Ordos
Black Horizons
By SFaccountant
Chapter 14
Ordos
Mining Nexus Ishrem
Spire 1, primary spool
Deck 36-M
The heavy blast doors slowly crept open, a loud squeal coming from the much-abused gears in the engine. Kaelith clearly found the noise aggravating in the extreme; the melta-mandibles hanging under his head quivered and sparked, as if they were eager to carve into the offending mechanism. Plasma sparked from the machines mounted on the back of his exoskeleton, along with an accelerated rate of exhaust ejection. His face remained patient and expressionless, glaring forward under the glow of bright green orbs.
“It’sh a nice view from up here, ishn’t it?” Solon asked, staring out of an armorglass window at the numerous scrap shacks and prefab structures below. It was not a pleasant image at all, although it may have compared well to the soot-stained buildings of Ferrous Dominus.
One of the five Iron Warriors behind him grunted while they waited for the half-functional door to open. “Are we going to head right back to the ship after this? This place looks… awful, but exploitable.”
“Exploitable, yesh! That’sh why we’re here!” Solon said cheerfully, stepping forward into the gap between the doors. They hadn’t opened nearly far enough to let him through, but the Warsmith simply wedged a leg into the space and levered them open by force. The squealing was amplified horribly, and the others were sure they heard something snap within the door mechanism.
“If you want to explore the place after we’re done here, you can. I would advishe coming back to the ship once you want to resht rather than shtaying in Ishrem, though. There are a lot of thievesh.” Solon pulled back his leg and then walked through the door.
“Contra: it is advisable that subject N-771 remain with us to minimize disruption to local hab-sphere,” Kaelith argued while the Iron Warriors followed Solon into the next room. “Extrapolation: Indulging the subject’s petty demands is escalating operational inefficiencies. N-771 should be held in strategic reserve aboard the flagship when not deployed.”
The talkative Iron Warrior stopped and looked back at the Dark Magos, its helmet visor lenses a bright green rather than the traditional red. “I have a name, you know.”
“Concurrence: You do possess a primary designation, albeit its employment while you are incog is also inadvisable.”
A dark chuckle came from the Changeling Queen’s vox grille. “I’m sure you are perfectly content locked away in your little forge room tinkering with guns for weeks on end, Magos, but my quarters are sadly not so interesting. I need to get out when I have the opportunity to… taste the air a little bit.”
Kaelith spat an airy dismissal in Binaric, and then suddenly set upon the doors. Mechadendrites seeped out of hidden compartments and melta-mandibles released precisely measured bursts of intense heat. Within seconds he had excavated a gear from the wall, and Chrysalis watched in fascination as it vanished underneath the various whirling and quivering machines around his “neck.” A few seconds later it re-emerged again, cleaned of rust and its malformed edges smoothed.
“Where ish the Executor?” Solon asked, reaching the middle of the room. It was a fairly large and clean meeting area, with a spread of old lounge furniture and a desk near the back. There was also no one else in the room other than the Chaos pirates.
“How does this work normally? What do you do here?” Chrysalis asked.
“We trade technical shervicesh for fuel and raw materialsh the shtation minesh from the ashteroid field,” Solon explained, swiveling around to face backward on his chassis, “and information.”
“Information?” The disguised changeling tilted her head to the side.
“We have few contactsh within Imperial shpace. We musht know what coloniesh have been losht or created, where new warsh have broken out, and where the richesht new production centersh are. We download captured data-shtacksh whenever we can, but the information gathered here ish of a particular nature, from many of the mosht prolific criminalsh in the shector.” Then he swiveled back around to face the desk again. “He’sh not ushually late, though.”
A smooth hiss came from the entrance as the doors closed, their internal machinery restored to something close to perfect operating condition. Kaelith rapidly scuttled past the Iron Warriors and crept up to the desk, his body rising to loom over it. A lumen blinked on, and the Dark Magos paused.
“Examination: Vox link inbound. Codex inload at 72%. 79%. 84%.”
Solon straightened up, his chassis legs lifting the bulk of his body higher off the floor. The other Iron Warriors seemed to relax their guard, mag-logging their weapons and leaning against the walls. One even dropped onto a couch, and the furniture creaked terribly under his weight.
A glass node on the desk flickered, and a soft buzzing sound came from the device as it slowly activated. A hololith appeared behind the desk, although the image was terrible; the coloration was all wrong and there were stripes of empty space badly marring the projection. Nonetheless, the hololith was recognizably a man, or at least the upper half of a man. A burst of static came from the transmitted next to the projector node.
“Greetings, Warsmith! This is Executor Gaines! I am pleased to once again act as your host and liaison within our home of Ishrem.” The body of the hololith moved. The Executor was probably bowing, but the quality of the image made it simply impossible to tell.
“Well met, Executor. Thish ish Warshmith Sholon of the 38th Company Iron Warriorsh,” Solon announced. “I have come to negotiate a price for the maintenance ritesh and repair dutiesh performed upon your home. Our vesshelsh require refueling and reshupply from your shtoresh.”
“Yes, yes, very good. I will-“
“Interjection,” interrupted Kaelith from the other side of the hololith. “This interface method is a departure from typical protocol. Explanation required.”
The hololith flickered again as Gaines moved in some fashion that it was unable to correctly display. “My apologies for my impertinence, Magos. Recent security concerns required new protocol for handling guests.”
“Contra: We are not mere ‘guests.’ Tonal designation: Scorn. Divergent interrogative: Why has the primary objective queue not included reactor maintenance? Exhortation: Extended periods without repair will increase the chances of containment loss and critical failure.”
“There are some… unique circumstances that require our reactor to remain isolated for now. It is a private matter,” Gaines said, his tone apologetic.
“Admonishment: A containment failure will be a highly public event, regardless of your wishes,” Kaelith hissed. “Addendum: Do these privacy concerns also explain the transmission failure that crippled internal vox-net and noosphere access after our arrival? Contextual: The objective queue does not request repairs to those devices, either.”
Chrysalis watched the Dark Magos berate the hololith with rapidly waning interest and eventually turned toward one of the Iron Warrior guards. “Does anything exciting happen on these excursions, or do you all just stand here and watch them argue?”
The Astartes was surprised at being addressed directly for what sounded like small talk, but after a few seconds of staring at the shape-shifter he shrugged the massive shoulders of his armor and replied. “We stand here and watch. I’ve heard the station offers diversions and baubles for the mortals to entertain themselves, but there’s nothing of great consequence on this rock and the residents know their place. Little excitement to be had.”
“Disappointing, but I supposed there could be other interesting things to do besides killing,” Chrysalis mused, looking back toward the lift.
“Like what? What does something like you do for entertainment?” a different Iron Warrior standing in the corner asked.
“I kidnap young lovers and feast on their joy,” Chrysalis answered. “Although since I was augmented I don’t have to do that to feed, so I guess it’s more of an indulgence now. Like a dessert, or a sport.”
“You have strange hobbies,” grunted the first Marine. “Be patient, this will not take much longer.”
Mining Nexus Ishrem
Docking bay
“All right, Sir! We have 20 lasguns, 20 laspistols, and 80 battery pack magazines usable in either! Please inspect your delivery to ensure that all inventory is present and meets your specifications!” Wind Chime chirped, hovering over a mag-lev cart. “If everything is satisfactory, then I can take your payment and conclude our transaction!”
A young earth pony was carefully moving a trio of crates off of the cart and onto the deck. Behind her stood a single Iron Warrior who seemed to be studying one of the cutters docked nearby rather than paying attention to the delivery. In front of Wind Chime were four residents: three men and woman, all of whom seemed quite perplexed but generally relieved at having to address the cute hovering mare rather than the Chaos Space Marine.
“I’m surprised that these misers let xenos touch any of their wares,” mumbled one of the buyers as the box was opened in front of them.
“They were pretty hesitant at first, yeah! But they learned to trust us ponies and I hope you will too!” Wind Chime said, giggling into a hoof. “Is everything in order? You can test-fire the weapon here if you like! Just aim at the crate lid!”
Under the lid was – as advertised – a stack of recently manufactured Voss-pattern lasrifles. The earth pony bowed her head and then moved to the next crated, pushing a button on top that cause the lid to unlock. She flipped the lid off and let it fall to the deck well clear of the crate.
One of the men took up a lasgun and then rolled it over in his hands, inspecting it. Then he walked to the next crate with the ammunition batteries and loaded it in, flicking a switch on the side. A gentle buzz came from the weapon’s primary capacitor, and a small display on the side beeped and showed the number 99.
The man held it up as if to aim, and his eyes glanced to the side. The Iron Warrior was staring directly at him, glowering silently from behind the helmet’s red visor. The Chaos Marine already had his boltgun in hand, of course. Very few of the humans who had ever seen an Astartes found them without their weapons at the ready. His eyes darted the other way, toward the woman. She shook her head with a grimace.
“… They look good to me,” said the resident with a small cough. “The fabled scions of Chaos would hardly sell us defective weapons, now would they?”
“Depends on which ones, I’m sure!” Wind Chime replied, her voice still perfectly cheery. “Now, the price-“
A loud clunking noise echoed through the deck, startling the various crew. Bright warning lumens turned on, scattering red light across the deck. Apparently whatever alarm system they were part of had been seriously degraded, but it was clear that something important was happening. A tortured squeal came from numerous straining metal components at once, and then huge shutters started descending along the section of the docks that met the rest of the station.
“Hey, wh-what’s happening? What’s the matter?” Wind Chime asked, looking around nervously.
“The dock shutters are closing. Maybe they’re doing maintenance on something and need the atmospheric field turned off.” The man holding the lasgun returned it to the original crate. “Sure would be nice if they told US before the docks got vented.”
“V-Vented? You mean…?” Wind Chime gasped, whipping around to stare at the quivering shield that kept air and pressure from escaping into open space. It had not occurred to her before, but the failure of such a barrier would immediately suck all the air in the docks – and potentially the rest of the station – into space. Considering the state of Ishrem’s more sophisticated equipment, she was surprised by the general lack of alarm among the humans, who merely seemed aggravated.
“Yeah, we probably have three minutes or so before they cut the power,” the buyer said, annoyed but not obviously concerned. “This happens every once in a while when something is on the fritz. Let’s wrap this up, yeah?”
Mining Nexus Ishrem
Deck 11-D
Spike grunted as he clambered across the crawlspace, his spinal fins scraping the top even while he was flat on his belly. A small lumen was strapped to his head, illuminating the way wherever he faced, and a few tools tied to his waist rattled and scraped along the floor. The space was only about twice as wide as the young dragon was, with every surface covered in dust.
Spike continued scraping forward until he reached the end of the crawlspace. A metal latch was positioned on the metal paneling there, and he reached out and grasped it before tugging it sharply to one side. The panel did not move. He tried twice more, a growl escaping his throat at each attempt, but the panel would not budge.
“Hey! The access is stuck!” Spike shouted.
After a few seconds, Gaela’s voice came from behind him. “Is the panel locked or irreparably impeded?”
“No, I think it’s just rusted shut!”
“Then try harder,” commanded the Dark Techpriest.
Spike grumbled something unpleasant under his breath and then pulled a screwdriver from his belt. He stabbed it into the seam between panels, and then attempted to pry the seam open while again pulling on the latch. After a minute of scraping, clanking, and grunting, the panel finally jolted open.
“Hah! I got it! All right!” Spike shouted between heaving breaths. “Gaela! It’s open!”
“You are two minutes behind schedule,” Gaela replied. “Proceed.” A clanking noise followed her voice, and then a sharp click.
Spike sighed, and then pushed the panel the rest of the way open. Behind it was another narrow space running perpendicular to the access, with several thick cables attached to the bottom. One of the cables was frayed and clearly damaged, like someone had been cutting through it but had given up halfway.
“Found the damage!” Spike announced, crawling forward to poke his head into the other crawlspace. “You’re sure the power’s off, right?”
“Affirmative. Proceed,” Gaela called back.
Spike took a handheld torch from his belt. He shifted around to get a better angle, using his free hand to adjust the lumen on his forehead. As the beam shifted, he briefly glimpsed something strange off to the side, further down the line of cabling.
He turned to shine the lumen in that direction. A black, multi-legged creature with a spine-riddled carapace sat on the cabling several feet away. Its legs twitched, and its eyelids opened up over a single, milky orb that peered into the lumen’s glare. It looked to be maybe half the size of Spike’s head, although between the legs, hook-like mandibles, and the rapid onset of panic, it was difficult to gauge the creature’s real mass.
Spike felt his heart leap into his throat. The creature raised a pair of claws and scuttled forward, its teeth(?) slicing together like scissors.
“UWAAAAAAAAAAAH!!” Spike screamed in terror, and then spat a jet of green fire just before the alien got into lunging range.
A brief, agonized shriek came from the creature as it was cooked alive in its shell. It eventually rolled away, and its legs curled up under it to form a smoldering ball. The cabling under it sparked and popped as the outer casing was burned and the exposed braids started to melt.
“Status report!” Gaela barked. “Spike! Respond!”
Spike gasped and coughed for a few seconds before he shouted back, “A spider! There was a spider down here!”
The pause that followed seemed curiously judgmental, somehow. “A spider,” Gaela responded, her tone deeply unimpressed.
“A BIG spider!” Spike clarified.
“You are a DRAGON,” the Dark Techpriest reminded him harshly.
“Dragons hate spider bites as much as anyone else!” Spike protested.
“If the passage is clear now, repair the cabling,” Gaela commanded, a strong note of impatience in her voice.
Spike looked over the burnt cabling, wincing. “Uhm… some of this is going to have to be replaced…”
“Then cut out the damaged sections for reconstitution. I am almost finished with the maintenance rites on the regulator.”
“All right, all right… Just give me a minute…” Spike replied, pulling another tool from his belt and tenderly pushing the dead alien further away.
Gaela knelt in front of a bank of battered data wafers, her servo arms rising and falling in minute, precise movements. Sparks blasted from the tips, and occasionally a different arm would briefly beam a laser into the wafer she was working on.
+God of Machines, unholy spark within steel, let your will be unchained,+ Gaela prayed as her mechadendrites burrowed new paths through the wafers. +In your perfection are our labors known. In your function is our will realized. May this device be whole once more.+
Several lumens on the cogitator bank started to blink on and off. Gaela finished with the data wafers and slid them back into place, and then flipped a switch. The lumens turned off. She flipped the switch again. The lumens did not turn on again. She slammed her tri-claw arm onto the cogitator surface. The lumens flickered back on as if chastened, and this time did not blink off again.
“Spike, you are behind schedule,” she announced, pressing a few buttons on the console. The attached screen turned on, albeit slowly.
“Sorry! I’ve cut away the damaged parts! Just gotta… Oof… get the new one in place…”
“Proceed with haste,” Gaela commanded. “I still wish to do a voluntary diagnostic on the vox relays. Their sudden and total failure does not match previous estimations of system decay.”
“Working as fast as I can!” the young assistant shouted back.
A burst of static came from behind Gaela carrying the subtle but familiar distortions of Binaric Cant. +Why do you tolerate that creature? I find its frequent complaints aggravating.+
Gaela glanced back at another Dark Techpriest making adjustments to a fire suppression node. +He is useful,+ she said simply.
+We possess numerous automata and servo skulls which would provide the same services more efficiently,+ the other Techpriest retorted, +and they perform labors without so much noise.+
Gaela felt a flicker of irritation. She wasn’t completely sure why; her colleague’s criticisms were straightforward and rational and his proposed solution was viable. Still, her aggravation stuck in her throat, demanding to be voiced.
“If you dislike working in proximity to Spike you may abandon this task and move on to the secondary vaporators in the adjacent deck,” she said bluntly, “I can perform the remaining rites in this section.”
The other Techpriest turned to stare at her, unpleasantly surprised both by her response and her decision to reply in Gothic. Emerald green lights glowered from under their black hoods, and for a moment the only sounds in the hall were the strained hum of the cogitator and the distant clanking from Spike’s work. Then the other Techpriest removed his servo arm from the node.
+I accept your terms,+ the Dark Techpriest said simply, retrieving a power glaive that rested against the wall.
“Acknowledged. Cycling task roster,” Gaela replied, making the adjustments while she returned to the console.
The other Techpriest reached the door to the next section and gestured to the small cogitator next to the mag-lock. The door was locked and the Dark Techpriests were not given the proper authorization keycodes to undo them, but that was of little consequence. Nobody on Ishrem was capable of encrypting a proper data-ward and the tech-cultists navigated the simple and badly corroded machine spirits guarding the devices with trivial ease. The lumens flickered uncertainly, and then died. A second later there was a muted clunk as the inactive mag-bolt disengaged.
The Dark Techpriest detected an auditory anomaly while the door slowly cracked open. Heavy footfalls approaching rapidly. Metal-clad, likely of power armor grade. The estimated heft – judging from the sound intensity – suggested inadequate weight to be Astartes armor. Likely another tech-cultist then, perhaps in need of assistance.
He had just enough time to re-evaluate his assumption and update his priors before the eviscerator chainsword rammed into his abdomen.
Gaela whirled around at the ferocious sound of a chainsword’s teeth sawing through metal, snapping up her axe in her hand. The head of the sword erupted out the Dark Techpriest’s back, and then his assailant braced a foot against him to shove away his corpse. The dying tech-cultist released a final Binaric transmission, cast as far and wide as he could manage within the station.
+The Ordo Hereticus is here.+
The message was received, decrypted, and inloaded into Gaela’s cortex engine in an eye blink, but she was quite preoccupied. Power armor greaves pounded across the deck as she sprinted toward the attacker in a full charge. She noted the assailant’s power armor embellished with bright red purity seals and a classic fleur de lis, soiled as it was by a jet of oil and blood splashed across it, but the data was immediately filed away for later consideration.
The Sister turned her eviscerator and slashed to intercept the next Techpriest, meeting the charge head-on. A crackling power axe crashed into the eviscerator’s blade, slicing through the teeth and chain of the weapon before lodging into the main body. The impact was jarring, but Gaela managed to follow up first, smashing her tri-claw arm into the helmet of her opponent.
The zealot reeled, but recovered in time to try to block Gaela’s second attack. The heavy chainsword sputtered, its engine revving uselessly while the sundered belt of razor teeth spilled out onto the deck. The power axe cleaved through it entirely this time, and then ripped through the arm beneath. A scream of pain and anger erupted from the wounded woman, and her other hand went for the bolt pistol on her hip.
Gaela’s servo arm snapped closed on the arm before she could draw, the pincer straining and sparking while it struggled to hold the weapon down. Another two other servo arms darted forward at the same time, cutting into the power armor with a melta torch and welding laser. The tools were not nearly as effective against a warrior in full power armor as Gaela’s actual weapons, but by the time the enemy wrenched her arm free and smashed them aside, Gaela was bringing her axe about again. The crackling blade ripped through the armored woman, decisively finishing the duel.
Gaela had barely wrenched her axe free when a bolt shell impacted her shoulder plate, knocking her backward. Another round exploded against the wall next to her, and she darted to the side of the doorway, out of the way of the opening between hall sections. She had glimpsed more power armored bodies sprinting through the dimly lit hall beyond, all with weapons drawn.
“Gaela?! Gaela, what’s happening?! Are you fighting?!” Spike shouted from the crawlspace.
“Affirmative! We have incoming hostiles!” Gaela shouted back as she quickly inloaded an override command to the door controls. The creaking slats of metal stopped with a ponderous thud, and then slowly started to move the other way.
“Is it spiders?! I warned you about the spiders! They’re HUGE!” Spike replied with a grunt.
“It is NOT spiders!” Gaela assured him.
Her power axe cleaved into the wall next to the doors, and she ripped a long tear into the aged metal bulkhead. Large gears caked with rust were stuttering into place at a deplorable rate, and Gaela promptly identified the key mechanism and punched her power axe into it. With a frustrated snarl that, in her opinion, counted as an entreaty to the machine spirits, Gaela pulled on the axe handle, using it as a lever to force the doors closed faster. They slammed shut within seconds, and Gaela’s welding laser immediately started fusing the gears together.
“WHOA!! What happened here?!” Spike gasped as he crawled out from under the cogitator. “Is the Techpriest dead? Who is that?”
“That is a member of the Adeptus Sororitas, a soldier of the Imperial ecclesiarchy!” Gaela shouted. The sound of an armored fist striking metal came from the door. “There are more of them! I believe your other queries can be resolved with simple observation!”
“WRETCHED HERETIC!!” roared a rather feminine voice from the next hallway. “SUBMIT TO THE EMPEROR’S HOLY RETRIBUTION!!”
“I decline,” Gaela replied, withdrawing from the door mechanism and turning to Spike. “We must-“
A power sword stabbed through the doors in a burst of blue light, showering similarly covered sparks over the floor. Spike’s eyes bulged. Gaela turned to face the breaching weapon, and then lifted a foot.
The disruption field around the sword flickered, and Gaela slammed her boot into the exposed flat of the blade. The weapon shattered at the impact, and some seven inches of the sword’s tip was sent bouncing across the floor.
“A curse upon your wargear,” Gaela spat, wrenching her power axe free of the hole in the wall. “Spike, let’s go.”
“Okay, yeah!” Spike started to turn, but hesitated when the broken sword was pulled back out of the doors. “Uh, they can’t get through righ-“
“RUN, Spike,” Gaela said, bolting down the hall.
The dragon yelped and did so, scurrying after her as fast as he could. Behind them, in the hole ripped through the blast doors, an anti-armor krak grenade was hammered into place. The pin was pulled, and then a half-dozen voices boomed through the rusting hallways in tandem.
“BURN THE HERETIC!! KILL THE MUTANT!! PURGE THE UNCLEAN!!”
Spike flinched when he heard the sound of rapidly tearing metal behind him, but this time he didn’t try to look back. Ahead of him, Gaela’s greaves banged incessantly against the deck plating while she ran, creating a tremendous din that echoed through the lonely corridors. No matter how many times he’d seen it, he was always shocked at how fast the humans and Astartes could move in full armor; the powered suits of the Dark Mechanicus seemed to bear their own weight so well that the user may as well be running unencumbered.
Thinking back to the body he had briefly seen on the floor at Gaela’s feet, he hoped the armor of these “Sororitas” people was not so well crafted.
“Ga-Gaela! Wait up!” Spike gasped, dropping on all fours to try to keep up with the Dark Techpriest. “Don’t leave me behind here!”
“Grab the haft,” she said, suddenly moving her grip up the length of her axe.
“The haft? What do-YEEK!” Spike nearly got smashed in the face as Gaela thrust the butt of her axe behind her, but jumped at the last second and grabbed on. “C-Cutting it a little close there!” he complained as he was carried along with the weapon.
“Just close enough, it would seem.” Gaela’s servo arm swiveled around and clamped onto Spike’s tail, carrying him up and onto her back. “We must proceed to the vox relay and transmit a warning.”
“Who are those people? What are they doing here?” Spike asked breathlessly.
“Those people were the Sisters of Battle, the Chamber Militant of the Ordo Hereticus. They serve the Imperial Inquisitors,” Gaela explained. “As for what they’re doing here, I cannot say. This is entirely unanticipated. Granted, there is presently a great deal of heresy on Ishrem, but motive alone does not explain their presence. This isn’t even the correct Ordos to address something like a Chaos fleet.”
Gaela’s boot squealed against the deck plating as she turned a corner. Down the hall were a pair of vagrants leaning against a large crate who seemed to be in the midst of conversation, but they immediately stopped and stared as a cloaked figure in power armor carrying a purple creature on its back barreled toward them. Gaela, for her part, was willing to simply sprint past, but Spike leaned to one side and shouted to them.
“Hey, we have Imperials! Spread the word, guys! They’re coming for us!”
At first the residents were perplexed by the sight of a small, round purple and green creature shouting at them, but evidently they understood Spike well enough. With little delay they too broke into a run, bolting in the same direction as the Techpriest. They started to fall behind right away, but Gaela paid them no heed. Spike offered them a concerned grimace, but reasoned he’d done all he could before he climbed over onto Gaela’s shoulder.
“Are they going to be okay if these Sororitas people catch them?” the young dragon asked.
“The Sisters of Battle concern themselves with slaying heretics above all else!” Gaela explained.
“Okay… and they’re not heretics, right?”
“Unfortunately, who is and is not a heretic is often a matter of intuition and opinion! It may be that any citizens standing between us and the agents of the Inquisition, however incidentally, are aiding and abetting heresy! The Inquisition can be permissive like that!”
Gaela reached out to the door to the main cavern, still some 50 feet away. The console flickered to life, and the doors started to open at her beckoning.
“They won’t follow us into the population center, will they?” Spike asked, nervously glancing down the hall behind them.
“The Sororitas would follow us onto the ship if they could. They are often suicidal in their fervor. It is one of their more respectable traits,” Gaela grunted back, “but I’ve little idea what their current mission protocol is. We should assume all of Ishrem is compromised.”
“Right, okay. So first you’ve got to fix the communications thing.”
“I suspect it is not broken. At least, not by accident.”
Mining Nexus Ishrem
Spire 1, primary spool
Deck 36-M
“Remonstration: These supplies are well below operational projections. Analytic: Without additional compensation the fleet would profit more with minimal refueling and an immediate departure. The time necessary to perform the few scheduled repairs is non-optimal,” Kaelith hissed, his body looming over the hololith. The melta cutters under his head twitched toward each other like the mandibles of some agitated insect, creating a very disturbing image for the man on the other end (assuming that hololith projector was in better condition, at least).
“That may be true, Magos, and I apologize for our meagre offerings, but circumstances are what they are,” Executor Gaines said sadly.
Kaelith whipped around, a loud and disapproving bleat coming from his vocal emitter. +I dislike speaking to this man while he is outside of laser range,+ he snarled in Binaric Cant while he scuttled away.
Solon chuckled, beckoning to the hololith. “Deshpite the inefficienciesh, we’ve already given our crew leave for the cycle, sho thish will have to do. You may begin the transhfer immediately. The Techprieshtsh have already begun their laborsh at the asshigned shtationsh.”
“Very good, thank you!” Gaines said, the hololith again distorting horribly as he bowed. “Oh, but I do have one additional question, Lord Warsmith. I know it may be unconventional – usually I provide YOU with data on potential objectives – but I’m on a bit of a hunt and I’ve been asking around.”
“What ish it?” Solon prompted the man. “I won’t trade relevant data for nothing, of courshe.”
“Perish the thought, Lord Warsmith.” Gaines started working at the console below him, and a vid-screen in the back of the room slowly flickered on. The color seemed broken at first, appearing as a sequence of randomly colored bars, but then it flickered and the correct image appeared.
Solon stared. Kaelith stopped pacing behind him and stared. The Iron Warriors escorting them weren’t all paying attention, but those that did were suddenly brought to alert, standing up straight and readying their weapons. Those Chaos Space Marines that weren’t paying attention noticed the ones that were and looked at the screen. Then they too straightened and were visibly on alert, making it absolutely clear to anyone watching that they recognized the image.
“… I take it this is familiar, then?” Gaines asked.
“I… can’t shay, at a glance,” Solon said, doing a slightly better job of playing dumb than his soldiers. “What ish that shupposhed to be, shome kind of shquad emblem?”
The image on the screen was a bright purple star over a white starburst. Nothing that any of them had seen in all their travels across the galaxy and through the Warp, until they had visited a primitive little world on the edge of Tau space. The image was Twilight Sparkle’s cutie mark.
“I don’t really know what it is, Lord Warsmith. I was hoping you could educate me,” Gaines said, coughing into a fist. “I can offer you material aid in return, of course.”
“You don’t know what it ish? Then why are you showing it to me?” Solon demanded. “Did you shee shome colorful shcrawl on a hydro cell and decide that you had to ashk the next Chaosh Lord you encountered about it? How did you get thish?”
The man in the hololith gulped, his sudden fear very visible through the broken image. “That… It’s very… hard to explain, Lord. But I was told this image was significant…”
“Told by WHO?” Solon demanded, his front legs lifting up onto the desk. “Tell me where you got thish, Executor.”
“The, uh, origin of this image does not wish to be identified,” Gaines admitted, stumbling over his words, “perhaps it would be best if-“
“Magosh,” Solon interrupted, turning to glance at Kaelith “trace him. We will continue thish convershation on more favorable termsh.”
“Wh-What?!” Gaines yelped.
“Status: Preliminary triangulations place likely transmission origins at seven points with >82% probability. Analyzing structural factors…”
Solon swiveled around to address the other Iron Warriors. “Prepare for a fasht breach and asshault. If we encounter defenshive pershonnel, capture the firsht one you encounter for interrogation. You may shlay the resht.”
“Ohhhh yes, now THIS is a trip,” Chrysalis cackled, her visor pulsing green.
“All right, that’s quite enough. This deception has become stale,” came a new voice from the hololith.
When Solon swiveled back around, the Executor was no longer being projected. The quality of the projector hadn’t improved at all, so the particular features of the new person weren’t clear, but it was definitely another man. His face – what could be seen of it – had a bulky, obtrusive bionic implant over the right side of his head, and his hair was sparse and messy. His outfit belied his rather crude appearance, however, being much neater and more formal, with a shaped armor vest of polished metal.
His coat also carried a symbol that was distinguishable despite the poor quality of the hololith. It was a large, stylized letter “I” with a skull in the center: the emblem of the Imperial Inquisition.
“… All right, now I have NO idea what’sh going on,” Solon confessed.
“I am in no position to enlighten you, traitor,” the Inquisitor said, his tone cold and calm. “This has been a learning experience for me, too. But I hope to learn a few more things before your imminent demise, if you would indulge me.”
“Executive: Immediate redeployment,” Kaelith said, his body swinging around and scuttling for the exit.
“I must ask you wretched marauders to remain in this room until we are finished,” the man in the hololith said. “To incentivize this, I’ve mined the spire you’re currently in with demolition charges.”
Kaelith froze on his way to the lift, like a cogitator suddenly freezing to inload a vast host of new calculations. Solon turned to look at his escort, his optics lingering on one Chaos Marine in particular. Then he turned back to the hololith.
“You have a cohort of elite Chaosh Shpace Marinesh caught in your trap and you’re… telling ush about it?” Solon asked, skeptical. “You’d rather talk than wipe ush out in one fell shwoop?”
“You flatter yourself,” the man deadpanned, “but you have a point. I suppose it would be rational to guess I’m bluffing, high as the stakes are in this particular gamble. So, allow me to put your mind at ease.” He raised a hand and snapped his fingers.
Mining Nexus Ishrem
Scrap market
Deck 9-B
“What do you mean you don’t serve ponies? Do you have ANY idea what I’ve already been through today to get here?! What kind of establishment is this?!” Rarity seethed, staring up at the woman in front of her.
The resident was slim, almost gaunt looking, with gold-dyed curly hair and obscenely long nails caked in glitter. She was standing in front of a long, windowless structure designated only as “The Wash” by a colorful and entirely unpowered electric sign bolted over the entrance. The woman had no obvious weapon, but she possessed a spray bottle and scissor at her hips, holstered in a hanging cloth belt. Hardly the sort of tools one would want while staring down a unfamiliar creature that was armed and armored, yet her sneer was utterly fearless.
“I don’t see what’s so hard to un’erstand. I serve HUMANS,” the proprietor said with a strange but distinctive drawl. “Occasionally muties, too. Depends. But I’m not messin’ wit any xeno hair. ‘Specially wit… THAT,” she flicked a single finger in the direction of Rarity’s forehead.
Rarity recoiled, an expression of deep shock etched in her features. “My… horn? What’s wrong with my horn?!” she demanded, her eyes narrowing dangerously.
“Bad look. Creepy. Bit phallic. Dun like it.” Her dark red lips pressed into a line. “Almost looks like somethin’ could… shoot out of it.”
“WHAT?!” Rarity recoiled, her scowl intensifying. “How DARE you?! What kind of establishment is this?! I came here to get my mane washed, not to have my physiology judged by some drug-addled harpy!” she snarled back.
Pinkie Pie suddenly leaned in from behind her. “Okay but sometimes magic does shoo-“
“NOT NOW,” Rarity barked, shoving the other mare away.
Then Rarity took a deep breath and regarded the grim-faced hairdresser with an icy glare. She planted a boot against her chest plate, emphasizing the Chaos Star colored with beaten gold. “You really have no idea who you’re dealing with, do you? Do you know these colors? Do you think the Chaos Marines hand these suits out to every talking animal they encounter?”
“Get to the point, freak. Time ‘s money.”
“I AM TRYING TO PURCHASE YOUR SERVICES, YOU PAINTED HAG!!” Rarity shouted, her horn suddenly pulsing with magic.
In the heat the moment Rarity had fed some power to her horn, surrounding it with an icy blue glow. The hairstylist recoiled, her hand darting toward her hip. Rarity’s magic wrapped around the scissors in her belt, pinning them into place in the loop they were suspended from. To Rarity’s surprise, that was not the tool the stylist drew.
“BACK, XENO SCUM!” the woman barked, snatching up the water bottle in her hand and releasing a gentle puff of mist spray into the unicorn’s face.
Rarity yelped and flinched away. The woman sprayed her twice more, taking an aggressive step forward. Rarity whinnied and retreated, her eyes squeezed shut.
“Stop that! Quit it!” the unicorn shouted while she flailed.
“Get outta here! GET! NO ALIENS ALLOWED!”
The rest of the Equinoughts, as well as the scrap market in general, pretended not to see the conflict, thoroughly embarrassed by the fuss. The other armored ponies strolled easily through the tables of parts, food, and assorted goods, drawing numerous anxious stares but no complaints. The other shop keeps, for their part, did recognize their armor style and understood what it meant. Some also discreetly noticed the bullet dents and scorch marks on their armor, as if they had just arrived from a fresh battle. Nobody in this section of the station kept guards.
“So what’re these things? They look like… uh… not edible.” Applejack had her helmet disengaged, and she was closely scrutinizing a pile of twisted, soggy brown lumps as politely as Honesty would allow.
“Call ‘em rust weeds. They’re some kind of fungus you can grow with just moisture and heat, and they spawn best on old metal,” explained a dirty man wearing heavy goggles. “My partner has a space where he grows them on the wall of the reactor ventilation tubes. Place is like a sauna, which is perfect for ‘em.”
“They smell awful,” Applejack admitted.
“They taste worse,” the seller replied, “but it’s enough to get you through the day, and they’re perfectly safe to eat. More than you can say about that ‘meat’ Johnstone’s selling for thrice as much!”
“Do they ferment?”
“No. Believe me, we’ve tried. A LOT.”
Twilight peered closely at a battery pack made of three cells taped together. The merchant on the other side of the table studied her with equal intensity. This stall had all sorts of small, simple machines, from torch lumens to mag-locks.
“So… what’s your story, anyway? Some kind of new Chaos mutant?” the man asked, crossing his arms over his chest.
“No. Alien,” Twilight corrected, moving from one battery unit to another. “Don’t worry, we’re friendly.”
The shop keep’s eyes darted toward a crack in Twilight’s shoulder pad. “That’s some awful strong battle armor you’ve got there.”
“Yes. Not everyone is as friendly as we are,” Twilight said regretfully. Then she looked up at the merchant. “Did you know this battery has a radiation leak?”
“Oh? What’s wrong with it, exactly?” the man asked, frowning.
“The contact plate isn’t secured properly. The corner seam is releasing trace radioactive material. It will probably get much worse if someone were to charge it,” Twilight explained.
“Ten percent off,” the shop keep replied.
“Uh… I don’t think you understand. This could make someone very sick with regular exposure,” Twilight continued. “If it’s going to be stashed away for an emergency I suppose that’s one thing, but for regular use this could kill someone!”
“Fifteen percent off,” he countered, “plus I’ll tack on some silvertape for free to cover up that seal.”
“Just… Just put up a sign or something, okay?” Twilight sighed before turning away.
When she turned around, Rarity was standing behind her with a grim expression on her face. The unicorn’s mane was damp and frayed, with several curls sticking to the gorget of her power armor. Her eye shadow was also starting to run, giving the impression that she had been crying, but Twilight made every effort not to notice.
“Twilight, I have an ethical quandary that demands your attention,” Rarity said, her voice cool and calm.
“No Rarity, we’re not going to attack the beauty parlor and make them do your mane,” Twilight replied firmly.
“But Twilight, she’s racist,” Rarity retorted, her ears pinning back and her lower lip trembling.
“Yes. We all heard,” the young Princess admitted. “So I don’t think you’re going to like what happens if we force her to style you.”
“Why do you even need this place, anyway? I don’t understand it at all.” Jerriha came up behind Rarity, a hand planted on her hip. “What kind of tools do they have here that they don’t have back on the ship?”
“As a matter of fact it’s very difficult to get Techpriests to build quality brushes and curling irons,” Rarity said, drawing herself up before the Fireblade. “But that aside, the tools are just a small part of it. Makeup and manestyling is an ART! And that means you need a proper artist for results!”
“And that human female is your artist? Really? She looks like someone dunked her head in a plasma coolant cistern,” Jerriha said with a chuckle.
“Don’t be so judgmental, dear. Your species barely HAS hair,” Rarity sniffed.
“ANYWAY, the angry lady’s taste or skill hardly matters when she won’t serve ponies,” Twilight interjected, gently placing her boot on Rarity’s gleaming shoulder pad. “I’m sorry Rarity, I know you were looking forward to this.”
“It’s much more than mere disappointment, dear,” the unicorn seethed. “I have been insulted, humiliated, shot at, and soaked since I set hoof on this harmony-forsaken rock, and I for one am DONE. I’m going straight back to the ship before something else happens!”
An explosion suddenly erupted from one of the massive columns in the middle of the station, throwing chunks of burnt metal into the air around a blooming fireball. The roar of the detonation rolled through all of Ishrem, and everyone in the scrap market stood up or whirled around to watch in shock. The spire didn’t collapse, but as the smoke started to rise it was obvious that a huge gouge had been blasted into the structure.
Rarity pursed her lips and looked forlornly at Twilight. “We don’t HAVE to go check on that, do we?”
“EXPLOSIONS!” Rainbow Dash said with just a little bit too much glee, flying overhead and stopping over the edge of the deck platform. “C’mon guys! Let’s go help! Or make things worse! Depends on what’s happening, exactly.”
“Right behind ya, Dash!” Applejack shouted, galloping past with a gait heavy enough that the objects on the surrounding tables quivered. Pinkie Pie was on top of her, standing her front legs atop the armor cowl and grinning happily.
Twilight patted Rarity on the shoulder pad again. “Come on. Let’s go see if there’s any more helpless primates to save.”
Mining Nexus Ishrem
Spire 1, primary spool
Deck 36-M
The sound of straining metal filled the room as the shaking from the detonation finally let up. The overhead lumens and the hololith at the desk flickered, but power kept flowing. Only one person had fallen over from the explosion, jarring as it was; such a jolt wasn’t usually enough to knock over an Astartes and Kaelith’s body had excellent stability. One particular Iron Warrior had been bowled over when the floor moved, however, and that one groaned and started crawling over to the wall to push itself up.
“I trust that demonstration was sufficient?” said the man in the hololith. “Or shall I activate another charge? I’m not sure the spire will endure more than one blast, but that’s more your problem, really.”
“Who am I shpeaking with? What am I to call you?” Solon demanded.
“You will address me as ‘Inquisitor’ where necessary but I don’t anticipate there will be much confusion about who is addressing whom,” the Inquisitor said sternly. “Now, then-”
“Are we shtill getting refueled?” Solon interrupted.
“… What?”
“I jusht finished negotiating the price for the shervicesh of our Mechanicush contingent. Ish that shtill valid? That changesh numeroush projectionsh if it ish not,” Solon explained.
“Are you being serious?” the Inquisitor asked.
“Yesh. It occursh to me that you would obvioushly not want to allow the fleet to shupply before we depart, regardlessh of whether we do the job or not. However, the shecrecy of your operationsh may force you to remit payment sho to maintain your deception. Which ish it?” Solon asked.
“Extrapolation: The Inquisitor intends to detonate the charges and eliminate us once he has acquired the necessary data /ALTERNATE/ deems our cooperation improbable,” Kaelith interjected.
“Well that’sh a terrible idea. We’d have no reashon to cooperate,” Solon responded, “but that shtill doeshn’t addressh the refueling matter.”
“If I say yes: your fuel will be transferred once all the repairs are done and you’re all dead, can we move on to my questions?” the Inquisitor griped.
“Well not anymore, no. Now there’sh a whole new shticking point.”
“I don’t care,” the Inquisitor snapped. “Now then: how do you know of this symbol? Where did you see it in the past? Do you know what it means?”
Solon’s optics shifted while the Inquisitor spoke, slowly turning in a circle. Next to the far wall, under the sight line of the vid-sentry recorder that was surely keeping watch on the room, a snake with green eyes was slowly creeping up the wall toward an air vent. It had a large red bulge in the middle that was obviously a mechanical component and didn’t properly meld at all with the scales around it, and Solon wondered – not for the first time – if he could have done a better job designing Chrysalis’s cybernetics to work with her shapeshifting magic.
“I’ve sheen that shymbol before. Sho what?” Solon offered the Inquisitor. “Where did YOU shee it, and why ish it sho important to you that you’d rather follow up a lead on it than kill a handful of traitorsh?”
“I’m asking the questions here, heretic scum,” the man retorted.
“If you’re not even going shate my curioshity it’sh beyond my comprehenshion why I should cooperate. You’re jusht going to blow up the shpire when I tell you what you want,” Solon reasoned.
The snake slipped its head into the air vent, and then started sliding its body into the shaft.
“I’m simply trying to pry whatever tidbits I can from your Warp-addled brain before I rid this galaxy of another few vermin,” the Inquisitor shrugged. “You are correct, of course: the information I seek isn’t worth letting you scum go free, so I won’t waste your time with false bargains for-”
The core in the middle of the snake suddenly slammed into the vent cover, being too large to fit through the gaps.
The Inquisitor halted, and then glanced up at something. “What was that?”
“What wash what?” Solon asked. “You were talking, I didn’t shay anything.”
The snake slipped backward a few inches and then tried to pull through again, slamming the core into the vent even louder. The metal started to give a little, and the snake backed up and did it again. And then again.
“What’s that banging noise?” the Inquisitor demanded. “Is someone trying to remove the deck cladding over there? It’s no use.”
“No idea what you’re talking about. I don’t hear anything but your shtuffy and inadequate attemptsh at interrogation,” Solon replied.
“Concurrence: Zero audio anomalies detected. Hypothesis: Signum decay stemming from poor maintenance rites may cause unexpected aural feedback,” Kaelith added, his naturally stilted speech doing a good job of covering his desperation.
The snake slammed the core into the vent again, and one of the thin metal slats broke off. It quickly pushed through entirely, escaping into the ventilation shaft.
“Why are you worried about revealing data to ush, anyway?” Solon chuckled. “You have ush cornered, don’t you? You’ve jammed outgoing transhmisshionsh and my army doesh not know you’re here. Why not tell me why you want thish alien?”
“Alien?” the Inquisitor asked, straightening.
“Yesh. Alien. You didn’t know?” Solon leaned back on his chassis. “How did you come all thish way and go to all thish trouble without knowing that much? What ish thish shymbol to you?”
“You persist in asking questions,” the man replied irritably.
“You will endure, Inquisitor,” Solon said dryly.
Mining Nexus Ishrem
Spire 1, primary spool
Spire exterior
Chrysalis hammered the vent cover with her head, jarring loose the old, rusted screws. Three of them were ejected from the cover’s corner mountings and the plate was left to hang from the remaining one, swinging back and forth under the now-open ventilation shaft. The snake slowly poked its head out into the air, its green eyes glowing in the shadows of the tunnel and its tongue flicking out to taste the air.
Smoke billowed up from below, spoiling what would have surely been a grand view of the decks and platforms below. A quiver ran down the Changeling Queen’s long, serpentine spine at the hot, acrid taste. She preferred more abstract flavors of danger: men at the edge of violence, equines pushed to desperation, and cyborg dullards who constantly observed her like a colorful puzzle to be unlocked and then discarded.
At the bottom of her eye blinked a message transmitted to the delicate and mysterious cybernetics within her head: Breach exterior; disable charges
Chrysalis slithered out onto the sloped surface of the spire exterior, her serpentine body finding easy purchase among the protruding rods and dented bulkhead plating that protected the interior office. Down below, roughly halfway down the full length of the column, was a still-smoldering wound carved into one side of the spire. It was impossible to tell the full extent of the damage with the smoke obscuring it, but Chrysalis guessed that the column would probably remain standing under the current damage and that it wouldn’t suffer another explosion nearly so well.
She stopped once she spotted her target: a gunmetal box attached to the edge of the flaming gouge in the spire. It had some kind of rusty scrap plate on the outside to obscure it, but a green lumen was attached to the block beneath, as well as a short rod that was surely a signum receiver. Her optic bionics confirmed it, bracketing the explosive and then identifying it as such. On the platform below there were people rushing about; some were clearing away debris, and others looked to be trying to get into the spire lift with no success.
Chrysalis stared down at the explosive through her glassy green eyes, unmoving. She had no idea if the charge might go off when she tried to remove it. Or if the “Inquisitor” would get so aggravated with Solon’s attempts to stall that he’d just blow them all up before she got the chance. But more importantly, what would happen if she simply changed forms and flew away?
“I’m already free,” the snake said quietly to herself, her forked tongue flicking from her mouth. “I could simply leave, half the wretches that run this fleet would perish, and there’s nothing any of them could do. I could join the humans here, or sneak among these strange aggressors, or simply find the equines and wait for my leash to slip a little further. It’s MY decision now, isn’t it? Their lives are in my hooves.”
Chrysalis lifted her head, looking down at the people below. The oblivious humans scurried around in a panic, shouting orders and dragging the injured away from the blast zone. After a few seconds the sound of exceptionally loud gunfire came from across the spool. Boltgun fire. A few of the humans trying to help were struck, their bodies pitching violently to the side before landing in rapidly growing pools of blood. The rest of the residents fled immediately, scattering to the relative safety of the surrounding buildings and shacks.
“…… Bah, who am I kidding?” Chrysalis chuckled, curling her body around to slip her tail around the explosive charge below. “I’ve never had such fun as when I’m bailing these maniacs out of trouble. Besides, it might be somewhat beneficial to have the Warsmith indebted to me for saving him and that ridiculous clockwork centipede.”
The snake’s tail tightened around the bomb and twisted, ripping it free of where it had been stuck onto the column’s exterior. Then she swung her tail underneath her and let go, sending the demolition charge plummeting onto some random shack a (probably) safe distance away. With that done, she started slithering across the rods and crannies to find the next explosive.
“… Maybe I AM getting a bit soft after all,” she mumbled to herself as she spotted another charge.
“Woah! An alien snake! Cool!”
Chrysalis flinched and then snapped her head around and upward. Rainbow Dash was hovering just outside of the smoke column, far above her. The pegasus darted forward and then cut power to her flight pack, dropping down to the changeling’s level before hovering again.
“The explosion must have set it free,” Rainbow reasoned, having her visor zoom in on the strange creature while she remained out of striking range. “I need to contact Fluttershy and see if she can pick up another critter. This place is like some kind of run-down space zoo.”
“It’s me, you idiot,” Chrysalis hissed, her eyes flashing green.
“What? Chrysalis?!” Rainbow briefly moved into an offensive pose, and then remembered that the Changeling Queen was (mostly) on her side. “What are you doing here?”
“Oh, I’m just touring the space station a little. Seeing the sights. Discovering new worlds and new alien civilizations. Exploring the final frontier. Demining this massive building that has the boss cyborgs in it,” she slipped her tail down toward the next charge, wrapping it around the explosive block.
“Demining?” Rainbow furrowed her brow, and then looked over toward the demolition charge. Data-screed washed over her visor screen and the object was picked out in red, but Rainbow found it terribly distracting and banished it with a blink. “So there are more bombs rigged to blow?”
“Yes.” Chrysalis paused, and then a wave of bright green washed over her body. Her form remained that of a large jungle python, but the color of her scales had changed to match the spire’s exterior almost perfectly.
Rainbow Dash blinked. “What was that about? Are you trying to hide?”
“Yes,” Chrysalis said again, carefully squeezing the explosive with her tail and prying it off the bulkhead.
“Why?” Rainbow asked right before a boltgun round slammed into her flank.
The pegasus yelped as she spun around in the air, instinctively beginning to evade. An outline of her armor briefly appeared and started flashing obnoxiously, as if she might not have noticed that she had been struck by a bullet that could knock over a minotaur. Two more shots cut through air toward her, but now that she was in motion she was a much more difficult target.
“What’s going on here?! Is that slaver guy back for round two?!” Rainbow Dash growled, spinning away from the spire and speeding up. She pinpointed the source of the gunfire and her visor display zoomed in on it while she cruised overhead.
“… Space Marines? What? Those aren’t our guys!” Rainbow exclaimed in alarm. With a blink she took a pict-capture of her assailants, and then barrel-rolled away right before another bolt round rocketed toward her.
She banked hard to fly around the central spire, trying and failing to spot Chrysalis again before she picked up speed through the air. Only one more bolter shot chased her on her retreat, whipping over her flight pack in a near-miss. Rainbow passed over the central spool platform and then descended rapidly, dropping down between a pair of shacks made from repurposed shipping containers.
“Guys! GUYS!” Rainbow shouted, stopping over the other Equinoughts. “Something weird is going on here! We have Space Marines! Not Iron Warriors!”
Twilight lurched backward in surprise. “WHAT?! There are Imperial Astartes in the space station?!”
“Yeah! Hold on, lemme show you!” Rainbow spent a moment blink-clicking back and forth, summoning the pict-capture and exloading it to the squadron channel.
“Those… ain’t Space Marines,” Applejack said, squinting at the image on her display. “Too small.”
“Are those women? I think they are! Look at the shape of the torso plating of their power armor,” Twilight said, fascinated. “That’s definitely not an Astartes model.”
“Really? Oh, blast, now I really regret not bringing my helmet,” Rarity complained. “I’d LOVE to see a power armor suit shaped for the fairer sex! A proper one not riddled with machines like Gaela’s.”
“They’re females? Equipped like Astartes?” Jerriha shrugged. “My understanding is that power armor is most common among the Space Marines and Mechanicus, but there are patterns available for normal humans as well. Boltguns too, although they don’t pack QUITE as much power.”
“Okay, well I guess they’re some human girls in power armor carrying huge guns who aren’t Space Marines. Whatever,” Rainbow Dash scoffed. “What matters is that they shot me! I was just floating around over the blast site talking to Chrysalis and they shot me for no reason!”
“Chrysalis? What’s she doin’ here? Did she cause the explosion?” Applejack asked.
“She said no and that she was actually removing the bombs, but I dunno. I couldn’t keep track of her because the not-Marines tried to kill me and I had to break off,” the pegasus grumbled. “She looked pretty suspicious to me, hidden up on the column near the explosion, but I definitely saw a bomb and I don’t think she put it there.”
“Well, are you sure these mysterious armored ladies aren’t with Ishrem’s security?” Rarity asked. “A spire just exploded and you were buzzing around it talking to a shapeshifter. Fairly suspicious!”
“Definitely not,” Twilight decided. “This wargear is too sophisticated and the design too ornate. I’m seeing a lot of Imperial iconography here. We should presume these are Imperium soldiers.”
“Right-o! So what does that mean, exactly? What’re we doing here?” Pinkie asked.
“We’re going to kill them, right? That’s what we did to the last batch,” Jerriha lifted her pulse carbine and toggled on the power feed.
“No, we’re not going to kill them,” Twilight insisted, sounding exasperated. “We don’t know who they are or what they’re doing here or how many there are. We’ve already stumbled into a firefight today and I don’t think we’re in great shape to take on opponents better armed than the slaver’s guards.”
“Okay, so what if we head back toward the ship, pick up Fluttershy and her new monster friend on the way, grab Rarity’s helmet and the Pain Train, and then come back and fight them?” Rainbow asked.
“Please don’t call it the Pain Train. You keep calling it that and I’d really prefer you didn’t,” Pinkie said with utmost seriousness.
Twilight thought about it for a moment. “First, we need to get the word out here that there’s some kind of Imperial soldiers running around. Then we should retreat to the ship and let them know, in case they’re not aware of it already.”
“How do we get the word out? None of our communication doohickeys’re workin’,” Applejack complained.
“We’ll need to find a station vox. I believe those should still work,” Twilight announced. “So let’s-”
“Incoming!” Jerriha barked, picking up the sound of approaching armored footsteps. “Cover, now!”
Jerriha and Pinkie Pie bolted to the other end of the containers and Rainbow hopped up onto the roof. Twilight removed her force harmonizer and turned it into a shield, floating the barrier to block any shots into the alley. Applejack didn’t bother moving, confident in Twilight’s shield and her own armor, but Rarity slipped behind a series of pipes winding into the side of the adjacent shack.
The incoming enemies rushed into place at the other end of the buildings, pressing against the wall and then leaning in with a boltgun and flamer, respectively. Jerriha and the other mares could immediately see what Twilight had meant when she referred to the ornate nature of the armor. The suits were well-polished, with bright red tabards and engravings of wings and fleur de lis. Red wax disks sealed long strips of parchment to their armor, the script partially burnt and tattered from exposure to the elements. The armor suits were obviously powered, with backpack reactors and glimpses of cabling between the gaps in the plating, but the suits were much sleeker and thinner around the limbs than the armor they had seen before (including their own). They also had a pair of conspicuous bulges at the top of the chest plate that definitely corresponded with a female physiology.
The ponies had time to take all this in because, curiously, the two Imperial warriors did not open fire. They stopped and stared, saying nothing, and then turned toward each other as if to confirm that they were witnessing the same thing. They wore helmets, of course – with a white banding across the eyes and forehead and no vox grille – but their uncertainty was plain to see.
“Um, hi!” Twilight said as cheerfully as she could, deciding to take advantage of the surprising lack of violence. “Now, you’re probably thinking about whether or not you should attack the strange aliens you’ve found bearing wargear clearly marked with the faction symbols of your worst enemies! And the answer may surprise you!”
The armored women ducked back behind the buildings, not responding to Twilight’s greeting. Data-screed briefly ran over Twilight’s visor display, leaving behind a few key passages inloaded from her bionic eye.
Hostile ident-codex verified:
Adeptus Sororitas Battle Sister Benitt
Decrypting vox link
Complete. Exloading vox registry
Link established
“-and five others. They did not attack when we revealed our position, but the target sputtered something about why we shouldn’t kill it.”
“The target creature is an absolute priority. Alien or Chaos wretch, it is no matter. Flamer and frag weaponry is forbidden so long as you engage it.”
Twilight recoiled in surprise. A quivering oscilloscope graph appeared over her visor display while the conversation played over her helmet’s own vox link. A second readout offered to let Twilight link directly with her opponents, presumably for the purposes of speaking to them, but she declined to do so.
“… Twi? Are we gonna run, or…?” Rainbow asked, peeking over the edge of the roof she was on.
“Very well. And the other xeno filth?”
“Kill them. We shall deliver to the Inquisitor his prize, but the other blasphemers shall face the appropriate judgment for anyone bearing the marks of the Great Enemy. I’ve dispatched our reinforcements. Emperor be with you, Sisters, and may His fury guide your fire.”
“Glory to the holy God-Emperor. Victory to the Imperium of Man.”
“The target? I’m the target?” Twilight asked, dumbfounded.
She took an unsteady step backward, but got no further before the Sisters opened fire.
Boltgun and bolt pistol fired into the alley between the containers, smashing against Twilight’s shield. Rarity and Rainbow retaliated, plasma fire and shuriken slicing into the walls around the shooters but failing to connect.
“Fall back! We’ve got to get out of here!” Twilight shouted, retreating as she kept feeding power to the harmonizer’s barrier. “They’ve got more troops coming! We need to alert the fleet!”
Jerriha leaned out and then fired a photon grenade down the alley, landing it right between the two assailants. They recoiled at the intense burst of light and sound, their helmets’ autosenses briefly overwhelmed.
“Move! Move!” the Fireblade barked, already feeding another photon grenade into her launcher. Rarity raced by, followed by Applejack at a much slower pace. Twilight turned around to flee once they were already out, and Jerriha sprayed pulse fire over the alicorn’s head to cover her retreat.
“Cut behind that shack! Keep to cover and follow me!” Twilight shouted, galloping past Jerriha and Pinkie Pie. “They’re trying to take me alive, but that doesn’t apply to the rest of you!”
“What? Why’re they tryin’ to capture you?” Applejack asked.
“Hay if I know! We need to reach a communications cogitator!” the young Princess replied.
“Okay, but can you take control of this thing real quick?” Rainbow Dash asked, swooping down to fly over Twilight’s head.
Twilight looked up and blinked, uncomprehending. Rainbow had an object clamped between her front greaves. It was box-shaped, and a green lumen was on the side, blinking on and off. Her bionic quickly bracketed the object for identification.
Demolition charge: KCS-300 heavy pattern. Kartex base with neodrol catalyzer. Unit has been primed. Signum detonator detected.
“DASH!! THAT’S A BOMB!!” Twilight yelped, scrambling to speed up.
“Yeah, I know. Can you use your robot eye to fix it to explode when we want rather than when the bad guys want?” Rainbow asked, flying after her squad leader.
“NO!! Get rid of it!” Twilight shouted.
She actually didn’t know if she could access this particular detonator with her optical bionic, but Twilight understandably didn’t want to test it on a live explosive at close range when she was trying to run away. Rainbow Dash made a disappointing tsking noise, and then spun around in the air before kicking the charge away. The explosive struck the ground and bounced, eventually landing next to a series of rusted pipes.
Mining Nexus Ishrem
Spire 1, primary spool
Deck 36-M
“It is a psyker, then?” the Inquisitor asked grimly.
“Well of courshe it ish. What interesht could you posshibly have in shome mundane alien with a negligible pshykant profile?” Solon scoffed. “You shaw a pretty drawing and decided to poke around shome rushted pirate den on the edge of the Shegmentum Tempeshtush at random to look for it? Ish that the nonshenshe I’m shupposhed to believe here? Obvioushly the clue had to come from a pshyker or a xeno to begin with.”
The hologram didn’t speak again, but the man visibly grimaced.
“I’m shtill quite perplexed ash to what you want it for, though. I sherioushly doubt you’re on a misshion to inveshtigate thish alien shpeciesh for extermination. Are you even Ordo Xenosh?”
“Traitor, I’m growing very weary of your deflections and probing,” the Inquisitor griped, looking at something off to the side. “More importantly, it seems I’ve gotten a better lead. You’ve been QUITE unhelpful in addition to being a betrayer to all of humanity, so I will now purge you from the God-Emperor’s realm.”
Kaelith made a Binaric squeal and the other Iron Warriors started searching surroundings, looking for possible bracing points if the structure collapsed beneath them.
The Inquisitor raised a hand in front of him. “When your blighted soul is delivered to your daemonic masters to be devoured, you may inform them that Inquisitor Gholth of the Ordo Malleus sent you.” He snapped his fingers.
Mining Nexus Ishrem
Spire 1, primary spool
Deck 2-K
Four explosions suddenly ripped through the air around the main platform, blowing apart shacks and blasting craters into the deck plating.
The Battle Sisters following Twilight were knocked off their feet as the bomb Rainbow threw exploded in mid-air, bowling them over with the shock wave as soon as they rounded the corner. One was smashed into a shack’s wall and stunned, while the other was simply hurled back into the streets and skidded across the walkway plating.
On the other side of the detonation, Rainbow found herself thrown through the air as well, her senses briefly overwhelmed by the noise and force of the demolition charge. She spun around chaotically before her head slammed into a support girder for the upper decks, and a loud crack came from her visor from the impact.
The other ponies and Jerriha were also jarred from the detonation, although they had wisely sped up as soon as Twilight had shouted about a bomb. Applejack grabbed Jerriha with her tail just before the Fireblade lost her footing, yanking the bipedal soldier back upright. Pinkie, Twilight, and Rarity all stumbled from the shock wave, but found it easier to remain standing on four legs.
Twilight rushed ahead toward where Rainbow Dash had fallen, skidding to a stop over the pegasus and levitating her shield low to protect both of them from potential gunfire.
“I’m not going to take off my helmet right now but you should know that I am giving you such a look,” Twilight huffed.
Rainbow moaned. “The unicorn doc is gonna yell at me again…”
Mining Nexus Ishrem
Spire 1, primary spool
Deck 36-M
The echo of the explosions faded, and Solon was quite gratified to detect little more than a brief tremor running through the floor. The hololith of Inquisitor Gholth was staring expectantly, but after a few seconds his expression soured.
Solon leaned forward. “Well, well, looksh like-”
The hololith switched off before the Warsmith had the chance to taunt him. The lumen indicator turned red, and the vox line was cut.
“Tch. I had shome good banter ready, too,” Solon complained while he turned away from the desk.
“Opprobrium: Doubtful,” Kaelith snipped while he scuttled toward the exit.
The doors to the lift were locked – remotely, of course, after they had entered the office – but Kaelith defeated the middling data wards with little more than a gesture. The lumens shifted from red to green, and the recently repaired doorway smoothly opened up.
“Analysis: Contemporary scans do not suggest ascender sabotage. Conclusive: Enemy agents thought the demolition charges sufficient to stop us.”
“Very shloppy of an Inquishitor to undereshtimate Iron Warriorsh,” Solon remarked as he and the Chaos Space Marines filled the lift.
“Concurrence: For the Inquisitor to spare us long enough to conduct a largely ineffective interview was a grievous error.” Kaelith’s optics pulsed, and the lift started to descend.
“There are many piecesh of thish puzzle shtill misshing,” Solon admitted. “We cannot evaluate-”
The lift shook suddenly, rattling loudly as something struck the exterior. Several somethings, in rapid succession.
“Analytic: The impact reverberation and burst volume is consistent with heavy bolter fire,” Kaelith spat. “They are trying to disable the ascender, but do not have optimal weaponry available.”
“Brace yourshelvesh,” Solon warned as his right arm unfolded into a short-barreled cannon and slowly cranked up to aim at the ceiling.
A single bright orange shot cut through the top of the lift, vaporizing the chain and pulley slowly lowering the ascender. It promptly started to fall, and the shriek of the wheels scraping against the side rails filled the shaft.
The lift hit the bottom deck hard, but the warriors within were hardly shaken by the impact. A pair of Iron Warriors immediately moved to the entrance, boltguns at the ready. The doors creaked open, straining badly from the damage sustained in the fall.
As soon as there was sufficient room, the mouth of a heavy flamer was jammed into the gap between doors.
The soldiers didn’t have time to shout a warning before the lift was filled with burning promethium, not that it would have made much difference. Flames filled the interior in an eye blink, and the soldiers and Techpriest within promptly began cooking in their armor. Kaelith immediately started venting a flame suppressant mist that washed against the burning promethium, dousing the blaze all around him and the Iron Warriors closest to him.
With a defiant shout, Solon slammed his front legs into the doors and ripped them open, immediately charging forward through the breach. He plowed over two armored bodies standing just outside the lift, throwing them off their feet and knocking them to the ground before he stopped. One leg lifted and then landed on an enemy, punching straight through metal, flesh, and bone with brutal force. Then Solon leaned sharply to the other side, reaching the second body and seizing it by the shoulder pauldron.
“Ah-ha! And sho we have our firsht prishoner!” he taunted, hauling the Sister of Battle up to eye level. Flames still clung to his chassis, licking at his armor, but it did little apparent damage to the daemonic machinery.
The Sister clung to her heavy flamer but serpent-like mechatendrils immediately set upon the weapon, disconnecting its fuel supply and breaking off its igniter torch to render the weapon useless. She lifted it and gripped the trigger, but nothing happened except a small, pitiful spurt of liquid promethium from the barrel that very slightly fed the flames burning over Solon’s chassis.
The Sister spat a curse in some obscure regional dialect Solon didn’t bother to identify, and then howled at him in low Gothic. “The Emperor shall see your ashes smeared across this fetid pit, traitor! Whether by my hands or my sisters, there will be no redemption for you scum!”
Solon didn’t reply right away, tilting his head to the side. “… Wait, what are you doing here?”
“Purging the Emperor’s galaxy of treasonous heretics!” she replied with earnest vigor, slightly insulted that he had asked.
“Yesh, fine, I get that, but you’re the wrong Chamber Militant. Your Inquishitor ish Ordo Malleush, which meansh-”
The Sister jammed her combat knife into Solon’s arm, piercing the thinner layering opposite the elbow. Then she kicked against Solon’s leg, managing to tear free of his grip and fall back onto the deck.
“Hey! I’m not done with-” a bolter round struck the side of his head, pitching it sharply to the side despite barely denting his helmet. Several more shots impacted his legs and torso, and a frustrated growl came from the Warsmith’s vox grille.
He turned toward the source, spotting a half squad of Battle Sisters covering across the spool deck with a perfect line of fire on the lift. Solon’s heavy bolters dropped into position under his chassis and opened fire, spraying a long trail of heavy bolts over the enemy’s barricade. The Sister next to him stood back up, finally discarding her heavy flamer entirely and drawing her sidearm.
A dozen lasers all struck her in the side at once, converging on a single point to slice through flesh and armor in the blink of an eye. Kaelith kept an auxiliary optic on the body while he spat a burst of fire suppressant onto Solon, watching as the soldier collapsed into neatly cut, smoldering pieces.
+Advisory: Withdraw toward the primary docking bay.+ Kaelith bleated to the Warsmith, curling behind Solon’s bulk to cover from the incoming boltgun fire.
“Negative. Chooshe a target and return fire!” Solon ordered before activating his arm cannon. A section of the barricade protecting the enemy squad was ripped out in a neat O-shaped hole, along with the Sororitas warrior sheltering behind it.
+Contra: Current strategic objectives are not served by engaging the enemy. Addendum: I am unable to reliably estimate strength of enemy presence.+
“Well there can’t be that many! Do you have any idea how hard it ish to hide a congregation of Battle Shishtersh?” Solon shouted right before his heavy bolters emptied the first ammo drum.
“Warsmith! Genn and Termon are badly wounded from the flames!” barked one of the other Iron Warriors. Three of them had taken up cover nearby, trading measured fire with the Sororitas across the deck. “They will not survive if left here!”
“Ugh. Shliver is going to yell at me if I let them die,” Solon groaned. His heavy bolters reloaded, and then started spewing fire across the enemy barricade again. “All right, you three withdraw to the docksh with the wounded!”
“Interrogative: Why are we not going with them? Analytic: We have no mission objective other than survival,” Kaelith demanded, switching to Gothic so that the lesser Astartes could understand.
“I determine our objectivesh, Magosh, and we have one more here on Ishrem!” His arm cannon fired again, blasting another large glowing hole in the enemy’s cover. The occasional bolt shell still crashed into his armor, but it was much reduced now, even with his guard detail mag-locking their weapons and securing the wounded.
“Interrogative: What could possibly be of sufficient import to risk being encircled and destroyed? Remonstration: We are still unable to contact the flagship for reinforcements,” Kaelith complained.
“You heard the Inquishitor ash well ash I did,” Solon huffed, a blast of toxic fumes erupting from his smokestacks, “they’re not here for ush. And I am NOT inclined to shurrender the Princessh to the Imperium, whatever their intentionsh. Now shtop whining and triangulate her poshition!”
A loud, obnoxious “blurk” sound came from the Dark Magos. “Tonal designation: Resigned. Tactical requirements: Neutralize local resistance and redeploy to cogitator banks at positional 2.009.331.802.”
“Confirmed. Iron Warriorsh, you have your ordersh!” Solon shouted.
“Iron within! Iron without!” the soldiers shouted, two of them hauling the injured Astartes while the third led them with his weapon drawn.
Solon switched off his guns and clambered across the primary spool, his bulk hammering huge dents into the deck plating. The two remaining Sisters immediately stood to meet the charge, training their bolters on the Chaos Lord and emptying the magazines into him on approach. Bolter shells pounded against the Warsmith’s heavy plating, chipping away shards of ceramite and filling the chassis bed with shrapnel.
When he reached the barricade Solon smashed it open, entering through one of the holes blasted in the plate. The two enemies immediately split to face him on opposite sides, drawing their chainswords, but Solon’s servo arm immediately snapped up one of the warriors and pulverized her. At the same time he turned to face the remaining Sororitas, looming over her.
“I have shome queshtionsh for you before your inevitable martyrdom, zealot,” the Warsmith declared, his optics pulsing with crimson light.
She promptly leapt onto Solon’s leg and shoved her chainsword into his helmet, the whirling teeth screeching against metal as they chewed into the vox grille. Solon hammered a fist onto the back of the chainsword, breaking the weapon’s blade off from haft. His mechatendrils latched onto the Sister before she could recoil, granting him precious seconds to seize her by the shoulder and haul her into the air.
“All right, before we begin let’sh just clear off thoshe backup weaponsh,” Solon explained, his serpentine mechatendrils biting onto the woman’s combat knife and grenades and tearing them free from her belt. “I want to know what your misshion here ish on Ishrem!”
“Our mission is to cleanse the very stars of scum like yourself,” the Sister spat, “to purge Imperial space of the cancer of Chaos, and redeem ourselves under the Emperor’s gaze with your blood!”
“That’sh not what I meant and you know it,” Solon snapped. “What ish your misshion here? Ish it-”
The Sister of Battle grabbed onto the combat blade still stuck in Solon’s inner elbow, wrenched it free, and then stabbed it into Solon’s optical array. The blade tip punched through the glassine lens and sliced deep into the machinery below, and about half of his visual outputs exploded into useless static.
“… All right, that’sh really my fault for leaving the knife in.”
With an enraged snarl, the Sister kicked into Solon’s abdomen with both feet. The impact barely marred the plating there, but it did manage to wrench her free of the Warsmith’s grip. She hit the ground and rolled into a crouch, barely avoiding a mechanical leg that tried to stomp her. Then she surged to her feet, once again drawing her bolter.
One of the mechatendrils spat a thin jet of melta gas after her, spearing the warrior through the torso. She stumbled, her boltgun slipping from numb fingers and tumbling onto the deck.
“The Emperor’s… enemies will… ALL burn,” the woman seethed, falling back to her knees.
“Contra:” Kaelith announced, crawling around Solon’s chassis and looming over the zealot, “we will remove the slaves of the null-Omnissiah, organism by organism, vessel by vessel, and planet by planet. Your convent shall join you in failure and your aspirations will be deleted.”
The woman doubtless tried to summon the strength for another reply, but the last of her strength left her and she slumped onto the deck.
Solon grunted as he pulled the combat knife out of his optical array. Sparks and colorful oozing fluids leaked from the shattered glassine, and it took a few seconds for him to deactivate the damaged uplinks. He tossed the knife aside, looked down at the dead Sister of Battle, and then twisted his head to look at Kaelith.
“You didn’t even help thish time,” Solon moped, moving along past the barricade.
“Analytic: Total enemy combat power was negligible compared to your own. Interference was judged to be unwarranted,” the Dark Magos explained, following him.
“She shtabbed me in the face!”
“Tonal designation: Amusement. Concurrence, Warsmith. She did.”
“We should really take shome of theshe zealotsh prishoner, but I shupposhe that can wait.” Solon reached the edge of the spool deck and leapt down, his legs landing on the lower deck with a noisy crash. “We musht find Shparkle and neutralize their jamming devicesh sho we can contact the ship.”
Kaelith slithered down the wall behind his Warsmith, his many legs and smaller manipulators scuttling across the near-vertical surface. “Analytic: If the standing hypothesis is correct and the Inquisition was laying a trap for the equine, it must be activated by now. Conclusive: Our chances of preventing capture are minimal and risk of destruction overwhelming. Proposition: Return to the flagship and recover the animal at a later time.”
“Your hypotheshish ish flawed, Magosh,” Solon slurred, raising his voice to be heard over the sound of his legs pounding against the deck plating.
Kaelith made a loud, unpleasant blurting sound. “Extrapolate.”
“Thish wash not a proper trap at all. The Inquishitor wash not prepared to meet ush. Hish only lead wash that shymbol,” Solon explained.
“Contra: It is unwise to rely on the Inquisitor’s professed motives and data,” the smaller cyborg retorted.
“Tell me, Magosh, why would a daemonhunter be sheeking an alien, ushing the chamber militant of the Ordosh Hereticush?”
“Speculatory: It is not uncommon for Inquisitors to work together. This may account for the overlap in resource deployment and apparent conflict in objective sorting.”
“I shushpect that any other Inquishitorsh on hand have their eye on Gholth himshelf, rather than hish prize,” Solon chuckled. “Thish ish a guessh, but I don’t think he came to Ishrem looking for an alien. He wash expecting a human witch.”
A crackle came from a vox caster above, warning of an imminent announcement. A few sparks blasted from the wiring, and the sound quality was abysmal, but the machine was in good enough shape that the Chaos pirates could easily make out the words.
BEHOLD THE EMPEROR’S GLORY!
WITNESS THE EMPEROR’S JUSTICE!
WITH BLESSED BLADE AND HOLY FLAME SHALL WE COMMENCE THIS PURGE IN THE NAME OF HE!
CITIZENS OF ISHREM – PIRATES, SMUGGLERS, SLAVERS, AND MOST WRETCHED HERETICS – YOU HAVE BEEN JUDGED!
GIVE THANKS, FOR THIS IS THE HOUR OF YOUR REDEMPTION!!
Mining nexus Ishrem
Interior deck 3-12
Tertiary spire
“… Oh, you CANNOT be karkin’ serious.”
Daniels stared at the sputtering vox caster in disbelief. He was hardly the only one. Several other soldiers, voidfarers, and brothel guards stood stock-still, gaping at the machine. None of them moved, unsure what to do. The situation just seemed perfectly surreal: standing in line in a house of ill repute only to be suddenly denounced en masse by some kind of zealous crusader over the station’s vox net.
“It’s got to be a prank, right?” one man asked, his voice nearly a whimper. “There’s no… no Imperial troops on Ishrem. There couldn’t be. How would they…?”
One of the brothel guards broke and ran, not uttering a word. Two clients immediately turned to follow him, rushing through the exit as fast as they could manage without crashing into something.
I OFFER MY LIFE TO THE EMPEROR. I PRAY THAT HE ACCEPTS IT.
I OFFER MY STRENGTH TO THE EMPEROR. I PRAY THAT HE REDRESSES IT.
“It’s not a prank,” Daniels said, his voice grim.
A dozen other men and women scrambled for the exit. The prayer continued, and the brothel burst into a frenzy of panicked activity as staff and clients alike sought to flee. Some of the parlor rooms burst open, with men and women struggling to get their clothes on while cursing and rushing for the exit.
Daniels looked down at his ticket forlornly, and then released a deep sigh. “I don’t suppose this place has a refund desk…”
Mining Nexus Ishrem
Command deck, section 7-E
I OFFER MY BLOOD TO THE EMPEROR. I PRAY THAT IT QUENCHES HIS THIRST.
I OFFER MY BODY ON THE ALTAR OF THE BATTLEFIELD. I PRAY THAT HE GRANTS ME A NOBLE DEATH.
I PRAY FOR HIS PROTECTION, AS I OFFER ALL THAT I AM.
“Would anyone care to explain why there are prayers to the Emperor being broadcast all across this misbegotten rock?”
Inquisitor Gholth stepped through the door into the command center, one hand held behind his back and the other gripping a force rod capped with the Inquisition’s emblem. The man was aged, looking to be in his seventies at least, but had a casual strength and build that spoke of several rejuvenat treatments and subtle bionic enhancements. His right eye had been replaced by a decidedly unsubtle bionic device that took up that side of his skull, with thick cabling winding backward to vanish under his shock white hair. His beard was fairly short and pointed, with the Imperial Aquila and another of the Inquisition’s infamous emblems positioned on his chest plate on either side of it.
Across the room were two members of the Sororitas watching the Inquisitor enter. One, marked as a Palatine by her rank emblems, wore silvery power armor with lit candles affixed on one shoulder pad. She had no obvious bionics, and her pale face was drawn over with electoos of scripture and framed by raven black hair in a simple bowl cut. She stood up as the Inquisitor approached, but it was the other woman who spoke.
“Would you prefer a different hymn, Inquisitor? Perhaps something of lighter tone?” she asked. Her voice creaked slightly, carrying an undercurrent of sarcasm and a subtle warning.
“I would PREFER if all of Ishrem were not politely informed of our infiltration,” Gholth said tightly, stepping up to the table to face the women. “I did not give the order to deploy!”
“You are correct, Lord Inquisitor. I did,” the Palatine replied, her voice perfectly calm.
“So I had guessed,” the man hissed, glowering at them. “Annihilating the slums was bad enough, but we will be quite fortunate if the heretic flagship does not already know of our presence! I put a great deal of effort into these traps, Lady Arthwin. I merely ask you HOLD your righteous fury until they are spent. Are you capable of this? Or will I find my objective in the midst of a purifying pyre, reduced to smoldering bones?”
“You will get your prize, Inquisitor,” Palatine Arthwin replied, her voice precisely the same as before. “Whatever it is you want with some corrupt xeno monstrosity.”
Gholth’s expression tightened, and then he turned his gaze to the seated women next to Arthwin. “Sister Theamin, you said you found it? Show me.”
The seated Sororitas started tapping at the controls of the hololith projector on the table. “We received confirmation from a pair of Sisters covering the detonation of the spire. It matched what the merchant told us. Xenos. One of which bears your mysterious symbol, Inquisitor.”
“By the Emperor, it’s true. It’s all true,” Gholth breathed, running a hand through his hair.
“We know only that we found something that matches the strange… symbol your vile pet found,” Theamin warned, pressing at buttons with visibly growing frustration. “It is an alien witch bearing blasphemous armor that slew the merchant’s crew and travels with a small pack of its kind. Our Sisters are in pursuit.”
“I see. Where is this merchant? I have a few questions for him while we’re hunting the objective,” Gholth said.
“Purged,” replied Arthwin.
“What? Why?!”
“Heresy,” she said simply.
“Every resident on this station is heretic to one degree or another, Palatine!” Gholth retorted.
“Yes,” she agreed frostily.
“Oh! Here it is! Sorry, I’m just hopeless with these machines,” Theamin said, finally activating the correct data node.
The hololith flickered to life, slowly generating a three-dimensional image of Twilight Sparkle standing in front of Rarity and Applejack. The force harmonizer floated in front of her, a barrier covering the front facing. Gholth stared, struck silent by the image. His bionic eye pulsed, data surging through it.
“… Remarkable,” he breathed, walking around the hololith. “Wings… a single horn… and that body… it’s…” he tilted his head to the side. “Small,” he said decisively.
He could gauge the size due to the surrounding objects, and he was quite surprised to see that the alien was perhaps two-thirds as tall as he was. There was no mistaking the symbol, however; it was etched clearly and purposefully on two of the pauldrons shielding her shoulders and hips, as well as emblazoned on her chest. It wasn’t merely a near resemblance, and neither of the two other aliens bore the same symbol. His eyes studied their wargear, and then Gholth shifted his eye to study Rarity’s exposed head.
“Is that what they look like? They look almost like…” Gholth trailed off, scratching at his beard.
“That one’s blasphemous wargear seems to be incomplete,” Theamin noted, “and our sisters report that another of the foul xenos seems to bear no armor at all.”
“This power armor bears hallmarks of the Iron Warriors’ designs and profane modifications,” Gholth noted, his experienced eye picking out several details less obvious than the large Iron Skull on the shoulder. “But it’s less than half the size and bears no external power plant. Bizarre. They really constructed an entirely new type of power armor suit for these… creatures?”
“If the merchant is to be believed, then this wargear enabled them to overcome his guard complement with ease,” Theamin noted. “Not men of faith or great skill at war, in my estimation, but it would be foolish to underestimate these beasts.”
“I’ve no doubt they’re a serious threat. It would have been prudent to get more precise details regarding the fight with the merchant,” Gholth said, his eye narrowing at the Sisters.
Palatine Arthwin didn’t change her expression. “The accounts of cowards and heretics are worth little,” she reminded the Inquisitor.
“If only we could all rely on zeal and prayer to carry the Emperor’s will to fruition,” the Inquisitor said, his voice sharp. “Those of us with more delicate objectives must rely on evidence, Palatine. And all too often it is only cowards and heretics who have it.”
With a swipe of his hand, the pict-capture of Twilight vanished and was replaced with a three-dimensional station map. It was a crude thing with very low detail, but it was kept reasonably up-to-date with numerous markers bearing information about equipment breakdowns, sewage leaks, shielding failures, and other such problems that regularly plagued such a vast and poorly-maintained outpost. There were several points marked that represented areas held by the Adeptus Sororitas, mostly in the internal maintenance and staff sections.
Theamin reached across the table to point to one of the large columns that ran from deck to ceiling. “Here. The target was found and confronted amongst these… dwellings. They were surprised to find that the blasphemous xenos did not attack when confronted.”
“Fascinating,” Gholth mumbled, straightening up. “Perhaps these creatures can be convinced to stand down, or at least distracted for a critical moment. Did your soldiers successfully parley with them?”
“No. They were instructed to restrain their more indiscriminate weapons and slay the target’s compatriots,” Theamin explained.
Gholth spent a moment staring incredulously at the woman before he could muster a response. “WHY?!”
“They are heretics,” Arthwin pointed out helpfully.
“Heretics? They’re not even human!” the Inquisitor retorted angrily.
“One sin among many,” the Palatine replied, her voice a rumbling growl.
“By the Emperor, we’ve been handed every possible boon of fortune in this operation and it could yet be for NOTHING thanks to your senseless bloodlust!” Gholth complained, running a hand through his hair anxiously.
“Do you have orders, Inquisitor? Or shall I see to the capture of the objective?” Arthwin asked, a dangerous edge to her tone.
“Yes. Yes, I do.” Gholth took a deep breath, and then started setting markers on the hololith using the control console. “Position Purifier squads here, here, and here. Set the pursuing troops to drive the xenos this way, toward these old refinery complexes. They are NOT to kill any of the xenos until the target has been secured.” He looked up at the smoldering glares of the warriors across from him. “I realize it is not your way, but you are to practice discretion and temper your holy zeal until we have our prize. Too much hangs in the balance! If you have any Sisters in reserve, direct them to guard the secondary hangar. With an enemy fleet at the docks, it’s our only path out.”
“What of the traitors and human heretics?” Theamin asked.
“An irrelevance. Engage as necessary but do NOT lose sight of the objective. It is crucial that this blasphemous psyker be captured alive and unharmed,” Gholth pressed. “Is that clear?”
Arthwin nodded her head ever-so-slightly. “And how are we to capture this… fragile abomination, precisely?”
“You won’t.” Gholth raised a hand and snapped his fingers.
A yellow shimmer briefly warped the air behind Gholth, and then a Techpriest appeared. It was over seven feet tall with a very thin body wrapped tightly in the red robe traditional to the tech-cultists of Mars. A single baleful yellow eye glimmered from within the hood, locked onto the Inquisitor. Neither of the Battle Sisters were expecting the cyborg, but it got little more than a raised eyebrow from them.
“IGNITION CODEX RECOGNIZED. AWAITING COMMANDS,” the strange Techpriest said, its voice loud and resonant.
“This is 7229. She will be assisting this endeavor,” Gholth explained. “Ordinarily I would not expose her even to the faithful before her prey was already in sight… but I do not want your warriors gunning down an important servant of the Emperor in their fury to cleanse this facility. 7229 can be… startling when deployed.”
“Your prudence is well-reasoned,” Arthwin replied, staring up at the Techpriest evenly.
There was something unusually uncanny and repulsive about the Techpriest, and Arthwin felt her palm itching for the grip of her sword. She would probably hesitate to cut down someone wearing the crimson robes of Mars on the field of battle, but a less stalwart Sister would likely heed the impulse to banish such a creature without orders to the contrary. Arthwin nodded to the other Sister, and Theamin took up her vox link to give the warning.
“Now, then,” Gholth said, working at the hololith console, “here is your target, 7229. A xeno and a psyker, wearing blasphemous armor.”
The hololith shifted back to the pict-capture of Twilight Sparkle in an alley. The Techpriest’s optic glimmered. Gholth turned back around and stared up at the cyborg sternly.
“This target is to be captured ALIVE. Prioritus Absolute. Do what you must to subdue it, but the less it is harmed in the process, the better. I do NOT want excessive blood loss or cranial trauma confining it to the medicae sanctum once it is taken. Understood?”
“AFFIRMATIVE,” 7229 stated, “DESIGNATE SECONDARIES.”
“There are some Iron Warriors skulking about the station,” Gholth said bitterly, “avoid them if at all possible. Similarly, the target travels in a group of aliens boasting similar wargear. Avoid fighting them unless it advances the success of your primary mission. I will leave the calculations of such tactical avenues to you.”
“AFFIRMATIVE. OBJECTIVES LOGGED. DEPLOYMENT STATUS: ACTIVE.” The Techpriest’s body seemed to shift and contort, and then suddenly it was gone.
The Sisters of Battle stared silently as Gholth plugged a small silver rod into the input node of the hololith table. The hololith began to break apart as the data within was extracted and the table’s internal data stacks irretrievably destroyed. After a few seconds the lumens on the console went dim as the machine spirit itself was erased, and the projector was rendered completely inoperable.
“I must prepare the shuttles for departure. It will be a treacherous journey, to say the least.” Gholth turned around and started walking to the exit. “You have your orders, Palatine.” He suddenly stopped. “One of those orders, by the way, is that you are forbidden from slaying Executor Gaines.”
Arthwin’s expression had been like stone, but at this command she scowled. “Why do we need that scum’s heart still beating? He has been completely useless thus far. He has evaded the Emperor’s justice long enough!”
Gholth groaned, affixing the warrior with a scowl. “We do not have time for me to recount all the contingencies and bargains I have established in our operation here, Palatine Arthwin. I am ordering you, in my formal capacity as an Inquisitor, to specifically refrain from killing only TWO creatures on this station! Can you curb your righteous wrath well enough to comply?”
“As you wish, Inquisitor,” Arthwin said, her displeasure evident in her tone.
Gholth grimaced and rushed out of the command center. Theamin stood up slowly, heaving a tired sigh. She turned to an exit door on the opposite side of the room and Arthwin moved to follow, her face still fixed in a disapproving scowl.
“What are your orders, Palatine?” Theamin asked. “Shall we follow the Inquisitor’s deployments? And what of the reserves?”
“Keeping the Purifiers as mere wards to herd the enemy is not an appropriate use of their valor. If the Inquisitor won’t cleanse the Chaos scum in Ishrem, then we will. Set them to hunt the traitors. Our remaining Sisters not pursuing particular targets may begin purging the residents. The Inquisitor can see to the security of our shuttles.” Arthwin scowled. “My orders for the pursuit of the xenos has not changed. The target is to survive. The others must die.”
“Understood, Palatine,” Theamin said.
“We’ve spent too long in this wretched nest of lawlessness and heresy, skulking in the shadows to fulfill the Inquisitor’s ludicrous hunch,” Arthwin spat. “That man is already reaching deep into the forbidden! Do you believe any of this will come to aid the Imperium? Do you think this blasphemous creature is worthy of being left alive?”
Theamin hummed briefly, and then replied. “This Inquisitor is a curious lot, and his methods are suspect. He is also, of course, a psyker himself, which may color his strategy and darken his soul. But he is still an Inquisitor, and I do not presume to know his quarry better than he. Those who would think to study and hunt the abominations that torment the Imperium rarely have the luxury of purity.” She pressed her palms together and bowed her head as she walked. “I put my faith in the Emperor’s light, not treacherous aliens and cryptic rantings, but Inquisitor Gholth is also part of the Emperor’s host standing against the madness of this blighted galaxy.”
Arthwin slowly nodded her agreement, her irritation visibly calming. “Of course. The Inquisitor’s plots may vex me, but this is hardly the most difficult test of faith we have endured.” She paused. “To that end, I should take Gholth’s strategy more seriously. Contact those Sisters in pursuit of the xeno witch and inform them that it is not necessary to slay the other aliens immediately. They need only drive them into ambush. Less risk that way.”
“Of course, Palatine. And once the target is taken?”
“After the witch has been extracted then they are all to be slain, Sister Dogmata. The Inquisitor has marked but two souls free from the Emperor’s justice. Let no others survive who would deny Him.”
“It will be done, Palatine. Glory to Emperor, and Imperium.”
Had some difficulty with the Warhammer common lore here, as I was apparently under a lot of misconceptions about how widely spread the knowledge of daemons was through the ranks of the soldiers most likely to face them. Suffice to say this wasn't exactly a mission for Grey Knights.
Have a Wind Chime, by Reterica!
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wooooo
Love it. I want to see Rarity admire the beautifully decorated armor of Sororitas while fighting at the same time. Additionally, she laments how impeccably perfect the Battle Sisters' hair is during such an intense fight compare to her mane. Then she discovers to her horror that each Battle sister has identically styled and colored hair.
OH MY GOD ITS HERE OH MY GOD OH MY GOD
I cant wait to read
You just made my night after i was banging my head against calc homework, I got instantly cheered up the second i saw this update
cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/1115932280146366478/1162977675816738846/image.png?ex=653de65c&is=652b715c&hm=80cd65807bfe7c8f06b3e06681a40e4d6c7fcebc85ba2ed4df8f9fbe45cf0250&
Also minor formatting issue probably?
11722363
"You really should pit more effort I to shampooing your hair, darling"
"BY FIRE BE PURGED, ALEIN!"
Skewers her throughh the chest with her powersword "Hmmm, quite."
11722363
Well...
There can be options as to what exactly could be revealed come the time helmets would be removed.
Valorous Hearts, for example, consider scars and deformities to be an equivalent of Battle Merit Awards, basically. A sign of divine blessing.
Just imagine, impeccable armour being stripped away only to reveal a face consisting mostly of chemical burns and badly healed cuts, with an eye missing to boot - 'cause this particular Sister was truly blessed.
Yeah, that's not exactly the place there you would expect to see Valorous Hearts deployed, of all people - but this whole operation reeks of intra-Inquisitorial intrigues, and being hastily cobbled together by a Radical chasing a wild goose of a quote hint unquote extracted from half-coherent babbling of a demented psyker in futile attempt to outplay his Inquisitorial vis-a-vis, so there's that.
So.
Very tall, thin, and with something ever so slightly wrong about her.
Oh, and only one eye.
Hmm...
cards.scryfall.io/art_crop/front/4/1/4129cb0d-eefe-4971-9db8-1196201ef353.jpg
An offshoot of the Pariah Project?
Or just a random augmented blank inducted by Mars specifically to hunt the rogue psykers?
That quote is so tone perfect for this story.
11722506
HELLO, IMPERIAL CITIZEN! WE ARE HERE TO FREE YOUR FROM YOUR CHAINS AND/OR OPPRESS YOU UNDER OUR ARMOURED BOOT DEPENDING ON SITUATION!
Though I'd argue in one of the previous parts there were, perhaps, a more apt one:
Is that Sister Theanim Secundus, related to Theanim Mane by any obscure Warp corruption at all?
Oh great, The sororitus Inquisition have a souped up HK with cloak, and theres an unlocked Crysalis and a Free Roaming Pinkie on the station.
Time to play play Hide and Seek?
Good thing Solon didnt put a Bolter Round up that heavy glamer nozzel when it appeared?
The title Image is rapidly approaching, as Rarity gets further denied her SPA. If she goes Total Postal, then Diamond Storm will be the least of the Sororitas problems. Induvidually targeted explosive micro needles aimed precicely in every joint, activation stud, connector and tear duct?
Awesome chapter dude, it as nice to see things in the Sisters of battle and inquisitor side of things and not show them as being as competent or as cooperative as we usually expect them to in the book, that they were caught off guard on certain details of their mission and they don't always get along perfectly and will squabble with each other. The sisters of battle are the exact type of blood thirsty suicidal bitches that I would expect them to be. From the sound of it I think the Inquisitor thought he had gotten a powerful psycher that he could use for his anti deamon crusade. It was funny to see Sollon and the tech priest being caught in a trap and were stalling for time as well as throwing the inquisitor off guard on the details of who they are after. I would personally thing ponies would count more as Ab human or heavily modified life stock then an actual truly zeno a race, so I think they could skirt the line of being mutants and ab humans in a legal grey zone which they could work in. I am assuming Sollon will plunder the entire station for the 'defrayal' of the station commander and will leave it in the command of one of his underlings after he is done with the bolter bitches. Fun chapter dude keep it up.
You never bring the zealot along for a stealth mission, even more so when it a stealth mission that requires the capture of someone alive. You just don't do it, they are only a single ARGGGH!! away from being full berserkers themselves after all.
Can't take you people anywhere.
I kinda like this inquisitor. I wonder what he wants with Bookhorse...
11722900
We know TS is hunted by some malevolent warp entity strong enough to browbeat other Daemons into joining that venture.
Given her exploits (like stealing souls of the damned from some unnamed but powerful warp bozo during the orc invasion of Canterlot), that could be something personal but trivial; or, given all the "extinguish the Light" business, it could be something greater yet, connected to her endgoal of saving at least some members of 38th Company (possibly even Serith).
Inquisitor is of Ordo Malleus, which means - Daemons.
It is plausible, that during some unrelated case in the process of performing his duties (exorcism, et cetera) he learned of something that Daemons deem significant threat to them (a new Anathema, if you will) from some low-level Daemon, or prophetic visions of some psyker.
A Light they despise and fear, and that must be extinguished at all costs.
Consequently, anything that the Warp thinks must be destroyed, is an object of interest to the Malleus, and a call to action for any Inquisitor Radical enough to use that information.
The hint to existence of that particular OOI clearly was nonspecific and cryptic enough for him to not know anything about it beside the connection to the symbol in question and existence of a small window of opportunity during which it could be retrieved, but solid enough to act on in haste before that window of opportunity would close.
Alternatively, he is not just a Radical, but a full-blown Renegade, and is seeking this particular OOI to further his own yet unspecified goals; or he is not very good in his job, and is being played by the Daemons like a fiddle he is.
Insofar as I remember, there was only one other instance of Imperium being able to gain access to this particular piece of information without involvement of prophetic psykers and/or Daemons - the Heart of Vengeance affair. But, if any data would've been recovered from that wreck, it would surely contain such tidbits as Xenos nature of the mark-bearer, the suspiciously familiar wargear the Xeno was wearing connecting it to CSM in some way, and its psyker nature.
Given that Inquisitor knew pretty much nothing beyond the symbol itself, that would seem rather unlikely.
11722365
Forgot a /. Thanks!
11722621
Nope, completely made up. I'm not at all familiar with the Sororitas characters
11722642
I think they're going to be very hard-pressed to sanction ponies as a tolerable species when the species was first discovered allied to Chaos forces.
That's a much worse case than most aliens have!
11722962
Theanim Mane isnt Sororitas, they are Austreoh/Eljunbyro.
Congratulations Twilight, you are on the run of becoming one of the MOST wanted in the sector.
Money well spent in that couch if can stand half a ton man dropping into
Good chapter, lot of fun stuff
Smooth negotiation skills by Rarity🤣🤣🤣🤣
Also Solon's verbal Judo
The Inquisitor brings along Sisters of Battle to a STEALTH mission. Me thinks he was desperate for resources and this was the best he could do.
But yeah, this is not going to end well. The whole station is going to start freaking out and the Sisters are going to kill everyone they see. It's going to be a total bloodbath.
Some interesting speculation about why an Ordo Malleus would want Twilight... Very interesting indeed.
11722871
11723067
In fairness to Gholth, he didn't really know it was going to be a stealth mission either, which is why he initially confronted the space station in a warship. After that he was able to organize a less violent insertion, but alas, the Adeptus Sororitas is not quite as flexible in their operational strategies.
11722954
Dang, you know your stuff!
11723135
Interesting... so he is working on the fly with limited resources but a very specific goal in mind.
Well, time will tell.
Side note, all your stories are great and it puts a smile on my face when you post a new chapter.
Solon slinging the bants at the Inquisitor was great. I really do enjoy scenes where he gets to shine as himself. I remember there was a scene on Centaur III, where Twilight was thinking about how she didn't like it when Solon reminded her he was an evil overlord, but this was great. He analyzed the situation, used all the tools available, and came out completely on top, albeit with a knife through his optics.
For some reason, it only just struck me how close that battlecry is to "maim, kill, burn!"
The inquisitor is right. They hit the jackpot and the Sisters are tripping over themselves to spoil it because capturing anything alive does not compute. The interrogation with Solon was pretty incompetent on his part, though.
I wonder what he thinks there is to gain from Twilight; is it related to how much daemons hate her?
11723273
That kinda thing would attract sure many inquisitor of less puritan nature indeed
11723067
Well, in all fairness, zealots are very good in not leaving anything alive to tell the tale of their presence.
And if no one is left alive to tell on you for being there, technically "stealth" part of "stealth mission" could be considered achieved, so...
11723181
Hey, he is not Galaxy's Bottommost Loser In Dueling for his pretty (and quite ingenious) optic clusters.
One wants to keep the Title - one gotta do what one gotta do.
Hmm wasn't the cutie mark on the shoulder pauldron?
11722451
I hope she is not a seriously messed up Sunset Shimmer...
11723485
Depending on where exactly The Mirror leads in this version of reality, I suppose.
Schola Progenium is... not the best place for the relevant events' variation to take place, let's leave it at that.
11723483
Yeah - one pauldron should be stamped with the Iron Skull, and the other - with the buttstamp of the armour wearer, afair.
Doesn't preclude suits from having second set of personal heraldry engraved in more traditional for ponies place per se, though, akin to Astartes having markings on knee pads, so maybe it is just that.
11723483
11723696
I probably did say that at some point, but since their hips ALSO have extra plating with large open space for decals their cutie marks are usually painted there too/instead
This is the "canon" illustration of her armor, and the mark is on the chest, too. So I should probably just change the passage that suggests it wasn't just plastered all over.
derpicdn.net/img/view/2016/5/13/1152638.jpg
Thanks for another awesome chapter!
11723804
I presume thouse does not help the matter also, with pauldrons stamped, but hip plates being seemingly clean, sans usual light embellishments
cdn-img.fimfiction.net/story/bjk4-1432556887-176991-medium
cdn-img.fimfiction.net/story/4pcq-1432578432-207723-medium
cdn-img.fimfiction.net/story/hi9a-1443884819-289995-medium
while among the more recent ones some shew personal heraldry on the pauldrons, while hip plates being stamped with Iron Skull
https://derpibooru.org/images/3148376
while others - including older "officials" from EZTP, to muddy the waters further - shew personal heraldry primarily on hip plates, and pauldrons being clean or stamped with Iron Skull only
https://derpibooru.org/images/2930906
https://derpibooru.org/images/2662371
cdn-img.fimfiction.net/story/1pmy-1575430650-455583-medium
And others still - like thouse ones - have nothing to do with anything 'cause they are entirely unrelated, but I will leave the links here just because
https://derpibooru.org/images/3199471
https://derpibooru.org/images/31934
https://derpibooru.org/images/31918
https://derpibooru.org/images/3145
https://derpibooru.org/images/31903
Well, what can I say in that regard - good luck herding cats.
I do remember armour-free tails being artistic license; hell, half of the named characters in W40K proper prefer to wear no helmets, and other half uses thouse only because they physically can't ditch them, being living suits of armour, fused with wargear, or having highly detailed ceremonial pieces they morally obliged to hold to with psychotic obsession (hi, Dante) - which is demonstrably stupid, but highly cinematic: Rule of Cool, et cetera, et cetera.
Personally, I find thouse illustrations enjoyable in any iteration; and, given thouse armour suits are one-of-the-kind state-of-art artifacts created by a Primarch-level genius, some individuality in heraldry placement is only to be expected. I just tend to assume that most recent description relays the state of things as they are in this particular point of the story.
Which could lead to some unintended but quite interesting venues of wild speculation on the readers part, and merciless flooding of the comment section with nonsensical walls of text - but c'est la vie, I suppose.
Thought of the day: Everything is canon, not everything is true.
Very nice chapter. The plot is thickening. Again everyone wants Twilight. But Solon is not giving her up without a fight.
11723804
Uh… there is no actual space for her wings in the wings there ^^;;;;
11724240
The Warsmith's technological miracles truly know no limits.
11724412
In sooth.
If only he could support his technological proficiency with unmatched dueling prowess... But alas.
Always love when a new chapter of age of iron comes out. Not much to say that hasn't been said yet, extremely curious for the reveals to come.
Kinda curious about sunny now. Sure, I doubt she's the Pariah, but will she appear in the story yet, perchance?
11724489
He did beat a Sister of Battle one-on-one! She inflicted significant damage first, but he definitely won!
11724751
Sunny? As in Sunny Starscout?
. . . I am both amused and horrified that the Chaos Marines are the less bloodthirsty faction here.
Tellis would be impressed.
11724778
I think they're talking about Sunset Shimmer.
11724778
I'm not sure that actually counts, since there were two Sisters of Battle there. He killed one of them really quickly, but it still makes it not quite a duel.
Which means he managed to get damaged due to a small fight, without his horrible dueling luck activating. Possibly.
Either way I'm pretty sure none of it is going to get him any respect from anyone.
I find it pretty funny how quickly Solon's skill in combat drops as soon as there's only one combatant. Perhaps he just got a little too cocky and failed to account for the Sister's fearless zealotry.
Anyway, something I wanted to comment on from the previous update but I guess I forgot to.
We have an Inquisitor Locus, of the Ordo Hereticus, who coincidentally happened to be involved in both Norris Delgan and Wyatt Daniels backstories.
And now we have Inquisitor Gholth of the Ordo Malleus involved in the plot and he seems to have a personal interest in Twilight for reasons not yet clear.
My brain keeps trying to say that there's a third Inquisitor from someone else's backstory but I'm really not sure about that one.
I keep getting this image of Spike getting caught in a flamer attack and then emerging from it unscathed, leading to the Battle Sister who tried to immolate him freaking out a bit that the holy flames had no effect.
From some of the descriptions we got from this, you've been playing some Darktide, haven't you?
11724968
Oh. Hm.
I have considered various possibilities to include Starlight Glimmer (and to a lesser extent Sunset Shimmer) but I just have a hard time coming up with a useful or interesting role for them, either where the story plot is concerned or their own personal dramas interacting with their new reality under a Warhammer regime.
11725051
Locus was the only Inquisitor mentioned before Dark Horizons. You might be thinking of Gaela's back story. Gaela was arrested and punished for heresy, but it wasn't an Inquisitor that got her.
Damn this shit be hitting different can't wait for the next one
11724412
I'm building a bit of headcanon where Solon keeps the brains of opponents he's lost duels to in jars, hooked up with audio and visual sensory inputs and a text-to-speech device to allow them to communicate (nothing to do with TTS). The brains are recovered from various battlefields by a special Mechanicus squad working off screen, very hush hush and without knowing the end result themselves. This process has been going on for millenia.
Most of the time the brains are kept inside jars sealed off from the outside world, but every now and then Solon will take the covers off one or a number of brains and try out banter with them. Their undying existence is to be a Chaos Lord's springboard for trying out one-liners and bants. Over the years he's collected brains from nearly every Loyalist chapter, most of the Chaos Legions, all the ordos, commissars, Navy officers, the whole range of the Imperial armed forces; sort of a Trazyn the Infinite deal.
That's why he was disappointed the Inquisitor cut the call short.
11725308
He doesn't do this with captured brains, he does it with programmed personalities in his lucid simulation dreams.
Remember those? (You probably don't; it's been a while and it wasn't very important).
11725466
I do actually, the initial scenes with him and Luna and him complaining that she was acting like a jealous wife were quite enjoyable, to say nothing of the Equinoughts team-killing each other in training. Mostly I remember that he used those lucid dreams to design things in solitude though, and the only real personality I can recall was the Big E Himself. Solon was definitely not practicing banter with Him, he was furious in His presence.
I suppose programmed personalities fits, but the captured brains hobby felt quirkier and more evil than trading barbs with ChatGPT. I clutch my headcanon firmly; its power grants me +2 on obscure knowledge checks!
I love seeing Solon being a tactical commander. He has an excellent poker face when the physical threat isn't immediate.
My first thought was that he was going to have Chrysalis turn into something like a large dragon to simply carry his group off the spire, but Solon clearly likes to play his cards pretty close to the chest.
11724778
Sunset Shimmer. Forgot Bacon Horse lost her nickname to the new gen
Warsmith Solon is best Chaos Lord, EVER. Never change, Solon, you're too awesome.
So this Inquisitor Gholth heard about Twilight from his "pet daemon"??? Why do I get the feeling this is another attempt by whatever is in the Warp to kill Twilight? That's the only thing that makes sense. They really should ask Discord for an injunction or something. Yes they would owe Discord a favor, but better the Chaos you know...
The Sororitas/Sisters of Battle. REALLY cannot stand their zealotry, Is it wrong that I hope each and every single one of them dies without actually managing to kill anyone from the 38th company? I want them to have had the most futile fight ever, and to die in despair. If the whole station ends up allying with the 38th because they saved them from the Imperials, that would just be icing on the cake.
Really need to tell the Harvest the mean little shuttles are trying to hurt her purple friend. Although that might risk the station as well...
One of these days, Spike is going to end up with augments of his own, and that might just be "today".
Thank you very much for the chapter!
11725728
Chrysalis may be fond of turning into big smashy things and mauling her enemies, but she's much, much better at sneaky-sneaky work.
11726429
Well I can't guarantee they'll prove that ineffective, but they're not packing a lot of plot armor here.
Chrysalis ABSOLUTELY NOT rationalizing friendship
Another fantastic chapter. I can’t wait till the Harvest of Steal comes to rescue her waifu Purple and eat the space station and also eat her pony waifu Purple