Chapter 11: Seeing through Crosshairs
Amberley looked at the tightly sealed plasteel door before her, and a small grin because of the victory at hand appeared on her sober countenance. The moderately bright lamps in the corridor put her in a good light.
From Joshua's perspective, he could start to appreciate the Inquisitor's face framed by her blonde hair, and despite standing in front of a door he did not even know of before today, fighting his instincts that screamed she's an Inquisitor, he decided that she was very good-looking.
The moment ended, however, when she turned around to look him in the eye, and he felt the blood leave his face. Naturally, because he was still flanked by six Terminator Armour-clad Astartes, and it was hard not to think that despite having holstered their weapons, those hulking demigods would make quick work of him at the Inquisitor's orders. No matter what shape the Emperor's eyes and ears took, they were still Inquisitors, and thus no matter one's station, having good manners in the presence of an Inquisitor is always a wise choice.
"You have never been here before? And I thought you have explored every corner of the governor's residence after taking up the post." Amberley tried to ease the situation by joking, but the governor's face still seemed frozen in shock, pulling his dry-cracked lips in a feeble mimic of smiling.
By now, the Inquisitor has decided that the incumbent governor was quite simple and naive, or in other words, nigh-on stupid in politics. If not for the backing of top brass and the invasion, Joshua would never rise to the position of governor, being unable to navigate politicking and all.
But the Ordo Hereticus has made its decision, and Joshua was its appointed candidate for governor of Londinium*. She tapped her temples to ease the throbbing.
"Gracious eye of the Emperor, Olivia left in absolute haste and left me with no last instructions. When she left...vanished, Londinium was a city of the walking dead with heretics popping up all over the place, and I was kept from going anywhere except the study and meeting room by dealing with these matters, so how could I have learned of a room she had kept hidden on purpose?" Joshua seemed to recover from his anxiety as he spoke, growing slightly agitated.
"Oh...she is one to play her cards close to her chest? Let us find out what else she has kept hidden from the gaze of the Emperor, shall we?"
As the Tech-priest dealt with the combination lock, Amberley turned to Joshua, looking visibly exhausted from reliving his first days as governor.
"All I know about your predecessor is that she had brought prosperity to Londinium once with her competence and betrayed the Imperium as soon as things went south. Even though I had never asked before, I assume you and others who had helped her during her tenure have some other thoughts on her more controversial policies."
Joshua turned glum at the veiled question.
"If you really want to know, well, that woman gave us a hope, hope for a better future, of Londinium recovering its height during the Golden Age**. You only need to look outside to know how far away we are from that empty dream of hers, all that talk, and the mess she left us with. Terror, invasion, Chaos, ruins, ash," he sighed, "I have never understood how she thinks, what she thinks about, but with the benefit of hindsight it may be best for me not to understand that traitor's mindset. Thinking big brings about heresy, and a small mind can be easily filled with faith."
"If you have just spoken your mind, then praise the God-Emperor, Londinium has a bright future to look forward to under your leadership, Governor Joshua."
With that, the Inquisitor turned away from the soldier who carried Londinium's future on his shoulders to the Tech-priest dealing with the enigmatic keypad. She realized an overlooked possibility: if the lock was coded with the processing chips not approved by the Mechanicum, then the Tech-priest's cogitators would not be able to crack the locks' machine spirit.
"I have deciphered the machine spirit's 'open' combination, Eyes of the Omnissiah, with help from the previous users' deciphering dictionary; but please in all cases proceed with caution, for I fear that what awaits us behind these doors is not watched over by machine spirits," the Tech-priest finished with a nervous chitter of binary.
"That shouldn't be a problem, I do not think anyone would set up a death trap in their personal collection room." But before the intrepid Inquisitor could enter the room, an ultramarine gauntlet blocked her way forward.
"Is there anything wrong with the room, Epistolary?" Amberley raised her eyebrows at Muller's apparent trespassing on her authority.
Muller spread his arms out before him, letting the light in the corridor glint on his ceramite plates.
"I do not sense anything wrong within the room, but please stay behind me for safety concerns," he returned coolly, "I am afraid there is more to the room than I can sense now."
Even as she heard his voice, Amberley could feel the same words ring in her head.
Psykers and their telepathic abilities.
"Thank you for the offer," she acknowledged with a nod, "after you, then."
Returning the nod with a green flash, Muller stepped into the room, and the ground shook with the Astartes' footsteps while servo-motors in the armour whirred gently.
Trailing his shadow, Amberley entered the ex-governor's dark chest of wonders, which she had taken pains to keep hidden. A brief glance showed row upon row of shelves and strange tanks holding all sorts of items. An artefact propped up behind a cabinet shelf's glass door caught the Inquisitor's attention at once.
A pict-capture, with the words "shot in 969 · M02, Mankind's first step beyond Terra. In memory of those great pioneers" on the frame.
"A fine trophy to place in one's collection. Governor Olivia has undeniably good taste."
And not just that. Other articles of note include a painting bisected by red and blue, a skull of some long- extinct creature mahogany in colour, and books dating back Emperor-knows-when.
On the other side of the room, on various stands was pieces of archaeotech, some seemingly complete, and... xenos technology, like that certain teardrop-shaped ornament suspended in a display case.
"If we got hold of those before she left, that would be enough to let her be executed on the stake," Amberley remarked, gesturing at the heretek collection, "I am afraid she had it easy, don't you think so Joshua?"
Joshua forced a smile in reply, most of his mind trying to deal with the fact that, in a sense, Olivia was a highly corrupt governor. This collection must have cost a fortune, either in thrones or in favours.
"Muller, would you have a look at that teardrop in the tank? It looks Eldar in origin, have you seen it before?"
The ultramarine-clad Chief Librarian surveyed the article in question for a moment, and with a silver-blue flash that crossed his eyepieces, he nodded.
"I have seen this object before, during my service in the Deathwatch. It is a tool the Eldar use to record information and does not carry any dangerous psychic properties. It requires psychic power to activate though, your grace. I will proceed with your consent."
"Let me think for a moment."
She kept her gaze on it, as if she could find out more secrets by prying it with her eyes. If this piece of xenos technology landed in the hands of her more conservative colleagues, she did not doubt that they would ordered it to be destroyed. But she did not consider herself a strict Puritan Inquisitor like the half-mad Monodominants, and she was not on Londinium to deal with heretek. This item that Muller said stores information may give her some of the knowledge to finish her mission. While the benefits were unclear, its risk was confirmed to be minimal by a Deathwatch veteran, and that makes the venture worthwhile, even though the Eldar, being the Eldar, might have booby-trapped ones they give to Imperials.
"Go ahead then, let's see what it can show us."
Muller nodded, stretching out his arm then closing his eyes.
The teardrop-ornament recorder started to glow, then it grew brighter and brighter until a hologram started to materialize around the Eldar device, expanding out until the hologram was dozens of times larger than the psychic projector.
"Oh my...this is..."
A bright, spherical halo appeared on the exposition stand, silently displaying a detailed overview of none other than the planet of Londinium itself. Many fluctuating statistics were visible all around the main sphere, while orbital defenses, space stations and satellites in geosynchronous orbit were represented with blue and black blinking markers, slowly rotating the simulation. Oceans and rivers of toxic waste, hive clusters and canyons that crisscross the planet's surface were all highly detailed and accurately presented on the planet's simulation.
"Heresy. No mercy if she is sighted again." Joshua's voice came out cold. Maybe this map was leaked to the Chaos forces, enabling them to wreck the damage they have done to his beloved home world.
Amberley tapped the holographic user's memo box and found the tag General Machines Corporation among the highlighted notes. The tag quickly expanded into a bi-colour 3-D model of what was marked as...
"A map of the central cesspool," Muller announced, then turned his visor to Joshua, "Governor, have you seen this map before?"
"This is the first time I have ever seen a map this detailed of the region, but I do know of its existence. It is right underneath the spire, in the Hive Bottom. But why is there an underground cavern this size under it?"
"Cavern?" Amberley turned her eyes to the bottom of the cesspool, "clarify a bit, governor."
"Here," Joshua pointed to a point below the bottom of the cesspool, "it should be solid hive rubble there. With a cavern that size, if the central cesspool starts pouring into it from an opening, the resulting instability will cause a serious hive quake, taking the spire down with it. Why would such a danger to the spire remain to this day?"
"I can tell you this, governor," the Inquisitor whispered as a predator's smile emerged on her face, "our kind usually confirm one theory when we come into contact with matters that do not make sense, and that is some person, or some creature, is trying to keep their crime under wraps, away from the Emperor's watchful eyes."
*Since this is meant to be a gag, I will explain it a bit: in 2010, ex-General Secretary and President of China Jiang Zemin gave a statement on his term as leader of China, in which he said: "...but Comrade Deng Xiaoping told me 'the Central Committee has made its decision, you will be General Secretary (of the Communist Party of China)'..."
**Golden Age in this instance does not mean the Dark Age of Technology, but the Forging, starting with the reign of Maximus Thane as Lord Commander of the Imperium, and ending with the final battle of the Catelexis Heresy, in which the Black Templars caused a tremendous warp event known as 'the Howling' to be unleashed, killing billions of Astropaths. This period is called "the Golden Age of the Imperium" in the Warhammer 40,000 5th edition rulebook.
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