The Impersonal Journal of Inquisitor Vawn

I went to the UK for a 6 week holiday to see my partner and spend time with him. I suspected he was going to propose. I love the UK, I love him. Supposed to be a good time, huh?

He proposed on the night we went out to celebrate our third anniversary, a day before our actual anniversary. It was amazing and sweet and lovely. I was so happy.

Back in Australia, I lived with my ex husband. We had an amicable breakup, he knew I was seeing someone else. We were still good friends, though we had our moments from time-to-time. He stayed in our house and was looking after my cat and our dog. I hadn’t heard from him since the Friday before my fiance proposed to me. I tried contacting him over skype, I tried calling him. He wouldn’t answer. My mum had spare keys so I asked her to go over and check up on him.

I expected him to get on Skype and tell me off for checking up on him.

It was two in the morning when mum called me to tell me he was gone, passed away in bed. He was 35. He would have been 36 in ten days. Less than three days after one of the happiest days, my world was thrown upside down. I couldn’t do anything from the UK. My mum had to take care of everything - the police, the coroner, my cat, our dog, everything. He was from the UK, so all I could do was contact his family and let them know. And cry.

The coroner’s report was inconclusive. They don’t know why he died. He was on some very heavy medications, it could have been an accidental overdose. He had some very significant health issues, including heart problems and emphysema. They don’t know what caused it, and with it being ruled a non-suspicious death, the tox screens and other in-depth analysis will have to wait for the normal processing time, so we won’t know anything more for six to nine months.

Our dog was an Alaskan Malamute. 7 years old. A very energetic, boisterous dog who we named Hudson after one of the characters from our favourite movie. Chris was his world. I say he was “our” dog, but Chris had been sick and not working the whole time we had him, so he spent every day with him. He walked him, he spent time with him while I was at work - he was Chris’ boy.

I couldn’t keep him. I work full time, I will be going over to the UK again to see my fiance before we get married. He suffers from separation anxiety and energetic destruction - he needs to be handled by someone who knows how to look after a working dog, specifically an arctic breed. I asked my mum to contact the Alaskan Malamute rescue society in my state, as well as the breeder we got him from to find out if we could find a good home for him, with someone who’d be able to do right by him in his last years.

A week after Chris passed, Hudson started displaying problems with urinating and eating, becoming lethargic. Mum took him to the vet. They did a urine screen, there was no infection and no crystals, but they put him on antibiotics just in case. He seemed to perk up a bit.

A week later, he was having the same problems again, only with vomiting as well. Mum rushed him to the vet first thing in the morning. He’d developed a neurological problem, his brain wasn’t sending the signals to his bladder to work properly, everything was going wrong. They said we could have done testing and treatment to try and resolve it, but the outcome didn’t look good. I couldn’t afford to put him through that, both financially and emotionally. His Person had gone. Everything had changed. He was an old boy for a big dog, even the rescue folks said he was a senior dog. He’d been hurting for a few days if not longer based on what the vet said about the urine build-up in his bladder. Not to mention the difficulties involved in re-homing a dog with expensive medical issues. I made the decision to have him euthanised.

In two weeks I lost someone I’d lived with and cared about for over a decade, and the dog that we’d raised from a puppy together - and I was on the other side of the world and completely unable to do anything.

I asked my family to help removing Chris’ things from the house, and cleaning up in his wake. I’ve come home now to a house where everything is different. His belongings are mostly gone. Certain rooms are empty, stripped and repainted. Other rooms have things moved and resettled, everything in different places or other things missing.

The furry nose and whines and paws that reached under the gate to greet me when I get home are gone. I didn’t even get to say goodbye. To either of them. my last conversation with Chris was about some fish he was cooking, and the takeout I was going to order that night.

They’ve both been cremated. Some of Chris’ ashes will go home to his family. The rest, and Hudson’s ashes will be taken up to a place in the scrub not too far from here, where my mum and stepdad got married actually. Neither Huddy nor Chris had ever been up there, but it’s a place in the trees, where kangaroos and emus roam freely. As Chris’ mum said - Australia was his home, he loved it here. At least a part of him will get to stay here always.

His pursuers rushed past the entrance to the alley on the cross street outside, so close that he was amazed they didn't hear the gasping, jagged breaths that rang so deafeningly in his ears. But he was thankful to see the whole group passing, none casting even a curious glance down into the dark side-way. Despite how much it had hurt, and how many grazes and bruises he'd earned himself in the process, it seemed that doubling back through the warren-like side paths, sidling down a construction gap and pressing his bulk through the jagged, half-fallen wall had been the right decision. For now, at least, he was still at least fleet enough of foot to do that.

When his heart had finally slowed somewhat and the aching hitches of his chest had settled down to a mere light pant, he risked a cautious glance out of the alley, looking up toward the street where they'd followed his last sighting, then back down the way they'd come from. Back toward the Stingjack's nest. He knew there would be more waiting back there and that they'd be on high alert after detecting his intrusion, but he hoped they wouldn’t expect him to double back around and return so soon. It was only a matter of time until the drones that had chased him started reporting back their lack of sightings, so the sooner he acted the better chance he had to - well, to do what, he wasn't exactly sure. He had to admit that he hadn't thought that part of the plan through terribly well.

Pushing himself gingerly from the alley, he started making his way back toward the warehouse, trying as much as possible to keep to the shadows and use cross-alleys to wind his way back. It wasn't as fast as just barrelling down the street toward his destination, and he'd shed his robes in his flight and was now clad in simple dark fatigues that had been hidden beneath, but he knew he'd been made and he didn't know how much of the immediate neighbourhood had fallen under the malign influence of the repulsive crystal effigy at the cult's core. It seemed to have some measure of psychic control over the followers, linking them together in a blasphemous net of psyk energy and any member had seemed to know instantly what another member had learned or witnessed. A fact that was made terrifyingly clear to Tarick when he'd accidentally stumbled over a single cultist while trying to find a vantage point to watch their comings and goings and managed to then set off the whole Throne-forsaken lot of them.

He had no idea where Jaspar was, a fact which both terrified and relieved him. They'd separated after synching their chrons and confirming the rendezvous point and timeframe where they'd aim to return regardless of success or failure. On the way down through the hive they'd discussed whether she would try to infiltrate the cult openly, posing as a lost soul looking for answers in the harsh world of the lower hive. After all, it was a tactic that had worked before. But Tarick was glad he'd argued against it, pointing to the evidence where it had been tenuously theorised that other instances of the cult's rising some form of psychic manipulation or hive mind conjoining related to them. So she'd taken to her synskin and chameloline cloak and promised him she'd stay unseen, trying to find her own routes into their base of operations.

His fingers itched, wanting to tap out a tattoo on the microbead in the hope that she'd pick it up and respond, but he didn't dare. So far as he knew, their enemies had only detected his presence, and though he had no proof that they had vox-thieves or comm-relay sniffers, he didn't want to take that risk. Not to mention the fact that he never knew how precarious the situation that she as actually in might be. She might not respond, but that moment of inattention might prove vital for her as it had for him. He sighed and carried on, trying to ignore the pain that had flared in his leg in the mad dash to slip their net.

Though he kept his ear pricked for hints that the group that had been chasing him had stumbled onto his deception, or even that they'd given up and were simply returning from the frustration of not having found him, Tarick heard little to suggest that the pursuers had turned to make their way back to the warehouse behind him. In fact, he heard little to suggest that there was much traffic around the streets of this area of the hive at all. The acolyte stopped, his heavy brow furrowing. It was the middle of the afternoon bloc and while the manufactora were still in the middle of the production cycle, there were plenty of people who should have been on the streets, following errands and going about their daily lives. Autocars were much rarer at this level of the hive, but some still made their way around, choking along on hastily-repaired engines, their throaty roars undercut by the high whine of the groundbikes which were far more common in this area. And neither of which he could hear, except in the far distance where the main feeder roadway passed through this subsector. The relative near-silence of the streets he was traversing lent a rather surreal air to proceedings, he didn't know that he'd ever known any Imperial city to be so… still. It almost felt like the hive itself was alive and aware, holding its breath as it waited for something to transpire. The back of his neck had started to itch, the hairs there stirring of their own accord as if he could feel the weight of countless unseen eyes on him, and he started to wonder if he really had managed to get away as cleanly as he thought. He reached down at his side to pull his bolt pistol from the holster strapped tightly (far too tightly) around his left thigh.

Thumbing the safety off, he held the firearm close, both hands wrapped around the grip to hold it steady. He hadn't tried shooting his way past when he'd first escaped because he'd hoped to just be able to disappear and not have to leave any bodies in his wake to invoke uncomfortable attention from the local Arbites. He'd had to register his bolt pistol with the Administratum on first arriving in Vorta City and he'd done so in order to keep both them and the other local authorities on-side, but the comment that had been made about it being rare for a civilian to have a weapon like that on Vorax Tantius had stuck in his mind. Jaspar hadn't been nearly so forthcoming, a veteran at smuggling weapons into restricted places from her long years of working as Elle's infiltrator and generally not one to let people know what cards she was holding at any given time. She'd convinced him to let her smuggle in the needle pistol that he also had concealed in a seam-pocket in his shirt, and he was thankful for it as he wondered briefly if he should switch over to that. At least an unregistered weapon would be harder to trace directly back to his cover identity here, but something stayed his hand. He wanted to know that anything he put a round into was likely to end up with a hole at least large enough to put their fist into in their chest. That was usually sufficient to stop most people in their tracks.

As he set off again, he realised sweat had beaded along his brow beneath the fall of his dark hair and he lifted his hands enough to briefly pass his forehead along his forearm to push it away. This section of the hive was far from the atmos exchange, and the air was still and seemed to hold the stench of humanity and decay close around him. Every part of him felt damp, the fabric of his clothing clinging to his body, making him acutely aware of just how the pounds had gathered over his frame in the years since he'd lost his leg. He resolved that once this business was over and they were on the way back to debrief, he'd check in with the medicae on whatever ship they were on and start trying to get a diet and exercise plan under way. Maybe he'd even have to take Elle up on her offer of having another custom augmetic made to help him get things back under control. It was just getting ridiculous. Whoever heard of a fat Commissar?

It was as he lowered his hands again, bolt pistol still clutched ready, that he saw them. Shadows cast across the edge and slightly into the mouth of the alley by a light source that his observer or observers hadn't realised would pick them out. Someone standing just around the corner. Even as he squinted and tried to make out more details, he saw the faintest curve of a head and the side of a face start to peep around the edge, trying to look down the alley without making themselves visible. He could see the shifting and bulging in the shadow that suggested more than one person was there, the others stacked up behind the first in a column. Pausing for a moment, he looked down at his feet and cursed as he started to scrape one boot against the ashcrete beneath like he'd stepped in something unpleasant, glancing up from beneath his heavy brows to keep an eye on the shape and the shadows. The head grew bolder, peeking out further as they realised he wasn't looking up, then drawing back seemingly to confer with the others. That was the moment Tarick had been waiting for, keeping his glance on the shape of the shadows as he backed carefully away back toward the cross-alley that had led him into this one.

The shadows shifted again and he turned, starting to pick up his pace to hurry down toward the cross-alley, swinging around the corner and picking up his pace as he heard the ringing of boots starting down the alley from behind him. He cursed again, this time under his breath, picking up his pace into a shuffled run and juking down the first side-alley he could reach, trying just to make sure he wasn't immediately visible when they rounded the corner again behind him. As before, their pursuit was silent apart from the sound of their footsteps ringing off the walls of the alley behind him. He hadn't realised it when he was escaping the first time, but along with his noticing of the uncanny quiet had come the equally disquieting realisation that at no point had he heard the cultists shout, call warnings or try to coordinate their chase verbally in any way. He pushed himself harder into a proper run, trying to ignore the dragging spikes of pain where his augmetic pulled at his flesh, as well as the harsh gasping of breath that came on now with any attempt to move above a slow jog.

Tarick didn't bother trying to retrace his steps this time, instead deciding to try and move on a roundabout circuit - still heading toward the warehouse at a slight tangent, aiming to circle around and try getting past. Maybe he could still lead them, let them think he was heading for the warehouse but slip past it instead and lose them if they tried to set up an ambush for him there. That would be the best idea. Let them think they were funnelling him, waste time setting up with the assumption that they knew where he was going and what his ultimate goal was; the more time and energy they wasted devoting resources to hunting him down, the more openings there would be for Jaspar to get in and destroy the relic. He put his head down and dug deep, cutting across and through more of the labyrinthine alleys, occasionally dipping out onto the main streets to catch a glimpse of the landmarks he had noted in his earlier travels to keep him on track. He knew that this would most likely expose him to any hidden observers, but it was a calculated risk, hoping to draw their trap in his favour and keep them guessing on his intended direction. His lungs burned and his leg ached down to the bone and up into his hip, but still he pushed on. He could rest when it was done, when he was past the warehouse, when they'd either lost him properly, or when Jaspar signalled him that the mission was done. He could only hope that it would be soon, and that the destruction of the carving would throw the group into disarray.

Despite his vigilance he certainly wasn't expecting the fist that collected his jaw with a painful crunch as he stepped back into an alley, knocking his head to the side and causing his vision to starburst with light before fading into a grey haze. There was no time to respond or bring his pistol to bear immediately, so he instead let himself fall with the punch into an ungainly roll. It was far from graceful with his bulk and rejecting augmetic, but it served its purpose, getting him away from his assailant and allowing him to come up into a crouched shooting stance and bring his weapon's sights up to the figure emerging from the shadows behind the broad runoff pipes bracketed to the wall. It had been concealed there, waiting as he had come along into the alley, taking his moment of distraction as he looked back to ensure he hadn't been followed again to attack. There was no point bothering to shout a warning or to attempt to scare the man away; that would only alert more of them anyway and leave this one free to attack him again.

Instead he simply seated his aim at centre of the body before him, squeezing the trigger smoothly as he braced his arms against the wrenching kick of the pistol. At this range it was almost impossible to discern the concussive explosion of the weapon's fire from the secondary explosion as the impact of the bolt round into the body triggered the mass-reactive shell, blowing out everything from mid-ribcage to pelvis in a spray of pulped flesh and viscera. Before the ringing echoes had even died Tarick was struggling to push himself to his feet and limp away, not waiting to see the man's reaction, trusting that he was leaving little but a corpse that hadn't fallen yet in his wake. It wasn't the first time the former Commissar had shot a man, and it wouldn't be the last. He resolved to say a prayer for the soul of the sinner to receive his judgement at the hand of the Emperor later, right now it was his duty to carry on with his mission as best as he was able.

His pace was definitely flagging now, his vision occasionally greying at the edges as he continued to try and push himself, his jaw and teeth now joining in the chorus of pain from his lungs and his abused leg. As he dove from the end of the alley into another, he shook his head and tried to blink his vision clear, allowing himself to take a few deep, panting drags before carrying on. He tried to focus, tried to keep his head up and his situational awareness high, but the truth that he was rapidly coming to accept was that he really wasn't cut out for wetwork any more.

More footsteps echoed along the quiet streets and he could just hear the sound of running feet over the struggle of his own flight, summoned from all directions in response to the explosion of his bolt pistol. He needed to keep moving, couldn’t let them catch up and hem him in. They must have found the body of the one he’d shot by now, but he still couldn’t hear anything from them except for the repeated sound of boots driving him forward. A wild thought took him, that in fact they weren’t hunting. They weren’t looking for him. They knew exactly where he was, and they were driving him, moving him in the direction they wanted. He shook his head again, trying to shake the feeling and get his focus back on his task at hand as he struggled around the corner and into the next alley - and straight into the sights of a lasrifle aimed from the street beyond. A curse dropped from his lips, his own bolt pistol rising to bring the rifle-wielder into his sights, but the presence of a further pair of red-dot lasers converging their aim on his chest stayed his finger from the trigger.

"You can shoot one of us, we have no doubt of that friend. But can you shoot all three before you take a mortal wound?" A calm, genderless voice floated from the alley that Tarick had emerged from.

The former Commissar shook his head slightly, keeping his eyes locked on the passive gaze of the man holding the rifle "I have to admit… I'm not a sharpshooter. But I'm not too terrible… My scores at the range hold up… well enough. How about your buddies' there?" He puffed, trying not to sound as utterly winded as he was.

"Our shooting prowess is not in question here. They are only the weapons you see. To answer our own question, we think not. Put your gun down friend. We promise we won't hurt you…" A hand fell on Tarick's shoulder and he tried to resist the urge to shy away or make any sudden movements that might result in a hotshot round to his face. Instead he turned his head slowly to look at the figure standing next to him now, a tall and solid-looking manufactorum worker woman with limp, greying hair. She smiled blandly and nodded to him as his gaze met hers "Come now. We forgive you your trespass. Come with us and you won't be hurt. We promise this."

Tarick squeezed the grip of his bolt pistol between his palms, slowly lowering it. There was a risk to any mission. He knew and accepted this. If he managed to shoot the ones aiming at him that he could see, he didn't know if there were actually more who had him in their sights from behind or above. And even if there weren't, he knew he couldn't keep running. To open fire now would as good as sign his death warrant, but the longer he stayed alive the more chance there would be for him to either escape them, talk his way free or for Jaspar to extract him. He tried not to sigh too openly, instead giving the talking woman a narrow violet glance "Do I have your word that no harm will come to me?"

The woman nodded, lowering her hand from his shoulder as he lowered his pistol "We promise. We will not hurt you. Put your weapon away, and come to the meeting place, this way…" She gestured to the street beyond, where the others holding weapons had similarly slung or holstered them once more. He was acutely aware of the wording the woman had used when he'd pressed for a response; she'd been very careful to repeat that they would not hurt him. Which was not the question that he'd asked.

He hesitated, his pistol lowered but still clutched tightly in his grip as he looked at the woman, her soft smile almost infuriating in how assured it seemed. The urge to snap up his gun and wipe the smile - along with most of her face - off of her head was a strong, but he knew ultimately suicidal one. Instead he nodded, reluctantly putting the pistol back in his holster "As long as you keep your word, we'll have no problems." He replied, unable to keep a slightly sullen cast from his voice.

"The last thing we want is a problem." The woman replied, nodding once more before stepping past him toward the alley entrance. The cultists standing there stepped aside, making space for her to emerge and Tarick realised that he was just supposed to follow her, no shackles or bindings. It seemed they trusted him not to just duck and run away, though stepping out onto the street he became acutely aware why they were so confident. The street itself was peppered with knots of the previously-absent hivedwellers, standing about and silently watching the alley as he and the woman emerged. As they began their progression toward the warehouse, the watchers on the street started to fall in behind him, and he noticed further groups of watchers lingering in the alleys and cross-streets, cutting off any chance he would have had of trying to slip their notice and escape once more. His heart sank. He was sure now that they'd known for some time exactly where he was, it had just been a matter of running him down and manoeuvring him into place to spring the trap.

2

"Feth!" Perched on a rooftop overlooking the procession below, Jaspar spat a curse under her breath. She pulled away from the edge of the building and started to move toward the far side, trying to keep pace with the head of the group even as she pulled the chameleoline cloak off of her shoulders, bundling it up to clip to the small of her back and freeing herself to move without it flapping around her. She'd been in place watching the warehouse headquarters of the cult when the alert been raised and a flood of silent people had emerged from the building to spread out into the streets in all directions. For a time she'd dithered, suspecting the cause but hoping it hadn't been Tarick, praying that she could use the distraction to enter the warehouse and complete the primary objective before peeling off to try and rescue him. Unfortunately that did not prove to be the case.

A forgotten or overlooked vent window high on the warehouse wall had allowed her a somewhat limited view of what appeared to be the main chamber or gathering room. The vantage gave her restricted visibility of a number of the cultists but no ability to see the relic itself and what she had gleaned from her hours of hidden observation that the chamber was never truly empty; at times the group seemed to diminish down to a dedicated few dozen, at others the vast space was packed to standing room only, with bodies squeezed in around the abandoned shelving racks and machinery bracket and pressed hip-to-hip with one another.

When the alert had gone up, it had been during one of the latter times, where it seemed that nearly the whole population of this sector of the hive had been packed into the warehouse, gazing in wordless reverence at what she presumed was the relic at the far end of the room. She couldn't tell what they were doing, if they were praying or communing or otherwise just enjoying basking in silent awe, but it had sent fingers of chill trailing down her spine just to watch. It felt wrong, whatever it was. The only thing that had felt more wrong was how the ones who'd left had turned without a word, filtering out from the rear of the room first, moving off in their assigned groups seemingly at random but with a silent purpose to their movements. Roughly a dozen had been left behind from what she could see from the awkward angle the narrow window afforded her, but she suspected more were lingering out of sight. It didn't make sense that the ones she could see would be the only ones there. And while Elle had made it clear that securing or destroying the relic was their primary objective, she had stressed that it was not one that should be achieved at any cost and if serious harm threatened either of them, the other should work to extract if necessary.

Jaspar chastised herself as she kept pace with the group along the emergency access gantries and rooftops above. She should have insisted they worked closer, trying to use their individual skills together rather than seeking their own resolution to the problem. It had seemed like a good idea at the time, making a two-pronged plan of attack to try and come at the cult from unexpected directions, but those sorts of plans only really worked when both prongs were properly coordinated. Though they worked well together, they still didn't have the familiarity of years that she had built up with acolytes like Bottle or Harllo, where each knew exactly what the other was capable of and how they were going to achieve it. She should have known better. Tarick wasn't exactly a neophyte, but he was definitely far from seasoned.

She looked on with concerned curiosity as the cultists escorted Tarick along the main streets toward the warehouse, noting the hitch to his limp and the particular strain in his expression. His leg. He'd tried to hide it from her, keeping up with her jogs through the ship, but she'd seen the angry red marks and swelling in the tissue around the junction between flesh and the augmetic. It was rejecting, infected, and only getting worse. She knew that Elle had offered to have her Biologis look at it, to see about crafting a better-quality leg that was designed specifically for his body, but it seemed he was yet to take the Inquisitor up on the offer. She hoped that if nothing else, this would drive him to.

As the parade grew near, finally entering the courtyard before the warehouse, she chanced making her way closer to the edge of the building that she was watching from, pulling a modified green laser pointer from her gear pack. It looked to her that the cultists were quiescent now they'd found Tarick, passively escorting him back to the warehouse. They didn't even seem to be considering that he wasn't acting alone, as far as she could tell the entire congregation that had flooded out in search of him was now joining the column. She paced along the side of the building toward the corner, trying to get a better angle even as Tarick chose that moment to turn slightly, looking up along the buildings as if seeking her out. She took the opportunity to play a quick flash from the pointer out and into his eyes, muttering a quiet apology to herself as she saw him wince and turn his face away again. But with any luck at least he would know she was there now.

Her message conveyed, she stepped back from the edge and pulled her chameloline back out from its bundle, snapping it out and settling it around herself with a flourish. Even from her high vantage point, it had been easy to see that the cultists had left Tarick with his pistol, and the beginnings of a vague plan were starting to formulate in her mind. As she stretched out into a sprint to get back around to her original observation window again before they made their way all the way inside, she could only hope that she'd be able to further alert Tarick to what she had in mind without giving the game away.

3

Tarick bit back a sigh as he was led through the streets, the warehouse looming as they drew ever closer. It was almost embarrassing, that these quiet and completely passive-seeming people had him dead to rights. But the throbbing ache in his leg precluded any attempt to run, and even if it wasn't so painful, he still wasn't aware exactly how many of these people were actually armed and able to draw a bead on him. Getting shot in the back as he tried to waddle his useless self away was not the way he wanted to go. He'd never hear the end of it in the afterlife, he was sure.

Gritting his teeth, he continued to hobble on into the courtyard of the warehouse, chancing a glance up at the surrounding buildings when a spear of green light flashed from a rooftop, flashing in the corner of his eye before disappearing again. He winced, trying to resist the urge to throw himself to the ground, instead looking up with a squint to try and see where the light had come from. On the rooftops above, he just managed to catch the flash of a compact, dark figure who nearly blended with the ill-lit roof above. Jaspar. He suppressed a smile, turning his face down and blinking again, raising a hand to rub at his eye as if trying to push away some dust or a wayward eyelash that had settled within. If any of his captors noticed his brief moment of distraction, they gave no indication that he could see.

On reaching the vast, corrosion-speckled doors that sealed the warehouse from the world, the grey-haired woman turned, offering Tarick that bland smile again "You came to us to find our Heart, but if you'd only asked we would have shared it willingly…" She paused a moment, allowing the words to hang on the air between them before she continued "You should be thankful. The Heart has taught us forgiveness, how to transcend our mortal failings and frailty. Otherwise we might have had to kill you for your crimes."

"Crimes?" Tarick was unable to resist scoffing, as a certain morbid part of his mind wondered how far he could push these people "Removing a heretic from the world is my holy duty, not even close to a crime."

But the woman didn't seem willing to be baited, instead shaking her head and turning back to the doors to push them open, revealing a small foyer within that was draped with random swathes of blue cloth and curious daubings of a symbol, a strange conglomeration of lines and curves. Instinctively he shied his eyes away, wary of willingly viewing anything that seemed so clearly heretical. But no matter where he looked, there it was and after a moment he realised that the accustomed itching nausea that he associated with viewing articles of the ruinous powers just wasn't there. It didn't mean that the sigil wasn't heretical of course, but there was less chance of it immediately corrupting his soul, and for that he thought a quiet prayer of thanks.

Around Tarick the cultists had paused, waiting for the woman to gesture for him to enter the foyer and head to the double doors at the rear of the room. Though ordinarily the large windows in the doors would allow easy visibility of the storage space beyond, now they were covered to obstruct the view of whatever lurked behind. It was not a reassuring thought.

Once more the woman stopped, her hand resting on the handle of the doors as she turned to look back to the acolyte, the press of bodies behind him pushing him forward despite any hesitation he might have felt "You will see… Things. That will open your eyes and your mind. You might be fearful at first. You might cling to your old notions and your old beliefs. It's… easier… if you let them go. Just open your heart and accept."

"Yeah, I'll get right on that." Tarick nodded, rolling his eyes. It was your stock-standard heretic speech. Oh, we've discovered the true mysteries of the universe, just open your mind so on and so forth. He'd heard the line before, in various forms. And as heretical loonies went, this lot seemed to be rather docile now that he'd submitted to their capture. He had a passing thought in the moment that it might have just been easier - and much less painful - to have done so in the first place. At least he wouldn't have had to go into this rubbish sweaty, winded and limping.

His dismissiveness and nearly open scorn didn't seem to bother the woman, instead she simply nodded and pushed the doors open. They were on a mechanism that allowed both to swing wide when one was pushed, adding a sense of grandiosity to the proceedings that was somewhat diminished by the fact that the view of the room beyond was still obscured by the equipment racks and abandoned machinery. But through the clutter, beyond the two dozen or so bodies that were still lingering around in the space, he could just make out a bluish-black haze, an illumination that seemed to simply blot out everything around it. The light put his hackles up again and he found himself wanting to resist even as he found his feet shuffling forward, drawing him into the room.

The woman seemed pleased, nodding as she let go of the doors for another to hold, stepping in to walk at Tarick's side and head the procession into the space beyond. She started to speak again, but this time as she did, others dotted around the room also picked up and joined in, their voices droning in an identical neutral tone "The Heart calls. Do not be afraid. Let it take you…"

Tarick's frown settled right back into place. He could feel the pull they spoke of; his feet wanted to move, to walk him forward into that darklight. It would show things, expose the truth and let him see the world for what it really was. His fist clenched at his side, his nails digging into his palm as he sought to focus himself and clear his thoughts. Jaspar was here. She'd seen what was going on. She'd have a plan. He hoped.

Rounding the shelving racks, he was brought into the open space before the altar that had been set up at the far end of the warehouse. The lighting was muted in the room, candles and self-adhesive auto-lumens stuck around the room at haphazard intervals, providing enough light to see by but not glaringly so. But it didn't matter. All that he could see now was the Heart, the crystalline relic seated on a pile of crates draped with more blue fabric. It was larger than he'd expected, roughly the size of a grox's head and something about it did indeed remind him uncomfortably of a heart, vaguely pointed at the bottom and rounded over the top. But it was faceted and angled and something in the shape of it made his eyes itch and his head ache. It was wrong, like it didn't belong in this universe, the hernia of some alternate realm forcefully pushed through the fabric of reality.

The light it cast had a definite edge, a radius that separated its boundary of direct influence from the rest of the room and he realised that nothing stood inside that boundary, all of the worshippers lingered outside of it, all eyes turned to watch Tarick expectantly. The path between him and the relic was clear, and though the press at his back had ceased, still his feet moved and drew him forward. He stopped, wavering. He knew he needed to play along, but some sense, some idea of wrongness told him that once he crossed that hard line he would be lost. A faint buzzing had started in his ear, but that didn't seem important right now.

He took another step forward and the world exploded into chaos.

4

Jaspar eased the window open inch by painful inch, working the graphite solution into the hinges and tracks as she pulled it to a point where it would be wide enough for her to wriggle her way through. It was agonisingly slow going, she didn't want to risk the screech of a semi-corroded hinge or unmaintained pin to draw attention up where she was lurking. Even with the chameloline, drawing direct attention like that would be unfortunate at best and run the risk of exposing her at worst. From the corner of her eye she could just see the commotion near the doors, the sense of movement as they were pushed wide and people started to make their way in once more.

"The Heart calls. Do not be afraid. Let it take you…" Jaspar looked up from her work with a startled jolt, peering through the window as the chorus of voices spoke out. It was the first time she'd actually heard any of them say anything, and to hear the words from several mouths at once was unsettling to say the least.

It made her shudder, and she gave the window a final tug before admitting that it was probably about as wide as it was going to go without actually breaking something. The gap was narrower than she would have liked, but a rough eyeball estimate suggested that if she sucked in her gut and moved real slow, she could just… slide through. If she took her backpack off. She cursed beneath her breath, sticking her head through the gap with her chameloline hood pulled as far forward as possible, trying to see what lay within and hoping that it wasn't just a sheer drop to the floor. Unfortunately for her it was, though just to the right of and slightly below the window, some large pipes of indeterminate nature ran along the wall. Vent outflow or gas intake for some machinery long gone she supposed. She eyeballed the gap. She estimated that if she stood on the windowsill and gripped it, she could just about slide her body through and stretch to catch the pipe with her toes. Maybe.

Beneath her, Tarick made his way into the room, accompanied by the flood of people who'd gone out in search of him. He limped, haggard-looking, his fist clenched at his side. He was closer now than he'd been when she was on the rooftop, and she could see the vague confusion and irritation in his expression. Jaspar couldn't help the small smile that crept in to tug at the corner of her mouth. Only he could find it in himself to be what could be best described as "grumpy" when faced with heresy and potential death such as this. But as adorable as it was, it was still a precarious situation and she slipped herself back out the window to pull her backpack off and start rummaging through it for the things she'd need. Weapons and tools were clipped to her belt, carefully arranged to minimise the chance of rattling or chiming before she stood to try and sidle her way through. This was for all the marbles indeed.

Jaspar could just see Tarick's hesitant footsteps through the warehouse as she clung to the wall and carefully threaded her way through the barely open window, face pressed sight and breath held as she reached out, stretching with her toes, missing it, sliding and trying again. There was a fraught moment, where she thought she'd had a good foothold and started to shift her weight over, only to have her soft-soled shoe slip despite its grip. She gasped and pushed off with her back foot, putting her weight further forward and onto the pipe as she lunched for one of the support brackets, just managing to snatch it with her free hand. The sound of her gloved palm impacting the rig seemed deafening to her, but somehow despite all her expectations, when she dared peel open an eye to look down the group seemed to still be watching Tarick where he'd hesitated a few feet from the border of the blueblack light.

She could see the relic properly now, though her eye wanted to skip away and avoid looking at it. How Tarick managed, she would never know. Instead she turned her focus away, trying to take in the room as a whole for the first time. Dozens of people lining the walls, the paths between the shelves. They stood next to each other, before and behind, pressed up against close. The ones who hadn't left the area to go hunting for Talon had arrayed themselves along the hall, watching both him and the crystal silently and intently. The artefact itself

Now she could feel it, the urge and to look at the Heart growing ever stronger. And if she could feel it, she wondered what were things like down there for Tarick? She counted again, over four dozen bodies and even more pressed to the doors outside. Even with the splinter pistols, she wouldn't be able to fire off enough shots to kill them all before they started to cause her trouble - and Tarick was right there, in the middle of them. Not to mention the fact that she didn't know if any of her non-explosive weapons would be able to even so much as crack the crystal, let alone cause it to break. And she didn't think she could throw a grenade that far. But Tarick had his bolt pistol, and he was a few yards closer.

Pulling one of the frags from where she'd clipped it to her belt, Jaspar held it in her right hand as she tapped out a message in morse on her microbead with her left; RDY FIRE GRND IN. A heartbeat pause and she risked a look up at Tarick, trying not to glance too closely at the light. He hadn't reacted, and she wasn't sure if he'd heard or comprehended the message, seeming transfixed by the Heart. She tapped the message in again, then held down a long press that would send it on a repeating cycle. He'd either hear it soon enough, or if worst came to worst she'd find a way to compensate.

Priming the grenade, she let the microbead message cycle through one more time, whispering a prayer under her breath before she tossed the projectile in an under-hand lob into a knot of the followers a few metres behind Tarick. There was a moment of confusion as a few of them looked down at the sudden clink of metal at their feet, then the frag exploded and she was on the move.

5

Tarick was buffeted by the force of the explosion and he felt more than heard shards of shrapnel ripping past him. A few new sharp pains added to his already extensive collection suggesting that he’d taken at least a few hits, primarily to his back and rump, though thankfully it seemed the bulk of the explosion had been worn by the group of followers a way behind him, their bodies shielding the rest of the room from the carnage. He'd kept his feet, though his ears were ringing from the concussion of the blast and the startled screaming that had picked up behind and around him. It was a jagged, atonal sound, echoed by some but not all of the followers around him, and it made his ear itch with a buzzing irritation. As he shook his head to try to clear it, he realised that the ringing buzz he could hear wasn't just the trauma of a grenade in the enclosed space - though there was certainly enough of that - but a deliberate noise, a code on his microbead. Jaspar.

Around him the echoes of the explosion gave way to shouts and more of the atonal chorus of screaming, the cultists seeming split between traumatised reaction and a furious swarm. Fire from solid projectile and las weapons started ringing out around the room and he hunkered down, lumbering to one side as best he could while he tried to gather himself and shake off the pall of the Heart. They seemed to have forgotten momentarily about him as they sprayed fire up toward the rafters and gantries around the top of the room and he took the opportunity to move around to one of the shelving units, trying to put it between him and the congregation. Another explosion rocked the warehouse from the far side of the room.

"Any time you wanted to shoot that fething rock would be great thanks hot stuff!" Jaspar's voice was breathy with her exertions and he could hear the shots ringing off of the steelwork around her carried over the microbead. He blinked, nearly slapping the side of his head in his eagerness to reply.

"Jaspar!" He called in reply as he pulled his bolt pistol from its holster, readying it. He heard the clanging of feet landing heavily on a pipe somewhere overhead "Are… Are you okay?"

"Yep, yep-yep. Fine… Just go, just fething shoot!" She was scrabbling to keep moving, pulling another grenade from her belt. She was out of frags now, down to flash-bangs. But they didn't know that. She primed and hucked again, aiming for a group closer to the doors. The screaming wail was rising and falling, with more and more of the group moving to pick up weapons as others pounded at the doors and walls outside.

Tarick leaned around the edge of the shelving unit, trying to focus past the chaos. The grey-haired woman was standing inside the line of light now, her eyes unfocused and hands raised and the lank strands of her hair had started to frizz and pop with energy, rising around her head in a halo of static energy. The screaming seemed to be issuing from her, or perhaps through her the more he thought about it; the screaming, like the crystal, seemed to come from a realm outside their own, punching rudely through the wound that the icon had formed. And she was between him and it. As he looked, bringing his pistol up to aim at her, one raised hand snapped over toward him and the screaming shifted pitch again. The noise was horrendous, scratching at his brain, making his eyes itch and sending spikes of agony drilling into his ears. He fought the urge to wince, tightening his hands around the grip of the pistol as he settled the sights over her chest and squeezed the trigger three times. There was a flash and a sudden, brilliant vision of the room around them, every cultist and worshipper screaming and thrashing, their cries of agony echoed by the multi-jointed black shadows that were clinging to their necks and shoulders, obscene multi-legged spiderlike creatures that hurt his very mind to try and comprehend. Then there was another flash and everything went white and silent.

For a moment he'd thought the bolt pistol had exploded in his hands, his vision coming back dazed with starbursts, his head ringing and leaving him reeling slightly. He tried not to panic, blinking and shaking his head as he tried to regain his vision and the sensation in what he was sure would be the ruined wrecks of his hands. As the ringing cleared slightly, he heard Jaspar's voice, muffled as if she was speaking from a great distance "Sorry about that, one of them kicked a blinder right next to you… Are you okay?"

He blinked again, realising as the ringing and echoing continued to clear that the screaming and gunshots had stopped completely. His hands weren't an agonised ruin, still clutched white-knuckled around his bolt pistol, and the rest of him seemed more or less intact - for a certain given value of the word. Jaspar bounced on the balls of her feet in front of him, lithe and somewhat hypnotic in her synskin, and he was struck with the urge to take her in hand and pull her into a close embrace. Instead he looked around, his brow furrowed. The warehouse was littered with bodies, some torn apart from the explosions of frag grenades, others simply dropped where they were standing, eyes glazed and staring at the ceiling. The grey-haired woman was slumped back against the altar, her chest gaping open and singed where the bones of her ribcage had been pushed outward by the explosion. Behind her the idol had topped over, left cracked in half and rocking on its base, a strange popping, cracking noise issuing from it like ice dropped into warm water. As his hearing continued returning, Tarick realised that was the only noise he could hear beyond Jaspar's own excited voice.

"I'm okay, I'm okay." Tarick nodded, leaning down to press a kiss to the infiltrator's brow, nearly sick with relief. He looked around again "What the frak happened?"

"You shot the woman, she started to walk toward you, so you shot her again and she fell while you were pulling the trigger a third time and just… Boom. It exploded. Well, there was some kind of explosion, beyond the flash bangs, and when the smoke all cleared, it'd fallen over and the light had gone." Jaspar shook her head, looking around "And so had the rest of these jack-wits." Her noise curled and she cocked her head slightly "Sirens. Word's gotten out I think. We should… Hm. Feth. My backpack's up on the roof, and I don't really want to leave this thing here for the Arbites to find."

Tarick couldn't hear the sirens yet, but he wasn't about to argue. He knew her Jaspar's hearing had been augmented long before he met her, so he trusted her on matters of things to be heard "We can take some of these… hangings. Wraps. I don't think they'll have painted the stuff on the back and… well even if they have, it doesn't feel like it was corrupting me. It's just your garden-variety heresy I think."

The infiltrator nodded again, turning to pad over to the altar and start pulling down some of the blue cloths, throwing them over the altar in a messy pile so she could simply scoop them around and pick up the now-silent idol "My backpack's empty, there's no point going back up there to grab it. Let's just get out of here as soon as we can. I don't particularly feel like spending the weekend in an Arbites holding cell while they try to figure out if our Inquisitorial credentials are real, do you?"

Tarick laughed, pushing off from the shelving unit with a groan and a rub to his aching augmetic as he took her side and started looking for another avenue of escape "Like you'd spend more than five minutes in one of those things if you really didn't want to."