Thraxius moved through the Aquairre's bridge like a crimson ghost, navigating the veritable maze of consoles and expendable personnel with practiced grace.  The fingers of his right hand lovingly caressed the links of the smooth metal chain in their grip, carefully suspending an ornate censer one foot above the ground and allowing its pungent ceremonial fumes to billow, dream-like, in his wake.<br/><br/>While his vox blurted carefully formulated strings of binary code, sounding like nothing more than incomprehensible static to just about anyone else, it was a mere undercurrent to the words he was chanting over them.  In the appeasement of the Machine Spirit of the mighty vessel, it was difficult to tell whether the binary commands or the reverent hymns actually did the work in urging it to comply.  He certainly wasn't at any liberty to say.<br/><br/><div align="center"><strong>"Toll the Great Bell Once!<br/><br/>Pull the Lever forward to engage the<br/><br/>Piston and Pump...<br/><br/>Toll the Great Bell Twice!<br/><br/>With push of Button fire the Engine<br/><br/>And spark Turbine into life...<br/><br/>Toll the Great Bell Thrice!<br/><br/>Sing Praise to the<br/><br/>God of All Machines"</strong></div><br/>A lone servo-skull bobbed beside him in time with each memorized line, bedecked in what looked to be an old explorer's cap and a bronze facsimile of a handlebar mustache.  The eager little machine was far too comical for its own good, and on more than one occasion Thraxius had been the brunt of some ridicule because of it.  That he'd actually gone so far as to<em>name</em>the thing didn't exactly help matters.  It wasn't as though<em>Sir Bogart</em>was anything more than a standard medical servo-skull, but somehow the unorthodox decor lent it a certain charm.  Who says a techpriest can't have a sense of humor, however dry it may be?