Prologue of Volume 1: s/12967125/1/Small-Fish-in-a-Big-Pond-Prologue

Beginning of Volume 1: s/12967139/1/Small-Fish-in-a-Big-Pond-Volume-1-Episode-1-Alackaday

Previous episode: s/13006731/1/Volume-1-Episode-4-If-You-Know-the-Enemy

Prologue

Sounds of distant blasts broke through the music in the earphones. The girl jumped off the sofa and ran to the window. Black smoke was rising to the clear sunset sky over the cottage village. Not chimneys or fireworks. The same she had seen from the balcony of the orphanage before the Sisters led them out of the classrooms. She kicked the door open, rushed to the living room. Mother and Father weren't there.

She saw the old mercenary coming upstairs with a gun in his hands, clad in a full carapace suit. 'Uncle, what's on? Where are Mom and Dad?'

'Lassie, put on your coat and hat, quicker. Heretics are upon us. They've blown up a few houses already.'

'Will they go too?'

Four years ago she had been hiding in the smouldering ruins for two days until she heard human voices in the yard. A man and a woman with Aquila sigils on their armour. Soldiers and militiamen were unearthing corpses of her friends and Sisters from the rubble left of her home. Two more younger girls had survived the bombing but died in hospital a week later. She was left alone. She tried to help the Inquisitors watching over the wounded citizens, cooking for them like the Sisters had taught her. The Inquisitors asked her how she had got to the orphanage but she remembered nothing apart from the little town at the sea that was no more.

It had been winter like now when they left her homeworld together. To the starry void she had dreamt of seeing when she was stupid and happy. With no children of their own, they didn't give her away to another convent. The next world they stopped on was almost as good as her own. A few months had passed, and she started calling them Mother and Father. When they left their cottage for the mysterious excavation sites daily, she stayed home reading books they'd bought for her, walking in the garden, studying with the sage acolytes. Uncle was her best friend in the retinue. He always brought her sweets when he arrived home from duty, told funny stories about his war adventures. Once she asked him about his family but he didn't answer. She had never seen him that sad before.

Uncle led her to the ground floor. The small cellar door that had always been closed was swung open, and chilly wind blew in to the rooms. Mother met them, a squad of Storm Troopers besides her. In power armour she hadn't worn since the day they'd found the girl. Wall panels had been removed to reveal control screens and cogitators. Father was tapping on the main screen, both tech-acolytes helping him at the terminals.

'We're leaving now, Mom?'

Mother leaned over to hug her.

'Sorry, Volentia. We'll join you later when we deal with the assault.'

'Let me stay with you. I'm afraid the heretics will...'

Mother didn't let her finish the phrase.

'Everything happens by His will alone. Say a prayer for us on the way.'

Father turned back from the cogitators. The girl reached out for him.

'Uncle will lead you to a good man's place,' he said. 'My childhood friend from the Schola.'

Tears on her eyes, she looked at the mansion for the last time when Uncle helped her climb up to the underground tunnel exit on the edge of the cottage village. For the last time. A blaze of excruciating brightness dazzled her for a few seconds. The echo of the blast sounded in her ears, inside her head like no other sound before. A bout of sickness brought her to her knees in deep snow.

'Lassie, quicker. That's witch-stuff.'

At midnight, in a small shuttle the Governor gave them, grief finally broke out. The Governor had told her many polite words about his sympathy for her loss, promised to bring the criminals to justice, wished to get over the mourning. Things like that happen to many, if not most Imperial citizens. Her foster parents had joined her friends by His side. She tried to show resilience they had taught her but when the shuttle left the planet, tears rolled down her cheeks again.

Uncle sat on his seat, his eyes red, his hands trembling. He'd taken a bottle of amasec from the Governor's mansion, and it was almost empty by now.

'We're friends in mishap, lassie. Remember asking me about my family? I was happy to have a wife and two bonnie kids. And I was stupid to start wandering away from home when they grew up. One day, I returned to my home planet only to find them all killed in a heretical riot.'

He breathed out as if he'd got rid of a great burden.

'Are they with the Emperor now, Uncle?'

'They are, lassie. But we have work to do before we join them. We're going to see your father's friend, a fellow Inquisitor. He'll bring you to a Schola where you'll learn to become a Sister of Battle, a Commissar or even an Inquisitor like your parents.'

They had to spend a few hours searching across the hive city on the arrival. The gaunt man with a yellow face of a drunkard they found in a dirty bar looked more like a marketplace beggar than a Witch-hunter. When they greeted him, he took a well-thumbed rosette out of his pocket.

'Dead along with his ball and chain?' He spat the cigarette butt to the floor and gulped another shot of moonshine browsing through her parents' testament. 'Thought they kicked the bucket years ago.'

'Sir, I hope for your assistance in finding a decent Schola for the young lady,' said Uncle.

'Schola, Schola... Well, listen here. I have a better idea. Half of my goons have just had their throats cut by my best buddy of a nemesis. Girl, what about entering my most fancy company of heroes?'

'Unthinkable, sir. Miss Volentia is only fourteen. She needs proper education.'

'I've employed underhive teens. They're the best workers, with little trash in their heads, useful to sneak everywhere. Girl, being an Inquisitor is just awesome. You'll have adventures in the slurs, go to smuggler parties, travel to real xeno worlds. You'll befriend a Drukhari corsair and might get a round red squig as a pet for your next birthday.'

Uncle pursed his lips. Something slammed into the window glass from the outside, and splinters scattered all over the bar stand. Boozers ran out with guns in their hands. The inquisitor walked to the window and kicked the dark bundle on the floor to the corner. The girl grabbed Uncle's hand.

'The bastard has cut another goon's head,' the Inquisitor said with a snicker. 'But I have more and just don't give a damn.'

'I'm sorry, sir. Lassie, let's go. I still have friends across the galaxy that can help us.'

'You may bugger off but the girl will stay. I need a reserve candidate for an Interrogator if my current one gets flayed by the Night Lords or blown up with a grenade in his pillow. The testament states I have the guardian rights after my buddy's death.'

'I'll become an Inquisitor, sir?' She spoke for the first time since the landing.

'If you survive. But anyway, it's fun to serve in my crew for even a month. Just don't wallow, fine? Here's your laspistol to drill a hole or two in any cocksucker that attacks us today. When we get back to our hostel, I'll show you a glass jar with a Pink Horror inside.'

'Let me sign the contract as well.' Uncle frowned at the inquisitor with suspicion.

'Only if you can cook. Otherwise, hired guns are cheap as shit.'