Chapter 290: Weapons Upgrade, Part 2
Kian turned his attention to the wraithbone armour and the war mask. Antonius anticipated the question.
"The armour is total loss. You cut it in half and the damage exceeded the self-repair threshold. The psychic conduit network inside has completely failed. Research value only, nothing practical remains.
The war mask is a different matter. It contains a system we haven't fully mapped yet: a bound psychic personality construct. If you put that mask on, the construct will immediately attempt to overwhelm your mind. It was keyed to its original wearer. For anyone else, especially the person who killed her, it would attempt to burn through your consciousness and seize control."
The war mask's function relied on a complex integration of Warp-derived technology. A wearer was meant to have the war-self activated through the mask, a secondary combat personality that took command of the body. For Kian to put it on would be to invite that construct to treat his mind as hostile territory and act accordingly.
"So the armour and the mask are both unusable as equipment. Is there anything worth salvaging?"
"The armour is fit for study and nothing else. I'd recommend selling it to us outright. The mask, however, contains a psychic amplifier. At this size, it produces a 35% increase in psychic output. That level of amplification in that compact a form is genuinely impressive Aeldari engineering."
Kian's expression sharpened.
"Can you extract the amplifier and integrate it into power armour gauntlets?"
Antonius nodded.
"Give me two days."
"One more question. Do you have power armour rated for vacuum operation?"
The enginseer didn't know what had prompted the question, but answered directly.
"Yes. The Heavy Reactive Power Armour we supplied previously can be fitted with a vacuum module and life-support system for void combat operations."
"Good. Take the wraithbone armour for your research. Build me a vacuum-rated heavy suit and integrate the psychic amplifier into the arm assembly."
Antonius confirmed the commission. Kian pocketed the power glaive and shuriken pistol and left the Forge Temple.
His next stop was the astronomical observatory.
The observatory maintained several large-aperture telescopes for stellar cartography and planetary approach monitoring. The staff were Adeptus Mechanicus priests, and the facility director received Kian with considerable deference.
Kian asked to view the Ork warship.
The director led him to the main operations chamber, brought up the relevant telescope feeds, locked onto the target, and put the full magnified image on the primary display.
The history was simple enough: one Aeldari escort vessel and five Ork warships had arrived in the system. The Aeldari craft and four of the Ork vessels had destroyed each other. The fifth Ork ship had taken engine damage early in the engagement and gone dead in space. The Aeldari, judging it no longer a threat, hadn't bothered finishing it off. It had been drifting in the vicinity of Secundus-496b ever since.
Kian looked at the image on the screen. Four kilometres of welded scrap and salvaged metal, trailing unidentified fluid from several hull breaches, hanging motionless against the stars.
He looked at it the way a man looks at something he has wanted for a very long time.
It was derelict. It was Ork-built. It was held together by a principle of engineering that defied rational explanation. None of that changed what it was: an unclaimed void-capable vessel, the closest he had ever physically been to the stars and everything he wanted from them.
He was going aboard. There was no version of events in which he didn't go aboard.
The observatory director, a man of extensive technical knowledge and limited sentiment, saw the expression on Kian's face and attempted to manage expectations.
"My lord, that vessel has no practical value. It's space wreckage. Ork construction in particular presents unique problems: Ork technology functions partly through a psychic field generated by the collective Ork population. Sufficient numbers in close proximity and a certain degree of belief can make physically non-functional machinery operate. When the Ork population decreases substantially or their collective morale shifts, that field weakens, and whatever it was sustaining begins to fail from the inside outward. That warship is already deteriorating. It will eventually break apart on its own and scatter across the deep void."
He gestured at the display with professional finality.
"A complete wreck, my lord. Salvage is not viable and repair is essentially a meaningless concept in this context."
Kian's foot was tapping against the floor in a rapid, continuous rhythm.
"It looks structurally intact from the outside."
"An intact arrangement of wreckage, my lord."
Kian took a slow breath. The technical assessment was irrelevant. He was going to look at it regardless, because it was a ship and it was there and it was unowned, and that combination represented an opportunity he had no intention of ignoring.
"How many Orks are likely still alive aboard?"
The director considered the vessel's dimensions.
"Ork force organisation doesn't map neatly onto conventional military structures, so any estimate carries significant uncertainty. For a vessel of that displacement, somewhere between 80,000 and 150,000 is a reasonable working figure for the original complement.
From telescope observation, the aft section took direct hits from Aeldari weapons fire. The engine compartment appears to have been breached, which would mean both structural compromise and radiation element leakage throughout that section. Casualties from that alone would likely account for roughly a third of the original number."
Kian did the arithmetic quietly.
"So there are at least twenty thousand Orks still alive in there."
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