Shadow Point by Gordon Rennie

Author:Gordon Rennie
Language: eng
Format: MOBI, epub, pdf
Publisher: Black Library
Published: 2012-11-13T22:23:01.989000+00:00

ERWIN RAMAS SIFTED through the streams of new data flooding into him through the mind-link with the Drachenfels. He had received the almost incomprehensible orders relayed from the inquisitor aboard the Macharius, and, like the other vessels in the Imperial formation, his crew had recalibrated their surveyor systems in the same way as the Macharius had. Now the four eldar ships stood revealed to the Drachenfels's electronic senses, and Semper studied their detestably alien and unfamiliar shapes with a detached and coldly cruel interest.

It had been more than a hundred and fifty years since he had last encountered the eldar, but here they were again, cruising through space well within range of his vessel's lance turrets like a peace-time flotilla parading before some local planetary dignitary at a ceremonial review of the fleet.

Ramas didn't know what dangerous foolishness the Lord Admiral and that damnable inquisitor on the Macharius had had in mind when they had come up with the idea for this mission the Drachenfels and its two sister ships had been despatched on, but he knew one important thing.

The eldar were not to be trusted. He'd follow orders and hold his fire, but, at the first sign of treachery from those xenos scum, he'd let fly with everything the Drachenfels had.

He reached out through the mind link into the ship's matriculators, retrieving his precious firing solution programs. He activated them, running them in a practice simulation through the Drachenfels's logic engines, his mind flickering back and forth between the simulation and the real-time information relayed to him by the ship's surveyor and auspex systems. He compared the two data streams, and then merged them, using the surveyor-gathered information on the nearby eldar ships as the new model for the firing simulation.

Ramas's equations had been good, he knew, and the logic engine-created phantasm images were fine enough for what they were, but it was always better to have a real target and hard data to work with.

The logic engines waged the imaginary battle amongst themselves. Non-existent lance beams cut through an imaginary void to find and strike illusionary targets. Phantom explosions erupted in an intangible battle-zone which existed only in the ship's dreaming machine-mind.

Ramas studied the results, and made the necessary corrections to his firing solutions and targeting equations. He ran the simulation again. This time, he was far more satisfied with the outcome.

He smiled his lipless smile. He would follow orders, but he would watch the enemy ships and be ready for the first sign of treachery. When that happened, he promised himself, they would find him more than ready and prepared to settle old scores.

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