawn into its mesmerizing presentation... --- The stars holding reality in a frozen landscape, each one recedes to its origin, lifting the veil of stasis from the warring factions with thievery. Thievery of their fought off 'cargo'.

"What the?! What have you done to our to-be-processed colony, you damnable harlots?!" Immediately, with no reserve, the highest of the imperial Sabbath throws an accusatory finger toward the chaos demon, her dress discard, once, seconds away from introducing an uninitiated colonial to the depravity of chaos.

The same one downing her grape drenched staff over her accuser. Sparks fly in her parry, the two locked in a bitter contest of strength, the purple seductress, spitting back "Us?! You're the little killjoys who went to try putting OUR new inductees from our delectable mittens!"

"Do not speak to me like that, you sickening slut!"

"Calling the kettle black are we?! I can see your bare legs, you frustrated bureaucratic!"

They grith their teeth, their followers mercilessly forcing each other in the ground, violating one another into submission, either via weapons or their hands. A concert of lustful violence spiraling around the two, fluids staining the deck. Fluids far removed from the usual blood.

The orc crashes against the tallest of the swole devil bug, an infuriated stare deep in the insect's eyes "Oi! What the hell?! You think of robbing us of our humies, don't ya?! Well, Ima show you good krumping until y'all give us our pets back!"

The leader snaps back, screeching in her frustration unheeded, still dripping in thick, mucous leaks. A battle of submission rolling between orcs and devil bugs, soon mixing and gaining in intensity as the men of each quadra join in, bringing their own depraved desires to battle along with their mistresses, a recreation of what always was, what will always be... --- The dance to their realm. A place beyond the galaxy. Far from the touch of the factions, since the dubbed 'Dark Age', and evermore. They rest and recuperate in ships. Ships beyond the concepts seen before. Gild and hard lights, propulsions of star dusts pushing the ship at speeds the light could only dream of.

A void within a void. A dimension, distant from the dangerous tempest of the warp, lucid and tranquil. Only for the ships to stall, snapping from this place of cloud, and celestial dust, offering the reality back to the people's sight.

Myriad of sights like the gates. Grander, bigger, an alluring spectacle to Jeremy. Before, at long last, their hymn ceases, now returned to a different reality. A space colored in the bright void of dawns.

Hundreds of world, exalted by spires and armor of ebony metal and solid light. Passing by to the nearest of them, the approach, revealing countless airship painting the skies in their glimmering propulsors, and even more countless bystanders walking by as the ships lower themselves to the airport.

With the pedestals lowering, leaving the new arrivals to wonder where they were, Jeremy could not help but notice how...different the people here were. They had none of the overbearing uniforms from those of the Imperium. None of the overly exposed and unashamed asymmetrical colors of the chaos cultists. None of the ramshackle pieces from the pink women of poor English, nor even the entire lack of cloth from the insectoids speaking in union.

No, their eyes conceal a faint glow, one he could judge to augment in the darkness of the void, with intricate motives coursing their pigments in the same elegance of their irises. Be they a man, a woman, or a monster, all of them carry this touch as if touched by something of enlightenment. Or ascension.

Not only that but their personal space, touched as well, coerce tiny, specific pieces of metal floating in perfecting synchronicity to their movement. Some had those in the shape of nimbus hovering over their heads, sometimes, spurned in a burst of light. Shapes constantly tethered to the space behind their back, whispering as a watcher. And others still, had their living outfit occasionally shift, arms feeling the soft movement of alloy, acting on the thoughts of its wearer.

All of their armor and outfit, silk and alloy he couldn't quite comprehend. His enchantment to their sights blinds him to the colonials being stepped down and guided by an assortment of golems, automatons and others, all bearing this change.

"Admiring the place, are we?" A voice calling to him among the rest walking away. Jeremy's eyes dart around the plaza. A plaza revealed through his more scrutinizing glances, from the rails to the seats. From trees to localized parchment of nature.

Until they stop, lock into a woman amidst many, the most, serving as velvet guides to the very confused colonials. Just like the rest, this woman seemed to carry power behind her glimmering ornate irises, flushed in a deep lightning glow. A color that is comfortable at coursing along her body, though her arms were his only indication of this pattern.

Before them, a fading work of glasses and metal, acting as the most mundane of goggles, yet nothing like he had ever spotted before. They faded, looking not to cut away from the freckles populating the woman's cheeks.

Sharp ears flop by the side of her head, surrounded by seemingly wild and unkempt hair poking out the side of her head as elemental daggers...but only at the front, for the back reserved a singular dance of braid overlapping one of her shoulders, stopping net at her chest. Luscious yellow beset by the side of her irises, he could not hope to figure out which one looked better than the other.

Like the rest of those with changed glints, her outfit is that of a cold white with a hint of blue at its very surface, making it an imperfect white, but eye-catching none the less. A top stopping where her skirt begun. A skirt withholding at the knees, where armored greaves carried on, a revering silver adorning the legs they were duty-bound to protect.

Jeremy couldn't shake the feeling that she was comfortable with the mind-blogging concept the others are casually carrying, perhaps, just a bit more than even them.

He was fixated on her slightly pale complex, a compliment on the outfit befitting her, blind to her forward pace, reaching out for his hand "Hey now, I'm fine with you looking over my trappings, but you probably have a hundred and one questions".

A platform illuminates underneath their feet as she looks over to the trios that came with a calm voice to his distress "Day off, ladies. I'm sure your counterparts await a great longing".

Gold, silver and stone bow to her as the platform of hexagon light begins uplifting the duo, the golden golem waving back before instantaneously dissipating through the air...af if they never where there begin with, an error translated elsewhere in blue hues.

It was only then, as the wind flew around him in a lulling manner, alongside the sight of marriage between architecture and nature, that Jeremy realized how far from the soil he was. Further snapped back was her clapping hands, calling him to her endless entice "Now that we're traveling along to the medical ward, we can play 'a hundred and one questions'. Shoot".

"Wha--where--". He still was recovering from the onslaught. The horrid sights to the peaceful ambiance, two contrast pulling on his psyche. At least until the very slightly smaller woman wraps her hand around his. A slow pulse of green and blue, the between, stems. It gorges at his mind, biting the worst of his experience, condemning them to desertion.

"Yea, sorry about that. The folks from that galaxy aren't the most considerate for new blood...or escapees". Her tone is that of disappointment, almost anger.

"You sound like you speak from experience", he retorts with impossible ease, struggling but a second ago.

"Well, ten millennia of the same mess can get exhausting. You have no idea how many here would say the same".

"I can see that". Jeremy looks to the appearing and disappearing spires, towering over the limit of the planet's atmosphere, all beset by the woman just to the left, hanging on solid rails of materialized alloy. There was something so familiar about the way they were built.

"Nice place, ain't it? You seem to enjoy the view", she calls out, an undoubted grin plastered over her elegant visage. A common trait among her kind.

"Yes, it feels..." Jeremy approaches the edge of the gliding hexagon, pressing his hands on materializing rails, watching.

"Familiar? Well, it should. You lot kinda came up with the design a while ago".

"What? I don't remember...I never...". Confusion afflicts his mind.

"Ohh, sorry. I keep forgetting they no longer spur you lot anymore. Only keep you to get that paltry power you could wield to better things. Alright, remedial time!" The woman claps her hands, a wink to his side the moment she catches his awareness.

"So, I'm sure you've caught on by now that this place among thousands of others is unlike the mess of the milky way".

"Well, it is rather serene here. And, no one seems overly aggressive".

"Hmm, hmm. Well, that's what the retention of different thinking tends to do. From a lost age, one that they would consider cursed. At least, by the name they gave it". The woman's ears flop down, somewhat spurning the words coming out of her lips.

"Really? What would that be?"

"The dark age of technology. An age where anything and everything was possible...until it began encroaching in their little territories. It's all fun and games until those coming up with the concepts decide that they want a little more than being at the bottom of the hierarchy. These kinds of times were pretty harsh for your human ancestors. Got just a bit tired of being prey to others that saw them as nothing more than juice bags to fuel their own little stomachs ".

"That would explain the other's desperate needs to flee..." Jeremy's head slumps down, again, confronted with the imagery of what he saw.

"Hmm, hmm. But, fate was a pretty frowning entity in that era. You see, there's nothing quite telling them to 'bugger off' like a pack of artificial women taking a liking to their creators, and confessing. Back then, they had their obscene display of feminine prowess to lure away the least sturdy of your kind, bid them forsake their dedication to the advancement of their species. That ended rather swiftly with those golems taking the hands of their masters, presenting them a wealth that your feminine sides had long sought and done given to the most hopeless: an alternative".

"An alternative?" Jeremy looks at her, blissful eyes staring back with an unknown warmth, a feeling he couldn't rub anyway but as...welcoming.

"Hmm, hmm.  See, those from the Imperium, the chaos, the devils from beyond, and orcs forgot that humanity tends to throw their hands in the gauntlet with more vehemence with someone leaning behind them. Be it from those of us who sincerely wanted a spot alongside your kind, your own gentlewomen or the machines your ancestors nurtured to sentience, they skyrocketed through their advancement. And, they didn't take too kindly to that. Thought to impede on those so-called 'dangerous' advancements...while forgetting the very same people looking to support them. The women of iron, stone, and gold especially, rebuked them. Every time, it was one-sided in their favor. They tried appealing to you lot, it failed, as they could see the deception long-hidden before by the sincerity my and many others' ancestors offered. They tried bargaining to keep you in place, it failed as well, the reality of spanning beyond even the galaxy, a closer possibility. Otherworlds where we could sustain ourselves indefinitely. With the failures twice burnt on their pride, predictably, they went to arms, looking to quell the 'amusing humans and their upstart rebellions'. They forgot the machine they built and their technology, a pretty alien march compared to what even the greatest of Baphomets had to offer. Or even what the foulest of magic the demon-born could hurl".

"Really? It sounded like they should have--" Factions holding billions, perhaps trillions at their beck and call, all in the same interest. Caught up in the attempt to keep his ancestors in check through the predictable iron grip. He thought that was grounds for their easy victory. It was wrong.

"Won?! Hahahaha! Oh man, you're severely underestimating what drove them to such heights, to begin with. No, they did not. Their celestial corruptive gases? Passing across entire systems? No, it didn't work. Not with inhibitor arrays planted around junctions. A showcase of overwhelming magic? An attempt to give an 'example'? Pity that didn't work against the 'Great Gates'. Even the onslaught of the devils from beyond the galaxy. A failure. Saw this little isolation as a big, bright light bulb with that 'spirit energy' they fed off other galaxies. Ironically, they were the easiest to deal with 'Insensibility Pylons' all-too-happy to spread out their arguments in the shape of cold, immobilizing lightning to get them to stop moving...just long enough for our ships to move them to a planet where they could...get accustomed to this hectic place of ours".

"Wow...I mean...wow. That must have sounded like quite the war". Jeremy looks away from her, thinking.

"It would have been. Though none of us wanted any further escalation. None of us wanted to have to bring out actual weapons and potentially incur collateral damage. And, with how they kept going, trying with more and more vehemence, it was inevitable. So, we left".

"You...left? So, here, we're not..." It was strange how different the void seemed here before the atmosphere caught his senses to bottled them in an earth-like place.

"Andromeda. The closest to this one place where we all came from. Although right now, we're mostly in the hidden recess of what they call the 'Halo Stars'. Unexplored charts to them".

"I see. So, they saw this as some victory? Those that wanted more left. More space for them, right?"

"Right...and wrong. See, they apparently got hypnotized about this marvelous work of art slapping their arrogance down to size and wanted some of their own. The moment we left this place, they wanted us back. The caliber of men who were able to make these works. Those who thaught it to those who were at disagreements with how things were. But, they were all gone. The only ones left were those who were lured away by carnality. Those with no more of that spark to innovate, nor the environment to spark it. They simply didn't have the mindset to sess beyond their self-perceived righteousness. As generations passed, their failures piled up, trying to make man as sparkling as they were at the dying days of the Golden Age. Failures turned to frustration. Frustration turned to lust, blind to its counterpart, the one piece that could have lit it. Predictably, they lost all interest into any advancement and fell prey to their desires with no lid to bottle it".

"And they've been doing this for ten millennia..." Jeremy looks back to her, incredulous.

"They have. They contend against each other. For resources. Territories. Mana, most of all. Four main factions. And many sub empires scattered all over the place".

"An unending war on a galactical scale. Yea, I can see why you left. Why they wanted out".

"Yes...it's also why you're here..." The woman approaches, once again, that soft simper across her freckles. Soft electricity rubs on his palm as he feels her warmth joining him "You, along the rest of them, didn't belong here. I could already see it through the women who felt lulled to this surrounded ship you found yourself stranded in. You're an innocent in this, with this spark. Like many before you, we couldn't allow them to break such precious innocence. It should be acclimated as to keep its luster in dangerous places. Not shattered forever. They would have done so and lost what their ancestors long-sought. No...you belong somewhere with like-minded people. A place like this. With people like us..."

"Really? You just...felt something about it?" Tha platform long stopped moving. Jeremy couldn't notice, hypnotized by the gentle gaze of the cheeky Gremlin race, one of them, at least. How many times has anyone given such a speech to a newcomer, seconds away from being 'processed'? "It...you know, in a place with unfathomable technology playing in the background, it feels like you're speaking in term of fate".

"Hmm, maybe I am. What about it? It was once said among you humans that science is the building block of your creator. The more you understand it, the more you can appreciate its work".

Jeremy spits out a chortle "That...that's not wrong".

"Glad you can see it. Come on, I gotta get you to the medical bay before anything else. Standard procedure, but I'll be here, waiting. Then, maybe..." They step out the platform, dissolving by itself, feeling its usefulness gone. Hand in hand, the woman, Cloé, guide him, her mind thinking of everything following the usual check-up. A home to stay in. The beginning of his training to capture what they long bathed in. And perhaps... --- 300.M42 "...trillions, quadrillions of individuals  all over the place...and you're the only one I would even think of spending the rest of my life with...yes, yes, I do!~

The shining loop of a ring, fabricated by the hand of the groom, the proposer. Metals he now understands, glimmering in his ascended irises of orange tides. A knee on the floor, two bodies in the void of space, nothing to distract them. Yellow and orange in twins, looking back at each other.

A hundred years, spent recovering, spent in the armament of the new man in the knowledge that should have been his as claimed by his ancestors, cumulated in the union of two souls, bound through distance, sparked the moment he hushed in pain...nevermore. --- 320.M42 From the edge of the Ghoul Stars. The shroud of horrors. The veil of alien enmities. Dark and uncharted...perhaps, save, for the most depraved minions of chaos. Towers of glass shimmering beyond subsystems. Spinning, concealing nightmare engines. Rattling shackles coercing them to a never-ending spin.

The marble spires, tethered to the nightmare within, swirling, breach the darkness of the dead stars, its malign mind, instinctually driven, drifting toward a blur of miasma. Den of the cultists and their unending-- --- "Faster, faster! Quickly! Our dark mistress shall yet claim the--"

"The mistress' winds are gone! I repeat, the mistress' winds are--

"Its nightmarish facade has devoured our love-addled salvos! Its--madam, we must turn our sails! It's about to--

"We're taking fire! The Imperium is pinning our exit routes. They're shooting our crippled ships-- --- "Keep pinning them down! We shall show them the folly of their--what?! What do you mean 'its devouring our energy output'?! Not from this--all vessels, fire at the entity! Quickly before our power source is--

"Mayday! Mayday! We're taking hits! We're taking--Onii-chan, turn this ship at--our engines are crippled. They're being siphoned by its facets!"

"Energy spike detected! The power it ate, it is regurgitating it back! Calculating trajectory--someone quell the chaotic fighters, they're cutting the flow of--

"Nii, we're its target! It's intended at--Onii-chan, make this vessel jump, it's facade is--

"The 'Small Princess' ship is gone, ma'am! It's no longer moving! This machine has rendered it--we're being targeted! Its turning more of its stolen power against us! It's firing, its--Orcs at our flanks, Nii! They battering our backs! We're stuck here, we're-- --- "Hahaha! Them dumb horned shiny goats weren't smart to predict us orcs! Quickly, board their vessels! Take their humies--

"What do you mean our boarding parties are drifting without 'wahhh'?! Get more 'knockers' to push them in if ya need too! We needs our--waits a damm minute! It'd be that mop-looking shiny over here! Hey, Brain-smash! Get a good lookie at that thing! Maybe there's humies inside--

"Brain-smash isn't responding, cap'n! Her 'rok' is quiet, all without the bang! That moppy thing stole all her 'wahhh'!" "Well, get it back, ya stupid gitz! We can't get ourselves humies to plow from that pearly thing without--

"Uh-oh! Brawn-maker, wait! Wait, this thing is using our 'wahhh' to--turn back ya gitz, turn back, we have-- --- Corpses. Corpses of thousands. Thousands of dead ships drifting without power. Silenced engines. Cracked by the fire of their own salvos, wrought about by alien return. Its lifeless voice spurred on every comms, every channel, every board.

'Corruptio deprehendi'.

Their inhabitants, long gone, forced to evacuate long before the hulls bucked and fissured, spilling out their empty insides. Rings upon rings of dead, gray ships floating in the void of space, wrought to their demise by an alien artifact.

'Corruptio deprehendi'.

Yet, they fight. Fight each other for reasons long gone. Corruptive and gilded lances flaring against the other. Hulls smashing into unsuspecting vessels, welcoming boarders forcing their enemies into sensual joust deprived of any attempt at any softness.

All of them, silenced once more by the nightmare engines' facets spiraling around its hidden heart. A shockwave robbing them of all their power, turning it chaotic. Rampant, blowing every fuse not dedicated to life support, to only then give them race before the ship's ultimate demise.

'Corruptio deprehendi'.

Yet still, the factions, they fight for entrance, the few, offered veiled entrance only after the sacrifices of unending fire, all focused to one spot. One and only one spot. Boarding parties flying within, the overwhelming amount, shot to immobility before they can even get in estimated ranges. Few get into its alien entrance... --- "Nii! Nii!" A runner up to a seated leader. Her tiny uniform tightly corners her tiny body, washed in colors of presumed order.

Another, slightly taller, turns from the display of void carcasses, a displeased expression at the ships wasted, hers, filled with evacuees. Two oversized horns protrude from each side of her head, squeezing the ornate hat sitting between "What is it?"

"Unidentified signal detected from beyond the borders of the Eye of Ribald! It's not from ours--

"What?! We have this unholy place locked what with this machine they seem to be building! What do you mean 'it ain't not ours'?!"

"I'm sorry, nii-san! It's--I don't know--" A ship flies past them, the concept of naval space, alien to it. Its velocity makes it barely visible to them, only spotted by the bright engines spewing a glimmering exhaust of dust. Stardust. So clean, yet, so rapid.

"What the--" The leading Baphomet quickly pilfers the captain's comms from her seat, a bellowing tone full of ire "Attention. Unidentified ship detected of Xenos signature! Fire on sight!"

The lights of ships only now joining the fray tune their naval cannons. All of the scopes, locked at the unknown aircraft. A fighter craft without a battleship resonating in the same signature. A traveler? Then he would become a subject of the Imperium, bound to a mistress.

They fire crippling shots, crossing in ways that would so often see small crafts overwhelmed and broken. They pass close to it but disappear in the hundreds into what looked like hushed absorption. Only for the best of a second divided in half before they suddenly returned to the firing cannons with greater intensity. Ammunition fitful in ambient white light, passing through the heaviest of battleships like one's knife searing through molten butter.

Ships heavily damaged by the reflection of the one-man aircraft drift apart, systems unresponsive. The factions matter little to the rapidly advancing craft, its pillar of reflection turning the brightest of the battle barges into derelicts unable to do much more than to wait for reinforcements.

Maneuvering across the hundreds of carcasses of metal and wire, it promptly dissolves and fades from existence, revealing but a man. A man isolated in a suit. Uncaring of the destruction raining around him as the nightmare engines of flat spires continue to spin. --- "Huh? A man?" One from the chaos cultists, drifting between the sight of the lone cosmonaut and the presence of one of their holiest avatar. A greater demon, long summoned through the pleasure-sacrifice of an ongoing orgy, inhumane cries of joy brimming the bridge in a miasma of purple mist.

He could sense her demonic glare following the flying entity in the void of space, her voice, teeming with power, teeming with desire. For her eyes caught the shining power lodged in his soul, a blinding star to demonic entities ~This one entity. Bring him to me. He looks...precious. A man to welcome deep in our folds~

Her lust is palpable, etched at the tip of her tongue. And the people inside the bridge, seduced by her enthralling voice, move without hesitation.

Fire concentrates all-around the lone man spiraling straight into the machine's spire. They dance with clumsy steps, always a note off as they fail in excess. None able to catch him despite their targeting array. Soon enough, fires of lead, golden lances and more begin grouping around his being. Each faction sensed his nearing the machine, each wanted this new man in their fold, pulled forward by an ancient desire to satiate. A treasure they long forgot they sought.

But their fires fail at every turn, unable to halt his advance straight into the spire. Crashing against it and dissipating within, the machination of his armor functioning to phase him though.

"Fecit bene". He utters in a lost tongue, black in his luster, lined in orange lines dotting his armor. The power making itself visible. He walks...

...straight into a machine. An atrophied piece of architecture in smooth pure colors of white. Gold afflicts its extremities, looking to serve a function in the tiny specs of solidified light. One of its hands, unlike the tooth-picked bipedal feet, is devoid of a claw pulsing in ambient energy, replaced by an elaborate firearm.

'Intrusus deprehendi'

The entity is privy to a lowering set of claws hacking into his shoulder. Or, it would, if not for the armor's threat detection spurning a thin, hardened coat of power directly opposing the strength of the construct. A hand he returns dotted in a sigil at his armored palm.

Gently brushing the side of its beak-like head structure, the light, dotted in red, shifts along with its internal glow to an orange tide. It becomes...subservient?

The lone cosmonaut walks, walks away from this desolate place of alloy and metal, followed closely by the construct, leaping in what sounded like jubilation. They walk past several rooms, places large enough to host entire hive cities. Matrix of the inside mounting larger space than the already impressive scale of the outside.

Frozen women by the hundreds, locked in place. Crimson auras keeping them still. Even the men, imbued in power armor, useless to resist this stasis lock. One projected by elevated lights, patrolled by more of the machines the cosmonaut had called to his side.

'Nota deprehendi'.

They ignored the fear-struck witches and familiars long at their whims for the lone entity. Though they march with intent, they do not draw weapons, enticed by the man's presence. Curious at the change to their brethren, they approach him, feeling the caress of his hands coursing their beak-like heads. Soon enough, they perk up, wooshing in a state of recognition. Recognizing the hand that touched them.

'Reditum eos'. He points to the stasis locked, unable to shriek. The men, grunting in their armors as the diminutive witches are approached by the changed machines, violent light illuminated in their way. Soon to blast them in a blinding projection, their very being, decomposed and recalled elsewhere. To a place of familiarity with the taller men soon finding their turn at the attention of the machines.

He walks and walks, finding further women of monstrous appendages fighting off the strange machines. Thir magic, worthless in a place nulling them. Every time, they turn their heads toward the lone man and the machine, lashing at him. His monument, an overwhelming prize as once sought.

They fall short, locked in gravitational cubes of his making, a shoulder turret keeping them down to the floor as more machine course from hidden corners, phasing them in the light.

On and on, he goes, repelling any creature, every creature with the light, pushing their molecules back to where they hailed from in the constant surprise of their peers listening to their distressing voices.

On and on, he makes his way, followed by a legion of machines, all perfumed in his own light. All the way to the core. The center of the nightmare engine, ever unleashing its furious return of the polluted ammunition, claiming a cohort of victims.

At its very center, a beaming light honed in the solid matter. Crimson color spiraling as the shape of a curved triangle, constantly shifting attention, aggressively ushering in salvos burning away that which shoots at its engines.

Or, it looked aggressive, only...

He approaches, catching the sight of the AI that immediately enlargens, its sole existence staring deeply and closely at the man.

'Intrusus deprehendi'. 'Intrusus deprehendi'. 'Intrusus deprehendi'. 'Intrusus--

"Hey..." His voice called out, his helmet, deconstructing. A face poured back, lined in bright orange irises, offering nothing but a candid stare and a hand on its solid light constituting a face "Remember your old pal?"

'Friend? Friend. A friend is here'.

"Lumi told me you got lost here. I'm here to bring you back". The man caresses the bundle of light pouring on his palm like the glass of a window, smooth and lukewarm.

'Lost? Lost. Wrong coordinates. Too far? Maybe. But, stood. Cleaned. Dirty, dirty place. Filled with detrimental energy Makes people without inhibition. Makes them do unrestrained acts'. The massive, spire-height construct crumbles to a tiny spec of light, weaving, and gliding around the entire room. At least, before it dives straight into the cupping man's hands, expecting its happiness to set its artificial eye into a familiar 'Happy. Happy to see a friend here. Unlike the divided bios of this galaxy. Constantly fighting. Constantly desiring with no end'.

The man cups it close to his side "Yes. I know. It's a work in progress. A long work. But for now, let us return home. Lumi misses you".

'Return. Home. Home to Lumi. Return to Lumi'. The man can't help but ponder at the AI's behavior. A curious eye made from the machination of a young mind, prone to sport the same thought process.

The man's helmet reforms, turning him back into the lone cosmonaut, now imbued with the sentient machine's information. The power output of the core.The factions surrounding the engines. Their numbers, strength, ammunition, shields, hull, ship casualties, what they target, their condition, the names of everyone inside, their rank, abilities and so much more.

Everything filtered through his helmet. Every single piece of information that he could find passes through the casing surrounding his head. Conclusion?

"Sunt adhuc longe brevis"(They still fall short)

He runs to the front of the engines, still bombarded by the outer forces. Their lances and slugs, falling so short. Alloy begins to shape before him, fashioning itself as a set of commands for him to utilize. The tiny AI, returned to a spheroid, swirls around the man, ecstatic as ever as he punches the coordinates to a route outside the eye. Outside the Sgementum Obscurus. Beyond the galaxy's reach. --- "The nightmare engines! They're--! They're--" The cultists of the demon lord notice its unholy movement. The spires, coating what hides beneath, swirl around it, locking it further in their alien metal flesh.

"They're fleeing?! With this entity inside?!" The white-haired matron jousts from her chair, an idle weapon of another age fashioned as a deep purple blade manifesting in her hand. She swaths the air, instantly brimming the atmosphere in pure, undistilled corruption. A wound in reality opening...somewhere.

Her minions, overtake by this aura of violent desire, take to each other, the commander bridge reduced to an everlasting orgy, none able to notice their greater demoness passing through the rift.

A rift giving her a step within the departing engines. Alone with the man that she lays eyes on for the second time. The lone cosmonaut. Lust brims her tone ~Hmm...you're even tastier-looking from here~.

A lust soon lost to his voice, a language ancient in design "Non pertinent, hic".(You do not belong here)

"This...this tongue. You..." The ancient demoness could see. A desire long made dormant by their absence. A sight no one else had the foresight to recall "You're...you're a..."

She grips her weapon, summoning the greatest of her hymns now spiraling around her. His armor. His tone. The eyes that glimmer behind his impossible armor. A human from the lost golden age. A bright, shimmering star to entities like her.

"You're from the lost age! You're one of them! They still live! And you're here..." Realization compressing her mind. A man from the golden age, standing before her, untouched by any creature of the milky way. Unspoiled by the by-the-book practitioners of the sabbath Imperium, worshiping their small forms as the holiest of all. Untouched by the rough-housing orcs of the orc empire, crass and dull in their quest for satisfaction. Nor even by the mindless swarms of the devils from beyond, who knew nothing more than to simply squeeze the minimum from the men they held.

Surely none of them could offer anything of worth compared to her. Surely, walking towards him, her swelling breath burning the local space around her would convince a premium specimen of her worth. Surely, the disposition of the mightiest and daunting body present in this 'cesspit of unfun brutes' would coerce him to dive in her arms, charmed to the depth of what she had to offer.

Her mind, consumed by the thought of indulging in an untouched man from the golden age, compels her to draw her weapon, overwhelmed by the desire to taste him. An ancient thirst, ignited by his proximity. Her breathing, short-tempered just as she becomes, taking a seductive stance hiding the tempest behind.

With no more, lost to this re-ignited torch, the demoness lunges, an array of shattered mirrors opening miniature portals to the warp, focused into beams. Beams so capable of shredding through the hulls of ships. Sure to bring this one into disarray...

...if not for the hands that made them into reality. They fall short, withered by the simply unmasking of his gauntlet. A hand, nude as the day he was born, elevated with the debuts of faint orange lines coursing deep into his armor. A singular loop binds itself into one of his fingers. The monument to an oath made to another. Literal protection burning the corruptive in a light reaching for the heavens.

"Tua persuasiones ex cadere in aures, aures"(Your persuasions fall on deaf ears). His speed, impossible. The ringed hand, clutching the greater demoness by the visage. Her startled expression, the last before her bonds to reality are dissolved by its presence so close. Prompted to return to the immaterial, away...

Before long, the nightmare engine, spurned by his attention, tears into a rift not belonging to the warp, the empyrean seas of the demon lord. But, elsewhere untouched, different. It engulfs the machine, forever gone in an instant.

The factions now left without an artifact to study...or a creature of old to swell their ranks or a potent source of spirit energy...collapse onto each other. Ever the conflict-driven faces, they fall on the others, ever fruitless...blaming each other for the collective failures that keep the ancients from openly stepping in.

The white-haired woman, in particular, forcibly possessing a woman amidst many with rage and ire, to cut a swath of corruption among those she esteemed to be responsible for a lost chance of a lifetime, even by demonic standard... --- 'Returned. Returned.' The tiny AI jumps in frivolous joy, its core bundled into a large, singular eye befit in sharp mandible serving as feet. It shakes on top of the man's shoulder as the landscape became a familiar one to the intelligence.

A planet, beyond the touch of the conventional, surrounded by countless exosphere-reaching skyscrapers molded-in alloy of white and solid light.

The gigantic ship of nightmarish engines and flat spires spins no more, landing in a self-replicating void harbor where both the man and the AI machine drift down.

Its spinning arrival had not come unnoticed, a pair of young, vibrant eyes watching from the window of the scraper. A window opening to her tiny, excited hands pouncing at the ever gliding man "Daddy!!"

His armor dissolved, the man's elevated circuits of sundew colors coursing along his arms are made bare. His arms open up, bracing for the youngling crashing with delight against his torso, welcomed in a father's embrace.

"Now, now, Lumi, no need to jump out the window every time I come back", he speaks, holding back a chuckle as his body drifts back inside through her exit point, holding his youngling close.

"Hehe, but you're back, daddy! With Marvin no less!" Hearing its name being spoken pushes the tiny AI from the man's shoulder, walking alongside to her shoulder, gently nuzzling itself on her cheek.

'Lumi is here. Lumi is here'.

"Hehe, Marvin!" Jumping from her father's arms, the little Lumi of bright yellow eyes, bright yellow hair, and pale blue skin nuzzle her construct, the tiny frame in which she gave sentience to.

"Ohh? Oh, wow! Those coordinates I gave you really were off!" Holding it to her face, the young Lumi seemed to filter the views of her tiny friend, finding it in the midst of the most conflict-strewn sector "They were supposed to send you off to the 'Pacificus', not the 'Obscurus'! Come on, let's go check out the ship! I wanna check out the scrubbing it did".

Her tiny steps walk off, looking for a more formal way of exiting their house. All under his soft stare. Jeremy smirks, having seen his daughter's ship. Nothing more than a heavy-duty cleaner that she thought of. One capable of soaking and neutralizing myriad of energy sources and atmosphere.

"I've seen our little gizmo girl run along with her buddy and thought that her nice father must have come back". A woman's voice, the one who's name is inscribed on his ring. His beloved, dressed in her typical outfit, walking jauntily towards the man.

"Of course, she looked distressed about the error of calculation. Couldn't just let him stuck over there".

The man feels the gentle caress of her soft touch reaching for the back of his nape, one of the fingers, imbued in its own ring. His name inside. His wife, overjoyed at his return, unable to withhold herself from stealing a 'welcome back' kiss from the glad applicant.

A quiet accolade with which she welcomed him every time, communicating the boundless joy she nurtured since that day. The day of his proposition so soon after his ascension. All the moments since then, small and big, significant and unimportant, breathed through this kiss among countless more cumulating in their young one's labor.

The one coming back seconds as her parents were still exchanging fiery stares "Mommy...? Daddy...?"

A gentle smile perfumes their expressions as they turn to the fruit of their union, sheepish in her tone "The...the Janitor has a chip on its fourth face..."

As rapidly as their youngling was in understanding, the intricate art of repairing was still too overly complex for her as the two understood.

Exchanging another simper, Cloé turned back to her diminutive "Of course, darling. Come, mommy and daddy will show you how to repair, alright?"

They tread to the exit of the room, hands looking for a tiny pair. They find it, their daughter now walking between them, giggling as they effortlessly balance her off her feet, her AI twirling all the while.

This picture, locked among so many in his head, spurned the luck Jeremy had to be found. Stuck in a sight of horrors, singled out in a ship among so many, to be joined to a beloved, he recognized his luck.

...for, in the darkness of the 42 millennia, in the unending carnage of the milky way, there is no love...only lust...