Herald of the Stars: Chapter Nine (Patreon)

I stare in disbelief. Where’s my super weapon? My ‘Nope’ cannon? The plans for the Astronomicon?

My hope.

Where did it all go?

I close the file in disgust, unwilling to look at it. I know I am being foolish, but when you’re stuck between demons, orks, tyranids, and Emperor knows what else, what you need is dakka - guns and ammo, not fancy containers for them.

Pacing around the canteen, I punch the occasional wall. My sore hands bring me back to reason. Rather than mope, I should challenge the mechanicus cruiser, Distant Sun. The whole point of trading with the orks was to get the tools, to make the equipment I need to explore its fortified innards.

That will get me more loot, possibly enough to fortify myself against the orks and tyranids. Then I can spend my time learning and upgrading myself while I find out what I need to do to get that cruiser working, detach it from the hulk, and warp out of here.

I take a few deep breaths, regaining my focus and go over my initial plans from several weeks ago.

After departing, I can trade in the data I’ve scavenged for new crew and equipment, then bribe the mechanicus with parts of the STC so they will let me keep the ship and sponsor me for a Writ of Trade, the one piece of paper in the Imperium of Man that can grant me freedom from eternal servitude.

I’ll also need something to keep the mechanicus and other factions in check so they don’t nick my stuff or stuff me in a hole while I build my power base. Being a one man army in 40k is a fool’s dream, no matter how amazing the archeotech I have is.

Groaning, I knock my head against the wall a few times. This is a ridiculous plan. I turn around and lean against the wall. I hold up my left hand.

“Privateer and CEO of a private military company with city sized ships that sail on a sea of nightmares.”

I hold up my right hand, “Slave to the Emperor and his cronies, dissected by the mechanicus, tortured by the inquisition and eternally on the run, dodging dark eldar and other horrors.

Last, I raise my left foot, “Remain on this blighted hulk in the company of xenos who want to eat or beat me.”

I suppose the last option is I kill myself, but I’d fall on my face if I try raise another limb, so that option can fuck right off.

Standing straight, I clap my hands once, “I need a goal. Not survival, a writ, or any other necessity, but a flight of whimsy. A dream to hold when it gets tough.”

The things I miss the most, aside from family, are the little luxuries: my shed, with its tea stained mug and battered tins of biscuits and sugar. My favourite tools. The random draw filled with useful odds and ends. The greenhouse, filled with plants on a hot summer day. My bicycle and tricked out van. The smile and thanks from grateful customers. My science, history, and nature documentaries. Ice cream on the beach. Takeaways of all kinds. The sofa.

I laugh. No wonder I was so fat.

I don’t need to be a hero or a tyrant, a slave or a hermit. I just need my pie in the sky. That little slice of happiness, and if I have to slice my portion from the wishes of my enemies, and defend it with void shields and las cannons, or turn myself into a temple of technology to get what I want, then so be it.

Tremble, enemies of Man! The British are here, and they’re all out of tea.

That’s so dumb, I smile, but just what I needed.

I have eight days before my next trade. Mulling over how to tackle the cruiser, I return to my workshop and start constructing the parts I will need. I spend a week fortifying the library and building an airlock over a section of the hull. With defences in place, I am able to charge E-SIM at the library too, and do so with every opportunity.

Trade day arrives, and Bola delivers a single item. We agree to meet again in thirty days. I was expecting a circuit printer, or something similar, so I can make basic electronics. Remote explosives are a must before I feed the orks too much gear.

Deal complete, I return to my room and examine my odd loot: a matt-black sphere, the size of a football, with a single power button on the top. It’s been scratched up and decorated with ork symbols, mostly crude depictions of weapons and janky spaceships. I try to power it on, but nothing happens.

Well, turning it on and off again doesn’t seem like an option, so how do I plug it in?

“Can you provide remote power to this unit, E-SIM?”

++Acknowledged... Error... Remote power module for non-E-SIM equipment: unavailable... External Machine Integration module: unpowered.++

“Right, so even if I could power it on, I’ll need to run another module. Let’s save this for when E-SIM is back to normal power. Oh! I’ll put it on one of the remote charging pads in the canteen. They charged the batteries, maybe they can juice this device too.”

After placing the sphere in the canteen, I gather supplies and gear up, then head to the library and use my pipe and power field to carve into the Distant Sun’s hull. This stuff is way heavier than the lead and bricks I’m familiar with. I cut the hull apart in breeze-block sized pieces as I can’t handle anything bigger. The scanner labels it as ferrocrete.

The first two metres are a single plate, after that, it becomes a series of metre sized hexagons of composite materials, ceramite and plasteel, in an adamantium alloy frame. Four days and twelve metres later I reach another solid shell, which is where I hit a snafu.

My pipe and powerfield can only scratch it. I bring up the scanner and it tells me it’s 27% adamantium and a whole bunch of other metals set in an atom perfect rigid structure that is entirely unnatural.

The surface is covered in miniscule bumps that have a scattering effect; my sensor module can’t penetrate it more than a millimetre, even though it managed the ablative ferrocrete and hexagonal armour plates without trouble.

It’s my first contact with Adeptus Mechanicus material science for a mission critical component, and it’s super impressive. I almost wish this was a less competent example of their craft as I really want to get inside the hull, recognising I’ll be thinking the opposite once I actually own the ship.

I scrape a tiny sample off the hull and away from the scattering effect, my scanner is able to give me more information. Throwing the data at the research matrix, I ask it to devise a way to cut and form the alloy and it requests more power.

Sitting on a small stool and rest my arms and chin on a scrap-made table. My sprayer rests against the side and my shotgun and armour are heaped upon the surface.

Examining my power reserves, MP 89%, EP 100%, I return E-SIM to normal power. At least with the defences in place I can maintain the warp tap.

The library looks pretty good now. It’s clean, the shelving is upright, and the ladders for the upper shelves are in place. A fifth of the massive room is filled with piles of scrap, shelving that was too heavy or damaged to move, that I dismantled. Before, it was pretty depressing. With the data from all the lanyards, I see it more as part of the process of discovery, if you want to call a panda and a shipping container STC useful data.

OK, maybe I am still a little bitter.

Sound and movement alerts quickly toss my musings aside. Didn’t I get all the demons in this part of the station hulk?

The scrap heap shudders and clangs. From its depths slithers a half metre, serpentine xeno with a broad head, massive jaws, and armoured back. Crab-like limbs and claws click over the metal as it scurries straight at me, followed by another five identical fellows.

My head blares with an alert, ++Warning, unknown biohazard. Prepare for combat.++

I grab my shotgun, flip the safety, aim and fire. A massive spray of chitin and purple fluid spray from the lead xeno’s head, it stumbles and falls behind, then dashes forward.

The other xenos start jinking left and right like fleas, alternating between a rapid, skittering advance and random jumps.

I miss the next couple of shots and drugs flood into my body; the xeno advance’s apparent speed slows a little. The drum clip spins as I rack and fire. My nine remaining rounds kill two and wound another.

A pair of xenos leap at me. I swing my shotgun like a club knocking one away and the other gets pulped by the stock as my powerfield comes online. Rushing the xeno I knocked back, I crush it as it rolls over, and damage the floor too. A heavy weight hammers into the back of my legs and I stumble, barely leaping into a roll, rather than faceplant. Still, I am too slow.

The first xeno I hit lunges for my neck just as I come up in a crouch. Tucking my chin, I punch it, going clean through its exoskeleton and skull. The sudden weight hanging of my arm drags me down and the last xeno goes for my extended arm, severing it in a single bite.

I stare in shock for a moment before E-SIM forcibly drags my awareness back to the fight. Dropping the shotgun, I reach over with my remaining hand, I grab the bitey xeno’s back and use the powerfield to mush it, half-severing it and leaving the xeno flopping on the ground.

Retreating to the table, I pick up my trusty pipe and smash each xeno to pieces, just to make sure, then spray them with nanites. I clutch the stump of my arm, and watch the creatures dissolve. Doing so will prevent them from recovering the biomass in the bodies, but mostly, it's to be doubly sure they’re dead and gone. Emperor knows what might spawn from that mess if I left them to rot.

++Well done, Aldrich. Scans suggest the area is free of hostile bio-forms.++

“Urgh. That was horrible. What am I going to do about my arm? Crap! The suit too.”

++Take a look at your wounds.++

I grimace and look at the mess of my right arm from the corner of my eye.

“Oh.”

There is nothing to see. The mesh suit has sealed over the stump.

++Pick up your severed arm and hold it to the stump.++

Picking up the dribbling body part from the mess, I brush it against my chest then hold it against my stump.

It’s a little fiddly, but I get it done and the fabric sticks to itself, pinning the arm in place.

++This damage is beyond the mesh suit’s self-repair ability. However, I can use your construction nanites to aid the process. It will be fixed in under thirty minutes. Your arm will take longer to reattach properly, approximately two hours. The more time you spend resting and eating, the quicker it will repair.++

“Then I’m going to sit on my stool and do absolutely nothing. Maybe it will help me stop shaking.”

++Shall I turn off the warp tap until you have repaired the breach?++

“Yeah, good idea. I don’t know if those things are attracted to it, but better safe than dead. So much for at least retaining power levels.”

++Warp tap dissabled. Would you like to name the hostile bio-forms?++

“Ah, I’m pretty sure those were tyranids. Part of a galaxy spanning swarm of locust-like xenos. I don’t know what specific strain or hive they are though.”

++Database updated. I have some good news for you, Aldrich. That last fight gave you just enough kills to unlock upto two new modules. Would you like to examine your options? Perhaps the distraction would help.++

“I’ll give it a try. Show me the ones you think would help the most.”

E-SIM presents a list of ten modules. As I read them, a small smile creeps over my tired face.