Entering his chambers, the tech-priest gave a hidden scowl at the servitor who was still dusting and cleaning the sizable chamber.<i>"Rest." </i>He ordered, and 'she' obeyed... It was, infuriating, in his mind, how the Lady D'crux so often tried to couple him with this woman or that. She had even risked introducing him to an eldar, in hopes that an intellectual equal or better would catch his fancy. Yet every try was bested. His will never faultering. Weaving between the various counters and tabled, he noted only in perifery that all the skull servos were locking into their plug-beds. Just as the servitor was coupling tubes to herself what would feed power, and nutriants into her body, keeping her ready for a maternal duty she would never fulfill...<br/><br/>Why was he like this? So obstinent? Mostly, it was a devotion to his duties, an indulgence of his work. Even if he was to be a father, he knew his own part in the parenting activities would be minimal. Only briefly, had he ever seen his own father or mother. Which made all the times he spent actually with them all the more memorable.<i>Son,</i>He could still hear his father say, with the rebreather mask he himself now wore,<i>When your time comes, be it to work, fight, die or love, you will know it to be so.</i>Was this why he resisted? Evading and enduring each attempted for his seed the captain made? Not that such thoughts teased his mind in youth...<br/><br/>Far from it. despite the age difference, he remembers with clarity his days of training, a young Zevion, both impressed, admired, and feared for his towering size. Some of hte crew joked he was a marine, born to the wrong life, others that his mother must have been an orc. But always, before his initiation into the Mechanicus, he remembered the looks women would give him. His footfalls stopped, as he stared at a mirror. Only a small one, used to peer around cumbersom devices in need of fixing. he wasn't a bad sight, even with a bulky, ages and venerated augmetic eye on the right side. His brows were heavy, almost prolithic, complamenting strong cjeekbones that vanished under his rebreather. He turned away, purging these tretcherous thoughts from his mind, while dimming the lights, and entering the relatively small bathroom.<br/><br/>Cloaks and robes fell to his feet, as did his shawl. Metal boots and armbands followed, and finally his britches. Grabbing a bucket, sponge and soap, he sat on a reinforced stool in the shower stall, silent as he filled the bucket, worked in the soap, and began to wet and scrub himself. Seeing only by the light of a single glow orb and the red of his mech eye. The large sponge not so sizable compared to his burly hands, as he scrubbed the blood from his fingertips. He should speak with her about capping them, or replacing his hands all together. Metal was better then flesh, always was, always will be. Metal did not delay in it's duty, circuits did not suffer dreams, be they good, bad, or wet... Wiring felt not the pain of a wound, or the ache of one's loins. Machines did not fantisize about their captains when in teen hood.<br/><br/>But metal could not clean itself... Flesh was the tenent of metal. Mortals were the keepers of machines. He fell still, quiet... As he listened to the spirits of hte ship, the ghosts of the piping, phantams of bulkheads. Much of hte ship was making ready for bed, just like him. yet others... others were sating lust, indulging with good drink. Surrounded by people, living on a ship that spoke with him, how could the man feel so alone?<div class="messageTextEndMarker"> </div>