by Dan Abnett
I damned myself for not thinking the consequences through. I'd robbed her of self-esteem and what little confidence she could muster. I'd shown up her lifelong efforts to find comfort, love and respect as hollow, self-destructive, self-denying futility.
I tried to talk about the work she could do for me. She wasn't much interested. In the end, I pulled up another chair and sat next to her as she worked the painful truth through her mind.
I was still sitting there when I received a vox-signal. It was Maxilla.
'I wonder if you could join me on the bridge, inquisitor? I require your assistance/
* * *
The bridge of the Essene was a wide domed chamber with floors and pillars of red-black marble. Silver servitors, immaculate and intricate as sculptures, were stationed at console positions sunk into the floor, their delicate geared arms working banks of controls set into polished mahogany fascias. The air was cool and still, and the only sound was the gentle hum and whirr of the working machines.
Maxilla, still dressed in his mourning robes, sat in a massive leather throne overlooking the room from a marble dais. Articulated limbs extending from the rear of the throne suspended pict-plates and consoles in his reach, but his attention was on the massive main observation port that dominated the front of the bridge.
I strode across the floor from the entrance. Each servitor wore a mask of chased gold, fashioned into a human face of classical perfection.
Inquisitor/ Maxilla said, rising.
'Your crew are all servitors,' I remarked.
'Yes,' he said distractedly. 'They are more reliable than pure flesh.'
I made no other comment. Maxilla's relationship with the Essene seemed to me akin to the way the Adeptus Mechanicus worship their god-machines. Constant involvement with such ancient instruments had convinced them of the natural inferiority of the human species.
I followed his gaze and looked at the main port. The gleaming sphere of Gudrun lay ahead, a creamy swirl of clouds stained with the lime-green phantoms of great forests under the climate cover. Clusters of black shapes thickly dotted the space between us and the planet. These were huge groups of orbiting ships, I realised. Massive dreadnoughts at high anchor, trains of great merchant ships, convoys of trade freighters streaming in under tug supervision. I had seldom seen such a wealth of orbital activity.
'Is there a problem?' I asked him.
He looked over at me, something like anxiety in his eyes. 'I have performed legal manoeuvres and entered the trade lane approach. Gudrun control has allocated me a high-anchor buoy. All relevant data is in order and my tariffs are paid. But I have just been informed that we are to be boarded and inspected.'
'This is unusual?'
'It's been ten years since anyone even suggested such a thing of my ship.'
'Explanation?'
'They say security. I told you there was a founding festival under way. You can see considerable portions of Battlefleet Scaras on station. I think the military is being over-careful of its interests here just now.'
'You mentioned my assistance.'
'The inspection launch is on its way. I feel it would facilitate matters if they were met by a ship's master and an Imperial inquisitor.'
'I can't pull strings, Maxilla.'
He laughed humourlessly and looked me in the eye. 'Of course you can! But that's not what I'm asking. With an inquisitor present, they will treat
the Essene with more respect. I'll not have them root through this vessel mindlessly.'
I thought for a moment. This smacked of the favour I had a feeling he might call in. Worse, it stank of impropriety on his part.
'I'll agree to be present for the sake of order, provided you can assure me you have nothing to hide.'
'Inquisitor Eisenhorn, I-'
'Save your indignation for the inspection, Maxilla. Your assurance is all I require. If I assist you only to find you have some dirty secret or illicit cargo, you will have a great deal more to worry about than the Imperial Navy.'
There was a look of great disappointment on his face. Either he was a superb actor, or I had truly wounded his feelings.
'I have nothing to hide/ he hissed. 'I fancied you and I had become… if not friends then decent acquaintances at least this voyage. I have shown you hospitality and freely given information into your confidence. I am hurt that you still suspect me/
'Suspicion is my business, Maxilla. If I have wronged you, my apologies/
'Nothing to hide!' he repeated, almost to himself, and led me off the bridge.
A navy pinnace, matt-grey and deep hulled, drew alongside the massive Essene and clamped itself to the fore starboard airgate. Maxilla and I were there to meet it, along with Fischig and two of the ship's primary servitors, spectacular creations of gold and silver machine parts.
I'd summoned Fischig on the basis that if the sight of an inquisitor would help, then an Arbites chastener would do no harm either. Betancore was instructed to keep everyone else with the cutter.
The gate-locks cycled open and the hatch jaws gaped, exhaling torrents of steam. A dozen large figures emerged through the haze. They were all dressed in the grey and black body armour of naval security, with the crest and sector-symbol of Battlefleet Scarus displayed on their chests and gold braid edging their epaulettes. All were masked in form-moulded ceramite helmets with lowered visor plates and rebreathers. They were armed with compact, short-frame autoguns.
The leader stepped forward and his men grouped behind him. They didn't form a neat echelon. Messy, I thought, casual, lacking the usual drilled discipline of the infamous naval security arm. These men were bored and going through the motions. They wanted this formality over and done too.
Tobius Maxilla?' barked the leader, his voice distorted by his mask and vox-amplified.
'I am Maxilla/ said the ship's master, stepping forward.
'You have been notified that an inspection of your vessel is due. Furnish me with crew lists and cargo manifests. Your full co-operation is expected/
At a nod from Maxilla, one of the servitors moved forward on silent tracks and handed the security detail's leader a data-slate with the relevant material.
He didn't look at it. 'Do you have anything you wish to volunteer before the inspection begins? It will go easier for you if you make submissions of contraband.'
I watched the exchange. There were twelve troops, hardly enough to search a ship the size of the Essene. Where were their servitors, their scanning units, their crow-bars, multi-keys and heat-detectors?
They had no way of knowing who I was from my appearance, but why had they not remarked on the presence of an Arbites?
My vox channel was set to the cutter's. I didn't speak, but I keyed it three times. A non-verbal part of Glossia Betancore would understand.
'You haven't yet identified yourself/ I said.
The lead security trooper turned to look at me. I saw only my reflection in his tint-coated visor.
What?'
'You haven't identified yourself or shown your warrant of practice. It is arequirement of such inspections.'
'We're naval security-' he began angrily, stepping towards me. His men faltered.
You could be anybody' 1 pulled out my Inquisitorial Rosette. 'I am Gre-gor Eisenhorn, Imperial inquisitor. We will do this correctly or not at all.'
You're Eisenhorn?' he said.
There was no surprise in his voice at all. A tiny thing to notice but enough for me.
The warning was already rising in my throat as their guns came up.
EIGHT
A dozen killers.
The procurator.
Grain merchants from Hesperus.
Maxilla uttered a yell of disbelief. The leader of the security detail and two of his men opened fire.
Their compact autoguns were designed for ship-board fighting and zero-gravity work: low velocity, low recoil weapons that fired blunt-nosed slugs which couldn't puncture a hull.
But they were more tha
n capable of shredding a man.
I threw myself sideways as the first shots spanged off the deck or left ugly metal braises on the wall. In seconds, it was utter chaos. All the security troopers were firing, some on semi-automatic. Smoke filled the air and the airgate chamber was shaking with muzzle flashes and gunfire.
One of Maxilla's servitors was decapitated and then punched into spare-part debris as it turned towards the attackers. The other tried to move to shield Maxilla, but more shots tore out its tracks and its torso.
Two shots ripped through my trailing coat, but I made it to the doorframe behind us. I yanked my stub-pistol from its holster.
Fischig had drawn his own sidearm and was blasting away as he backed towards the door. He dropped one of the troopers with a tight group of shots that sent the man flying in a puff of blood. Then Fischig was lifted off his feet by a hit to the stomach. Doubled over, he tumbled into the corner of the chamber and lay still.
Maxilla roared and raised his right hand. A beam of searing light spat from one of the ornate rings and the nearest trooper exploded, burned down to scorched bone and ragged armour in his midsection. As the smouldering ruin crashed to the deck plates, the man behind him caught Maxilla in a chasing arc of automatic fire and blasted him backwards through the glass doors of an evacsuit-bay.
The rest were charging my position. I braced and fired, placing a shot that shattered the visor of the first approaching security trooper. He fell on his face.
The stub-pistol, designed for concealment, had a four-shot clip and I had a spare magazine in my coat pocket. Seven shots remained and there were still nine of them.
At least the stubber had stopping power. The clips only held four shells because they were high-calibre solids, each the size of my thumb. The short, fat muzzle of my stubber barked again and another trooper spun sideways.
I backed down the corridor, hugging the wall. The access-way to the air-gate was a wide, cable-lined passage, octagonal in cross-section and lit only by deck lights. The troopers' slow, buzzing shots hissed down the hallway at me. I fired back again, but missed my target. A salvo of rounds blew out a power relay on the wall nearby in a shower of sparks. I ducked away into shadows, and found the latch-handle of a shutter in the small of my back.
I turned, pulled it free and threw myself through it as a blizzard of shots impacted along the access-way wall.
On the other side of the shutter, I found a narrow inspection tunnel for the airgate's main docking mechanisms. The floor was metal grille, and the tight walls were thick with networks of cables and plumper hydraulic hoses. At the end, a bare metal ladder dropped down through a floor-well or up into an inspection shaft.
There was no time to climb either way. The first trooper was pushing through the shutter and raising his weapon. I shot down the length of the tunnel and blew out his chest-plate, and then jumped off the grille into the ladder well.
Five metres down, I slammed into a cage-platform. There was only red auxiliary light down here. The troopers' visors had vision amplifiers.
I was down in the guts of the vast docking clamp now, crawling between huge greased pistons and hydraulic rams the size of mature bluewood firs. Gases vented and lubricant fluids drizzled amid dangling loops of chain. The throb of heavy-duty compressors and atmosphere regulators filled the air.
I got into cover. All four red tell-tale lights on the stubber's grip were showing. I ejected the disposable plastic clip and slid the fresh one into place. Four green lights lit up in place of the red ones.
There was noise from the ladder-well. Two bulky dark shapes were moving down, backlit by the light from above.
Their visors had heat-enhancement too. That was clear the moment they both started firing at my position. I buried myself behind a piston unit but a round ricocheted off the oily metal and slammed into my right shoulder, driving me forward against the deck. My face hit the grille, and it reopened the gash in my cheek, popping out several of the butterfly clips that were just beginning to get the torn flesh to knit back together.
More shots rattled off the scant metal cover. Another ricochet hit the toe of my boot, and another punched into my arm, smashing my hand back against the wall behind me.
The impact kicked the stubber from my grip. It bounced away across the floor, just out of reach, the four green lights taunting me.
There were at least three of them out there now, moving through the confined space between machinery, firing bursts my way. I crawled on hands and knees along behind a horizontal clamp piston, low-velocity rounds pinking off the wall behind and above me.
I thought about using the will, but I had no chance of getting line of sight to try any sophisticated mind trick.
At the back end of the massive clamp, I found cover by the arrestor baffles and giant kinetic dampers that soften the impact of another ship against the docking arms. Greenish light filtered from a small control panel mounted in the wall between the dampers. The panel had a toughened plastic hood over it like a public vox-booth, and a glance showed me it was a test-reset terminal for docking array maintenance. I tried punching several icons, but the small, oval plate displayed the message Terminal locked out. Automatic safety measures were in place because a ship – the naval security troopers' pinnace – was in the docking clamp, mated to the airgate on the deck above.
I could hear scrambling above the ambient noise. The first of the troopers was clambering down the side of the clamp, following my route back to the dampers.
I took out my inquisitorial rosette. It is a badge of office and a great deal more besides. A press of my thumb deployed the micro multi-key from its recess, and I slid it into the terminal's socket. It engaged. The screen blanked. My rosette had up to magenta level Imperial clearance. I prayed Maxilla had not encoded his entire ship with personal encryptions.
The screen flashed again. I tapped a release order into the terminal.
'Dock array in active use,' it told me in blunt green letters.
I hit override.
With a tumultuous grinding, the docking clamp disengaged. Dampers roared. Steam vented explosively. Alarms started wailing.
There was an agonised scream as the trooper on my heels was gripped and then crashed from the waist down by ten tonnes of expanding piston-sleeve.
From the deck far above, there were explosive bangs and the shriek of shearing metal. I could barely hear them above the mechanical din in the clamp chamber.
When the sighing and hissing of the massive pistons died away and the venting gases reduced to a sporadic gasp, I clambered up from behind the dampers. The entire architecture of the chamber had altered as the massive docking engines had switched from active to disengaged. Two troopers had been crashed by the heavy gear, another lay dead under a steam vent, braised in his armour by a rush of superheated steam.
I took up a fallen naval-issue autogun and retraced my steps.
By my count, there were still four loose and active. I came back along the inspection tunnel and re-entered the access-way. Warning lights strobed all along the passage and muted alarms still sounded. A figure suddenly appeared to my left. 1 wheeled around. It was Betancore. He was looking straight past me, one of his elegant needle pistols aimed straight at me. He fired it twice.
A distinctive stinging buzz resounded loud in my ears – and a security trooper at the far end of the passage staggered out of cover. Another shot and the man slammed over, feet out from under him.
'Came as soon as you gave the signal/ said Betancore.
'What's your tally?'
'Four, so far.'
'Then we're probably done. But stay sharp.' I smiled at myself. Telling Midas Betancore to stay sharp was like telling a dog to stay hairy.
'You're a mess/ he told me. What the hell happened?'
Blood ran down the side of my face from the reopened gash, 1 was moving awkwardly from the glancing hits to my shoulder and arm, and I was thoroughly smirched in machine oil from the docking mechanism.
'This wasn't an inspection. They were looking for me/
'Naval security?'
'I don't think so. They lacked precision and didn't know procedure/
'But they had kit, weapons – a Navy pinnace, Emperor damn them!'
'That's what worries me/
We went back to the airgate. An emergency shutter had come down to seal the breach when my makeshift undocking had torn the pinnace off the side of the Essene. Through side ports, I could see its grey hull skewed alongside us, still attached to the clamps by one of its own docking extensors, though that was badly twisted. Its integral airgate had blown on disconnection and at least the passenger section was open to hard vacuum. If the crew had survived, they would be in the foresection, though probably helpless. Glittering debris, scraps of metal plating and sheared sections of extensor hung in the void outside.
I checked Fischig. He was alive. His Arbites uniform was heavily laced with armour, but the short-range impacts had given him internal injuries; he was unconscious and leaking blood from the mouth.
Betancore found Maxilla beyond the shattered glass doors of the evacsuit-bay. He had crawled across the floor and propped himself against
a harness rack. From the chest down, his rich clothes were shredded and his legs were gone.
But then, from the chest down, he wasn't human.
'So my… bare facts are revealed to you after all, inquisitor…' he said, managing a smile. I imagined he was in pain, or shock at least. To control the sophisticated bionic lower body he had to have intricate neural linkage.
What can I do to help you, Tobius?'
He shook his head. 'I have summoned servitors to assist me. I'll be back on my feet soon enough/
There were many questions I wanted to ask him. Was his reconstruction the result of old injury, disease, age? Or was it, as I had a feeling, voluntary? I kept the questions to myself. They were private and didn't concern my investigation.