Just an idea I had. Consider this a bit of fan fiction if you like. It's not the best written thing on the planet, but it's a dedication of sorts to one of the more memorable characters in the BP fiction 
******
It was a delicate business. Each pin required careful threading through microfine holes. They were not the machined elements of old, their gnarled metal twisted by the brute force of a drill bit. Were he doing this for the purity of the art, perhaps it might have suited his purpose to rent his material by such measures. Those concerns had little meaning. Why need he choose an inferior method of effecting his will upon the elements? He did this not as an exercise in obsession as some might have thought. His gears were burned to near molecular precision by a laser drill he had installed in a neighbouring cabin. Each chord was precisely measured and suited for the purpose he intended.
Rarely did he make a mistake. When he did, he found a way to work it in. There was always a way to turn a mistake into an opportunity.
Time came so fleeting as of late. A few minutes here, a half hour stolen there. Days would go by where his mechanism would simply sit idle and untouched. If nothing else, it was proof of his thesis - it was not obsession, as his officers thought. It was something else. Something more. An expression of a belief, the culmulation of a philosophy. A guard against the things that lurked unseen in the minds of men.
One finely combed cog rolled between his fingertips. He caught a glimpse of one of his officers reflected in the laser defined reflective sheen, his image scattering into a dozen filaments of light. He had little use for a bed. The Admiral had a bunk where he slept but it lacked the niceties of home. His office, buried deep within the bowels of his destroyer, was as close to a home as he ever needed. He slept when his body demanded but for every other moment, his mind kept him awake.
"Admiral," spoke the officer. The man looked nervous. He paid it little heed.
"Captain," he replied, not taking his eye off the cog. With sinews steadied by decades of endless conflict, the hair thin rod slid through the hole as if there were never a hope of it doing anything else. A flick of a finger turned the gear and energy coursed through the whole assembly. Thousands upon thousands of rods and gears of all shapes, sizes and configurations began to twist. For a brief moment, the entire construct seemed to click of its own accord before finally, it fell away into silence.
He allowed himself a thin smile at his work before turning in his chair and rising to his feet.
"It's Lopez. Take us to Condition One. They will be coming."
*
"Shot, shot, bearing two seven zero mark one two seven. Lateral compartments prepped for venting."
"Alpha, reorient, octant four. Uriel threat attempting to disable broadside BEMs.
"Charge up on BEM1. Firing solution confirmed, UED Eris, ventral compartments. Lance away."
"DCT 14, 16 and 17, Warhammer impacts penetrating inner compartments. Casualties decks 8, 9 and 11. Prep for radiation hazard, get those bulkheads sealed!"Each blow that struck his warship penetrated her to her core, but she was built of sterner steel than those she faced. Their torpedoes came in waves, but they would fail. Her beams melted through steel and will alike but they were not her weapons. Her weapons were his cogs. Each of them intended for a purpose, positioned and stressed to the very point of breaking and not a piconewton further.
He knew he pushed them harder than regulations. That was the point. The regulations were a framework, a guideline to prevent foolishness. Above all else, he was not foolish. Each of his people knew exactly as much as they needed to know and not an iota more. Sometimes, however, they did not see as he saw.
He suspected his enemies thought this too. He suspected his enemies would abuse it.
They did.
Another blast rocked the Atreus' bridge. He allowed himself a moment to steady himself and turned to his comms officer. "Lieutenant."
"Sir?"
"Put Lopez through."
*
That evening, he had to repair his model. One of the cogs had warped.
