Chapter 2 Part 3

Chapter 2

Part 3​

Arbiter HQ

Jenova Town

Deimos Peninsula

"You know, I expected that we would have to fight our way through the whole damn building." I muttered.

"That would have been a prudent stalling tactic. Or just blowing us all up." Anteas was a bright ray of sunshine once again.

"That too." I glanced at the plain metal walls surrounding us as we made our way down to the holding cells and interrogation rooms. Whent's squad led the way and so far with the sole exception of two choke points that were protected only by automated defenses we hadn't faced anything of note. "It's too damn quiet."

"I can't sense what's below us. No taint, but…" Anteas trailed off.

I took him at his word. Usually the things that could block a Psyker's warp senses weren't healthy. Or there were more than a few ways to pull it off, but I doubted that we would be lucky enough for this to be one of the nicer options.

"Where are all the arbiters?" Santos, who was shadowing me, asked aloud.

"There should be enough of them to slow us down a bit." Anteas hummed – the sound came out of his helmet strangely distorted, almost eerie.

"No matter where they are, it can't be good for us."

"It never is. Chaos tend to work that way. When they aren't busy screwing each other."

"Too much information." Santos groaned.

The rest of the troopers wisely didn't touch the topic with a ten foot pole, which in itself was surprising. My temporarily bodyguards were a strange bunch.

In front of us, the marines opened fire, before Whent helpfully shouted "Contact!"

The sound of bolters discharging within the building was outright deafening. Within moments, the only thing I could hear was the roar of the weapons. The fact that all I could see was Anteas' power-pack that was attached to his back didn't help matters.

Whatever decided to be shot up by the Astartes, didn't even slow down their progress and a few seconds later we were passing through a door frame. The old fashioned door it belonged to laid twisted in the middle of a large room. By the look of it, it had been tackled and trampled by a space marine.

The poor bastard that had been apparently bracing the door was in even worse condition, though he was mostly intact even if his chest made a good impression of pancake. The other ten or traitorous arbiters strewn all around the room weren't so lucky. They made a great visual aid on the effectiveness of bolter rounds and let's leave it at that.

Did you know that a bolter blowing up your guts makes a worse mess than if you did the same with a chainsword? For some reason part of me was finding the carnage oddly beautiful, while there was another that wanted me to puke everything that I've ever eaten.

Weird.

I shook my head and looked around, trying not to pay attention to the corpses. We were into an interrogation room – a proper one I mean. While there were some interesting devices to help untie ones tongue, there was a lot of gadgets meant to tell if someone was lying. Granted, most of them were rather crudely made and quite old, but if my training was correct, they should have been rather effective despite that.

However, it was clear that the room hadn't been used for its original purpose lately. There were two men and a woman strapped into chairs, who were methodically torn apart. Considering that most if not all of the lie detectors appeared to be trashed and not by the marines, I doubted that the point had been gathering information.

No, the fucking traitors had had their fund with the Inquisitor's retinue. At least one of them, I mentally amended. The closest man still had pieces of his jacket left and while it was soaked with dried blood, a stylized I patch on the shoulder facing me was clearly visible.

"That doesn't bode well for the Lord Inquisitor." Anteas stated.

"Not at all." I nodded and averted my eyes from the torn mess that once was a human face. The man who should have been one of my colleagues had been tortured to death.

"You all have cameras in the helmets recording this, right?" I asked the Librarian.

Somehow, my training came up to the surface, making me look at the situation with professional detachment. I never thought I would be so glad that Sister Joakim's insane training methods, but you can't argue with results. I probably owed her and the rest of my teachers a lot, because I had the sneaking suspicion that if it wasn't for their efforts, I would be either dead or blubbering wreck by now.

"Of course. It's SOP." Anteas nodded.

"Good. I would request copies of this segment at least once we're back. We'll have to confirm if these people were part of Lord Requista's retinue."

"Naturally. Just don't touch the bodies, they might be trapped." The Librarian added.

"I won't. It's not like it would do them any good. They're with the Emperor now." I made the sign of the Aquila at the dead agent and turned my attention to Whent's men. One of the Astartes was busy cutting through a metal door with a power sword. The sound was surprisingly quiet after the last firefight. That or my hearing was shot.

"Agent Veil, we're approaching the command center, however enemy resistance is stiffening. We should take it in five." The Lt's voice came over my vox caster.

Shortly after we got into the HQ, command came through for us and found a loyal arbiter who had served in this building before being returned to the capital. He was able to give us a rough location of our objectives – the command center and detention cells. After that we separated – Pickos went with Whent's second squad to neutralize the building's nerve center, while the rest of us headed towards the dungeon.

"Good. Carry on." I answered.

A solid clang sounded a few seconds later – the sword wielding Astartes kicked the door he had been working on and it a massive piece of it flew down the corridor.

"Paths' open." The Marine declared, sheathed his blade and pulled out a bolter.

"Lead the way, my Lords." I waved at the Astartes.

"Go. We've wasted too much time already." Anteas added.

The marines pointedly ignored me, gave a nod to the Librarian and vanished one after another down the corridor.

A squad of mowed down traitors later, we were carefully descending through a tight stairwell, which was barely able to take the weight of the marines. The comparatively flimsy metal it was made of groaned with every step they made, yet it held.

It was a good thing that we descended two at a time with the rest providing cover or simply staying out of the way, because I doubt that it would have held me too, much less a third Astartes. The damn wait was nerve wracking too – this place had ambush practically written all over it. Even crazed cultists would have recognized it as a prime killing ground… yet no enemy materialized.

No mines, or improvised explosives. No traps.

That didn't bode well at all. At best we were going to find empty cells or just corpses, because I doubted that the traitors were dumb enough to leave a live Inquisitor, no matter their condition, for us to find.

Still, we reached the bottom without incident… if you don't count the fact that the warp simply cut off just behind the door that was now facing us. Even with my psychic senses clamped shut, I could feel a void, an emptiness that made me feel sick.

"We just breached the CP. Casualties acceptable." Pickos announced while the Astartes were preparing to cut through the door.

"Outstanding, Lt. Any idea if you can patch into to building security?"

"One of the Space Marines is working on it."

"I can confirm." Anteas announced. "The door should be opened in a few seconds."

"That's the first good news I got since arriving here."

"So we must be ready for a really bad one." The Librarian added.

Little did we know what was happening right now a few hundred kilometers from here and it was pretty fucking bad.

The door quietly retracted into the floor, revealing an empty guard station.

"Any sight of resistance?" I asked.

Anteas had to order the same info before we got an answer. There were still two short platoons in the building, near the command center, though they were busy making themselves scarce. As far as the cameras and sensors were concerned, there were just a handful of still alive prisoners with us down here.

An icy ball formed in the pit of my stomach. To say that I had a bad feeling would be a charming understatement.

The Astartes led the way and we descended one more level until we reached the cells themselves.

"Sir, you many want to see this." Whent, who led the way spoke.

His squad took a step to the side, allowing us to pass. Whent used his gun to pint at a cell to the right.

"A present for the Corpse-Emperor's servants!" That was written with drying blood on the cell's door.

"Sweep for explosives and then carefully open the door." Anteas ordered. "You squishies better take cover out of the cell block."

"You heard the Lord Librarian!" I snapped and made myself scarce. My shadows didn't need prompting and followed suit.

"It's clear!" Anteas shouted a minute later, in clearly affronted voice.

Obviously he too found the lack of traps and resistance insulting or just a bad omen for the things to come.

Yet another great opportunity to screw us over wasted. The fuck was going on here?!

"You better come here, now, Agent Veil." The Librarian spoke formally.

Fuck. I sprinted down the corridor. That wasn't going to be good. Like at all.

Damn right I was. Halfway there, I could smell the rot and stench of body fluids. The marines, who were gathered around the cell door made me way without prompting this time.

The first thing I saw was Whent, who was actually standing at attention just inside the cell. Next to him, Anteas was on one knee, towering over… My mind refused to comprehend what exactly I was seeing. For a moment I thought that it was a pile of bloody rags used to mop up some bloody mess. I blinked and shook my head.

It… That had once been a man.

Now it was a head with most of its flesh flayed attached to what might have been a human torso at one point.

"Whaa… ooo…szooo...loog..." The mutilated corpse somehow wheezed.

Fuck me with a Baneblade! The poor fucking bastard was somehow still alive.

I gave him a closer look, something that I immediately regretted. Most of his flesh was gone, or black and rotting with infection. The only thing that still kept him alive were the bionic implants I could see in his torso.

"Lord Inquisitor Requista." I stated. It was barely recognizable, but if I squinted right, what was left of the face looked like the picture I got with my orders.

His single remaining bloodshot eye turned in my vague direction. Apparently he had enough left of his mind to recognize his name. That and chiding us for not getting here earlier.

Tough bastard. If I had been through the same and somehow still alive, I knew I would have been driven insane by now.

"I'm Agent Veil, your new initiate." I spoke aloud, hoping that he could hear and understand me.

"Yooo… late..." Requista whispered through missing lips.

"I know." What else could I say?!

"Mmm, people?" He rasped.

I shook my head.

Requista closed his eye and went still for a few moments. I honestly thought that he had passed into the Emperor's light, but then he shook with wet cough and looked back at me.

"Chaoss… rituall…. The peninsual..." His voice was barely a whisper and it was weakening with every word.

"We know." Anteas rumbled quietly. "Our strike cruiser will be taking out the whole area shortly."

"Goo..." Requista gave out a sigh that I chose to interpret as one of relief.

"Sir, the Blood Ravens company deployed here and the Imperial Guard have conflicting orders. There were already skirmishes between the two forces. We need higher authority to stop them from killing each other." I spoke in a loud and clear voice.

Fuck it! The last thing the dying man needed was dealing with this shit! The whole situation, made me furious almost to the point seeing red.

Requista's eye stared at me, as if asking what the fuck could he do about it. I averted my gaze.

"Rrrr… rozz..." The Inquisitors whisper was barely audible.

What was that?

Anteas stood up and looked around. A moment later he knelt next to a pile of offal in the corner and pulled out a blood and gore covered object. He found some kind of rag and hastily cleaned it up, before presenting it to Requista.

The Inquisitor stared in his rosary for a long moment. His mutilated face twisted in something that should have been a smile, but in fact was a vision from hell itself.

A burst of what sounded like binary came from his implants and the rosary in Anteas' paw glowed with soft golden light.

Requista's eye turned and looked at me.

"Veeel..." Requista wheezed. "Aaacc.. iiin… In… siiit… Veeel..." Somehow he managed to give me a firm nod. "Buuun the… eeeretec… prrrge… xeno..." He rasped for a last time. His eye closed and Requista laid still.

I just watched the mutilated corpse. I didn't know the man. I didn't know of him, either – just the fact that he was an Inquisitor and one of the toughest bastards that I was likely to ever meet. Yet… seeing him die here, like that – doing his duty with his dying breath… It changed something.

It made me furious.

It gave me a purpose.

I straightened up and made the Aquila with my hands, before giving a deep, respectful bow to the dead inquisitor.

"Brother Sergeant Whent, check the rest of the cells. See if there's anyone still alive in here." I spoke in a voice I didn't recognize.

There was no doubt. No uncertainty. Just a conviction that I wasn't going to fail Requista. I was going to fulfill his last will and cleanse this world from the traitors and xeno polluting it or die trying.

I could do nothing less.

"You heard the Inquisitor." Anteas snapped, letting cold fury lace his voice.

Whent went rigid, but then saluted and got out.

The Librarian turned his attention to me and offered me the rosary.

I carefully closed my gloved hand around it.

"Things like these..." Anteas whispered. "They either make or break a man. I have high expectations of you, Lord Inquisitor."