Sisyphron was back.
He hadn't even had a chance to change his white lab coat, which was now stained with black oil and dust, making him look somewhat disheveled. However, his mental state was one of extreme excitement. The old fellow was trailed by two Storm Trooper guards carrying two heavy cases.
"Andy! Good news!" Sisyphron slammed his tactical backpack onto the workshop table. "That old fox Tech-Priest Zol might say he wants no part of this, but his body is quite honest."
He unzipped the bag and pulled out a data slate as thick as a brick. "This is a structural map of the underground pipeline network in the Sector 9 Forbidden Zone. It's a static version—an old map from fifty years ago—but the topographical layout shouldn't have changed much."
Next, he pulled a strange device from the other case. It looked like a polyhedral metallic tumor, bristling with interfaces of various specifications, some even featuring ancient ribbon cable slots.
"And this—the universal network access point you asked for." Sisyphron wiped his sweat. "Tech-Priest Zol said this was salvaged from a communications base station in the Upper Hive. He modified the protocols so it can simulate handshake signals for most civilian and security networks. But he told me to warn you: if you get caught doing something bad with this, don't you dare sell him out."
Andy took the heavy metallic tumor and weighed it in his hand. Although the current timeline was the 41st Millennium, the agonizingly fragmented network environment of the Warhammer universe remained unchanged. Many people assumed a spacefaring era would have a galaxy-wide "Super Internet" where one could watch videos or look up data anytime. They were dreaming.
In this dark universe, humanity's communication technology had long since regressed into fragments. Every planet, every hive, and even every corporation used its own independent intranet. These networks were physically isolated, their protocols were incompatible, and most were tightly controlled by the Adeptus Mechanicus or administrative departments.
For a commoner to go online? Non-existent. If you wanted information, you either sent a physical messenger or used a physical access point like this.
"Good job," Andy praised. He dismissed Sisyphron and locked himself in the core workshop.
Andy plugged the universal access point into his main console. Then, he extended a finger, and a data probe jabbed directly into the core interface of the access point.
Hum—
Indicator lights flickered to life, and green data streams began scrolling across the holographic screen. Andy immediately activated the long-dormant "Ghost Backdoor"—the small program he had slipped into the bottom layer of the Helios intranet when he previously wiped the security hard drives of their factory.
That program had been masquerading as an inconspicuous temperature sensor data packet, blending into Helios's massive data stream. Now, as Andy's handshake signal was sent out, the Ghost Backdoor woke up. It began streaming data back to Andy in a continuous flow.
On the left side of Andy's screen, the old static map Sisyphron brought back appeared. On the right was the real-time security dynamic data captured by the backdoor. The two maps overlapped, calibrated, and fused in Andy's mind. The once pitch-black Sector 9 Forbidden Zone instantly became transparent before his eyes.
Helios had roughly divided the zone into four sectors, each handling different excavation tasks. Andy began analyzing Helios's layout as if he were playing a real-time strategy game with a "map hack" enabled.
"Sector A..." Andy located a massive void at the edge of the map. Real-time data showed twelve heavy engineering mechs, codenamed "Rock Fortress," working there. While Andy didn't recognize the specific model, the name suggested they were used for hauling starship components weighing hundreds of tons. Their concentration there meant Sector A held something big. Given the location and structure, it was likely the engine room of the crashed starship.
Was Helios trying to dig out the Warp Drive? Andy couldn't say for sure.
"Sector B..." After a quick estimation, Andy determined Sector B was located at the midsection of the wreckage. Dynamic data showed a high density of personnel, mostly technicians and armed security. The patrol frequency was three times that of other areas. This indicated a core value zone—likely the bridge or the cargo hold. Only high-value goods or data were worth such a security investment.
"Sector C..." As an outer perimeter, Sector C was deployed with a large number of automated sentry turrets and an infrared monitoring net. Clearly, Sector C served as the entrance and exit, used by Helios as their defensive line.
"Everything looks normal..."
One had to admit, the Helios Group was well-organized, systematically dismantling and excavating this centuries-old shipwreck. At this rate, they might have already cut through the hull.
Andy was about to chart an infiltration route when his gaze suddenly froze. In the transmitted system logs, a long string of red data caught his attention: the supply consumption list for the security network. Usually, no one looked at this data because it was too trivial. But Andy was an Iron Man born from engineering; he was extremely sensitive to numbers.
[Sector D - 4th Elite Security Squad: Bolt Ammunition Low Warning!]
[Sector D - 7th Tactical Team: Las-battery Recharge Request (URGENT!!!)]
[Sector D - Logistics: Requesting allocation of three crates of frag grenades, two crates of melta charges...]
Andy's brow furrowed. "Normal so far? My ass!"
The consumption rate was clearly wrong. If this was just a normal excavation operation, why were they burning through so much ammunition? Even if they encountered some mutated creatures in the zone, a few lasguns should have solved the problem. But at the current rate of ammunition expenditure, Andy estimated that hundreds of bolts were being fired every minute. That density of firepower indicated a small-scale skirmish.
Furthermore, these expenditures were all concentrated in Sector D. Andy looked at Sector D on the map. It was located deep within the starship wreckage, marked as an "Unknown Structure" on the static map. The Helios Group hadn't deployed engineering mechs there; instead, they had funneled their most elite armed forces into that area.
"Who are they fighting?"
Andy pulled up deeper device status logs. A newly refreshed alert caused Andy's electronic eyes to contract slightly.
[Warning: Sector D - Heavy Plasma Cannon Unit 3 - Overheat Forced Cooling.]
[Warning: Sector D - Heavy Plasma Cannon Unit 7 - Overheat Forced Cooling.]
[Warning: Combat Servitor 772 - Signal Lost.]
Good grief. They were using heavy plasma cannons? Those were heavy weapons specifically designed to take down large targets! And they were firing them until they hit forced cooling limits!
This meant the enemies in Sector D were either incredibly tough or numerous—so many that Helios's elite troops were struggling.
Was it Genestealers? Unlikely. If Genestealers had infiltrated the corporation to this extent, Helios would have collapsed by now; they wouldn't be digging out engines so methodically.
Orks? Even more unlikely. If there were Greenskins in there, the entire Mid-hive would be hearing the "WAAAGH!" by now.
If it wasn't an external invasion... then there was only one possibility. The enemy came from within. Not from within the corporation, but from within the starship that had slept for centuries.
Countless possibilities flashed through Andy's mind. Rogue Trader ships were notorious "blind boxes." Wandering the edges of the galaxy and the Warp for years, who knew what contraband they kept in their holds? Andy thought of the Genestealer in his own cold storage... perhaps a sealed xenos specimen? Or... the crew had turned into something unspeakable?
"Can't tell for sure..." Andy closed the alert window.
Looking at it this way, the Helios Group had clearly dug up something catastrophic and was now pinned down. They had suppressed the news, holding the line against whatever it was while greedily trying to dismantle the ship.
For Andy, this was a massive opportunity. If it was a monster that even heavy plasma cannons couldn't kill, Andy would just be sending his men to their deaths. But if he could exploit the chaos of the situation...
"It seems that for the upcoming infiltration mission, I'll need to bring some heavy firepower along, regardless!"