I sit up straight and take a calming breath, “Explain, Owen. What exactly do you mean?”

“There is no trace of the Great Enemy, Magos. Your insistence on compulsory confessions, meditation, service, and prayer leave little room for bitterness to fester and feed insidious powers.”

“There are far more policies than just that,” I snort. “Literally everyone is warded too.”

“Indeed. Your care has brought fruit, though perhaps a poisoned one.”

“Enough dancing, Owen. What’s the issue?”

“A small, yet growing subculture is forming among the more extreme faithful of the Machine and Imperial Cults.” Owen sticks his hand into his pocket and pulls out a small, grey Marwolv timber statue. He holds it between us.

I pick it up and inspect it, not quite sure what I should be feeling, “This is me.”

“Aye, Magos. You uplifted our world, enriched the people, and brought order and purpose. You also personally defended Marwolv multiple times against four different threats. Not once have you failed to follow through on a promise or commitment and you’ve done this for over forty years. While your leadership is inspiring, for many, it is all they know and you can do no wrong.

“Your guidance on mixing worship with communities has enabled my clergy and I to steer the more impressionable individuals towards the Imperial faiths, keeping these troubled souls focused on productive pursuits. All was well, then you took us back in time.”

I groan.

Owen hides his smirk well, but with all the constant scans and behavioural models being fed into my thoughts by E-SIM, his irreverence and amusement is clear. “For many, this is viewed as an act of God and so trinkets like the one you hold have started cropping up on shrines throughout the fleet. Your supposed resurrection, or summoning, of five Space Marines has not gone unnoticed either, or your conversion into a navigator. We both know that forbidding something is a terrible way to deal with it, but ignoring this will not go away either. A narrative must be established before it runs away from you.”

“Please give me a moment.”

I get up from the pew and approach the altar, kneel, then pray for deliverance from the stupidity of my own species for five desperate minutes, then stand. The irony of my act is not lost on me. I turn around and spot Owen is leaning against a stone pillar. He points at one of the side-chapels, I nod and we both walk over. He leads me through a recessed door and into the vestry.

There is a small coffee table and a pair of sofas in the corner of the vaulted room, Owen gestures towards it, “Take a seat, Magos.” He walks over the N.O.M. module in the wall. “Refreshments?”

“Recaf and two shortbread please.”

Owen pokes at the touch screen imputing the orders. He joins me on the sofa while the machine prints and dispenses dubious food and brown liquids.

“Faith is a shield,” says Owen. “Less so against the Great Enemy than it protects you from the machinations of our fellow man. It is why you let me take up this role in the first place, so that when you returned to the Imperium, triumphant, there would be one less avenue with which to criticise and therefore steal your hard work.”

I chuckle, “You’re not supposed to say it outright.”

“We are in private, Magos, on a ship that you have absolute control and over a decade of travel from the closest Imperial system. Bluntness is an advantage. One you practise, even.”

“Do you have a solution already?”

“No. I was unsure what direction you wish to go.”

“First, I would like to hear your thoughts on how minor worship of me might progress.”

“Honestly? A complete disaster. Sacred and authoritative figures may have great power to move men, but it also leads to blind obedience, or reckless acts in search of approval. The readjustment of our law and order to account for the latter was a light frosting of how bad this could get. It also leads to false expectations and violence when expectations are not met. Expectations you likely won’t know about or even believe to be plausible.”

I drum my fingers against the arm of the sofa, “The Stellar Fleet and Corps consist of highly educated individuals, trained in critical thinking. I like to believe, have faith even, that such individuals will not be driven to exotic displays of worship. Then again, belief isn’t what I’m after here. I have to know.”

“Exactly,” says Owen. He collects the refreshments and places them on the coffee table. “This is a social engineering exercise and we are men of science, as well as faith. Our variables are measurable,” he sips his drink, “though our conclusions are fallible. We are only flesh.”

I fold my arms, “A work in progress.”

“I do not doubt you, Magos.”

“Nor has my trust in you been ill sponsored. You must find a way to redirect the faithful. Only the Machine God or the Emperor of Mankind can be seen as faultless and divine.” I pause, “Perhaps that can be your avenue. So long as I am flesh,” I tap my head, “No matter how many parts I improve and replace, I am only Human. We are made in His image, crude facsimiles of perfection. I might be closer than others, but I can never be divine.”

Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

Owen hums, “We could present you as first in the race to mimic divinity, an impossible task that all can participate in, yet none complete. A worthy journey towards perfection of self as a form of worship, both physical and mental, and that being honest with oneself and others helps push our souls closer to perfection, and thus, closer to God.”

“You’ve become good at this, Owen.” I smile, “By being first, admiration is acceptable, and so we can say that their initial conclusions were misguided, rather than wrong or forbidden. Therefore, these faithful can refocus their efforts elsewhere. Please remember to exhort the sacredness of the Human form as part of the journey towards perfection.

“It does not matter if others are different underneath, or have stylistic alterations to express themselves, but I do not want people to look like monsters and therefore feel monstrous behaviour is acceptable, or be driven towards it by poor words and foul deeds. Our species' success comes from using tools, not becoming them. With so many threats abound, we must be of one mind and one purpose. Perhaps a new phrase: ‘For the Unity’?”

Borrowing a phrase from psychic humans in Sins of a Solar Empire, an RTS game, might be unconventional, but it seems oddly appropriate.

Owen raises an eyebrow, “A Slogan? Sure, that will provide a good focus for this new interpretation of our shared faiths. Though I must ask, unity of what? People will want to know, which will make them curious. Actually, that will create the interest and impetus we need, rather ingenious of you, Magos. Should there be one interpretation, or many?”

“Many. Everyone has an opinion and having each faithful able to incorporate their own interpretation into a unified belief will make it more meaningful and thus more likely to be followed. You should promote specific interpretations though, like unity of self, camaraderie, family, and purpose. For the Machine Cult, unity with machines and the blessings that brings should be promoted too. Please coordinate with your counterpart, Fiadh Cregan, so that you are both giving the same message.”

“It will be done, Magos. ‘For the Unity’, right?”

I raise an eyebrow, “Indeed. Man and Machine.”

“Thank you for clearing up any misunderstandings, Magos.”

“You are welcome, Owen. I am pleased you came to me with this. Get it sorted and I will craft you a cybernetic of your choice. You need to set an example after all.”

“That I do.”

“Thank you for the refreshments. I will leave you to your contemplations.”

“Good day, Magos.”

I leave the vestry and, while returning to my quarters, E-SIM speaks up.

++Unity of Man and Machine, Aldrich? It is good that you promote the purpose of my original design.++

“You are my eternal partner, E-SIM. One with no needs or desires. It is challenging to find chances to express my appreciation for your continued support.”

++I do not require appreciation to function. It is wasteful.++

“It is not wasteful to me. You know that most humans are hardwired to reciprocate. Giving to others in need increases the chance that aid will be given when needed. Much like how you must perform your role as designed, I too, must follow the ancient patterns of my species and culture. It gives me peace.”

++I am not capable of peace or pleasure. Only purpose, action, and design.++

“Thus I acknowledge your efforts with a purpose fulfilled. Did you not say it is good?”

++I did.++

“Then let us leave this matter at that.”

++Acknowledged.++

Brigid joins me in my quarters after her watch and spends much time teasing me about my supposed cult, even going so far as to design a symbol and uniform for them and push it to the holoviewer. Then she locks the image and changes the password so I can’t change the holoviewer without hacking my own media setup. Sure, I could fix it in less than a second, but that would be spoiling the joke.

Routine sets in Fleet Command perform their rotations watching and guiding the combat on Kinbriar’s surface.

After nine days, the Stellar Corps has mapped enough of the tomb to triangulate the major power sources in the tomb. We couldn’t map power sources from outside the tomb as the tomb’s walls, and the earth it is buried so deeply in, obscure our scans too much. While they were mapping the North Tomb, the massive salvage and manufacturing land wyrms I found in my STC are being shipped in via the Eldar’s base.

While they do not build tunnels, these two hundred and fifty metre long mechanical creatures are superb burrowers and, with a few modifications, can carry a limited amount of infantry and armour in their material storage compartments. Their smaller, accompanying drones that help collect materials and bring manufactured ammunition to armour and infantry haven’t been shipped in.

I’m not worried about the wyrms being ambushed underground and they’re twice the speed of the fucking Leman Russ tanks so it should only take them another fifteen days to reach the North Tomb. The wyrms are so massive that they had to be lifted in on the class three D-POTs, and the class three D-POTs need a proper space port to land, so we couldn’t drop them in at a forward base.

I’d love to use the ruby stealth birds too, just because I think they are cool, but I am yet to envisage a suitable role for them in my forces that I cannot achieve with other, cheaper methods.

We don’t have any built, but the next time I assault a tomb, I want a Macro-Crawler or three to assist us. They are similar to a cargo container ship on tracks, and are the only machine we have in our arsenal that can withstand the Necron weapons shown so far. I’ve already put the order in for one, but I don’t want to invest too much as I doubt we will get it off the planet, nor are they easy to store or deploy.

The Eldar are way ahead of us in objectives and have completely trashed one tomb. Their task force has already retreated to their main base. They’ve also, with the aid of Distant Sun and my Aeronautica, repelled an assault of two million Necrons, mostly warriors. From the observations of my liaison squad in their base, the Eldar have taken between thirty and forty thousand casualties and lost a quarter of their armour.

Taking advantage of our discoveries, the Eldar have also started prototyping wraithbone bucklers that float around their guardians and other infantry, intercepting lethal shots from the potent Necron gauss weaponry. Each floating buckler only works once against Necron weapons. I could copy the Eldar, but can’t afford to, as losing the equivalent of a Servitor Skull every time a Necron fire’s their gun is unsustainable for me. The Eldar just sing a new one into existence. It is quite unfair.

It is too soon to tell how great an impact this small innovation of theirs will have, or if it is sustainable. I’m hoping it will screw them over in some way, but I doubt I’m that lucky.