"My Lord, I meant no offense. This is standard protocol, a necessary formality," Vormay explained cautiously, terrified that Axion might rescind his proposal. The implications in Axion's words had already sparked a frantic excitement within her.
Despite his annoyance at the questioning of his craftsmanship, Axion did not press the matter. Vormay was not an Iron Man; he could not simply uplink the production telemetry and sensor logs directly into her mind.
His manufacturing process integrated real-time quality control that rendered defects impossible. Had his production lines been of a higher tier, standard Federation quantum-printing, not a single atomic-level error would exist.
The pair arrived at the hangar, where dozens of Tech-Priests were locked in a silent standoff with the mechanical sentinels Axion had left behind. Both sides maintained a facade of restraint, if one could ignore the overlapping, cacophonous shrieks of binary canticles filling the air.
The rest of the crew had retreated, unable to endure the grating noise, leaving only the disciples of the Machine God. The Tech-Priests stared at the machines with expressions usually reserved for holy relics, while the unaugmented crew saw little difference between these silver forms and the standard Legio Cybernetica automata of the Mechanicus.
As the Eight-Legs dragged two massive metallic crates from the shuttle's hold, three accompanying Sapient Machine Automata stepped forward to unseal the lateral panels.
Row upon row of Lasguns and power packs lay nestled in perfect, interlocking grids. The absolute uniformity was a balm to the disciplined mind and a nightmare for those prone to phobias of unnatural patterns. The mechanical units stepped aside, flanking the crates like silent guardians.
The damaged automaton, however, drew the lion's share of the Tech-Priests' attention. While the pristine units hid their complexities beneath smooth armor plating, the proxy directly controlled by Axion exposed a wealth of unique structural enigmas through its rent chassis.
A male Tech-Priest stepped forward, bowing shallowly to Vormay. The sigil upon his chest set him apart; where others bore the common marks of Tech-Acquisitors or Enginseers, he was a Reclaimator. He gestured toward the mangled automaton with a trembling mechadendrite.
Unlike the common priests Vormay had recruited or the standard Enginseers assigned to ship maintenance, this man had come of his own volition. He was, in essence, a one-man archaeological expedition for the Cult Mechanicus.
A Reclaimator's sacred duty was the salvage of materials from ancient, broken systems and the oversight of the endless, localized repairs required to keep the Imperium's technology breathing. Their understanding of Dark Age technology often eclipsed that of their peers. Frequently dispatched to lethal or uncharted zones to recover esoteric components, they were viewed by the black market as suspicious, cunning figures, often maintaining clandestine ties to criminal cartels.
To a Reclaimator, a Rogue Trader, with their unique warrants and tendency to wander into the galaxy's forbidden corners, was a font of "miraculous" discovery.
"Matriarch Roskora," the priest intoned, "if you were to surrender that damaged mechanical shell to me, I would offer in exchange devices of... extraordinary value."
Vormay looked awkwardly at the bowing priest, then glanced at the motionless, broken automaton.
"Priest Caiz, this is our guest. He is neither a commodity nor my property to trade."
"According to my calculations, there is a 73.28% probability you have already attempted to exploit this guest," Caiz countered. "Evidently, your current machinations have proven ineffective."
Vormay's expression soured into further embarrassment. Unexpectedly, the broken automaton stirred.
"Linguistic analysis suggests the probability of truth in this priest's statement approaches 89.25%."
Axion redirected the automaton's optical focus toward Caiz.
"Intriguing. I choose to pivot the parameters of this trade toward Priest Caiz. If your devices pique my interest, I will grant you this mechanical shell. I may even rectify the deficiencies in your own augmentations."
"Your physical form appears to utilize fragmented, legacy patterns for several of your neural implants. I can provide an update to your mechanical architecture."
Unlike Vormay, who was merely gene-enhanced, forty percent of Priest Caiz was cold iron. He possessed the standard bionics of his station, but several of his more esoteric implants were the result of daring, unsanctioned technological experiments. Spending his life amidst lost tech had granted him a heterodox perspective and a reckless streak of curiosity.
Ever since he had integrated a certain ancient sub-structure into his neural lace, Caiz had felt his body becoming increasingly unresponsive. No matter how many times he disassembled the bionics, he could not fathom the root of the error.
He recognized the geometry within the Iron Man's chassis. A private, custom-built interface he had crafted bore a haunting resemblance to a segment of the machine's internal logic. But the design was incomplete, and no one in the Sector had the wisdom to finish it.
Hearing Axion's offer, Caiz's mechanical greaxes emitted a low hum of excitement. A mechadendrite snaked out from beneath his crimson robes, offering a data-slate to the broken automaton.
Axion scanned the slate, then handed it to a nearby, intact unit. The damaged proxy lacked the necessary data-ports for a direct hardline transfer.
The information on the slate was exhaustive, a digital manifest of Caiz's entire private collection. As the data surged through his processors, Axion turned the automaton's head to stare at the Tech-Priest.
The inventory was vast. It contained materials the Mechanicus had yet to even classify, alongside a mountain of hardware. Caiz had even gone so far as to include high-resolution pict-captures for every item, creating a visual archive for easy reference.
This was a boon for Axion. Many of the names the Mechanicus used for these relics were complete gibberish compared to his own archives. The images, however, bypassed the linguistic drift of ten thousand years.
The nearby automaton projected several holographic images into the air. Axion pointed toward the shimmering blue projections.
"Identify the origin point of these artifacts."
Caiz shook his head slowly. "That cache was acquired from a group of... individuals seeking sanctuary. I exchanged a shipment of arms for them."
His explanation was shrouded in vagueness, but Axion remained indifferent to the politics of the exchange. The metallic structures in the images were unmistakable: they were Quantum Disintegrators and Quantum Printing Modules salvaged from a small-scale Standard Production Line.
The modules bore a distinct etched sigil of the heraldry of a Federation-era weapons research institute. Among the other items of similar aesthetic, Axion identified several compatible Quantum Storage Units.
Having selected his prizes, Axion fixed his gaze on Caiz.
"Specify your terms for the transfer of these specific items."