Chapter Text
When Augustine was little, his Baba could lift him with one hand and hoist him above the Black Legionnaire's head.
Oh how the young Astartes loved to play the "jetpack game"! Oh how it felt like he was flying high over another world when his Baba spun him round and round the central chamber of the habsuite. A little black-haired boy giggling and cooing, flapping his arms like a bird.
His mama, on the other hand, always watched the two with caution. As an Imperial Fist, even one forced to live in exile, they viewed the actions of the Black Legionnaire with suspicion. The first time Clothilde caught their "husband" hoisting baby Gus in the air, their hearts leapt in fright and they sprang forth, ready to catch the babe in their arms.
"Don't worry, my sweet. He's an Astartes like us," Farhad would explain, with not an ounce of doubt in his actions. "He's stronger and tougher than human children his age. He needs to take risks to reach his full potential. Besides, his parents are there to catch up if he falls."
Time passed and Augustine became too big and heavy to play the "jetpack game". As a Chaos Marine was strong enough to hoist a grown man in the air, it was years after he left his mama to start his training. Augustine and his parents held those memories close to their hearts even as light years separated them. For his Baba, it was an affirmation that he'd picked his first wife well, to produce such a beautiful child. For his Mama, the memories of first child kept them alive in a life of captive misery. For Augustine, the hope of seeing his family again drove him forward through years of brutal training and abuse at the hands of his peers in the Eye of Terror.
How terrible then was the wound to Augustine's psyche when he realized the ugly lies behind those happy memories of his parents!