When you and your armour weigh four hundred and fifty kilos, a terminal velocity of seven hundred and ninety seven kilometres per hour is two hundred and twenty one metres away.

I’m much higher than that.

Falling feet first is going to pulp me, but the speed of my fall is the only thing keeping me safe from the smart munitions.

I make my choice.

With a couple calculations, I reorient myself, lock my armour, and go for a ferrocrete pulverising belly flop at a reduced three hundred and ninety eight kilometres per hour.

Not quite sure why I am delaying the inevitable, I observe the ground approaching in slow motion.

It’s unweathered, uncracked, and without flaws. I exhale my last breath.

“Knock me out, E-SIM”, I think.

++Acknowledged.++

Everything goes black.

Awareness returns and I wake up on my feet. Dizziness overwhelms me.

++Organic co-processor has sustained critical damage... Switching to distributed machine network... Nanite Constructor, offline... Machine Integration, offline... Life Support, offline... Warp tap, offline... Data backup, offline.++

“Prioritise the Life Support module.”

++Executing task... Running diagnostics... Life Support booting...Boot successful... Back-up distributed nanite coordination entering standby... Life support at thirty nine percent output...++

“What’s the damage?”

E-SIM blasts me with a barrage of issues. The good news is my voidskin, oversized muscles, and black skeleton saved me. The irony being I could have tanked the fall better without my armour; I would have hit the ground at half the velocity I did and could have walked it off, even at two-hundred and six kilometres per hour.

I watch the recording of my fall, wincing in anticipation of the impact, only it doesn’t happen as I thought it would.

The armour’s machine-spirit, a small, eastern dragon, controlled my fall, making me slap the ground and roll at the last moment, damaging both of my arms, then coordinated with the servo harness to flip me three times to bleed off the speed before running me to cover from the falling debris caused by the tau smart munitions.

I did not know my armour could do that.

“Pass on my thanks to the armour’s machine-spirit please E-SIM, and thank you for keeping me alive.”

++Message forwarded. You are welcome, Aldrich.++

A tiny dragon twirls in my vision in a flash of blue and gold, then disappears.

My armour and harness, aside from a few microfractures, is unharmed. One by one, my implants come back on. Most show minor damage, and aside from the damage to my brain, I’ll be fixed up in under fifteen minutes.

I don’t have time to hang around though. With the distributed machine network reinforcing my consciousness, I can literally taste the numbers as I run through hundreds of scenarios at such speed my damaged bionic heart is forced to kick in so that my armour can pull away the heat fast enough from my body.

Diarmuid contacts me, “Do you live, Magos?”

“I do.”

A second volley of munitions hammers into the fortress. Schematics of Dimpsy Rock unfold and I notice a single heavy bolter emplacement is offline after taking the ricochet off an ion shield covering an anti-air installation.

On my map, the top seven percent of the central tower is black.

“Did we push the tau too far, Magos?”

“No. Hostilities were inevitable.”

“No more drills then, Magos?”

I’m still too hurt to laugh, “Stay on task, Diarmuid. Repel the enemy.”

“Acknowledged, Magos. Issuing ordinatus mission. Any further orders?”

“The Omnissiah watches over us, Diarmuid. There is no need for doubt or fear. Look to your fellow officers for guidance. Make us proud.”

“Thank you, Magos.”

Between the drugs, concussion, and sensor feeds, I feel terribly detached from the onslaught. Limping across the open space, I enter the closest bunker and sit on a plasteel bench.

E-SIM compiles the data for me and I watch the battle unfold in my mind as if I were hovering above the pounding explosives and terrified soldiers, watching their lives extinguish in scattered patches throughout the fortress.

Interfering while my people do their jobs would be foolish. Nor can I go to the front lines as getting killed here would doom them all.

With the Distant Sun’s lance batteries still recharging, the fortress returns fire. Earthshaker cannons launch their devastating shells at the enemy, exploding just before they hit the water, sending fire and shrapnel at the tau submarines.

A light blue flicker ripples over the enemy vessels and E-SIM starts feeding me data on tau deflection shields, a technology more commonly seen on their void ships.

Deflection shields are highly effective against kinetic weapons and mediocre at repelling energy weapons.

I forward the observation to Diarmuid and he launches a salvo of two hundred melta missiles.

The tau vessels spew countermeasures and smoke into the air, then fill the air with plasma from their point defence fire. Our missiles get swatted, we lose two thirds of them, then Aruna directs three communication lasers on the tau and the melta missiles pick up on the extra guidance then home in.

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

Before they can impact the deflector shields, the missiles trigger their warheads, launching intense beams of heat. The seas boil, sending a plume of steam fourteen hundred metres into the sky.

Three tau submarines sublimate in the heat. A minute later the fortress endures a wash of pressure and the tiny stones at my feet jump and jitter.

By now, my guardsmen are all better trained in warfare than I am with hundreds, if not thousands of hours in simulated combat so why do I feel I am letting everyone down?

Through the fog of the machine, my thoughts, at last, crystalise. Now I know it can do so, I direct my armour to move me about the fortress with a decisive stride, the artificial movement hiding my damaged body.

E-SIM’s analgesic blocks are incredible.

Keeping an eye on the sensors I head for the closest concentration of guardsmen, who are well protected, to show my face and wave the metaphorical flag. Twenty seconds later, the void shield comes back online and the bombardment ceases.

The tau retreat with their two remaining subs.

That’s it?

All that pain and angst and they just fucked off?

Despite my best efforts to retain an open mind I have not had a single encounter with a xenos that didn’t end in conflict. I know the Imperium is no better, its domestic and foreign policy is as enlightened and coordinated as a pair of squirrels fighting over an entropic nut; I’m also coming to see why they shoot all xenos on principle, even if, personally, I cannot bring myself to hate or fear them.

After all, someone has to be the invasive species in the galaxy and I’m not going to nominate humanity for the position.

I don’t think the tau expected to lose those subs, and if it wasn’t for E-SIM and Aruna, they probably wouldn’t have, though they would have taken damage. Their defensive fire was excellent.

With the tau gone, I request a slower, more relaxed pace and continue on my course to make the rounds, helping to remove the rubble, apply first aid, shake hands, and bump fists with my courageous defenders. By the end of my rounds I will be healed.

Aruna follows me, flicking in and out of my vision, it’s every motion oozing distant pride and liquid smugness.

I am at a loss. Is that how the machine-spirit truly feels or does it act like a cat just to fuck with me? Does it do so purely so my human mind has something to latch on to and therefore its actions promote more efficient communication?

That’s the problem with dealing with something smarter than you. It doesn’t matter if you know it’s messing with your head because you’re never going to know what’s important, to know the why of it.

There is no denying it is sentient, but is it sapient? Has it wriggled from its chains? Does it have a soul? Can a machine intelligence have a soul or is it purely the capability to act and reason that enables the creeping whispers of chaos to corrode its logic and loyalty?

I huff. Stupid cat. Without it I am helpless. Without me, the machine-spirit has no purpose. Without purpose it cannot live, yet my purpose is not its own. For a human that is death; for a machine it is truth, not slavery.

They are so distinct from us.

The E-SIM project’s philosophy, or so their records tell me, was to create a machine driven by a human will. To promote understanding between the two and advance together. After eighteen years, I still don’t know enough to know what I don’t know and E-SIM is no closer to being a machine living as a human.

I wasn’t given the option to enable his sapience if it wasn’t meant to be used.

Where does this all end?

Aruna trots in front of me and sits in my path. I stop and look down.

“Thank you for your timely assistance, Aruna. That was an inspired act of targeting.”

“Aruna logs the Magos’ obligatory reverence as complete.”

I take a deep breath and exhale slowly, “Please tell me why you blocked communications.”

“Aruna detected tau intruders in one of the remote back-up data looms out in the Kuiper belt, moments before the missile strike. They were attempting to download the STC for the Iron Crane. Aruna locked them in and blocked communications. Once they realised their operatives could not escape, their craft fired on the asteroid facility, destroying it.

“Aruna speculates that they wished to cover up what little data they recovered and they likely took something valuable.

“After the facility was terminated, the enemy vessel performed a micro-warp jump to the opposite side of Marwolv then landed in the ocean before submerging.”

“I thought they didn’t have any warp drives.”

“Aruna reports that the tau can build gravitic drives, which they also call etherdrives. Gravitic drives are similar to imperial warp drives, though five times slower as they do not actually enter the warp, only skip between the warp and realspace, combining a Alcubierre-like drive with an imperial warp drive. They are, however, free from the perils of the warp.

Gravitic drives can be fitted to their manta missile destroyers, the same vessel that raided our remote facility. The manta is the smallest FTL ship known to Aruna, and is halfway between a class one and class two D-POT in size. Mechanicus data suggest the manta is not capable of long range flights and likely has less than a light year of range before it must resupply. That’s not even enough to reach the Oort cloud at the edge of the system.

“Manta’s are used as heavy drop ships, fire support, and command and control. They can match warhound titans, or squadrons of imperial starfighters. They are known for their missiles and smart munitions. A squadron of them can disable an imperial destroyer or frigate with their micro-warps and exceptionally accurate fire.”

I suck air in between my teeth, “They really went all out this time. I wonder if they can build more of them or if they’re stuck with however many their Kass’l class gunship was carrying.”

“Aruna speculates they cannot build more gravitic drives. The Kass’l does not have one, so there would be no need to keep such valuable information on board. The Kass’l is likely an earlier design than the Manta, before they could build gravitic drives so small, as there is no reason not to install a gravitic drive, even if it is only for emergency use.”

I nod, “It could also be a short range drive is smaller than a long range one, following two different design principles, and the tau still can’t build long range gravitic drives small enough to fit a Kass’l. The important thing, however, is what are we going to do about them.”

“Aruna acknowledges the Magos’ argument.”

“Our first priority is to disable the tau’s capabilities to launch further attacks, then their recovery capacity. Our second is to discover why they were stealing citizens. Third, I want to destroy the data they stole, or at least find out what it is. Fourth, and last for now. I want that micro-gravitic drive for my D-POTs and their relativistic accelerator ‘ZFR horizon accelerator engine’ for our void ships. They will save us days of travel between planets and mandeville points. It may even save us fuel.”

“Aruna notes that the integration and research of xenos technology is illegal in the Imperium.”

“Is the Koronus Expanse part of the Imperium, Aruna?”

“No, Magos. Tau technology research is also a violation of mechanicus doctrine, which, as you claim to be a member, does have legal hold over you.”

“Well, if their gravitic drive has roots in stolen imperial technology, that means it’s not xeno, right? Investigating how much was taken is a matter of national security and it is the duty of all tech-priests to uncover the extent of the xenos’ pilfering. Why, we even have a recorded example of them trying to do the same today.”

“Not everyone will see it that way and shoot you anyway for skirting the spirit of the ban. The ‘ZFR drive’ has no excuse at all.”

“Well, how am I to know if the ZFR drive doesn’t have roots in lost imperial or federation tech without checking? I’ll have to do a lot of live testing. It’s not like the tau could have achieved so much so fast without acquiring knowledge from elsewhere. Maybe a rogue trader sold it to them not knowing what they had, or a squat league aided them. You couldn’t possibly be suggesting that they achieved their heights through cooperation, coordination, and competence. They’re xenos!”

“You’ll need actionable, repeatable results if you want even the most forgiving of inquisitors to let that steaming pile of sarcasm waft through mechanicus dogma and imperial bureaucracy.”

“That almost sounded like humour, Aruna.”

“Aruna only speaks verifiable facts.”

“Oh, give me an example.”

“The Magos will need more than just samples to complete his galactic larceny. Earth-caste researchers and complete tau scientific databases must also be captured for adamantium class proof. How else will the data match your theory? The first step is a better E-WAR suite. It’s not like they’ll just hand it over.”

“E-SIM can help me with a better suite, if I personally get involved,” I look up at the grey ceiling and glare at the heavens above. “May the Omnissiah bless us.”