‘Very well,’ he said. His gaze lingered on Tsu’gan a moment longer before he lumbered away to convene with Nu’mean.

‘Pain is everywhere, brother,’ he added, his back turned. ‘Embrace it in the fires of war or run and let it be your master. I can’t make that choice for you.’ Then he was gone, leaving Tsu’gan to ponder his wisdom.

The fusion-point was where an old enginarium deck had breached what sensors and ship schematics suggested was the Protean’s medi-deck. That was good. It meant the cryo-stasis chamber would be close by upon entry. Not so good was the several thousand kilograms of debris preventing a direct burn, hull-to hull, through to the next vessel.

Such a problem might prove an impasse to common explorators or even fellow Space Marines. Terminators had no such issue.

‘Heavies guard the rear,’ said Praetor, ‘Everyone else… cut her open.’

The sound of revving chainfists ground the air before the two squads went to work hewing and sawing.

‘Apothecary, stand clear,’ he added. ‘Don’t risk your cargo, brother.’

Emek nodded, checking the vial embedded in his gauntlet. The chemical solution sloshed benignly within.

‘If we can locate a blast door or even a sealed bulkhead, I might be able to unlock it from here. It’ll make our progress swifter.’

Praetor nodded to the Apothecary before wading in with his thunder hammer.

Emek looked again to the vial. A small injector needle on the end would guarantee delivery of the solution, which was red and faintly luminous. Emek knew little of its origin, but he knew it was potent. Scarcely fifty millilitres resided in a clear armourplas tube the size of the Apothecary’s thumb.

So much, resting on so little a thing.

They found the door. It was a disused service hatch in the Protean’s aft that led to a short maintenance conduit and the ship’s medi-deck. Only wide enough for one Terminator at a time, entry was fairly slow. It did give Tsu’gan and the others first in the line a chance to reconnoitre their surroundings though.

Unlike the Glorion, the old Salamanders strike cruiser still maintained a flickering power grid. Lume-lamps cut up the dark in trembling flashes, revealing a gloomy interior. Gunmetal was scorched black in places from an old fire, long dead. Soot carpeted the deck underfoot and shifted like a torpid sea every time one of the Firedrakes moved. Ash clung to rafters and crossbeams like grey fungus.

They had emerged into a large, hexagonal room. Five of its sides branched off and terminated in a console, making the room some kind of hub. There were glyphs and icons crafted into the walls. Sigils of the Salamanders – the flame, the serpent and the drake’s head – glittered wanly against the Terminators’ halo-beams. The light above was hexagonal too and its design echoed outwards concentrically.

Emek was poring over a green-lit console as Tsu’gan approached him.