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I may have a few 40k stories in me - this is the one I've thought about writing for years and finally made a rough start on.

The Deed of Ahna MacDorn

Part 1 - Drone.

It was ten hours and twenty three minutes into Ahna’s shift when, with a sound like an angry tea kettle followed by a wet splat, the confirmation servitor vomited on her. Ahna put down her soldering Iron and closed the wiring compartment and recited the Canticle of rest, causing it to slump against the gun breech. Finding a rag she carefully cleaned the half human machine’s oral grill, then the floor plate, then her drab grey coverall. Finally, she climbed out of the tank hatch and called for a starvling messenger urchin to summon the Conservator. The child nodded its pinched face, said “I’ll find Nan right away” and scampered off. Ahna scowled and sat on the turret and looked back down the line of mighty Leman Russ tanks stretching down the immense hall. Thunder that was not thunder grumbled in the distance and a fine shower of dust descended from the vaulted ceiling, a gentle rain of delicate color in the light of the remaining stained glass. Other, broken windows let in the light of New Caledonia’s second sun as it set towards the sea.
Very shortly Nan Haymish arrived and the two women exchanged nods of greeting. Haymish was a typical highlander, with skin like near black bark, plump, her overlong greying hair partially died red. She carried the tools of her trade in a black fold out case marked with a skull and cog.
“The Poorly Clanker’s in the Steed then?”
“I wish you wouldn’t call them that” began Ahna, but Haymish was already climbing in through the drivers hatch, leaving the tall younger worker to follow her.
With an officious tutting the Conservator examined the servitor’s living parts, taking its temperature, shining a light in its one eye, and measuring the pulse. Its breathing was labored, and the hand with the delicate circuit testing probes twitched spasmodically.
“The wee dear’s got an infection of the stomach. Cassidan Ulcers I fear. We’ve not much left to give him.” Nan Haymish drew out a brass syringe and loaded it with ampule. “Roll up your sleeve ya lowlander scrivner.”
“Me? But…”
“I dinna want you getting what he has if we can help it. You’re a shadow of your former bony self, and frankly there wasn’t much to begin with. You’re worth ten of his kind to this Manufactorium I warrant, so its a vitamin and antigerm serum for you. In fact, I trow we can let the wirehead rest in the dormitus and you can finish this without him, eh?”
“I don’t think…”
“Mamzelle Ahna MacDorn, you’ll do as I say, or I’ll have the Senior down on you, see if I don’t. You know I can.”
Ahna submitted the injection stoically, grimacing as the cocktail burned through her arm. Together they got the servitor up and out of the tank.
“Problem?” It was in fact Senior MacFell, who approached ponderously. Six months ago he’d had three chins, but now only the flaps of skin remained. He’d also traded the whip that usually rode on his hip for a Mark 5 Tristan pattern laspistol.
Ahna curtsied out of habit, an incongruous motion in overalls, and said “Senior, the servitor is ill. I was almost finished with Five Five Six Two’s awakening but now…”
MacFell shrugged. He was a chocolate skinned lowlander like Ahna, though there the resemblance ended. “Go home Ahna. We’re cut off from the munitions Depot anyway, so the line’s moving no further today. We can finish it tomorrow, with or without the Clanker.
“Senior, the Rites….”
Suddenly, MacFell reddened and snarled: “I said go home. If I say it will be finished tomorrow it will, and no Drone will tell me otherwise.” Haymish laid a hand on his arm and he glanced at her and exhaled.
“If Father Voltrus objects you can write him a new set of purity seals to make up for it. You’ve a fine hand.” He and Nan exchanged winks. “Now, Mamzelle Haymish, I believe you and I have important Manufactorium business to discuss over a bit of Synthahol….”
“Why, Senior, I thought you’d never ask”.

*******

Ahna gathered her belongings and turned to go. She ran one hand down the chill flank of Five Five Six Two’s track guard as she walked, counting the rivets as she walked back down the assembly line. Weary drones were struggling to complete their quotas and there was a still a substantial din. Ahead chains clanked and drones chanted as they heaved a turret into place. Further down tracks were being bolted and locked together, each tread stamped with the Aquila. Rivet guns clanged and drills whined as the tanks were fitted for their armor. It was nearly a half Klom to where the steeds were born in fire, where scared and shirtless conscripts cursed and shouted as the rivers of molten metal poured into the castings. Ahna watched the sparks leap and the shadows splash across the mural showing the Emperor’s armored angels landing on New Caledonia long ago.
At the end of the line she waited to receive her ration chits and then walked out into the acrid glare of her world’s setting suns. The Manufactorium was set into the side of a craggy hill - attendant shabby habs and admiinstratum buildings sprawled around it. Further down the slope by the shallow sea where brinefishers waded was the old city, and it was here Ahna turned her steps descending past crumbling statues and piles of rubble. There was a kilted piper holding his instrument, his gaze far away where smoke from artillery was wafting. She pressed a quarter ration chit into his hand and said “Play the Imperial March”. He smiled and hefted the bag under his arm, engaged the drones, and a moment later the strident music floated down the hillside.
Where the manufactorium road met the Grand Avenue of Kainborough there were sandbags and gun positions. Haggard soldiers stood about trash fires in promethium barrels. One, with the pale skin, blond hair and olive uniform of the 128th Pyrean sat with his head in his hands rocking back and forth, a dry wretching and moaning sound issuing from him. Ahna stopped, frowning.
“Pay him no mind mamzelle Dronetta,” said a big hussar of the Valarian 7th cleaning a Type Nebula III Meltagun. “Lost his steed he has, and his friends with it. Burned com uhn Feux Rouge. Worthless now - to us, the Emperor, or you for that matter” He grinned. “Now me, on the other hand….”
Ignoring the Valarians’ banter, she knelt by the broken man and touched him on the shoulder. He glanced up, and she stared into his eyes solemnly.
“What is the terror of death?
That we we die with our work incomplete.
What is the joy of life?
To die knowing our task is done.”
There was a moment of silence, then the Valarians broke into uproarious laughter. Reddening, Ahna stood and strode away without a backward glance. She passed a commissar of the 128th hurrying up the hill, her black coat streaming behind her, braids flapping, boots clacking on the cobbles. Not long after there came the cough-crack of a bolter round fired at close range.
There was a little white haired vendor with a tattered blue tarpaulin to shade the sun selling the daily cheeps from behind a folding table. Ahna unwrapped her traditional two tankards. She bought half a day’s rations of brinecurry and thick, yeasty beer and ate and drank while walking, not bothering to remove the shells of the little arthropods.
Walking faster, she made her way down to the sea where gulls, seemingly unaware that there was a war on, chattered and fought over the pickings washing up in the stinking slurry of the half tide. Once before she’s found a floating body, but today there was only the usual kelp, shells, and trash.
In time the hospice loomed ahead, built on a promontory, high arched windows and terraces where once convalescents would take their ease over the sea. Now the windows were mostly shuttered or sandbagged, and human flotsam and jetsam ebbed and flowed through the huge brass front doors. No one challenged her as she made her way inside past the bloody halls of the wounded and the quiet resting places of the dead. A medicae stopped her on the third floor and thrust a pitcher into her hands.
“Water. Make sure each man has enough and then boil the instruments.” He hurried away.
Ahna set the pitcher down on a side table amid some crusting swaddling cloth and walked on. Her destination was a small room on the fourth floor seaside, a privileged room sprouting screens and tubing, canisters and unknown instruments. When she had first started coming here it had been swarmed by priests, officers, and the curious. But for the past week the Angel had been alone.

*******

Next up: Part 2- Driver.

I like it! Great atmosphere and a varied selection of figures. Also, the main character seems like a likable soul. Please more

Some good worldbuilding there, with a fine eye to detail. So far, so good!

I'm also very intrigued. Nice piece

Really great stuff. A joy to read and beautifully imagined. And not too long too, just the right length.

You're really quite good at this. Keep it coming and thanks for sharing.

I am intrigued.