[Dark Heresy 02] - Innocence Proves Nothing

by Sandy Mitchell - (ebook by Undead)

  The Emperor’s Justice, Scintilla System

  248.993.M41

  “A rather unfortunate outcome,” Inquisitor Grynner said, glancing up from the data-slate containing the interrogator’s report. Not trusting himself to speak, Quillem merely nodded. He still felt nauseous from the after-effects of the teleporter, and a sick, dull headache hammered at his temples. Krypen, the Deathwatch Apothecary, had given him something to ease the discomfort of being abruptly folded through the fringes of the warp, but it didn’t seem to have helped a great deal.

  “Most unfortunate,” Grynner repeated. “I trust you’re recovering, Pieter?”

  “As well as can be expected,” Quillem replied, wondering if this was how a heretic felt when the inquisitor began an interview with them. Then he dismissed the thought; most heretics were fooled by the pose of vagueness Inquisitor Grynner so successfully cultivated, at least until they’d let something incriminating slip. He was under no illusions about the formidable intellect facing him across the polished wooden desk.

  Grynner nodded, as though that was precisely the answer he’d been anticipating: most likely it was. Quillem had been working with him long enough for the older man to be able to predict his responses with a fair degree of accuracy. “I’m pleased to hear it,” he said. “And Carys?”

  “Not too good,” Quillem admitted, after a momentary hesitation he was certain his patron had registered. “Apart from the effects of the teleport, she’s still blaming herself for the operation going klybo.”

  “Perhaps with good reason,” Grynner said, glancing at the data-slate on which Quillem could see his own report reproduced in glowing, upside-down letters. Composing it through the haze of nausea and disassociation which continued to dog him after the teleport had been difficult, but he’d persevered, knowing the inquisitor would want all the pertinent details to hand as quickly as possible. “She was the one who tripped the alarm, was she not?”

  “It wasn’t her fault,” Quillem said, sensing the trap a lesser man might have fallen into, and evading it without thought or hesitation. “She was following my orders, and had every right to expect that I knew what I was doing. They all did.” Arken, Malven and Rufio had paid dearly for that assumption, and he wasn’t going to leave Carys to carry the burden of it on his behalf. “I should have kept them safe.”

  “A noble sentiment,” Grynner said dryly, “but a singularly unrealistic one given our calling and responsibilities.” Suddenly, the blue eyes behind the unnecessary spectacles were hard, and focused, and Quillem felt as though he was staring down the barrel of a plasma gun. “I do hope you’re not going to let this little setback compromise your efficiency, Pieter. You’ve shown a fair amount of promise so far. It would be rather inconvenient if I felt I couldn’t rely on you to the same extent in the future.”

  “I won’t let you down, inquisitor,” Quillem said, hoping he didn’t sound too disconcerted by the implied threat. Once lost, Grynner’s confidence could only be regained by long and hazardous service, a route he’d already taken once to rise to his present position, and was by no means keen to repeat. If he even survived the experience.

  “I’m pleased to hear it.” With the abruptness of a card sharp making the Abbess disappear, the mask of pedantic prissiness was back. Grynner picked up another of the data-slates arranged neatly on his desk, activated it, and handed it to Quillem. “Anything here strike you as familiar?”

  Suppressing the pounding in his temples as best he could, Quillem squinted at the display screen, and read a paragraph or two. Then he nodded, regretting the abrupt gesture instantly. “It’s one of the reports your friend’s agent filed from Sepheris Secundus,” he said, as soon as the flashes of light stopped dancing across his retina. “The follow-up statements from the two Guardsmen he had seconded to his team.”

  “Quite,” Grynner said. “Specifically, their description of the heretic forces which attacked the Black Ship holding pen.”

  Quillem returned his attention to the screen, concentrating with rather more effort than he would normally have required on the shuddering letters. After a moment he nodded again, a little more cautiously this time. “It sounds like the same group of mercenaries that attacked us,” he said. “The same mixture of Imperial and xenos equipment, and the same psyker in eldar armour.”

  “Which means we now have all the confirmation we needed that the Faxlignae are behind this affair,” Inquisitor Grynner said. “No other renegade group has access to so many xenos artefacts, or would risk using them so openly, if they could make them work at all.”

  “It also seems to confirm their connection to the psyker underground,” Quillem said, to show that he was paying attention. “A wyrd with eldar wargear; that’s a combination you don’t see every day.”

  “For which we should all thank the Emperor,” Grynner concluded dryly. He sat back in his seat, and steepled his fingers. “Unfortunately we seem to have lost our most promising lead. Before pulling out, the mercenaries did a very thorough job of destroying the datafiles in the office you found.”

  “There must be secondary records,” Quillem suggested. “Traffic control, berthing fees, stuff like that. If we can get the name of a ship, that might get us somewhere.”

  “Possibly,” Grynner looked thoughtful. “But it’s just as likely that they left their carrier vessel in the outer system; the chances are it never docked at Scintil VIII at all.”

  “I’ll try running it down anyway,” Quillem said. “You never know, we might find something.” He was beginning to feel more like his old self again, the nagging sense of guilt at the deaths of so many of his team receding under the comforting dictates of duty; at least for now.

  The inquisitor nodded. “I’d also suggest,” he said, in a tone which made it clear that he fully expected the suggestion to be followed, “that you find out what Carolus’ people are up to. They should be arriving in-system about now, and it seems quite clear that we’re following different strands of the same conspiracy.”

  “Consider it done,” Quillem assured him. “Do you want me to make direct contact with them?”

  “Not for the time being,” Grynner said, after a momentary reflective pause. “We still don’t know why Carolus decided to invoke Special Circumstances, and until we do it might not be wise to advertise our own interest in the affair. Discretion, I think, would be the best way to proceed.”

  “Discreetly it is, then,” Quillem agreed.

  The Misericord, the Warp,

  Date and Time Meaningless

  The waiting was the worst part for Drake. Once combat was joined, he could let instinct take over, the immediate-action drills he’d practised in the Guard and the Royal Scourges taking the place of introspection, but until that happened his imagination kept supplying worst-case scenarios, each one more disturbing than the last. If Kyrlock had been with him it wouldn’t have felt so bad; they’d have taken refuge in the profanity and banter which had sustained them on the battlefield, but his friend was Emperor knew where. Not for the first time, Drake wondered how he was faring, and hoped that he was all right.

  “Getting anywhere with the data-slate?” he asked, reflecting wryly that he must be getting desperate for distraction to attempt small talk with Vex.

  “I believe I’ve succeeded in decrypting the files,” the techpriest replied, “but their contents still require detailed perusal and analysis. Most appear to be concerned with unremarkable business dealings, and similar personal contacts.”

  “Anything relating to Adrin or Tonis?” Horst asked; he’d kept the comm-bead network open, so the whole team could respond instantly as soon as the attack came.

  “No mention of Tonis, although Adrin appears several times in the business files. He seems to have been facilitating the purchase of some merchandise from Scintilla on Tancred’s behalf. The sort of pointless expenditure the Secundan nobility habitually indulge in, so I see nothing particularly suspicious in that.”

  “Everything’s susp
icious where heretics are concerned,” Keira reminded him sharply. Drake turned his head a little, trying to spot her, but she’d chosen her ambush point well, and remained invisible from his position. Horst was stationed towards the middle of the space below, taking cover behind a tangle of fallen metalwork, where he would have a good field of fire as the mutants advanced, and a clear line of retreat to the rope ladder.

  “I stand corrected,” Vex replied dryly. “Nonetheless, the importation of wines, rugs and decorative automata seem less probable avenues of heretical endeavour than the meetings of Adrin’s coven of wyrds. Most of the cargoes were routed through the same shipping agent, a man named Voyle, so that connection might be worth following up when we get to Scintilla, however.”

  “Is there anything about the coven itself?” Drake asked, and the techpriest nodded.

  “Several references to a group Tancred refers to as the Sanctuary of the Blessed. There are few details, but Adrin is clearly connected to it, and the final dated entry on the data-slate is a summons to a meeting of the Sanctuary at his mansion on the evening we raided the premises.”

  “That seems pretty definite—” Horst began, only to be interrupted by an explosion in the depths of the tunnel, where Drake had rigged a couple of frag grenades attached to tripwires. The booby trap was crude enough, but he hadn’t expected the muties to be overly bright, and it seemed he hadn’t underestimated them.

  “Incoming,” Drake warned, catching the first sight of movement from his elevated perspective, and began shooting at the first group of mutants to make it as far as the hole in the wall. Smoke and dust from the explosion billowed out behind them as the misshapen parodies of humanity lurched forwards, and for a moment he found himself hoping that Tancred had been caught by the blast. In that he was disappointed, however; a moment or two later he caught sight of the Secundan fop emerging from the hole behind the first wave, evading every las-bolt the Guardsman sent in his direction with the same infuriating ease.

  “I see them,” Horst said, his voice calm, and began firing too, each bolt from his pistol claiming a mutant life in a spray of blood and viscera.

  “Holy Throne,” Drake said. “He’s sent the whole rutting tribe this time!” He continued to shoot until his power-pack ran dry, then ejected it and snapped in a replacement; as he did so the shambling horde below took advantage of the brief lull to surge forwards like a tidal wave.

  “Looks like it,” Keira agreed, ghosting into visibility at last, to dispatch a small group of mutants, which had just run past the shadows concealing her in their eagerness to get to Horst, in a single flurry of blade strokes. Ignoring the expiring abhumans littering the ground at her feet, she charged forwards, carving her way through the next wave as though they were no more substantial than smoke. “He must really want that book.”

  “How’s it coming?” Drake asked, glancing briefly at Vex before sighting his recharged weapon on the largest group of mutants he could find. Every time he squeezed the trigger another one fell, but it was like trying to punch holes in water; the gap would fill instantly, and there still seemed no end to the horde pouring into the upended hold. “We can’t hold them off for ever.” He switched his aim, taking out a group a little more tactically minded than the rest, which had bypassed Horst in an attempt to cut him and Keira off from the ladder.

  “You won’t have to,” Vex assured him, his own data-slate back in his hand. A green “ready” icon pulsed reassuringly on the screen. “I can activate any time you’re ready.”

  “Just a couple more minutes,” Horst said. “We need to make sure Tancred’s taken the bait.”

  “He’s moving,” Drake reported, switching his attention back to the wyrd puppet master. Tancred was trotting towards Horst, behind a bodyguard of heavily muscled mutants, although what help he thought brute strength would be against an explosive-tipped pistol bolt was beyond Drake. He was running awkwardly, his left arm hunched in close to his body, and the Guardsman was heartened to see a smear of blood on his sleeve where Keira had pinked him at their last encounter. “Heading for Mordechai.”

  “Hoping I’m carrying the document,” Horst said dryly. “Makes sense; heretics aren’t very big on delegation. Too much trust involved.”

  “Pull back,” Drake urged. “While I can still cover you.”

  “On my way.” Horst turned and sprinted for the ladder. “Keira, pull out.”

  “I can still get to him!” Keira snarled. She was slashing her way relentlessly towards the wyrd, heedless of the number of brutes surrounding her. If she wasn’t careful, she was going to be cut off and pulled down by the sheer weight of numbers.

  “Stick to the plan!” Horst said, picking a couple of attackers off her back with well-placed pistol shots, and she nodded, a trifle reluctantly, before turning away from her target to begin hacking her way towards the ladder. They reached the hanging avenue of escape almost simultaneously, and Horst waved her up. “Go! I’ll be right behind you!”

  “You’d better be.” Sheathing the sword, she began swarming upwards, while Horst defended the foot of the ladder for a few vital seconds, his bolt pistol barking death at the onrushing horde.

  “She’s here!” Drake yelled, switching to full auto, and hosing down the first wave as they closed on Horst’s position. There was no point in picking targets now, the whole floor just seemed to be a seething mass of frenzied, misshapen flesh, intent on killing them all. “For Throne’s sake move!”

  “Hybris, do it!” Horst instructed, and started to climb, the bestial pack hard on his heels. The first few mutants to arrive started scrambling up after him, and Drake seethed with frustration at his inability to pick them off.

  “I can’t get a clear shot around Mordechai!” he snarled, emptying the powerpack in the general direction of Tancred instead, who seemed as unconcerned as ever by the blizzard of las-bolts, even as his bodyguard was cut down around him.

  “I can,” Keira said, hanging upside down over the lip of the passageway by her knees, her back to the wall and her crossbow in her hand. She took the shot, then flipped herself upright again, to land on her feet in the corridor.

  “Thanks,” Horst said, as the leading mutant fell, screaming, into the mass of his fellows below, Keira’s bolt embedded in his neck. Then the arbitrator’s head and shoulders appeared over the rim of the drop, and Drake leaned down to take his arm, hauling him to safety with as much strength as he could muster.

  “System activated,” Vex said, glancing upwards with an air which, in anyone but a techpriest, would have looked to Drake suspiciously like anxious anticipation. A loud metallic booming noise echoed though the chamber, and the mutants hesitated, milling uncertainly for a moment before renewing their attack.

  “Sin off,” Keira said, striking down with her sword at the first mutant to appear at top of the ladder. Blood fountained as she sheared through both his arms, and he toppled backwards, an expression of dull-witted astonishment on his face. The ropes parted too, and the ladder followed, taking its cargo of abhumans with it.

  “It appears to be working,” Vex said. “The door mechanism is functioning as I expected.”

  No sooner had he spoken than the water arrived, bursting like a bomb on the floor below, scattering mutants and detritus alike. The noise was worse than Drake had expected, the thunderous roar drowning out all other sounds, battering him with an almost physical force; if it hadn’t been for the comm-beads in their ears, conversation of any kind would have been impossible.

  Incredibly, the torrent just seemed to increase in power as the hold began to fill, surging up the sides of the chamber; within seconds the Angelae were drenched with spray and the backwash surging around their feet.

  “I would recommend expeditious withdrawal,” Vex said. “This is becoming rather too reminiscent of the Fathom-sound.”

  Drake nodded. “What he said,” he agreed, looking in awestruck horror at the boiling, foam-flecked cauldron, which filled the space below. A few of the hardier m
utants were still struggling to remain above the surface, but most of the bodies he could see were motionless, floating among the other flotsam.

  “Wait,” Horst instructed. “I want to make sure of the wyrd.”

  Drake nodded, scanning the surface of the water around the roaring column which still rose in the centre of the chamber; flecks of debris and mutilated corpses appeared and disappeared around it, churned to the surface and sucked back down again by the relentless waterfall in a matter of seconds.

  “There!” Keira pointed to a feebly kicking figure, its garish Secundan clothing unmistakable, as it surfaced, and began to sink again.

  “Something’s wrong,” Drake said, a nameless foreboding descending on him. The way the wyrd was moving didn’t seem right, somehow.

  Even before he’d finished speaking, Tancred spasmed, then seemed to tear open, as something huge and formless began to force its way out from inside him. Tentacles thrashing, flickering in and out of corporeal existence, and battered by the boiling waters, it struggled to find a purchase in the material world.

  “Throne on Earth, it’s another daemon!” Keira yelled, taking up a guard stance with her sword.

  Drake fumbled a fresh powerpack into his lasgun, mouthing the litany against the warpspawned he’d memorised from the Infantryman’s Uplifting Primer, and hoped that the blessing Vex had performed on the weapon was still holding. He’d taken down another of these monstrosities with it, he reminded himself, which must surely have endowed it with some enduring virtue.

  He pulled the trigger, praying to the Emperor to keep his aim true, the stream of las-bolts raising clouds of steam as they sliced through the sleeting spray. Where they struck home, they gouged ichorous craters in the abnatural flesh, but the majority of the shots passed straight through the entity; tormented by the roiling waters, it seemed to be having trouble taking form, and the more it solidified, the more it seemed to be finding itself at the mercy of the currents in the maelstrom. A moment later, still pursued by Drake’s dogged marksmanship, it was dragged under the column of water pouring from the lake chamber above.