Infiltrator (First part)

[Rain]

I don't play a Power Armor army anymore, but I came up with a short story idea involving Astartes kind of on a whim and thought I'd put it up here to share it. I may or may not finish it but here's what I have so far, no action yet just exposition. A prisoner in the hands of an Astartes, a prisoner that apparently has secrets to keep.

 

Infiltrator

 

The man awoke with a start, the sudden beam of light throwing it across his face rousing him from a fitful sleep. He was lying on his side, in a cell no more than five by eight standard feet, furnished with nothing but the pale slate of some unidentifiable stone like substance. His head ached and his vision swam, the great figure standing before him seeming to fade in and out of focus, a great shifting leviathan of darkness silhouetted against the only source of light in the tiny space that amounted to the sum total of his current universe.

 

His hands which were already curled up against his chest in a kind of half defensive, half fetal posture, and they lightly patted around his neck and shoulders. Feeling nothing but a coarse cloth, he glanced down upon himself. His armor, the regalia of an Adeptus Hereticus Inquisitor was gone. He wore a nothing but a loose fitting outfit of rags that hung limply about his taut form.

 

Looking back at the looming figure in the doorway, and blinking through tears brought on by the sudden light raking against his eyes, he swallowed, attempting to focus and pick out the peculiarities of his visitor and (he mused) probable executioner.

 

“Who are—“

 

His words were rasped through a throat that had not seen water for far longer than is biologically tenable and came out more as cough than speech. For his part, the figure in the doorway reached to his belt, and unclipped a small metallic object that he tossed with what appeared to be an almost preternatural softness toward his prisoner, as if afraid that launching the projectile with any significant percentage of his strength would kill the poor wretch where he lay.

 

The object struck the slate floor and slid, coming to a halt a mere inch from the prone man’s nose. At such range, even his damaged vision quickly ascertained that the object was a flask, a vessel of precious life amid the stark darkness of his cell. The man grasped the flask eagerly, and propping himself up on his left elbow, unscrewed the top and downed the contents in three rapacious gasps.

 

The water was cool and crisp, and the man’s mind sang as it ran down his throat. Closing his eyes in monetary bliss, he almost forgot where he was, or what likely awaited him.

 

“My name is Raphin”

 

The figure in the doorway, the momentary life-giver, spoke in the emotionless bark of an external helmet vox.

 

“And I am a seeker of truth, a judge, the razor that cuts away all obfuscation. But you may know me as an Interrogator Chaplain.”

 

“My lord I—“

 

The man was instantly snapped from his reverie; he was quite familiar with the First Legion, and with their Interrogator Chaplains. His old master had worked with one many decades ago and had passed on his experience. Their very presence implied the guilt of the accused and their methods were known to be, well, far from diplomatic.

 

“Silence. As I have said, I am Raphin, Servant of the Lion and Chaplain of the First. You are Adronicus, a sapper and a spy. An infiltrator in the service of dark powers.”

 

Adronicus laughed weakly, though he had downed the entire flask, the sound was still oddly dry, like sandpaper being rubbed against itself.

 

“If you are so sure my lord, then why do I yet live?” He dragged the word “lord” out this time, as if in condescension, an peculiarity of speech that the Astartes did not dignify with any sort of immediate response.

 

“Because you are a coward. And as any coward you shall fold in search of clemency. You shall tell me all that you know. All that occurred on Syllus Secundus.”

 

Adronicus laughed again, this time his laugh actually did degenerate into a hoarse cough, one that left tiny flecks of blood across the dull floor before him, glinting like rubies in the false light spraying out from behind the Dark Angel.

 

“I’ll tell you—at least what I know. Though I’d wager the account will less than please you. That is assuming that you will even believe me, which you won’t. And why should you, I’m a traitor after all, an infiltrator…”

[Yaj]

Wish I had not read this!

 

Why? Because I'm trying to work on my current story (Judgment of Iron) and now after reading this I'm starting to think up a new stories. To top it of this first part of your story is also good.

 

Very good.

 

Looking forward to more.

[Rain]

Thanks, always fun to share this kind of thing. I'll read what you've written in JoI, I was actually an Iron Warriors player for a long time and probably will be again whenever a new codex releases, they make some pretty interesting characters I think. Anyway here's the next part. Someone call Scooby and the gang, there's evil afoot!

 

The shuttle shook as it passed through the roiling smog of Syllus Secundus’s upper atmosphere. Though they were still many miles from the planet’s surface, the massive spire of the primary hive could already clearly be seen, rising up through the sepia tinged clouds like the jagged nail of a corpse.

 

Adronicus, Inquisitor of the Ordo Hereticus, closed his eyes as a slight fit of nausea took him. He had done this hundreds of times of course, descended on a transport of less than elegant construction into the atmosphere of a planet whose air even jet engines preferred not to breathe.

 

And yet he had never quite acclimated, the very human form of his inner ear rebelling against the post-human concept of orbital descent. He opened his eyes after a few moments, and looked across the cramped crew compartment to the only other soul sharing the space, his bodyguard and what passed for friend, Jarek Sol.

 

Unlike his master, Sol seemed utterly unperturbed by the descent, staring not so much at as through Adronicus with the light gray of his right eye and the dull red of his bionic left. His arms were crossed in a vaguely threatening posture, and hanging low on his hips was a pair of heavy autopistols, glinting softly in the ruddy glow of the crew compartment lights.

 

Sol was a stormtrooper once in a past life, and though most of Adronicus’s peers elected to travel with entire retinues of such men, as well as servitors, cherubim, and other more esoteric retainers besides, Adronicus saw such plentiful company to be a liability more than an aid. A predator stood greater chance of discovery if he surrounded himself with adjuncts, and the Inquisitor’s prey was both skittish and alert.

 

As well they should be he supposed, to stand against the will of the Imperium of Man was quite the precarious position, and one that promised a most painful fall. Swallowing back another ball of saliva and bile, Adronicus heard the chime signaling the beginning of final approach. He thanked the Emperor under his breath and moved to retrieve a dataslate from the robes hanging about his armor. An oft-repeated ritual that elicited a slight smile to crawl across his companion’s scarred features.

 

He read over the slate again. Syllus Secundus was a hive world, and a fairly important one given that it provided bodies both for the sprawling manufacturums of the nearby forge world of Syllus Primaris and the ranks of several space-borne chapters of the Adeptus Astartes; chapters that arrived in mighty fleets every few decades to collect promising youths as potential aspirants into their cloistered order.

 

One such fleet was apparently due to arrive in a matter of weeks, a crusade of the Black Templars chapter, seeking strong and able candidates to engage in the trials needed to become a Templar neophyte. This was normally a time of great rejoicing amid the milling billions of the hive, as the Emperor’s very sons were to walk among them, selecting several of their own children to be taken away from the squalor of hive life and uplifted among the stars to walk in the very Emperor’s shadow.

 

Unfortunately it seemed, not all was well upon Syllus in this particular recruitment cycle, for several of the youths chosen and prepared to be presented to the Templars as aspirants had met untimely and rather grisly ends. Others had apparently disappeared entirely, despite having been sequestered within the armories of the gubernatorial palace as they awaited the arrival of the Templar fleet.

 

The local nobility, having enough knowledge of the arcane and forbidden to mostly see it where it did not exist, had raised sufficient clamor of cultists and witchcraft that that it eventually reached the ever-open ears of the Inquisition. Suspecting that there was reason for suspicion, his superiors had sent Adronicus, both to investigate the deaths and disappearances, and to rule upon the existence of any unclean influence upon the surviving potential recruits.

 

He closed his eyes once more, and rested the back of his head against the shuttle bulkhead as the squat pig-nosed craft rattled in the final stages of landing. Sometimes, he really hated his work.

[Rain]

The shuttle settled neatly into a hangar, a vast steel cavern tucked into the web of innumerable crevasses and minarets that formed the chaotic and uneven structure of the hive spire. Adronicus walked down the boarding ramp to find three figures already waiting for him.

 

The central figure, a woman in her early thirties, wore the adornment of a person of some distinction. Though he was unfamiliar with the customs of this particular grain in the Emperor’s vast sandbox, Adornicus could see by the bright silks that adorned her that she must have some personal or perhaps familial connection with the governor himself, few others could afford such luxuries. Flanking her were a pair of PDF troopers, their uniforms stylized in dark crimson and gold, and their hellguns filigreed with inlaid silver. Royal guards of some form Adronicus reasoned; so yes, the woman must be—

 

“Dana Cyron.”

 

She spoke in a clipped, official manner, betraying no hint of local dialect in her Low Gothic.

 

“I serve as adjutant and executor to the Governor, and I am to afford you with any passage or privilege that you require in your investigation. Within reason of course.”

 

Somehow the woman appeared to believe that the Inquisition, or indeed the Imperium operated “within reason”. A quaint and endearing idea, and one that forced Adronicus to display a wry smile.

 

“Well Ms. Cyron, myself and my associate are certainly grateful for your hospitality, and would be most remiss to not operate, as you put it, within reason. Is that not right Jarek?”

 

“Oh yes, discretion is perhaps my strongest suit my lord.”

 

He spoke evenly, with the heels of his hands resting upon the holstered handles of his autopistols.

 

“Only to be outdone by your valor my friend.”

 

“Of course.”

 

Dana glanced quickly between the two men with her brows furrowed before finally interjecting.

 

“As we are all—servants of the Emperor we all have schedules to keep, no? The Angels of Death arrive soon and I am sure that you are quite eager to begin your investigation. If you will follow me.”

 

Andronicus inclined his head slightly in a half bow, but Dana’s back was already turned. Smiling once more he followed her and her guards out of the hangar.

 

Dana Cyron’s office, was, as Adronicus had expected, furnished rather lavishly. Though there were no windows, for indeed, who would wish to look out onto the bleak rust-scape of Syllus Secundus, it was a spacious room built into the side of the governor’s private spire. The walls were the color of aged amber, and her long rectangular desk was made of a hardwood that had certainly been sourced from offworld.

 

All symbols of unusual privilege, especially for one so relatively young, and Adronicus supposed, probably not of noble birth. He couldn’t quite place why he thought so, though most probably it was her determination, no her silent desperation to fit the mold of what one of high status should be. Her perfect Terran dialect, her aloof economy of speech, her stoic resistance to subtle intimidation, all learned and earned, not born.

 

He pondered the nature of her station and elevation as she enumerated the various specifics of the case that had already been delivered to him on his dataslate. The first sign of anything amiss was apparently the deaths of two aspirants, they were found together, roughly speaking at least, and it was believed that they had killed one another, not an unheard of outcome considering the intense rivalry to be selected by the Adeptus Astartes.

 

Because of the precedence of such events, and the desire to silence them so as to keep the reputation of Syllus Secundus as a recruiting world pure, little investigation was done of the initial deaths and no pictographic evidence was preserved. The knife, that was apparently used in the deaths of both youths as one had apparently attacked the other, been disarmed, and then stabbed himself with his own weapon, was also missing, or more correctly, discarded, as it was seen of little value, evidentiary or otherwise.

 

The next death, somewhat more mysterious though still supposedly explicable was an ostensible suicide, though the youth had rather thoroughly gutted himself, in a manner darkly similar to the ancient warriors of Nippon many millennia past.

 

Then, the disappearances began. To date six aspirants had just, disappeared, with no tell or trail as to where or why.

 

“Still, it’s hardly supernatural”

 

Dana spoke in the closest that her voice seemed to be able to come to a conversational tone.

 

“With all due respect my Lord Inquisitor, I had counseled the governor against calling on your office’s involvement. Your time—“

 

“Your governor did not request involvement, involvement was sanctioned, by powers that, with all due respect my Lady, are far beyond your governor. That said, I do understand the apprehension that you and many others in this hall may feel at the presence of, what do they call it? The Eye That Sleepeth Not? Funny provincial little moniker, in any case, I understand your trepidation and assure you that if you have nothing to hide that nothing is exactly what I shall discover.”

 

“Very well.”

 

She nodded, a look of calm resignation barely touching her features before it was swiftly suppressed. A man that had not worked in Adronicus’s line of work for quite so long could easily have missed it.

 

“Well , first things first then. Take me to the armory”

 

“As you wish my lord.”

[Lysimachus]

Very nice. It's kind of funny knowing where things are going to end up, but it's still cool because we don't know how it's going to get there. Nice description of the characters involved too. Eager for the next bit!

[d Karma b]

I.

Want.

More.

 

This is a fantastic little piece of literature here, I beg you keep writing; this story has the beginnings of a real epic. :P

[Yaj]

I'll read what you've written in JoI, I was actually an Iron Warriors player for a long time

 

Then I'm sure you'll be most disappointed.

 

This is still good.

 

Keep it up.

[Rain]

Thanks for the encouragement, it's pretty fun to write anyway but always nice to know someone else likes it. Anyway, more.

 

The so called armory was a vast and sprawling complex, almost a miniature city unto itself, comprised of barracks, commissaries, training chambers, shrines, and all manner of amenities that allowed it to operate as a self sufficient home and staging base for the governor’s personal army. The youths that were to be presented to the Astartes had a separate sub-wing of the complex devoted to their upkeep that adjoined the Grand Hall of the Royal Guard, although tradition mandated that they were to be left with no direct minders, so as to develop their ruggedness and self-reliance.

 

Their days were devoted almost entirely to tests of physical endurance and martial training, and unlike the ostentatious chambers that served the Royal Guard, their rooms were drab and Spartan, probably in some attempt to imitate the hospitality of an Astartes cruiser.

 

After a brief sojourn through various unpopulated chambers, Adronicus entered a large rectangular training room, followed by Sol and Dana, who had insisted on accompanying him on his visit. As he had not seriously expected to find anything of interest, he amicably obliged. Looking out at the aspirants across the thinly matted floor of what was obviously some kind of sparring chamber, the first thing that stuck him was their size.

 

“How old are they?”

 

“Prepubescent all. Astartes implants do not take properly to candidates that have already begun becoming, well, actual men.”

 

Dana responded matter of factly, as if reciting a lesson to an ignorant pupil.

 

“Some of them could pass for it I suppose, but some of them must be 16 at least, the stature, the muscle development—“

 

“I assure you my lord, they are all of the proper age, we would not waste the time of the Emperor’s sons by presenting to them stock that they cannot use. Our planet breeds strong and hardy individuals and only the best are ever even considered to be presented.”

 

“Perhaps so, I suppose I should speak with some of them; you however may stay here, Jarek could use the company.”

 

She began to reply but he had already stridden off across the great floor of the training room toward the sparring aspirants and the clamor of their training blades drowned out any response. She did not follow.

 

Much to his lack of surprise, no one had apparently seen or heard anything in particular out of the ordinary. The youths seemed to lack even a basic understanding of who he was or why it may well behoove them to speak with him, and they followed a pack mentality of reservation and silence that greatly annoyed him. He supposed he could have threatened them, and as a representative of the Emperor’s justice he could present almost any threat that he wished, but somehow he felt that they would be even less receptive to such tactics than his prim new friend Ms. Cyron. Furthermore, he was simply not in the mood to threaten a gaggle of children with mass execution, a conceit the likes of which he had no exercised in long time. With a labored sigh and light shake of the head he finally walked back to his waiting entourage.

 

“Well?”

 

Dana spoke with something between impatience and bemusement.

 

“Amalsec. Where can I get some amalsec?”

 

“Intoxicants are strictly forbidden within the armory. There is an—establishment several floors down however, right outside of the primary freight elevator, the floor is marked as “The Hole” in graffiti that no one has apparently seen fit to repair. Some of our more lax personnel visit it with great regularity. Or so I hear. In any case, whenever you would like to resume your investigation, I am of course, at your disposal.”

 

Adronicus said nothing as she turned and walked away. He was tired. Tired of space flight, tired or questioning and interrogations, but above allhe was deeply tired of tolerating planetary governors and their impudent flunkies, and of sorting through endless cases of rogue psykers that could do little more than bend spoons or of hunting down nobles that indulged their supposed worship of the Dark Prince with the children of their indentured servants.

 

Perhaps the greatest problem was that he couldn’t always even just shoot them. At least not in practical terms, he could technically shoot them all he supposed, Jarek alone carried enough ammunition and power cells, but Throne the dataslate work that would produce. One could not simply execute a member of planetary nobility without facing all matter of bothersome questions and documentation, assuming of course, that one wasn’t a Coteaz or Karamazov, but he certainly wasn’t and so he couldn’t. He sighed again.

 

He needed a drink, but he also had a job to do, and though the assembled aspirants appeared to have little readily accessible knowledge as to the nature of what had befallen their peers (and therefore incidentally increased their own chances of selection), perhaps one of the more “lax” denizens of the armory could shed some insight. After all, the disappeared aspirants had to have gone somewhere, and the only way out of their wing of the armory takes one straight through the barracks of the Royal Guard, a fact that would rationally imply that they would be noticed, even correcting for the expected incompetence of most such over glorified PDF.

 

The “establishment” as Ms. Cyron had so aptly put it was a different world entirely from the glistening, precisely manicured halls of the Royal Guard or the gray but similarly immaculate training rooms of the aspirants. A kind of charcoal fog seemed to waft through the thick, muggy air and curl itself around the various patrons. The bar, booths, and tables, were all a sickly non-color that reminded Adronicus of nothing so much as human waste, and the patrons themselves ranged from in appearance from distasteful to vaguely dangerous. The Hole indeed.

 

“What wonderful places we visit my lord.”

 

Adronicus shrugged.

 

“At least there are no Lictors here. Probably. I imagine they would not be able to abide the smell.”

 

Jarek Sol scratched the thick knotted scars surrounding his bionic eye.

 

“I prefer Lictors.”

 

They took a seat at one of the several empty booths lining the walls and Adronicus waved over what he supposed was a waitress. He was still working, and if any of his majesty’s esteemed protective squadron could be easily persuaded to share their experiences The Hole would certainly be the place to find them, but there was no reason to indulge himself a little. Besides, he had to keep up appearances.

 

He was on his second flask of amalsec, a vintage with all of the proper refinement of Thunderbolt fuel when he noticed that one of the men sitting at the bar before him and behind Sol was regarding them with an abnormal amount of interest. The man had a fairly disheveled appearance, his sunken eyes sitting above a carelessly half-shaved chin and neck and below what was no longer well cropped hair. Despite his apparent lapse in hygiene, Adronicus noticed that the man worse the unmistakable crimson carapace armor of the Royal Guard, or what would have been unmistakable if it were not for the cloying charcoal fog that permeated The Hole, and that appeared to have partially affixed itself to the man’s clothing.

 

Adronicus looked to Sol and made slow gesture with his eyes. “There” he said without saying. Jarek Sol nodded, again a barely perceptible gesture and the outer reaches of Adronicus’s hearing registered the soft click of autopistol holsters unclipping. Adronicus winced as he realized that the man was no longer where he should have been, the stool that he had been occupying mere moments previous now stood empty, held only by the charcoal mist.

 

“We need to talk.”

 

The man was standing beside him.

[Rain]

Andy makes friends wherever he goes. Unfortunately it tends to not end well. Poor Andy. Anyway, next part.

 

 

 

“So talk.”

 

Adronicus appeared unfazed, he did not often lose track of people, especially people that he was making a point to not lose track of, but accidents happen and he supposed he might as well make the most of it.

 

“No, not here, I can’t stay here much longer, but we need to talk, it concerns the security of the planet and perhaps the entire Imperium, it—“

 

“And just what do you know of the entire Imperium?”

 

Adronicus accentuated the word and raised a single eyebrow in an almost comical gesture of skepticism. The man swallowed hard and looked around quickly. Adronicus could see that he was sweating, and that dirt and perhaps the singular pollution of The Hole had stuck to his sweat and thereby his flesh, laying upon him like long streaks of dark warpaint.

 

“Alright, let’s go, lead the way and try not to do anything too sudden. My friend here has quite a quick hand, and I’m not too much worse.”

 

The man exhaled, obviously relieved that his ploy, to whatever end he deemed to take it, had at least heretofore worked. As Adronicus followed him out of The Hole he reached down and undid the clasp over the grip of his plasma pistol. A relic far older and presumably more valuable that he, it had served as both a tool of war and summary execution, able to pierce even the powered armor of an Astartes, not that Adronicus had ever used it for such a purpose, nor indeed thought he’d ever need to.

 

The man, whose name was still a mystery to Adronicus, lead on wordlessly through the tangled allies of the hive. Away from the noble district, the color palette had become almost universally that of rust and decay, and hive workers moved in great throngs or streams, their downcast eyes never taking note of the strangers among them.

 

The width and girth of the streets varied immensely, from the narrow capillaries to the wide aortas of the hive’s arrhythmic heart. There appeared to be little logic or reason to their design, as ramshackle constructions stood both beside and occasionally amid the larger streets, and snaking passages led either to darkened shanties and squalid warrens, or simply to collapsed steel and improvised roadblocks. Having expected this, Adronicus had set his dataslate to record their path, a kind of digital trail of breadcrumbs that he could follow in the event that he was forced to terminate his new friend and therefore his knowledge of hive navigation.

 

Still, he felt a growing unease as they descended further and further into the city’s tangled bowels, a feeling of suffocation, of burial, as if they millions of tons of decrepit steel and rockrete were enclosing around and upon him like a makeshift grave. He shook his head slightly to clear his thoughts, chiding himself for his infantile and primeval unease. This was just a hive city, and this man, while probably insane and possibly a murderer, was but a man, and he had killed plenty of those. There was no reason to be afraid. They traveled on.

 

Adronicus exhaled uncomfortably as he pushed himself sideways through an especially narrow passage between two great pipes of corroded metal. Though the man had slinked through with relative ease, Adronicus’s armor had made it quite the ordeal. It occurred to him as he finally shoved his way out that it had been half of a standard hour since he had last seen a hive worker. The particular detour his mysterious friend had taken had been into what appeared to be some form of disused boiler complex, one that had probably once provided power for some of the surrounding tenements but now provided little more than homes for rodents, both human and otherwise.

 

Some of the ancient machinery still thrummed and gurgled with a semblance of operation, though Adronicus doubted that it was anything but vestigial. The machines were relics, and like so many things in the Imperium they had simply been forgotten, left to slowly fall apart under the weight of eons, their utility and indeed their existence no longer a matter of knowledge or concern.

 

“Stop.”

 

The man’s sudden speech quickly snapped Adronicus out of his reverie. The stood in a great chamber, with pipes the width of small personnel carriers snaking between dead cisterns that stood about as the cyclopean idols of a forgotten god. The man stood before a bulkhead flanked by two pipes that travelled upward into chamber’s uneven ceiling. He stood still, his head cocked slightly to one side as if he was listening for something, or perhaps considering some grand enigma. Then, as quickly as he had stopped, he spun to face Adronicus, the flap of his ragged Royal Guard cloak whipping back with the speed of his about-face, and revealing the butt of a hellgun, glinting dully in the thrumming sodium illumination of the complex.

 

Sol had already drawn his weapons. His right pistol discharged, the heavy slug striking the stranger between the collar bones. Tendrils of raw energy, like tiny serpents born of quicksilver, radiated out from the impact point as the man’s refractor field absorbed the force of the slug. Sol fired again, the shot from his left-hand pistol throwing up a great comet’s tail of sparks as it was deflected by the field over the man’s right shoulder.

 

“No! Please!”

 

The man eyes were wide, as if in a panic, even as he depressed the trigger of his weapon. He fired once, the white hot las-bolt whipping by Adronicus’s with temple with a whipping snap of expanding air, singing the rough stubble of his cheek as if with a dull razor. Before the man could fire again, and before Adronicus had had time to sight his own pistol, a dull crack rang out in the chamber, reverberating among the bones of the boilers like a distant thunderbolt.

 

The bolter round shorted the man’s refractor field and struck him directly in the solar plexus. Upon contact with the man’s chest it detonated, bisecting him in two and spraying the bulkhead before which he stood with a great arcing fan of blood and bone fragments. The man’s head, the faculty of thought and reason, and the architect of their fateful journey into the city’s bowels, was long dead before it stuck the ground.

 

Adronicus turned, his plasma pistol now fully drawn, and pointed his weapon at his savior. Directly behind him stood an Astartes, who had apparently been hidden among the twisting steel and inky shadows of the complex; the dull red of his eye slits the only points of color upon his unmarked matte black armor.

[Lysimachus]

Cool. Where's the next chapter? :lol:

[Rain]

Here's some more, I guess it's half done or something, I know what else is going to happen just not how long it will take. Anyway, glad that some people are actually reading it too, thanks.

 

“Greetings Inquisitor”

 

The Astartes spoke through the lifeless machine-bark of his external vox caster, his words echoing eerily about the rusted cavern of the disused facility and creating the illusion of coming from many places simultaneously.

 

“I must say that your reception of your savior is less than warm, never mind tactically imprudent, do you honestly believe that you pose a threat to me?”

Adronicus said nothing, allowing the low hum of his plasma pistol’s charged energy cell to speak for him. The near silence lasted for perhaps a few seconds before Sol finally interjected:

 

“Astartes or no, nothing in this world or the next would much appreciate two high velocity slugs through its throat, and you’re but a few fractions of a second from a personal experience friend.”

 

The Astartes laughed, the harsh staccato sound sounding unnervingly like projectile based gunfire. With a theatrical grace, the black armored warrior lowered his boltgun and mag-locked it to his thigh with a resounding clank. He then raised his arms, bent at the elbows in an “L” figure, his palms open and facing the two men in a mock gesture of surrender.

 

Adronicus exhaled slowly, not having realized that he had not performed the rather necessarily function of breathing since the ex-Royal Guard had nearly taken his life with a hastily aimed lasbolt. As he inhaled two fresh lungfuls of the chamber’s sour, oily air he finally managed to speak.

 

“What is your name warrior? And to what chapter do you owe your allegiance that would allow you to act so—“

 

Adronicus paused momentarily, attempting to find the correct word so as to not offend the giant.

 

“Independently.”

 

“My name Inquisitor, is Ingo Pech, and I am brother-sergeant of the Raven Guard, 3rd Company under Shadow Captain Kayvaan Shrike. My, ‘independence’ as you put it is a great defining feature of the brotherhood of Deliverance, we aim to achieve with few that which cannot be done with many. A task with which you must by now be intimately familiar.”

 

Adronicus nodded. Despite the soulless quality of the Astartes warrior’s speech he though he heard a hint of bitter irony as the warrior spoke his name, as if he was chagrined at not being immediately recognized or—

 

“In any case” The warrior continued. “I was dispatched to this planet for much the same reasons as you, however given the jealous autonomy of both the Inquisition and the Adeptus Astartes, we were apparently heretofore unaware of one another, an issue that I seem to have remedied most punctually.”

 

Pech inclined his head slightly as if to gesture toward the remains of the nameless man that he had killed.

 

“As you may or may not have realized Inquisitor, the cancer upon Syllus Secundus runs far deeper than we could have initially surmised. Tell me, how much do you know of history?”

 

“I have studied it of course, the Age of Apostasy for example was a great teachable moment for some of my more, uh, zealous peers, and indeed a black mark against the entire Ordo. It—“

 

“And what of the Horus Heresy? What do you know of the Traitor Legions?”

 

The giant had since lowered his arms but made no further gesture as he spoke, as if was discussing nothing of greater import than tomorrow’s weather, or the particular features of a given vintage of amalsec.

 

“But you can’t possibly mean, Syllus Secundus is on the other side of the galaxy from the Segmentum Obscurus, an attack by the Dread Nine this far out in space would be unprecedented, it would be suicide.”

 

The Astartes laughed again, this time with what struck Adronicus as a semblance of genuine mirth. He seemed to be enjoying their exchange, an emotional response that Adronicus had never imagined would exist in an Astartes’ grim and long post-human mind.

 

“Not all of the Traitor Legions engage in such vulgar displays of power Inquisitor. Tell me, what knowledge have you of The Hydra? What do you know of the Alpha Legion?”

 

Adronicus felt the sweat on the back of his neck turn a frigid cold as his breath once more found it difficult to enter his lungs.

 

“Only that they are the most insidious of traitors, cowards even among the ranks of the treasonous, they work through intermediaries and agents, fanning the flames of rebellion and disappearing before armed response may be mobilized.”

 

Adronicus shrugged, attempting desperately to appear nonchalant and not particularly succeeding.

 

“Yes; quite so Inquisitor, and unfortunately for Syllus, long slumbering embers of unrest upon this particular dominion of the faithful have been as you say, fanned to the cusp of open perfidy by the agents of the enemy. Indeed I have reason to believe that the governor himself has been ensorcelled by the wiles of Chaos, though what their final aim may be I have been unable to discover, a task in which perhaps you may aid me.”

 

Adronicus nodded and turned to Sol, who had seemed to have been frozen in a firing position, his weapons sighted at the Astartes warrior’s neck joint the entire time that that his master had been conversing with him.

 

“Put them down Jarek”

 

“And just trust him? I don’t know my lord, he’s not that charming.”

 

Jarek Sol’s humorless crooked smile graced his scarred visage as he holstered his weapons.

 

“It isn’t as if we have a great amount of choice at the moment”

 

Adronicus spoke with what he had hoped would be pragmatism but what sounded far more like a hollow resignation.

 

“That is correct.”

 

The Astartes responded in his cold machine-voice.

 

“You do not.”

[Lysimachus]

Nice. The last couple of lines don't flow very well though, it's a little confusing as to who's speaking?

 

Maybe swap stuff round a bit:

 

“Put them down Jarek”

 

“And just trust him? I don’t know my lord, he’s not that charming.”

 

“It isn’t as if we have a great amount of choice at the moment.”

 

Adronicus spoke with what he had hoped would be pragmatism but what sounded far more like a hollow resignation. After a long moment, Jarek Sol’s humorless crooked smile graced his scarred visage as he holstered his weapons.

 

The Astartes responded in his cold machine-voice.

 

“That is correct. You do not.”

[Grotsmasha]

Mooorrrreeeee!!!!!!!

 

It's travelling quite well at the moment, great job.

 

Cheers,

Jono

[Rain]

Hey guys, a little more, I'm currently really busy as I'm sending out grad school applications and most of my free time I'm playing The Old Republic :P . Anyway, bad mojo goin' down.

 

 

 

Adronicus frowned, inwardly composing himself and attempting to filter as much of his unease as he could manage given the nature of what was unfolding and the rather disquieting claims the Astartes was making.

 

“So, to business then” Adronicus spoke, looking at the massive black-armored warrior with what he earnestly hoped was professionalism.

 

“You claim that the governor is a traitor, a follower of Chaos, yes?”

 

“Yes”

 

The Astartes remained impassive, looking more like a statue made of some unknown light-absorbent matter than a living being.

 

“And, by that logic, I gather that you suspect him in the recent disappearances?”

 

The Astartes nodded slightly, a motion that much to Adronicus’s secret relief disrupted the eerie inhumanity of the warrior.

 

“That is quite correct Inquisitor, it appears as if the Governor, as well as several nobles are preparing some form of ritual on behalf of the Alpha Legion. They are plotting something, something that I believe involves the summoning of warp entities, entities that demand sacrifice.”

 

“By the throne…”

 

Adronicus had once more lost his so painstakingly manufactured look of confidence, and his face drained visibly. This was far more than he had expected, he was not of the Ordo Malleus, and he lacked the very specific training to face such threats. Though this Astartes was no doubt a formidable warrior Adronicus knew full well that even he was not equipped to face the abominations of the warp alone. The inquisitor swallowed quickly, no longer caring how he appeared, but knowing that he had little choice but to pursue what was considered his duty. In a rapid tone that bled a hint of desperation, Adronicus spoke:

 

“So we stop them then, we stop the ritual before the warp-spawn can be summoned. I assume they are not yet ready to proceed, else the summoning would have already occurred, so we act, we move against the mortal element before the never-born become a factor.”

 

The Astartes was once more completely still, though Adronicus received the oddly unnerving impression that the warrior was smiling behind the mechanical visage of his helm.

 

“And that Inquisitor, is precisely the reason that I require your services. There is little time to waste, the Emperor’s work awaits us.”

 

Adronicus followed the digital map stored on his dataslate, walking at a brisk pace so as to be rid of the oppressive surroundings of the ancient innards of the hive. Jarek Sol followed silently behind him, he had said nothing since Adronicus’s conversation with the Astartes and he did not need to. Adronicus knew that his companion distrusted the Astartes, but, as always, he followed. Adronicus had never quite understood whether the venerable stormtrooper’s loyalty was to him, to the Inquisition, or to the ephemeral concept of duty, but whatever brought it about, the man’s steadfastness was fit for, well an Astartes.

 

The Astartes himself had stayed behind, giving Adronicus a small device that the Inquisitor had tucked away into a pouch upon his belt. Apparently the device could be used to summon the massive armored warrior when the final stage of the plan was to be carried out. Until then, Adronicus would move alone, setting the stage for the final act in a manner that would arouse the least suspicion, as he was, after all, supposed to be there. And as far as the ruling body of Syllus Secundus he was still as uninformed as he had been upon his arrival, something that he sought to remedy.

[InquisitorHayn]

Great stuff so far. I think I know where this is going, but I'm eagerly awaiting the rest to confirm. Thoroughly enjoying your descriptions and the very human persona of Adronicus.

[Rain]

You what I like? Rum and coke. Is that not manly? What if I punch someone while drinking it? Oh anyway, it was late and I was under the influence, so as usual I wrote more stuff. Hope you guys like it, come to think of it it's barely even a 40k story, but whatever close enough. It's also almost done, and it will actually kind of make sense when it is (I hope). Oh and you can probably guess at least a few of the "twists" InquisitorHayn, but hopefully not all, most will be explained pretty explicitly at the end, though some I'll just leave implied. Anyway, here it is:

 

Dana Cyron paced in a rough figure eight within her spacious office, her eyes set and cast down at a shallow angle, as if following some skittering object visible only to her. She stopped mid-stride and steadied herself, absently biting the right side of her bottom lip as she listened for footsteps outside of her chamber. It had been several hours since she had last seen the Inquisitor leaving the questionable comforts of The Hole in the escort of a man that she had immediately recognized, though she had only seen him through the grainy pict-feed of a closed circuit surveillance device.

 

It was Eno Kresh, a royal guard and something of an alcoholic. Neither the most dependable nor the most notable man in his best of days, Mr. Kresh had finally managed to gain some importance through his recent acquisition of a well publicized arrest warrant, courtesy of his prominence the planetary governor himself. Dana released her lip from in between her teeth and frowned, her thoughts skipping across the surface of her mind as she attempted to focus both in and outwardly, to both prepare her next move and be forewarned of when it was time to make it.

 

The door swung open. Dana Cyron looked over her shoulder, her face a perfect mask of nonchalance, showing neither surprise nor relief at Adronicus’s reappearance.

 

“Hello Inquisitor”

 

“And hello to you administrator”

 

Adronicus smiled, the ease of the gesture seeming to almost mock the seriously set woman. He spread his arms, palms facing out in a gesture that resembled an exaggerated shrug, his head tilting slightly to the side as he raised his shoulders.

 

“So it appears, it appears that we have a problem”

 

He spoke casually, and in a friendly and familiar tone that seemed strange coming from an armored instrument of the Emperor’s unsleeping fury. Dana Cyron furrowed her brow, her mouth drawing into a tight circle as she turned to face the Inquisitor.

 

“A problem with your investigation, or—“

 

“Let me ask you Ms. Cyron,” he interrupted, “when first we spoke, you said that you counseled the governor against Inquisitorial involvement”

 

“That is correct”

 

She spoke evenly, as if giving deposition before an Arbites judge, the practiced tone of a lifelong bureaucrat. Or a very well practiced and casual liar, Adronicus smiled slightly as he was struck by the redundancy of the sentiment.

 

“Now tell me, were there any others that echoed your counsel? Moreover, what did his—Excellency? Or whatever you call him on this planet himself appear to believe regarding the necessity of Inquisitorial intervention?”

 

Dana blinked, seemingly stuck by the sudden directness of the Inquisitor’s cross examination.

 

“There were others that saw it unnecessary yes. His prominence—“ She emphasized the word, an implicit correction to Adronicus’s casual miswording of the pertinent Syllian honorific “his prominence tended to agree I think, though his mind has seemed heavy lately, and I must say that he does not share with us as much as he sometimes did. I worry for him if I am to be frank, this has all lain on him quite heavily.”

 

Adronicus nodded, seeming to look past her, his eyes narrowing slightly as he thought. After a time that could not have exceeded several seconds he blinked, signaling the end of his internal dialogue and the arrival at a decision.

 

“I would like to meet with your governor Ms. Cyron. I believe that he and I have much to discuss.”

 

Dana Cyron’s face seemed to pull in on itself and she broke Adronicus’s gaze, fixing her eyes on the floor as she searched for the proper response.

 

“That may not be immediately possible my lord you see—“

 

“No.” Adronicus spoke flatly, though the slightly condescending hint of amiability could still be heard in his voice. “No I do not see, I do not see and I do not wish to see. Take me to your leader Ms. Cyron, I am not asking, I am telling.”

 

She sighed, her exhalation seeming to telegraph not so much resignation as anger.

 

“Alright, I will make the necessary arrangements. I will need—perhaps half of a standard hour however, can you allot me that much?”

 

Adronicus smiled again, and looking up Dana Cyron was now sure that she saw something behind the façade, behind the confidence, and behind the casual mirth, there was—fear? She blinked and the expression was gone.

 

“I am glad that you have agreed to reason Ms. Cyron. I await the audience at your earliest convenience”

 

“As you wish my lord”

 

Her own voice had fallen as she strode back toward her desk.

[Andrew J]

I likey! I likey! When will the next chapter commence?