Valdor watched calmly as the Emperor paced, waiting for the Primarchs to arrive back aboard the Imperator Somnium. They had received a signal from the Gamma indicating that the others knew about Omegon. He had been able to confirm this with Joysepha and Pryskella. This made it more tense.
“Which order are they coming aboard in?” he asked the Emperor.
“I’m not sure,” the Emperor said. “It seems that there were complications with the fleets which is affecting their arrival.”
“Somehow, I don’t think Alpharius wants to show up first.”
“Probably not. Though being last might be worse,” the Emperor chuckled. “I doubt that they’re going to leave until everyone’s here.”
“Agreed,” Valdor said. “Now is when we find out. Here’s the first arrival.”
“Jaghatai,” the Emperor noted. “Somehow not surprising.”
“Father!” Jaghatai said happily as he ran down the descending ramp. “Am I the first back?”
“Yes, but it looks like Leman is right behind you,” Valdor said. “Have your ship move.”
“Torghun!” Jaghatai called back. “I’m off.”
The White Scars didn’t reply, just launched and turned quickly. As it was they barely got out of the way in time for the Space Wolves to enter without a collision. Leman hopped off without waiting for his transport to actually land.
“Thanks for the ride!” he called up. “Better move out of the way before someone else shows up.”
“Of course, Jarl,” a Space Wolf in the hold said, waving.
“Who else is going to come in that fast?” Jaghatai asked as they headed towards the Emperor and Valdor together.
“The Lion wasn’t far behind me,” Leman said. “He just prefers to come in with more… I don’t know the word.”
“Gravitas?” Jaghatai suggested, which got a snort out of Leman.
“Yeah, or what he thinks is gravitas.”
“Leman,” Valdor said with a shake of his head. “Isn’t it rude to speak that way of someone who isn’t here to defend himself?”
“He’ll be here soon,” Leman said. “That’s his right there.”
“So it is,” the Emperor agreed as the Dark Angels’ ship landed neatly where the Space Wolves had hovered just a moment before. Since their departure had been informal, the Lion wasn’t making a big deal of his return either, though ceremony was something he took seriously. In fact, it was one of the rare things he and Fulgrim could agree upon.
“Do you know who’s after you?” Jaghatai called as the Lion came up to the observation level.
“Horus, I think,” the Lion answered. “Though he and Magnus were tied at one point.”
“What about Alpharius?” Leman asked. “Do you think they’re coming together or separate?”
“It doesn’t make any sense for them to arrive separately,” Jaghatai pointed out. “Now that we know about them.”
“We know about them,” the Lion said. “But the rest of the crew doesn’t, and maybe they want to keep it that way for now. Otherwise they wouldn’t have been sneaking around like they were before.”
“How did you guys learn about Omegon?” Valdor asked. The message they had received hadn’t provided details.
“Leman and I sniffed them out,” the Lion said. He looked like he was about to ask another question, but decided against it.
“Are they here yet?” Horus called from the landing area.
“No,” Jaghatai answered. “How far behind you is Magnus?”
“Not far,” Horus said, waving his ship off. “In fact I see his shuttle now.”
Roboute was behind Magnus, followed surprisingly by Mortarion and Angron in fairly close succession. Alpharius and Omegon arrived together just ahead of Rogal, they stood awkwardly to the side as the others arrived. Finally Sanguinius rounded out the returning Primarchs.
“Um,” Omegon started, looking embarrassed. “I know there’s questions… but can we do this somewhere more private?”
“Of course,” Sanguinius said quickly. “It’s a family affair after all. No one else needs to hear about it.”
“We realize this must be awkward for you,” Vulkan said. “That doesn’t change the fact that you are our brothers. We want you to be comfortable to talk to us about anything.”
“We thought this might be the case,” Valdor added. “This way.”
“Thanks, Valdor,” Alpharius said. At least, Valdor thought it was Alpharius. He wasn’t sure how the Emperor and Malcador actually told the two apart. Maybe I need to hide little markers somewhere on them he thought to himself. The Emperor shot a quick glance at him, indicating that his master had caught him.
+You’ll figure it out in time+ the Emperor sent. Valdor gave a minute nod, hoping none of the Primarchs had picked up on their exchange. Finally, they reached the room Valdor had ordered cleared out.
“The only question I want an answer to is the one Angron asked earlier,” Horus said. “Why?”
“Father?” Alpharius asked. “That’s really more of a you question. We just went along with it.”
“We aren’t angry at you about that,” Magnus said, having picked up on one of their thoughts. Their minds felt identical and he knew it was going to take a bit to figure that out. Especially since he had been in both of their minds on several occasions and hadn’t figured out that they weren’t the same person.
“Who said we aren’t angry?” Angron asked.
“Isn’t that just your natural state when you aren’t asleep?” Alpharius replied quickly. Angron opened his mouth, and froze with it open.
“A fly will get in there if you don’t close your mouth,” Mortarion said. He was trying to sound grave, like Malcador, but was also trying not to giggle and it didn’t quite work out the way he wanted.
“Morti’s right you know,” Perturabo said.
“Where’s a fly even going to come from?” Fulgrim asked indignantly. “Are you accusing Shipmaster Kaal of not keeping a clean ship?”
“No!” Mortarion said. “I was trying to make a joke.”
“No you weren’t,” Fulgrim growled.
“He was,” Konrad said suddenly. “Didn’t you hear him? He was trying to do a Malcador impression.”
“And failed,” the Lion said, doing his own impression.
“Not all of us are as vocally gifted as you,” Mortarion muttered.
Omegon giggled, which caused a pause in the arguing. The rest of the Primarchs turned questioning glances at him.
“What?” he asked. “It’s nice to see you guys have already sort of gotten used to us both being here. You’re fighting with each other instead of ganging up on us.”
“That’s kind of weird,” Leman said after a moment. “I almost forgot that there was something different.”
“Like we’re the same person?” Alpharius asked, that was what he was worried about.
“Not really, at least not for me,” Angron answered. “More like this is how it’s supposed to be.”
“Is it also weird that it didn’t feel like anything was missing before?” Jaghatai asked. “But nothing’s changed?”
“Yeah,” Magnus mused. “It is weird.”
“Like you never picking up that they were different?” Mortarion asked pointedly. He wasn’t convinced that Magnus hadn’t been in on the whole thing.
“Don’t blame Magnus for that,” Alpharius said quickly. “We worked hard with Father and Malcador to make sure our minds were as identical as they can be.”
“You did?” Mortarion and Magnus asked in unison. Angron was just a moment behind them, creating a slight echo-like effect.
“Of course,” Omegon said. “We are both Primarchs, as Lion and Leman proved. We don’t do something without going all in.”
“Here’s the important question,” Roboute said, trying to get in. “How do we tell you two apart?”
“Uh….” Alpharius and Omegon said together.
“They even sound like one when they talk together!” Angron growled. “If I couldn’t see two people I wouldn’t know there was more than one.”
“We worked on that too,” Alpharius admitted. “But going back to Roboute’s question. I don’t really know. We are identical twins.”
“We have the markers we use on our armor,” Omegon mused. “But that’s really subtle, even for us.”
“Inverted colors?” Leman suggested. “At least for a bit while we get used to the both of you. I’m sure we can figure out some way of telling you apart.”
“Maybe?” Alpharius said uncertainly. “I was thinking maybe some kind of contacts.”
“No!” Magnus said sharply. “That’ll just make it harder to tell you apart. Since you’ve been swapping your whole lives, we can’t be sure that you would keep things the same?”
“I… hadn’t thought about that,” Alpharius said, surprised that Magnus felt so strongly about it.
“You’ve got us there,” Omegon giggled, realizing that Alpharius was caught off-balance. “I guess inverted colors are a good idea. But Magnus, why the objection?”
“I… consulted a pair of twins in my Legion,” Magnus said. “The ones we met at the haunted house.”
“Oh! I remember that,” Omegon said. “You specifically asked them for this, right?”
“Yep,” Magnus said. “Lion brought Zephyr, and you guys brought four initiates with you…. Is this why you brought them?”
“To hide in?” Alpharius asked. “Yes, that was how we got Omegon out here in the first place. Valdor helped with that.”
“So, you really didn’t intend to come forward with this?” Rogal asked.
“No,” Omegon said. “I swear this was a test run, just getting used to be involved in the same thing at the same time. We’ve only….” He trailed off, not wanting to bring up the abduction incident again.
“It’s happened a few times,” Alpharius added. “But mostly when we were super little, before Father and Malcador taught us to count.”
“But what have you guys done when we go off world other times?” Fulgrim asked.
“We swapped, one of us one time and the other the next,” Omegon said. “Same for all of Valdor’s survival training missions.”
“I think we can sort out who actually went on what adventure another time,” Horus said. “We still need to sort out how we’re going to tell Alpharius and Omegon apart.”
“It’ll be easiest with something on their clothing,” Fulgrim said.
“What about the hand signal I had Joysepha use?” Valdor suggested.
“What was only for one of us,” Alpharius pointed out.
“But the same concept worked for Omegon and I,” Fulgrim said. “Unless you guys were swapping for the dzira project?”
“That was always me,” Omegon said quickly. Then he paused, thinking about it. After a moment he turned to Alpharius, and they nodded in unison.
“Now that’s creepy,” Angron muttered. Konrad and Mortarion nodded their agreement.
“I’ll leave first,” Omegon said, after staring at his brothers for a moment. “You guys come up with a hand signal for Alpharius.”
“Then we’ll swap places,” Alpharius continued. “And you guys make one for Omegon. We won’t tell each other.”
“Our words as Primarchs,” the two said together. Before any of the other Primarchs had a chance to react, Omegon left, stating that he’d just be out in the hallway. ********************************************
It took a bit before they could agree on a hand signal for Alpharius. Omegon’s was easier as they could use the one he had set up with Fulgrim. Once both sets were agreed on, there was really only one thing left for the twins to decide. Were they going to continue to live as they had been? Or go completely public?
“We should at least tell Shipmaster Kaal,” Omegon said after a bit of debate. “It seems only fair.”
“True,” Alpharius agreed. “But maybe not Headmaster Kirraen? At least not yet.”
“Obviously not yet,” Jaghatai said. “We’d have to use the astopathic choir to get to him.”
“Not really what I meant,” Alpharius said. “I meant when we get back. It’s going to be confusing enough for Shipmaster Kaal. Master Kirraen is possibly going to be worse.”
“How so?” Lorgar asked, genuinely curious.
“Because they split us up silly,” Fulgrim said. Angron shot him a look, but it didn’t seem to bother Lorgar. “If there’s suddenly another one of us it’ll throw everything off.”
“Ah, that makes sense,” Lorgar nodded. “We don’t want to overload the teachers.”
“But, they’re just a pair of little guys,” Leman said jokingly. “They can’t be that bad.”
“There’s how many of us?” Horus asked. “And how many Custodians are willing to work with us?”
“Nineteen all told,” Roboute said. “And… four?”
“Four, but only when Xandren’s around,” Corvus confirmed.
“Is it really that low?” Valdor asked. “Or are you leaving me out?”
“We are,” the Lion said. “Pretty sure it’s five with you and Xandren though.”
“That’s… reassuring,” Valdor said. “I’ll have to talk with some of my people.”
“Well, we might be up to seven,” Lorgar said. “Depending on what Joysepha and Pryskella think of us.”
“Maybe,” Ferrus said. “I like Pryskella, so there’s hope.”
“So, back on the topic at hand?” Alpharius suggested. “Just Shipmaster Kaal?”
“I think so,” the Emperor said. “We’ll work out something with Nova.” ********************************************
"So, what did you think?"
"Overall? Not as bad as the Pecs, the Abs, and the Biceps made them out to be. You?"
"The same, though there are some Legionaries with... backwards thinking."
"Oh, that's not good. Which Legions?"
"The Eighth and the Seventeenth. I've already brought it up with Valdor. What have you made there?"
"Isn't it obvious? A little something for us to remember them by."
"Did you tell them you were making dolls?"
"Of course not!"
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