Ben Counter - Galaxy in Flames

'Apothecary,’ said Eidolon, 'the captain wishes to know of our enterprise,’

Fabius looked up in surprise, his long intelligent face framed by a mane of fine blond hair. Only his eyes were out of place, small and dark, set into his skull like black pearls. He wore a floor-length med-icae gown, blood streaking its pristine whiteness with runnels of crimson.

'Really?' said Fabius. 'I had not been made aware that Captain Tarvitz was among our esteemed com­pany,’

'He is not,’ said Eidolon. 'Not yet anyway,’

'Then why is he here?'

'My own alterations have come to light,’

'Ah, I see,’ nodded Fabius.

What is going on here?' asked Tarvitz sharply. 'What is this place?'

Fabius cocked an eyebrow. 'So you have seen the results of the commander's augmentations, have you?'

'Is he a psyker?' demanded Tarvitz.

'No, no, no!' laughed Fabius. 'He is not. The lord commander's abilities are the result of a tracheal implant combined with alteration in the gene-seed rhythms. He is something of a success. His powers are metabolic and chemical, not psychic,’

You have altered the geneseed?' breathed Tarvitz in shock. The gene-seed is the blood of our primarch… When he discovers what you are doing here…'

'Don't be naive, captain,’ said Fabius. Who do you think ordered us to proceed?'

'No,’ said Tarvitz. 'He wouldn't-' That is why I had to show you this, captain,’ said Eidolon. 'You remember the Cleansing of Laeran?' 'Of course,’ answered Tarvitz. 'Our primarch saw what the Laer had achieved by chemical and genetic manipulation of their biolog­ical structure in their drive for physical perfection. The Lord Fulgrim has great plans for our Legion, Tarvitz, the Emperor's Children cannot be content to sit on their laurels while our fellow Astartes win the same dull victories. We must continue to strive towards perfection, but we are fast reaching the point where even an Astartes cannot match the standards Lord Fulgrim and the Warmaster demand. To meet those standards, we must change. We must evolve,’

Tarvitz backed away from the operating slab. The Emperor created Lord Fulgrim to be the perfect warrior and the Legion's warriors were moulded in his image. That image is what we strive towards. Holding a xenos race up as an example of perfecВ­tion is an abomination!'

'An abomination?' said Eidolon. 'Tarvitz, you are brave and disciplined, and your warriors respect you, but you do not have the imagination to see where this work can lead us. You must realise that the Legion's supremacy is of greater importance than any mortal squeamishness,’

Such a bold statement, its arrogance and conceit beyond anything he had heard Eidolon say before, stunned Tarvitz to silence.

'But for your unlikely presence at the death ot the Warsinger, you would never have been granted this chance, Tarvitz,’ said Eidolon. 'Understand it for the opportunity it represents,’

Tarvitz looked up at the lord commander sharply. 'What do you mean?'

'Now you know what we are attempting, perhaps you are ready to become a part of this Legion's future instead of simply one of its line officers,’

'It is not without risk,’ Fabius pointed out, 'but I could work such wonders upon your flesh. I can make you more than you are, I can bring you closer to perfection,’

'Think of the alternative,’ said Eidolon. You will fight and die knowing that you could have been so much more,’

Tarvitz looked at the two warriors before him, both Fulgrim's chosen and both exemplars of the Legion's relentless drive towards perfection.

He saw then that he was very, very far from perВ­fection as they understood it, but for once welcomed such a failing, if failing it was.

'No,’ he said, backing away. 'This is… wrong. Can you not feel it?'

Very well,’ said Eidolon. 'You have made your choice and it does not surprise me. So be it. You must leave now, but you are ordered not to speak of what you have seen here. Return to your men, Tarvitz. Isstvan III will be a tough fight,’

'Yes, commander,’ said Tarvitz, relieved beyond measure to be leaving this chamber of horrors.

Tarvitz saluted and all but fled the laboratory, feeling as though the specimens suspended in the tanks were watching him as he went.

As he emerged into the brightness of the apothe-carion, he could not shake the feeling that he had just been tested.

Whether he had passed or failed was another matter entirely.

SEVEN

The God Machine

A favour

Subterfuge

The cold sensation snaking through Cassar's mind was like an old friend, the touch of something reasВ­suring. The metallic caress of the Dies Irae as its cortical interfaces meshed with his consciousness would have been terrifying to most people, but it was one of the few constants Moderati Titus Cassar had left in the galaxy.

That and the Lectitio Divinitatus.

The Titan's bridge was dim, lit by ghostly readВ­outs and telltales that lined the ornate bridge in hard greens and blues. The Mechanicum had been busy, sending cloaked adepts into the Titan, and the bridge was packed with equipment he didn't yet know the purpose of. The deck crew manning the plasma reactor at the war machine's heart had been readying the Titan for battle since the Vengeful Spirit

arrived in the Isstvan system, and every indication was that the Dies Irae's major systems were all funcВ­tioning better than ever.

Cassar was glad of any advantage the war machine could get, but somewhere deep down he resented the thought of anyone else touching the Titan. The interface filaments coiled deeper into his scalp, sending an unexpected chill through him. The Titan's systems lit up behind Cassar's eyes as though they were a part of his own body. The plasma reactor was ticking over quietly, its pent-up energy ready to erupt into full battle order at his command.

'Motivation systems are a little loose,' he said to himself, tightening the pressure on the massive hydraulic rams in the Titan's torso and legs.

Weapons hot, ammunition loaded,’ he said, knowing that it would take no more than a thought to unleash them.

He had come to regard the power and magnifiВ­cence of the Dies Irae as the Emperor personified. Cassar had resisted the thought at first, mocking Jonah Aruken's insistence that the Titan had a soul, but it had become more and more obvious why he had been chosen by the saint.

The Lectitio Divinitatus was under threat and the faithful had to be defended. He almost laughed aloud as the thought formed, but what he had seen on the Medicae deck had only deepened the strength of his conviction that he had chosen the right path.

The Titan was a symbol of that strength, an avatar of divine wrath, a god-machine that brought the Emperor's judgement to the sinners of Isstvan.

The Emperor protects,’ whispered Cassar, his voice drifting down through the layers of readouts in his mind, 'and he destroys.' 'Does he now?'

Cassar snapped out of his thoughts and the Titan's systems retreated beneath his consciousness. He looked up in sudden panic, but let out a relieved breath as he saw Moderati Aruken standing over him.

Aruken snapped a switch and the bridge lights flickered to life. 'Be careful who hears you, Titus, now more than ever,’

'I was running through pre-battle checks,’ said Cassar.

'Of course you were, Titus. If Princeps Turnet hears you saying things like that you'll be for it,’

'My thoughts are my own, Jonah. Not even the princeps can deny me that,’

'You really believe that? Come on, Titus. You know full well this cult stuff isn't welcome. We were lucky on the Medicae deck, but this is bigger than you and me and it's getting too dangerous,’