Chapter 12 – The Giant Walks
The city was alive.
Cars rolled along the streets in endless lines, honking at one another. People hurried across crosswalks with coffee in hand, voices rising and falling like waves. The air smelled of exhaust, fried food from street carts, and the faint salt of the sea carried inland.
Gaius walked among them.
Even in his simple coat and boots, there was no hiding what he was. His shoulders stretched broad enough to block the sidewalk, his stride long enough to cover three of anyone else's. He didn't push, didn't rush, yet people stepped aside on their own, drawn by instinct. Some stared up at him, others whispered, a few raised their phones to snap pictures.
To him, it was… strange and yet Nostalgic.
He lives now as a Primaris Ultramarine, a warrior of the Imperium fighting for humanity. Yet in this place, he feels a strange pull, something both alien and nostalgic. Once, long ago, he had been an ordinary man from a real world, before the surgeries and the centuries of war, that remade him into a Primaris.
Peace.
He let the thought settle in his mind as his boots struck the pavement, heavy but steady. There was no gunfire in the distance. No alarms, no screams. Only the sound of traffic and laughter, mixed with the endless chatter of millions of people.
For a moment, it felt almost unreal.
At a food cart on the corner, a vendor flipped sausages over a sizzling grill. Smoke and spice drifted into the air. The man caught sight of Gaius as he passed and froze, spatula still in hand.
"Hey… big guy!" the vendor called out, forcing a laugh. "You want a hot dog? On the house. You look like you could use one."
Gaius stopped, his shadow falling over the stand. The vendor's smile faltered when he realized just how tall the man before him was. Still, he held out the bun like an offering.
Gaius accepted it with one hand, the hot dog looking almost comically small in palm. He studied it for a second before taking a single bite that finished half of it. The vendor gawked as the massive stranger chewed once and swallowed.
"…Good," Gaius said simply, his voice deep but calm. He gave a single nod of thanks and walked on, the crowd parting for him once more.
The vendor just stared after him, mouth open. "Holy crap," he muttered.
A small boy clung to his mother's hand near the curb, eyes wide as Gaius passed. "Mom! Mom, is he a superhero?"
The woman tugged the boy away quickly, embarrassed. "Don't point, honey. Come on."
The boy's voice carried as he was pulled along. "But he looks cooler than Superman!"
Gaius glanced after them, but said nothing.
Everywhere he looked, the world was alive in ways that stirred something inside him. Neon lights flickered over shop windows. Street performers drummed on buckets while strangers tossed coins into their cases. Young couples leaned close, whispering and laughing in the shade of trees that lined the boulevard.
So many small, ordinary things.
Things that could never have lasted where he came from.
A faint weight pressed against his chest at the thought. Nostalgia, perhaps. A world were people, can live and die of old age, not die in war.
Here, it was real.
And he, a giant shaped for battle, was the one who felt out of place.
Still, not everyone looked at him with innocent wonder.
Across the street, a man in a suit pretended to read a newspaper, though his eyes flicked up far too often. Another leaned against a lamp post, murmuring into a hidden earpiece. Two dark SUVs crawled along the road at the same pace Gaius walked, never overtaking him.
On a rooftop, the glint of a long camera lens caught the sun.
They were trying to blend in. To anyone else, they might have. To Gaius, they were as clear as torchlight in the dark.
He said nothing, changed nothing in his stride. Let them watch. Let them think him unaware.
Patience had been carved into him long ago.
As the sun lowered, the city grew even brighter. Signs lit up in every color, painting the streets in blues, reds, and golds. The noise didn't lessen, it grew, alive with music, cars, and voices.
Gaius stopped at the edge of a wide plaza. A fountain sprayed water into the air, its streams glowing in the light. Children ran around it laughing, their parents calling after them. Couples sat on the steps, sharing food.
He stood there for a long moment, silent, watching the life around him.
This, too, felt unreal.
Not because it was impossible. He who has traveled across the Imperium, from one end of the galaxy to the other. Most worlds he encountered were places where people lived short, harsh lives, crushed by oppression, enslaved by cruelty, or consumed by endless war. Only within the Realm of Ultramar did he see something different, a place where citizens could hope to live full lives, even dying of old age, under the just rule of Roboute Guilliman and the Ultramarines.
Behind him, engines rumbled. The dark SUVs had stopped again at the far end of the plaza. Men in suits stepped out slowly, moving into position among the crowd as if they belonged. They didn't come closer, not yet.
Gaius felt their eyes on his back.
He didn't turn.
Instead, he began walking once more, the crowd flowing around him without ever touching him. Children still pointed. Phones still clicked. Voices still whispered.
~~~
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