Disclaimer: All Warhammer 40,000 and Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha concepts belong to their respective owners. No challenge is intended.

10: Prisoners

The park at the bottom of Eifast's shaft was tilted at an appreciable angle. Ponds and fountains drained across the landscape. Lance could see a tree fallen in the distance, roots grasping at air, a river of mud pooling in the crater.

The longer this went on, the worse things would become.

Kamath stood in the central plaza, shields flickering yellow. Mask stood behind her, weapon at the ready. The other two Tertiaries were nowhere to be seen. It was an ambush, of course. The marines were probably hiding somewhere in the endless rings of stories climbing the shaft around them. It was almost reassuring; there was nothing subtle about the situation, no opportunity for further deceit.

Vivo was sitting below a statue leaning askance as it reached to the sky. His captors had clipped a collar around his neck and chained him to the statue's legs. Lance noted that he was clutching the sphere of Sacred Heart as though it were a toy. The kid showed good thinking.

Behind an arch on the parkland verge, Atlas revved his gauntlet engines. "One minute to deadline. You ready for this?"

"I've got my peekaboo charged. If we can't buy time with talk, I'm ready to get them properly confused. You have One-Eye?"

"Yeah, yeah I think so. Bastard's big. He'll throw me off balance if I hold him wrong." The big man was dwarfed by the unconscious monster astartes thrown over his shoulder. Atlas shifted his balance. "Doesn't matter how strong I am, if I don't get leverage he's taking me down in his sleep. Literally."

"Maybe you should drag him. Kamath's smart enough to plan around your strength if you show it off. Do we have time to find a cart?"

"Nah, this is fine. I'm using Mach Caliber to take the weight – I won't kick in the Numen unless we need to start kicking ass."

"Right. Remember, leave the talking to me. We're going in."

The pair stepped out of hiding. A broad marble path led to the central plaza. Cover was no good at this stage – they wanted to be seen, to put the Tertiaries at ease.

"That's close enough," rumbled the Plus-Knight as they entered the plaza. "Where are the rest of you?"

Lance put up his hands, showing Cross Mirage in pistol form safely holstered at his sides. "I don't understand you," he said clearly. "Allow my computer to run a translation."

This was their first ruse to buy time. Kamath spoke a dialect that had been dead for millennia. The squadmates had assimilated the language from their Intelligences, thanks to smart spell templates. But the longer they could draw it out, the more time they had for the cruise titans to complete their ritual and bring reinforcements through the shield.

Cross Mirage beeped and intoned, "Please restate your message." The Intelligence was doing its best impression of a computer from the legend-reels of the 58th millennium. It seemed to be amused.

Kamath growled. "I have no patience for games. Your child negotiated in my language when we threatened the civilians. I know you can speak words I understand."

"I'm sorry," said Vivo from behind her. "I didn't think."

"Speak in my language," said the Plus-Knight, "or I shoot somebody."

"Say you're sorry, Vivo," said Atlas in the ancient dialect. "It's alright, you didn't know."

"Enough." Kamath levelled her weapon. It was configured for hornet mode. "You, the black-haired one. Is my man Twelve alive?"

Atlas hefted One-Eye's considerable mass. "Yes, but he has broken bones."

"Those will heal. Bring him forward and place him halfway to my position. If you try anything, we will shoot you. Twelve was prepared to sacrifice his life and we will not hesitate to grant his desire."

Atlas edged forward. Mask idly strolled to one side of the paved area, increasing the angle between him and Kamath. Atlas glanced around at the balconies ringing the park; there was a good chance that he was giving the missing two Tertiaries a clear line of sight. He tagged likely positions on the battle link. Knowing Kamath they'd be out of the likeliest areas, but second-guessing beyond that was fruitless.

"Good. Now remove your weapon and throw it into that stream."

He complied, stripping the heavy metal gauntlet with some difficulty. It hadn't been designed to be removed; the device materialised already wrapped around his arm. He felt a momentary pang at separation from his companion, but it was necessary.

"There are only two of you? I find it difficult to believe such tiny creatures could have taken out one of my men, even wounded as he was. This suggests subterfuge. I do not intend to take any chances. Now, the red haired one – throw your computer-gun into that bush."

Lance held up his hands. "Before I do so, you must know that you are being used. Your orders do not come from the Imperium, and we believe-"

"Be silent." Kamath took a step forward. "I've heard all this before. We are the Emperor's faithful servants. It matters not who sits upon that Throne, nor the foreign age in which we find ourselves. We sacrificed our very lives to the Emperor's ideal, a strike force advancing through time itself. Don't think you can turn us aside with a few words. We have no doubt left in us."

"I don't doubt you received all the correct codes." Lance stepped forward in turn. The plaza narrowed between them. "But they're ancient history today. Schoolchildren could find those codes in the Library! And they ordered you to take this building. Did you ever ask yourself why?"

"My life is the Emperor's to use," said the giant astartes. "Your gun, now."

"You have no objective," continued Lance. "You're a distraction being used by a petty criminal gang. Your ship, your crew – all died for nothing."

Kamath roared and brought her weapon forward.

Lance vanished.

A volley of stun rounds flashed from a second-storey balcony. Paving stones blew into the air; rounds sparked harmlessly from Kamath's shield-armour.

"An illusionist!" She went to one knee, released a volley of green hornet rounds into the building's facade. Green bolts slammed against the balcony from a position on the seventh level, and a copse of trees in the park itself. "Six – kill the soldier! Eight, Twenty, reduce the sniper nest to rubble!"

Mask levelled his weapon on Atlas. The black-haired man was unarmed and out in the open.

But he'd been waiting for this.

As the first rounds lashed out, he was accelerating into a crouch, force fields pushing him across the plaza. "Eifast, the doors! Vivo – be a good boy!" He pushed up and put his shoulder into Mask's solar plexus, sending the pair toppling head over heels into the gardens.

"Yes sir," said the building, and shutters crashed down around the Tertius on the seventh story. That would keep one of them out of the fight for a few minutes. Three against two, but the two had a kid on their side.

Atlas had to get Mask away from Kamath. The plan called for maximum confusion. He got his knee into the Tertius' stomach and rolled. Dirt and foliage sparked and flashed from the yellow shield-armour. The listing building made the plazas and avenues of the parkland one long downhill surface, and before Mask could regain his bearings they had rolled over a parapet and into a shallow pebble-lined stream.

"Bad move," whispered the silver-faced creature. "You move fast, but without your weapon, you're no match for me. Twelve will thank me later."

He brought his weapon around in sword form. Atlas threw himself down and rolled on fields cushioned by the surface of the stream. Mask followed wordlessly, massive armour boots throwing up sheets of spray as he wove the green-eyed blade in the forms of some ancient sword art.

Atlas couldn't help noticing the water droplets splashed to the surface in perfect rows. Weird coincidences tended to boil out of the Warp when psykers clashed. Then the blade parted the stream by his head in a howl of steam, and he had to scramble.

The barrage from the second story had stopped. Kamath gestured at the nearby trees. "Twenty, eyes on shooter. Did we get him?"

A jetpack coughed in the copse. Topless rose above the branches.

That was enough for Lance.

He dropped the invisibility as he ran the last few paces. It hadn't been an illusion. He'd been right there the whole time, walking right up to the enemy. The decoy shooter spell was proving useful today.

Cross Mirage put a spell-line onto Topless as she arced across the park. It wrapped twice around her leg and lifted Lance from the ground. The Tertius jerked in the sky under the sudden weight and looked down in panic.

"Catalyst chain!" Lance's other pistol spat a tangle of spell energy at her weapon. It worked – green fire flashed and burst inside the enchantment. Cursing, the astartes jetted higher, kicking her legs in an attempt to shake off the attacker.

Kamath looked from one side to another. Mask had vanished behind an ornamental bridge slanted over an empty stream bed. Topless was rising rapidly, Lance dangling dangerously below her. "Twenty, hold still!" The airborne investigator converted his pistol to a vicious twin-ended amber energy blade and prepared to stab at her boots. "I'll shoot the ant off you." Her weapon folded into beam mode.

"No you won't," said a small voice behind her.

"Silence, child," growled the commander. "Your guardians have failed. You're alive only because I need to shoot your friends first."

"I won't let you."

Kamath growled in exasperation and spun around. "Very well, if you will not cooperate, I have no choice but... to..."

The child's toy ball hovered above his head, emitting a golden light. He stood legs apart, arms in a fighting guard. He barely reached her knee, he was chained to solid stone by his neck, but his eyes blazed with a terrible light.

"Sacred Heart, set up!"

Golden fire filled her vision.

Kamath slammed a boot into the pavement. She refused to be driven back by the raw psyker power cascading around her.

The fire spiralled and condensed. It wrapped itself around the form of the boy and knitted into luminous bones, glowing muscles, a mane of majestic golden hair. Plates of gold boiled out of the air and bound to his limbs. A thousand runes and eagle talismans etched themselves upon the armour all at once.

Vivo looked down at Kamath. He loomed over her three-metre frame like a parent confronting an errant child.

"You're not going to touch my friends."

"By the Emperor," stammered the commander. Her unshakeable faith was built on the sturdiest of foundations – but she was not prepared for those foundations themselves to stir and walk.

"No," said the demigod in a voice like an orchestra. "The Project made me an echo of His genome, but I am my own person.

"My name is Vivo Urban. Stop fighting.

"Now."

Kamath gaped for a moment. Then she threw her head back and howled at the heights of Eifast Stratoblock.

"Never! I will fulfil my orders, or die trying!

"Come, blasphemous clone! Stop me if you can, for I will never surrender!"