‘Understood. Hold fast.’ Time was of the essence. Nem­etus slowed and then stopped, holding out his shield to signal his closest warriors to halt as well. He turned and looked up, pleased to see the purge of the upper balcony was progressing quickly. ‘Judiciar Admonius and companions will continue the cleanse down here. Ready data terminals for transfer.’

He pulled away the bulky datatrap maglocked to his thigh and set it on the casing of the closest cogitator. He found the data port without problem and joined it to the trap with a snake of cable from the top of the storage device. The handful of Intercessors with him did the same at other consoles.

‘Whatever the drawbacks of the Machine Cult’s dogma, at least they have not changed their terminal connections in eight thousand years!’ laughed Brother Heraclon.

A flurry of sparks erupted from the terminal next to Nem­etus, unleashed by a pair of mutants that had crept back through the maze of power conduits and data cables strung between the main display and the control terminals. He turned without thought, catching the next volley on his shield, a few bullets glancing from the pauldron of his armour. Two bolt rifles barked from the doorway and a second later the twisted features of each traitor disappeared in a bloody detonation, their decapitated bodies slumping to the metal deck.

The rev of chainswords was sporadic from above as the Assault Intercessors of Audacity hunted down the last few of the enemy. Nem­etus returned to the datatrap and flipped open the case of the runepad and small status screen in its side. It whirred softly as he activated the transfer, recognising scattered pieces of navigational data as it flowed from the cogitators to the storage machine.

There had been no sound of combat for several seconds and he waited for the confirmed clear, ready to broadcast to the Ithraca’s Vengeance that the strategium was under control. Before he could do so, the command vox chimed in his helm.

‘Assault command, this is ship command.’

As he recognised the voice of Praxa­medes rather than Shipmaster Oloris, Nem­etus’ body reacted as though threatened – his pulse suddenly increasing again, providing a shot of energy that coursed along his nerves and blood vessels.

‘This is assault command. Enemy strategium seized, data transfer underway.’

‘Abort the operation, assault command. Return for gunship extraction immediately.’

The order came like a blow, and it was several seconds before Nem­etus could reply.

‘Negative, ship command. Negative. We are in complete control of the objective zone and data transfer is ongoing.’ He needed something more precise and glanced at the progress monitor of the datatrap. ‘Ten minutes, brother, and we will have scoured their databanks clean.’

‘You don’t have ten minutes, brother. A traitor battleship is breaking from the stellar debris field. Its lances will be in range within seven minutes. You have to extract now.’