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once again i am bored and so once again i have started writing a short story.
it starts with an astartes captain arguing with an imperial navy admiral about who should 'flick the switch'



“Captain, this should be your responsibility” the admiral said with a sigh as he gestured to the switch that had newly appeared on the panel.

“With respect admiral, I am a warrior, not an executioner” explained the astartes as he looked up to meet the admiral’s gaze. The admiral froze under the stare, seeing a look of pure dread in the astartes eyes.

“I understand your connection to the people down there, but we are under the orders of the ordo malleus and I have enough blood on my hands” the admiral pleaded in a vain attempt to get himself out of flicking the switch. His plea changed quickly to an order, now desperate not to flick the switch “I am admiral of the penan fleet, and you are standing on the deck of my flagship, Hades you will flick that switch!”

‘Hades’. That wasn’t his name. He hated being called that. It wasn’t his name. He didn’t have a name. But for forty years they had all called him Hades because of what happened at Eden’s edge. There he earned his reputation as a cold blooded, merciless and ruthless monster. A reputation he did not want.

“Don’t call me Hades!” he warned the admiral

The admiral’s gaze wavered as he begins to understand that he has just angered an astartes, and a powerful one at that. “I apologize if I caused offence, they told me that that was your name” he said in a terrified but surprisingly unapologetic tone.

The astartes moved towards the panel after finally making up his mind. The admiral turned and walked casually but quickly towards the door at the end of the control room not wanting to be near the angered brute. The astartes hovered his finger over the switch and hesitated. He didn’t remember a thing from before he became a neophyte, but he new that he was born on the planet below. He new that there were still friends down there who still truly respected him, and family, who still truly loved him. But he didn’t remember them. He wanted to, one day, find his family, just so he could find out what he had been like before, or even to just find out his name. But there would be no chance of that now. He flicked the switch.

The deck shook, the astartes presumed it was missiles firing, but it wasn’t. Immediately the control deck lit up with flashing red lights and warning sirens. Deck hands and officers began sprinting about in all different directions to find out what happened. The astartes paused and listened to the frantic shouts, “someone has hit quarantine on gun decks five, six and eight” a woman shouted “reports of casualties on gun deck three” a man called as if he was guessing the astartes next words.

An enemy agent had managed to get onboard by stowing away on a Lucifer guard transport vessel, somehow they had then to the gun decks and inspired many of the serfs and deck hands to join his cause. The rebels cross wired the processing arrays on the virus bombs and cyclonic torpedoes. They had been rigged to detonate when they got the order to launch. Luckily the gun decks were all quarantined before the life-eater could spread throughout the whole ship. Unluckily the strike cruiser had been set to planetkill, which meant there was a matter of minutes before the cyclonic torpedoes also launch, or in this case, self detonate…

nice story but what is the life-eater?

good story

shas'o vera wrote:nice story but what is the life-eater?

you're joking, right?

The virus in the viral bombs I believe?

not my fault i dont read every single piece of backgroud info

yeh the life-eater is the virus

Moving thread to Dakka Fiction.

Good one mate

I like the story and the concept, especially as the Marine's self-destructive quality reflects the plight of the ship! I hope you don't mind, but I've added a few Grammatical points that you could try out to make it sound even better. I hope they help!

cadian512 wrote: ‘Hades’. That wasn’t his name. He hated being called that. It wasn’t his name. He didn’t have a name.

^^I really love the short, punchy sentences here. I use them too, they're a great tool. Although, I feel that the second 'It wasn't his name,' could be dropped without losing the power of the statements.

Also, be careful about mixing tenses. It's something that's hard to know you're doing and I am always guilty of this one! Here we have the past and the present tense in the same sentence.

cadian512 wrote: The admiral’s gaze wavered as he begins to understand that he has just angered an astartes, and a powerful one at that.

Instead try "The admiral's gaze wavered as he began to understand that he had just..." or "The admiral's gaze wavers as he begins to understand that he has..." etc.

cadian512 wrote: He new that there were still friends down there who still truly respected him, and family, who still truly loved...

^^I really like this; it's a great way of linking his back story with the narrative, but rather than repeat 'truly', perhaps we could expand on his childhood further;
"He knew that there were friends down there that still truly respected him, and a family who would never stop loving the child that was stolen from them on that fateful night..."

cadian512 wrote: An enemy agent had managed to get onboard...

^^Lastly, sometimes it's better not to be so direct with the facts, let your audience draw their own conclusions, or use your characters to do it for them, it helps to keep them hooked and reading! If you try something like this below, you can develop the relationship between the two men.

...As the sirens blared the admiral checked his pict screen frantically, 'Intruders!' he snapped.
'If they're the rebels from the planet...' the Astartes started to say, but was cut off by a desperate cry from a deck officer. 'Virus bombs!'
'On my ship, I'll have someone's head,' the admiral said, wiping the sweat from his brow.
'Perhaps from those unchecked Lucifer transport ships!' Hades rumbled, his anger rising with every passing second...

Anyway, all of these points are just suggestions, the important thing is that you're writing decent prose in the first place! And with a little tweaking this story could be even better!

thanks rinkydink for the suggestions, i wll be adding to the story as soon as i have time and ill editit then

ok... heres the edited version:

“Captain, this should be your responsibility” the admiral said with a sigh as he gestured to the switch that had newly appeared on the panel.

“With respect admiral, I am a warrior, not an executioner” explained the astartes as he looked up to meet the admiral’s gaze. The admiral froze under the stare, seeing a look of pure dread in the astartes eyes.

“I understand your connection to the people down there, but we are under the orders of the ordo malleus and I have enough blood on my hands” the admiral pleaded in a vain attempt to get himself out of flicking the switch. His plea changed quickly to an order, now desperate not to flick the switch “I am admiral of the penan fleet, and you are standing on the deck of my flagship, Hades you will flick that switch!”

‘Hades’. That wasn’t his name. He hated being called that. He didn’t have a name. But for forty years they had all called him Hades because of what happened at Eden’s edge. There he earned his reputation as a cold blooded, merciless and ruthless monster. A reputation he did not want.

“Don’t call me Hades!” he warned the admiral

The admiral’s gaze wavered as he began to understand that he had just angered an astartes, and a powerful one at that. “I apologize if I caused offence, they told me that that was your name” he said in a terrified but surprisingly unapologetic tone.

The astartes moved towards the panel after finally making up his mind. The admiral turned and walked casually but quickly towards the door at the end of the control room not wanting to be near the angered brute. The astartes hovered his finger over the switch and hesitated. He didn’t remember a thing from before he became a neophyte, but he new that he was born on the planet below. He knew that there were friends down there that still truly respected him, and a family who would never stop loving the child that was stolen from them on that fateful night. But he didn’t remember them. He wanted to, one day, find his family, just so he could find out what he had been like before, or even to just find out his name. But there would be no chance of that now. He flicked the switch.

The deck shook, the astartes presumed it was missiles firing, but it wasn’t. Immediately the control deck lit up with flashing red lights and warning sirens. Deck hand and officers began sprinting about in all different directions to find out what happened. The astartes paused and listened to the frantic shouts, “someone has hit quarantine on gun decks five, six and eight” a woman shouted “reports of casualties on gun deck three” a man called as if he was guessing the astartes next words.

The old and rusted automatic door shot open with a wiring screech and the admiral charged back onto the bridge as if on a warpath. As the sirens blared the admiral checked his pict screen frantically, 'Intruders!' he snapped.
'If they're the rebels from the planet, they could have used those unchecked Lucifer transport ships!' Hades rumbled, his anger rising with every passing second. So now the astartes knew the means, but not the end, until… “The virus bombs!”. The deck officers shout was heard by all on the bridge. The silence after was one of fear and dread. The astartes turned slowly to the admiral and begun to speak “are the virus bombs tamper-proof?!”. The reply was concise and only added to the tension, “no”. the astartes turned to the deck officer, failing to control his choler “lock down all gun decks now!”. The deck officer was frozen to the spot with fear, never before on the receiving end of an astartes rage. “Now!” he removed his sidearm from his holster, but managed to keep himself from shooting the frightened man. The deck officer jumped forward and began frantically pushing buttons and barking his own orders into the receiver.

The strike cruiser had been set to planetkill, which meant there was a matter of minutes before the cyclonic torpedoes also launch, or in this case, self detonate…

small update!



Suddenly, even over the alarms blaring on the bridge, a terrifying scream sounded just on the other side of that old and rusted door, the noise etching itself forever in the souls of all who heard it. Immediately after, the din of the bridge vanished instantly; even the blaring sirens seemed to release from their awful chorus.

“Lock down the bridge!”, the admiral almost knocking the startled deck officer to floor with the new found fury and reawakened authority in his voice. The order was followed quickly. Only after it was too late did they see their mistake.







if you read this please reply

more



Several minutes before, just outside that old rusted door, a brave Lucifer stood up to an old friend, with his sword drawn, ready to fight, ready to kill him. He walked calmly but cautiously down the dark corridor, the lights were out and every half second the lights of the sirens would ignite the corridor in a blood red light. The Lucifer held his blade at an angle, at the standard guard that is etched into every Lucifer during their intensive training. He approached slowly; his old friend had not yet caught his scent. Riyan, the Lucifer, recognised warp psychosis when he saw it, only they had not been through the warp in nearly a year, so what had caused it in the other Lucifer? Riyan didn’t know. Riyan didn’t care. He didn’t want to kill his friend, but it was a simple situation: he was a friend, now he is an enemy. He had smuggled those men on board and he had lead them to the gun decks. He was a traitor to the emperor, he deserved death. Justice is cruel, but necsacary. The Lucifer, once known as dak, turned a corner and was lost, for just a moment. Riyan continued the pursuit until he heard the sound of a struggle, then the sound of ripping flesh, and then silence. He waited for the sirens light to once again illuminate the corridor but regretted doing so once it did. He saw dak. Standing several meters away from him, his gaping maw slicked in wet blood. His right hand held a man by the hair. The man was on his knees and clearly dead. He was covered in arterial blood that was spraying from a rip in his neck.

“Dak stop this!” Riyan pleaded to his already lost friend

“It’s already too late; you know this to be true!” Dak’s voice was cold and full of an uncompromising menace. Each word he spoke, he spat blood too the floor and took an awkward step towards Riyan, still dragging the new dead corpse by the hair. When he got to just a meter away he stopped. He looked up and roared, the sound seemed to pierce Riyan’s skull and it clearly left its mark. Riyan released his blade and dropped to one knee, clamping his hands tightly around his ears. Dak freed his corpse and once again started towards his foe. Riyan kicked back and slid across the sleek surface of the ceramite floor. As he skidded to a halt he clasped for either of his two side-arms, both of which were holstered at hi waist. He grabbed Nefar, his own hand-flamer, and fired it at Daks chest. He was engulfed in flame and swung his arms violently though the air. Riyan jumped forward, just to the right of his flaming former friend, and rolled on his side, landing just next his fallen blade. He took it up and strode purposely towards the man, who was still swinging furiously in an attempt to find purchase and tear Riyan limb from limb.

“Justice is cruel!” he shouted as a brought down the gleaming blade on the right side of Dak’s neck, removing his flaming head in one fell swoop. Boiled blood continued to spray out of the charred corpse for what seemed like decade. Riyan didn’t know why but he stayed there until it did cease to flow. And then, with a sigh, he turned and began to walk, “justice is done”. His own words rung in his ears until the moment he died. His own words rung in his ears until the end of the day.




should i add more and explain what happens to the people inside the bridge or shall it leave open?