Chapter Eighty-Four: Rescue

"Captain Wang Ming! God! God! We have seen the true God! We believe in Him! He will grant us true salvation!"

Darcy Oak spread his arms wide, like Jesus upon the cross. Yet his expression grew ever more frenzied, and his twisted face, displayed in the holoprojection, wore a strange smile as he looked toward Wang Ming.

"I understand, Captain Darcy Oak. Rest for a while. I will send a rescue team," Wang Ming said calmly, looking at the pitiful man on the screen.

"I am sorry, I am truly sorry, Captain Wang Ming. I may be a little too agitated." Darcy Oak looked at Wang Ming's calm face and slowly forced himself to settle down, though the effort was plainly unnatural and left him visibly distressed.

"All right, Captain Darcy Oak. You only need to wait a little longer. My rescue team will be docking with your ship very soon." After saying this, Wang Ming cut the connection.

After ending the video call, Wang Ming contacted Wang Xiaofa, who was aboard the Imperial Truth, and told him to take his men to the hangar and prepare to go to the Starry Sky, to bring them the Emperor's blessing.

The crew aboard the Starry Sky was already beyond saving.

Wang Ming rose from his chair and looked out through the viewport at the world of Moles, as though deep in thought.

"Captain Jiang Tao, contact Hu Jin."

Watching the lights of the great and small hive cities on Moles, Wang Ming spoke to Captain Jiang Tao's holoprojection. Jiang Tao promptly got in touch with Hu Jin.

"Boss, what is it?" Hu Jin spoke to Wang Ming through his personal terminal. He was currently in a small hive city on Moles, doing construction work with the Imperial Guard auxilia.

"There is a strike cruiser from an Adeptus Astartes chapter heading for Moles. When the time comes, take the Second Company to make contact with them. If they prove troublesome, then take the Second Company and make them loyal."

Wang Ming explained the situation to Hu Jin and told him to take the Second Company to the starport. Wang Ming would arrange for them to have another strike cruiser of the same class there, so they could meet that chapter.

"Sure thing, Boss. I'll head over right after I help the auxilia finish putting up the roof of this factory." As Hu Jin spoke, the clanging and banging of construction machinery came faintly through on his end.

"Those few of you, put that down. That's not something you can move. It's too dangerous! Let me carry it. What you're doing is very dangerous."

After the war on Moles ended, the otherworldly travelers all went off to find things to do, such as helping with basic infrastructure and the like.

After the First Engineer Company used STC templates to mass-produce a great quantity of building materials, the travelers led large numbers of auxilia to the various hive cities, where they constructed factories and other basic facilities.

The powerful bodies of the Primaris Astartes allowed the travelers to exert themselves to the fullest. With strength and boundless energy, they could even build a factory in a single Terran week, working day and night without rest.

"Fine, take care of your business first, then come to the starport afterward. They only just entered the system, after all. It will take at least a day or so to reach Moles. By then, just make contact with them proactively. I'll send them a signal first and see what their situation is."

Listening to the sounds coming from Hu Jin's side, Wang Ming told him not to hurry. He was only notifying Hu Jin; there was no real urgency.

After arranging everything, Wang Ming left the office. He was going to the starport to prepare ships for Wang Xiaofa and Hu Jin.

The Korson Starport on Moles was also busy today. The last time Korson Starport had been this active was when Xu Feng used a one-way vessel to send Chaos cultists to the doorstep world of the Tau Empire.

One hundred and fifty fully armed Astartes entered the strike cruiser docked in the starport in orderly fashion, while the technosacerdotes of the Adeptus Mechanicus held incense burners in their hands and chanted binaric litanies, conducting rites of blessing for the strike cruiser that was about to make its maiden voyage.

As the plasma exhaust of the strike cruiser flared to life within the starport, the First Company was about to bring the Emperor's salvation to the pitiful crew aboard the Starry Sky.

"Captain Darcy Oak, my rescue team has already been dispatched. Can you see them?"

Back in the office aboard the Imperial Truth, Wang Ming contacted Captain Darcy Oak again to inform him that he had already sent the "rescue" team and to have them make docking arrangements on their side.

"I can see them, Captain Wang Ming. They are nearly here. Once they arrive, the Starry Sky will dock with them. Thank you very much, Captain Wang Ming." Darcy Oak looked at the strike cruiser on the radar as it approached them and said excitedly to Wang Ming.

"No need to thank me, Captain Darcy Oak. It is what we should do."

Wang Ming looked at the eight-pointed symbol of Chaos on Darcy Oak and, as always, replied with calm composure.

The strike cruiser carrying the First Company soon reached the side of the Starry Sky. After entering the Moles system, the Starry Sky had been heading toward Moles all along, so it was, in a sense, a mutual approach with the First Company's strike cruiser.

The Starry Sky and the First Company's strike cruiser both began moving toward one another. Once they reached docking position, the Starry Sky extended a docking port and latched onto the strike cruiser.

At the docking hatch of the Starry Sky, Darcy Oak and the remaining two thousand five hundred and thirty-two crew members waited for the human federation rescue team of their imagination to enter through the airlock and bring them supplies and medical aid.

Unexpectedly, among this group of people already deformed beyond recognition by the warp, there were even some twisted children. They had been born aboard this starship corrupted by the warp, and compared with those who had once been citizens of the human federation, they had been corrupted by Chaos even more thoroughly.

Twisted talons and all manner of horrific fleshly growths sprouted from their bodies, which were covered in every sort of Chaos sigil, their forms grotesquely warped and utterly discordant.

Among the crowd, those former citizens of the human federation held these children in their arms and kept speaking to them in a nervous murmur:

"It's all right. Rescue has arrived. When the time comes, you'll be able to undergo the best surgeries. The Federation will cure these illnesses of yours."

At last, the docking hatch slowly opened, but what came through was not the rescue team they had imagined, but a volley of searing bolt shells.