Ferrus shook his head emphatically. 'No.'

'No?'

'I can honestly say that I didn't,' said Ferrus, draining his chalice and pouring another. 'Can you imagine the weight of the responsibility? We've come this far with the Emperor at our head, but I can't even begin to conceive of the ambition that it must have taken to lead a crusade in conquest of the galaxy.'

'So you don't think Horus is up to it?' asked Fulgrim.

'Not at all,' chuckled Ferrus, 'and don't put words in my mouth, brother. I won't be branded a traitor for failing to support Horus. If any of us can be Warmaster, I'd expect it to be Horus.'

'Not everyone thinks so.'

'You've been talking to Perturabo and Angron haven't you?'

'Amongst others,' admitted Fulgrim. 'They communicated their… disquiet at the Emperor's decision.'

'No matter who was chosen, they would have raged against it,' said Ferrus.

'Probably,' agreed Fulgrim, 'but I am glad it was Horus. He will achieve great things.'

'I'll drink to that,' said Ferrus, draining his chalice.

He is a sycophant and easily swayed… said a voice in his head, and Fulgrim blinked at the force of it.

With the end of the war on Laeran, the steady stream of wounded and dead to the apothecarion had slowed, leaving Fabius more time to devote to his researches. To ensure the secrecy his experiments demanded, he had relocated to a little-used research facility aboard the Andronius, a strike cruiser under the authority of Lord Commander Eidolon. Its facilities had been basic at first, but with Eidolon's blessing, he had gathered a bewildering array of specialist equipment.

Eidolon himself had escorted him to the facility, marching along the length of the Gallery of Swords to the forward starboard apothecarion, its brushed steel walls gleaming and sterile. Without pause, Eidolon had led him through the circular hub of the main laboratory and along a tiled corridor to a gilded vestibule where two corridors branched left and right. The wall before them was blank, though there were indications that there was soon to be something placed upon it, a mosaic or bas-relief.

'Why are we here?' Fabius had asked.

'You will see,' said Eidolon, reaching out to press a portion of the wall, whereupon it had arced upwards to reveal a glowing passageway and a spiral staircase. They had descended into a research facility: surgical tables covered with white sheets and incubation tanks lying dormant and empty.

'This is where you will work,' declared Eidolon. 'The primarch has placed a heavy burden on you, Apothecary, and you will not fail.'

'I will not,' agreed Fabius. 'But tell me, lord commander, why do you take such a personal interest in my labours?'

Eidolon's eyes had narrowed and he had fixed Fabius with a baleful glare. 'I am to take the Proudheart to the Satyr Lanxus Belt on a "peacekeeping" mission.'

'An inglorious, but necessary duty to ensure that the Imperial governors are maintaining the lawful rule of the Emperor,' said Fabius, though he had known full well that Eidolon would not see it that way.

'It is shameful!' snapped Eidolon. 'It is a waste of my skill and courage that I should be sent away from the fleet like this.'

'Perhaps, but what is it you require of me?' asked Fabius. 'You did not escort me here personally without reason.'

'Correct, Apothecary,' said Eidolon, placing his hand on Fabius's shoulder guard and leading him deeper into the secret laboratory. 'Fulgrim has told me the scale of what you are to attempt, and though I do not approve of your methods, I will obey my primarch in all things.'

'Even in undertaking peacekeeping missions?' asked Fabius.

'Even so,' agreed Eidolon, 'but I shall not be put in a position where I shall be made to suffer such indignities again. The work you are doing will enhance the physiology of the Astartes will it not?'

'I believe so. I have only just begun to unlock the mystery of the gene-seed, but when I do… I will know all its secrets.'

'Then upon my return to the fleet, you will begin with me,' said Eidolon. 'I shall become your greatest success, faster, stronger and more deadly than ever before, and I shall become the indispensable right hand of our primarch. Begin your work here, Apothecary and I shall see to it that you have everything you need brought to you.'

Fabius smiled at the memory, knowing that Eidolon would be pleased with his results when he rejoined the fleet once again.

He leaned over the corpse of an Astartes warrior, his surgical robes stained with the cadaver's blood and his portable chirurgeon kit fitted to a servo harness at his waist. Clicking steel arms like metal spider legs reached over his shoulders, each bearing syringes, scalpels and bone saws that assisted with the dissection and organ removal. The stench of blood and cauterised flesh filled his nostrils, but such things did not repulse Fabius, for they spoke of thrilling discoveries and journeys into the unknown reaches of forbidden knowledge.

The cold lights of the apothecarion bleached the corpse's skin and reflected from the incubation tanks he had set up to mature the altered gene-seed through chemical stimulation, genetic manipulation and controlled irradiation.

The warrior on the slab had been on the brink of death when he had been brought to the apothecarion, but he had died in bliss with his cerebral cortex exposed as Fabius had taken advantage of his imminent demise to work within its pulpy, grey mass in order to better understand the workings of a living Astartes brain. Inadvertently, Fabius had uncovered the means of linking the nervous system with the pleasure centres of the brain, thus rendering each, painful incision a joyous sensation of unalloyed delight.

Quite what this discovery might mean to his researches, he wasn't sure, but it was yet another fascinating nugget of information to store away for future experiments.

Thus far, Fabius had met with more failures than successes, though the balance was gradually shifting towards the positive now that the war on Laeran had provided him with a ready source of gene-seed upon which to experiment. The furnaces of the apothecarion had burned day and night disposing of the waste of his failed experiments, but these blows to progress were necessary for his and the Emperor's Children's pursuit of perfection.

He knew there were those in the Legion who would recoil from the work he was doing, but they were without vision and could not see the great things he would achieve, the necessary evils that must be endured to reach perfection.

By taking the next step in the Astartes evolutionary journey, Fulgrim's Legion would become the greatest warriors of the Emperor's armies, and the name of Fabius would be celebrated the length and breadth of the Imperium as the chief architect of this elevation.

Even now the apothecarion's incubation tanks held the nascent fruits of his experiments, tiny, budding organs floating in a nutrient rich suspension. The tissue samples were from Astartes who had fallen on Laeran, and Fabius predicted that his enhancements should double their efficiency. Already he was growing a superior Ossmodula that would increase the strength of the epiphiseal fusion and ossification of a warrior's skeleton, resulting in bones that were virtually unbreakable. Next to the enhanced Ossmodula was a test organ that combined elements of Laer hormones, which if successful, would alter the fundamental nature of the Betcher's gland, allowing an Astartes to replicate the sonic shriek of the Laer with devastating results.

Work on refining other organs was only just beginning, but Fabius had high hopes for his work on enhancing the Biscopea to stimulate muscle growth beyond the norms and produce warriors as strong as Dreadnoughts who could punch through the side of a tank with their bare fists. The multi-spectral eyes of the Laer had provided a great deal of information he hoped to incorporate into the experiments he had begun on the Occulobe. Scores of eyeballs were pinned like butterflies in the sterile cabinets beside him, chemical stimulants working to enhance the capabilities of the optic nerves.