With the impending threat of a murderous Inquisitorial investigation on its way, even the Fabricator is slightly more motivated into finishing up the repairs of my ships.
One after another, the corvettes are reard with torpedoes and loaded into their launching bays on the Icarus carrier, while the damaged Battle Barges are dragged into dockyards for a complete refit.
So are the damaged cruisers and other vessels boarded and captured, while the traitors are kept disard and under guard, awaiting their trial.
The last Astral Claws' Cardinal-class Heavy Cruiser nad the Thoth's Hound contained the Forge Master of the Blood Angel bodyguard?" I asked with a sadder voice.
It seed so kind of phased claw had managed to rend even his blackstone armor plates, ignoring the shield as well.
I had a suspicion what kind of technology stood at the base for that claw, probably one of those phased swords used by the Callidus Assassins, or a similar weapon with C'tan provenience.
Astartes Tybahlt valiantly held onto the arm of his Astral Claws foe, allowing his Battle Brothers to kill his enemy, but his organs were all shredded beyond repair. I wasn't ready to allow him to die so easily though.
The dreadnought itself was found empty in a sealed vault on the Mantis barge, but wasn't fully operational, although the Atomantic Shield still worked, and that was the most important thing.
"And I expect you want that Ghost Razors gauntlet installed on the dreadnought as well. Alright, it can be done, but it will take a few years." The Fabricator accepted after a few seconds of thought.
He probably needed to work on this himself, which would guarantee perfect quality, and allow him to examine and learn all those secrets. Sneaky tech-priest, but then I couldn't really complain.
"Great! You're amazingly helpful Fabricator, and do your Cult chanicus proud. So you were saying sothing about a Knight? I would need two of them, for and my other pilot I rescued at Badab." I demanded with a slightly more pleading voice.
Just a tiny bit, because I did have an Astartes Chapter now. No more need to be ultra ek, just politely ek.
A wave of tal tentacles blurred around him, and it seed I touched a sore spot. "I would gladly help, Lord Pef. It is why I gifted you with the best Mind Impulse Unit in the galaxy. But my Forge World cannot produce Knights or Titans. We have several godmachines, but we only service and repair them. The Volcano Lance and Cannons templates from your STC gifts will allow us to field a dozen more Titans in a decade, which is imnsely important to our faith."
I blinked in surprise, and then just sighed. Of course not all Forge Worlds had Titan Manufactoriums. I was used to richer Forges after all. This was not Ryza, who kept an Ork Waaagh on their doorstep just to test the Titans in combat.
"It's it alright, Fabricator. Let see where your Forge could be of help...Catachan regints! Yes, the jungle warriors, once provided with Ard Sentinel walkers, will be very useful in establishing my dynasty on a dozen jungle worlds around my capital, and help clear the Orks. Unlimited order for as many regints you can obtain, with as many guardswon as they can spare, dear Magos. And provide them adamantium blades and chest plates, like my other Catachans have. I'd say a thousand Sentinels per regint, plus 500 Chiras and Hydras for the chanized regints." I mused out loud, while picking up an Astartes heavy bolter in my left hand.
The heavy bolter gun was straining my power armor even without firing it. Much too heavy even for a Catachan, but would work great on the Sentinels and Chiras.
Lasguns wouldn't really work against Orks, just like the ongoing war on Armageddon proved. The stupid mushrooms were too resilient, and so were the Tyranids.
"And you want heavy bolters and flars...possibly combi-weapons on those Sentinels?" the Magos deduced as I strained to hold the heavy weapon in one hand.
Looked great, but bolter pistols were the effective limit for my current armor.
"Chainsaw sword and flar one arm, adamantium gunshield with heavy bolter on the other. Sealed cockpit with adamantium window blinds. Infrared auspex for night combat. Similar outfit for Chiras, flar and heavy bolters. Tanks will not be that useful in jungles, but a wing of bombers per regint could provide close-air support. Prothium refinery and a bolter round manufactorium for every settled planet, with a thousand tech-priests to oversee repairs. And a hundred more bolt sniper rifles, per regint." I added in a distant voice.
Adamantium might be expensive, but there were gatonnes of it in the damaged hulls. A single cruiser could provide a million tons of adamantium, enough to armor a million Sentinels.
A Sentinel is twice as small and 1000 tis cheaper than a Knight, and the gunshield would be large enough to cover the shoulder socket and the bolter ammo drum.
The chainsaw uses prothium as fuel, and sa does the flar, and the burning prothium would lt even steel, and more importantly, the flesh behind the armor.
Very effective in jungles and vs. organic enemies like Orks and Tyranids.
"A dozen Catachan regints should be possible to requisition. But for more guardsn and all that equipnt...a few decades." the Fabricator proclaid while examining the sniper rifle that I pointed him to.
A good sniper could kill a hundred enemies every day. Tis a hundred snipers per regint, they would devastate any enemy, even if fortified and entrenched.
Not that Orks or Tyranids hid in trenches, but they weren't the only possible enemies, just the most nurous.
The repairs on the damaged Astartes ships continued and the barges were being modified with a vertical torpedo cell-block for 100 torpedoes, which should allow them to fight a battleship and even win.
Similar to that reload system I first created for the Manticore missile launcher, the empty torpedo container could be extracted and replaced with a full one, increasing re-arming speed by ten tis in zero gravity.
The teleport rooms on the barges were also undergoing complete repair, while the Astartes were grumbling about having tech-priests going all over their stuff.
I didn't care much about that. Who were they going to complain to? ?
Just like forr Master Huron had discovered, independent Astartes command of their Chapters might be great for the absence of superiors, but that also ant no protection from those superiors.
They were at my rcy, and rcy wasn't sothing I was willing to spend much.
I spent my ti overseeing my new Lanter Chapter and revising their Codex and doctrine, tinkering with the hypnotic chairs that enforced loyalty and imparted automatic reflexes and knowledge of enemies and weapons.
It would take decades to prepare a better Codex, but my own STCs could be uploaded in the data-vault, and various tic subordination commands for the Inquisition or other high ranking Adepta of the Imperium could be slightly loosened or outright circumvented.
There were also so highly coded mnemonic instructions with Mars signature imprints, which were probably part of the problem with the Lanters curse. Soone had experinted on them, right at their founding 5000 years ago.
Sadly I didn't have clearance to delete them, so I might need to 'borrow' other hypno-chairs from the other barges or the Starfort.
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