Chapter 5: Men and Machines
The hunched, rat-like figure of a small man scurried through the tight passages and corridors of the giant void craft. He brought a message for his master, deep within the hull of the vessel. He was scared of his master in a strange way. Not a fear of violence or physical torment, but he was afraid of his master psychological pressure. The ways in which he spoke, and played with his poor mind. But it did not sway him from his messaging duties, and with great haste, he hurried to the diagnostics room where his master worked on yet another great work.
He swung open the door to the diagnostics room and the scent of chemicals, rot and burning incense hit him like a blanket of misty stink. "My lord, I bring news" In the darkness, deep into the dank room, his master turned around. Grand Magos Dominus Regulus Stradivaria was not a pretty sight. Once, maybe he had resembled a man, but heavy cybernetic augmentation had brought him far from his bipedal and conventionally built human form. The untrained and unaccustomed eye would probably view the Grand Magos as a horrendous abomination, claws, cables and machine parts sticking out from all sides of his being, but most of him were covered in the red cloak of the Mechanicum of sacred Mars. Regulus Stradivaria's cloaked face turned towards the messengers, insectoid machine appendages running through and out his old and torn face, and three large ocular visors, or 'eyes' if you could even call them that, lit up the room around the messenger in a ghastly green light.
"My… My lord, I bring news from the sensorium on the higher levels" The messenger stuttered once again, now once he had gained his lord's attention. "Ah, Serapis, you do not have to fear, I always value information" The Magos Dominus answered, his voice heavy and mechanical, coming from multiple speakers conveniently placed around his machine form, to amplify his weak and old biological voice. "Yes, my lord-" He was cut off by Regulus. "Time is valuable to me, you if anyone should know this Serapis. Do not waste it" It was hard to tell the emotional tune of Stradivaria's voice, for it was always the same mechanical machine pitch. Sarcasm was not easy to detect in his voice, although he knew it was something the Dominus often used. This was one of the many reasons the Messenger was afraid to speak to his lord. "You were right, my lord, the warp anomaly is a recurring phenomenon, it originates from the Irrilian sectorum". Serapis told the Magos, waiting wearily for a reply. "Once again it seems my hypothesis has been proven correct."
Grand Dominus Regulus Stradivaria, of course, followed the teachings of the Cult Mechanicus very closely, anything else would be strictly heretical. However, he did not get along with the rest of the priesthood of sacred Mars. He felt that their obsession with mechanical faith sometimes could get in the way of what he believed was the truest and most holy of missions. To accumulate as much knowledge for humanity as possible. Regulus Stradivaria believed that this was truly the purpose and test, set out by the Omnissiah to test the faith of Regulus and his kind. Nothing would get between Stradivaria and his goal. He was determined.
"It is best if you come with me to the sensorium, and see for yourself, my lord," Serapis asked, now when he felt that his master was in a better mood. "Perhaps you are right Serapis" The Magos spoke in his chilling machine tone. Hundreds of little legs skittered across the floor as the Grand Magos made his way out of the dark laboratory, his massive machine body crawling seamlessly out the door.
Regulus Stradivaria captained an old Dauntless Class light cruiser, a vast vessel crewed by thousands of men, and equipped with enough modified weaponry to face off any enemies he might encounter on his research voyages around the galaxy.
The sensorium fell silent as the Grand Magos Dominus entered the relatively small room, and only the servitors continued there work, as they had been programmed to do. "I have been informed that there is data here for me to evaluate, is my servant correct?" The Magos Dominus asked, his voice heavily amplified by the voice box on his steel carapace. "Yes my lord, we have uncovered new data for you to analyse" One of the half-machine adepts answered. "Wonderful" Regulus Stradivaria Answered his voice cold and devoid of emotion.
Cogitators clicked as the Magos downloaded the diagnostics to his digital memory. His brain interface system was processing the vast amounts of data, filtering it and serving only what was important to the enhanced biological mind of Regulus Stradivaria. After a few brief moments of machine interface, Stradivaria was finished. All data processed, filtered, catalogued and stored in his internal cogitation systems.
"Change the course" Regulus spoke out into the room. "What is our new heading my lord?" "Tenebris Inferior. There is more data to be excavated there". If the Magos Dominus calculations were correct, he was on the verge of something that might change the future for humanity, he only needed more data from the sector.
Warp travel is a dangerous business, and it has never been easy to surf the waves and tides of the immaterium, but since the fall of Cadia and the great rift, the warp has grown ever more uncontrollable and it's wrath consumes sometimes even the sturdiest of ships with the most stable gellar fields. But travelling the warp is a necessity, and for tens of thousand years it has been the only way to travel faster than light.
The only one capable of looking into the warp was the Navigator. Her psychic prowess allowed her to see into the unconquerable and with her mind conquer it. She could fathom the unfathomable, and understand the impossible. For this is the gift the Emperor had given to her and her kind, twelve thousand years ago, at the birth of the Imperium, during the dawn of the glorious great crusade. Regulus knew these times, although he had not lived through them, he had always had a fascination for the days of the crusade.
"What is causing these fluctuations in the warp Grand Magos?" One of the adepts on the command deck asked Stradivaria, as he stood static in the middle of the bridge, running calculations and accounting for all possible variables. "I cannot say, the warp does not care for our physical laws, and is therefor incalculable. It is a tech-adepts nemesis. But through its interference with our material world, the warp translates to the language of physics and mathematics. A language in which I speak. Just because the warp is incalculable does not mean it is inunderstandable." The magos answered the adept if only investing a portion of his consciousness in the conversation. "Do you fear their interference? Could it be a trick to attract our attention?" The adept answered, following the Magos answer. "The information I have analysed thus far, do not show any data pattern commonly connected with the activity of the Arch-Enemy. I do not think they are involved." Stradivaria answered in a cold calculated tone. "If it is not the ruinous powers, and it is not a purely physical anomaly, then what could it be? Xenos trickery?" The Adept answered the Magos, trying to understand what his lord was implying. "I cannot answer you Adept, for I do not know." Regulus Stradivaria turned his head and studied the Adept "You strive for more knowledge and information. That is good. What is your name Adept?" Humbled by his master's question, the Adept stuttered and struggled to speak for a moment "I am humbled-" He was cut off "Your name, Adept"
Ubrelor was older than he seemed at first glance. He had served deep in the techno vaults of Telebria Secundus for almost a century. He was a natural at serving the ancient data looms of the tech vault, and without him, the archeotech of that world would have been lost much earlier than it was. But the Xenos incursion had ruined the ancient tech-world, and much that once was had been lost. With his workplace and home ruined, Ubrelor was forced off-world with many other refugees, hopping from world to world looking for a place to serve. Mostly he served to repair and maintain the manufactorum machines of the factories on numerous hive worlds but there, much of his expertise and potential was unfulfilled. But after four decades of work in the manufactorums, he was picked out by the Grand Magos, who just happened to be looking for adepts with experience regarding Archeo-Tech.
"My name is Ubrelor, at your service my lord," Ubrelor told the towering behemoth that was Regulus Stradivaria. "Good, Ubrelor, your competence will be required. Do not stop seeking the truth." The Magos answered, seemingly finished with his calculations and snapping out of his static trans. "We have arrived"
The Grand Magos Dominus skittered through the tight corridor towards the sensorium, trailed by all manner of Adepts and Tech-Priests. "Test the diagnostics on the probe and the warp space sensory array," Regulus said the moment he entered the sensorium, with no introduction or other information regarding his quick arrival. Stradivaria did not have time for such, he simply expected his crew to always be ready, and his orders to be followed. "At once my lord" A servitor, fused to the sensory equipment of the sensorium answered the Magos, before hydraulics pulled him back into the maintenance hatch in the deck, were the servitor had been condemned to work the rest of his days.
The sensorium was humming with the sound of machines and blinking with visors, displaying all kinds of sensory information regarding the status of the voidborne antennas and probes. Adepts working all kinds of machines on various levels. Some on the top of hydraulic lifts, raised far above the others to work the cogitators and data looms near the domed roof of the cathedral dimensioned sensorium. Two Adepts dragged large data cables towards the Magos Dominus, ready to connect them and directly interface Regulus with the large quantities of data the sensorium was cycling.
Regulus always interfaced with the information source directly, never wanting it first to be filtered by any cogitator servitors. No, Regulus Stradivaria valued raw data, he felt that through the processing of it, he could come closer than any other to the god of all knowledge, the Omnissiah. The direct interface was however very dangerous and the risks were many. That is why there were always cogitator servitors to first interface the source, so if the data was corrupt, the mem-cores of the tech-priest or Adept would not be the first to fry. However, onboard the ship, Stradivaria had grand halls, dedicated to the storage of his vast amounts of knowledge and consciousness, in rows of cognition-servers as a backup of his memory incase his mortal form would ever be destroyed.
Stradivaria's three machine eyes blinked and fluttered as he processed through the information. "Serapis," he said, speaking through his data processing trans. "Yes my lord" the little frail adept answered wearily, always at the Magos side in case he was needed. "I have a message for Adepts working the warp engine." Serapis wrote down the magos message on a piece of parchment, just to make sure he wouldn't forget it, although his enhanced memory hardly could forget it.. "Tell them to run all diagnostics and to repair the system if it shows any signs of damage. Today it will be stress-tested. It cannot fail." The Magos followed as Serapis wrote it down. "Anything else you wish to convey, my lord?" Serapis said, looking up with his cyclopean eye at the Grand Magos Dominus. "That will be all Serapis."
Serapis was an eternal debt to Regulus. He owed the Magos his life after it had been spared almost half a century ago. Serapis had grown up on the agri-world of Nova Orstillian, abandoned by his parents at an early age and living off scraps left by the protein farmers who drove the economy of the ancient planet. He had been involved in all kinds of petty crime, stealing everything from protein-bricks to jewellery. Life was good for a while and he earned a name for himself in the underworld of Nova Orstillian, but his luck turned when he attempted to steal a shipping container of high-grade agricultural products, meant to be shipped off-system. He was caught by a Servitor, and later a worker punished him by pouring industrial grade sulfuric acid in his eyes, permanently destroying them and turning him blind. Blindly begging for food on the stinking streets of Orstillian, he grew more and more desperate for each day, and after a few weeks, he attempted to pickpocket one of the hundreds of workers walking down the busy street. Serapis was caught and handed to the city Aribites. He was condemned to eternal servitude, and he was set for lobotomization. However, Stradivaria saw better use for him aboard his vessel and saved the life of poor Serapis. To be able to perform his task as the Magos messenger, his vision was also restored by a large, crude and mechanical eye, for which Serapis was very grateful.
To Regulus, Serapis wasn't even necessary. The Magos didn't need a messenger, and he was perfectly capable of conveying his orders another, quicker and more effective way. But Serapis made him feel something. On the street, the little man had made some of his old, withering biological feelings slip through, although he didn't know which of them. Maybe it was pity, maybe he felt a fleeting sensation of empathy. Maybe, he himself had originated similarly to Serapis, those four millennia ago, although he could not remember. Or maybe, he just enjoyed having someone so weak, frail and helpless under him, so he himself could feel superior. But Regulus didn't need to feel superior, for he was. He was so vastly overwhelming in both physical prowess, and pure intellectual power, that he had thought himself beyond those basic human needs. Maybe Regulus believed himself transcended. He couldn't know, but for now, he kept little Serapis as his project.
Serapis scurried through the labyrinth paths and corridors of the vast cruiser, knowing through his neural implant exactly where he was, and where he was going. Through his brain-interface, he was a part of the ship.
His years in blindness had taught him the importance his nose held. He could smell the ship, and he knew every sent and odour aboard it. Long before the addition of his ocular implant, Serapis had relied solely on his acute sense of smell. He knew that he was nearing the engine bay and machine room, for it was the most arcane part of the ship, and the sent of ancient machine oil and smoke from the old machinery grew ever stronger.
The pipes grew larger, but also more rusty the deeper in he got. Incense was burning in every corner and filled the machine-bay in a holy aura. The smoke in the air grew thick, but through it you could just manage to see the lights and flares of possibly hundreds of Tech-Priests and adepts, praying in unison to the holy machine spirit. Maybe this was what kept the derelict engines running. Although it was highly unscientific it had been the only way the eldritch machines of the Imperium kept on working.
Purity seals made of ancient parchment, scribbled on by uncounted members of the Holy Priesthood of Mars covered the oldest machines, like leaves on branches. But in the middle of it all, the cables and pipes slithered like serpents towards a single point in the middle of the engine room. As they met, the cables rose up, twisting and turning, fuming with boiling liquids, vents shooting steam and smoke into the air, covering the room in a cloud of dense smog. But higher up, the pipes were covered by a dark red robe, filthy from centuries of service in the engine room. The robe belonged to a semi-humanoid being, connected from the waist to all the cables, and in turn, connected to the engine room itself.
"My master sends me here with a message my lord." Serapis stammered in front of the being, connected to the ship. The being turned, the cables moving in an organic manner, as if they were simply an extension to the being itself. You could see now that the being in the large robe had once been a man. His face remained mostly intact with few augmentations, but his purity in flesh did not make him less hideous. Both of his eyes had been replaced by machine sensors, and rings of boils and irritations in the skin surrounded them. But that was the only colour left in his horribly scarred features. The rest of the skin on both his hands and face was bleached and grey and felt dead as if it could shed at any moment, revealing the skull and metal below.
"What does lord Grand Magos need of me." The man said, his voice low and frail like that of a dying man. "He asks of you to run the diagnostics on the engine. He speaks of some sort of test. My lord says it will induce enormous stress on the machine spirit." The old man relaxed, his eyes rolling back as he interfaced the machine spirit. A strange aura of energy surrounded him like he had been consumed by something far more powerful than his ancient and biological mind could comprehend, but quickly the field vanished and the strange feeling it had caused in Serapis left him. "It has spoken to me."
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