Mechanicum

'The kings of Gyptus often chose names that symbolised their worldly power and spiritual might to act as a kind of mission statement for their rule,' said Maximal, and Zeth could hear the whir of data wheels as he called up more information. 'Usually the king's name was carved upon a representation of his palace with an image of the god Horus perched beside it.'

'The ''god'' Horus?'

'Indeed, the name is an ancient one,' said Maximal. 'A god of the sky, of the sun and, of course, war. The ancient Gyptians so enjoyed their war.'

'And what did this Horus name symbolise?' asked Zeth, intrigued despite herself.

'No one knows for sure, but it seems likely that it was to imply that Khaba was an earthly embodiment of Horus, an enactor of his will if you like.'

'So you are suggesting that this machine, whatever it is, was built for Horus Lupercal.'

'That would be a logical conclusion, especially as Chrom enjoys the favour of the Fabricator General, and we all know whose voice he listens to.'

'I have heard this before, but I cannot believe Kelbor-Hal values the counsel of the Warmaster over the Emperor.'

'No? I hear that Regulus has recently arrived in the solar system with missives from the 63rd Expedition. And his first port of call is Mars, not Terra.'

'That doesn't prove anything,' pointed out Zeth. 'Regulus is an adept of the Mechanicum, there is no reason to suspect any ulterior motive behind his coming to Mars first.'

'Perhaps not,' agreed Maximal, 'but when was the last time an emissary from the fleets reported to Mars before the Sigillite of Terra?'

1.04

If any of the tissue that caused the chemical and neurological reactions associated with awe were still part of what little organics remained of the Fabricator General's brain, he would no doubt have found the view through the polarised glass that topped the peak of his forge awesome.

But Kelbor-Hal - as his human name had once been - was capable of little in the way of emotional response these days save bitter anger and frustration.

Far below him, the vast forge complex of Olympus Mons stretched away beyond sight, the towering manufactorum, refineries, worker-habs, machine shops and assembly hangars covering thousands of square kilometres of Mars's surface.

The vast hive of manufacture was home to billions of faithful tech-priests of the Machine-God, the great and powerful deity that governed every aspect of life on Mars, from the lowliest tertiary reserve unit of the PDF to the mightiest forge master.

Greatest of the structures arrayed before him was the Temple of All Knowledge, a towering pyramid of pink and black marble, crowned with a dome of glittering blue stone and a forest of iron spires that pierced the sky and pumped toxic clouds into the atmosphere.

Vast pilasters framed a yawning gateway at its base, the marble inscribed with millions of mathematical formulae and proofs, many of which had been developed by Kelbor-Hal himself. Mightier, and home to more workers, priests and servitors than the Mondus Gamma complex of Urtzi Malevolus - where untold thousands of suits of battle plate and weapons were produced to supply the Astartes Legions of the Crusade - the Olympus Mons forge was less a building and more of a region.

The Fabricator General knew he should be proud of his accomplishments, for he had uncovered more technology than any before him and had overseen the longest reign of increasing production quotas in the Mechanicum's long history.

But pride, like many other emotional responses, had all but vanished as the organic cogitator once housed in his skull had been gradually replaced with synthetic synapses and efficient conduits for logical thought. The Fabricator General was over eighty per cent augmetic, barely anything that could be called human remaining of his birth-flesh, a fact of which he was supremely glad.

While the fleshy organ remained in his head, he could feel every biological portion decaying with each passing moment, each relentless tick of the clock a moment closer to the grave and the loss of everything he had learned over the centuries.

No, it was better to be free of flesh and the doubts it fostered.

Far below, thousands of workers filed along the stone-flagged roadway of the Via Omnissiah, its surface worn into grooves by the sandalled feet of a billion supplicants. A score of Battle Titans lined the wide road, their majesty and power reminding the inhabitants of his city, though they needed no reminding, of their place in the equation that was the workings of Mars.

Monolithic buildings flanked the roadways - factories, machine temples, tech-shrines and engine-reliquaries - all dedicated to the worship and glorification of the Omnissiah. Vast prayer ships filled the sky above the volcano, gold-skinned zeppelins broadcasting endless streams of binaric machine language from brass megaphones. Bobbing drone-skulls trailing long streams of code on yellowed parchment swarmed behind the zeppelins like shoals of small fish.