The Gavel Hangs

[Welcheren]

Wind pulled at the grey habit on Brother Tulour’s trans-human body. He walked the short distance to the edge of the balcony until the gale heaved at every inch of him. It whipped the black tabard at his waist and smelled of heather. It howled up from the narrow gulley, carved deep into the green slopes beneath the northern spur of Fortress Masada. It was like the breath of his home, the inhalation of the vast body from which he had been born, and selected for inclusion among the Emperor’s Dark Templars. Then it lessened in a matter of seconds. A gentle drizzle drifted down from a southern angle, kissing his robes and his shaven scalp. Brother Tulour seized the wet edge of the balustrade, clenching his knuckles into whiteness. Carefully, in a deliberately measured pace, he digested the information he had just received. And then, almost as if in response to his building agitation, the moon loomed through a break in the clouds. It seized his gaze with its dull red light – red as the robes of the magi that laboured beneath its surface. Tulour’s hands tightened, and then relaxed.

 

Subdue your anger… subdue your rage and let the gifts of the Emperor harvest it into a molten bolt of retribution, a spear and a fist against his foes.

 

Tulour recited the litany and closed his eyes. He allowed the Unsleeper to enfold him and induce a pseudo-meditative state. Incrementally, it drew his mind back to the bowels of the red moon of Masada – the stellar companion that threatened to alter his chapter forever; back to the Chamber of the Gavel, where he had visited the Magos scant hours before.

 

 

*****

 

 

Tulour wore the full plate of the trans-human Astartes, helmet included. Although he had come here to speak with allies, he always wore full armour when he entered this demesne of the Mechanicus. So had all those before him. Through the long, vaulted corridor he strode. His feet casting hard echoes against the red marble walls, closer and closer to the six scitarii arranged in a line before of the next door. It would be the seventh portal he had passed through in the last hour. Servitors had been hoisted into baroque alcoves all around the tall doors and high up in the walls. Corpses arranged were angels should be. The cyborgs boasted ancient and arcane firearms. Tulour understood the gesture intended by the antiquated design of the weapons: in this small way, the Mechanicus were demonstrating their acuity in the maintenance of holy machines from eras prior to the Heresy. But after more than a hundred years, Tulour was entirely indifferent to such displays. And yet the hope of his entire order rested on there being verifiable expertise behind the performance.

 

“Who approaches this sanctum of the Omnissiah?” Three red-robed magi, repulsive amalgamations of flesh and metal, stepped forward from behind the scitarii. A putrid cloud of smoke erupted from a grill in the floor, enveloping the ensemble of machine-men, smelling of harsh chemicals that probed Tulour’s helm like claws. The foremost magos held aloft a toothed power-axe, but its face remained shrouded within its hood. “Who is so favoured as to enter this repository of knowledge?”

 

Tulour had learned long ago that patience with these rituals and politicking was indispensable for successful dealings with the Adepts of Mars. But he, and those of his order who had come here before, had a message of their own and communicated it in more subtle ways. Artfully contrived thuribles on his plate emitted the scents of Masada. None of the magi could smell it. No mortal would could smell it within this riot of smoke. But they would detect its chemical presence nonetheless. It was a practice calculated to remind the Adepts of Mars that despite their mutual interest in the moon, one vital difference remained. While their concern upon this moon was completely absorbed with the discovery of lost lore, the world below was sacred to the Astartes. For a thousand years, the Dark Templars had benefited from the proximity of a Martian recovery project. But new discoveries had changed the relationship during the last five hundred. If the worse should come to pass, if the moon destroyed the planet below through some mistake or negligence on the part of the tech-priests: the Space Marines would not allow it to go unpunished, whatever the cost.

 

The voice within the red hood droned on. No response from Tulour was needed. After a long soliloquy of litanies, the priest answered his own catechisms. He intoned Tulour’s name and rank before finally admitting the warrior to the space beyond the doors.

 

He had almost gained his destination. In this new space, the red marble was replaced with dark blue. The corridor became far narrower and much darker. He had penetrated deep below the surface of Masada’s moon. For another hour he walked. Finally a portal of stout wood appeared, but instead he turned left and faced the blank marble wall. From somewhere among the black-and-blue veins across it, a mechanical whisper reached him.

 

“Who seeks admittance?”

 

“Brother Monum Tulour, veteran-sergeant of the Dark Templars – first company.”

 

The wall sunk into the floor with barely a sound, but the cacophony from the chamber beyond would have bowled a lesser man to his knees. The stabbing rays of red light would have done worse. Tulour had reached the source of Masada’s natural lustre – and the architect of its doom, the death sentence of his home.

 

He looked down into a bowl, crafted in the shape of an amphitheatre. Instead of stone, it was constructed of black metal. Hundreds of servitors and data-savants were arranged where seats would be, labouring tirelessly despite the heat and the stink of oil. A storm of binary chitter flowed between the cyborgs. Bionic hands and more obscure attachments were in constant motion, maintaining a steady and complex record of readings emanating from the thing down below, at the centre of the amphitheatre. Across from Tulour, on his own level, at the other end of the bowl was the magos he had come to address. Magos Explorator Nostrom.

 

Tulour traversed the circumference of the bowl, for the top level was devoid of servitors, allowing the anointed to gaze down at the miracle and the curse below. Nostrom stood between two looming datastacks, carried by burly servitors. Slowly, he lifted his gaze to the newly arrived Astartes. Red light glinted on the bare bone of his skull. All flesh had been removed. A thick tube, cased in metal and surrounded by smaller twins descended from Nostrom’s jaw. More pipes curved from cranial implants, some snaking into the datastacks to his left and right. Others disappeared into the robes that covered a protrusion on his back, like a small hill that endowed the Magos with a hunched appearance. Tulour knew that the many limbs about his torso were disproportionately spindly, but for now they lay concealed under the red robe.

 

When he reached the space beside Nostrom, Tulour looked down into the centre of the bowl. There was a pipe of black metal. Suspended above it, hanging in the air, was a tiny red orb, no bigger than his fist. His lenses compensated for its radiance. This red orb was the centrepiece of a great machine, filling the inside of the moon. Since before the Age of Strife this sphere had stimulated the bio-diversity of Masada. Exactly how it operated Tulour did not know. The Machine Priests are jealous of their secrets. He knew, however, that Masada boasted a natural variety that surpassed all the world he had yet visited. This was the cause of tundra and desert, jungle and forest. The machinations of this orb was what succoured the feral peoples far below, from whose populations the Dark Templars elected recruits.

 

For the Adeptus Mechanicus, however, it offered a different promise. To date, no one had fully divined the intended function, or functions, of the devise that sat within the red moon. At least, so Tulour had been told. Yet the priests had uncovered enough evidence to suggest that its secrets could enhance the reactor cores of all Imperial capital ships by tenfold, perhaps even its fusion weaponry. Whatever the long-term benefits, a grave obstacle had become apparent.

 

The priests of Mars had their own name for the red orb. But for the last five hundred years, those among the Dark Templars who knew of it had taken to calling it the gavel. For half a millennium ago, the tech-priests had ascertained that the inscrutable machine of which this orb was part, was failing. Soon the orb would fall into the channel below it, and render Masada entirely inimical to human life.

 

“Great is the wisdom of the Omnissiah. Great it the generosity of the Machine God” Nostrom’s voice was perturbingly human; at odds with his physique. “For we, his adepts, have attained the necessary knowledge, lord Tulour. We know now what is needed to maintain this wondrous machine. We can return it to its full operational splendour.”

 

Tulour turned to face him, waiting for an elaboration. After an empty pause: “Yes?”

 

“The machine is missing a vital component. Its absence poisons the construct’s spirit.”

 

“And you now possess the wherewithal to construct it.”

 

“No.” Tulour waited, but the Magos did not respond for some time. He did not permit himself to tense; he forced himself to match his interlocutor’s equanimity. “No, lord Tulour, courageous veteran of the Emperor’s Chosen. This is a device of unsurpassed complexity and lineage. Alas we cannot compose the missing part. Fortunately, we need not do so. For it is already in our possession.” Two hands snaked out from under the robes. The sparse flesh upon them was wizened and failing. Nostrom spread his hands out in a gesture of ease. “We need only retrieve it.”

 

“From where?”

 

“The Ultima Segmentum. A world nigh to the Ghoul Stars. One of my exploratory fleets unearthed the necessary component over two hundred years ago, lost within a vault of many other wonders. But the Machine God did not deem us worthy to receive knowledge of its function. That has changed. Our devotion to healing this construct has earned his pleasure. As I have said, we need only retrieve the missing component.”

 

Immediately, Tulour wondered why the Magos had not transferred the component to some other stronghold sooner. For now he left the thought unvoiced. Other concerns were more exigent. So Tulour considered his response carefully. Slowly he ran a finger across the red laurels running across the temples of his white helmet. “I earned these marks of honour in service to one of your fleets. Before me, others have done likewise. Many of our brothers now lie interred in the Valley of Respite. They died to ensure the future of our world. With all respect due to your station, Lord Magos, this is not the first time you have proclaimed the cure located.”

 

Nostrom tilted his head sideways and spread his hands in a manner that, Tulour assumed, was intended to garner sympathy. The light from the gavel gave his skull a hellish glint. Not for the first time, Tulour felt an intense repugnance for this half-man. “We are all instruments at the disposal of the Omnissiah’s will. Well do I recall your service, and your elevation has been well deserved. Through it, and the service of your brothers, we have earned knowledge of the final piece. But, of course, I empathise with your suspicion.” To hear such words from this creature had never become less strange. “Might I humbly remind you, lord Tulour, that at the conclusion of each of the expeditions that you and yours have undertaken, I explained at some length how all the earlier components you successfully retrieved for us, have postponed the complete failure of the machine? Your brothers in the forge will tell you the same. I can assure you that this component is the final one.”

 

 

*****

 

 

The drizzle washed over Tulour as it washed over Fortress Masada and the valleys and mountains. Perhaps it would cleanse him of the disgust he felt for these things – these priests. Their hideous forms were an insult to the sanctity of human flesh, especially his own augmented flesh, and to the machines that he bore into battle.

 

No, he thought. That was not the origin of his disgust. Tulour had achieved his elevation to the first company after participation in three Mechanicus expeditions – each one promising to cure the gavel. Over the course of five centuries many similar campaigns had been launched. All had failed, regardless of the retrieval of other treasures.

 

Tulour understood that his anger was caused by his certainly that the Machine Priests would have divulged nothing of what they know, nothing of the impending threat, if they had not looked to their neighbours on Masada and seen strength at arms that could aid them. They were solely obsessed with the glory that would slip through their fingers if the gavel failed. Tulour felt certain that the entire operation on the moon was being conducted under veils of secrecy from rival magi. His brothers among the Techmarines concurred, but could shed little light on the matter. For their training on Mars did not induct them into such deeper mysteries and opaque temple politics. A footstep sounded behind him.

 

“Brother Tulour,” it was Tucault.

 

“Brother Reclusiarch,” Tulour greeted.

 

The Reclusiarch stepped into the drizzle and gained the balcony’s edge. The cold air condensed on the small metal coin, fused into the Chaplain’s hands, bearing the chapter’s icon. He had selected robes of black instead of grey. The visit was official. “You glare at Masada’s daughter as if you could pluck her malignancy from the sky.”

 

“Would that I could.” He waited, hoping that the Chaplain had brought news.

 

“Our Lord and Master had intended to address you himself, but I insisted. The mission is yours Monum.” Tulour straightened. “You have earned it. You will be accompanied by your brothers in squad Masada’s Blood. The strike cruiser Dirge of Honour will bear you.”

 

“A complement of tech-priests will go with you to effect the retrieval,” said a new voice. Brother-Techmarine Dular had emerged from the Fortress. “They travel aboard the Megiron-class Forge ship Deliberation of Prudence.”

 

“That is a vast ship,” Tulour responded.

 

“Indeed.”

 

“What does this betoken?”