Von Beck hears a cough while searching an abandoned facility with his team. He suspects there may be a survivor and follows the sound to a destroyed laboratory. There, he finds a gravely injured man who tells him there is a machine on the station that needs to be shut down because it is alive, before dying.
Von Beck hears a cough while searching an abandoned facility with his team. He suspects there may be a survivor and follows the sound to a destroyed laboratory. There, he finds a gravely injured man who tells him there is a machine on the station that needs to be shut down because it is alive, before dying.
Von Beck hears a cough while searching an abandoned facility with his team. He suspects there may be a survivor and follows the sound to a destroyed laboratory. There, he finds a gravely injured man who tells him there is a machine on the station that needs to be shut down because it is alive, before dying.
Von Beck hears a cough while searching an abandoned facility with his team. He suspects there may be a survivor and follows the sound to a destroyed laboratory. There, he finds a gravely injured man who tells him there is a machine on the station that needs to be shut down because it is alive, before dying.
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A faint sound caught von Beck’s attention. A cough?
Perhaps there was a survivor on board.
The rogue trader briefly considered alerting the Mechanicus agent. She was searching another part of the facility and yet, despite her command to be notified should he find any survivors, he didn’t really trust her. Besides, von Beck wasn’t exactly one to take orders. He signalled silently to the other members of his search party and they proceeded cautiously down the cold, dimly-lit corridor. Emergency lighting flickered above and in some places sparks showered from damaged lumen strips, briefly illuminating several corpses on the deck plating. Ugly holes riddled the walls in a crazed pattern, indicative of wild gunfire. Some holes were large enough to put your head through. Stepping carefully over the bodies of the dead, von Beck lead his team down the passageway and through a wide portal at its end, leading into one of the many laboratories in the facility. This was where the sound had come from. The room was circular, lit by a cerulean glow emanating from a row of large armourglass casements to their left. Each window was separated by a thick, heavily riveted buttress. They were clearly designed to withstand tremendous forces. Devastation lay everywhere. Workbenches, datastacks, terminals and all manner of unidentifiable scientific equipment had quite literally been blown or smashed to pieces. And yet, despite the devastation, von Beck could see where some machines or equipment were missing. Or more likely taken. Von Beck was beginning to have his suspicions about who, or perhaps more appropriately what, was responsible for the attack on this station. And he didn’t like it one bit. As he slowly walked around the laboratory he heard the sound again. It was wet, more of a gurgle than a cough. Rounding the corner of a heavy workbench perforated with large calibre bullet holes, the rogue trader finally found the source of the noise. A pitiful wretch of a man peered up at him from a triumvirate of optical lenses that faintly whirred as they sought focus. Dried blood caked his head and a trickle of red liquid ran from the corner of his mouth. Tattered robes of crimson covered what remained of his body, ragged holes torn across his chest. A cybernetic hand reached up imploringly. ‘Help me...’ he gasped, more blood spluttering from his mouth. Von Beck knelt beside him and grasped his hand in his own. ‘I will, but we need to get you back to my ship.’ The man slowly shook his head. ‘No. Help me to… shut it down.’ His bionic eyes moved to look over von Beck’s shoulder, and the rogue trader turned to follow his gaze. ‘There is a machine that need’s to be shut down? Why is it so important?’ Another cough brought a grimace of agony to the man’s face. He took a moment before giving a whispered reply that made von Beck’s blood run cold. ‘Because it is alive.’
