by Andy Hoare
‘My lady,’ Grand said, nodding as he did so, his voice, as ever, scarcely more than a grating whisper, but sounding as if he spoke from mere inches away nonetheless. ‘What, may I ask, might concern you in a place such as this?’ The inquisitor made an expansive gesture with both arms as he spoke. Brielle knew that he referred not to the station as a whole, but to this specific section of it, the section in which the tau prisoners were to be held, to be questioned and, she had little doubt, to be put to death.
‘I have come…’ Brielle said, her mind racing to justify her presence when she could not entirely explain her reasons for coming, even to herself. ‘…I have come to look upon the face of our foe, to watch as he dies.’ She knew the words were lies even as she spoke them, but hoped it was the sort of statement that the cardinal and the inquisitor might appreciate.
‘Indeed?’ said the inquisitor. Brielle caught a glimpse of slitted eyes beneath the hood. ‘You, unlike your father, would see these aliens die?’
‘I would see them die, my lord,’ Brielle replied, aware of the annoyance evident in her voice at the mention of her father.
‘Good!’ interrupted the cardinal, stepping forward to stand before Brielle, his arms reaching out to grasp her shoulders. ‘Perhaps, my child, there is hope for you yet.’
Brielle resisted the urge to squirm at the cardinal’s touch, standing defiant as she caught another glimpse of those eyes beneath the inquisitor’s hood. She felt somehow… unclean in his presence. What is he? she wondered.
‘I am an inquisitor of the Ordo Xenos,’ Grand said, ‘and as such it is my duty to persecute the xenos wherever it may be found. My lady, if you too would serve your Emperor in this manner, come and look upon the face of our enemy.’
Brielle stood frozen as the inquisitor turned, hauling open the armoured portal before which he and the cardinal had been standing when she had come upon them. Crimson light washed from the opening, its hue obviously at odds with the brilliant white and pale jade given out by the station’s own illuminations. She knew that the light told of some human wickedness, though she had no idea what machinations of torture the inquisitor might have concocted.
Brielle watched from the shadows of the darkened interrogation chamber, intent upon the scene unfolding before her. She felt a thrill of tension, combined with the queasiness of apprehension at what she might be forced to witness. She had put aside her musings on just what had drawn her to this place; she would find out soon enough.
Brielle found herself in a low, wide chamber, its tau manufacture usurped by arrays of devices of human crafting. Tall banks had been placed against the walls, glass dials and rapidly blinking lights adorning their surfaces. Fat cables, some pulsing with obscene motions, writhed across the floors and connected the machines, paper seals, secured with holy wax, fluttering from each. Such machinery would soon become a common sight across the tau station, now that it was in the hands of the crusade forces, turning the orbital entirely to the function of serving the Imperium’s mighty war machine.
A ring of tall, floor standing lighting rigs stood at the centre of the chamber, each casting its hellish red glow inwards. Brielle could just make out the shuffling figures of Mechanicus attendants within the ring, each making miniscule adjustments to the controls mounted on a further array of machinery. An empty surgical chair stood in the midst of the scene, mighty iron bands mounted where they might secure ankles, wrists and neck. Behind the chair a senior tech-adept tinkered with a device that resembled a crown of incredibly fine needles, each tipped with a tiny point of red glowing light.
Brielle saw clearly that the chair and its associated paraphernalia would be used to extract a confession from a tau prisoner. Sermons she had heard as a child returned to her, reminding her that the xenos must be shown no mercy, it must be sought out and ruthlessly crushed, lest its loathsome presence taint the very soil of the galaxy’s worlds, worlds reserved for mankind by manifest destiny and the blood of the martyrs. Yet, her life as a rogue trader had taught her that such doctrines did not apply to all. Furthermore, at Mundus Chasmata she had caught a glimpse of something more, something offered not by conflict with alien races, but by contact. She had caught a glimpse, and desired to see more.
The heavy thud of an armoured portal swinging open caused Brielle to turn her attention to the centre of the chamber. Emerging from the shadows and into the red light stepped two bulkily armoured, helmeted figures. Each held a long staff, the wicked claw at the end of each shaft securely clamped around the neck of the tau prisoner.
Brielle pushed herself back against the wall, raising herself on her toes and craning her neck to gain a clear view through the jumble of machinery. Then she caught herself and shrank back into the ill-lit corner, not wishing to draw attention to herself, though she had the blessing of the cardinal and the inquisitor to view the proceedings.
Despite the clutter surrounding the scene, Brielle was afforded a clear view of the prisoner, the first tau she had seen in the flesh. He was tall, his limbs spindly and fragile in appearance, his neck forced sharply upwards by the mancatchers held by the guards. Brielle noted that the tau was indeed male, and naked, his blue-grey skin cast in a sickly hue by the red illumination. Despite the indignity of his treatment, Brielle noted that the prisoner bore himself with a degree of pride, not having been reduced to the snivelling creatures even many human convicts would be reduced to in such a position.
The guards shoved their prisoner forwards with a cruel jerk, manoeuvring him to a standing position before the chair, his back facing it. Then they yanked back on the mancatchers, forcing the alien down so that he was lying on the chair. The instant his limbs touched the device, the iron bands snapped shut with a vicious clang, securing him firmly against all hope of escape.
The mancatchers disengaged from the prisoner’s neck with a metallic rasp, and the guards brought their weapons to their sides in parade ground fashion. The two armoured figures then turned and stomped off into the shadows, where Brielle assumed they took up guarding positions, though she could not make them out from where she stood.
Silence settled over the chamber. Brielle became aware of a stark, somehow acidic tension building in the air. Seconds dragged into minutes, the Mechanicus attendants shuffling around the prostrate alien, making unseen adjustments and mumbling prayers to appease the machine spirits. She watched as the prisoner’s chest rose and fell, a fine sheen of sweat appearing beneath the heat of the lights.
Then, Inquisitor Grand emerged from the shadows, into the harsh red light. He wore his customary black hood and robes, but Brielle could see that he wore some manner of glove, long needles and fine, silvery wires protruding from his robes.
As the inquisitor approached the tau, Brielle saw that the prisoner too had caught sight of Grand. The tau’s breathing increased as he strove to turn his head to look upon the inquisitor. Grand took up his position immediately behind the prisoner, and rested his hands on the device mounted over the tau’s head.
‘If the choice were mine,’ whispered the inquisitor, his voice plainly audible despite its low tone, ‘I would incinerate every last one of you. I would reduce you to ashes, and scour clean those worlds you have sullied with your filthy tread.’
The breath caught in Brielle’s throat at the inquisitor’s words, their sheer vehemence making her profoundly grateful that they were not directed at her.
‘But, it has been decided that you may be of more use to mankind alive, for a time at least. Although I have the authority and the right to order you and all your kind destroyed,’ said the inquisitor looking away from the prisoner and, it felt to Brielle, turning his head in her direction, ‘I am willing to accede to the will of the whole, for a time at least.’
Brielle looked at the prisoner’s face, to see what his reaction to the inquisitor’s words might be. It occurred to her that the tau, in all likelihood could not understand Grand’s words. She kne
w that some amongst the aliens had learned to communicate in passable Gothic, gleaned from the many systems throughout the entire region that they had infiltrated, but she had no inkling how widespread this had become. The tau’s face betrayed no specific understanding of Grand’s statement, beyond an evident appreciation of the inherent malice.
As if in answer to Brielle’s musings, the inquisitor drew himself up to his full height. He lifted his hands and placed them on either side of the apparatus behind the tau’s head, lowering the crown of needles and probes. The wires writhing at Grand’s wrists snaked out of his voluminous sleeves, each linking up, and melding to a tiny port on the device.
Brielle realised that the inquisitor meant to undertake something other than a verbal interrogation.
The rise and fall of the prisoner’s chest became faster and shallower, yet he closed his eyes as if in noble resignation of his fate. Brielle felt a prickling sensation crawl over her skin, realising that the feeling was more than one of simple unease at the scene unfolding before her. Her skin itched, and it took a supreme effort to resist the urge to scratch it with raking nails. She forced her attention onto the centre of the chamber, seeing that the inquisitor’s hands were clamped around the prisoner’s forehead, a halo of writhing, hair-thin wires joining human and tau in some cruel, blasphemous union.
Brielle watched as Inquisitor Grand used some form of witchery. He was tearing into the prisoner’s psyche, using the wires to bridge the gulf between human and xenos. She felt revulsion well up within her; she felt unclean. She felt spiritually soiled by the psychic taint radiating from the scene before her. She felt literally revolted, as if she had not washed in a month, as if her skin, her organs were contagious, and to wear her own body was to wallow in corruption.
Brielle caught herself, shaking free of the sensation with a supreme effort of will. She leant against the wall behind her, realising that she was reacting to the inquisitor’s use of his powers. She took a deep breath and gathered herself, before walking from the chamber in as controlled a manner as she could manage.
Ever-increasing waves of actinic corruption snapped at her heels as she walked through the chamber’s armoured portal, the prisoner’s alien screams echoing behind her before being abruptly cut off as the door rolled shut at her passing.
Having left the interrogation chamber, Brielle paced back and forth in the brightly lit, sparsely appointed atrium. She could not physically be in the room, sharing the space with the inquisitor as he went about his terrible business. Yet she feared the impression her leaving might create, and so she impatiently awaited the end of Grand’s bloody interrogation. All the while, she was able to hear the prisoner’s screaming, faint and muffled by the heavy armour of the chamber’s entrance. Worse still, she could feel the psychic backwash of the inquisitor’s probing, though thankfully the effect was but a shadow of what she had experienced within.
After an hour or more had passed, the portal rolled open with a heavy grinding, the deep red, infernal light washing through. Standing in the portal was the cardinal. He beckoned her to follow with a silent gesture.
Stepping across the chamber’s threshold once more, Brielle was greeted with the overpowering stench of burned meat. As revolting as the odour was, more disturbing was the realisation that the taint was also spiritual, a stain upon the soul and upon the ether that would remain within the chamber even were it scoured with the cleansing flames of holy promethium.
‘Be not shy, child,’ the cardinal said as he turned to address Brielle, his voice low and threatening. ‘We do the Emperor’s work.’
‘But you wanted them all dead,’ she blurted, unable to comprehend why the cardinal and the inquisitor had interrogated the suspect when, by all accounts, they had opposed doing so in the recent council session.
‘Oh, I do,’ the cardinal replied, a twitching grin touching the corner of his mouth, ‘I very much do, but the council has decided that we should know our foe, and so we shall.’ With a slow flourish of his right arm, the cardinal stepped to one side to afford Brielle a view of the centre of the chamber.
She looked to the surgical chair, gave an involuntary gasp and spun around, her hand shooting up to cover her mouth. What she had seen upon, and scattered around, the chair filled her with utter horror.
‘I understand,’ the cardinal said from behind her. ‘The xenos is a filthy creature, its form so different from the consecrated body of Man.’
She caught her breath as the cardinal spoke, feeling her heart beat return to something approaching a normal rate. She turned to face him, but pointedly avoided looking towards the chamber’s centre.
‘I thought…’
‘Speak child, for you are among friends.’
‘I thought,’ she continued, ‘you were going to question him.’ She felt foolish even as she spoke, but went on nonetheless. ‘Why did you…’
‘Kill it?’ the cardinal asked, his voice loud. ‘The xenos has no right to live in the galaxy. The stars belong to Mankind. The council would have us question the prisoner, and so we did. Once questioned, it was disposed of, as is only fitting.’
Brielle felt cold dread at the cardinal’s words, not that he should act in so callous a fashion, for such deeds were the price of humanity’s survival in a galaxy of a million threats. No, she was filled with the notion that here was a man who would manipulate the entire crusade to achieve his own ends, and it mattered not a bit who suffered along the way. She saw in her mind’s eye the course the crusade would take if the cardinal were to become the dominant figure on the council. The entire region, the Damocles Gulf and beyond would be reduced to ashes. None would survive to profit, whether from conquest or conflict.
‘But,’ the cardinal continued, ‘the beast’s death was not in vain.’ Brielle looked up to see that Inquisitor Grand had come silently upon the pair, and was standing at the cardinal’s shoulder.
‘Indeed,’ the inquisitor whispered, his eyes seeming to Brielle to flash crimson for just an instant, before being swallowed up beneath the shadows of his hood. ‘I discovered much of interest before the prisoner expired.’
‘What did he tell you?’ Brielle asked, playing along with what she saw as the inquisitor’s theatre.
Grand chuckled by way of explanation, a sound Brielle scarcely believed could have issued from a human throat.
‘He told me nothing,’ the inquisitor replied. ‘I saw what I needed to see, but no words were exchanged between me and the prisoner.’
‘So what did you see?’ Brielle asked, annoyance spiced with fear rising within her.
‘I saw a race entirely consumed with a false ideology. They believe they expand for the good of all, but I saw where they fear to look, and I saw it is fear that drives the tau ever outwards, and it is fear that will ultimately drive them to destruction as they are dashed against the ancient forces at large in the galaxy.’
Brielle felt confusion at the inquisitor’s words. She had gleaned a little of the tau’s philosophies, and did not recognise the drives that Grand described. So far as she understood, the tau sought to unite every race they came into contact with, through a desire for mutually constructive cooperation.
The inquisitor was studying her, Brielle realised, and she returned her attention to him, locking her thoughts away.
‘I saw a race that believes the galaxy is a small place. A place they believe they can tame with childish ideologies and cold technologies. They hurl themselves across the void without an inkling of who or what awaits them. If they only knew…’
‘They would run and hide,’ said the cardinal. ‘And so they should, for even now a force is being gathered to seek out and destroy a nearby colony that the inquisitor learned of from the prisoner’s mind. Even as the battle rages below us, we shall send out our forces and destroy these aliens wherever they may be found. When every tau on this side of the Gulf is dead, we shall cross the void an
d raze to ashes every last world in their pathetic little empire.’
Brielle knew then that the crusade could not be allowed to continue if these two were to be its leaders. What had begun as an opportunity was rapidly descending into utter madness. Her mind reeled as she considered the scale of the disaster about to descend upon the Eastern Rim, upon man and tau both. She looked up and saw that the inquisitor’s armoured guards were escorting in the next prisoner, and the Mechanicus attendants were shovelling the previous one into a large containment drum, to be jettisoned, no doubt, with the station’s waste. As the cardinal and the inquisitor turned their backs on her, their attentions entirely shifted to their new task, she turned and walked on unsteady legs out of the chamber.
She maintained her composure almost the entire way back to her ship. It was not until she had boarded once more that she gave in to the urge to throw up violently across the deck. The confrontation had left her soiled. She was sure that it was not merely the exposure to Grand’s witchery that left her feeling so compromised. It was the rank insanity that made her so ill, an epic lunacy that would spell the doom of the entire fleet and, perhaps, an entire race, if she did not act.
Later, Brielle lounged in her quarters aboard the Fairlight. She had welcomed the return to the familiar surroundings of her vessel. It might be cramped and ill lit compared to the tau station, but it was her home. The lighting was turned low, and a shadowed figure sat opposite her.
‘I know enough of the Imperium,’ the man said, ‘to know that they will carry out their threat.’
Brielle sighed and took a sip of liqueur. Despite the fact that she had bathed, for hours, and scrubbed her skin raw, she still felt the horrific stain that had touched her in the interrogation chamber.
‘I know that, Naal.’
‘And you must act.’
‘I know that too.’
Naal leant forward in his seat, his face, tattooed with an Imperial Aquila and lines of spidery text, came into the light. ‘My masters aided you when you called upon them. They, in turn, require your aid.’