Family. Duty. Honor.

Continued from here:

"Ah, Eklius. I remember him. Isn't he the one who died and then became a machine spirit? Quite an unusual way to come back from the dead? But to be honest, I am glad Darius gets to have him around. Those two seem to be close friends."

Her mood gradually calmed down as a result of Drifak steering the conversation away from anything nurglite. Still, she figured out it would be a good idea to reasure the scout.

"By the way, even if I got mad over you know who, you do not need to worry about me making a scene. I am not going to wreck anything, ok? No matter how angry I get."

For a brief moment, she winced as she remembered those times in her youth where she thrashed rooms whenever she was in a foul mood.

"Now, going back on topic, you said the Sixty gave their lives to evacuate sixty thousand refugees? That is a noble sacrifice, let me tell you. Unfortunately, that mentality seems to be unusual on our kind."

She let out a long-suffering sigh, and pinched the bridge of her nose.

"The things the Iron Hands and Marines Malevolent do to civilians are a good example of the opposite attitude. It is as if mortals were bugs to them."

Continued from here:

Drifak's reaction didn't go unnoticed to Akhenaten. "Look, I understand why you panicked. It took me a long time to get used to my new appereance. Heck, I even worried about breaking mirrors for years. But at least you did not throw boiling coffee at me, so we are good. And yes, even with our kind's accelerated healing it hurts a lot and leaves grevious injuries." She avoided mentioning she turned the offender into mincemeat.

"So you were born on the fleet? For how long has your family been in it?"

“On my mother’s side, she was the first one. On my dad’s side it was my grandfather. The one who’s a Felinid.”

Drifak makes a snort. “Although I suppose now my grandfather is Mortarion.”

"Ah, so chances are it was your grandfather who came from Carlos McConnell. And as for Mortarion being your new grandfather, well, I get how you feel. We are related to people like Abaddon the Despoiler, Fabius Bile, Huron Blackheart, Typhus, and Eidolon The Auric Hammer. But it's not all bad. There's also people like Saul Tarvitz and Uriel Ventris.", she shrugged.

Continued from here:

Drifak's reaction didn't go unnoticed to Akhenaten. "Look, I understand why you panicked. It took me a long time to get used to my new appereance. Heck, I even worried about breaking mirrors for years. But at least you did not throw boiling coffee at me, so we are good. And yes, even with our kind's accelerated healing it hurts a lot and leaves grevious injuries." She avoided mentioning she turned the offender into mincemeat.

"So you were born on the fleet? For how long has your family been in it?"

"Ah, I see. Well, I wish you the best of luck in your studies. The career of an apothecary is a challenging but rewarding one. I do remember my beginnings a long time ago. I am a biomancer, so it was necessary for me to become medically trained so as to avoid things like turning my insides into outsides. I had to study for years until I was allowed to modify myself."

A sad smile formed on Akhenaten's face. Those days were long gone, just as Prospero was.

"Makes sense. Fuck up with biomancy too much and you die in horrible agony, or so I've been told. I'm not a psyker."

Two fluffly triangular ears suddenly perk up from where they were laying flat on his head, the same color as his hair.

Drifak looks around. "I hear a fly." He mutters.

Akhenaten tilted her head. She could also hear the fly. "Ah yes, a pesky fly. I never liked them, to be honest. I'd rather feed them to my carnivorous plants." Her attention then went back to Drifak. "Oh, so you are felinid? Now that's unusual. So, are you from Carlos McConnell?"

The annoying fly landed on Drifak's ear. A few seconds later it dropped to the floor, dead. "I used biomancy to turn off its brain. Easiest way to get rid of them. Else I would have to chance them with a flyswatter."

“From…who? And only kind of. My grandfather was a Felinid. I’m a bit of an experiment. I wanted to be an Astartes more than anything. Gallus and Eklius were pretty thorough in their research, getting everything ready so I could actually survive the implants.” Drifak says with a small smile. His teeth are more pointed and sharp than normal.

His ears flick a little. “Sorry if the ah…mutant…bit makes you uncomfortable. There’s a reason the ears are flat most of the time.”

"Oh. Carlos McConnell is the name of the planet from where felinids come from. It possibly was named after the person who discovered. You said you wanted to become an astartes more than anything, right? Well, I am glad your dream became true. And as for the mutant part...look I am the least qualified person to judge."

She took a look around to check if someone was around. When the biomancer saw none, she proceeded to remove the glamour necklace around her neck.

What could be described as an eldritch elderly astartes stood before Drifak. "I am way more mutated than you. To the point some people have mistaken me for a daemon or a xenos. As for why I am like this, it is the flesh change. I was on the verge of turning into chaos spawn when a warp entity saved me. But they could only interrupt the transformation, not undo it.", she shook her head.

"Ah, I see. Well, I wish you the best of luck in your studies. The career of an apothecary is a challenging but rewarding one. I do remember my beginnings a long time ago. I am a biomancer, so it was necessary for me to become medically trained so as to avoid things like turning my insides into outsides. I had to study for years until I was allowed to modify myself."

A sad smile formed on Akhenaten's face. Those days were long gone, just as Prospero was.