Chapter 4: Catching a shadow
A flash and then daylight, Solusia had escaped. She knew not the world on which she had appeared, but clearly it was far from peaceful. As soon as she appeared she could hear the distant sounds of battle. She needed to find food and supplies as in her haste she only managed to bring her knife. "I suppose I should be grateful that this gate happen to lead to a still habitable planet," she thought to herself "Even if it is inhabited by humans," she muttered in disgust.
Solusia wandered through the wilderness with stealth and grace. She moved towards the sound of battle, for where there is battle, there are supplies to be scavenged. Eventually she came across the battle; it was a fortress, residing on the edge of a cliff no doubt under siege, the suns of this world were beginning to set. Judging by their movement in relativity to the time she started searching, it would be dark soon, and she would have the perfect opportunity to take what she needed from the humans. Not far from her she heard a small party moving through the forest, no doubt they thought they were moving quietly but to Solusia they might as well have been bounding through the woods.
Solusia headed towards the sound of the stumbling humans with effortless grace. She came across the pack, they seemed completely unaware of her presence. She followed them staying approximately 5 meters away. She observed them, they appeared to also be scavengers given there ragtag appearance. She figured following them would be ideal, as they clearly had been here for longer than she had and no doubt: were familiar with the area, and knew some good methods and possibly places to find good loot. She started to stalk them, they made no action to notice her presence, until, their leader looked down at a device he was carrying. "On 8!" he shouted. The entire group turned 120 degrees to their left, directly facing Solusia. She realised her position had been compromised and leapt backwards to escape the humans. They fired a barrage of lasgun fire, most of which she was able to avoid. However, she was hit twice in the leg and once in the stomach. She lay completely still, desperately hoping to hide from her pursuers.
"Hold!" their leader shouted. Solusia knew any movement would just give away her position, her only hope was to wait, and if discovered, attempt to deafen her assailants with a psychic shriek. She heard their footsteps approach, much more cautiously and controlled than before, almost as if they had been acting clumsy. There was a pause, silence. Then Solusia felt a hand grab her by the hair, she turned and shrieked with all her might. The humans were affected by the ear piercing cry but not as intended. Instead of the slumped over agonizing heap of men that usually fall before such a scream, Solusia only witnessed the humans become mildly irritated by her howl. One of the guardsmen jabbed the butt of his rifle into her jaw. Shooting pain made it nearly impossible to produce any substantial sound, of course she saw no further point in trying, as it clearly had little to no effect.
The leader of the group knelt down infront of her "You eldar think you're so bloody clever don't you? Well you arent the first pointy we've come across." He gestured to his helmet "Equipped with frequency specific noise reducing ear pieces. Made these out of the ears of chaos noize marines. This..." he held up the device he looked at earlier "Is a psychic tracking device. Shows the direction, distance and power of all psychic energies within 2 kilometers. Pulled a couple of these beauties off of some imperial psychic hunters who came to the wrong moon. You thought you were tracking us but really you were walking right into an ambush,"
Solusia was enraged, partially because she was wounded and captured, more so because she was being talked down to by a human but mostly because she was outsmarted by a group of humans on some back world rock, who were equipped with gear made from the corpses of chaos worshippers. "Put her in chains, we'll bring her back with the rest of the loot once were done here," His subordinates complied and bound Solusia with rope and chain. One of the larger ones carried her over his shoulder until they reached the battlefield. "Looks like the Imperials one this one," some of the other soldiers exchanged currency at this news. Why, was a mystery to Solusia; human customs were strange and illogical. Suddenly there was a flash a few meters back in the forest, made more apparent by the darkening sky. A large human warrior wielding a glaive stepped forward from the forest brush. "Nice of you to join us," The leader of the rebels commented upon the arrival of the human. "What are we looking at here?" "Decisive imperial victory," the first human said to the larger human while handing over currency to him. "Thank you," the larger human said, storing the currency in a pouch. "If the sororitas didn't make an appearance, you can bet your arse you'd be forking over 50," the smaller human informed the larger one. "Indeed, but the lord of change has seen fit to bless me twice today," the larger one chuckled "Bugger you and your lord of change...sir" the smaller one responded as likely some form of insult towards the larger one, without any apparent fear of repercussion.
Solusia was unwillingly fascinated by these humans customs. So fascinated in fact that she was too distracted observing the humans bizarre behavior than to maintain her prior anger at her capture. "So what do you think another hour and we move?" the little one asked "Better make it two, the sororitas may be sticking around for a bit," the big one replied. He turned and looked at Solusia. "What do we have here?" He asked examining Solusia. Her anger returned. "Some eldar thought she could get the jump on us. At least I think it's a she," The big one turned her head to the side. Solusia groaned in pain.
The big one gestured at her broken jaw "What happened here?" he asked "Bit of a screamer this one," the human carrying her remarked "Ah I see," Said the big one. After two hours of waiting, the big one gave the go ahead. As his subordinates set forth into the battlefield to scavenge for supplies, the big one sat in a meditative pose. He was concentrating on casting, what Solusia recognized, as a visual obstruction spell. It appeared as though he was casting it across the majority of the battle field. Not an easily achieved feat. One that, Solusia knew, would require a lot of concentration. This was her chance to escape. Slowly and carefully she attempted to shift herself to a jagged rock that jutted out behind her. "Don't," The Human spoke "This spell takes a lot of focus, I'd rather not break my concentration and your legs in one motion. But believe me I will," Solusia stopped scooting. "Thank you," the human commended.
The other humans were back within the hour, an hour which Solusia spent metaphorically, and somewhat physically, kicking herself for being so careless as to be caught be idiotic, clumsy, pigheaded humans. This self frustration continued as they marched their way back to camp, as opposed to teleporting because the big one was suffering from psychic fatigue, she presumed. They strolled through the foliage without any real caution at all. Which was surprising to Solusia because she knew they could be graceful, for humans. Yet they didn't seem at all concerned with running into an ambush, or concealing themselves at all. At one point they began singing. Solusia was once again fascinated by the seemingly illogical behavior of humans, while simultaneously feeling terrified that, at any moment, they would all be killed. But they weren't.
They marched on for the better part of an hour(or so) until they reached their destination. Their destination, was a fortress buried deep in the woods, mostly underground, heavily camouflaged and warded with warp and divine symbols alike, many of which Solusia had never even seen before. After gaining entry through the heavily guarded, reinforced entrance, she saw an entire city filled with war painted and armed citizens. Every adult it appeared had a lasgun strapped on their back, regardless of the activity they were presently engaged in. There were inner defences being manned by 3 man teams, heavy bolter turrets and auto cannons. They took Solusia through the streets where children pointed at her in curiosity.
The humans "escorting" her were welcomed and revered by those they passed on the street. To avoid the throngs of people, the large one splintered off from the group to head in the direction of a dirty, off-white building. But not before first taking some of the supplies that his subordinates had acquired from the field. The human scavenging party took Solusia to a sturdy looking gray building. Inside they took her to a cell with absurdly thick walls and threw her in. "Welcome to your new home pointy," one of the humans grinned before slamming the cell door shut. Solusia waited for a moment, then began to free herself from her bonds. First her arms, then her legs, then her mouth gag. Her jaw was still in a lot of pain, she assumed it was broken. She looked out her cell window and began to plan her escape.