It was neither the biggest, nor most impressive of the atolls that had been identified, but the more the pattern was studied, the more obvious its importance became. Strategic advisors theorised that it was perhaps a seat of what passed for government on Laeran, but when the pattern was revealed to the primarch, he immediately saw its true purpose.
It was not a place of governance: it was a place of worship.
Icy fluorescent lights bathed the apothecarion of the Pride of the Emperor in a bright glare that reflected dazzlingly from glass cabinets and gleaming, steel bowls containing surgical instruments or bloody organs. Apothecary Fabius directed his menials as they wheeled a heavy gurney bearing the corpse of a Laer warrior from the chill of the temperature controlled mortuary cabinets.
Fabius kept his long white hair, the mirror of the primarch's, tied in a severe scalp lock, accentuating the sharpness of his features and the coldness of his dark eyes. His movements were curt, their exactness reflecting his intensity and the precision of his methodology. His armour stood upon a rack in his arming chamber and thus he was dressed in his red surgical robes and a heavy rubberised apron smeared with dark alien blood.
Wisps of cold air rose from the body, and he nodded in satisfaction as the menials halted the gurney next to the stone autopsy slab upon which lay another Laer warrior, fresh from the battlefield. This specimen had been killed by a shot to the head and so the majority of its body was largely undamaged - at least from the fighting. Its flesh was still warm to the touch and it stank with the oily stench of its secretions. Reams of data scrolled on hololithic panes suspended on thin cables from the ceiling, projecting ghostly, crawling images around the bare, antiseptic walls.
Fabius had been working on this warm body for the last few hours and the fruits of his labours had been singular. He had removed the alien's innards, its organs displayed like trophies on silver trays that surrounded the mortuary slab. The suspicion that had been forming in his mind since the assault on Atoll 19 had been confirmed and, armed with this information, he had sent word to Lord Fulgrim of his findings.
The primarch stood at the entrance to the apothecarion, the halberd-armed Phoenix Guard standing a respectful distance behind the lord of the Emperor's Children. Though the white-tiled apothecarion was spacious and high-ceilinged, it felt cramped with the primarch here, such was his presence. Fulgrim had come directly from the fighting, still clad in his purple battle plate, the blood still singing in his veins from the fierce melee. The war was entering its third week and there had been no let up in the fighting, each battle pushing the Laer from their various atolls towards the one the primarch had identified as a place of worship.
'This had better be good, Apothecary,' said Fulgrim. 'I have a world to win.'
Fabius nodded and leaned over the cooled corpse, a scalpel blade sliding from his narthecium gauntlet and slicing through the stitching that held the incisions on its chest closed. He pulled the thick flaps of skin and muscle back to reveal its interior, affixing clamps to hold them open. Fabius smiled as he saw the insides of the Laer warrior, again admiring the perfect arrangement of organs that had made it such a fearsome killing machine.
'It is, my lord,' promised Fabius. 'I've never imagined anything like it, and nor, I suspect, has anyone else for that matter, save the more extreme genetic theorists of Terra.'
'Anything like what?' demanded Fulgrim. 'Do not try my patience with riddles, Apothecary.'
'It's fascinating, my lord, quite fascinating,' said Fabius, standing between the two Laer corpses. 'I have performed genetic analyses of both these specimens and have found much that may be of interest.'
'All that interests me about these creatures is how they die,' said Fulgrim, and Fabius knew that he had better reach his point quickly. The pressures of leading such an intensive campaign personally were demanding, even for a primarch.
'Indeed, my lord, indeed,' said Fabius, 'but I believe you may be interested in how these specimens lived. From the researches I have undertaken, it appears that the Laer are not so dissimilar to us in their approaches to perfection.'
Fabius indicated the opened chest cavities of the Laer warriors and said, 'Take these two specimens. They are genetically identical in the sense that they are from the same gene-strand, but their internal workings have been modified.'
'Modified?' asked Fulgrim. 'For what purpose?'
'To better adapt them for the role they were to fulfil in Laer society, I should imagine,' replied Fabius. 'They are quite marvellous specimens, genetically and chemically altered from birth to perfectly fulfil a predetermined role. This one, for example, is clearly a warrior, its central nervous system designed to operate at a much higher level of functionality than the envoys we captured at the outset of the war, and do you see these glands here?'
Fulgrim leaned close to the corpse, his nose wrinkling in disgust at the alien stench of it. 'What do they do?'
'These are designed to release a compound onto the Laer's carapace, which forms a toughened "scab" over areas damaged in combat. In effect, these organs are a biological self-repairing function that can patch up damage within moments of it occurring. We are lucky that Captain Demeter was able to kill it so cleanly with a head shot.'
'Do all the Laer have these organs?' asked Fulgrim.
Fabius shook his head, indicating the scrolling data on the hololithic plates. Images of dissected Laer flashed up, and flickering projections of various alien organs rotated in the air above the corpses.
'No, they do not,' explained Fabius, 'and that is what makes them so fascinating. Each Laer is altered from birth to perfectly achieve the purpose for which it is designed, be it a warrior, a scout, a diplomat or even an artist. Some of the earliest envoys we apprehended had enlarged ocular cavities to better capture light, others had enhanced speech centres of the brain, while yet others had been designed for strength and endurance, perhaps to better function as labourers.'
Fulgrim watched the data on the plates, absorbing the information at a speed beyond that of any mortal man. 'They move towards their own perfection.'
'Indeed, my lord,' said Fabius. 'To the Laer, altering their physical makeup is simply the first step on the road to perfection.'
'You believe the Laer to be perfect, Fabius?' asked Fulgrim, a note of warning in his voice. 'Be careful what you say. To compare these xeno creatures to the work of the Emperor would be unwise.'
'No, no,' said Fabius hurriedly. 'What the Emperor has made of us is incredible, but what if it was but the first step on a longer road? We are the Emperor's Children, and like children, we must learn to walk on our own and take our own steps forward. What if we were to look upon our flesh and find new ways to improve upon it and bring it closer to perfection?'
'Improve upon it!' said Fulgrim, towering over Fabius. 'I could have you killed for saying such things, Apothecary!'
'My lord,' said Fabius quickly, 'our purpose for living is to find perfection in all things, and that means we must put aside any notions of squeamishness or reverence that limit us in finding it.'
'What the Emperor crafted in us is perfect,' stated Fulgrim.
'Is it really?' asked Fabius, amazed at his own hubris in questioning the miraculous work that had gone into his own enhancement. 'Our beloved Legion was almost destroyed at its very birth, remember? An accident destroyed nearly all the gene-seed that went into our creation, but what if it was imperfection rather than an accident that brought about such a terrible thing?'
'I remember my own history,' snapped Fulgrim. 'By the time my father first brought me to Terra, barely two hundred warriors were all the Legion could muster.'
'And do you remember what the Emperor told you when you learned of the accident?'
'I do, Apothecary,' said Fulgrim. 'My father said that it was best to have failure happen early in life, for it would awake the phoenix bird within me so that I would rise from the ashes.'
Fulgrim stared at him, and he felt the power and anger in his lord's
eyes as he remembered the anguish of those long ago days, knowing that he played a dangerous game. He may very well have signed his death warrant by speaking so frankly, but the possibilities that might be opened up were worth any risk. To attempt to unlock the secrets of the Emperor's work in creating the Astartes would be the greatest undertaking of his life. If such a thing was not worth a little risk, then what was?
Fulgrim turned to the warriors of the Phoenix Guard and said, 'Leave us. Wait outside for me and do not return until I summon you.'
Even though their master was aboard his flagship, Fabius could see that the primarch's bodyguards were uneasy about leaving their charge without their protection, but they nodded and made their way from the apothecarion.
When they had gone and the door had shut behind them, Fulgrim turned to Fabius. The primarch's eyes were thoughtful and he glanced between the corpses and Fabius, though what thoughts filled his head were as alien to Fabius as those of the Laer.
'You believe you can enhance the gene-seed of the Astartes?' asked Fulgrim.
'I do not know for certain,' said Fabius, struggling to contain his elation, 'but I believe we have to at least try. It may be that it will prove to be fruitless, but if it is not…'
'We would move closer to perfection,' said Fulgrim.
'And only by imperfection can we fail the Emperor,' said Fabius.
Fulgrim nodded and said, 'You may proceed, Apothecary. Do what must be done.'
The Brotherhood of the Phoenix met by firelight in the Heliopolis, arriving in ones and twos as they passed through the great bronze portal and took their seats around a wide, circular table placed at the centre of the dark floor. Reflected light from the ceiling bathed the table in light and crackling orange flames burned in a brazier set into the surface of the table's centre. The high-backed chairs of black wood were equally spaced around the table, half of them occupied by cloaked warriors of the Emperor's Children. Their armour shone, but each plate was battered and had clearly seen better days.
Solomon Demeter watched Julius Kaesoron and Marius Vairosean pass the Phoenix Gate, and the remainder of the Legion's captains that were not currently in battle filed in after them. Solomon could feel their weariness and nodded to them as they sat to either side of him, grateful to see that his friends had returned safely from yet another gruelling tour of duty on the planet below.
The cleansing of Laeran had been tough on them all. Fully three-quarters of the Legion's strength was in the field at any one time and there was little chance for respite in such a demanding war. No sooner had each company's warriors returned to the fleet for re-supply than they were sent into battle once more.
Lord Fulgrim's plan was audacious and brilliant, but left little room for rest and recuperation. Even the normally indefatigable Marius looked exhausted.
'How many?' asked Solomon, already fearing the answer.
'Eleven dead,' said Marius. 'Though I fear another may die before the day is out.'
'Seven,' sighed Julius. 'What about you?'
'Eight,' said Solomon. 'By the fire, this is brutal. And the others will have suffered a similar fate.'
'If not worse,' said Julius. 'Our companies are the best.'
Solomon nodded, knowing that Julius was not boasting, for such a thing was unknown to him, but simply stating a fact.
'New blood too,' he said, seeing two faces around the table that were new to the Brotherhood of the Phoenix. They bore the rank insignia of captain on their shoulder guards, the paint probably not even dry yet.
'Casualties are not confined to the rank and file warriors of the Legion,' said Marius. 'Good leaders must necessarily put themselves in harm's way to inspire the men they lead.'
'You don't need to quote the book to me, Marius,' said Solomon. 'I was there when they wrote that part. I practically invented going up the centre.'
'Did you also invent the concept of being the luckiest bastard alive?' cut in Julius. 'I've lost count of the number of times you ought to have been killed.'
Solomon smiled, pleased to see that the war on Laeran had not crushed everyone's spirits. 'Ah, Julius, the gods of battle love me and they wouldn't see me dead on this piss-poor excuse for a planet.'
'Don't say such things,' cautioned Marius.
'What things?'
'Talking of gods and the like,' said the captain of the Third. 'It is not seemly.'
'Ah, don't get upset, Marius,' smiled Solomon, clapping a hand on his friend's shoulder guard. 'There's only one god of battle around this table and I'm sitting next to him.'
Marius shrugged off his hand and said, 'Don't mock me, Solomon. I'm serious.'
'Don't I know it,' said Solomon, a hurt look on his face. 'You need to lighten up a little, my friend. We can't go around with grim faces all the time, can we?'
'War is a grim business, Solomon,' said Marius. 'Good men die and we are responsible for bringing them back alive. Each death lessens us and you would make jokes about it?'
'I don't think that's what Solomon meant,' began Julius, but Marius cut him off.
'Don't defend him, Julius, he knows what he said and I am heartsick of hearing him run his mouth while brave warriors are dying.'
Solomon was stung by Marius's words, and he felt his choler rising at the insult in his friend's words. He leaned close to Marius and said, 'I would never dream of making light of the fact that men are dying, but I know that a great many more would not come back alive if not for me. We all deal with war in different ways and if my way offends you then I am sorry, but I am who I am and I will change for no man.'
Solomon stared at Marius, practically daring him to prolong the unexpected argument, but his fellow captain shook his head and said, 'I am sorry, my friend. All this fighting has left me bellicose and I seek to find cause to vent my anger.'
'It's fine,' said Solomon, his anger draining away in an instant. 'You're so by the book that I can't help needling you from time to time, even when I know I shouldn't. I'm sorry.'
Marius offered his hand, which Solomon took, and said, 'War makes fools of us all, when never more are we required to maintain our standards.'
Solomon nodded and said, 'You're right, but I don't know any other way to be. I let Julius take care of the culture side of things. Speaking of which, how is that little stable of remembrancers you've been cultivating? Any new busts or portraits of you yet? I swear, Marius, soon you won't be able to turn a corner without seeing his face in a painting or carved in marble.'
'Just because you're too ugly to be immortalised in art doesn't mean that I shouldn't be,' grinned Julius, well used to Solomon's friendly barbs. 'And it's hardly a stable. Mistress Kynska's music is wondrous and yes, I hope to be the subject of a painting by Serena d'Angelus. Perfection exists in all things, my friends, not just war.'
'Ego this big…' chuckled Solomon, spreading his arms wide as the Phoenix Gate opened once more and Fulgrim entered, fully armoured and robed in a great cloak of feathers the colour of fire. The effect was magnificent, all conversation around the table ceasing in an instant as the Astartes gazed in awe at their beloved leader.
The assembled warriors stood and bowed their heads as the Primarch of the Emperor's Children took his place at the table. As always, Eidolon and Vespasian flanked the primarch, their armour similarly wreathed in cloaks of feathers. Each carried a staff topped with a small brazier of black iron that burned with a red flame.
Though the circular table was, in theory, supposed to do away with rank and position, there was no doubting who the master of this gathering was. Other Legions might have a more informal setting for their warrior lodges, but the Emperor's Children thrived on tradition and ritual, for in repetition came perfection.
'Brothers of the Phoenix,' said Fulgrim, 'in the fire I welcome you.'
Bequa Kynska sat at the wide desk of her stateroom aboard the Pride of the Emperor and stared at the blue world below her through the brass rimmed viewport. Though the scene was beautiful, she hardly saw it, still
fuming over the blank pages of music before her and the rejection of Ostian Delafour.
Though the boy was plain and unassuming, with no great physical attributes to recommend him over the lovers she had taken over the years, he was young, and Bequa craved the adoration of the young above all else. They had such innocence, and to corrupt that with the bitterness of age and experience was one of the few pleasures left to her. Since her earliest years, Bequa had been able to have any man or woman she desired. Nothing had been beyond her. To be denied something now, when she had the opportunity to achieve the incredible, was supremely frustrating.
Her anger at Ostian's refusal of her advances gnawed at her and she swore a silent oath that he would pay for such effrontery.
No one rejected Bequa Kynska!
She placed her fingertips on her temple and gently circled them in an attempt to ease the headache she could feel building behind her eyes. The smooth, artificial texture of the skin felt cold to her and she dropped her hands to the desk. Surgical augmentations had kept the worst effects of her age from becoming visible, but although she was still considered beautiful, it was only a matter of time before human artifice would not be able to disguise the ravages of ageing.
She picked up the quill from the desk and her hand hovered over the page of musical staves, though each line was infuriatingly blank. She had spread the word that she was to compose a new triumphal symphony for the Lord Fulgrim, but thus far she had not put so much as a single note in the ledger.
Being selected to join the Remembrancer Order had been a great, if altogether expected honour, for who else could compete with Bequa Kynska's musical talents? It was a natural progression from her time at the Conservatoire de Musique, and the potential for new horizons and new conquests seemed limitless. In truth the spires of Terra had grown stale for Bequa, the same faces and the same platitudes heaped upon her, now ashen and tasteless after so long. What was new for her on Terra now that she had sampled every carnal and narcotic pleasure that her money could buy? What new sensations did a bleak, empty world like Terra have to offer a libertine of her epicurean palate?
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