+Faith and ignorance are so often alloyed that they might as well be called one,+ sent Ignis.

+An observation we can agree on,+ replied Ahriman.

+It is not an observation. It is an objective truth.+

Ahriman watched as the Word Bearers moved across the chamber. Occasionally one of them would stop, and Ahriman would hear the thought-echo of a canticle spill into the ether.

+The artificial gravity is stable?+ he sent to Ignis, still watching the Apostle and the other Word Bearers.

+It is. The primary systems of this facility were maintained to an adequate level. Power, gravity, atmosphere – it is all functioning.+

Ahriman nodded. In the churn and swell of the ether he felt something shift, something that cast a shadow across his thoughts and tugged at their patterns. For a second, he felt as though he had just stepped off the edge of a hidden precipice. He steadied himself, turning his will and sight inwards until the sensation of falling passed.

+Breach the walls and bring them in.+

Ignis gave a small nod. Ahriman felt a pulse of thought pass out through the shrine walls to where the ships waited. A second later, a patch of the vaulted ceiling above began to glow with heat. Then it blew outwards. A new glowing hole over a hundred metres wide opened to reveal the sunlight and the hull of the Ankhtowe. Tugs and haulers swarmed forwards as more fresh holes appeared in the comet’s skin. Black, slab-shaped containers the size of battle tanks slid through the openings. Spider-limbed servitors detached from the tugs and began to unfasten the containers. Ahriman could feel the growling ache of psychic noise from within as the first layers of sedation faded from their cargo. The tugs pulled back until the solatarium hung in the void between the ship and comet.

Silver and plasteel sheathed the solatarium sphere. Rune-stamped chains had been welded to the casing and five tugs had dragged it from the guts of the Ankhtowe and into the vacuum. Worms of light played up and down the chains. It creaked and shivered as it moved, its dimensions seeming to flick between being close and far off even as you looked at it. Ahriman held his mind in a state of perfect balance as the sealed sphere was lowered through the hole like an eye being set back in its socket. The chains holding the solatarium broke before they were unfastened, their substance dissolving to light and smoke. It hung a metre above the floor of the chamber. Sparks of multicoloured light earthed into the void. Two of the Word Bearers were on their knees, tongueless mouths filling with blood as they thanked their gods.

Ahriman felt the storm winds rising in the realm beyond. He gave a single nod.

+We begin.+

Battle-barge Monarch of Fire, Jovian Gulf