'No, that is my responsibility' the other tech-priest said emphatically. A white-feathered cherub-familiar, its face a mass of brass finished implants, descended from the darkness of the bridge's vault to alight on one of two additional robotic arms the shorter magos had grafted to his shoulder blades. His train, however, was longer than that of Magos Thule's and another infant-homunculus bore it up in grubby hands, in an attempt to keep the ornately embroidered cloth off the ground. 'I am Arch-Magos Cthulius Helphasian Schrodinger. And what brings you here, Iron-Father? Are you here to break the heretic siege of great Gehenna?’ The half-skull, half-machine face of the Machina Opus gazed at Gdolkin with a hollow-eyed, soulless stare.

Gdolkin was aware that his own armour was dented and scratched down to the bare ceramite in places, hardly worthy of an audience with one of the masters of the Cult Mechanicus, but this was war and as such his appearance couldn't be helped.

'My brothers and I have come to this Emperor-forsaken forge world to find Magos Thule, for it was he who has called on the ancient bonds forged between our Chapter and your holy organisation in times past, asking for our aid in this war against the Despoiler's thirteenth black crusade.'

Arch-magos Schrodinger looked somewhat taken aback. The grotesque cherub-familiar and the train-holder both reflexively made the sign of the Holy Machine. This obviously wasn't the answer the arch-magos had been expecting. Magos Thule had been a thorn in Schrodinger's side ever since he arrived on this planet and now it turned out that he was the one calling the shots after all.

'Begging your pardon, arch-magos.’ an adept said, scurrying onto the command platform and giving a reverential bow as he did so, his voice distorted into electronic tones by the reverberations of a vox implanted into his throat.

'What is it?' the arch-magos muttered irritably.

'Apocalypse cannon energy levels now at seventy-nine point nine-nine per cent.’ the adept informed his master.

Thule might be calling the shots at this moment, regarding the Space Marines, but he wasn't calling all the shots.

'Prepare final firing solutions,' Schrodinger commanded, ignoring the Iron Hands again, his orders being passed down the line to adepts, gun-crews and senators throughout the leviathan land-gun.

'What is going on?' the towering Iron-Father demanded, tact and patience clearly not amongst his virtues.

'Schrodinger, don't do this!' Magos Thule commanded. 'I'm warning you!'

Gdolkin looked at the two sparring tech-priests in bewilderment.

'Get rid of this turbulent priest!' the arch-magos wailed. 'Iron-Father, seize this cogitae-addled fool.'

'Cannon levels at eighty-one point zero-six per cent.'

Gdolkin looked at Schrodinger askance, indignant anger burning through his red-eyed gaze. Who did this Mechanicus adept think he was, making such demands of one of the Adeptus Astartes? The relationship between the Iron Hands and the Machine Cult dated back thousands of years, and was based on mutual trust and respect.