"The melta charges are set. Once we return to the ship, engage the engines and move astern. The charges are on a three-minute timer. We'll use the kinetic force of the blast to see if we can wrench the hull free."
Calanthus finished his vox-comm with the Captain and immediately urged the Tech-Marine to return the Thunderhawk. As the gunship docked in the hangar, a violent shuddering began.
Along with the screeching sound of twisting metal within the hull, another explosion detonated at the snagged keel. The sound and vibration traveled through the contact point between the hulk and the cruiser.
BOOM!
On the lower hull, the writhing daemons were instantly flung into the void by the shockwaves. Those that had already breached the interior were likewise tossed about. The Astartes' magnetic boots kept them locked firmly to the deck, but the Naval ratings behind them were thrown into a disorganized heap.
Then came a piercing sound of metal fracturing. Alarms blared once more across the ship.
"Upper armor compromised! Hull breach!"
The ship, already missing its prow, had its dorsal plating ripped open by a jagged outcropping of the space hulk as it pulled away. Hundreds of elite Naval ratings were sucked screaming through the breach into the void. Fortunately, everyone had been ordered into void-suits in anticipation of hull damage, so they didn't die instantly.
The downside, however, was that these men were now staring directly into the Warp. Some had their minds instantly flayed, mutating into semi-daemonic abominations; others collapsed into hallucinations, firing their weapons wildly into the dark. A resolute few bit down on their grief and turned their weapons on their own heads. This was the final mercy the Holy Emperor granted to His loyal and steadfast subjects.
Witnessing the loyal veterans ending their own lives in the void, even the Astartes paused to offer a silent salute.
"They are heroes of the Imperium. Though but mortals, they are monuments to its strength. May their souls find rest at the foot of the Golden Throne."
After the brief tribute, the Ultramarines, who remained on deck thanks to their mag-boots, marched toward the aft sections. This area was untenable. The remaining daemons on the outer hull would soon come swarming through the breach. They had to fall back and establish a defensive line.
Just as everyone thought they were clear, the space hulk's keel, softened by the heat of the melta blasts, rapidly cooled in the vacuum.
Creeeeeak…
The agonizing sound of metal deforming made every heart skip a beat. Then, a massive surge of counter-force sent everyone staggering.
"Captain, report!" Calanthus's voice barked over the vox.
Sitting on the bridge, looking out the viewports at the cruiser, now four-fifths clear of the hulk, the Captain was equally bewildered.
"The Machine Spirit isn't responding!"
"The ship is out of control!"
At the bridge consoles, Naval officers frantically reported the status. Several red-robed Tech-Priests hurried onto the bridge. As data-slates were interfaced, the priests occupied half the bridge in a flurry of activity.
"Status report!" the Captain yelled, incensed by the chaos.
The Tech-Priests ignored the Naval officer. After two sharp bursts of binharic static, a servitor looked up, its hunched body twitching as it spoke for the priests.
"The vessel's Machine Spirit is being interfered with by the Machine Spirit of the space hulk. We have lost nearly half-control over ship systems."
Several Priests of Mars grimaced, their minds being hammered by a deluge of corrupted data flowing through the hard-links. They had to find the Machine Spirit amidst the sea of information and soothe it before it was lost entirely.
Beyond the bridge, in the Cogitator arrays of the mid-deck, more priests were toiling. Servitors lit sacred incense and sprinkled holy oils. The Tech-Priests chanted binary canticles, their hands dancing over data-pads. Occasionally, a priest would collapse, only to be dragged away like refuse by a servitor. These fallen priests hadn't merely lost consciousness; their biological brains and electronic augmetics had been fried by data-spikes.
Communicating with a Machine Spirit was never a simple task.
Though the ship had mostly detached, the ancient Machine Spirit within the space hulk seemed utterly enraged. Violent data-streams surged everywhere. In a visual blind spot beneath the cruiser, several mechanical parasites, looking like clusters of writhing wires, were extending themselves, tethering the cruiser to the hulk. The ancient ship's furious spirit found its outlet through these daemonic constructs.
The cruiser's Machine Spirit flickered like a candle in a gale under the assault. As the living cables of the Warp-entities spread, they began to siphon the ship's power from obscure junctions. This energy was fed into the parched conduits of the space hulk.
Lights within the ancient wreck, dark for millennia, began to flicker. Powered by the stolen energy, the hulk's Machine Spirit crudely ignited its long-dormant reactors. Massive power surges began to pulse.
The Cogitator arrays within the cruiser were being corrupted. The busy Tech-Priests watched in horror as the living wetware began to undergo minute, grotesque changes. Electronic daemons within the hulk began to swarm. The deluge of data caused the Tech-Priests to lose consciousness one by one.
Suddenly, the remaining priests felt a jolt. The chaotic data became orderly. The scrapcode was purged. The raging ancient Machine Spirit vanished from the cruiser's systems as if struck by a heavy blow.
But the cruiser's own Machine Spirit... was gone.
The Tech-Priests scanned the data-streams, desperate to find any trace of it. But the ship felt hollow; no Machine Spirit remained.
In a darkened corner of the hull, Axion slowly withdrew his finger.
A collision of this magnitude was something even an Iron Man could do little about, so he had left it to Calanthus's team. As for the swarming Warp-entities, Axion had no desire to intervene; seeing the Ultramarines shatter them with ease told him there was no challenge there. The Imperial Navy and the Ultramarines, and certainly the mortals aboard, were not part of his protection or service protocols.
He had followed Calanthus only to see this so-called Primarch and seek answers, and perhaps to meet the engineer who had modified the quantum storage chips. The lives of others were secondary.
However, he couldn't allow the ship to be destroyed; he still needed to reach the Primarch.
Axion had interfaced with a data-port and surged through the ship's systems like an unstoppable tide. He had simply deactivated several non-essential modules and diverted the excess power directly into the mechanical parasites trying to seize the ship. The sudden surge of raw energy had turned the daemonic creations to ash instantly.
The scrapcode released by the electronic daemons was wiped clean by Axion. To him, the "Machine Spirit" the priests obsessed over was merely a mass of disorganized, cached data. To facilitate control, he had simply deleted it entirely.
Rebuilding the data structure and restoring command systems was, for Axion, a triviality.
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