The "Glory" of Sicarius
Location: Gloriana-class Battleship Macragge's Honour, Deck 12, Tactical Briefing Chamber (temporary classroom)
Time: Week 3 after the Battle of Iax
Current Course: Macragge, Realm of Ultramar
---
Captain Cato Sicarius, Master of the 2nd Company of the Ultramarines, Knight Champion of Macragge, Grand Duke of Talassar, and High Suzerain of Ultramar, was experiencing a humiliation more daunting than facing a Necron Overlord's hyperphase blade.
He stood before a towering hololithic star map, cerulean power armor polished to a flawless sheen. Purity seals were perfectly arranged. His crimson cloak hung in impeccable symmetry.
He was a hero of the Imperium.
A blade of Guilliman.
A paragon of the Codex Astartes.
And he had been assigned—
—to tutor a child.
---
Roboute Guilliman had spoken with an expression Sicarius could not decipher.
"Teach her the glory of the Imperium. The duty of the chosen. The history of Ultramar."
A pause.
"I believe only you, Cato, possess the patience and excellence required."
It had sounded like praise.
Sicarius had accepted it as such.
This was not babysitting.
This was the shaping of a soul.
---
"Ahem."
His amplified voice echoed through the vast chamber.
"Attend carefully," Sicarius declared, pointer striking the projection of a star system. "As I, Cato Sicarius, have stated, the Great Crusade was the Emperor's grand design to reunite humanity beneath enlightened rule—"
Skrrrrt.
A metallic scraping interrupted him.
Slow.
Grating.
Deliberate.
Sicarius inhaled.
Deeply.
He lowered his gaze.
Eileen lay sprawled across the massive mahogany briefing table. The ceremonial short sword gifted by Guilliman was currently being used to carve something into the wood.
It looked vaguely like a pig.
Or perhaps a rat.
In the corner, Sergeant Varo stood at parade rest. The slight tilt of his helmet suggested he was absolutely watching.
"Miss Eileen," Sicarius said carefully, voice gaining the edge he reserved for undisciplined recruits. "Are you listening to my account of the 77th Battle for Macragge's polar fortresses?"
She blinked up at him, brown eyes unfocused.
"Oh. Yeah. You charged a bunch of green things and cut them up."
"It was a coordinated assault against Ork warbands!" Sicarius snapped. "A demonstration of tactical brilliance!"
"Mm." She nodded. "You hacked them up very tactically."
Varo coughed once.
Loudly.
---
Eileen raised her hand.
Sicarius straightened.
"At last. A question."
"Those blue bald aliens you mentioned. From Damocles. The T'au."
He nodded curtly.
"…Are they tasty?"
Silence.
Absolute silence.
Even the hololith flickered uncertainly.
"Excuse me?" Sicarius asked, very softly.
"You know. Their skin's blue. Is the meat sweet? Like berries? Or sour? Like rat?"
Varo made a choking noise.
Sicarius felt a vein throb.
"The T'au are xenos. They are to be purged. Not consumed."
"Waste of meat," Eileen muttered. "In Hive 42, if you kill a giant rat, you eat it for three days."
Sicarius silently recited passages of the Codex Astartes on composure.
The Primarch had warned him this would test his patience.
Very well.
He would adapt.
---
"Enough history," Sicarius said. "Let us speak of tactics."
The hololith shifted, projecting urban ruins.
"You are cornered. Thirty armed heretics approach. No ammunition. One short blade. What do you do?"
He expected courage.
Sacrifice.
Resolve.
Eileen squinted at the projection.
"They have guns?"
"Yes."
"And they're hungry?"
"…Yes."
"I lie down."
Sicarius blinked.
"You what?"
"Lie down in the corpses. Smear blood on my face. Hold my breath."
"That is cowardice."
"No, it's survival," she replied calmly. "When they loot the bodies, I stab the leader in the ankle. Cut the tendon. He falls. They trip. I run into sewers."
She mimed stabbing.
Varo made a strangled wheezing sound.
Sicarius froze.
He ran the simulation in his mind.
A mortal child charging thirty cultists: death in under a second.
Feign death. Sever Achilles. Escape through confined spaces inaccessible to power-armored pursuers.
Survival probability: non-zero.
Damn it.
She was tactically correct.
"This is dishonorable," Sicarius insisted weakly.
"Dead people don't have honor," Eileen replied. "Old Joe said they just rot."
Sicarius found he had no immediate doctrinal counterargument.
The lesson deteriorated from there.
"Announce a duel?"
"Why give them time to aim?"
"Never strike from behind?"
"Backs don't have eyes."
"Die for the banner?"
"Can a banner stop bullets?"
By the Emperor.
He, Cato Sicarius, breaker of warhosts, was being dismantled by a hive-born child.
---
Eileen, meanwhile, was bored.
Very bored.
She remembered how, during discussions of her "glowing incident," this same mighty Captain had knelt instantly under the Emperor's presence.
A mischievous idea formed.
[Oh no. I know that look. This will be good.]
"…Thus," Sicarius continued grandly, "the Codex Astartes is not merely tactical doctrine, but the spiritual foundation of—"
The short sword clattered to the table.
Eileen's body began trembling.
Sicarius stopped.
Her head lowered.
Then snapped upward.
Her eyes rolled white.
Her face went slack.
When she spoke, her voice was low and rasping.
"…Sicarius…"
His blood froze.
He remembered Iax.
The pressure.
The absolute, soul-crushing majesty.
Was the Emperor descending again?
Because of his lecture?
Cold sweat soaked his undersuit.
"You… are… very… noisy…"
The words came slow and distorted.
Sicarius did not hesitate.
He dropped to his knees so hard his ceramite cracked the deck plating.
Head bowed.
Arms crossed over his chest.
"Forgive me, Lord!" he stammered. "I sought only to fulfill the Regent's command! I shall be silent! I shall undertake penance!"
Varo instinctively bent one knee—
Then paused.
No ozone scent.
No psychic resonance.
No golden radiance.
And—
Was that suppressed laughter?
"Pfft—"
Eileen exploded.
"Hahahaha! Uncle Sicarius! Your face! Like a fat pigeon stepped on!"
Silence returned.
Sicarius slowly raised his head.
No Emperor.
Just a child doubled over in hysterics.
His face shifted from pale to a violent shade of red.
He, Cato Sicarius, had been outmaneuvered by a twelve-year-old with no armor and sticky fingers.
He rose stiffly.
"This is an outrageously inappropriate jest," he declared through clenched teeth. "Blasphemous. Unbecoming. Entirely—"
"You knelt really fast," she said brightly. "Faster than Old Joe when enforcers came."
That one struck like a bolt round.
"Class dismissed!"
He turned sharply, cloak snapping.
Varo's shoulders trembled.
"Do not laugh, Sergeant," Sicarius ordered as he passed.
"Yes, Captain," Varo replied, voice suspiciously strained.
At the doorway, Sicarius hesitated.
Without turning, he removed a small metal ration case from his belt and flicked it backward with perfect aim.
It landed on the table before Eileen.
She opened it.
Pure Terran cocoa chocolate.
Officer-grade.
Rare even in Ultramar.
"That is strategic reserve, not confectionery," Sicarius called from the corridor, voice fading. "And do not employ such disgraceful tactics again!"
The door sealed behind him.
Eileen broke off a piece and tasted it.
Bitter.
Rich.
Sweet beneath.
"He's loud," she said thoughtfully, licking her fingers. "But he's nice."
Varo finally allowed himself the faintest smile.
Somewhere along the ship's internal vox channels, a new legend was already forming—
The day Cato Sicarius, Champion of Macragge, was brought to his knees by a hive girl with very convincing acting skills.