Steel & Oil: Warhammer 32K

What had been their greatest asset was now an iron coffin. Forced out of their vehicles, the Iron Hands could only watch as the Soul Drinkers shattered the tanks one by one with their close-combat weapons.

Lorgash and Birmingham stared at the veterans in astonishment. They held their breath, unable to accept that a few dozen men had broken the assault of an entire Astartes armoured formation.

"Is this really a way we could fight?"

"Why not?"

An unfamiliar voice answered. The two turned to find that Lin had come to stand beside them at some point.

"Keep fighting, and sooner or later you'll be able to stand shoulder to shoulder with them."

The words lit a spark in Lorgash, who until moments ago had wanted nothing but a clean death. After the Soul Drinkers' rebellion, the Astartes had finally found a new purpose.

Lin was satisfied with their fighting spirit. These Astartes, now confirmed as scions of the Second Legion, would become fresh strength for him.

Still, their violent reaction aboard the Shanzheng proved they remained deeply marked by the Second Primarch. Before he could turn them into Hunters, Lin would have to throw them onto the Azure Star and let it grind them down first.

No point dwelling on matters that could only be discussed once they had left Terra. Lin clapped his hands, drawing the attention of every stunned Soul Drinker. "Those Iron Hands are target practice now. Finish them with your bolters!"

The Soul Drinkers came out of their daze, raised their bolters and opened up. At Lin's signal, they deliberately aimed for non-lethal spots.

Driven from their vehicles, the Iron Hands could find no proper cover. Bolt rounds that had been little more than candy against tank armour were now a lethal threat.

Watching brothers who could no longer organize any counterattack, Kuber understood the battle was lost and refused to prolong it.

His order came out raw and ragged. "Fall back!"

The Soul Drinkers did not pursue. The barely reassembled Iron Hands managed to drag their wounded brothers off the field.

Kuber kept glancing back at the Soul Drinkers standing among the wreckage of the Land Raiders. Their savage, brutally efficient way of fighting had overturned everything he believed about war.

"That was less a battle than a nightmare," he muttered.

Back at their own forward position, Kuber went storming off to find the Priests of Mars.

He meant to demand why Mars had provided no intelligence whatsoever about the enemy's bizarre combat doctrine, only to find the Priests already shouting each other down.

"What in the void were those weapons? Even with a Disintegration Field on the blade, nothing should be able to cleave a tank in half!"

"I say they were daemon weapons. We should hand them to the Inquisition and have them condemned!"

"Don't talk rot, the Inquisition is on their side!"

The Priests of Mars disagreed about the weapons, but they were uniformly cold toward the beaten Iron Hands. No one acknowledged Kuber when he barged in. Only after he spoke first did Calxus voice his undisguised disappointment.

"You failed, Captain Kuber."

Fury churned inside Kuber's skull, but he knew an emotional outburst would only make things worse, and he crushed it down. "Their method of war exceeded our projections."

"Exceeded your projections? Mars furnished you with superior materiel. Land Raiders, Rhino transports, ion weapons, meltas... enough firepower to annihilate an Imperial Guard regiment, and you buried all of it on the battlefield. Did your flesh drag down your judgement, Captain? Perhaps that is precisely why the Iron Hands exiled you."

Under the Priest's razored attack, any reason would be treated as an excuse for defeat.

Kuber did not bother arguing that it was Mars' own demand for a mere show of force that had skewed his judgement. He was certain this pack of Priests would have fared no better than his brothers on that field, yet he had to swallow the humiliation of being lectured by cogboys.

"You still need our strength, and my brothers need treatment and resupply. The Soul Drinkers' combat power was unexpected, but they lack supplies. Sustain the offensive and they will inevitably be ground out of existence."

"We must first seek instruction from the Fabricator-General, Captain Kuber. All you need do now is contemplate your failure."

The Iron Hands' defeat set off a long chain of consequences. The Fabricator-General, who had never once entertained the possibility that they might lose, immediately found himself on the back foot in the standoff with the Ultimate Wall.

Kuber's reasoning was sound enough, but Kubik had never actually intended to kill Lin, and what he needed was not a "promise" that the Soul Drinkers would eventually be destroyed.

Mars concealed far too many weapons of mass destruction. If he truly wanted to break with the Ultimate Wall, or with the entire Imperium, would he really need the Iron Hands to do his killing for him?

What he feared was that an open break, or a leak, would bring hundreds or thousands of Custodes to Mars for a group excursion.

(In fact, one of the webway tunnels beneath the Golden One's toilet runs straight to Mars, though presumably nobody on Mars remembers that anymore.)

News that the Soul Drinkers would not be broken any time soon let Kurande apply still more pressure on Mars, demanding that they release the man at once. With no leverage over the Ultimate Wall and five hundred thousand Skitarii still impounded by it, the Fabricator-General could only stall, babble and deflect his way through the confrontation like a man playing tai chi.

Kubik raged at the incompetent Iron Hands, but what was done was done. All he could do was decide his next move.

The only way left to break the deadlock seemed to be completing the teleportation plan, the plan Terra must never learn of, as quickly as possible.

"Give those Iron Hands the bare minimum of supplies and keep them pressing the Soul Drinkers. Assemble my Battle-Automata legion. Tomorrow I visit Magma City in person!"

Now that he knew how the Ultimate Wall had learned Mars was moving against Lin, Kubik harboured heavy suspicions about Archmagos Augustus. Augustus shutting himself away the moment he returned to Magma City only weighted those suspicions further.

The Fabricator-General had chosen him to head the project because the Archmagos' specialty fit precisely, and because he had no backers, no allies, and was easy to control. Kubik had never imagined that this stray dog dragged back from Maxim could grow a second heart and start scheming beneath his very nose.

Kubik still could not determine what the schemers behind all this intended, or how deeply Augustus was involved. But remote oversight through subordinates and data feeds was clearly no longer sufficient.

He set aside the trivial malfunction in the data-throne for the moment and decided to bring it back into full service.

At this pivotal moment, with the future of Mars at stake, he had to go to Magma City himself, deliver Augustus a warning, and make him understand who the true king of Mars was.

Activating and preparing the Battle-Automata legion took time. It was not until the following afternoon that the Priest serving as his attendant came to report.

"Lord Fabricator-General, your transport is ready."

Kubik gave a nod. All ten metres of him, data-throne included, was hoisted by over a hundred Servitors and loaded aboard a specially built black state carriage.

Behind his conveyance came the assembled Battle-Automata legion, built around Castellax-class battle-automata with Vorax-class automata in support. It was Kubik's own specialized private army. Through the data-throne he held absolute command authority over all twelve hundred machines.

If necessary, he could also use these automata, their cognitive circuits enhanced, as a medium through which the data-throne could intrude upon and seize ownership of other Skitarii.

Such a force far outstripped over a hundred thousand Skitarii. Even if Magma City hid thirty thousand axemen within its walls, Kubik was confident he could micromanage every unit through the data-throne and drive these automata clean through the city from one side to the other.

The data-throne was the foundation of his rise to Fabricator-General, the source of his security, and the reason he dared bring his own Battle-Automata legion and go put Augustus in his place personally.

When an entire Battle-Automata legion arrived beneath the walls of Magma City trailing an aura of slaughter, the whole city fell into an uproar. Kubik waited patiently outside. Some time passed before Augustus came hurrying out.

"Lord Fabricator-General, you gave me no notice that you would be inspecting us today."

"I am the Fabricator-General of Mars, Augustus. Is there anywhere on Mars I may not go without giving notice first?" Kubik's voice was ice. "Or do you no longer consider me the master of Mars?"

"I intended nothing of the sort."

"Better so. Understand this, Augustus. Mars has lately produced one variable after another that falls outside our predictions, and without exception those variables have been detrimental to Mars."

Augustus lowered his head, his tone humble. "Fabricator-General, the Mars of today contains far too many constants beyond our control. Variables are unavoidable."

"A string of coincidences will only ever be confirmed as inevitability. Augustus, I would prefer you not be part of that inevitability. Mars never accepts accidents."

"The interests of Mars have always come first with me."

Kubik said nothing, seemingly weighing the Archmagos' attitude. After a brief silence he rose from the data-throne. "Take me to the teleportation device. I need to confirm its status with my own optics."

"Your will."

Augustus' bearing did not shift in the slightest. He had rehearsed his counter-strategies countless times in his logic circuits, and he respectfully ushered the Fabricator-General and his Battle-Automata legion into Magma City. They soon reached the test site, which Augustus had already disguised with great care.

The Chaos star that had been mounted on the teleportation device was temporarily cut away, and the dark Psychic emanations masked. But purging Chaos corruption is not the work of a single day, and Kubik's instruments registered an abnormal Psychic concentration. He knew something was wrong.

He examined the teleportation device closely, a device the Priests had rebuilt through pure gut-feeling engineering. Beside him, Augustus was delivering an overview of the experiment.

"Trials on the teleportation device are progressing smoothly. We have successfully substituted Warp energy for the ork Waaagh energy. Some technical details still require refinement, but overall progress matches projections."

"By what specific method?"

"Through arrangements and permutations of runes that channel the energies of the Warp, altering the type of Psychic force to make it more efficient. If all goes well, we will no longer need to seize the teleportation array aboard that Attack Moon on Terra. We will use a Psychic engine to carry Mars itself out of the Sol System."

Kubik reviewed the trial reports Augustus had submitted earlier. "This does not match the experimental records you previously filed."

"We made certain adjustments to our research direction that we have not yet had the opportunity to report."

Kubik did not answer at once. Warnings were already firing in his logic circuits, and not only about an experiment that might well have crossed a red line. They were warnings about his own safety.

"Augustus, I require more experimental data."

"Compiling the data will take some time..."

"That is acceptable. Transmit it to my data-throne when it is ready."

The Fabricator-General took several steps back, signalling that the inspection was concluded. "Your work satisfies me, Augustus. Unfortunately the Ultimate Wall continues to press us at every turn, and I cannot spend more time on this project."

"Of course, Fabricator-General," Augustus said softly, and in the same instant issued a covert command within his logic circuits.

He escorted Kubik to the door of the test site. Just as Kubik was about to remount his data-throne, Augustus spoke again.

"Lord Fabricator-General, if this project interests you, why not remain and witness with your own optics the great work of its activation?"

In that moment the crisis warnings breached the critical threshold in Kubik's logic. His head snapped up, and he saw Skitarii pouring in from every side of Magma City, the very Skitarii that had been transferred here under the pretext of a wartime footing.

Kubik tried to seize control of them, only to find that beneath a surface obedience to Mars, their inner cognitive cores had been uncannily overwritten.

What manner of overwrite could leave even a Fabricator-General helpless?

Shock gave way to rage. "Augustus! You dare-"

"You mean to say betrayal, General? Yet when Mars exiled me after the Great Heresy, did anyone stop to consider that you betrayed me first?"

Augustus spread his arms wide, the exultation and fanaticism in his logic plain for all to read.

"Though I owe your betrayal a debt of thanks. It was betrayal that allowed me to come before the true Omnissiah!"

Kubik had no processing capacity left to wonder what a "true Omnissiah" might mean. He had assumed the Officio Assassinorum's attempt on his life had merely stirred certain parties on Mars to covet the throne of Fabricator-General. He now understood the matter was nothing so simple.

Augustus had entangled himself with something far more terrible.

He deployed every weapon on his frame, his Servo-arms unfolding to throttle the Archmagos, whose bulk was a fraction of his own. But Augustus had prepared for this, and under the protection of the other Priests he withdrew to a safe distance.

An endless stream of Skitarii charged Kubik, and the Fabricator-General, a beast of a machine, paid their fire no mind whatsoever.

The ion shields and void shields built into his frame turned aside every shot. The Fabricator-General, who had not taken the field in person for a very long time, displayed his true power at last.

"You think treachery on this scale is enough to defeat a Fabricator-General?"

Having swept the Skitarii from around him, he charged for his conveyance, and his objective was plain: the data-throne.

He had not escaped Magma City, nor gathered an army to crush it. But so long as he had the Battle-Automata legion, Kubik was certain he stood on undefeatable ground.

He jacked into the legion's command network and pushed kill orders into a thousand Battle-Automata.

"Sit tight, you traitorous scum. Watch me use my Battle-Automata legion to blow every last one of you sky high!"

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