40 Thousand Reasons

Chapter 134: Harness

I did return to the Pharos just in time, to observe Trazyn's the Infinite latest feat.

With a black beam of unreality, the Black Fortress fired upon the Hadex Anomaly slowly reducing it in volume and glow until the Blank pilot inside the liquid cockpit just died and the black beam vanished. It was a bit sad, but that Psi-titan Princeps did lack everything below his stomach, thus he wasn't useful to my plans.

However, it was still a great result, as the Warp Vortex had been reduced by almost half, restoring thousands of star systems back into the galaxy. His death has not been in vain.

"It seems you have failed, Necron Lord. I am very disappointed." I spoke to his mind, letting my sadness filter through.

"So am I, stranger. I would need a powerful human Pariah or a Solitaire Harlequin to attempt this type of adventure again, and those are too rare in this damned galaxy." the Necron Overlord complained seeming disappointed as well.

I mused on this for a minute, searching for a suitable target. Eidetic memory and the Chapter's extensive travel logs did help.

"There is someone able to help. An Inquisitor named Ivixia_Dannica, who does have a Pariah in her retinue. You'd need to disguise the operation as a Mechanicus adventure, using those Forge Venatoria techpriests and their records for similar attempts in the Eye of Terror and the Maelstrom. You won't get the credit for this magnificent achievement, but you also won't be chased down by a dozen Great Demons afterwards. Better deflect the guilt elsewhere, right?" I proposed with a faint smile.

Better have an Ordo Malleus Inquisitor face down those demons when they came howling for revenge.

I saw Trazyn stand still for a few moments, before reaching the same conclusion. "The techpriest ruse won't hold out for long, stranger. I've dealt with Inquisitors before. But for the sake of completing the task... I shall try. Any chance you would know the location of another such Psi-titan? Two of those weapons firing from parallel timelines would seal the Anomaly for good, even without having to use the Ymga. Asking for its use would be too costly, even for one such as myself." The Overlord pleaded with a glance at the ceiling.

I smiled inward, already expecting his demand. Two weapons meant two pilots, each from different eras. "There is one such Psi-titan which might be salvaged, Lord Trazyn. During the Horus Heresy on the world of Espandor, in Ultramar. The Psi-titan is called Occedentalis-Damysus. However, you should expect heavy psyker activity around that location, and you'll need at least a Null Rod or Wand."

The Necron wizard grimaced visibly, and held out the very Null Rod I gave him. "And I should expect you need another Null Bone Staff for this. Maybe two extra Bone Staffs with mind shields, like you always ask."

I nearly chuckled, as the Necron was getting used to my style.

"Sure. Those are useful to my agents, but what I need is the operation manuals for a couple of Necron devices. These ones." I explained and sent over the five Necron artifacts I had saved for this exact moment, including the new transdimensional beamer.

If a Necron had spit glands, I bet Trazyn would have spat in disgust. "Such a random collection...including a tracker...a C'tan cowl and a beamer. And these two...a memory assembly chair for Crypteks...and a polishing datawand. You really want a manual for this? Just point and click and the item gets cleaned. No manual needed!"

Well, I didn't know what it was til now, but a magical device to clean anything was good too. Washing blood from my weapons and armor was a bit tiring sometimes.

Anyway, I had another demand of more importance, for me. Thus, I sent the self-repair device from the old Freeblade's Knight over. "This item, I need it in three STC versions, from simple to very advanced. I'm told it's similar to Necron self-repair, but I doubt that. Human tech is never that advanced, even if it looks similar in operation."

Trazyn sighed while scanning the Blessed machine and agreed. "It doesn't even have a subspace storage for repair alloys! I guess that feature would be the very advanced option. Sold separately, as it would require extra time from my Crypteks."

I agreed to his demand, of course. It might be something simple for Necrons, but self-repairing Titans and Knights would be immensely valuable to humanity. And perhaps even spaceships, one day.

"And lastly, that planet moving engine...which you never traded to me, even after Sarlok got burned." I demanded with a grin.

"Moving planets now! With human-made machinery...it almost sounds impossible. I rather visit the Orrery and move that planet directly where you want it." Trazyn grumbled as he took out a Mechanicus data-slate and began downloading stuff on it.

"Aren't a couple of Dynasties fighting over it right now? Makes me wonder how you even gained access to that device." I grumbled in annoyance.

"Ha! I cheated of course. But that's something for another time. I expect I'll hear from you in a decade, stranger?" Trazyn said as my promised items began falling towards the blackstone floor, and vanished.

I didn't answer, of course. We were not that kind of friends, anyway.

Plus being mysterious had many advantages, one of which was complete surprise. Poor Trazyn could never rest, never knowing if he was being observed and judged, by a stranger with a puppy.

I opened my eyes and looked Zarhulash in the eyes. "Shall we try this again, Mighty Zarhulash?" I asked while reading and memorizing the instruction manuals for those Necron artifacts.

I don't think C'tan can feel fear, but perhaps worry flashed in his eyes. "...Is it so bad to desire freedom, Pef Lancefire? Surely you can understand my predicament." the prisoner pleaded in a clear case of a prisoner's dilemma.

"Nobody is truly free, my friend. We all have enemies, friends and duty. I have my duty and you have yours. Just ask yourself this, Mighty C'tan. Do you really want me as your enemy?" I asked in a gentle voice, while playing with the green Necron pistol, that could in fact capture C'tan star gods and even Greater Demons. Only had three shots though, unless a Necron Cryptek would recharge it.

"That would seem unwise, at this moment." he admitted in a suffering tone.

I nodded in agreement, and stored the pistol back in the tesseract. Using advanced weaponry was a luxury I could not afford, not yet.

"Let's start again. World engine, Reality Cage and a C'tan power source?"

"We don't actually need all that, as you know already. The Reality Cage would be useful, mostly to prevent Farseers and those Immaterium dreams from finding us. As for propulsion, we could either use those slow engines provided by Trazyn, or control the Tyranid Narvhals to drag us away, much like they do for their fleets. You have control bracelets, so we just need a living rock harness inserted directly into the synaptic node." Zarhulash explained in a patient tone, glancing up at the dataslate I deposited on his head.

I twisted space and brought the memory device into my hand. This did seem to work, possibly. Like a carriage drawn by a hundred dragons, tied with gravity chains instead of real ones.

I'd have to feed the mind-controlled Narwhals some biomass to give them energy, but I had plenty of Orks in storage to serve as fodder. Or even better, other Tyranid corpses that would be soon arriving for this task.

Even better, there was sufficient living rock around for a million such living rock chains to control the Tyranids.

So I took out the beamer and pointed at a wall and took a meter wide bite from the indestructible element. Inside the transdimensional pocket, the living rock seemed alive, and easily malleable into whatever form I wished.

Well, I suppose it was why it was named living rock, right?

Took me a couple of hours of hard work to construct the control harness, which looked like a spear with a dozen spikes...anyway. It was a harness, it said so in the title.

Then I took the spear out, and materialized the control bracelets on my wrists. With a mental push, I felt the harness activate, ready to inject nanofilaments into the target.

A second later, a captured Narvhal bioship appeared behind the gas giant, and my spear vanished to impale the synaptic node. Controlling the Tyranid was complicated, as it used senses alien to me, instead of eyes or sound.

First thing, I fed it a thousand Orks for a test run, then grabbed a small asteroid and flung it into the gas giant. Of course, this happened in slow motion, and took many tries, but eventually it worked.

An internal alert returned me to my own body, as the Inquisitors were awake and asking Canis for me.

I guess mind controlling those traitor Astral Claws could wait. These ladies needed some hard work to be turned to my side, both with logical arguments and my favorite weapon, my spear.