Part 15 (1/2)

Cavalerio nodded, sweat streaming from his brow, and his mouth dry. His heart was beating in brutal syncopation with the fiery heart of Victorix Magna, the straining power of a supernova at the engine's core burning hotter and faster than it was ever designed to. He could hear Magos Argyre's desperate supplications to the reactor's spirit and felt the anguish of the mighty engine in the numbness spreading through his limbs.

The image of the Imperator filled his senses, both through the viewscreen and through the Manifold. Data scrolled like liquid light through his mind, and he drank in the colossal feats of engineering that had gone into its construction and the utter lethality of its existence.

Its limbs were death incarnate, the grinning skull-face an abominable harbinger of destruction. The bristling weapon towers and bastions were a martial city-fortress carried on the back of an ancient G.o.d, though this burden was borne willingly and not as a punishment.

To fight such a thing would be the greatest achievement of any princeps, but it would probably also be his last.

The monster took another step, taking with it any chance that this crossing of the Tempest Line was accidental.

*Princeps Sharaq requests instructions,' called out Kuyper. *Arcadia Fortis requests permission to fire.'

*Vulpus Rex and Astrus Lux moving into flank fire positions,' noted Palus.

*Tell them to hold positions, d.a.m.n them!' shouted Cavalerio, his pulse racing like the roaring discharge of a gatling cannon. *No one opens fire unless I give the order. Make sure that last part is especially clear, Kuyper.'

*Yes, my princeps.'

Cavalerio had the sensation of events sliding beyond his control, and he fought for breath as the fire from his loyal engine's heart poured through the virtual marrow of his body like blood from a ruptured artery.

His vision blurred, the edges of the Manifold swimming like a badly-tuned picter.

Victorix Magna was hurting, hurting badly, and Cavalerio knew he had to end this ugly confrontation soon.

But how to do that without beginning a firefight that would destroy them all...

RAPTORIA STRAINED AT the edges of Princeps Kasim's control, a feral, b.e.s.t.i.a.l thing that demanded blood and poured violent thoughts into his consciousness. Its murderous heart had tasted the enemy's presence and felt the heat of its metal skin. It wanted to kill.

Kasim looked down at the gold cog medallion he wore and focused his mind on the discipline encoded into his thoughts by the Legio Magi before beginning this walk. Clogged data from previous engagements were washed from the peripherals grafted to the frontal lobes of each crewman's brain to ensure each engagement was begun without the mental baggage of the last, but the hungry taste of battle was impossible to wash away completely.

No engine ever really forgot the hot, metallic flavour of war.

Kasim could feel his steersman's efforts to keep the aggression from Raptoria's movements and could hear the engine's hunger for battle in the thudding, roaring drumbeat of her reactor.

Raptoria wanted to fight and, d.a.m.n it, so did he.

Princeps Cavalerio was holding his fire and so too must they, but it was galling to see the engines of Mortis so brazenly insulting the honour of Tempestus. To allow this art of defiance to go unpunished was a bitter pill to swallow, and he could already feel Raptoria's ire building within his skull with the malicious promise of future pain to come.

*Power up weapons,' he ordered in an effort to a.s.suage the engine's bloodl.u.s.t. *Disengage safeties and surrender all firing authorities to me.'

By a.s.suming all firing authorities, he was making sure that the feral heart of Raptoria didn't overwhelm the low-grade brain coding of the emplaced gun-servitors and open fire herself.

Kasim didn't want his engine to act without his control, but if a shooting war started, he was going to be ready to prosecute it to the best of his ability.

*Why isn't the Stormlord opening fire?' wondered Moderati Vorich.

*Are you in a hurry to die?' asked Kasim. *Because that's what will happen if we let this get out of hand.'

Despite his rebuke, Kasim was wondering the same thing. Mortis had clearly breached the Tempest Line, and Cavalerio was quite within his rights to fire. As much as his heart was spoiling for a fight, Kasim knew that the odds against victory were high.

Staring into the Manifold, Kasim saw the heroic form of the Victorix Magna standing firm before the monstrous, towering might of the Imperator. Beside her stood Arcadia Fortis and Metallus Cebrenia, all three engines dwarfed by the enemy engine.

*What are you planning, Stormlord?' whispered Kasim.

The Imperator loomed on the Manifold, a glowering G.o.d of war that could destroy them all. A few more steps and it would be right on top of them.

IN THE CABIN c.o.c.kpit of Metallus Cebrenia, Princeps Sharaq was wondering the same thing as Kasim. Moderati Bannan counted the ever-increasing distance Aquila Ignis was striding into the territory of Legio Tempestus.

Increasing the angle of his view through the Manifold, Sharaq saw Victorix Magna standing proud beside him, venting hot exhaust gases and sweating lubricant from its overflows. Even without the spiking data readings, he could tell that the venerable engine was suffering.

*Come on, Indias,' he whispered. *Hold her together a little longer.'

He transferred his view outwards, seeing the agile, snapping forms of Vulpus Rex, Astrus Lux and Raptoria darting around the edges and rear of the approaching Imperator like pack wolves hunting a stag. Ever bellicose, their weapons were powered and ready to fire.

The ground shook and Sharaq could feel the tremor through every joint of his engine's structure. Inertial dampers could compensate for most fluctuations in a t.i.tan's surrounding environment, but the mighty tread of such a colossal enemy was beyond its power to completely dissipate.

He looked down at the far away ground, feeling a stab of pity for the ma.s.sed ranks of skitarii gathered around his engine's splayed feet. To face a beast like the Imperator from a Warlord's c.o.c.kpit was a terrifying enough prospect, but to stand naked before it without the protection of voids and armour...

That was courage indeed.

*Range to target?' asked Sharaq, fighting to keep his tone even.

The question was unnecessary. He could already see that the Imperator was less than three hundred metres away through the Manifold, point-blank range by any normal measure of things, but insanely close in this situation. He could already hear the squeal and rasp of the voids as their fields warbled with the proximity.

*Two hundred and fifty metres, my princeps,' said Bannan.

He spared a glance to his left.

Victorix Magna stood, implacable and immovable, before the marching Imperator, and Sharaq loved the Stormlord for his resolve as much as he was frustrated by his inaction. The tension within the c.o.c.kpit compartment of Metallus Cebrenia was unbearable.

Then a harsh, deafening squall shrilled across the vox frequencies, a filthy blurt of continuous, corrupted code noise that sounded like throaty laughter. Sharaq flinched and his sensori screamed as the wailing shriek tore at their hearing.

*What in the name of the Omnissiah is that?' yelled Bannan, s.n.a.t.c.hing the vox-set from his head.

Sharaq killed the audio as the cackling laughter code burbled over the vox and the booming warhorns of the Mortis engines echoed from the towering cliffs of Ascraeus Mons.

The Imperator lowered its weapon arms, every horn, bell and augmitter upon its colossal spires and bastions blaring in disdain. The noise was unimaginably loud, broadcast across every audible wavefront and code frequency.

Debased and dirty codelines conveyed vile algorithms that Sharaq felt worming their way into his peripherals like viral code, and his aegis protocols fought to prevent them from reaching the deep sub-systems of Metallus Cebrenia.

*Princeps!' shouted Bannan. *Enemy course change detected.'

Sharaq gasped, his mind awhirl as his implants defended his neural paths from infection by the sc.r.a.ppy code fragments carried on the war-scream of the Imperator. He forced his mind through the clotted data packets of black, oozing information that blurred his vision and saw that Bannan was right.

The Imperator was changing course, its stride swinging to the east.

Like a great ocean liner travelling at speed, the course of such a vast machine did not change swiftly and its new heading would barely carry it past the south-eastern skirts of Ascraeus Mons.

*Dolun? Intercept plot,' hissed Sharaq, the beginnings of a blistering headache building behind his eyes. *Where's it going?'

His sensori didn't answer, and Sharaq twisted his head to see Dolun lying supine on his reclined couch. The man's eyes rolled back into his skull and foaming spittle gathered at the corners of his mouth.