‘The Emperor’s Children have fallen far,’ said Andros.

Cogitator systems built into the Armour of Reason highlighted points of interest and threat for Guilliman automatically. He examined them all cursorily. The primarch’s engineered brain was capable of processing a phenomenal amount of information; that had always been his special talent. He listened in to the battle chatter of the fleets and the quiet order exchanges of his squads as they spread out. He scanned the frequencies for notification from his other strike teams, all while he examined the avenue and read multiple datascreed readouts scrolling down his face-plate display with equal attentiveness. He formulated plans, gave brief orders via vox and databurst, but it was the ship that absorbed him most.

The Triumphal Way had changed beyond all recognition. Where once was splendour, darkness held court. The little light that the Ultramarines brought was swallowed quickly, reduced to a dismal silver that took the edges from everything, smearing all features into an uncertain blur where distance was difficult to judge and the darkest areas could prove to be anything but shadows.

The primarch remembered the Triumphal Way as it had been, when it was a showcase for all that was fine in human art. Gone were the bronze heroic statues that had lined its broad path, as were the masterpieces painted by the artists of the 28th Expeditionary Fleet that had hung between them. In their stead were hideous abominations, contorted sculptures of a shocking nature and artworks that depicted the profane and the obscene. The latter had been rendered in pigments derived from unclean fluids which, left alone, had sprouted thick mats of mould.

No attempt had been made to place these new adornments carefully, or to clear away the old. Shattered frames were heaped like driftwood. The bronze scrap was scattered across floors obscured by a clotting of filth. The marble cladding of the walls was pitted all over, and black liquid oozed sluggishly from wide cracks. Onyx columns had been wrenched from their settings and lay broken, the engraved list of past victories on them reduced to a jumble of letters. The paving was shattered in many places, and where the metal of the deck should have been visible there were only black, watchful pits.

Worst of all was the silence. Sound was unnaturally muted. Battle raged outside and the ship was under heavy bombardment, but unlike the Gauntlet of Power, whose halls rang to explosions and the howls of overworked machines, the Pride of the Emperor did little but shiver from time to time, like a giant stirring in its sleep. No light flashed through the high armourglass windows at the avenue’s apex; only darkness was visible. Discordant music drifted from somewhere. Three screams issued from another direction, shockingly close.