Chapter 4: The Web of Mars.
Spider-Man | Forge World Mars
Mars burned.
Not with fire, but with industry.
From orbit, the planet glowed red not by nature, but by a million foundries breathing heat into the thin, poisoned air. The surface was a continent of metal and dust, a living machine powered by worship.
The Adeptus Mechanicus called it holy ground.
The Forge of the Omnissiah.
And deep within the labyrinthine manufactorums of the red planet, voices hummed in harmony a choir of flesh and steel.
"++Initiate Data-Communion Subroutine Thrice-Seven.++"
"++Confirmed. The anomaly within the reactor catacombs persists.++"
"++Could it be another malfunctioning servitor?++"
"++Negative. The Omnissiah's will is precise. This motion does not align with preordained labor patterns.++"
Three Tech-Priests stood in a vaulted hall, their faces hidden behind rebreathers and glowing ocular lenses. Incense hissed from brass vents, mixing with the smell of machine oil and blood.
Servo-skulls drifted above, recording every syllable of the binary litany.
"++We shall investigate.++" said Magos Lineth-04, voice half-human, half-static. "++If the anomaly is machine, we will sanctify. If it is flesh... we will purify.++"
"++By the will of the Omnissiah,++" the others intoned, crossing themselves with bionic fingers.
where the air was They descended into the under-foundries thicker, the heat unbearable, and the sound of gears echoed like heartbeat and prayer.
And somewhere in that darkness, something moved.
.
.
.
.
A shadow flickered across the metallic webwork of the ceiling, darting between pipes and servo-cables.
Tiny glimmers of red and blue danced in the gloom.
A voice, quiet, breathless, and still managing to quiver with humor:
"Okay... note to self."
A soft thud echoed as Peter Parker landed on a rusted beam, crouching low. His lenses adjusted automatically, scanning the vast chamber below.
"Definitely not Queens."
He looked down at rivers of molten metal, lines of servitors welded into conveyor chains, their flesh twisted into the machinery itself. The air smelled like oil and bone.
"Not a friendly neighborhood anything..." he muttered.
He tapped his wrist and the web-shooter clicked, sputtered, and sparked.
"Great. Out of web fluid and I've apparently crash-landed in the robot version of a horror movie."
His head turned sharply as a servitor screamed - a sound more static than human. The Tech-Priests below barely flinched.
"Okay, so they're... not exactly humane employers either."
He started crawling again carefully, silently - tracing his path through the rafters. The deeper he went, the stranger the hum became. It wasn't electricity. It was prayer.
"Yeah, Pete," he whispered to himself, "you really did it this time. Maybe next time just stick to fighting muggers and don't, y'know, fall through a dimensional tear in the sky."
A laugh escaped him short, nervous.
It echoed back at him in mechanical mimicry.
Peter froze. His spider-sense prickled a needle of warning through his spine.
Below, the Tech-Priests looked up, eyes flaring red.
"++Contact detected.++"
"++Blessed be the Flesh that Crawls.++"
"++It moves like spirit. It defies gravity. It must be sanctified.++"
A hundred servo-skulls turned upward. Red targeting beams lanced through the gloom.
Peter blinked. "Uh-oh."
.
.
.
.
Moments later, alarms wailed across the forge. Metal boots thundered on gantries. Incantations of purity echoed through vox-casters as legions of Skitarii mobilized.
And somewhere amid that chaos, Spider-Man kept running not from fear, but from bewilderment.
He'd fought monsters, aliens, gods...
But zealots who worshipped machines?
That was new.
He vaulted over a steam vent, muttering between gasps, "Okay, note to future me when you wake up on a planet where people chant at circuit boards, don't move. They'll probably call you a toaster and build a shrine around you."
The ceiling burst open light searing through. Hands of steel and flesh reached out.
"++Capture the Spirit-Born!++"
"Spirit what now?!"
He fired a desperate web-line - it splattered halfway before burning in the heat. The pull yanked him just enough to vault across the pit. But a magnetic field caught him mid-air, spinning him into a wall.
His head rang. The world blurred.
Figures loomed over him robed, chanting, praising.
"++The Omnissiah has sent His Avatar.++"
"++The Flesh Engine awakens.++"
"++We shall sanctify it.++"
Peter groaned, half-conscious.
"Sanctify? Can we just... talk this out first?"
A metal hand brushed his faceplate, tracing the lines of his mask reverently.
"++Be still, divine spirit. We will bless your circuits and still your doubts.++"
Peter's mind drifted. Circuits? Bless?
"Oh no," he mumbled. "They think I'm... hardware."
And as darkness crept in, the last thing he heard was the chorus of machine-prayers rising over him cold, mechanical, worshipful.
"++Praise the Flesh that Thinks.++"
.
.
.
.
The clangor of forges echoed like the beating heart of a god. Sparks fell like rain as the endless hymn of the Mechanicum rolled across the rust-red horizon, a symphony of gears, steam, and devotion.
Peter's eyes fluttered open. Metal faces surrounded him - not faces, really, but masks carved in mockery of flesh, tubes slithering where veins should be. He tried to move; servos hissed. Adamantine clamps held his wrists.
"Okay," he whispered. "New rule. No more science fairs off-planet."
The figures chanted in binary litany:
"++Silica anima detected.++"
"++Organic mechanism displays self-repair protocol.++"
"++Omnissiah's will confirmed.++"
"Glad to know someone's impressed," Peter muttered. "Now, if one of you could tell me where the nearest exit is-ow!" A cable jabbed his shoulder, drawing a drop of blood that shimmered under the forge-light.
The Magos overseeing the rite raised a servo-hand, optics whirring.
"++Observe the synthesis. Blood of carbon, sinew of alloy.+ +"
"++This one is no servitor. It is... integration incarnate.++"
Peter frowned. "Integration? Buddy, I can barely integrate a social life."
They didn't understand him, of course. To them, his every twitch was sacred motion, his every breath an encrypted pulse. The air trembled with data-chants, each syllable a prayer disguised as code.
And yet as the forge's glare deepened, Peter saw something through the haze. Machines stretched endlessly, forming towers like cathedrals, their spires lost to smoke and stars. A planet not of life, but of worship to the Machine God, to the perfection of the cold and the mechanical.
"Man..." he whispered, voice catching. "This whole world runs on faith in circuitry."
For a moment, he remembered the hum of New York - the subway rails, the buzz of neon, the city's pulse beneath his feet. A world of steel, too, but alive. Human.
He looked up at the Magos, at the devotion in its hollow lenses. And deep down, Peter felt something he didn't expect.
Pity.
"Guess I've seen zealotry before," he muttered. "Science, politics, fandoms... it always starts with someone saying they found the truth."
The clamps hissed tighter. A servo-arm descended, ending in a drill that gleamed like a sacred relic.
"++Prepare the Blessing.++"
Peter winced. "Okay, bad time for a flashback, Parker."
And then with a sharp breath, his instincts kicked in. His wrist twisted, fingers straining.
The drill lunged and he moved.
"Sorry, guys," he said, voice low. "But I don't do crucifixions."
The table shattered. Metal screamed. Sparks danced like fireflies in a dying sun as Spider-Man burst free, webbing across cogwheels and crucibles, swinging high above the gasping Tech-Priests.
One of them whispered, almost reverently:
"++The Flesh Engine... moves.++"
"Yeah," Peter called back, landing on a gantry high above. "And the Flesh Engine would really like to go home."
The bells of Mars tolled again deep and mechanical as the Magos gazed up at him, awe and madness flickering behind glass.
"++Omnissiah... walks.++"
And Spider-Man, silhouetted against the molten light, sighed.
"Great. I'm a religion again."