"Again. Very carefully now, Galiel. We have not yet ascertained the device's behaviour upon destruction."

"Yes, Artisan."

Enginseer Galiel closed her eyes again, letting her consciousness flow along the interfaces linking her to the examination chamber. Within the hardened chamber, surrounded by sensors and precision instruments, lay one of the insectoid specimens recovered from the hulk. As she interfaced with the warded systems in the interior, Artisan Ouden's presence pushed urgently against her, shoring up her defensive barriers. Transmitting the proper authentication codes to her data-stacks brought the Xenologis libraries to the fore. She chose a rite of analysis; preliminary scans indicated the object parameters most closely matched the target-predictions of this method.

"Blessed Omnissiah, shield us from the impure alien. May their inferior comprehension never blight mine. What is human is holy. Even as I study the Xeno, may I abhor it."

She commanded the rite to execute, reams of data flashing across her info-space as her cogitators set to work, seeking patterns and insights that would unlock the mysteries of the machine. At the same time, she probed for the shining spark of sentience: a sign that the contraption was more than dead steel. A machine spirit.

She found it. Or rather, it found her. For such a small body, it was surprisingly complex and intelligent. And aggressive. It went after her presence immediately, sniffing the data-tracts like a bloodhound. There was no telling what it could do if it found her. Galiel softly canted a rite of obfuscation, rapidly spinning up anti-forensic djinns to cover her tracks. It was the digital equivalent of firing from the hip: crude, inaccurate, and eventually ineffective. But she had to hope it would be enough for her purpose.

With a twitch of her haptics on the control console, she edged one of the interfacing dataspikes forward to dock with the insect's shell. A new world of internal circuitry immediately spread out before her: a labyrinthine maze of logic gates, engrams, and interface drivers. Her data-form grew adaptive interfaces like wings as she soared through the energizing electric flow in the systems. There were traps to contend with here too: hard-coded security gates and hardware safety controls. She took the opportunity to run the most invasive analysers she could without drawing attention. Maybe the construction would match something in her libraries. There were more esoteric functions too: motive pathways she could not divine the nature of, systems that were entirely nonsensical to her, code-kernels that defied even her extensive lexicon of novabyte. These, she avoided on her travels, only collecting cursory snapshots to file away for study by the Divisio Xenologis research stations. Perhaps they could update her libraries, eventually. Some of the scans, however, were returning results. Worrying results.

This foray was another failure, in any case. She had reached the metaphorical centre of the data-stacks, where the central processing core would be. Here, however, only darkness reigned. Irretrievable corruption. She sighed and withdrew, terminating the link with the examination chamber.

"My apologies, Artisan. This specimen too has not remained intact."

"Are you certain you did not trigger any self-deletion programs?"

"Certain. My obfuscation rites were successfully able to interdict any defence mechanisms. The specimen arrived damaged."

"Like the others."

The sleek form Artisan Ouden now occupied unloaded a small binharic blurt, resembling a sigh. It looked no different from any of the lower-ranked adepts milling about in the myriad manufactorums and Laboratoriums of the Ark: significantly augmented, but with bulky, crude features, lacking the masterful sophistication with which Magi sculpted their bodies. But it differed in one key aspect. It was a drone: a dumb shell for the Artisan to utilize when quarters became too cramped, or actions too granular, for his true, blessed form. Even now, it was clearly visible through one of the large panes of transparent plasteel forming the facility's walls, humming softly in a low-power state. The bulk of Artisan Ouden's consciousness was here in the room with them.

He swiped at the data-slate he held. "Specimen twenty-three, denoted a failure. Fifty-three more remain."

"My cumulative analyses have revealed some aspects of the problem, Artisan." Galiel brought up the compiled data through the laboratorium's data-light prism with a thought. "The construction indeed bears evidence of alien engineering, as you had suspected, though about 43.2258% of the specimens presented are too esoteric even for the archives I have access to. I have requisitioned more sophisticated parsers from the Xenologis temples on Sanctus Ferrum, and sent them the sample data for more thorough study. Hopefully, they will uncover something. However, the other half of the puzzle is the more worrying."

"Elaborate, Enginseer Tunakha."

"The machines are also partially of human design, Artisan. Masterful design, at that. The machine spirits are bright and active, despite the central processing being missing. And it particularly bears the peculiarities of Sanctus Ferrum design, modified by some… influences I can't yet identify."

Ouden's form jerked, as if struck by a haywire pulse, even as his voice remained perfectly level. "Are you fully cognizant of what you are implying? That a Magos of Sanctus Ferrum would hole himself up in this hulk and combine his knowledge with foul xeno tech-heresy… And to what end? Any Techpriest possessing the requisite knowledge and clearances for such a feat would be kept under strict watch and, if my information remains accurate from my last inload two milliseconds ago, are all accounted for."

"Indeed, which is why we must consider a different perspective. Boreal's Wrath."

"The ship… it was built on Sanctus Ferrum."

"That is correct, and would mean—"

"That whoever our unknown opponent is has had time enough to study and assimilate our techniques of production, even if he does not any longer bear our world any allegiance, or indeed never did," Ouden finished. "These devices were created by someone who has extensively studied our engineering doctrine, presumably from this warship and possibly from many others among this conglomeration."

"And, given the level of sophistication, he has had a substantial amount of time to do so."

"An accurate appraisal. Your intuitive capabilities, Enginseer Galiel, are above expectations. I am pleased."

Even the simple, matter-of-fact nature of the praise could not stave off the blush rising to her cheeks. "I am unworthy, Artisan."

"If this one may demand your attention, Ouden."

Laboratorium Alpha-Secundus was technically under the command of Magos Hekaton-1, famed savant of the Divisio Psykana. But he had been more than happy to lend it to them for their experimentation; the high-security isolation chambers, meant to contain the taint of Chaos artifacts, were similarly well-suited to mind-controlling machine bugs. Clearly, however, he could no longer resist not offering his input. The curse of a scholarly mind.

The Magos himself was no more than a skull floating six feet off the ground, held aloft by sophisticated repulsor systems and crammed with enough sophisticated micro-augmetics and digital weapons to make an entire Glavian forge-fane blush. A fine dust of nanobots surrounded the pitch-black, bony core of his being, intelligently forming and dissipating a variety of specialized interfaces and apertures to deal with any situation. The highlight of his expertise, however, was the sturdy black rod protruding downwards from the skull's chin, glowing with techno-runes and sanctified wards. Eldritch security systems, to control and direct his charges: reinforced jars containing brain tissue, masterfully excised and altered, lazily rotating around the nullifying rod. Each was the functional strength of a high-grade psyker, hidden and trained to cultivate their power far from the roving eyes of those outside the Mechanicus. When they were harvested, each was a master of their own chosen psychic discipline, and now, ringed by failsafe systems and controllable warding, they served their benefactor, bringing forth the eldritch powers of the Empyrean at his beck and call. There was a good reason behind Magos Hekaton's previous posting on the Astronet project, though many priests, Galiel included, saw his work as skirting too close to heresy for comfort.

"Speak, Hekaton."

"This is taking an inordinate and, dare I say, suboptimal amount of time. Allow me to communicate with the machine spirit. I am sure to a micro-tolerant degree of probability that I will be able to coax the answers you desire from it."

Ouden sighed. "You have always been impatient. Magos Hekaton, we know too little about this device to risk unfiltered linkage with it. If it has any sort of unexpected failsafe, there could be… unnecessary consequences."

"My Cerebra Infernus are my filter, Ouden. If anything at all happens, it will happen to them. My linkage is only through a significant number of hexamathic gates, any of which can be air-gapped in less than a standard small-measurement chrono-unit."

"You are at the height of your career. Why do you take this risk? Ask one of your students to do it, at least."

"The quest for knowledge demands my personal attention. Besides…" One of his optical augmetics did a 360-degree swivel. "I don't trust them. They couldn't tell an alpha-grade's medulla from a blank's cerebrum."

Both Galiel and Ouden exhaled a small burst of static laughter.

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"Very well. I will allow it, Hekaton, but only on one condition. Your linkage to the machine will be through Enginseer Galiel and under her oversight. Her Xenologis libraries will assist your endeavours."

"I have no protest. Her work is well above satisfactory for her station. Are you equipped with the requisite Astronet nodes and libraries, Enginseer?"

"Yes, sir. I am fully capable of and trained in psychic communication and transmission."

"Acknowledged." Magos Hekaton's jars spun faster as he floated over to her, runes flashing and shifting on their surface. "Upcycling technomancy expression. Downregulating inhibitors. Brace for Empyrean manifestation."

One of the jars turned cloudy, injected with a foreign, inky liquid by one of his many apertures. Immediately, her psi-sensor array flared to life: psychic phenomena in the area. Heavy concentration of Warp energy.

"Waiting for Astronet connection to transmit. Prepare whatever countermeasures you have to."

Galiel took a deep breath through her respirator arrays. This was it. She plugged into the examination chamber once more, already drawing up extensive hexamathic wards. There was no telling what the passage of so much psychic power would do to her. It was technically within the Astronet tolerance ranges, but she knew all too well the 'harmless' embellishments and cherry-picked data that went into these calculations. No harm in being prepared, though she should have asked for an opportunity to stress-test the augmetics first. Stupid, stupid.

Once the connection was fully established, she entered the machine's systems again, spinning up as many shielding and suppression data-tapestries as she had in her. No rite of warding taught to her went unused, seamlessly interwoven into a gigantic net for any tricks the belligerent spirit might want to pull. Then she uplinked her own security systems through the Manifold, supervising the data-djinns spreading through the barriers as she personally tweaked their security packages with xenotech-specific countermeasures.

Ouden pressed into the Manifold again. "You will never be fully ready, Galiel. Think on your feet. This is your chance to earn a powerful ally. Do not waste it on a flesh-vice like anxiety."

She sighed and nodded. "Omnissiah protect me."

"He is always with you."

He was right. She had done enough. If anything happened from this point onwards, it was the Magos' responsibility. Now, time to let him in. She let her consciousness wander through her augmetics, searching, until she found the correct controller interface. The one that led to small pieces of foreign brain tissue implanted across her cranium, sealed in form-fitting plasteel computronium. Slivers of an astropath's being, skilled in the art of telepathy and able to link with others of its kind. A network of psychic communication. Astronet. With a thought, she fed it with power, feeling crackling bolts of motive force bring the dutiful micro-servitors that mediated the connections to life. The world dissolved, not into the familiar Noospheric data-scape, but into a shadowy, dark mirror of itself, interspersed with shifting tendrils of fog. Energy, leaking from micro-tears in the veil of reality. For a natural-born psyker, this realm would be a confused jumble of thoughts, images, and sensations, as their untrained minds jumped from person to person like an underhive whore. Magos Hekaton's work, and those of his colleagues, replaced years of training with electronic precision, micro-bursts of energy activating precisely those parts of the nodes which their possessors desired.

She saw Magos Hekaton floating right behind her, his psychic presence a roaring pillar of flame that far surpassed her own. It was extending a coded connection request. She reached out and authenticated. Their nodes crackled with energy as they joined, melding their networks together for data transfer. Only in this case, the data was Empyrean motes.

The energy charged through her systems, suffusing the secure pathways she had prepared as it headed straight for the insect. Her hexamathic warding strained with the force. For a terrible few seconds, they looked like they would break. If that happened, not even the finest Genetors aboard this vessel would be able to save her. Her brain would be charred worse than the time her father had first used a promethium grill. What would Val say, if he found her like that? A vegetable, or a corpse?

Thankfully, it held, and the technomancer's psychic spear stabbed straight into its target. His data-form rose in her vision, crackling with energy as he pinned the machine spirit in place and sang to it. Potent litanies of revealing wore down its defences, and even Galiel's own mental fortitude began to stagger, her augmetics drunkenly trying to exload detailed logs to Hekaton. She played whack-a-mole with the directives, countermanding them with speed, but it was undeniable that he was skilled: she wanted to break. She wanted to tell him everything, about Val, about her confusion with some concepts, about how much she loved and how much she hated in the Cult, about her ideas on machine lore. With much difficulty, Galiel fought the warm, fuzzy feeling of safety. Redouble the warding. Use the Astronet filters. Stay sharp. Stay true. The Omnissiah demanded perfection.

Slowly, just as she was beginning to believe they had failed again, a steady flow of data emerged, quickly widening to a veritable torrent as the machine spirit finally broke under the Magos' assault. She roused her cogitators from their self-repair sleep, muttering soft apologies to the irate spirits as she set them to work again. Collect. Collate. Analyse. Infer. Though the central processing core was gone, the data was never truly deleted. The machine spirit knew all that occurred in its form, though it usually kept its secrets close. Only those initiated into the Mechanicus' deepest mysteries knew how to coax even spirits to forgetfulness. The creator of these devices, evidently, was not one of them.

Yes, it was all here. She converted the data into ad-hoc reports, firing them off through the ship's data networks for more specialized analysis. She felt Ouden link into the data-sphere, plucking a copy for himself. Galiel cursed herself silently. It was a breach of protocol to not show the reports to the supervising Magi first.

"Enginseer, assist!"

Magos Hekaton's urgent command drew her attention back to the examination chamber's data-flow. The machine spirit had inexplicably regained its belligerence, struggling against his grip even as hidden security subroutines activated. A veritable tide of security djinns and digi-viruses threw themselves against her defensive barricades. She forced a calming chem-agent into her bloodstream with a thought. She had anticipated this.

"Magos, please keep the spirit subdued. I will clear a path for your retreat."

"To the best of my ability."

With a moment taken to collect herself, Galiel leapt into the fray, interfacing with her defensive network. Her override codes immediately overwhelmed the relatively primitive self-direction on the djinns. They awaited orders. She drew deep into her Xenologis archives, letting viruses into her systems in a controlled fashion. Tantalizing streams of information led them straight into sandboxes and quarantines. There, adaptive security programs tore them limb from limb, consuming code fragments for their analysis rites. She spooled their output through her data-sec code generators, letting pre-programmed logic prepare blow-by-blow orders for her own forces. The core workflow established, she let herself split into fragments, each part of her consciousness mediating auto-assembly code-stacks that generated digi-weapons perfected by the Divisio Xenologis over millennia of research.

Each was the equivalent of an Ordinatus in the digital realm: a custom-made weapon to obliterate a specific type of enemy. Some, she directed against snapping hordes of self-replicating overflow programs, and destructive buffer systems decimated their numbers wholesale. Others went after hardened, high-quality targets, apocalyptic kill-codes and adaptive purges scouring their prey with lethal precision. Yet others targeted the master programs directing the enemy assault, interdicting their control directives with scramblers, noisemakers, and spoofers.

Slowly but surely, a path began to clear. She let a part of herself man the chamber's own systems, using dataspikes and lasers to physically destroy security processors and data-stacks. She wanted nothing more than to trigger the eradication systems and end this once and for all, but Magos Hekaton's psychic presence was still in the device. The potential for hardware damage from the psychic backlash was catastrophic. Even if he survived, even if he was outwardly thankful, in secret he would hate her for trying to damage his blessed steel. And his hate was a dangerous thing to incur.

After a few seconds stretched into eternity, a way was open. The Magos, to his credit, immediately noticed, beating a fighting retreat back into her systems and then across the Astronet to his own body. As soon as he was clear, she triggered the eradicator rays, coruscating blasts of energy dissolving the specimen instantly. A final blow from the corrupted machine spirit was caught by her techsorcist systems, redirected into a hopeless labyrinth of hexamathic code to dissolve.

The Magos' Cerebra Infernus spun down, their psychic power dissolving into thin air. Her psi-sensors finally calmed down again, their weary spirits settling into a restful sleep. He sent her a request to terminate the Astronet link, which she complied with immediately. Her vision collapsed back into realspace as the nodes calmed down, their psychic powers stilled by the withdrawal of energy. Her systems automatically diverted bio-gels to the plasteel capsules. There were stress micro-injuries that needed fixing after each use, though the process had become far safer than the first few prototypes.

After a moment to collect himself, Magos Hekaton spoke, using a synthesized flesh-voice to show his respect. "You have my thanks for your illustrious aid, Enginseer Galiel. Artisan Ouden has been incredibly fortunate to have found a protégé like you."

She bowed her head, reciprocating with her own flesh-voice. "I am unworthy of your words."

"Omnissiah's blessing go with you. I will not forget this, Ouden."

"You always do word your gratitude in the most sinister way possible, Hekaton." Nevertheless, Ouden's voice radiated a deep pride.

"When the time comes for your elevation to our ranks, you will have my support. Of that, I am certain. But now our time grows short. The data recovered…"

Galiel nodded. "It wasn't mind control. At least, not like we thought. That's why all of the hostiles the Skitarii are facing retain their unique mannerisms. It does not puppet them."

"No." Ouden scratched his metal chin. How his drones still regained that habit when his actual body was not anything close to humanoid, she could never figure out. "It is a slow hypno-indoctrination device. It plugs directly into the user's thought processes and uses long-duration subliminal messaging, sensory manipulation, and memetic assault to eventually turn the target into a willing servant."

"Very advanced construction, to be able to seamlessly interface with so many different types of nervous systems. Human, Astartes, T'au, Orks. We have encountered all manners of species so far, if the reports are accurate." Magos Hekaton's nanobot cloud shimmered like sand, pulsing in tune with his thoughts. "I wonder if it would work on our cybernetic systems as well."

"Hopefully not, with our memetic hardening. Nevertheless, Galiel, order all the adepts to treat them with the utmost care."

"Yes, Art—"

A tell-tale hiss of a containment seal being disengaged stopped them all dead in their tracks. One of the more curious adepts under Magos Hekaton had taken one of the specimens out of its transport container, and was now holding it uncomfortably close to his optics. Not a very long way from his cranium and nape.

Her hair stood on end as she almost tangibly felt the massive rush of power to Magos Hekaton's augmetics systems. He was probably preparing a long list of expletives to scream at the top of his lungs. Before he could, though, the device came to life. Unexpectedly, it did not attack its captor, intelligently skittering off his palm and to the floor before beelining for one of the narrow maintenance ducts leading out of the laboratorium. That was not good. Commotion erupted as the adepts all lashed out with their mechadendrites, trying to grab the insect, but it weaved between them with uncharacteristic intelligence, continuing on its inexorable path. A moment later, a precision las-shot incinerated it.

The Magos' skull closed the hatch containing a small battery of digital weapons. "What did I tell you about my students, Ouden?"

The Artisan sighed. "I think it is best we moved our experiments to a more secluded facility henceforth."

Galiel could only nod frantically in agreement.