Mellenova, The Bridge

"Warning, radiation hazard detected."

Little orange medkits spilled from the first aid box held captive against the bulkhead and landed at my feet. "Shit." I scrabbled through the pile and pried a kit open. A capped needle and sealed capsules with different coloured lids filled it. Analgesic medication, Phosphate poisoning medication, antibacterial medication, radioprotective medication. I popped two capsules with pink lids out and twisted their caps off. "Take six tablets with water when in danger of irradiation…" I shook the half dozen tablets in to my warm palm and tipped my head back. "…Bleurgh!" Bone-dry fragments trickled down my throat. "Uhh." Fingers widening the collar on my shirt, I staggered over to the bridge's central cogitator array. "Lusia, I'm hearing radiation alarms on my end."

Lusia's voice came through scratchily over Lilli's servo-skull. "—Put us in the Warp!"

"The Warp?"

"We're out of options—"

"Lusia!" I flew over to a monitor displaying orange and red radiation symbols threatening the ship's decks. "Lusia, the reactor's dead in the red."

"—Beautiful." A sharp fizzing bled from the servo-skull, cutting off Lusia.

"Get the fuck out of there!" I darted around to the primary unit controlling propulsion. "Lilli, do not jump the ship blind—AGH!" A jolt jumped from the unit.

"I am sorry, James. My mistress has the final word. You have done enough damage."

I flapped my reddened hand and slouched over to an empty gunnery station. My damp shirt met the bulkhead and slid down it. The steady hum filling the bridge rose to a whine. Vibrations surged through the deck. The jerkin covering Estoc slipped down his torso, exposing the pink bandage on his chest. I tilted my head forward and clamped my hands over my ears. The howling Warp drive peaked and let out a whoomph. Darkness swallowed the bridge.

"Lilli?" I opened my eyes a crack and hobbled over to the cogitators. "Lilli—Agh!" I stooped and heaved off the Inquisitor's boots. "Lilli, gimme a system check." My fist rapped on a cogitator's casing. Green light seared my eyes. I jerked my head away from the blazing bridge array and held a hand over my eyes. "Gellar Field!"

"Ninety-nine point eight per cent!" Lilli's servo skull righted itself and zipped around my head. "Core temperature is stabilising—"

"Yeah, the rads!" I headed over to Estoc, gathered my jerkin, and moved it back up to his chin. Hang on, pal. We'll have you in a pod quicksticks. "Lilli!" I flew around to the readout terminal and battered the Return key. "Come on, turn on!" I jiggled the monitor arm. Two beady eyes appeared in a crack between monitors across the basin.

"Percussive maintenance will yield nothing, James!"

"Get ta fuck, Lilli—jumping the ship solves nothing! They're right outside the door and Lusia's down there in the reactor!"

"YOU SENT HER THERE!" Bright red eyes scooted around the cogitators and flew in my face. "YOU LET SPACE MARINES ABOARD!" A monitor shattered and arms twisted in a knot. "You did this, you… you… you…" The servo skull quivered in the air.

"System check." I swung away from Lilli's skull and keyed in a secondary monitor. "Start aft, work fore'ard – worry about the ship, I'll worry about the Marines."

"You haven't a single bullet." Lilli slipped out of view. "No sword, no shield."

"I have never needed the sword…"

"No, you cheat, you lie, you connive your way to things you are thoroughly undeserving of."

"You want to know where I started, Lilli?" I rounded the array to Lilli's skull. "Where I came from?" I palmed a monitor aside. "I was eighteen years old when the Imperial Guard sent me to hell. Now, I'm in charge."

"Lusia was right—you are an arrogant prick."

"D'you think the Imperium, the galaxy, the Warp cares what sort of man I am?"

"Lusia does."

I threw a dark look at Lilli and stumped over to estoc and kneeled beside him, medkit in hand. Fat lot of good this'll do for a gunshot wound. I uncapped the kit's needle and stuck it in Estoc's hip. Most it'll do is give you a good trip. I lifted Estoc's cold hand and laid my thumb on the inside of his wrist. Faint thumps met my fingertip. "Sleep tight, old man."

"James, James, they're gone."

"Who's gone…? Lilli, who's gone?"

"The Absolvers—they've retreated—"

"—Where?"

"The hangar!"

"How many?"

"All of them."

"Box 'em in."

"They have a tank!"

"We have an AI! Seal them in there…" I dived at the panels around the bridge door controls and worked my fingernails in.

"What are you doing?"

"—Uh, manual release."

"You could've just asked." A crack split the bridge doors. "There."

A hair-thin wire appeared between the parting teeth. "—NO!" I dived away from the doors and threw my body over Estoc's. Black smoke blasted across the bridge. White-hot fragments tore at the back of my shirt.

"James!" Sparks spat from perforated monitors. Shredded cables swayed from the ceiling. "What was that?"

"Pfft—urgh!" Smoke stung my eyes. "Lilli!"

"James, your shirt!"

I clawed at my shirt and dragged the material taut. Smoke curled over my shoulder. "—Shit!" I fell on my back and ground my shirt in to the deck. "Fuck, Lilli!"

"I—I didn't know…" Lilli's skull flew around to me. Fragments embedded in the bone smoked and one of her eyes had died. "Why would they—?"

"You worry about the ship. I'll worry about the Absolvers." I picked myself up and swiped dirt from my shirt.

"James, the rads!"

"Are you coming?" Abandoned cutting torches lay at the head of the stairs leading down in to Operations. A bright, orange gash three feet long smouldered on the door. "Bastards weren't even close…" I trotted down the stairs. Lilli's skull followed. Cracks and snaps rose from smashed holo-tables. Thin, grey smoke wept from destroyed cogitators lining the walls. Leaking cooling fluid spread across the deck. "…Organised banditry."

"State-sponsored banditry," Lilli said. "Shameful conduct from loyalists."

"Can you, er… Summon the tram to this station?" I shifted away from the spreading fluid. "I'll fetch Estoc."

In socks and shirtsleeves, I lumbered beneath Estoc's weight on to the tram for the ride over to Medical. A palm-sized dosimeter clipped to a belt loop on my trousers crackled. The needle wobbled between the green and the yellow zone. Lilli's eyes turned to the unconscious Estoc slumped on the seat beside me.

"He's strong." I ripped the plastic packet from a fresh compression bandage and gently peeled the soggy, pink one away from Estoc's chest. Blood oozed over the black flesh surrounding the palm-sized cavity. My hand pressed the bandage over it and smoothed the adhesive out.

Dosimeter crackling in my ears, I swung sideways and heaved Estoc's body through the parting doors. Heavy son of a bitch, aren't you… The med-bay's lights spattered on, flickered, then plunged the room back in to darkness. "Divert what power you can to this facility, Lilli—Agh!" My knees buckled and struck the deck. "Eurghhh…" I shuffled forwards on my knees towards the closest pod. "Lilli, Lilli, open the pod." Reddened knees squeaked over the deck. "I lost my legs once. I won't be finding them a second time—not at my age."

"Sorry, James—the Absolver's fed an infection in to my systems—a worm!"

"What the fuck is a worm?" I laid Estoc on his side beneath the pod and ran my hands over the smooth body.

"Imagine beheading a beast, only for two heads to sprout in its place."

"Spiking a lady's drink…" My fingertips ran over a keypad. "Well, that really does get my goat."

"Two, five, seven, James. Excuse me for a moment."

I tapped the numbers in to the pad. "You will crawl from bows to stern, across broken glass, disrobed, dishonoured. I will have my answer." A soft hiss escaped the pod. The casing popped and slid backwards. I stooped and gathered Estoc in my arms and laid him inside the Gel layer. "Okay, Lilli, you're gonna need to tell me what to do here."

"Don't worry, James. The gel layer will keep him stable."

"Yeah, you sure?"

"Absolutely. It's a remarkable substance, though I wish we didn't have to see it in action."

"Aye." The pod's transparent casing slid over Estoc and sunk back in to place. A flat display fitted to the pod shone light in my eyes. An unbroken, green line spiked in time with Estoc's heartbeat.

"Are you going to check on Izuru?"

"Lusia next." I turned on my heel and left the medbay. "Buzz her if you already haven't."

"My mistress is unresponsive."

"Alright—show me where you keep the NBC stuff."

Periodic rad spikes crackled in the ears of my baggy suit. A transparent panel offered me a letterbox view of the flat hover-gurney I pushed through Mellenova's corridors. "Soon as Lusia's recovered and treated, bring us out of the Warp. We'll deal with the Absolvers then. That's an order, Lilli." Crackles filled my ears. "Is this the safest route to the reactor?"

"Safest, yes. You're only eighty-five yards away."

"Only… hm."

"The Absolvers have embarked aboard their transport—tank and all."

"Some sort of ritualistic suicide attempt? They're not going anywhere."

"James, if they try and blow the hangar bay doors…"

"They'd be damning themselves. No ship that small carries a protection field—they're bloodthirsty pillagers, not fools." I twisted the gurney around a corner, following the signs Lilli projected on the floor. A sign on a bulkhead read: Reactor. The needle in the dosimeter embedded in the suit's forearm hit the far edge of the red zone and held there. "Lilli, I need you to get as close the reactor core as you can and get a visual on Lusia—might be too hot for me."

"Okay, stay put." Lilli's skull zipped away.

What's your game then, Brother Captain? I twisted and looked over my shoulder. A long, low groan murmured through the ship, deepening at its peak. "Lilli…?" Fog whitened the rectangular panel. "What have you done?"

"Found her!" A single bright eye zoomed around the corner ahead. "Come quickly, James!"

I shunted the gurney towards Lilli's skull, dosimeter fizzing in my ears. "Where—where?"

"Quickly!"

Sealed shutters, laid over an observation chamber, obscured the view of Mellenova's reactor. A curled-up figure in a blackened radiation suit lay on the deck beside an egg-shaped object. "Oh, you trooper…" I bounded over to Lusia, scooped her up in my arms, and dumped her on the gurney. The bomb thudded at her feet. I dragged the gurney around and pushed it away from the core. "Change of plan, Lilli, we're dropping from the Warp now."

"…It appears we already did."

"Catastrophic system failure?"

"I don't think so."

"Our field?"

"Stable. I do not know where we are."

"Never mind—vent that hangar."

"Alright. Hope this gets the message across."

Splayed showerheads roared over the gurney's passenger and me. Steam fogged my window. Scrubbers fitted to extendable arms unfolded from the ceiling and rubbed up and down my arms and torso. Slathered all over, I bundled Lusia beneath the scrubbers.

Free of the stifling suit, I pushed Lusia in to the medbay and laid her in the pod directly opposite Estoc. The bomb remained on the gurney next to it. Elbows resting on the pod, I tipped my head and laid my damp forehead on my forearms. "Some good news now, Lilli," I muttered. "Anything."

"She is strong."

"I know that." I ground my palm in to the canopy and wiped away the fog. A slight redness discoloured Lusia's cheeks but otherwise nothing looked amiss. "You know I know that too, lovely." Head down, hands on hips, I paced between the two occupied pods. "Hail them."

"We have nothing left to say."

"I do. One chance, Lilli. Let's give 'em one chance to leave." I dug out my flask from my trouser pocket

"I prefer zero chances. If it's war they bring, war we will give them."

I pivoted on my heel and met Lilli's remaining eye. "Hail them… please." The cap popped from the flask. A single drop fell from the neck and hit my tongue.

"Very well." Lilli's eye dimmed. "Curious, they appear to have changed their frequencies."

"Open channel, issue without encryption." I slipped my flask away and fished my pipe out.

"I am. Still no reply."

"No activity?"

"None."

My teeth ground upon the metal stem. "Lock this door behind me." Unlit pipe sticking out of the side of my mouth, I strode from the medbay, Lilli's skull at my shoulder.

Outside the foremost hangar bay, I counted down the minutes it took to repressurise, my teeth grinding my pipe's stem. Above my head, the warning light remained a solid red.

"This is the very same man who threatened to break your spine over his knee, isn't it?" Blue flame crackled in the underside of Lilli's damaged skull.

"Threatened…? Ohh, such a man would never bother with a threat when he could simply do—a man of his word is Brother Captain Sivitus. I have been where he intends to send me. Paralysis from the waist down brings on the most helpless feeling in oneself—worse than being stripped and flogged."

"Do men do that to one another?" Green light bathed us.

"I would remain content that you have not seen what men can do to one another." Chill air spat from a crack in the hangar doors. "You're still young. I'd rather your spark didn't fade away like so many others."

"What do you mean?"

"Don't let others try and take your life away and make you a slave. I was a slave in olive grey for so many years—then navy grey. The Roaneks had me as their muscle for two years—another slave. This is about the only thing I've ever done of my own free will—though it is more the will of Izuru Numerial than my own." The hangar doors reached the end of their travel and fell silent. "I am lost at the notion of free will." I took a single step in to the hangar. A shimmer akin to heat-haze surrounded the immobile Thunderhawk.

"You made that step by yourself."

"No, even comatose, the influence of the Eldar compels me. Together we hurtle towards another calamity of our own making—where all around us will be dead. That, or our ashes shall become one."

"I didn't understand a word of what you just said."

"Normally I'd attribute that to the rum but here I am regrettably sober…" I stuck my hand in my trouser pocket and brought out a box of matches. "And short my lighter." The matchhead rasped in to flame.

"What are you doing?"

I flicked the lit match in the direction of the Thunderhawk. A white-orange tattoo flared mid-air. The match's momentum slowed to nothing and it came to a dead stop six feet off the deck. "Interesting."

"What is that—a containment field?"

"Not from them." I swiped a second match across the rough. The lit head sailed at the field and wormed inside. An orange halo soared outward. Great ripples followed. In their wake, a metallic grey layer – entirely opaque – formed around the field and reshaped itself in to a solid sphere, thirty feet wide, hovering eight feet off the deck. Where the Thunderhawk's landing skids had touched the deck, there was nothing.

Inch by inch, the sphere's shadow flowed over Lilli and me. A green glow lit my skin. The remaining eye in Lilli's skull faded and the construct fell to the deck. Hairs on my neck standing on end, I tore my eyes from the sphere and dropped to one knee. Head bowed, I closed my eyes.

"Why have you come?" Many voices, overlapping with one another, whispered in my ears.

"I seek answers to questions I never asked, about a being whom I cannot escape from. Bent and beck, I am subjugate to her will. She controls me. I have never been so lost. There's a verse I think about sometimes… I knew a lad who went to sea and left the land behind him. I knew him well, that lad was me, and now I cannot find him."

Walls of stone surrounded me. Pale green glowed within deep crevices splitting large blocks and within hair-thin channels running along the floor. Shaped runes carved in to pillars cast weak light across the chamber floor.

"Ohh, now I am truly lost." Blocks melted away from me and formed an archway at the other end of the chamber. Fog rolled from my nostrils. Numb feet left prints behind me. I passed beneath the archway and rolled my sleeves down. A whisper from behind brought me around. A flat surface faced me. "So, that's the way it's going to be."

Statues stood on plinths dominating a chamber so vast, the ceiling was lost in darkness. Splayed wings reared behind form-fitting armour made up of hexagonal plates. Horns curved outward from grinning masks embedded in tall, domed craniums. Gauntlets gripped glaives mounted with thorns. A segmented tail curled around a statue's feet. Further on, another armoured being gripped a fourteen-foot-high, bladed staff in one hand and balanced a black orb in the palm of the other. Sharp claws dug in the smooth surface. Thin eye slits in a pallid mask gazed away in to space. It had no mouth.

My feet carried me over to the foot of the plinth. Gentle thuds escaped the pulsating orb. Spots burrowed their way in to my blurring vision. Warmth flooded my ears and stole down my neck. My eyelids drooped.

Sharp points pressed in to my shoulder and scurried up my head. Legs dug in to my hair. Many glowing eyes filled a shiny, metallic body sprouting curving pincers. "AGH!" My spine snapped backwards.

"Do not fight it, James! Let it in your mind."

My knees smacked the floor. Chittering, the many-legged thing scurried away in to the field of statues. Bent double, I held my arms to my chest and swung upright. My neck tilted back and cracked. "So, not even a man's thoughts can remain his own."

"A formality," many voices whispered. "Were you a stranger, you would quickly find this place your tomb."

"Okay…" I placed a foot on the floor and a hand on the edge of the plinth and pulled myself up. "So, you know me, else you would never have countenanced my presence in your domain."

A figure hovered in the open space between the rows of statues, its form shrouded by a cloak of pale green silk falling all eight feet to the floor below. Curving horns protruded from a wide hood shadowing a golden mask marked with a human's chin, mouth, nose, and eyes.

"Yet, I do not know you…" I pushed away from the plinth and loped over to the figure. My knee touched the stone and my eyes dropped.

"Rise, James." The voices merged in to one—a soft, accented, female voice. "Rise."

Whispering silk met my eye. Above my head, the figure turned its mask to me. Gold melted away from a pale-skinned human within the horned shell. "Izuru…?" My eyes narrowed at the oval-shaped face with the jawline. "No, no you're not." Blue-eyed and possessing stronger cheekbones and fuller lips, the woman cocked her head. "Blessed God-Emperor of Mankind, I did not recognise you, Lady Shesmet."

"Name me not for that stuprum." Shesmet's clawed fingers rose to her hood and lowered it. Two pairs of horns curved from the sides of a conical headdress. Thin eyebrows edged closer. "You wear his face." Pale eyes fell to the buttons on my shirt and cuffs.

"My mission is—" My arm flew upwards and stiffened. Shesmet's fingers closed around my grubby cuff and found a brass button marked with the letter I.

"You bear this symbol, a symbol of hate, of dominance!" Shesmet's lips closed together and drew inwards. Her chin quivered.

"I did what was necessary!" I yanked my arm away. "You're still bound to him—that's your problem—me, I cannot escape the will of Izuru Numerial. Nine years ago, I held her dying body in my arms. Six years ago, we found one another then parted just as quickly—we both knew it was the right thing. A few weeks ago, I hadn't even thought of her—not once in those six years! I bade my serial-killer soulmate farewell that day and I wish it had stayed that way. Now, she's wailing my name, begging me to come and bail her out of another bloodbath. The ship, the inquisitor, all of it is for her."

"She was poison to—"

"—Poison to me, to everyone around us!"

"She was not good for you. That top-heavy half-breed served only herself—"

"—I never had a problem with her proportions, only her nature."

"That nature swayed you with laughable ease—"

"—Swayed an impressionable nineteen-year-old with a big, fat chip on his shoulder." Forehead burning, I glared up at Shesmet. "She's sick. I'm taking her home."

"Ten years. You never learn."

"Nine. My lady, we experienced some malcontents in Granada. Looters posing as loyalist chapter Marines boarded us. We staged a reactor incident then jumped the ship blind—"

"—His ship, not yours." Shesmet's cloak swiped at me and dragged over my face. Her back to me, Shesmet began gliding away.

"You are mistaken." I trotted after Shesmet, hands clasped in the small of my back. "Mellenova, under the steerage of the Adeptus Mechanicus, carried us from Caira's Rift through the Granada System most reliably. She has outlived her master and been gifted a new name, a new life, a new mission purpose. We are both familiar with past lives, are we not, Kora?" Shesmet whirled around and flew in my face. White light burned in her eyes. I raised my chin and met her glare. "May we speak to one another as equals? Feet on the ground, face to face." A slow smile spread across my lips. "Your presence fills me with great reassurance. I am very happy to reunite at such a trying time."

The suns in Shesmet's eyes dimmed. Her head recoiled from me. Red lips folded inwards. A muscle quivered in her cheek.

A grin twisted my lips. "I see this place has yet to become my tomb. I am overwhelmed with anticipation at the thought of experiencing your hospitality, my lady."

"Your sweet-tongued sortie cannot conceal your fear."

"My fear holds little interest."

"We'll see." Shesmet whipped away from me. Her cloak swiped my face and dragged off the shoulder of a gold bodysuit. "That symbol is not welcome here."

"Then I will go without." I dragged my shirt over my head and undid my trouser buttons. "…I am loyal to banners no longer—not the Imperial Guard, not the Navy, nor the predators in the Inquisition." The Inquisitor's black breeches landed beside the white shirt. In socks and my undershorts, I strode up to Shesmet. "Predators."

Stone melted away from Shesmet forming a circular portal. "Put your clothes on, James."

"Help me." I kneeled, picked up a twisted corner of Shesmet's cloak, and straightened it. Shesmet dragged her cloak back over her shoulder and passed through the portal. I gathered the Inquisitor's clothes beneath my arm and blinked after Shesmet. Frozen beings filled containments fields on either side of the corridor Shesmet flew along.

"Oh, I see…" Human, Eldar and Orkish forms occupied their own fields, along with ferocious-looking bipedal aliens sprouting blades for arms. Many teeth filled snarling maws. "A collector of the diverse and deadly?"

"Curator."

"So, it's a museum, then." I peered in to a field holding nine Cadian soldiers in full combat gear – M36 Kantraels, ceramite covers and body armour marked with a white letter eight on shoulder guards. All nine lay behind an earthen berm and had their service weapons shouldered with fingers hooked around firing studs. Is that a little slice of Cadia too? The Cadian closest to the field's edge lay a little further back. Acne marked his cheeks and wide gaps separated his two front teeth. His M36 lay on the ground beside him. Both hands were pressed to the sides of his helmet where his ears were. "Did you ask that boy if he wanted this, or did he volunteer for permanent display?"

"I had no part in acquiring those specimens—this wing is dated to the end of the forty-first millennium."

I wound around the edges of Shesmet's cloak and drew alongside her. "Who came before you?"

"My mentor. Absent, alas, for many cycles."

"A being like you?"

"Not like me. He does not see humans."

"Then our evening will go undisturbed."

Shesmet's horns swayed over her right shoulder. Blue eyes found mine. "You speak his tongue well."

"Not his—his uncle's."

"Uncle?"

"A man named Richard Sorge. Zeleska's mother's br—"

"—Lay that name to ruin!" Ridges built up on Shesmet's nasal bridge. Her eyes stared wide at me. "No second utterance!"

"Richard Sorge made me the man I am today… is how he would have it. You are like a son to me, James—his very words." I closed my eyes. Gooseflesh rippled along my arms and up my neck. "I still hear his voice in my ear, whispering—I made you, I made you. This past decade, I have been controlled, manipulated, made to commit atrocities in the murmurings of bloody vengeance. You felt it too at Cadia when you smote him, didn't you? Cadia was our reckoning."

Shesmet's lips puckered. A hand flew to them and she twisted her head away from me. "Take to quarters. Sup with me in time."

Before us, the floor caved in and steps sprouted from the reshaping stone. I followed Shesmet's outstretched arm and clambered below the viewing gallery's level. The light cut out behind me and I turned and found blank stone sealing me in. Green light poured from fissures in the stone walls, illuminating the short descent to a bare chamber with smooth walls. A flat, stone tablet wide enough for two people to lie in occupied a corner. What hardy beings they must have been to endure such discomfort. Steep steps descended in to a wide, oval-shaped basin in another corner. At least they bathed. I dumped my clothes on the tablet and perched on the edge. Unrounded stone dug in to my buttocks. Lusia, Estoc. My head sunk. Warm palms drove through my hair and my fingernails dug in to my skull. Izuru. A brass button on my crumpled shirt, marked a letter I, caught my eye. God-Emperor, wrongs I have wrought on my journey sink me to unfathomable depths. Is this my destination—a place where all light fails? Grant me a sign, I beg you.

Water gushed from holes in the chamber wall and pooled in the basin. Steam formed a cloud above the rising bath. I kneeled at the water's edge and dipped a hand in. "I knew a lad who went to sea and left the land behind him." My reflection shimmered beneath me.

My own clothes sat folded at the top of the stairs outside the sunken chamber. Pale synth-wool tickling my neck, I climbed up to the gallery and wandered past the containment fields. Another ship? A planet, even? Deep red hair flew from the crowns of bone-white helmets – blade-armed Eldar locked in a perpetual assault. Adjacent the Eldar pen was a single, eight-legged monstrosity with curving spikes dotting its bloated body. Glad that isn't facing me.

A figure grew the reflection. "Do you wish to know what it is? Why it's here?"

My hands clasped over my belly. "I have held a commission in the Emperor's Navy and His Imperial Guard at separate times in my life. Even as an officer, not once was emphasis put on asking why." I sidled around Shesmet's cloak and headed along the gallery. Silk whispered across the floor. "Are they aware?"

"Some we keep in a state of awareness."

"Some."

"Some." Shesmet's cloak whisked alongside me.

"So, it's a prison."

"Palace."

"You find beings and bring them before your master." I looked up at Shesmet's horns. "I too have done this."

"You?"

"Aye. I would be honoured to make discourse over lunch, though I do have one condition."

"You would make a demand of the Castellan of Solemnace?"

"Rank and formal appointment turns my cheek." Palm-upwards, I offered Shesmet my hand. "Rather a remarkable woman of great wisdom and fortitude holds my interest."

Shesmet stared down her nose at me. Claws slid from the green folds and closed around my hand. Her body descended to the deck. Shoulders drew level with mine. Silk slithered away from my feet and shaped itself in to a shorter cloak swathing Shesmet's bodysuit. Together, we blinked through a portal in to a long, rectangular chamber home to a fireplace hewn from the rock and a stone table seated for two guests. Round bowls filled with a brown paste stood on curving mats. Wooden spoons sat beside them. Shesmet let go of my hand and went to the far end of the table and took her seat. Green flames sprang up in the fireplace. A large orb hovered on its own in a corner. Within a sunken section of the table, a semi-circular halo cast light up to the ceiling.

"Local flavour?" I picked up a long-handled spoon made of a shiny, stippled material. A stick-thin leg protruded from the thick layer on the surface of my bowl.

"Made from the Beikkyin species of insectoid native to this planet." A spoon flew in to Shesmet's hand. "Good protein."

My fingertips closed around the leg and pulled. A long, thin, and many-legged insect squelched from the soup. I raised my eyes, found Shesmet, and bit down on the head. My teeth tore through leathery skin. Cartilage crackled. Warm insides filled my mouth. Salt stung an ulcer on my tongue.

"And the guts of the Moriya tunnel worm." Shesmet brought her spoon to her lips.

"My dear…" I picked up an opaque glass and sipped water. "Just as my ears have been ruined from gunfire, my stomach has taken the very worst the Imperial Guard and Navy serves – this will not bother me." I plunged my spoon in to the mix. In silence, we ate.

Why are you here? Shesmet's voice reached my ears. Her eyes remained lowered and her lips around her spoon.

"I hadn't you for a psyker." I stirred my spoon in a slow circle through the dregs at the bottom of my bowl.

Answer my question, James.

"One of those bandits in power armour thought he could interrogate me. He now finds himself a half-blind prisoner along with the rest of his pillagers."

I asked once. Do not make me ask again.

I laid down my spoon and dabbed a folded cloth at my mouth. "I lost myself at sea. Now, I am adrift, alone, bereft wind and compass."

Sea?

"The legends of the wet navy—when vessels of wood and iron tacked the oceans of Holy Terra with nought but the stars and the wind to guide them." I rose and tugged the hem of my sweater down. "Legends."

Tell me.

"Lost at sea… and sadly dry." I eyed the orb and reached out. It flew past Shesmet and halted before my outstretched fingers. "Ah-ha…" The upper half faded. Inside the orb, bottles clustered.

"I like the Sakhalin."

"I prefer Old Navy." I drew a slim-necked bottle the colour of redcurrant from the cluster. A browned label on it read Sakhalin. "A holdover from my days in grey." I picked two silver glasses out and set them on the rim of the orb. "Many nights I have fallen asleep to her lullaby." My fingers brought the glasses together and I carried the Sakhalin over to Shesmet's end of the table.

"Are you a po—?"

The Sakhalin's cork popped out and bounced off the wall. I perched on the corner and tipped the frothing Sakhalin over the two glasses.

"Ah-huh." Shesmet's lips split. "Are you a poet?"

"Aye, and not a good one." I stood the Sakhalin back up and slid Shesmet's glass over to her. "She is the brains. My hand just scribbles what she whispers."

"Who?" Shesmet rocked her glass back and downed the Sakhalin in one.

"My Old Marsay—rum, to dry souls." I gulped the Sakhalin down. Fire blossomed inside me. "…Ahhh." More Sakhalin glugged from the open neck. "Does your mentor enjoy Sakhalin as much as you?"

"He is a dry soul, as you would say."

"A being of culture then—if these exhibits are anything to go by."

"He is life, death, and renewal. Your brain, your hands, are nothing to the power I wield through him."

"I have never needed it. The power men wield through others cultivates nothing but a black soul of remorseless apathy. Authority—the Emperor's commission—sows monsters disguised in human flesh. Men, women too, forget where they come from and become gods themselves, arrogant at Man's bullying juggernaut assimilating everything in its path, certain at its superiority over all other living organisms."

"And do you remember where you have come from?"

"I should be asking you that." I smiled down at Shesmet. "A humble farmer faces down the most powerful being he has ever met and asks of her…"

"A very dangerous farmer." Shesmet's lips broke in to a grin. "I must show you this." She sprang from her chair and headed over to a portal forming on the opposite side of the room from the crackling flames.

"I think I know…" I lunged at Shesmet's empty glass and scooped it up. Sakhalin clutched beneath an arm, I followed Shesmet through the portal.

"This facility was constructed to house beings in medium-awareness cells. Beings in this wing were taken during the forty-second millennium—as you can see here." Shesmet's feet left the floor and she swooped along to a containment field further in to the gallery. Pins and needles danced up the arm clutching the Sakhalin to my side.

"They are from a loyalist chapter." I set the glasses down on a bench facing the field. Sakhalin poured from the neck. A pink drop dribbled down the body. "Though their conduct would have you believe otherwise."

"We have traitor Marines somewhere…" Shesmet drew her cloak around her body and sat herself on the bench. "Somewhere."

"Cheers." Our glasses clinked. I tossed mine back and dabbed my thumb at the corners of my mouth. Thirty statuesque Absolvers filled the fifty-foot-square field. In the centre of the pack, Brother Captain Sivitus, teeth bared, gripped the sword his champion had wielded in the hangar. A dressing, covering his eye, wound around his head. You will crawl from bows to stern, across broken glass, disrobed, dishonoured. My fingers squeezed my glass. Blood filled my fingertips.

Bone clouted my ear. I flew off the bench and hunched my shoulders. Bells rang. Shesmet lurched at me, her arm outstretched. "—AGH!" Her hand flew over her mouth. "Nihilakh, I am sorry!"

"Heh—few too many orange juices, I think." One eye screwed shut, I rubbed my throbbing ear. Shesmet peeled her headdress away from her ears and lifted it off by the horns. Light brown hair fell down to her jaw. "Gored to death…" I scooped Shesmet's empty glass up and tipped the Sakhalin.

"Oh, no—" Shesmet thrust her hand over the top of her glass. "Mm-mm, no, I can't."

"What became of Mellenova?" I stood the Sakhalin on the floor and wiggled across to Shesmet. "I have friends in critical condition aboard." I leaned close. "If either of them are lost, that is on me."

"—Hic!" Shesmet cupped her hand over her mouth. Her headdress thudded on the floor. "She is—she is held in…" A gurgle arose in her throat. "…one of our berths."

"Very good." I laid my hand on Shesmet's shoulder. "I would ask you flush the faculties of radiation and action a diagnosis of the reactor. Do you have staff for that?"

"Mm-hm."

"My thanks." I squeezed Shesmet's shoulder. The gold plate beneath my fingers remained rigid.

"Let me just—let me just lay here for a…" Shesmet swayed and toppled towards me. I caught her shoulder and laid her down on the bench.

"You lay here for a sec." I stood Shesmet's headdress at her feet.

Sakhalin swinging by my side, I strolled through the gallery. How easy they fall. If not in bed, it's through the bottle. "Hur-hur." I swigged more Sakhalin and patted the bulge my pipe made in my trouser pocket. Still, I am short my leaf. I jabbed the stem in the side of my mouth. A solitary human, on his knees on grey ferrocrete, caught my eye.

My pipe clattered on the floor. Hairs on my arms sprang erect. Dry mouth agape, I brought my nose to the field's edge. Bright red tarnished a golden letter I hanging from a chain around the human's neck. A coin-sized hole oozing blood darkened the centre of his tall forehead. Trails dripped in his dull eyes and ran down his cheeks. I sank to my knees and clasped my hand over my mouth. The bottle wobbled on its base and tipped over. Sakhalin glugged across the floor.

Excommunicate traitoris.

My head sagged. God-Emperor Almighty. A warm palm rode up my forehead and scraped my hair back.

Some we keep in a state of awareness.

My hand grasped the upset Sakhalin and stood it in the pool glistening on the floor. Nine years she's kept you like this. I planted my palm on the floor and sat cross-legged before the Inquisitor. That's my bullet in you. Throne, I am sorry I allowed this. I gripped the Sakhalin by the neck and tipped the rest of the contents down my throat.

Steam drifted up the steps descending to the living quarters beneath the gallery. The Sakhalin and glasses dangled at my sides. Head listing, I trudged over to a bare shelf above the long tablet and dumped them.

"No human has ever set foot here." Shesmet's head lay on the edge of the pool. Bare arms spread along the rim.

"I thought as such." I hauled my sweater over my head and tossed it on the tablet. "The dominant feeling of the battlefield is loneliness."

"You think I am lonely?"

"You answered your own question, there." Shoes, trousers, and shirt landed on the tablet. "What I've learnt is that every soldier feels he or she is alone." Bare feet trod the cool stone. I squatted at the rim and slid my fingers beneath Shesmet's and lifted her hand. "Generals will nudge their little pieces around map tables day-in, day-out." My lips touched the white skin. "But all intimations with the enemy come down to the last two grunts and the last few rounds."

"Intimation," Shesmet murmured, a smirk twisting her lips. "Intimate."

I laid Shesmet's arm down and dipped my feet in. Warm, soapy water rose to my knees. On the opposite side of the pool, I rode the curving basin down and stretched my legs out. Shesmet's eyes fixed on mine. Sweat glistened beneath them. Her knees broke the surface. Ripples lapped at my stomach. Soap clinging to her body, Shesmet clambered across the pool towards me.

Curling hairs clung to the sticky patch left by the spilled Sakhalin. Hunched over on a bench, my left knee jiggled beneath my clasped hands. Osvat Radu Zeleska stared back at me, his bloodshot eyes frozen. Enough. I stretched my aching legs and stood up. Nose against the field's surface, I balled my fist and drove it in. A dense, thick liquid closed in on my hand and squeezed my wrist. Rolling up my arm, the field slowed my momentum to nothing, dragged my skin back from my eyes, and pinched my nostrils shut. Iron bars wrapped around my body and pressed my ribs inwards. Warmth burst in my lungs. Zeleska's shape blurred before my fading vision.

Liquid dissolved around me. Arms flailing, I blundered inside the empty field. Slacked-jawed, Zeleska swayed on his knees. A quivering hand rose to his forehead and pattered the oozing wound. Sharp splutters escaped his throat. His shoulders hunched and his head jutted forwards.

"Alright, son." I lunged at Zeleska and threw an arm around his shoulders. "Alright, I've got you." A grating wheeze tore from Zeleska's bloody nostrils. I lowered his head in to my lap. "I've got you." Fat, shiny beads spilled from his blood-filled eyes. A gloved hand seized mine. "It's alright." I wrapped my other hand around Zeleska's. "She can't hurt you anymore." Zeleska's grip slackened. His eyes, fixed on mine, froze.

A figure, clad in a hooded, green cape, stood silent out in the gallery passage. Weighed down by Zeleska's body, I swung to face the figure. Bare feet slapped upon the floor. "My bread, my bed, were yours." Shesmet's hood fell back from her damp hair. "Now, you spit on my hospitality."

"I put the bullet in his head." I bore down on Shesmet until we were paces apart. "I am putting this to a stop."

"You will be put back in your place." Cords stood out in Shesmet's neck. "Together."

"Ohh, there was such urgency in your embrace—so needy for the friction of skin. It is a pitiable being clinging to the illusion of power granted her by xenos favour. And I do pity you so, so much, seeing you high up on that lonely throne, lording over these caged animals."

"Predators." Shesmet's white lips thinned. "All who wear that symbol."

"He has been tortured enough."

"You know not its meaning." A white finger slid down Shesmet's cloak and parted it from her neck to her groin. Fingertips settled on a messy scar curving across her belly. "There were others. It was not just him possessing my body." Shesmet's chin trembled. "He promised he would cut it out—" Her voiced cracked and she twisted her head away. "He—" Shesmet clamped her hand over her mouth. She tottered away from me and collapsed to her knees. Short, sharp gasps seeped through her hand.

"If you wish to be free of his shadow, you must permit me to bear him aboard Mellenova. You will never have to look upon him again—that I can promise."

Hunched over, sticky cheeks shining, Shesmet screwed up a bundle of her cloak in her fist. Great heaves racked her chest and shook her shoulders. A yellow trail ran down her upper lip.

"You can let him go. All you have to do is open a passageway to Mellenova. Let him go, Shesmet."

Stone blocks cascaded from the ceiling and rearranged themselves in to a hexagonal archway in the middle of the passage between containment fields. Blue light leaped at me. I threw a glance at Shesmet then carried Zeleska through. After a moment's weightlessness, my feet met Mellenova's deck. Dead light strips embedded in the curving bulkhead stretched away down a corridor.

"Lilli?" I bent my knees and laid Zeleska down. "Lilli, you there?" Warmed muscles ached along my shoulders and arms. Sore thighs burned. Blackout. I dug my fingers in to the rolled neck on my navy sweater, hauled it over my head, and covered Zeleska's face. Come on, Lilli, at a time like this! I strode through the unlit corridors, arms outstretched and feeling my way along a length of pipes bolted to the bulkhead. Glass caught my eye. I dove at an emergency panel and wrenched the lid open. A dog-leg crank and a torch fitted to an iron band tumbled out.

Inch by inch, bulkhead doors screeched apart. The iron band ground a red line in to my skull. Palms reddened, skin sore and split, I shambled in to a tertiary weapon systems station in a primary compartment adjacent to the recreation facility. I fell against a desk jutting out from a cogitator monitor.

"…Ahh." I craned my neck and pinched the skin on my nape. Stumbling out of Gunnery, I dug my fingers in to my spine and headed over to the bulkhead door separating me from the tramway platform.

A hum rose from the bowels of the ship and the lights flickered on around me. "Lilli…?" My eyes rose to the ceiling. The hum grew louder. Dull alloy parted from one another and the platform doors grated apart. Rising in pitch, the hum became a shriek. Hands clamped over my ears, I locked my teeth together and edged towards the platform.

The door's teeth slammed together, rode apart, then slammed back in to place – BANG, BANG, BANG.

Oh, Lilli, what is happening to you? I shrunk back from the banging doors. Not a chance I'm making it through. Unless… Spindly swivel chairs faced cogitator monitors packed on to a 360-degree desk surrounding a tower of cables rising to the ceiling. I hooked my fingers around the smooth edges of a monitor and wrenched it off its shelf. Cables tautened and tore free from ports. The casing thudded on the edge of the desk and rolled off. I leaped back from glass popping free from the frame and scattering themselves across the deck.

Shards snapped from the cogitator's frame and left a trail behind me. Bright, copper wiring sprouted from mangled ports. Jaw set, I rammed my shoulder in the cogitator and shoved it the last few feet up to the banging doors then booted it in to the door's path.

Polymer cracked beneath the alloy. I planted a foot on the back of the case and dived through the gap and landed on my shoulder. "AGH—fuck me…" I scooted forwards on my hands and knees, away from the crumpling remains of the cogitator spitting tiny glass and polymer fragments outward. A tram rocketed past the platform, screeching, flames curling from its engine exhausts. I recoiled from the heat and flung an arm over my face. A red box set in the bulkhead caught my eye. I flew over to it and rammed my elbow through the cover and jerked on a T-bar.

Alarm bells wheedled. Water sprayed from perforated heads embedded in the ceiling and plastered my head and shoulders. Hugging my arms to my chest, I trudged over to the edge of the platform. "Lilli? Lilli, I'm back."

"James?" Lilli's voice boomed from speakers mounted high in the ceiling. "James, where are you?"

"I'm on the platform outside Gunnery—c—can you shut the fire alarms off?" I swiped water from the tip of my nose. The alarms died away, leaving the gentle hiss of the sprinklers. "Lilli, is something wrong?" A tickle danced down my spine.

"James, it's Lusia."

"Oh… I see." Drops soaked through my shirt. Head drooping, shoulders sunken, I backed away from the platform's edge and swayed over to a square pillar and planted a hand on it. My shoulder met the pillar and slid down it. Hands, clasped tight, rose to my lips and pressed inward.

Two caskets, one wrapped in the banner of the Imperial Guard, the other an unmarked piece of crimson fabric, stood alongside one another in an airlock. Sore eyes fixed on the cover, I squatted beside the red casket. My empty pipe rested in my palm.

A green smudge appeared in the corner of my eye. I lifted my heavy eyelids and smiled at the hooded Shesmet hovering at a corner in the corridor outside the open hatch. "Welcome aboard Mellenova, Lady Shesmet."

Hugging her cloak to her body, Shesmet took little steps over to me. I held out the pipe in my palm. "I do not smoke," Shesmet said.

"This was fired at the hand of a master craftswoman, with patience, with love."

Shesmet tilted her head and frowned at the tiny letters on the stem. "With love, L."

"I know what you're thinking." My fingers closed around the pipe. "Whatever we had, it was for the most fleeting of moments, before this voyage began. Lusia meant more to me as a companion and confidante than anything else. I have lost a dear friend." My lips twisted in to a smirk. "Lilli has lost her maker, her mother."

"Who is Lilli?"

"Lilli is Mellenova." My eyes jumped to the ceiling. "Lilli, may I introduce to you Lady Shesmet, the Castellan of Solemnace—did I get that right?"

"Hullo, my lady." A blue-eyed servo skull coasted in to the airlock. "Are you a friend of James's?"

Shesmet's eyes fell away from Lilli's skull. "Just Shesmet."

"Here, the ship's captain would normally read from the Articles of War since we are committing a former serviceman to the deep. Alas, without a copy to hand, we must find our words from within." I straightened up. My knees cracked. Shesmet backed away from Lilli and me. "I have known Andalusia on and off since Cadia, and I can think of no other being who was always there for me in the years after that great turning point. A woman of great bravery, stunning intellect, of wit, charm and good humour—an innovator in a galaxy preaching ignorance and blind obedience. I discovered Lusia again on Ursarker Creed Station by luck—by a silly practical joke I played on the screws after they gave me my lumps. Gone were the days of Lusia designing weapon systems, instead turning to consumer products—agri machinery and smoking devices to name a few. This was a sign of development, of progression away from weapons of war—a sure sign that she wished to see her talents employed in fields of far greater value to the people of the Imperium, people looking for a happy, quiet life, free from oppression; a life Lusia deserved more than the Adeptus Mechanicus would allow her. They would remember her as an Enginseer. Let us remember her now, not as a machine, as a woman." I laid the pipe on Lusia's casket. My hands clasped together, and I bowed my head.

Shesmet, arms trapped behind her back, leaned against a curving section of bulkhead outside the airlock. Lilli's skull held over Lusia's casket for a moment longer before following me out. I grasped the hatch release and wrenched it downward. The hatch spiralled inward and sealed. I shoved my hands in my pockets and placed my back to the bulkhead opposite Shesmet.

"You have my sympathies." Shesmet's eyes remained on the deck. "Please, do not commit them within this system."

I dipped my chin. "Lilli, think we can squeeze one more in?"

"Very well, James." Lilli's skull drooped. The bright orbs in the eye sockets had dimmed almost to nothing.

"Some friends of Shesmet's wish to examine the reactor too."

"It's fine." Lilli's skull drifted away from the airlock. "Anything you require."

"Dangerous company," Shesmet muttered once Lilli had gone. "That thing will look upon itself one day and realise it is answerable to no-one."

"A daughter, orphaned. It will be Lilli bearing Lusia's legacy in the future. They are one."

"If you think I wish to linger—"

"—I know you will miss the company of other humans in very short order, once we have departed."

"Great evil stalked the halls of this vessel—predators, so you say. I am ill at ease even setting foot on this deck."

"Then my cabin is yours."

Shesmet's eyes flickered up from the deck. "Free of the bottle, your flesh no longer appeals."

"I have none to give." My dull eyes met Shesmet's. "So, remain."

"I will remain."

"Remain the Castellan of Solemnace, and leave behind the son you forgot." My head jutted forwards. "You have a son." My eyebrows rose.

"I have a son?"

"Hmph—you have a son." A grin split my lips. "He's…" Shesmet's hand cupped her belly. Her head listed. "No, no, not that, er—"

"He cut it out."

"Titus, Shesmet. He is sixteen and out there alone."

"No." Shesmet pushed away from the bulkhead and flung a hand at me. "Hers, not mine."

"Until you have the courage to face him, you will always be alone."

Shesmet's arms went limp. My hands shot out and seized her before she crumpled on the deck. Denial. I thought as much. I dug my hand beneath her legs and trussed her over my shoulder. Many legs, skittering through Mellenova's vents and passageways, reached my ears. On the way to the reactor, I hope.

Inside my cabin, I laid Shesmet on the narrow bunk and parted the clasp on her cloak. Beneath it, she wore a dark, grey bodysuit. Silk? I pulled the material out from beneath her and brought it to my nose. The hairs on my arms stood up.

"Why do you want me?" Shesmet rolled on her side and brought her knees up. "I am broken." Her hands slipped beneath her head.

"I find people." I folded Shesmet's cloak in half, then half again. Leaning over Shesmet, I laid her cloak on a shelf above the bunk. "Once the Ynnari matter is settled, we will find your son." I kneeled next to Shesmet. "Together."

"He will not know my face. I will not know his."

"The longer you hide from this, the harder it will be to reconcile."

"He will not want me."

"You are his mother. There has to be someone there for him at such a pivotal point in his life. Do you want the Imperium to fill his head with zealous nonsense and drive him towards military servitude? Do you want your son to become a weapon, to lose his best years fighting an endless war? That spark in your child's eye is the most precious thing a parent can ever have. I will not see another die." I planted my hands on my knees and rose. Joints cracked.

"Will you watch over me?"

"I have other—"

"Stay. Please."

"Very well." I picked up the cabin's only chair and sat it beside the bunk. Fingers linked in my lap, I stretched a leg out and slouched. Long after Shesmet's breathing eased, I lifted my chin from my breast and crept out. Two bright, beady eyes watched me from down the corridor. Head hung, I approached the silent Lilli. "All decisions now fall to you. I am unfit to lead this expedition."

"Your words touched me. How are you feeling?"

"H—how am I feeling…? Lilli, she was your parent. That's on me."

"I lost my temper earlier, and then I lost control of the ship. I want you to know, I am sorry for endangering your life. I do not know what I should be feeling—the limits of my code. Can I ask you?"

Arms folded against my chest, I put my shoulder to the cold bulkhead. "An officer cannot show fear, distress, or uncertainty before subordinates, before anyone. Great, personal tragedy is taken in stride and withheld until such a point where the mission objectives have been achieved, then the officer's personal feelings may be expressed among appropriate company."

"I did not ask what the officer felt, I asked what you felt, James."

A dry lump heaved in my throat. "Shattered." My hand touched my warm brow. "Lost." I swallowed and gulped down air. "Hm-hm—status."

"Status?"

"Radiation levels—what are they looking like?"

"Whatever those things did, it seems to have flushed the worst of the radiation from the habitable areas of the ship. The reactor is still flooded—critical, at this time."

"Medical?"

"Background levels."

"Very good." I pinched the shoulder buttons on my chrono, illuminating the digits – 04:56. Not a chance I'm sleeping tonight. I ran my fingers along the stubble sprouting on my jaw and pinched my chin. "Propulsion, Gellar Field, fuel and provisions."

"Hm? Oh, let me see…" Lilli's skull fell in at my shoulder.

"Tell me on the way over." I gave Lilli an encouraging smile which disappeared the moment I turned my head away. My stomach contracted and my innards squirmed.

Gel cocooned the comatose Estoc inside his pod. Beside it, gentle blips crossed his heartrate monitor. "Anything from him?"

"Nothing."

I strayed over to the empty pod opposite Estoc's, the one Lusia had lain in, and laid my hand on the canopy. "Her?"

"…Nothing. It was quick."

Just plain ignorance, or are you learning how to lie? I reached around the back of the machine and flicked the master switch back and forth. The screens remained dead. My palm touched the back of the power bank and came away stone-cold. Power outage—could one of her blackouts have caused this?

"I know what you're thinking." Lilli's eyes blazed at me. "I would never allow my mistress to come to any harm by my actions or through inaction."

"Of course not."

"You would not have wanted to see her. She was… different when she passed."

"I know." I left the suite and headed down to the nearby wing containing Izuru's pod. Who do you think buried her? I brought my forearm up to a bulkhead and rested my head against it. "Lilli, until you have held the body of a person you love in your arms, you cannot know how I feel."

Behind me, Lilli's skull recoiled and the orbs in her eye sockets dimmed. I trudged in to the long chamber holding the pods. Lights snapped on above my head. Did I…? I brought my fingers up to my temples. No, this is the right room. "Lilli…"

A whimper stole from Lilli's skull. "I didn't know what to feel—LUSIA!" Lilli soared around in a circle. "LUSIA!"

"Lilli… umph!" Bone smacked my chest.

"LUSIA!" Lilli's skull butted me.

I cupped the implants bulging from Lilli's skull and held her in place. "Look at me."

"I'm sorry…" Lilli's eyes shut off entirely. "It was too much for me."

"You are strong. Your mistress's spirit lives on in you. Say those words—the first three."

"You are—"

"—I am."

"I am strong."

"We carry ourselves with dignity and reserve aboard ship. We let nothing deviate us from our mission—come, look here." I swivelled Lilli's skull to face the empty pods. "Where is Izuru Numerial?"

A deep groan reached my ears. The lights bathing the pods died and the orbs in Lilli's eye sockets faded. "Lilli?" I shook the servo skull. "Lilli, tell me!" Bone cavities stared back at me. I laid the servo skull on the deck and hovered by the doors. Deep shadows filled the corridor outside. I backed away. Teeth locked together, my thumbs worked up and down beneath my curled fingers. Shesmet's out there.

Alone and empty-handed, I crept back to the platform. Cool air drifted down the tramway tunnel. Balling my fists, I closed my eyes. Just a dead ship. I stooped at the edge of the platform and dropped to the tunnel floor. Dust flew up from beneath my feet. Plugging my nostrils, I laid my ear against pipe clusters running through the space beneath the rails. Nothing. I straightened up and set off, in total darkness, towards habitation.