Every ship that was presently deployed in the region showed up on the tactical hololith and Arrun pointed a finger to them in turn, naming each individually as he did so. In all cases, he named the ship before its occupants; a reflection on his position.
‘The Quicksilver is closest to us. Our brothers of Ninth Company were to begin their journey back to Varsavia within the next few days. For now, however, I will inform them to resume their patrol.’ Seeing the furrowed brows of the others, he elaborated, his face unmoving. ‘Our ship may be incapable of quick response should the Resurgent fail at inauguration. We may need their support should such a thing occur.’ He flashed the briefest of smiles. ‘It is essential to always remain one step ahead of the enemy, particularly when there is no enemy visible.’
Arrun was aware of the sudden bristling of both the Techmarine and the Apothecary at the implication that the project may fail. He ignored them carefully.
The Dread Argent and the Quicksilver were only two of the Silver Skulls strike cruisers, the others all presently deployed elsewhere throughout the segmentum and beyond. Arrun resumed his register of the other ships still in the Rift. Most of these were Gladius-class escorts, many crewed largely by Chapter serfs. With the ease of decades of commanding the fleet, he drew up the outline of the redeployment.
Ryarus, the taciturn, stoic Apothecary had up until now remained silent. Now he tipped his head slightly and studied the redesign of the fleet. He made a laconic observation.
‘Lord Commander Argentius is planning something.’ It was not a question, but a shrewd observation. The sheer number of ships that Arrun was picking off from the display was extraordinary. When the orders were prosecuted and transmitted to the rest of the fleet, the presence of the Silver Skulls in the Gildar Rift would be cut by more than half.
‘Aye. He probably is. Despite my repeated reports that something is not right in this system, he has chosen to downscale our activity here. We aren’t to leave Gildar entirely without protection, of course. But yes.’ Arrun stared at the hololith, his brow furrowing. ‘Yes, he has something planned. It is not the place for me to question or begin to second-guess his judgement...’
He left the rest of the sentence unspoken.
Arrun turned from the strategium table to stare out of the ship’s viewport and down at the world of Gildar Secundus. From here there was no way of recognising the volcanic nature of its surface. Far above the swirling atmosphere, there was a faint reminiscence of distant Mars. It was a uniform shade of murky red, as though someone had poured dust and ancient blood into the crucible at the time of its forging. Millennia of brutal eruptions during its cataclysmic formation had formed the distinctive jagged peaks and deep valleys that scarred its surface.
Hundreds of years had passed since the last active eruption and an exploratory geological mission had not only declared the planet was suitable for human colonisation, but had discovered rich deposits of the raw minerals needed for the refining of promethium which also bubbled to the surface in plentiful lakes. It was a double blessing from the Father of Mankind.
Far beneath them on the planet, thousands of Imperial citizens now dwelt largely in subterranean blocks tunnelled kilometres beneath the surface. Most worked the promethium refineries but as was the way with the children of mankind, they had an unerring habit of taking root wherever they could and making a life for themselves. After several years, agricultural domes began to output their produce and despite the best efforts of the planet’s militia, there was a steady underground trade in obscura. Over the past years, it had become a thriving planet, the destination for many traders of the Imperium – and those serving themselves first. Despite its prosperity, it was first and foremost a human settlement and as such, had swiftly become a target for thieves, raiders and smugglers.
‘Ryarus, Correlan... transmit the orders to the other ships,’ he said. ‘Advise the fleet to wait on my word.’ With a brusque nod, Correlan shut down the hololith, unplugged the cable and left the room with Apothecary Ryarus.
Left alone with his chief advisor, Arrun turned from the viewport.
‘Perhaps you would be good enough to once again divine the omens in this matter, Prognosticator.’
‘Of course. But I must ask that you be very specific with your question, brother-captain.’ Brand reached into a pouch at his waist and extracted a number of card-thin crystalline wafers. He shuffled them together as he spoke to Arrun, the surfaces of each brushing against one another with a faint whisper. ‘The Emperor does not like to repeat himself.’
Arrun considered for a few moments. Since the inception of the Resurgent Project, he had used Brand’s psychic connection with the Emperor to determine the appropriate course of action on many occasions. Thus far, the Prognosticator hadn’t steered them wrong. But he had never asked the questions that he most wanted the answer to.
Until now.
‘Are we doing His will by facilitating the creation of this... thing? Will we succeed?’ he said, asking the question in a cool, calm voice. Brand let the captain’s words fill the silence and die out, then inclined his head graciously before dealing out the pattern that would determine the answer to the captain’s question. He dealt each wafer one at a time, relishing the familiarity of them beneath his fingers. He had come into the possession of his own personal tarot four hundred years before, and when his psychic abilities activated the illustrations hidden in their mystical depths, they were quite beautiful.
He closed his eyes, a flicker of blue warp lightning crackling between his fingertips as he extended forth the probing, questing tendrils of his psychic conduit with the Emperor of Mankind.
His voice barely audible, he mumbled the Litany of Conjecture and turned over the first card. Its crystal surface shimmered and flickered into life. He studied it thoughtfully, then passed his hand over it again.
‘The Emperor. The most powerful card in the pack.’ Brand looked up. ‘Inverted.’
His heart had leaped at the first words, but had then sunk. Even Arrun who was not gifted with the foresight of the Prognosticators knew that the most powerful card in the tarot deck inverted was never to be taken as a good sign. An involuntary sense of unease ran like a chill of ice through his veins, trickling down his spine.
‘Continue,’ he said. ‘I would know more.’
The engineering deck was a bustling hive of activity. Servitors, enginseers and Chapter serfs created a constant, dull monotone which dipped in pitch momentarily as Ryarus and Correlan entered. As the two warriors crossed from one side of the deck to the other, the throng parted silently to let them through. The ripple closed behind them in a smooth wave and the raucous, incomprehensible noise started up again.
There was little to no ostentation on board the Silver Skulls vessels, apart from the rich displays of the company trophies that were located in the chapels. The Chapter was not aesthetically barren of course; they took great pride in their body art and the tattoo artists, the Custodes Cruor, were regarded highly. Many of the Silver Skulls designed their own tattoos and a number of them were genuinely talented, gifted artists. The ancient Varsavian tradition of marking their bodies was considered the ultimate battle honour and every brother of the Silver Skulls Chapter wore designs that were completely unique to the individual. Some chose representations of great battles that were breathtaking in their detail.
In all cases, the last part of a Silver Skull’s body to receive markings was his face. Only on ascension to the rank of captain were they allowed to receive that honour.
Passing through the bustle of the engine decks, Ryarus and Correlan headed for another room that was certainly not notable for any decoration. It was, however, notable for the many pieces of machinery strewn on every available surface. The smell of machine oil, burned promethium and lapping powder was all-pervading in here, its acrid odour permeating the air strongly. There was another Techmarine working who got up to leave when Correlan and his companion appeared. Correlan stilled him with a wave
of his hand.
‘Stay,’ he said simply. ‘You might learn something.’
This was Correlan’s main workshop and the centre of the project that had taken over their lives. Cables and wires littered the ground and Ryarus picked his way through the treacherous obstacle course with a hint of a smile on his craggy face.
‘I’ve never really quite understood how you can possibly work like this, Correlan. How in the Emperor’s name do you know where things are?’
Compared to the ordered, spotless apothecarion where Ryarus carried out his procedures, Correlan’s workshop was a place of nightmarish bedlam. Machines had been stripped back to their bare souls so that the Techmarine might better tend to them. Often, these stripped-down machines simply lay where he had left them when another, more pressing project had demanded his attention. In the far corner of the workshop was his harness, the mechadendrites motionless and devoid of animation without the Techmarine’s connection with them stirring them into life. The Techmarine treated Ryarus to an infectious grin, a stark contrast to his sour mood of earlier. Here, in what could be described as his natural habitat, the warrior was without a doubt at his best.
‘A foolish question, brother.’ His tone was playfully scolding. The Techmarine swept a pile of rolled-up schematics to one side. ‘I know precisely where everything is, Ryarus, because everything will always be precisely where I left it.’ As if to demonstrate the proof of this gargantuan, seemingly unbelievable claim, he moved aside several more mysterious objects, the purpose of which Ryarus couldn’t ever begin to comprehend and picked up a data-slate. He waved it triumphantly at the Apothecary.
‘You see?’ he said. ‘Precisely where I left it.’
As an aspirant, Correlan had demonstrated a remarkable talent with machines and an unerring ability to soothe troubled spirits. At times it was hard to believe that an individual in possession of such a fiery soul could demonstrate such patience with the stubborn servants of the Omnissiah. His training with the Adeptus Mechanicus on Mars had ended some five years previously and he had served under Captain Arrun for the entire time since his return. He worked hard and with great diligence and his prowess on the battlefield was executed with the same intensity that he delivered to everything.
Correlan was in possession of an honest, open personality and his emotions were always writ large in an unscarred, boyish face. His humours were often unpredictable but his abilities were without question. He had a tendency to insubordination and bad moods that made him tricky to handle; a trait which the Master of the Forge had frequently lamented.
‘Emotions, Correlan,’ he had said, ‘are superfluous to the purity of the machine. You must learn to put aside such petty thoughts and feelings.’ They weren’t words that the young Techmarine had taken to heart. The Master of the Forge had let it pass, knowing that in time, circumstance and the growing sense of one-ness with the Omnissiah would mark changes in him.
Ryarus liked him. He liked the younger warrior’s honesty and blunt nature and had taken Correlan under his wing in some respects, particularly during the course of the project.
More than once, Correlan’s patience and faith in his own ability had been stretched beyond its limits and the Techmarine had been on the verge of admitting defeat. What they were trying to accomplish was beyond anything the Silver Skulls had ever attempted and there was no frame of reference for the depth of work needed: no research, no failed attempts that had gone before – and as the days and weeks had blurred into months, failure had begun to look like a very real option.
Whenever those moments had loomed, dark and miserable, Ryarus had been there to encourage and support the younger warrior. A real friendship had grown between the two, as different as they were, and a mutual respect that meant they worked together like they had been a team for decades.
Daerys Arrun may have been many things; arrogant and prideful amongst others. But he was also a great judge of character. It had been no chance arrangement that Apothecary Ryarus had been reassigned to Fourth Company at the inception of the Resurgent Project. His cool, level-headedness was the perfect counterpoint to Correlan’s fire.
Correlan led the way to the far side of his workshop and placed his massive hand on the biometric scanner that was affixed to the wall. With a low hum and grinding of ancient gears, the door slid open almost reluctantly to admit them to the Resurgent’s chamber. The room was located perfectly between the Techmarine’s workshop and the apothecarion, allowing both Space Marines easy access whenever they were working.
This room was also cluttered – although this time it was with servitors rather than general debris. As the two entered, the machine-like chattering of the lobotomised Chapter servants swelled in volume. In their dull, emotionless voices, they delivered their reports. The noise would have been incomprehensible to anybody other than a Space Marine, but Correlan and Ryarus easily extracted the prudent and important information.
There was also a group of tech-priests picking their way awkwardly around the untidy area. Some were murmuring litanies that were barely audible over the noise of the servitors, whilst others were anointing various pieces of equipment with unfathomable shapes using fingers coated in sacred engine oil from a vial carried by one of their number. Everything they did was a complete mystery to Ryarus, but the earnest manner in which they behaved filled him once again with pride at his involvement.
Each one of them, from the lowliest menial all the way up to himself, had a specific purpose; a focus that related to the dominant feature of the room.
In the very centre of the room, encased within a transparent, narrow chamber; more of a tank which rose continuously from floor to ceiling was the Resurgent himself. A massive figure displaying the over-developed musculature and slightly equine face of the Adeptus Astartes was within, moving sluggishly within its confines. He was kept in a mostly rigid, standing posture, arms out by his side, by several clamps that minimised his body movements.
A gelatinous, sticky-looking liquid filled the tank, enveloping its occupant completely. It clung to his body, giving his darkly tanned skin an unnatural sheen. His arms and legs had long been severed from his torso at the elbows and knees and the machinery that had replaced them was not dissimilar to the arm and leg pieces of the Mark VII battle plate that the Silver Skulls favoured.
The human – if this was what he could still be considered – within the tank was now far more machine than anything and yet his face remained deeply human and astonishingly youthful. He was barely out of his teens. His skin was studded at regular intervals with jack-ports, exactly as Correlan and Ryarus themselves bore. These were the interfaces that granted a Space Marine the ability to connect to his power armour. But the boy in the tank had never been granted the Emperor’s Ward, what other Chapters knew as the black carapace, the membrane that coated a Space Marine’s bones and provided the valuable connection with their power armour.
The boy in the tank was incomplete. He was imperfect. He should, by all rights, be viewed as nothing more than a failure. Yet, to Ryarus’s eyes, the boy was something else entirely. He was their future. He represented everything that they had worked so hard for over the past months.
His still-human eyes were closed. Even though he had long gained mastery of the Watchful Sleeper which allowed parts of his brain to rest whilst the rest of him remained alert and aware, old habits died hard. Perhaps, the Apothecary considered as he stared at the youth within the tank, he drew some comfort from the act of sleeping. He shook his head and crossed the room, resting his hand on the armaplas separating him from the Resurgent. He spoke a single word.
‘Volker.’
At the sound of his name, the boy’s eyes opened and he met Ryarus’s gaze. A hint of a smile gave his face added warmth. Unable to move, he simply inclined his head in greeting. When his voice came, it floated from a speaker grille embedded in the front of his habitat.
‘Apothecary.’ His voice was still mostly human, with the slightest twang of artifi
ce about it as the augmetic implants within his throat moderated the sounds. They didn’t hide the soft tone in his voice, or the lightest trace of an accent that he still retained. ‘You’re late this morning.’ The fluid surrounding him added a faint burbling to his words, but he was otherwise perfectly understandable.
‘We were spending time at the captain’s pleasure.’ Without any further time spent on idle conversation, the Apothecary prepared to take the auspex readings of Volker’s vital signs whilst Correlan began the onerous task of draining the youth’s habitat so that he could exit the transparent holding tube.
Here then, was the Silver Skulls greatest technological project and most radical advancement of their existence. Here, within this specially designed tank was the future of the fleet. Here, within this tank was a technological wonder the likes of which the Silver Skulls had never seen. Here was the end product of a true marriage between man and machine.
Here, within the tank, was Volker Straub.
Volker Straub had been one of the most promising aspirants of his intake. Hugely charismatic and a gifted athlete, he was also a born leader. From the moment he had been brought from his tribe to the fortress-monastery on Varsavia, every soul his effervescent personality touched knew that his future would be bright. Here was a future Chapter hero in the making. He had undergone his earliest trials as champion of his group, never once defeated in hand-to-hand or blade training. He was bright, questioned everything and knew when to hold his tongue. It gave him great standing with his peers and more importantly with his elders.
Every implantation during the conversion process had gone like a dream. Every last thing about Volker Straub had dazzled the Chapter from his earnest nature to his startling wit and intelligence. He had been Captain Sephera’s absolute favourite. The grizzled Chief of Recruits had written report after glowing report of recommendation and in advance of Volker’s placement with the Scouts of Tenth Company, he had personally suggested that Volker receive a command at the earliest possible date. He had even offered to put his full personal support behind such a recommendation.
The Gildar Rift Page 4
