Warhammer: Adventures Of The Two

Elirom looked at the training ground upon which both men stood. The idea was to test the strengths and weaknesses of both of them, though considering Michael's recent surgery, and the fact that Jarod's ribcage was currently being held together by biofoam and wrappings, they might be slightly hindered in what they could test.

The first tests they tried were those on the Artisan paths, many of which Eldar chose to follow. They were partially successful, with Michael showing some skill in the path of the poet and Jarod in the path of the diplomat, but neither held any real amount of hope for those paths.

It was when they started getting into the paths that covered manipulating the materium and Immaterium that things started to get interesting.

Jarod focused as best he could but found that he was… anything but subtle.

"I swear it as if you have no knowledge of how to hide your soul in the Immaterium! I was not surprised when I first met with you, but for Isha's sake you must be capable of some stealth!" Elirom chastised Jarod.

"Well, I'm doing everything Alaric taught me, suppressing my soul and thoughts within the warp, avoiding the daemons, all the normal stuff." He responded with a shrug.

Elirom sighed as he rubbed his temples, "Alright, it appears we must start from the beginning. I ask that you remove whatever bonds you might have on your mind. Here in the webway, your mind should be safe from whatever horrors that would try to prey on your mind."

Jarod shrugged, closing his eyes and letting loose the barriers that he had placed around his soul. When he opened his eyes again, he saw Elirom, eyes wide open and gripping his staff to the point where his knuckles had turned stark white. Eldar all around them had stopped what they were doing and started staring at them.

Jarod looked around, not altogether sure what he was supposed to do, "So… what now?" he asked.

Elirom shook his head, "W-what are you? I have never seen a soul so bright!" Elirom asked as he proceeded to almost hyperventilate.

Jarod blinked. He looked around at the crowd of Eldar that had gathered around them. He looked back at Elirom. He blinked again. "Would we perchance be able to speak in private?" He asked.

Elirom shook himself out of his stupor, "I do not see why that would even be needed. With your power… I do believe you could do anything you wanted."

Jarod shrugged, "I'll take that as a yes then? Do you have a private room or something?" He asked.

Elirom paused, before nodding hesitantly and leading Jarod to a more private area. The room they were in was fairly empty, with wraithbone floors and decorations. Jarod whistled as he looked through the floor to ceiling window that gave a view of the craftworlds cities. It reminded him of places such as Rivendale, the Citadel, or Orokin stuff.

Turning to the Farseer, he was still unnerved at how hesitant and fearful the Eldar seemed to be, "Why are you so scared of me all of the sudden?" Jarod asked.

The Eldar shook his head, "When you released the restraint on your power, it looked as if I was seeing the heart of a star. To give an example, a normal human soul is akin to a candle in the warp, with an Eldar soul being more like a bonfire. Your soul though… it is brighter than anything I have ever seen. As I said before, it is as if I am looking at a star." he explained, "I have never seen a soul as powerful as yours. At first, I thought that you simply did not know how to restrain your psychic abilities, but I now see that you are a near master of the art, considering how little of your power was showing through your mask."

Jarod let out a low whistle, taking in what the Farseer had said, "Alaric told me that when I first got my power, that it was like a stun grenade had gone off right in front of his face, but the light dissipated as soon as I shielded my mind."

Elirom nodded, "That would be an apt description, yes. And, if you would not mind, could you please suppress your soul further? I fear we are attracting attention here, and I would be lying if I said that your soul does not strain my mind to look at." He explained.

Jarod winced, before doing what was asked of him. He'd never thought that his soul was as bright as Elirom had said, but now he wondered just how powerful he was.

"You said earlier that I was powerful. Just how powerful do you think I am?" He asked sincerely.

Elirom hummed, his brow no longer strained, "You could likely do whatever your mind could come up with. I have seen you use your power to lift small objects or to enhance your physical abilities, but I do believe your potential is well beyond that."

Jarod chuckled, "Well alright then. Tell me everything you know." He said seriously.

Elirom blinked, "What?"

"Tell me everything you know. You're older than I am, you know more about how to manipulate the warp, how to read minds, how to see into the future, how to conjure lightning. I want to know all of it." Jarod explained.

The Farseer was felt a great deal of surprise. Not only was this human acknowledging that the Eldar was his better when it came to matters of the immaterium, but he was asking to learn! Most Elder would deny the man's request. Most would take the opportunity to gloat, to hold their knowledge over his head only to snatch it away at the last second. Those Eldar were foolish.

Elirom straightened, "I will teach you what I know. I will help to prepare you for what is to come, and I hope that you will be wise enough to learn."

Jarod smiled, "And I will do my best to learn. I don't exactly have any plans on being Daemon food."

[-----]

Michael continued to marvel at the world around him, the towering skyscr.a.p.ers, the beautiful plant life, and the many Eldar sneering at him if he got close enough to see them. He ignored them. The council that ran the craftworld had given Michael and Jarod limited free reign of the craftworld, and Michael had been taking advantage of that via exploration.

He'd seen many shops, houses, and factories, all with Eldar working there. At one point he entered a park, where several Eldar stood around and talked. He even spotted a pair of children, which made him smile sadly. Children were rare among the Eldar, that was for sure. Slaanesh's birth had made sure of that. He stood at the edge of the park, out of earshot and at an angle that made it difficult for anyone to know he was watching. The parents of the children would probably urge them home at best, or outright attack him at worst.

He was brought out of his thoughts by a tug on his sleeve. Looking down, he blinked at the sight of a little girl. She said something in the Eldar language, which even though Michael had no idea what she was saying, it sounded like she was singing. He smiled and kneeled down in front of her.

"I have no idea what you just said, but I'll take it as a compliment." He said with a smile.

The girl wrinkled her nose. He wasn't sure if she understood what he'd said at first, so it came as quite a surprise when she answered him in low gothic -- albeit a bit broken.

"Mother say you bad. You not look bad though, you not feel bad." She said.

Michael laughed. Already the girl was more diplomatic than ninety percent of her species, "No, I'm not bad. Though I understand why your mother says I am. People like me have done a lot of bad things." He explained.

"You not do bad things?" She asked.

"No, I don't do bad things. I help people, like you and your mother. I want to stop people who do bad things."

She blinked, tilting her head slightly, "Like the bad people who made father go away?" She asked innocently.

Michael's heart skipped a beat, and the smile fell from his face. Her father was probably dead, all things considered, and odds are it happened in the battle against the traitor marines. Shaking his head, he forced a smile back onto his face, "Yes, I stop those people."

"Will father come back?"

"No, child," A voice said from behind Michael. Michael got up quickly and looked to the source of the voice. The Eldar in question was a woman in howling banshee armor, with a hand on one of her swords, and a dangerous glare in her eyes as she stared at Michael, "Your father will not come back."

The little girl pouted, before spouting off something in moonspeak. A quick conversation with the howling banshee had the girl frowning, with tears in her eyes as she scurried off, likely going to find her mother.

"I take it you don't deal with kids often?" Michael asked, the woman shooting him a glare.

"Do not mistake the council's trust for mine, Mon'keigh. Your people have caused more than their share of suffering." She said quickly.

"First off, I have a name. It's Michael. Second off, I'm not the Imperium." Michael said.

The woman scoffed, "So you claim innocence then?" she asked.

"Even if I did, I don't think you'd believe me. You people have had a grudge against humanity for how many millennia now? I'm pretty sure it goes both ways at this point." He explained.

"Your kind has killed countless of ours, our contempt is justified." She said.

Michael shrugged, "I never said it wasn't. Just know that you've killed just as many, often times unprovoked." He offered.

The Eldar frowned, before looking off in the direction the child ran, "Why did you save me?" She asked.

Michael blinked, "Uh, what?"

"I asked, why did you save me? Surely there was a reason."

"Uh, for the record, I have no idea who you are. If I saved you during the battle, your welcome, if it was at some other point, then I have no idea what you're talking about."

This time she blinked, a look of surprise coming over her features, "You do not remember me?" She asked.

Michael shook his head, "I pulled a lot of people out of the line of fire that day, if yours was one of them, cool. But I'm sorry if I don't recognize your face."

"You picked me up off the ground, sending me forward while one of the worshipers of she-who-thirsts attacked at injured you." She said, pointing to his cybernetic arm.

Michael just shrugged, "I don't know what to tell you. I don't pay attention to who I'm saving during a battle, and I don't care if it puts me in the line of fire. Besides, I ended up with a cool looking arm, who am I to complain?" He said.

The Eldar looked at him with a bewildered expression, disbelieving of the fact that someone, much less a human, would save them out of the goodness of their heart. It wasn't as if the Eldar were unkind to one another, but she had lived most of her life looking out for herself, as had those around her.

"And I wasn't lying to the girl," He said, causing her to look at him quizzically, "Humanity has fallen, so much so that I don't really think it will ever reach the point it was at during the golden age of technology. Chaos has corrupted half of humanity and the Imperium is crumbling under its own weight."

The howling banshee sighed, "I will admit, it pleases me to see that someone sees the folly of your species. We have seen it-"

"That's not to say you've done any better," Michael interrupted, causing the Eldar to glare at him, "You still cling to the hope that you can still bring your species back from the brink. You still believe yourselves superior to humans and other races, and yet you are in more dire straits than the rest of us. Your race is divided, one half wandering around on planet-sized sh.i.p.s trying to survive, while the other half sits around torturing helpless people For kicks."

Salah was speechless. She almost drew her blade then and there, her hand gravitating toward her waist.

"Then again you didn't do anything." Michael said abruptly, shaking the Eldar from her stupor, "I mean, you can't exactly blame one person for the actions of their ancestors. If you did that I don't think there would be any humans left in the galaxy."

Once again Salah found that she couldn't speak. Not only was Michael criticizing his own race, but he goes right back to insulting the Aeldari, only to-

"I mean, for crying out loud Adolf Hitler existed! Stalin, Hilary… ugh, there's way too many. Humanity is a self-destructive mess. And even forty thousand years didn't fix it! G-o-g-e Vandire, the evilest sounding name in existence. I mean, seriously, who the hell names their kid that!? And The Horus Heresy, I mean, the guy turned into the craziest person in the galaxy, and killed how many people? Seriously, if you judged the whole race on them alone, you might as well just kill us all."

Salah blinked.

"But then you have people like Gandhi, Mother Teresa, the freaking pope!... most of the time. If you judged the entire species by them then we might as well be considered the nicest species in existence. Honestly, that is neither here nor there, as every species has its positives and negatives. All I'm trying to do is fix this mess." Michael finished.

Salah didn't even try to speak, taking as long as she needed to compute what Michael was saying. She would have understood if he was simply aware of his races folly, but he had gone well beyond that, speaking as if humanity itself disgusted him, and yet he praised several individuals -- granted she did not know who they were, though she could make an educated guess.

"How are you so critical of your own race? They are your people! Your heritage!" she asked.

"Are the Drukhari not yours? Are they not your heritage? It's the same reason. I criticize the people that mess with our reputation and make our lives harder, and I'm not afraid to punch anyone that tries to commit genocide." He explained.

Michael sighed, "Look, we can go back and forth on this for days if we keep at it, so unless you have any intention of changing your opinion of us lowly Mon'keigh? I'll be exploring."

He turned to walk off, leaving the Exarch near speechless.

"Kiara."

Michael stopped in his tracks, "What was that?" he asked.

"Her name. The child who you spoke to. Her name is Kiara."

Micheal smiled, "Showing trust already are we? Who knows, maybe you'll tell me your name next." he said with a chuckle.

"Salah. My name is Salah, Exarch of the Howling Banshees." She said with a grimace.

Micheal's laugh ceased, and his eyes widened. An appropriate response given her rank, and it gave her a small feeling of pride when he realized his mistake- and now he was grinning ear to ear.

"Guess I picked the right day to go for a walk," he said, before finally walking off.

[-----]

Robert coughed into his fist, leaning against the wall of the hallway. He grimaced as blood covered his palm, and he slowly made his way to the medical ward.

I thought I had another decade at least… shows the accuracy of those tests I suppose… he thought to himself.

He stumbled into the medical ward, the various nurses snapping their heads toward him as they rushed to help him. They connected a number of nodes and devices to read his vitals, and they started to panic when he collapsed into a coughing fit. A monitor beeped in warning, a nurse shouted, and he was injected with some kind of medicine.

I suppose you'll be taking over sooner rather than later Jarod Carolinus.