LibriumArcana.Games

The Concourse of Praise for Him on Earth (number nine thousand and thirty seven) was a bazaar of sorts, one of the places where the Ecclesiarchy arranged for moneychangers on the great world of Ophelia VII to ply their trade. Off world currency was, after all, not sanctified. On this world, one great temple, the laws of the Administratum were loosely enforced and overruled by the canon law of the Ecclesiarchy, only the law of the Emperor, and of course, his most Holy Orders, held greater authority. Thus, the monies of countless worlds that were pure enough there were only allowed as tender in the spaceports of Ophelia VII, and had to be replaced with a standard Holy Coin to be used in offerings by the teeming masses of pilgrims.

It was a wonderful money-spinning scheme for the Ecclesiarchy, and had in its time, funded more than a few wars of faith.

The square was one of the gathering places for a great many pilgrims debarking from holy (a term that could often be considered ironic) ships, hence the moneychangers. Of course, even a humble square on this world had its holy sites. In this case, it was a spectacular choir that many said to have been established to welcome Sebsatian Thor to the world himself long ago. Its members, once pilgrims like those that wore down the cobbles around them, were fused together in holy union and altered, their voices enhanced beyond anything humanly possible, and their minds slaved to produce looped hymnals only from their lips. That was what happened to pilgrims who violated the law of the Ecclesiarchy – such redemptive punishment.

A figure dressed in white wove her way past the crowds of pilgrims from a hundred faiths queuing to make offerings at the choir of Thor, to have canticles sung by the choir to aid their souls. This figure could have told them that they were wasting their time, and that this site was no more holy than the next, but she didn’t. Faith, fanatical, eye-watering, knee bending faith was the lifeblood of the Imperium, after all.

The crowds of pilgrims parted before her as she walked. This was mainly because of the three battle sisters marching in front of her, shoulder pauldrons almost touching one another. She had business that didn’t involve the mundanities of the semi-servitor holy choir. She sought to deliver a message, scrambled with codes and encoded further in an old battle language.

A firey orator was exhorting leaving pilgrims to join the Frateris Militias, now that their souls had been purified, they should be tempered in the fires of battle for the Emperor.

As they worked their way off the square and into the back streets of the Astropath’s monastery, a claw-like hand reached out from a hunched bundle of rags to implore some of that same sacred coin. One of the sisters looked down and made to kick the hunched figure, but was waved away by the white clad woman. Instead, she leaned down and quickly grasped the hand, which tried to shrink back.

She knew, instantly, everything about the beggar. His name, the heart-rending and pathetic tale of how he had come to be in that place, and the wasting disease that ravaged his body. The last was easily dismissed from her mind, and just as easily dismissed from his body.

“Stand,â€Â

Prius Ristani watched impassively as the line of rodentlike Hrud were marched by. Another world has been claimed for the glory of the Imperium.

"HATE THE XENOS!" the voxcasters blared, the crowd responding with roars of rage. "DESTROY THE XENOS!"

In the normal course of events, it was not a matter which would concern a member of His Most Holy Inquisition. The subjugation of a colony of the wretched little xenos was an affair that could be carried out properly by the Imperial Guard.

But as for all who had survived the trials of Adraxis and Cyrus Gamma, Prius Ristani was no normal Inquisitor. He, along with Gix, Novum, Adivan and Varian, had been charged with the distribution of the archaeotech discovered by the late Inquisitor Lord Vonyirental on Adraxis, the precious weapons and materials of the Dark Age of Technology that could well be the salvation of the Imperium.

Bringing his latest Deathwatch retinue to this obscure colony world to unleash the new weapons upon a relatively weak foe was a continuance of this duty.

Rocks, debris, and other missiles began pelting the subdued Hrud. It was the right of the victor to annihilate the conquered, and the right of mankind to rule over all the stars of the galaxy, under the eternal guidance of the God-Emperor.

It was nothing new to him. As one of the more active and devout of the Ordo Xenos, he had instigated, overseen, and personally taken a hand in the massacre of literally billions of xenos creatures in his career, ranging from the craven Hrud to the haughty Eldar to the bestial Orks.

The circus slaughter of a few hundred Hrud captives was as nothing to that. Nevertheless, overseeing this final act would reinforce the authority of the Imperium and the God-Emperor upon the masses. Piety and hatred were the twin fuels of the Imperium, to be reinforced whensoever possible.

It had been decades since he had left the service of Xavier Varian as his Interrogator, and longer still since he had been the young, fiery commissar that had served as the hammer of retribution on Adraxis and Cyrus Gamma. The intervening decades had opened his eyes a great deal, burning away the pious naivete that had informed his galaxy-view at the time. In mind and in what little flesh he had remaining, he was nothing like the man who had arrived at Adraxis as the regimental Commissar of the 423rd Borean Rifles.

What remained of that young firebrand was the unwavering devotion to a galaxy cleansed of threats to humanity, the three great threats of the alien, the mutant, and the heretic. That and the title by which he was known to friend and foe alike- 'The Commissar'.

Behind him stood a squad of Adeptes Astartes, the most elite and fearsome fighting force in the Imperium and indeed the entire galaxy. Towering over mere normal humans, they stood at rigid attention, their latent destructive capacity idling in anticipation of new targets. With his warp-touched senses, he could taste the the innate discipline married to their devotion and roiling hatred of the Emperor-blighted aliens being paraded before them. So long as the alien lived, he was a blight in the sight of the God-Emperor.

He knew well when he and his detachment left, this ground would be declared sacred, and that those present would tell tales for the rest of their lives of having been in the presence of the legendary Astartes. As well it should be...

==============

Back aboard the Divine Will, a Rogue Trader vessel that had been confiscated when the former owner had fallen aprey of genestealers, he reviewed the message the astropath had transcribed. Lena Novidlorian had been touched by the Emperor, a living Saint who embodied His will in a fashion more pure and direct than any other mortal. Reading the handwritten parchment took him back to the desperate battles of Adraxis and Cyrus Gamma, and his greatest failure.

Nathan Talstrem had been an artefact of times past, touched by the Emperor Himself, and Prius Ristani had failed to protect him. Were he to live ten millennia more, there could be no repentance, no atonement for that failure.

He ordered the vessel to enter the warp and make haste to rendevous with the Saint. Having seen that all was in order, he retired to his quarters. Lounging on his bed was one of his ever-present retinue of cats, a colony of which migrated with him wherever he traveled. He extended his augmetic arm, finger held out so the cat could nuzzle it. He never named any of the felines who traveled with him, nor kept particularly close track of their affairs beyond seeing to it that they were properly fed, but the coterie of cats were the closest thing he had to friends.

Having made the proper offerings to appease the cat, he moved to his safe. Over the years, the traps and protections upon the holy artefact within had grown ever-more complicated, as his knowledge of such things increased. It took the better part of half an hour to disarm them all, a variety of instruments that would be quite lethal to virtually any form of life that attempted to steal this most sacred of possessions.

As a final step, he deactivated the stasis pod that encased the image of the Emperor, a gift from Nathan. Placing it upon the floor, he unbuckled the chainsword he had carried since Adraxis, laid down beside him, and abased himself before the most holy of images.

Oh Emperor, guide your servant once more. Send me to Your people, that I may gird them. Send me to Your foes, that I may slay them. Use my life as You will, and grant me that my death may serve Your purpose.

Carbonized bones crunched under the boots of Jolan Gix's power armour. The daemonhost Baelzedar drifted just ahead. Behind him the heavily armoured form of Hethor D'eckor was wrapped in a shimmering refractor field. "It is over," came Gix's voice from his helmet speaker. "You are done."

"No," said Aledail as he pulled himself up to his full height. He seemed puny under the great vaulted roof of the dome, one man standing alone amid a sea of charred bone. The lean man's armour and clothing were scorched from Gix's hellfire, his skin blackened and bloodied. "I will not." He raised his force hammer and a corona of power flickered into being. "Look what you have embraced Gix."

"I have enslaved the warp and bound it to serve the Emperor's cause. Your master has conspired with it and allowed it to run amok. My actions were necessary."

"Lies."

"Truth," said Jolan.

"You have not won yet." Aledail launched himself forward. The daemonhost extended steel rending talons to meet him. The force hammer hit the obscene thing in the chest and blew it apart in a flash of white light. Limbs flew away from the blasted torso. Bolter rounds from Hethor's gun exploded off Aledail's aura. "I've seen your file Gix. Mediocre at best hand to hand. And not my equal psychically."

Aledail lunged forward. Gix became a blur of warp accelerated speed. Aledail had a moment to gape in startlement. How is he doing-. His thought processes were ended by Gix's powersword slicing through his head.

"Wrong again," said Gix as Aledail's body fell to the ground.

They headed back the way they had come. The sentry corridor was dark now and the servitors lay shattered. Powerful lights pierced the darkness as the silvery sphere that Doctor Vikal used in place of cyberskulls lit there way. They stepped over the broken and shattered bodies of servitors, both theirs and Gix's.

"Gix," said Gard Vikal. "You won." The good doctors clothes had been shredded by high velocity bullets but the mesh armour he wore underneath had saved his life. "I own Domina a drink." He coughed. "Throne that hurts. Funny being on the recieving end of serious injury instead of the patching end."

"Rest doctor," said Gix. "I was able to make contact with Vess. Lydia's coming down with floater pallets and medical servitors."

"She's still pissed that you left her up there."

"Sending my gun-witch into battle with broken arms, no matter how well they are healing, was not the wisest move. Besides, I needed someone I could trust to be up there to let our allies know what happened in case we didn't make it."

"Foolish," rasped another voice.

"She's conscious," Vikal said helpfully.

"I cannot sense that obscene thing near you," said the injured Sororitas. She was lying on he side, her armour battered a pierced. "It is dead."

"Yes," said Gix. "Very conviently."

"Good. You should have not have made it."

"It was necessary," replied Gix. "And it served its purpose."

"Yes," she said, "I recall your reasons. But it is good that abomination is dead."

"It is better that you live."

"Yes," she agreed, "it is. For as Hethor D'eckor guards your life and Melina Sevall guards your heart-, no I can all but see you smiling under that armour I, I am not mistaken. She is a talisman of mercy, a victim made of victims. She helps keep alive all the human things that you must deny in order to be an inquisitior and prevents you from being needlessly brutal. As those two guard you, so do I. I guard your soul."

"Thank you Domina."

"It is my duty. You must remember your purpose and not be overwhelmed by the quest for the tools to achieve it. That way lies darkness."

Gix turned to Vikal. "Is it okay for her to talk?"

"Yes," he replied. "She's stable and it won't aggravate her inguries. As long as she doesn't mind the pain. Most other people would be begging to be drugged into oblivion by now."

"The pain is nothing," she replied. Vikal shrugged.

Gix walked over to her and knelt by her. "Thank you sister. And thank Nathan for me."

"I will," she replied. "And you are welcome inquisitor."

"So," said Vikal, "what now?"

"We get you some medical treatment. Then this place gets a once over by our resident expert."

"Me," said Gard.

"After that we tip off our colleagues in the progressive faction of the Adeptus Mechanicus and let them take custody. Aledail is nicely dead, at the hands of trustworthy and respectably Almaethian Inquisitor Jolan Gix, with plenty of evidence of wrong doing on his own part as well as his connections to his master and his masters deeds."

"What next?" said Vikal.

"Depends on the coded Astropathic transmition our modest little Iriza just recieved."

Captain Seyad Neen, commander of the Dominus-class Battlecruiser Four Hundred Saints, gripped the control toggles of his command chair as bursts of coherent light streaked past, firey explosions indicating his fighter cover was being peeled away bit by bit.

"Fleet status?" He yelled into the crew-pits.

"The Indefatigable's lost all propulsion, sir. Unable to repel boarders. Exsanguinator reports severe damage to the main hangar bays, and they've lost contact with the engineerum. In His Name reports primary void shield collapse, fighter screen at 5%."

Neen cursed. "Order the Indefatigable to fire on any and all targets of opportunity. Reassign their fighter screen to Name. Inform the Astartes that Exsanguinator may require assistance. Report on the flank assault."

"Ascendor and Sameter report acceptable status. Macharius is closing the noose."

"Patch me through to the Inquisitor."

The Captain's viewbox flickered into life. Inquisitor Novum had the organic side of his face to the camera, as he racked the slide on something offscreen. Neen could vaguely hear other sounds indicative of preparations for combat in the distance.

"Captain. I trust we are in position." He snapped with his usual brusqueness.

"Yes, my Lord, but we can't hold them from making planetfall for much longer."

"Half an hour. No less." Novum turned to face the camera, and Neen couldn't help but flinch; The Inquisitor had removed his obsidian faceplate, revealing the tangle of tubes and sockets laced into his shattered skull. "It has taken me 7 years, Captain, but we finally have the sector's last Norn queen in our grasp. I will not allow her to slip through my fingers again."

"Your thoughts, Inquisitor?" Brother-Sergeant Zoic inquired.

"In all likelihood, the time of Revelation approaches, Brother Sergeant," Prius said. They sat lotus-style on the floor in Zoic's Meditation chamber, facing each other. Spread before them was a game from the shadows of medieval Terran pre-history, black pebbles and white pebbles on a simple, unadorned board. Prius placed his next white stone, carved from the bone of a heretic, then nodded his head in completion of his move.

Zoic pulled his next pebble, glancing at the board. "The Mechanicus?"

"Will be most displeased," Prius responded as Zoic made his next move. "Quite violently displeased, in all likelihood."

A circle of figures in black robes stood gathered under starlight. Their robes were complemented by ivory chest pieces that displayed their natures and positions for all to see, and each one bore a polished red stone, sparkling with an inner fire brilliant enough to arouse the greed of mortal men to murder.

They would once have found the starlight beautiful and enchanting, but for the sickening glow that filled half of the sky. It was a horrendous baleful hue that induced madness from too much exposure at this short range. The Eye of Terror, beating heart of the indescribably depraved domain of the Chaos Gods, it spread slowly, year by year, like a cancer ravaging the body of the galaxy.

Ulthwé, the name of the ancient place where these figures gathered, sped away from that cancer with every means at its disposal. But it could never put far enough between itself and the Eye for comfort.

Was there anywhere far enough from the wicked growth that eclipsed the sky?

Arquellia dismissed the useless wondering from her mind and watched the circle again. At their heart, dozens, hundreds, of small stones flew in the air on currents of psychic energy, and between them, a pulsing malevolent glow of the gateway to the psychic domain of the immaterial realm. It was the cause of the wretched Eye and its gods and its traitors.

It was also the only hope for salvation of the Eldar race, though it had brought about their fall to such low depths. She turned to gaze at the crystallised form of one of the departed seers of her home. The tranquillity of his repose was reassuring, but also frightening. To look upon those frozen figures in this place, she was reminded of the true depth of her generation’s burden.

They did not simply have to protect and preserve themselves, but their ancestors. It was the reverse of the ancestor worship some humans held sacred. One bore the responsibility for all of one’s ancestors, living still in the heart of the craftworld. The present generation bore the responsibility to preserve not just one’s own life, but also their afterlives. She reached out to touch the tranquil face of one of the crystal figures.

“I wouldn’t do that,â€Â

They teleported into the Norn Queen's chamber, power armour absorbing the recoil of massive weapons. The Deathwatch, lead by Brother-Sergeant Severus, formed a protective cordon around the Inquisitor, resplendant in his lithe power armour.

"Prioritise targets. Brother Kohel, Tank-equivelant 40 metres." The Marine's Heavy Bolter spat molten death.

They worked with disturbing synchronicity, almost rivalling their centrally-controlled opponents in the efficiency of their movements and their carefully constructed fields of fire. Pater raised his arm and red lightning burst from his fingertips, searing the carapace from a Warrior-form's endoskeleton.

The massive Queen, a horrific mass of pulsating blood and bone the size of a Battle Titan, stood in front of them.

"Hold them." Pater ordered, and spread his arms wide, floating over a seething pit of acid and coming to a halt infront of the giant beast.

Battle drugs and psy-amplifiers surged into action with a thought, his entire suit becoming a conductor and amplifier for his already-considerable powers, glowing from sensor-banded head to adamantine toes with warpfire.

Previous attempts to destroy Norn Queens had the unfortunate side effect of instigating other Tyranid ships to birth replacements, in the so-called Hydra effect. What Pater planned to do this day was audatious, quite possibly suicidal.

He was going to hijack the Fleetmind.

"Hello, you old bitch." He whispered, and launched himself into the Tyranid's psyche.

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Dear God-Emperor. He was a gnat, insignificant before the overwhelming power of the hive mind. Quintillions of voices surrounded him, all shouting the same message in the same voice, driven by a conciousness larger than entire galaxies. Above the roar he could here louder voices, Synapse creatures with a small degree of independance ordering their lesser bretherin to death. He was being overwhelmed.

No time! He collapsed his mind to a single point smaller than an atom and dived into the sea, mental echolocation showing him the way. He couldn't stay linked like this for much longer.

There! The fleet, almost indistinguishable from the choir, but with it's own genetic signature. The Queen, micromanaging the entire assault on the system.

Mental fingers stroked an etheral keypad, countless buttons, dials and switches controlling every aspect of the vast horde that threatened the sector. No time for finesse. Pater's mental fingers sharpened into claws, and dug into the pad with a vengance.

The world seemed to stop as the millions of organisms constituting the hive fleet recieved garbled orders, conflicting instructions. Some ships tore themselves apart as the engine-beings jumped into the Warp without the rest of the ship, others fell upon each other mindlessly as their friend-or-foe signals failed. The Queen screamed across the void of stars, blasting Pater back into his body, where his suit's servos took over and landed him on the floor like a cat.

The Hive Ship was tearing itself apart, as the overlocking creatures that constituted it all veered in different directions. Pater stumbled and caught himself, screaming for a teleport as the ship broke up around them.

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Pater swilled the glass of Amaesac and stared at the Admiral across his ancient stirwood desk.

"Is there any sign of cohesion among the survivors?"

"No, sir. We're chasing them through the asteroid belt as we speak."

"Sloppy. We might never evict them from the system now. I want the captains responsible demoted and assign them to the cleansing teams. If they protest, I shall see to them... personally. Make that clear."

"Yes, my Lord." The man left hurriedly.

Now. Thought Pater. That Astropathic message from the Saint.

At one time the Eternal Will had been a kilometer and a half long sprint trader, carrying high value cargo swiftly from one system to the next. It had changed hands over the years and each owner until the present one had left their mark on this ship. Cargo holds had been removed for an expanded generarium hosting an additional plasma reactor. More void shield generators had been added and the arnament had been improved as well. An advanced surveyor suite was now housed in the prow and mighty two gun turret of heavy fusion beamers were the crown of her dorsal arnament.

Medical servitors awaited Gix's shuttle and took the wounded to the infermary. Gix headed toward a corridor secured with his personal lock code. A few touches at the keypad and he was in. He opened the first two cells.

They were marked with blood, and pus, and painted in runes of binding and control. He had kept to bound daemonhosts here, his weapons of last resort. He had used them up now and he couldn't say he was sorry for it. The extreme circumstances that justified their use no longer existed. He scourged the rooms clean with psychic flame.

He then sealed the corridor back up and headed for the bridge. Iriza was standing there. She was so shy and unthreatening, her presence was tolerated everywhere. The petite astropath handed him a sheet and bowed. He smiled. It was hard not to smile at Iriza.

He scanned the message and blinked. What now, after all this time? But he said nothing. He turned to his captain, Navigator Selanon Kay. The heavy set bald man smiled at him.

"Where to, inquisitor?"

"Opheila Seven."

'Brother-Captain' Malkamar found himself once again within the warm, comforting glow of Human space. What had been to be a three year tour of a Rogue Trader vessel had, in time, become a fifty year ordeal beyond the Imperium's borders. He had seen many Xenos, and killed.. some of them. His armour had held up well, considering an utter lack of parts. His ammunition had run dry ages ago, which explained why, as he disembarked the Rogue Trader vessel, he was wearing a T'au railrifle over his back.

His rank and title felt alien now. All of it did. Humanity itself seemed strange. In his many years away from here, where he unendingly fought Orkz, swapped tales and thoughts with Earth T'au, scowled and bickered with Exodite Eldar, Humanity had crystallized into some.. Perfect being of moderation. On Ophelia VII, he saw only excess once more. And worst of all, in the Emperor's Name.

Still.. The Bazaar was comforting. The sea of Humanity was comforting. The loud cries to the Emperor Of Mankind were especially comforting; here, he once again felt the God-Emperor's presense in his soul. So he moved, like a pilgrim among the horde of pilgrims, under his cloak. He could pass for a particularly devout Ogryn with it, and he intended to. An Astartes here would raise trouble. Perhaps not intentionally.. Most humans realized they were the Emperor's Holy Warriors, but he wanted no undue attention. He was sure trouble would find him. It seemed to.

He entered the chapel. According to the bridge, they were somewhere between six to fifteen hours from breaking into realspace, warp currents allowing.

His finely honed senses were screaming danger. While he had seen battle and faced horrors unthinkable ot normal man since his entry into the Inquisition, he had not faced tests on the scale of Cyrus Gamma and Adraxis.

Lena Novdalorian was a Saint, and the duties she called them to would be epic in scale.

One did not need a warp-tuned danger sense to know that.

He began lighting the candles.

Zala's presence in the chapel is made known by her will alone.

For too long has she been serving the Inquisitor with little to do, waiting for her Emporer God, Yar as she knew him on her world, to require her assistance. Again and again she would watch the Inquisitor and Warrior Leader, whichever one it would be at the time, charge into headon battle. They have had little need for her services until this time. So she has trained, and waited.

But now, they head into a different area. She has found her presence requested at more and more meetings. Yar has something in store for her.

She raises her hand and silently lights the candles along the way, each one in single deliberate motion on the way down to the center, where the two of them will pray and follow the ritualism of Yar.

He turned to look at her.

Now he knew what the Emperor had sent her his way for. He lit the final candle in the center of the shrine, then signed to her.

The time nears, His design moves forward. We will be called upon.

The signals the Inquisitor signs are more than just sign language, they are a body language specifically and intricately designed for her former world. Before her world became a memory, hunters would communicate with symbols of body, gesture, and expression.

When she sacrificed her tongue to Yar, the Inquisitor had learned her language so they could communicate in secret.

Gestured, Yar's will be done. Where are we going?

She takes the ceremonial dagger with strange perforated edges and hands it to him in ritualistic regard.

He lifted the sleeve of his robe, his augmetic arm scored with a number of scratches.

He had little flesh left to cut, but the Emperor understood the nature of his proxy.

The blade scritched along the metal of his arm.

A tilt of the head, a shift of the leg. Two fingers danced.

By blood do we honor the Emperor.

He offered the blade back to her.

Her own sleeve is moved up as the dagger is retrieved. Her own arm is full of flesh, with already forming scars from the years of ritualism with the Inquisitor. The blood flows easily and she paints the dagger with it.

With this blood, I consencrate. With blood, we honor Yar.

The dagger is placed over one of the candles where it begins to fire in the flame, growing hot and irritable.

Zala takes the ceremony bowl and catches her blood. Gathering the sacrifice to the Yar, blood and life, she places the bowl between them towards the flame, and then takes the hot dagger into her hand.

He took the bowl and placed it over the Purgatum, then pressed the activation rune. Energy coruscated through it, sizzling the blood into vapor.

By the fire of redemption is the flesh purified and the soul cleansed. By the light of the Emperor is the darkness driven back.

With his motions, she seers her flesh with the hot dagger, cauterizing the wound. The world is a focused searing fire for a moment. She shows no sign of anguish or discomfort; her redemption is found in the pain as she focuses on her Emporer. Removing the dagger, she smiles, as she is now cleansed. She hands the hot dagger to the Inquisitor for inspection.

He studied the blade, his augmetic eye measuring its temperature, analyzing it for stresses and microfractures. Returning it to the alter, he nodded once.

Prepare yourself by meditation and prayer. The shape of your duties cannot be predicted at this time, but be ready for anything.

She postures herself on the ground, her knees tucked underneath her as her hands stretch out in front, the balls of her toes and ridge of her hand on the ground. Although it is submissive in nature, it is the perfection position to be poised at moment's notice. She is in supplication, but ready to pounce if Yar requires it. Left uninterrupted, this meditation and prayer would last 6 hours in this same position.

Pater finished stripping his customised power armour from the hardpoints melded to his flesh, almost dreading the loss of sensation that resulted. He knew that he was technically returning to normality, but the armour had been designed to act like a second skin, meshing perfectly with his body and mind and boosting his abilities a hundredfold, but it had been designed almost too well. He felt slow and vulnerable when not in his suit, soft and helpless.

Joritu Aeseli looked up from her diagnostic equipment and tapped a gauge, making a slight scraping sound as her scalpel-tipped bionic hands touched the glass. "You should watch yourself. There's a 2 percent increase in free radical damage across the board."

Pater blinked and focused on her. "I'll be in the creche." He turned and left the room mechanically, still dripping from the suit's escaped conductor gel.

Joritu shook her head. He wouldn't be a functioning human being for some hours now; It was like he was on autopilot after combat, and the intervals were getting larger. The Hospitalier sighed and went back to work.

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"You called, sir?" The A.I. Byron trilled and tilted it's burnished casing in an oddly human fashion.

"Yes, Byron." Pater placed his mask and mechanical arm in a velvetine-padded casing and lay back in his mechanical creche. Nanofluids began to cycle through the machine and servo arms clipped various medical devices to his body. "Get us ready for immediate departure. We're heading to Ophelia Seven at best possible speed."

"At once." The servo-skull hesitated for a moment, and then left the room with a low warble of antigrav.

Pater sighed and closed his eye as mechanically-enforced sleep decended upon him.

Ophelia VII was not a place to approach too quickly, at least, not if one enjoyed having one’s body occupy less than ten thousand cubic kilometres of space. The planet was ringed with vast and impenetrable rings of adamant and steel defence, towering star-fortresses and great orbital platforms constantly ready for any effort the enemies of the glorious God-Emperor could make to storm the redoubt of faith.

Therefore, those approaching the planet were afforded a wonderful view of the system as they navigated its plane, only the ships of the Priesthood were permitted to leave the plane of the system, in order to better strike at any heretics daring to trespass in the sacred light of Ophelia.

While in theory, a ship commanded by an inquisitor had the authority to do as it pleased; the twitchy trigger fingers of the devout servants of the Emperor were not to be taken lightly. The waiting on the enforcedly slow cruise from the heliopause to the seventh planet was enough to make some pilgrims wish they had spent their money on entertainment instead of devotional icons.

On final approach to the planet, one could be assured of a very though probing. Random boarding inspections by the Sisters of Battle and the Frateris Militia, whose numbers were unrivalled here in this fastness of the Ecclesiarchy were common. As were occasional warning shots at those who deviated from their proclaimed flight paths.

Even here, one could see, if one looked to it, the telltale signs of the Arch-technology of Adraxis, in new defences being erected over the old, more powerful lances, faster traversal systems and even ancient gravitic impellers were the signs of the conspiracy of the Emperor’s servants, an organisation that had grown in its way to be beyond number, like every other organ of his will.

Descent into the atmosphere is another journey entirely, away from high technology, an educated visitor is often reminded of the pulsing heart of humanity, Holy Terra, and though without the indescribable glories of the Emperor’s and Ecclesiarchical palaces, the surface of Ophelia Seven has its own majesty, in the form of endless cathedrals and temples to the Emperor covering its entire surface.

Some people think that endless repetition of a glorious sight makes it fade.

The majesty of Ophelia Seven proves them wrong. Even the starports are glorious edifices to the holiness of Him-on-Earth, with great bell-bearing spires holding the chapterhouses of strange hermit-clerics who control the world’s landings.

It was often said that the world of Ophelia Seven had more great bells than there were stars in the galaxy. This was indeed correct. The alternate claim, that there were more bells than guardsmen in the Emperor’s Service was of course, completely false.

The Living Saint made no preparations for the arrival of her old comrades in arms, for secrecy was of course, the watchword of those servants of the Emperor who worked his will inside the Imperium itself…

Pater had a secret weapon reserved for cases like these, and its name was Anghel Mandruleanu. The sage seemed to have two things in infinite quantities; Patience, and official-looking forms signed in triplicate. Pater's miniature fleet, consisting of the Guncutter Stellar Concorde, two Thunderhawk transports and an ex-Rogue Trader vessel now known as the Imperious Dominor made a slow but steady progression towards their destination.

"There still shadowing us," Lydia Meradin said from the side. The tall woman was bent over an consulting a pic screen. Behind the Eternal Will coasted an Ecclesiarchy defence monitor that had been following them for quarter of an AU. It was almost the same size as the Inquisition vessel, but carried no warp drive and made use of small engines. Its power core was mostly devoted to feeding shield generators and guns, of which it had more than plenty.

"Easy," said Jolan, "they're watching everybody."

"We are the Inquisition," she replied.

"They don't know that," he answered.

She scowled. She did that alot. Jolan smiled. "Just wait until we're under the guns of those orbital fortresses. You'll feel better."

"You know I hate you," she said. Selannon Kay laughed long and loud.

"Was that a joke?" Jolan asked. "Are you developing a sense of humour?"

"Drop dead," she replied.

"I'll take that as a yes. You need to work on it. Social skills are important to an inquisitor. You never know when you might find yourself in a system crawling with Ecclesiarchy troops that have little, if any, respect for Inquisitional authority."

This was one of those occasions where a subtle approach was called for. Fortunately, the original charter of the vessel, bearing its original name of Stellar Ascendance, was still preserved, along with all legitimate documentation. Prius retired to his auxillary quarters, assuming his purported role as commander of commander of the security detachment.

Patience. He could wait until the final battle, if so commanded.