The vessel of the Mechanicus was a cathedral of machines.
Archimedes sat bound in a restraint chair, his wrists locked in brass cuffs, his chest strapped against a frame humming with hidden currents. The air reeked of oil and incense; the walls pulsed with lumen runes in patterns he could not decipher. Every breath was accompanied by the chorus of servitors, lobotomized men who chanted in half-words as pistons drove their bodies.
Above him loomed the Magos who had chosen him. The priest's face was a mask of lenses and grilles, its body a lattice of flesh and steel. Mechadendrites flicked in the air like inquisitive serpents, each tipped with a different tool: scalpel, syringe, cogitator-spike.
"Subject: Archimedes of Helios," the Magos intoned, voice flat as iron. "Assessment: scars significant, indicative of endurance. Biological anomaly: fixation on trauma as record."
A mechadendrite withdrew the cloth-wrapped rib from Archimedes' sash. It turned the bone beneath a red lumen, scanning, whirring.
Archimedes strained against his bonds. "Give it back."
The Magos' optics flicked, narrowing. "Attachment: irrational. Object: discard."
"No," Archimedes snapped, his voice cracking but steady. "It is not discard. It is memory. He lived, he died, and I carry him."
The mechadendrites stilled. The silence stretched until Archimedes felt his heart in his throat. Then, slowly, the bone was returned, set back against his chest.
"Noted," the Magos rasped. "Archive of flesh extended into artifact. Unique correlation."
Another tendril extended, this one bearing a slender scalpel. It pressed lightly to Archimedes' burned palm, parting skin. Blood welled, crimson drops hissing as they struck a collector-plate.
"Observation: hand steady," the Magos said. "Pain tolerated. Instinct: preservation."
Archimedes clenched his teeth. He wanted to spit, to rage, but instead he whispered the words he had spoken in the Hall of Ashes:
"Flesh remembers."
The Magos froze. Then its vox crackled, repeating back his words like a litany:
"Flesh remembers. Bone is scripture. Data accepted."
The restraints unlocked. Archimedes slumped forward, clutching the bone against his chest. The Magos loomed above, silent, lenses shifting like a gaze that did not blink.
"You will serve," it said. "Not us. Not the Omnissiah. But memory itself. Go now to the Wardens. Their vaults require what you carry."
Archimedes was dragged to his feet by Skitarii guards and led down a corridor where the smell of incense gave way to sterility. Ahead waited another chamber — its walls inscribed not with circuitry, but with the black-and-white sigils of the Wardens of the Grimoire.
The Mechanicus had tested him, measured him, judged him. Now they delivered him into the hands of warriors who would demand more than memory.
The iron hymn faded behind him.