Chapter Text
ZERO
It has been decades since Abel Haneumann set foot on the streets of Port Wander and while iron knows and remembers no pain, his weak flesh does. It reacts with terror to every clank of metal and wood crates being loaded and unloaded at the dock. It raises goosebumps at the sight of a red or black (or worse, both) coat. He doesn’t want to think about what would happen if the Inquisition found him here and recognized him for what he was. In some ancient Terran cultures, negative thoughts were believed to bring down bad luck on the one who thought of them.
So Abel pushes his fears aside with the same force he uses to push past the thick crowd of people in the streets of Port Wander. The last time he was here, Port Wander was a little cleaner, a little less crowded, but that’s likely what every traveler before him thought.
Port Wander was old even by Mechanicus standards. Initially founded by the Imperial Navy in 917.M40 as an investigation outpost, the efforts of enterprising Rogue Traders led the station to become the beating heart of trade between the Calixis Sector and the wild stars of the Koronus Expanse. Master Amarnat told him that the station used to be near-deserted when the Imperial Navy stopped operations there. Now its corridors were choked by merchants and mercenaries looking to make Thrones by less-than-legal means.
One could buy anything here, provided they had enough currency. Abel had just that, and it still took until the last minute to find the right cog for his great project.
He follows the flow of people into the Atrium of the station, taking side streets past houses of ill repute and shrines to the God-Emperor alike. Most people stopped there, if they were poor or pious, but a select few with enough Thrones pushed on to the Halo Stars. Named after the same stars in this region, the Halo Stars was the oldest entertainment establishment on Port Wander. And there, Imperial Navy officers, Rogue Traders, and Adeptus Administratum clerical workers alike pause their long voyage to the Expanse.
Abel passes under the marble facade of the Halo Stars, done in the style that Footfall’s architect had wanted for the lesser station, and brushes off the dust of distant stars from his red cloak. Underneath it, his mechadendrites cradle a heavy data cache closer to his weak flesh. It rests against his stomach, cold and warm on his skin at the same time.
The din of blaring sound projectors hits him the moment he steps foot inside. A band was performing on stage, their saxophones meshing melodiously with the electric lute of a lead singer, a young woman of unremarkable features or stature. Unnoticeable. Unremarkable until you heard her voice. Axiomantha had the good fortune of finding her for Abel just days before he arrived here and had already worried himself sick because their original contact, Omnissiah keep her, had succumbed to the Warp on her way to Port Wander.
Abel finds himself humming along to the music with his flesh voice. Axiomantha was right, he did find the journey enjoyable.
He sits at one of the plush sofas in a dark corner of the hall, keeping an eye on the singer. Axiomantha told him she had a bad habit of getting too deep into her cups of Tranq and an even worse habit of getting into deeper gambling debts because of her pride and temper.
You wouldn’t know it from how sweetly she sings of love. The way she twirls her dark hair in her hands like a smitten damsel.
He raises one mechandendrite, hoping to catch her attention sooner rather than later. The less time he spent here, the better.
She spots him a few lines into the bridge of her song, and when the performance is done, the young woman walks over to his table.
She drops into the seat across him, her mouth twisting to a halfway point between a grin and a grimace.
“I got a place not far from here. Let’s take this somewhere where there’ll be fewer eyes.”
He doesn’t bother to ask the young woman for her name. It would hurt him to know and it would not matter soon.