On the surface, Cawl appeared unaugmented. He was one of those who regarded the human form as holy in itself as an expression of the Machine-God's perfection. Friedisch was of the other school seeing the body as a natural accident that must be improved upon. Not that his own augmentations had gone to plan. Friedisch's ocular enhancement had not bonded correctly with his organic corpus. His skin was a sickly white around the plastek-coated steel, spongy looking with persistent infection. A scent of biocidal gels clung to him as a result of unsuccessful self-treatment.

'How can anyone proclaim their adherence to the Mechanicum code when they swap out components so freely?' Cawl said. 'There is a perfect point that can be reached, but that is the intersection between compromise and ambition.'

Friedisch put his tin mug of sustenance solution down. 'That's not perfection,' he said. 'That is settling.'

'It is a kind of perfection,' insisted Cawl. 'In admitting our imperfections, we move as close to perfection as we can get. Imperfections must be embraced and accommodated. They cannot be ironed away.'

Friedisch's frown grew a few more wrinkles. They pulled at the puffy skin around his augmetics. Cawl couldn't help looking at them. Friedisch had taken the upgrade too soon, before he had sufficient monies or influence to ensure good-quality finings.

'That's… heretical,' said Friedisch.

'Piffle!' said Cawl. 'Human rivalry cannot be programmed out. We in the Mechanicum are human. Human knowledge, human power. If we abandon human form, we abandon the Machine-God. How often do we forget that?'

Friedisch disagreed with Cawl; he was worried what would happen to him if he were caught spouting such nonsense, and by extension what would happen to Friedisch himself.

'You skirt dangerous ground,' said Friedisch. 'The central tenet of our creed is improvement of the human form through embracement of technology.'

'Yes!' said Cawl in agreement, though in actual fact he was not agreeing; it was a rhetorical trick he over-employed. 'And look at what the Emperor achieved doing just that. In the Legiones Astartes, primarchs, custodians and the others He has accentuated nature's art. What He has done is sublime, but the form remains. Surely the Machine-God must be pleased with these finest works of the Omnissiah?'

'If you believe Him to be the Omnissiah.'

'''Thou shalt know Him by his works',' quoted Cawl from the Principia Mechanicum. 'If you can't accept the Emperor as the messenger of the Machine-God, you will be waiting for your Omnissiah for a very long time,' said Cawl.

'There is too much dissension as to whether He is the Machine-God, or the Omnissiah, or neither,' said Friedisch. 'I'll leave the logic gate on either-or for that one.'

'I have made up my mind, and I am entitled to my own views.'