Mechanicum

he canted, sorting through a morass of data feeds, replaying inloads from his brother princeps to piece together the battle beyond his immediate concerns.

Before his engine's horrifying destruction, Suzak had fought like the killer he was, dispatching a Reaver and a Warlord before the Imperator had slain him. On the right flank, Princeps Sharaq and Metallus Cebrenia had, together with Princeps Kasim and Raptoria, taken down the last Reaver, which left only the Imperator, Aquila Ignis.

The Mortis engines had come expecting an easy victory, and no matter what happened next they would leave the bulk of their force burning on the Martian sands. Tempestus had earned themselves a legendary place in the history of Mars.

'It's firing!' shouted Kuyper.

Cavalerio opened a Manifold link to his surviving warriors. 'All Tempestus engines, this is the Stormlord—'

Princeps Cavalerio never got a chance to finish his order as a thunderous series of impacts smashed into his engine. Searing pain, worse than the death of his beloved Victorix Magna, surged through his body as the weakened shields collapsed under the barrage of missiles from the Imperator's upper bastions.

Deus Tempestus's shield emitters blew out in a cascading series of explosions, and the Stormlord's body spasmed in its tank as the feedback blitzed through his mind, fusing his synapses with those of the Manifold.

In his last seconds of life, he saw the heroic march of Metallus Cebrenia and Raptoria as they advanced upon the red and silver monster. Their weapons arms were wreathed in fire as they advanced, heedless of the impossibility of ever hurting the Imperator, though to call it such now that its masters had turned to the cause of treachery seemed perverse.

Metallus Cebrenia was the first to die, her right leg blown off, and an almost scornful barrage of rockets finishing her off as she lay helpless in the ruins of a giant loading bay. Raptoria lasted only moments longer. Her shields were torn away by a sweeping blast of gatling ca

Cavalerio felt their deaths and watched through the Manifold as Deus Tempestus sensed them too. Blood poured from his ravaged flesh and the liquid in his casket was almost opaque with it. He pushed himself to the front of the tank, feeling the fluids pouring from cracks in the glass and seeing the smoking ruin that was all that was left of his cockpit section.

Kuyper was dead, his body slumped and on fire in his moderati's chair, while across from him, the steersman, Lacus, was little more than a mangled lump of torn flesh. Cavalerio couldn't see his sensori, now realising that the entire upper section of the cockpit was open to the sky. The enginseer who had replaced Magos Argyre, an adept named Thunert, was still alive, only his lack of flesh saving him from the fires that swept the cockpit.

Cavalerio fought down his anguish as he saw the triumphant Aquila Ignis stride towards him, its colossal tread shaking the ground.

Its guns were silent and Cavalerio knew why, feeling the spiking pain of skitarii breaching charges detonating against his engine's leg armour.

'Mortis wants to capture us,' he said. 'I can feel them crawling inside us already.'

With what remained of his co