Genefather by Guy Haley

Author:Guy Haley
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: FLPB
Publisher: Black Library
Published: 2023-08-25T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

THE CONCLAVE CHRONALIS

Cawl was in his element. He enjoyed grandstanding, and there were few better opportunities to do so than before a group of tech-hungry machine-priests.

‘My esteemed brothers and sisters,’ he intoned. ‘You will be aware of my recent adventure in the heart of the Pharos of Sotha.’

Some were, some weren’t, but it never paid to patronise your audience.

‘You may also be aware of my latest project.’

The lights plunged dramatically. Cawl had tasked a submind of his to infiltrate the pyramid’s systems, no easy thing given their age and complexity, but accomplishable nonetheless. He gave the sliver of his consciousness the noospheric equivalent of a pat on the head – one of that size was an idiot thing, and easily pleased – while the greater part of his consciousness resisted the temptation to dive into the informational world it had discovered. There were wonders there, wrought in the exquisite machine tongue of the ancients. They would have to wait.

From a compact hololithic projector embedded in one of Cawl’s attendant servo-skulls, a tri-D image of the galaxy burst, depicted in full-spectrum colour. He’d recreated it exactly, incorporating all its glorious noise and hue. To a standard human, it would have appeared pretty, a turning whorl of stars, bluish, purplish, ethereal as smoke yet weighty as all life. The yolk of stars at the centre blazed with cold white light. Its arms trailed lazily from this centre, growing dimmer to the edges, attenuating into a milky haze at the furthest bounds where intergalactic space began. The great work of the Machine God, perfect but for those places where the blunders of His children had injured it; warp-realspace interfaces a sickening colour with no real analogue in the mundane spectrum, but closest to a veinous purple.

To the tech-priests, the projection was more vivid, singing with radiation of wave and particle, and blazing with every colour from deepest infrared to furthest ultraviolet. It filled the space above the convocation, drawing delighted gasps and little burbles of approval. The projection was quite impressive: rarely were such things so comprehensively done, but fitting a full hololithic device into so small a space as a skull was really remarkable. They were impressed.

‘The galaxy, some years ago,’ he said. ‘Until this happened.’ The image shook. Streamers of sickly light raced away from warp storms large and small. The Eye of Terror and the Maelstrom swelled like metastasising cancers, reaching for each other with corruptive limbs. They joined, spread, dividing the glorious whole of the galaxy in twain, and flooded the stars with supernatural fallout.

‘We can surmise that if this is not the ultimate goal of the Warmaster Abaddon, it at least plays a crucial role in his plans,’ said Cawl. ‘For this event was foreseen by the most ancient of races, and they took steps to prevent it.’

Green speckled lights ignited along the course of the Rift.

‘Many of us here have an inkling of the War in Heaven between the most enigmatic Old Ones and their arch-foes, the necrons, many millions of years ago.

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