Mercia shut her eyes tight and worked her way through the Litany of Gathering. Often its long passages were enough to centre her but the withdrawal from her medication kept her off balance. She found herself repeating sections of the litany and felt frustration starting to build. The surface feelings of the surrounding minds continued their intrusion and she knew her frustrations were not only her own, but emotions passed on unknowingly from the Mechanicus Adept Altera Medicus beside her.
"Subject Teta#{8.6}," the adept said tonelessly with his robotic voice. "Please keep my readings balanced."
Mercia opened her eyes and peeked at his red robed form where she lay on the examination table. He hadn't even looked up from the several screens which showed the ongoing full body examination.
Three servitors stood over her scrawny naked body and systematically prodded her skin for any sign of damage, weakness or corruption. Their cold fingers, full of micro sensors, following her every detail. The data was immediately transmitted to the adept for processing. From the temperature of nails to the colorations of scar tissue and everything in between. She sighed in silent humiliation. At least the servitors' minds were completely empty. Just preprogrammed, half dead vessels with their humanity torn out of them.
One of her handlers swallowed a light cough. She angled her head and glanced at him. As usual there were two of them, both in their black, reflective full body armour. They both had their boltguns lowered at her, fingers tense on triggers. Ready to kill her in an instant if anything was out of the ordinary. A common precaution in these cases. It had been the same as long as she could remember. She could feel their minds clearly, the odd combination of tense discipline and boredom. And fear. The undertone of fear for her and the unknown she represented.
Mercia felt the frustration from the adept mounting and tried to relax again. The fingers from one of the servitors now started tracing her scalp, delicately moving parts of her hair from one side to the other and scanning her head slowly in lines. She had only been on the troop ship Revenge of Nixtor for 2 years, her first active duty role, but already her hair had become almost completely grey and started to thin out. She knew the demanding work would claim her sooner rather than later, it was part of it.
Even though it frustrated her, she knew the necessity of this examination. She had lost control again, despite the medication, and this was only routine to make sure she wasn't damaged and a risk to her astropathic choir. She really missed her medication, but the readings from the examination had to be unambiguous.
She grinded her teeth silently and stared at the stark lamps above her. Details from the vision that made her lose control returned to her, the violent storm with a calm centre, real space and empyrean overlapping, flashes of conscious colour. In her bones she still felt the threat of the storm coming closer, fast. But that calm centre of it spoke to her, it was the key to something. She shut her mind and her eyes to the vision in revulsion. To ponder such things was the road to madness, far above her understanding.
"Subject Teta#{8.6}," the adepts started, looking her way for the first time with a multitude of green tinted lenses where the eyes should have been. They were the only thing seen in the deep folds of his rust red robe. The servitors backed away as one. "The findings are consistent with prior analysis" the adept continued. "Subject Teta#{8.6} are able minded, presently and only to an extent, but still operational for astropathic duty. 34% increase in daily sedatives recommended for extended service."
Mercia didn't know if the adept actually talked to her or recorded a verbal report to be filed. Maybe both. The examinations always ended in a similar way. The notion of an increased dose relaxed her, soon this checkup would be over and everyone's mind would be silenced.
The adepts' monologue continued. "The hypothesis of a too wide empyreanical viewpoint surface in combination with the subjects limited mental acumen is still strongly supported. Probability calculations for reaching an adequate level of control before being overcome is redundant."
"The Emperor protects," Mercia whispered to herself. Looking up into the lights again.
Then Mercia felt the storm coming again, the vision overwhelmed her, but it was no vision. She opened her mouth to scream but the whole ship convulsed. Everyone and everything was thrown up into the roof and immediately fell down, except Mercia secure in her restraints.
The lamps went out and were replaced a second later with red emergency lighting. The servitors lay where they fell, limbs twitching in the red darkness. The adept jerkily stood and then quickly left the room by a small side door. One of the handlers sat against the wall, his head twisted too much. The other steadied himself at her examination table and released her with the smashing of a rune on its side.
Mercia sobbed and hugged her own head to protect herself. The vision was everywhere, the storm had found the ship. The handler threw her robe at her and then violently tore her from the table. He dragged her towards the door as if she weighed nothing. He had lost his boltgun but had a pistol in his other hand. Mercia tried to open the box where she knew the sedatives were stored but was dragged away by the handler's iron grip. She screamed in frustration, desperate to shut out the storm. Through the storm she could feel the panicked emotions of people in the adjacent rooms and floors.
The corridor that had been clean and orderly just an hour ago was now full of running personnel. Things lay everywhere, some people too, and there were leaking tubes and sparking wires. Everything was red tinted in the emergency light. Shivers and shakes continued rocking the ship and there were sounds that no healthy ship should make.
"I cannot hail command" the handler said to her as they went. Mercia hid in her robes and tried to latch on to his feeling of focus and courage to keep the panic from all the others out.
"Contingency Teta-7 is in effect" he continued. "We'll find an escape pod and await further instructions. We're far from the choir enclave and there's a significant risk that you'll be attacked as a focus for people's fear, we'll replace your clothes on the way."
Merica didn't follow his statements. The combination of withdrawal, storm and others panic was enough without also recognising she could be killed out of hand here in the corridors of her own home.
The handler turned his reflective faceplate toward her and she could feel his iron grip around her arm tighten even more. "If the gellar fields are starting to fail, don't wait for me" he said, his voice cold. "I expect you to notice first and immediately fall on your Mercy."
Mercia managed to nod weakly and they continued. She felt the hilt of her short knife sewn into her robe. The blade to save her soul before she was taken in the event of uncontrollable warp corruption.
ยงยงยง
Captain Victus found his maintenance inspection of their valkyrie gunships violently aborted when the whole ship convulsed. He and his men were sent flying into the air alongside everyone and everything not bolted down in the hangar.
The Storm Trooper Captain turned in the air as gravity immediately reinstated itself and landed in the combat roll ingrained by their training. A feat in the heavy carapace armour. As he stood he took his helmet from the belt and put it on as the dim hangar lighting was replaced with the even dimmer red emergency one.
"Full combat readiness," he commanded in the helmet vox. "Squad, check in!" He continued and noted that trooper Tristan lay prone. The trooper's hair was turning red and wet.
Without thinking he registered the call ins while he turned to take the hanger in. All heavy equipment and vehicles were secured and unharmed, but there was personnel hurt all over. And the servitors with their lacking awareness and flexibility seemed to have taken their falls extra lousy. He noted that the ship didn't sound good at all. Blink controlling the helmet display he produced the accelerometer data and noted that the ship tremors increased steadily. Only trooper Tristan failed the call in.
The Storm Troopers all had their helmets on now and formed a perimeter around their gunship, hellguns and attention on the rest of the hangar. The clonking of maglocking boots could be heard when they moved.
"Vox operator, what's the word on the ship vox net?" the Captain inquired.
"Ship vox offline, getting our own up now" trooper Mira answered while she retrieved the vox backpack and its antenna from the gunship interior.
"Medic, report" Victus continued.
"Tristan will be combat ready in 10. Administering combat stimulants now."
The deck shifted violently to the side and they had to fight to keep balance. People screamed from other parts of the hangar. The sound of hurt metal and something large being ripped off overshadowed all other sounds and the troopers' helmets initiated their silent mode to protect hearing. The red emergency light flickered and died. Everything was quiet in their helmets when the metal aftershock died out.
"Troopers," the Captain said into the vox in a low voice. "Activate atmospheric seals." He could hear his own hissing as it was activated and started to make out their surroundings again when the helmet's night vision adjusted.
Around them even more people lay dead from blunt trauma. People screamed from pain and panic but it appeared soundlessly to the sound isolated troopers. But it indicated that they still had air in their part of the ship.
"Captain!" the vox operator exclaimed over the squad vox. "Fourth squad is evacuating the Colonel from the ship's bridge as we speak and are broadcasting an evacuation order on the company channel."
Victus went to her instead of answering and connected the vox handset to his armour and listened to the message before changing to the fourths own channel.
"This is your Captain" he stated simply. "Why?"
After a few seconds the sergeant of the fourth herself answered. "Colonel's orders, Captain."
Victus noted her tense tone and the stress he knew it represented. It sounded like she was running.
"As designated personal guards we were at the bridge for the incident," she continued. "But it's a fair bit above my paygrade. Something in the warp surprised the navigators who made an emergency exit to real space. Apparently we managed to hit the gravity well of a planet and our momentum is pulling us apart in the atmo..." The sergeant was broken off mid sentence.
Victus looked down to the vox operator who tried her best but failing to find anything.
"They are gone, I can't find anyone" she stated while still trying.
The ship's tremors continued to increase.
"Captain" trooper Marcus interrupted. "It's hard to see in this light, but I think the hangar gate is changing colour. Could it be melting?"
Victus blink initiated a dose of combat stimulants that was pumped directly into his bloodstream. He took a deep breath as his heart and mind started working on the next level. He started giving orders in a quick and harsh fashion.
"Troopers Faydra and Xanatov. Get this Valkyrie operational. NOW!"
"Marcus, get to the hangar override controls and activate the emergency mechanism. Figure it out!"
"You lot, find extra medical supplies, food and oxygen. Take it from the other gunships"
"The rest of you, get me all the ammunition and explosives that's even slightly portable! I want the ordonance to make the planetary assault ourselves if we have to!"
"And troopers, let no one stop you. You get until the hangar opens to get back to the valkyrie. The Emperor protects."