Industrial Zone 0267
Industrial world of Garetius Secundus, Garetian Sector
Segmentum Ultima, third century, M36

The horde of gretchin pressed against the short wall and began trying to cross it. Everywhere their unarmoured green skins and short bodies were met with knives and axes. The squats were dour in their manner as they faced the never ending onslaught. They had long since emptied their magazines trying to kill all the runtherds who drove the gretchin onward and were now forced to chop and hack at the horde. Still the gretchin kept coming.

"Watch yerselves!" screamed one of the squats, obviously a leader of some sort. "Keep choppin' and throw their bodies back on top of 'em." He and the other squats were not heavily armoured and it was apparent war had come upon them while attending other duties. But, they still had their axes and laser torches. They were squats and gretchin were greenskins. Orkoids. Nothing made the squats fight harder or with more fury. But, it wasn't enough.

Suddenly, an enormous boot stepped atop the wall beside the squat leader. But, the squat did not falter from surprise in his hacking of the enemy. He took heart instead. The boot was attached to an enormous cybernetic leg encased in armour. Atop that leg was a massive body encased in rust coloured power armour with several mechanical arms extruding from its back. A winged dragon was on one shoulder pauldron coloured in silver in grey. The other pauldron bore the skull and cog motif, the Machina Opus of the Adeptus Mechanicus. In the giant's hands was a great bolt gun with a belt of ammunition feeding from its back. Death rained down upon the gretchin as 0.998 calibre bolts began firing from the gun. Where the squats could only barely hold the line against the horde, it broke before the space marine. A runtherder tried in vain to turn its troops but the rain of bolts turned the slave driver and all the gretchin around it into a mist of blood and bone and flesh. Others tried to turn troops too, but to no avail. They were trampled. Still the gun continued firing and the gretchin continued running. In their wake was left a field littered with corpses.

Finally, the space marine ceased firing and the line of squats erupted in applause. Their leader looked up at the space marine and spoke. "Took ya long enough, Ekkehart, you legless box o' bolts."

A great laugh boomed through the armour's vox. "Well met, Merten Gunterson." Most soldiers of the Imperium would have wet themselves at facing one of the Emperor's Angels of Death. Not so for the squats. Words that would have been considered an ungrateful insult from another were recognized as a hearty thank you by Ekkehart. "It was important I finished something on the Iratus Rex. Come." With that last word, he turned and walked away.

Merten followed as quickly as his short legs would carry him, and his legs carried him to the hulking mechanical form of the Iratus Rex. The fallen Warlord-class titan was sitting upright on the ground as if it had just raised up from sleep, just as it had set since it was damaged while destroying the last gargant, the orks' version of a titan, that they had assembled and sent into battle. The Iratus Rex was one of a handful of titans of the Legio Crucius that remained on planet. Merten followed the space marine onto what amounted to the war machine's hips and to a great open cavity with heavy wires and cables streaming out.

As Ekkehart began digging though the gear, Merten looked back over his shoulder and did not like what he saw. "Flyers!" he yelled, as if Ekkehart, who was standing next to him, would not hear otherwise. Merten did a double take at the lead flyer. After many years of battling orks, they had never ceased to surprise him. The vehicle was no ordinary aeronautica. It was a red flying farm tractor with an enormous cannon mounted to its nose. The tractor was pulling a great disc harrow that was vertically arranged, instead of horizontally, and apparently supplying lift for the flyer. It could not possibly fly, and yet it was. The squat glanced back to see Ekkehart arise, holding a small box that had cables draped from it going back into the cavity. The box had some sort of handle and a single button on it.

Suddenly one of the great limbs of the Rex began to move. The entire limb was a macro-gatling blaster and it moved as Ekkehart tilted and turned the handle of the box. Suddenly the sound was deafening and Merten fell to his knees six barreled rotary gun began firing into the sky. As Ekkehart adjusted the control in his hand, the limb moved until its line of fire caught the flyer and annihilated it. Merten wanted to laugh with joy but he was in too much pain from his damaged ears.

When the firing ceased, he managed to pull a set of noise reducers from his pack and rise from his knees. Merten looked across the sky to see many more flyers on their way. "More are coming!" he screamed, unaware how loudly he was talking. When Ekkehart didn't answer and the titan's arm didn't move, Merten took his eyes off the sky to see what was holding up his giant comrade. Strangely, the space marine seemed to be staring off into a point of sky where the squat could see nothing but haze. Then, Merten noticed the box. While pretending to be obliviously looking away, the space marine was holding the box out for Merten to take. The squat took the box and cradled it like a baby. Then, a look of concentration grew upon his face as he began to move the arm with his control box. He pushed the button and the rotary gun came to life. A smile like that of a child grew on Merten's face and he began erasing the flyers from the sky.

"I can't believe he let you up on the body of the avatar of his Machine God," said the squat to Merten as he lifted up a mug of ale. The two sat in a small cubicle of their compound with a cask of ale on the counter.

"Wat ya say, Maarku!?" yelled Merten back at the other squat. He raised a mug of ale in his hand and finished it.

"Never mind!" yelled Maarku back at Merten.

"I can't believe he let me up on da Rex!" responded Merten, still yelling. Maarku laughed at his friend's loss of hearing. He raised his mug to Merten as a toast and took a long drink. Maarku then took Merten's mug and began filling it for him. Afterward, he began filling his own mug as Merten began to yell again without realizing it. "It is a shame 'bot those follers o' the Omnissiah. Dey are stupid. Dey preen and spout mumbo jumbo but have no real idea what dey are doin'. Not like us Duardin engineers…" Merten's voice trailed off as he recognized the change in expression of Maarku's face. "Ekkehart's 'hind me, isn't he?" Maarku nodded.

Merten looked over his shoulder with worry on his face. Ekkehart, who had removed his helmet, had his eyes hidden behind dark glasses and there was no emotion on his face. Suddenly he broke out in a laugh and put a data slate on the table. A small cable connected it to Ekkehart's armour. "Did I scare you?" he asked. The words flashed upon the surface of the dataslate's vid screen as he spoke. Merten read the slate and shook his head no, eliciting another laugh from Ekkehart. "You are right, " he continued and the dataslate continued to display his words. "They are fools and crazy. I can keep my mind occupied tinkering with the machines of war but I would go crazy if I had to deal with them on a regular basis instead of you guys. Even when I work out the solution, I have to keep my mouth shut. At least you understand the concepts instead of repeating gibberish." He took a deep breath.

"Well, sit down and have a drink wit us, " suggested Merten.

"I'm fine standing. These cybernetic legs never tire." Then, he added, "Why would I drink, it does nothing for me with my internal machinery."

"You can tell us 'bout yerself and yer Brothers and yer family. It is always 'portant to remember 'em," Maarku added. "Even if yer metal liver doesn't let ya feel the drink, you will still recognize its taste. Then, fer years to come, you'll member the stories ya told while tastin' it every time you recognize that taste again in the future."

"Wise words," replied Ekkehart as he took a freshly poured mug of ale from Maarku's outstretched hands.

"Well, are ya ever gonna tell us whut happened to yer legs?" blurted out Merten. Squats had never been known for skirting around a topic under ideal conditions, much less when they were drunk, which was a good deal of the time.

After a moment's pause, Ekkehart spoke. "I was young and stupid. Well, I'm not sure if I should speak like that is no longer the case, " he added with a small laugh. "I was among the first score of my people from Teuton to receive the Iron Dragons geneseed. The Ultramarines tested us hard and were not forgiving. While scouting a course, under orders of silence, I stepped into a great metal trap that had been placed by our Sergeant and it clamped down upon my leg. But, I was too hard-headed to stop and dragged it along behind me, still attached to my thigh. Then I stepped onto a second trap with my other leg." He paused for a moment before continuing. "Sergeant Ullis told me that I should have called to my Brothers for help and that if I had, the apothecaries could have saved my legs. But, I was young and hard-headed, and intended to keep the order of silence. So, I lay on my belly and dragged myself to the apothecary tent."

After pausing one more time, Ekkehart continued again. "They couldn't save my legs and decided to make me the first techmarine of our chapter. The Mechanicus Implants of the Machine God were wed to my spine and special reinforcements were added to my hips. Then, these cybernetic legs were mechanically adjoined to my implants. The tech-priests told me I was three quarters of a dreadnought, although I had no idea what that meant at the time." Ekkehart laughed again and downed the mug of ale Maarku had given him. "I was sent to the forge world, Ryza. Then, I had to study. They also gave me all sorts of conditioning to seal me to their Machine God. I don't think it worked. It was all I could do to not laugh at them. Somehow, I managed to study and I learned how to maintain and repair my war gear and the titans and a whole lot more." Ekkehart then removed his dark glasses and his grey eyes met those of Merten. "I suppose you have managed to make all the copies of the Rex's schematics that I have asked for?"

Merten nodded yes, suddenly worried that the space marine might know that he had made copies for himself too. His engineering corps, that he had inherited from his father after years serving an apprenticeship, would become the greatest engineering corps in the galaxy now. Ekkehart's voice interrupted Merten's thoughts. "I will build one of these one day. Perhaps you can use your copies to help me?"

The squat tried to hold in his surprise. "If we ever get off dis fersaken hole, then I would consider it an honour," answered Merten. "When these Warp storms subside, me and my fellas will be able to conclude our business here. We signed a contract to gather construction material here for the Ryu Navigator Clan. Millions of metres of communications cable. Switchgear. Lighting fixtures. Piping and manifolds. Something big. The Marshal Clan, a subclan of the Ryu, is sendin' a Galaxy-class transport to pick us up and take us to Glesia afore we go further. So, we'll be rat near Teuton.

"Excellent," answered Ekkehart. "Magos Alcine, working around the zones on the other titans, informed me that I would be returning to Teuton via a Galaxy-class transport as soon as it arrived. It appears we will be venturing back toward the Maelstrom together.