u/Expert-Caramel-7817

Context : Trazyn assisting Cawl with bringing the Cadian Pylons online but of course cannot resist taking a small souvenir

>Cawl looked over his shoulder at the xenos giant, who stood half-hidden in the shadow of a pylon, surrounded by the weapons of the Breachers. He’d plucked a servo-skull out of the air and was turning it over in his hands, death-mask head tilted to one side as he examined it. The suspensor engine buzzed in irritation, trying to escape.

>‘I… ah, I mean the royal we, Lord Castellan. We the defenders of Cadia. We the Imperium. We’re all on the same side, aren’t we?’

>At the side of the cavern, Trazyn tore the skull’s data-projection lens from its orbit with a dusty crack, and tossed the empty skull behind him.

>‘What are you doing?’ mouthed Cawl, covering the vox handset with one hand and throwing the others up in indignation.

>‘This is unique wiring,’ he said, as if Cawl was being deeply unreasonable. He ran a palm-emitter over the component. ‘Unique to the forge world of Magnax before it was lost in the Heresy. The same filaments and focusing lenses used in las-impulsors. Far too good to be repurposed in a servoskull.’

>‘Put it back.’

>The alien’s impassive death mask tilted to one side, and Cawl swore the metal mouth curled up at the edges. Then the necron flicked his necrodermis hand as if performing an act of prestidigitation and the component vanished into a hole in reality. He opened his empty hands, innocent. ‘I lost it.’

>Cawl bit off the shout that was rising in his throat, his hands raising in fists. Realised Creed had said something else.

>‘I’m sorry, Lord Castellan… Transmission break, can you repeat that last part?’

>‘You said we’re all on the same side. I certainly hope so.