315 – Ahhotekh: Redux
“Ozkan,” Ahhotekh said, his synthetic voice cold and detached. He’d long gone beyond furious; his rage was apoplectic, but it was kept in check by a combination of immense self-control, befuddlement, and need. “What am I looking at-“
Ahhotekh trailed off, his ocular sensors finally catching sight of his favoured Cryptek after the notification alerted him of the Codifier’s arrival on his command deck. It took a moment, which was practically an eternity to a Necron of his calibre, but he analysed Ozkan.
“What happened to you?” Ahhotek questioned, staring at the scuffed Cryptek, who walked with a limp, leaning on his staff with each step. All around his metallic body, the Cryptek wore marks of recent battle, some wounds still in the process of mending themselves. The crest on his head was broken, the single ocular sensor blinking erratically while the arm not clutching his staff was little more than a mangled mess hanging loosely at his side.
“The i-invaders infiltrated my D-Dimensional Sanctum,” Ozkan said, his vocaliser fizzling and being taken over by static between each word. Had he still been in possession of facial muscles or a face, Ahhotekh would have probably grimaced at the grating noise and even more so at the state of his most experienced Cryptek.
“How?” Ahhotek asked, returning his attention to the visual data feed flowing straight into his core matrices. The battle at the final gate, stopping the invaders from escaping into the greater Hollow Sun and disappearing into its vast, empty architecture, was only now ramping up.
Unfortunate as it was, without a Worldmind, it was left to the Crypteks under his command to rouse long-dormant weapons platforms and defensive installations. The energy was there; the Hollow Sun generated more power than it could ever use, even in the Dynasty’s heyday, but most of it went to waste, funnelled into the faux-star surrounding the Crownworld.
Rerouting a stream of power away from that and rousing long-dormant installations took time and effort, which they were all paying for. He felt the distinct shortage of Crypteks at his command even more clearly than ever before, and even more so the true extent of the damage the mad Phareon had done to the Crownworld in his brief moment of freedom.
The Hollow Sun was crippled without a Worldmind.
“Unknown,” Ozkan replied, his ocular slowly settling into a steady, if dimmer glow. “Suspected extra-physical Empyrean link between invading organisms. The prime organism was able to follow the link, teleporting into my Sanctum when I took possession of one of the lesser organisms for study.”
Was that how that anomalous creature escaped the Ghostwind? The Transdimensional Beamer hit it, and it worked. Ahhotekh was absolutely sure of that. Both of those initial invaders should have ended up in the Ghostwind, stranded and exposed to the hordes of Flayed Ones who call that abominable dimension home.
“You subverted one of the Canoptek Wraiths to deposit the lesser organism in your Sanctum?” Ahhotekh asked after a long moment.
The echoing space of the command deck fell silent; the Lychguard standing behind their Regent was as still as ever, but the Crypteks working tirelessly at data terminals in front of him paused. They remembered his distinct order to have both invaders banished to the Ghostwind. Even Ozkan paused, perhaps only now recognising his blunder … which would mean he had to be in an even worse state than he portrayed. Ozkan the Codifier did not make mistakes. He wouldn’t have served as the most trusted advisor to the Crimson Scythe for so long if he were in the habit of making mistakes.
Ahhotekh’s metallic finger tapped the armrest of his throne, the small clink echoing in the wide-open space. This wasn’t a mistake; it was intentional. Ozkan must have put studying the invader’s biology as a higher priority than obeying his Overlord-Regent. That was … troubling, and nearly enough to finally push Ahhotekh over the edge. He was just barely managing to keep his apocalyptic rage contained, and then this happened.
Ozkan fell on his knees, barely catching himself on his staff from fully collapsing on the floor. The ancient Cryptek bowed his head. “Forgive me, My Lord Regent. I merely endeavoured to gather information on this new foe, not believing that it would remain stuck in the Ghostwind for eternity. As evidenced, it escaped via Empyrean spatial tunnelling from my Dimensional Sanctum. The Ghostwind would not have held it for long, and it did not. As we have seen in this newest attempt, there are many lesser organisms bound to the primogenitor. If it didn’t trace the link leading to my Sanctum, it would have surely traced another link to escape.”
Ozkan was truly fortunate because that was the exact same conclusion Ahhotekh had reached, and, while he would never admit it, he regretted not attempting to capture one of the creatures for further study. In retrospect, it was fortunate that he did not give the order to do so. This way, all blame for the failure fell on Ozkan’s shoulders. Still, going behind his back was not something to let go so easily, especially now when the numerous Lords and Overlords of the Dynasty were looking at him for any sign of weakness. He’d already shown too much of that, but no more could be forgiven.
The Cryptek would need to be punished. But before that.
“And did you learn anything of value?” Ahhotekh questioned.
“Other than the Empyrean link, which serves as a Reality-Tether to connect all these strange creatures,” Ozkan said, and Ahhotekh would have rolled his eyes if he could at the transparent attempt to remind him of that finding. As if that would save this fool from his wrath. “Hyperphase weapons are perfectly functional against them, and a Tesseract Labyrinth should be able to contain even the primogenitor organism, according to my analysis. However, said organism was greatly underselling its capabilities during the initial incursion, and I do not mean merely in its ability to spawn those lesser combat organisms. It moved faster, impossibly fast, and the Empyrean energy sensors in my Sanctum nearly all detected a maximum density energy signature.”
Ahhotekh remained silent, musing over those words. The creatures in this new incursion were much easier to deal with than the pair that came here previously, or the first one that boarded his ship … but they were attacking a fortified position while the first sole invader was just running away. According to the analytical reports, the first invader exhibited roughly equal physical properties and capabilities to those of a portion of the newest wave’s combat organisms. Letting them escape into the Hollow Sun would be disastrous; he barely managed to catch a single one of those horrors in hours, and now there were hundreds, and he could see that there were actual organisms showing some capability for stealth, camouflage and optical cloaking. Now, those would be a nightmare to hunt down and eliminate.
“You will oversee the defences and the elimination of these invaders, Ozkan,” Ahhotekh said. “Personally. Take five Crypteks of your choosing and eradicate these creatures. Capture them, if you wish, but I want them gone. Failure will not be tolerated.”
“As you say, My Regent,” Ozkan replied, bowing his head slightly. “I will see to it that your will is done.”
Better have him act out in the open, where he could see him and be busy with an assigned task, than let the ancient Cryptek work in the shadows. Ahhotekh did not like that he was unaware Ozkan was interfering with the Canoptek Wraith’s orders. He liked it much less than he dared to do so. For a lesser Cryptek, he would have considered having them killed for the offence, even with his pressing need for manpower, but Ozkan … Ozkan was the one, perhaps the only one, who could fix all the issues plaguing the Hollow sun, given a few millennia. He couldn’t afford to lose him.
*****
Ozkan the Codifier stepped out of the Eternity Gate, decked out in full Wargear and followed by four of his foremost Cryptek associates, all of them previous apprentices from aeons past. Behind him was a veritable swarm of Canoptek constructs all bound to his and his four Crypteks’ wills.
He paused, slowly turning towards the lone figure standing next to the Gate’s exit, clearly having been waiting for Ozkan’s arrival. Up ahead, the battle was raging, a small corridor leading out onto a high-up balcony hidden from general view and shrouded behind an energy field.
“What do you want, Rahkoz?” Ozkan addressed his fellow Cryptek. If he held the most influence in the dynasty’s royal court, then Rahkoz, Harvinger of Eternity, the royal chronomancer of the Suhbekhar Dynasty, was right behind him. The two of them had been rivals of sorts ever since the time of the War in Heaven, as two Crypteks from different Conclaves tended to be when forced to occupy the same space repeatedly, though both had become deeply absorbed in their own work ever since the Great Awakening had begun. “You are not one to waste time by wishing me good fortune in a battle to come.”
“Correct,” the Royal Chronomancer said simply, leaning on his sapphire-headed Aeonstave. “I will be short. You walk into your doom, Ozkan. That creature out there is a menace. Losing you would be highly detrimental to the Dynasty, but the Regent is being obtuse about this folly. This sector of the Hollow Sun must be purged in its entirety if we wish to beat back this incursion.”
“Beating back this incursion is not the problem, chronomancer,” Ozkan said, straightening up as he started turning away from the ancient fool who liked to pretend he was omniscient. Perhaps the lesser Crypteks and the ignorant Lords who knew nothing of the arcane mysteries of techno-sorcery were fooled, but Ozkan was not. There was no such thing as omniscience, no matter what obnoxious, egotistical chronomancers liked to pretend since time immemorial. “We must put an end to its source, and for that, the progenitor organism spawning these creatures must be captured and studied. It may not be the only one of its kind, after all. This one certainly doesn’t seem to be either of the previous organisms that’d infiltrated our Crownworld.”
“If this incursion is beaten back, we must use the gained time to secure the Crownworld!” Rahkoz said, slamming the base of his Aeonstave into the ground to drag Ozkan’s attention back onto him. “We must call for reinforcements from slumbering Tombworlds. It is foolish to let them remain asleep while the Crownworld is compromised, and I am not merely talking about this incursion, but of the horrid state of our Hollow Sun itself!”
“You are free to take your whining to the Regent, Rahkoz,” Ozkan said dismissively. “I have no time for it, nor the will to entertain your needless paranoia any longer. Either assist me in capturing this creature, or begone.”
In truth, the problem lay in the fact that the Regent was paranoid about being overthrown in short order if he awoke an Overlord in command of a numerically larger force than himself. Rightly so, in Ozkan’s opinion. Resourceful as Ahhotekh usually was, he was limited by the tools at his disposal and clearly floundering, trying to live up to Phareon Ahmontekh’s mythical status. Which was impossible. That upstart would never be a ‘new Crimson Scythe’. But his paranoia served Ozkan well; he certainly enjoyed the near-absolute lack of oversight over his activities stemming from the Regent’s lack of manpower.
Besides, it wasn’t like they even knew where exactly all the Tomb Worlds had ended up after sixty million years of stellar drift. The Regent’s most trusted underlings were scouring nearby systems for any sign of the long-lost tombs day after day. That was how the Suhbekhar became aware of other forces also seeking dormant Tomb Worlds; the vermin infesting this region of space knew that if the Suhbekhar Dynasty rose once more, there would be nothing they could do but prostrate themselves before the Phareon and beg for his mercy.
“You are a fool, Ozkan,” Rahkoz said, tapping his Aeonstave on the ground. A simmering dimensional portal, hissing with aetheric green energy at its edges, popped into existence behind the chronomancer, and he stepped through it. “When the time inevitably comes that you regret your folly, remember: I told you so. I will make sure you are remembered for all your failings for all eternity, should you die an ignoble death.”
With that final mocking sentence, the Harbinger of Eternity disappeared, making Ozkan dismiss the errant thoughtstream that had begun contemplating testing some of his Wargear on the egotistical nuisance. His metallic fingers tightened around his Tremorstave, and he took a moment to banish the simmering rage back to the corners of his core matrices. He could deal with that upstart overabundant ego later-
A rumble ran through the entire room, and an instant later, the shock wave reached Ozkan’s audio sensors. The sensor feed from the chamber bombarded him with alerts in the same instant, all but screaming about high-tier ordinance being employed, and the rapidly climbing levels of Empyrean energy radiation released by the hostile creatures. However, the alert that caught his eye was the one notifying him that two static Monoliths were out of operation for the foreseeable future, and that the bulkhead was now two metres thinner within a few-metre-wide circle.
After a moment of hesitation, he broke into a sprint, rushing over to the hidden balcony and leaning over the ledge to take in the rapidly deteriorating situation with his own sensors. What he saw made him grip the railing until it bent under his fingers, his advanced processing capabilities instantly identifying the new organisms that had taken to the field as faux-Tyranids. With the Suhbekhar Dynasty’s holdings being where they were, they’d been forced to contest what the humans have come to refer to as ‘Hive-Fleet Dagon’, even if the devouring swarm of aliens largely left the lifeless slumbering Tombworlds alone.
He’d made sure to acquire a human learned in the study of the many new alien species infesting the galaxy to spare himself the effort of having to study them each themselves. Of course, he couldn’t trust the expertise of these so-called human ‘magos biologis’ or ‘inquisitors’, but they were at the very least useful for pointing his own research towards prospective test subjects, even if he vowed to re-trod the entire path of research from the start once his goals were fulfilled. Oftentimes, a faulty initial preconception could mislead an entire line of research, but he didn’t have millennia to carefully examine every single species in the known galaxy.
He swiftly identified the source of the problem, or rather, sources. Bioforms he could identify thanks to the knowledge extracted from a human magos biologis held his focus. Biovores — mobile artillery units — in great numbers, joined by Exocrines, which were just massive bio-plasma cannons on legs. Behind them were the more vexing creatures, the ones that his sensors told him were drenched in Empyrean power.
Zoanthropes … no, these were slightly different. A memory tinged with great amusement popped back into his mind, of the tale the human magos told him of the Doom of Malan’tai. These were Neurothropes, creatures born of the progeny of the bioform that devoured the Infinity Circuit of an ancient Craftworld. Their most memorable ability was to syphon the lifeforce of living beings to augment their Empyrean powers, which usually wouldn’t be of much use against the unliving legions of the Necron … but these creatures were freely syphoning energy from their fellow faux-Tyranid bioforms. His exotic energy sensors were warning him that they were doing exactly that, presently pooling their Empyrean power together for a massive immaterial attack that they likely hoped would blow the bulkhead open like a battering ram. He did a round of calculations, then simulations, all in an instant and concluded that they would succeed if they could keep going for fifteen minutes.
Troublesome. It would seem he might be forced to use extreme measures after all. He would prefer to capture the progenitor organism, but the Regent was correct in that letting them break through here would be disastrous. He just had to find a way to unleash a fraction of his secret weapon’s power and focus it on the target.
He didn’t want to blow a hole into the side of the Hollow Sun, after all. He doubted his Phaeron would appreciate that when he finally came back to his senses.