A lot and a lot and a lot of Imperial yakking here, partly because that's just how I like it but mostly because this chapter kind of got away from me, hence why it's of a reasonably hefty size. Oops.
Also because, you know, the characters have split now, so the Imperials are over here and the ME people are over there. And since this story is going to be running into a bazillion words it'll all shake out in the end anyway. In a few hundred chapters we'll all probably be bollock-deep in Reapers and won't even remember any of this.
I'm sure it all makes perfect sense.
Just as Jarrion had said, bright and early the next morning (by ship-time), the Assertive finally cast off from the orbit of Illium, much to the relief of those on the ground who'd been living in the shadow of the thing for however many days now, the vast majority of whom were still none-the-wiser as to who owned it or why it had just shown up.
Charting the course and returning to Nephros - being the gas giant around which they had first appeared and nearby to which presumably the phenomenon was still located - was not all that difficult. Altrx was getting to be quite the dab-hand at navigating in a galaxy lacking an Astronomicon. He was apparently making very good progress on that book he was writing on the subject, apparently.
He had offered Jarrion the opportunity to write a foreword, being the Lord Captain and all. Jarrion had politely demurred.
That the system Nephros occupied was surveyed and named and known in relation to those around it also helped in getting there, obviously. Made it much easier to pinpoint it relative to those spots on the galactic map that served as points of reference. Jarrion had made a note of its name, it really wasn't that hard to get back to in the scheme of things.
The real trick, once there, was finding the anomaly, as it turned out. 'In orbit' was a big place, after all, especially for a planet as large as a gas giant. Even equipped with the readings and with the Assertive's not inconsiderably powerful sensorium turned towards tracking it down it proved illusive, this...whatever it was they were looking for, this as-yet uncategorised hole in space and time.
Turned out it wasn't still in orbit anyway, in the end, but exactly where it had been back when it had been in orbit, before it Nephros had carried on along its way around its star, so a little bit out of orbit at this point. Space continued to amaze and astound. It probably made sense to someone, or else made the opposite of sense and frustrated that same someone. One of those two, or somewhere in the middle.
Jarrion had them drop a buoy, just for future reference. It'd probably get destroyed or displaced in however many years it took for Nephros to go all the way around again and smack into it (or just fling it into deep space, or whatever), but buoys were cheap and that was a problem for the future.
A future that might include a nice House Croesus colony in-system, serving as a gateway between the Imperium and this exciting new galaxy of opportunity, making future buoys unnecessary?
Anything was possible.
But that was, as said, something for the future. For now there were immediate concerns and issues now that they'd actually found the thing, namely what it actually was, and was it actually safe?
With the Assertive parked up next to it close enough for a very good visual and with it up on the bridge's main pictscreen it was impossible to tell. It was just there. Jarrion did not have extensive experience of inexplicable and unique holes in space or time or the Warp or anything of that ilk but he'd rather expected them to look more impressive.
He'd expected lightning at least, or some sort of crackling energy. The sort you saw when translating from realspace to the Warp, say. Or something with swirling edges. Or some sort of other obvious visual distortion. Something, anything - anything that might suggest that this was a portal of importance, a spatial anomaly to be respected and admired.
But no, nothing. As in it was just nothing. A wafer-thin disc of blackness against the stars. If you weren't there looking for it and if you hadn't known it was there to look for in the first place, you'd never have looked twice.
And you wouldn't have been there to look twice in the first place anyway.
It was rather ominous in appearance, actually. It was just there, not doing anything other than existing when by rights it probably shouldn't and not even having the decency to make a fuss about it. Jarrion had been hoping for the numinous and instead all he'd got was the quietly sinister and low-key.
Oh well. No sense in complaining.
"Was it that large when we arrived?" He asked, turning to Magos Blix. The Magos, along with a small knot of lesser tech priests he'd brought along, had taken over a portion of the bridge and were now furiously using the Assertive's sensorium to analyse and scrutinise the space-hole.
Pak was also trying to get in on this, but was meeting with surprisingly little success, being more-or-less sidelined by Blix and relegated to standing behind him and the other tech priests in silence. It was hard to tell, but Jarrion suspected that this was making Pak deeply annoyed.
Magos Blix fiddled about a bit more with the console he'd taken over, conversed in brief bursts of binaric with his cronies and then turned to Jarrion and said:
/size of anomaly has increased approximately one hundred and seventy three percent compared to initial data readings/margin of error five percent/answer: no it was not that large/
This sounded like a rather large increase to Jarrion.
"It's not going to get any bigger, is it?" He asked, doing his best to keep any of the mild concern he was starting to feel out of his voice as he spoke.
The thought that it might was a little uncomfortable.
/unknown/insufficient data/possibility of continued expansion/further data could extrapolate or confirm/
Not the most reassuring of answers. Jarrion stroked his chin.
"Well I could certainly use some more data before I do anything with that hole."
There came a snort from somewhere to his side. He didn't need to look to know why.
"Grow up, Loghain," he said, continuing to stroke.
On-screen, the hole continued to do what it had been doing the whole time, which is to say nothing at all other than hang there looking ominous and inscrutable and big.
Most things in the galaxy - and especially those you encountered in space - would probably kill you if you approached them wrong, Jarrion knew. Most things had about ninety-nine different ways to kill you when you interacted with them and one way that wouldn't kill you, and that was the correct way. The problem was that, from the outside, you rarely knew which way was which, and finding out blind was, well, something of a gamble.
Delicacy was key. Or Jarrion was just paranoid. Or maybe somewhere in the middle, again.
Still, this was important, as this particular ominous and inscrutable and big thing in space was also very possibly a way back home, and sitting around and staring at it wasn't getting them anywhere. Jarrion very much doubted that poking and prodding at the bridge's consoles was going to yield much of value either, at least not in any timeframe that suited him. He had things to do, places to be.
Bold action was required.
"If more data is what is needed, more data is what we shall have," he said, boldly, taking charge. Orders followed and action was taken.
First, an unmanned, servitor-driven augur probe of the sort typically used for examining unusual things in space was launched towards the breach (as it was tentatively being referred to, though no-one could remember who'd started calling it that). This seemed appropriate enough, given that the breach was certainly fairly unusual by just about anyone's standards.
The probe's instructions were simple: it was to pass through the breach (if passing it through it was possible, which this would demonstrate if nothing else), loiter for a minute on the other side, then return. Very simple, nice and straightforward.
This the probe did without any obvious problems. It passed through, it loitered, it returned. Just like that.
Obviously far, far too easy.
Once it was back onboard it was immediately stripped of its gathered data which was poured over with great interest. To the disappointment of all tech priests involved - Pak included, again, they having muscled in more successfully this time and having managed to basically take over from Blix the moment the probe had re-appeared, much to Blix's obvious displeasure - the data was the very picture of benign.
So with the information the probe had gathered proving to be too pleasant, the probe itself was the next target. It was transferred to the main hanger where it could be thoroughly dismantled, Blix and his cohort moving as fast as their augmetic limbs could carry them, Pak fighting to be at the front and Jarrion bringing up the rear, Thale shadowing him.
And dismantled the probe was, respectfully and with all due care taken and all appropriate rituals observed, if hurried. The thing was practically stripped bare, every part and component pored over for defects or damage or signs of corruption or anything that might indicate that its little jaunt hadn't been as comfortable as it had appeared.
But no dice.
The probe had suffered no damage and, to all appearances, the universe on the other side was perfectly acceptable and welcoming. Even time had passed on an apparent one-to-one basis, which beggared belief.
Safe. Easy.
Far too safe and easy. There had to be a catch.
For the next test they needed something a little different. Something to confirm that it was safe to travel through, that there would be no immediate and unhealthy consequences to a living crew.
With Jarrion's permission a handful of prisoners were procured from the brig, for there were always prisoners in the brig. These men, some still too drunk to stand and all securely shackled, were loaded onto one of the Assertive's lighters. The lighter's servitor backup pilot was given the same simple instructions as the probe had been given - go, loiter, return - and the lighter was then launched.
All waited.
Once the time was up the lighter returned, just like it was supposed to and just like none of those watching and waiting had been expecting it to.
The breach - that damn silent hole in space - hadn't so much as flickered.
Once unloaded and checked it was quickly found that the prisoners were all none the worse for wear, entirely unharmed. Though one had thrown up, this was assumed to be unrelated to the journey through the breach and more to do with the illicit alcohol he had consumed and which was now, mixed with his dinner, congealing across the floor of the lighter, the drink smelling only slightly worse having come up than it had on going down.
The prisoners were made to hose the lighter clean. They were then duly returned to the brig, partly for continued observation, mostly because they were still guilty.
(The brig was secure and sturdy enough that, if the prisoners did turn out to have been tainted by their trip through the breach, the damage could be better continued and the casualties limited - hopefully - to whoever else happened to be in the brig at the time.)
While that had been going on, the tech priests had been scrabbling their way through all the data they could lay their mechadendrites on, waving dataslates about, having servitors drag cogitators down to the hanger and even going so far as to start partially dismantling the lighter before the hosing off had even finished, though thankfully on this at least they had been been restrained.
Ultimately though they didn't learn anything that changed the obvious. Everything was as straightforward as it appeared to be, as unlikely as that was.
As much as the tech priests might have liked to suspect the breach was monumentally dangerous, everything they'd seen, every sensor reading and quite literally everything they'd thrown at it was showing that it was, in fact, entirely safe, almost to the point of being ridiculously, ludicrously, hilariously safe. Eventually they yielded and admitted as much, though it clearly pained them. It just made no sense.
Jarrion could hardly believe his luck.
Indeed, he might have suffered a minor attack of helpless laughter as the sheer perfection of the situation sunk in. Perfect, perfect! Beyond perfect! Simply unimaginable! Not in his wildest fantasies could it ever have been so perfect!
A lighter didn't even have a Geller field and those men had been entirely unharmed! Obviously they might later present something, but initial inspection was outrageously positive! A breach through time and space! From one universe to another! Through a hole ripped by a Warp drive! And yet a trip as simple as walking from one side of the street to the other.
A man in a spacesuit could have done it! With his eyes closed! Backwards! Probably.
The Assertive, being a proper voidcraft, would be safe as houses. Perfect.
Impossible, as said, yes. But perfect. Impossibly perfect. Providence indeed!
The Emperor truly did protect.
"Well, as resoundingly unlikely as it all seems that looks to be it, wouldn't you say?" Jarrion said once the excitement had died down and most of the equipment the tech priests had brought in had been taken away again. Even Pak had wandered off, apparently having lost interest, leaving only Jarrion, Thale, Blix and his cohort and perhaps a handful of crewmen who are barely worth noting.
/further data required/
Jarrion blinked and then pointed, bewildered, at the lighter, as though that settled everything.
"Further data required? What else could you possibly hope to learn! We sent men through it and they returned! None the worse for wear! Or no worse than when we sent them," he said.
The lighter was none-the-worse for wear, either, but Jarrion hadn't felt the need to point that out. It was obviously in one piece, and every inch of it had been thoroughly scrutinised for traces of Warp-based contamination, coming up with nothing. That didn't mean there was nothing, Jarrion knew, but it was at least a reliable indication. Certainly reliable enough that he felt safe standing near the thing.
/further data required/variables not yet explored/possibility exists of unknown risks/
Life was nothing but the possibility of unknown risks, as far as Jarrion was concerned, but at a certain point you just had to grit your teeth and forge onward. Jarrion gritted his teeth.
"Time is money, Magos. We can sit here and ponder our navels and the mysteries of the universe for years, I'm sure, and spend those years throwing all manner of increasingly expensive items at that hole, but there are things I need to do and many of those things require me being on the other side of that," he said.
/variables not yet explored/traversal of breach inadvisable/further data required/
Rarely enjoyable when a Magos started to repeat themselves.
Had Blix possessed a tone of voice Jarrion was fairly certain it might have started to sound annoyed here, or petulant. As it happened the Magos sounded exactly like he usually did, which is to say mostly monotone but just ever-so-slightly off-pitch that he kept you guessing.
"Yes yes, it's always best to have a good grasp of the risks involved in anything but I'd say that we do now, and so I want to know quite plainly if we can use it? Yes or no? Just a yes or a no," Jarrion said.
/further da-/
"Yes or no, Magos."
Blix emitted a quiet grinding sound for a few seconds before saying:
/yes/
"Excellent. You may return to your other duties, Magos, it seems we are done here."
Blix stared at Jarrion for a second or so before leaving the hanger without another word, giving only the briefest of brief bows in deference to Jarrion's rank. Had Blix the sort of face that allowed him to glare he likely would have done so, but as it stood all he could manage was a stare. Jarrion wouldn't have cared either way, about the glare or the utter lack of respect for his position (at least not this time). He'd got what he'd wanted and now it was time for the bold actions to continue.
Time was, as he'd said, money.
"Back to the bridge, Thale," he said, striding off, and a brisk pace and a jaunt on a few lifts and travelators later saw them both back on the bridge in short order, receiving salutes as Jarrion returned to his command throne.
Loghain was exactly where she'd been before all the fun with the probe and the lighter, having apparently decided to spend the time that Jarrion had been down in the hanger sitting in her chair twiddling her thumbs. Something about that was vaguely unnerving to Jarrion.
"Enlightening?" She asked as he sat down.
"Very," he said before raising his voice and pointing forward to the pictscreen and the ominous space hole still hanging there. "Line the ship up with the breach then take us through, slow and steady."
There were no questions or clarifications asked about this order as it was followed, as well there shouldn't have been, but Jarrion didn't need Loghain's Warp-trickery to pick up on the sense of tension among the crew on the bridge. He had to admit to a certain low, tickling anxiety himself, one that he was ably keeping pushed down where it couldn't bother him.
He was concerned, somewhere between mildly and strongly concerned, about what might happen were the Assertive to scrape or otherwise touch the sides of the breach as it moved through. He imagined that it would be bad, but did not want to find out how bad.
Thankfully, given how much the hole had grown, there was room to spare, and the ship moved through with no issues at all.
And they were back. Just like that.
Easy enough to make anyone uncomfortable.
Not all smooth sailing, though.
Well, mostly smooth sailing. Almost completely smooth sailing. But they did have to stop after having passed through to take stock and double-check that everything was where it was meant to be and nothing had gone wrong. Blix was very, very insistent on this and Jarrion wasn't going to argue with it because he would have been insistent on it himself.
Jarrion probably wouldn't have been as insistent on a full level one diagnostic on all of the Assertive's primary systems because he probably would have felt this was going a bit overboard, but better safe than sorry, he supposed, and it did give them time to re-orientate themselves. Pootling around the other galaxy had had them using different reference points and now they needed to get their eye in again, in Altrx's case his third eye.
So that ate up a few hours, during which Jarrion paced furiously and dictated lists of equipment and supplies to Torian, who meticulously noted it all down. Loghian was asleep in her seat, or pretending to be, though she did wake up surprisingly quickly and easily when Jarrion had lunch brought to him.
The Assertive was, in the end, totally fine, the diagnostics showing up nothing out of the ordinary and definitely nothing untoward. The transition through the breach had been utterly benign, just as as signs indicated it would be and just as Jarrion had hoped.
Not a moment after that had been straightened out they were off at full speed, making for Port Mercian, the expansive orbital facility sat right at the very edge of the Sector abutting a good chunk of House Croesus' wilderness holdings and the volume of space that Jarrion had been in before all the excitement and was now back in, having returned.
Port Mercian was primarily a stopping-off point for the meagre Navy patrols on this edge of the Sector while also serving as a reasonable but unremarkable trading hub, but more importantly for jarrion it was his de-facto base of operations for what was supposed to have been nothing more than flying the colours and sorting out the woes of some House Croesus colonists.
How long ago all that seemed now!
With Jarrion's lists of equipment and material Astropathically sent ahead and (hopefully) arriving before them, the plan was to dock at Port Mercian, take on all that which he felt was necessary to tackle the challenges ahead, turn around and head back to the breach with all haste. No sense in wasting time, after all.
Though, if there were any lingering doubts that they were back in their own galaxy they were quickly dispelled once they were underway. Jarrion had got quite used to the smooth, comfortable travelling the other side of the breach, with its tranquil Immaterium. There hadn't been any nightmares on the other side. There were nightmares now, and a sense of pressure that he had entirely forgotten about.
It also took longer. Not much longer, but noticeably. A day or two into their journey and Jarrion, more through sheer boredom than anything else, invited Loghain for a drink and a chat.
They would have been in the observation blister - purely so that Jarrion could make a point that he had invited her to take drinks there so she couldn't make a joke about it in future - but, with the ship presently travelling through the Warp, there wasn't much to observe.
Or, there was, but it wouldn't have done either of them much good to observe it.
And so it was that they were instead in one Jarrion's rooms, sat in comfortable chairs with glasses of expensive amasec, beneath an impressively large painting of his father's ship The Virtue of Disdain.
Jarrion had expected more needling from the Inquisitor about his invitation (who else was he supposed to have a conversation with? Altrx was usually fairly interesting company but he was steering the ship, who did that leave? Thale? Pak?) but to his surprise she seemed instead rather subdued, more fixated on fiddling with the glass in her hands than anything else.
This perplexed him at first, before he eventually put it down to being back where the Warp was less still, and this perhaps weighing on her more than it might a normal person, what with her being a witch and all.
As far as explanations went this was one that satisfied Jarrion, or at least satisfied him enough not to actually ask her if anything was on her mind. He was confident that, if anything was, she'd tell him in due course.
And it was so:
"I don't think Blix likes Pak much," Loghain said, out of the blue. Not at all what Jarrion had expected but it was unobtrusive enough that he was easily able to roll with it.
"Oh, how can we tell, really?"
"Well, I can read minds," Loghain pointed out.
"You shouldn't make a habit of that, it's impolite."
Which was putting it mildly, mostly for comedic effect.
"Sometimes I really can't help it! Honestly. Sometimes it comes off people like a heat haze. You'd have thought a tech priest would have been better at controlling their feelings, wouldn't you?"
"Hmm, well, be that as it may whether they're friends or not is hardly relevant, their duties do not overlap."
"Pak's duties seem to overlap with whatever they feel like doing at the time," Loghain said.
"You are...not wrong," Jarrion said, trying and failing to come up with a proper explanation of what Pak's actual role on the ship was, other than the thoroughly meaningless 'Explorator'.
A pause.
"I'm not reading your mind, just to say. You can put your hand down," Loghain said. Jarrion blinked at her, then realised he had in fact raised his hand to his temple without noticing having done so. He scratched his head then let his hand drop.
"I had an itch," he said.
"Of course you did."
Further silence.
"It's rather suspicious, isn't it?" Loghain asked, out of nowhere.
"What is?" Jarrion asked.
"That hole, breach, whatever," Loghain said, waving a hand. Jarrion cocked his head at her.
"How so?"
"You get presented with a route back home, no drawbacks, no dangerous price to pay? No consequences? Just a simple pop and done? Not just any route either, the way you arrived! Stable as anything. Bigger than when you arrived, in fact, just to make steering through again that little bit easier! Things like that don't happen."
Loghain sounded personally insulted. Jarrion took a sip before replying.
"Apparently they do," he said, cooly.
"Well they shouldn't."
"Oh Loghain, stop sounding so sour. Would you rather we not have returned? And do stop sulking, it's unbecoming of your station. This is providence, I told you! My venture here is blessed and has been blessed from the very moment it started! How else can you explain it? All is going according to plan. Ours isn't to question these things, it is simply to make the most of them! Our path is laid out before us. To do anything else but follow it would be, well, going against the will of the Emperor!" Jarrion said. Loghain fixed him with as level a stare as it was possible for someone with no eyes to do.
"Modest, aren't you? And as a rule you don't get very far as an Inquisitor by not being suspicious about things, from people all the way up to holes in space," she said.
"No, I suppose you don't. Would you have preferred we died horribly?" Jarrion asked.
"I would have felt vindicated in the few seconds before we were annihilated, but I wouldn't say I'd have preferred it. And while I'm on the subject, actually, isn't it a little dangerous, leaving this backdoor here for anyone to wander in?"
"Given that you're not a voidfarer by trade, Inquisitor, it may come as a surprise to you to learn that space is rather large, and the odds of anyone wandering anywhere by accident are so slim as to be practically non-existent. Even with the buoy there the odds are so slim as to be practically non-existent, I assure you. Unlikely things happen every day, yes, but there are still limits. I am not especially worried about anything going either in or out of this, ah, hole."
Jarrion hadn't thought about how that last part might sound until he'd said it, and once he had he wrinkled his nose in distaste and waited for Loghain to make some snide remark. Much to his amazement, she didn't, instead asking:
"Well, how about this: are you worried about what the Imperial response is going to be once someone finds out about this? And they will find out."
This much was obvious. Even if Jarrion hadn't been planning on lodging a proper, formal report with the proper, formal authorities (which he was, at whatever he deemed was the most practical opportunity), it would have been naive indeed to assume that word of what had happened and what had been found wouldn't somehow find its way to the proper authorities.
He was, for one thing, talking to an Inquisitor.
Not that Jarrion appeared at all concerned. He slicked his hair back with one hand and waved his glass about with the other, casually.
"Oh, not overly. Not that I'm 'worried' in the first place, obviously - why would I be worried about the proper function of the Imperium, hmm? I just don't think it's an immediate concern. And as-and-when the powers-that-be even come to hear of it I expect there'll be a lot of discussion, perhaps some investigation and, eventually, either a decision to quarantine it until another decision can be made or else send through some sort of exploratory, armed force. Depending on what else is going on at the time, of course. Personally, I think the former option is highly, highly unlikely. Hardly worth committing resources to another universe when you've already got one to worry about!"
"So the answer to the question would be that you are not worried at all, then?" Loghain asked and Jarrion had to pause to swallow the sip he was taking and then shake his head.
"Not especially," he said again, this time with a shrug, spreading his arms. "Whatever happens won't happen for decades anyway, and that's if things go quickly. Have you ever seen the organisation that goes into a Crusade? Even a minor one? And that's where they can see a clear and present danger! No, I shall have abundant freedom to make good use of the place without interference. By the time there is a proper Imperial response it'll just be a case of arriving to see what a fine welcome I'll have set up over there!"
"Aim high, Lord Captain."
"What's the point in aiming anywhere else?"
"The Inquisition might move faster, you know. So might the Mechanicus…"
Two bodies of note with access to spaceships, a known interest in strange happenings and a broad disdain for Imperial bureaucracy, or at least ways of circumventing it (largely by ignoring it).
Jarrion, having had another sip and perhaps misjudged it, winced for a moment at the burning and gestured to Loghain with the index finger of his hand-holding glass. Jarrion was not wrong when he held to the belief that having a drink gave you a wonderful, conversation-enriching prop to work with.
"Ah, you have a point, that was a concern for me, too. However, I've given it some thought and come to the conclusion that these two parties are also not a pressing concern," he said, setting the glass aside now that it was empty and he'd recovered. Loghain lent back in her chair ever-so-slightly and tilted her head another way.
"Is that right?"
"I imagine - and do tell me if I'm reading you or your peers wrong - that should you choose to report this strange event to your superiors, whoever and wherever they may be, assuming you even have any, they will note it as an interesting development that does not rank in urgency anywhere near the dozen of other pressing issues they no-doubt are grappling with. You will, therefore, in such an event, either be released to deal with it as you personally see fit with little ongoing oversight or else be politely but firmly directed towards something that might actually affect the Imperium. You know, your job, Loghain?"
"So you don't think that if I drop this bombshell that there'll be Inquisitors by the dozen all falling over themselves to come see if I was telling the truth or not? Just a whole mess of Inquisitors scrambling to be the first to slide themselves into this strange hole."
There it was. Jarrion sighed and took a moment to let that line just waft over him.
"No, I do not. I imagine most won't believe you anyway, and those that do won't care enough to do anything about it, at least not right now. One supposes they hear quite a lot of outlandish stories in their line of work, and can hardly go chasing after all of them. And especially when, as said, you appear to be already looking into it anyway."
Loghain couldn't make a joke out of this, and try as she might she couldn't actually really argue with his assessment, either. She'd met her colleagues, after all, and she knew how most of them operated. More to the point, she knew how she operated and knew what she'd do if she caught wind of something similar being brought back.
She'd do more-or-less what Jarrion had assumed the others would do. Ignore it and continue with her own business.
And that was assuming she mentioned it at all to anyone, which she wasn't under any real obligation to do in the first place. Not that she'd tell Jarrion that. He seemed to suspect as much already, wouldn't do her any good to confirm it.
"...you may be onto something there…" she said. "And the Mechanicus? What's your keen insight into their response and why it won't matter?"
"My guess - and again, I may very well be wrong - is that Pak will not tell anyone about this, certainly not their peers and especially certainly not their superiors. I can't really speak for Blix but given his years of service dedicated to the Assertive specifically I can't help but imagine he views anything not related to the ship as a hobby at best and a distraction at worst. The other tech priests are even more bound to the ship than Blix is and couldn't really care less even if they were aware of what happened, which most are not. Or so I like to think."
Tech priests were a myopic lot, often disinterested in things outside their jurisdiction or area of interest to the point of outright aggression. Pak was something of an exception given that they were an Explorator and so it was their job to be interested in unusual things, regardless of what they were.
What's more, apart from Blix and a handful of other tech priests that had accompanied Jarrion here or there to set up this or that and who had also actively helped analyse the breach prior to the return trip, basically all of the Assertive's compliment of tech priests had remained at their stations, attending to their duties, oblivious to what had happened and what Jarrion was doing. And of those few that had set foot off the ship all they'd seen were planets and space stations - nothing really out of the ordinary for them.
Blix was probably the only one with even an inkling of the situation, given he'd had to disembark and inspect non-Imperial spacecraft for suitability and also examine the strange anomaly that was the breach, and even that wasn't exactly beyond the realm of possibility back home where unusual spacecraft and strange space phenomena weren't unknown.
And on top of that Jarrion was, as said, pretty sure that the Magos couldn't have given less of a flying fuck anyway.
Or whatever it was the Mechanicus gave in such situations where most normal people would give a flying fuck or not give a flying fuck. Give less than a very arcane flying fuck, presumably, and one that was thousands of years old and irreplaceable and required very delicate handling and occasional anointing with oil in order to fly properly as it wasn't given.
Jarrion had given this some thought. Perhaps too much thought.
"Pak will keep all this to themselves? All this?" Loghain asked, doubt plain in her voice.
"Of course. Have you met many Magos, Loghain?" Jarrion asked.
"A few."
You bumped into all sorts in her line of work.
"Are they known for disclosing information to one another in a free and easy manner, or keeping to themselves everything it is possible to keep to themselves if it seems even the slightest bit valuable?" Jarrion asked.
Loghain was going to say something pithy in response to puncture his rhetorical questioning when what he'd said actually sunk in and she realised he was pretty much entirely on the money. Magos were sometimes known to assassinate one another if they thought they could get away with it, so doing something as low-effort as just not saying they'd found something to keep others away was certainly not beyond the realms of possibility.
Why let a rival try and slide in to swipe your shiny new stuff out from under your nose, after all? Why tell the bigger kids you'd found something cool? Why be a rung on someone else's ladder when you should be the one climbing?
"...you know, you're sharper than you look," Loghain said. Jarrion gave a tiny bow, or as much of one as he could while sitting. More of a slight forward dip and an extravagant hand gesture than anything.
"I have my moments. So no, assuming my guesses are accurate I don't think anything will really come of the Inquisition or the Mechanicus, at least not yet. Other than, I expect, you making a return appearance," he said, sharply. Loghain gave a tiny bow of her own.
"Well I'd let you get on with this on your own but I know you'd miss me if I left for good."
"Clearly you're better at reading people than I am if you're able to pick up on signals so subtle most wouldn't think they were even there," Jarrion said, tartly.
"Oh, it's not subtle that you'd miss me."
"I defer to your expertise, Loghain."
More quiet, slightly more comfortable this time. Less a moment of awkward silence and more just a natural resting point between topics. It wasn't altogether unpleasant, Jarrion thought, which was why he knew he wouldn't last.
"I have another question," said Loghain.
"Of course you do," Jarrion said, sighing, glancing over again to the amasec and considering a refill. He hadn't even finished his current glass yet.
"What are you going to do about the Reapers?" Loghain asked. This one took Jarrion a second to get, then he remembered what that word meant in this context.
"Hmm? Oh, those. The, ah, the ones that Commander is concerned about? You know, I haven't given them that much thought, I'll admit," he said.
"You probably should."
Jarrion took a sip.
"Pressing, is it?"
"A little bit. Only going by second-hand information, of course. Were it happening here and now I'd be less worried, but back there, the state their galaxy is in, how we saw things? It's a bit on the existential side," Loghain said and though Jarrion waited for a punchline or a little joke at the end there wasn't one. He raised an eyebrow.
"That bad?" He asked. Loghain shrugged.
"It could be. Some seem to think it will be. The Commander certainly does, I didn't even have to probe too deeply to learn that. Her and her crew, aliens and humans both, they were all on the same page. And those Council aliens might have been in denial and not in full possession of the facts but even they had gnawing doubts and worries. They were hiding them, wrapping them in excuses, but they were there. Anyone who knows - not the ones who've heard rumours, the ones who know - seems worried," she said.
Jarrion swilled his glass about a moment and then necked the rest, wincing briefly.
"Hmm."
This wasn't something he really had an opinion on.
Jarrion knew for a fact that the galaxy, his galaxy, was teeming with vile aliens and other even more malign forces who would all eagerly and happily see humanity wiped away, enslaved or even worse and that the only thing standing between them and this fate was the Emperor, His Imperium and His loyal servants (like Jarrion himself, for example. And Loghain too, he supposed).
These were just facts. Existential, aggressive forces were something to be expected. They were normal, everyday. Every moment was a struggle for survival. While the Imperium would eventually triumph over all its enemies, much of mankind stood daily upon the knife edge of annihilation. Complacency, indolence and impiety could very easily spell doom for millions - billions, even.
That was just life, those were the challenges and with faith they rose to meet them and with faith humanity was destined to rule the galaxy. Just how it was.
But back on the other side of the breach, through that hole, they had no Emperor, no Imperium, no united front, no guiding force, no faith. Worse, what might have passed for a united front - that Council of theirs - was anything but and a lot of them, most of them, were aliens. What chance did they have?
Jarrion had read about their wars and had not been impressed. Conflicts that had been written about as severe and devastating sounding like the sort of thing that might be embroiling any number of Sectors in the Imperium even as he was thinking about them. Or a Sub-Sector, even.
Though, in fairness to them, the bizarre nature of their spaceships - what with their reliance on those 'Mass Relays' - did make things slightly different, but only slightly. It spread their wars out a bit. The scale of the conflict was still nothing that would have caused undue concern back here, Jarrion was confident.
So what would the Reapers be like, then? Bad, presumably. Very bad indeed.
Jarrion wasn't an expert, but those few snippets and bits and pieces he'd picked up here and there did suggest an unfriendly picture. A picture that he was increasingly aware none of those back in the other galaxy were capable of confronting alone, and which was apparently nothing they felt like confronting together. Assuming aliens were even capable of working together effectively in the first place, which was a stretch.
So very bad indeed, yes.
Was all of his investment going to be for nothing?
"Have you considered letting them do it?" Loghain asked, and Jarrion was so deep in thought it took him a second to realise she'd spoken at all, and it was only her nudging his leg that got his attention in the first place.
"Do what? Cleanse the galaxy of life or whatever it is they're apparently intent on doing?" Jarrion asked, bemused.
"Yes," Loghain said bluntly. Jarrion just stared at her.
"Why in the Emperor's name would I do that? Let them do that? Do nothing to stop them doing that?"
He wasn't sure how best to phrase it, and while he was aware that one man - even a Rogue Trader - could hardly be expected to single-handedly turn the tide of a galactic war of genocide he wasn't so modest to deny that he could certainly pitch in to help.
"Because an empty galaxy is easier to exploit than one others have staked claims to, and a properly exploited galaxy would be more valuable to the Emperor and his servants than one populated by bickering aliens and faithless humans. So hypothetically you could simply continue about your business here for a few years and then return to a galaxy ripe for exploitation and devoid of competition. Hypothetically," Loghain said.
Jarrion was going to say something biting and pithy to this but the logic of the argument brought him up short. That was not an entirely unreasonable idea. Having to make nice with incredulous aliens was starting to grate on him a little, and the baffling attitude of the local humans - and his continually having to explain what to him was blindingly obvious - was tiring.
Wouldn't an empty galaxy be much easier?
None of this pussyfooting around and having dinner with pompous, disbelieving aliens rolling their disgusting eyes at everything he said, no more making nice with uppity, backwater colonists interested in his weapons and merchandise but never happy to see him. Just the open, rich, welcoming frontier and maybe, as a worst case, the occasional enclave of survivors that could easily be removed from orbit if the situation warranted it.
No more negotiations, no more diplomacy, just results. A galaxy's worth of low-hanging fruit! No competition! Think what he could achieve! No obstacles! Total freedom to carve out a colony truly worthy of the Emperor! A series of colonies, even! Anything he wanted!
Much like the ridiculously safe breach, it was one of those things that was so good he started to feel a bit light-headed.
But then he thought about it a bit more. Specifically, he thought about the Commander and then, from her, to the countless other humans in that other galaxy, those in the Terminus Systems he'd met, truculent as they were, and those in that Systems Alliance that he mostly hadn't met yet.
That resolved it for him fairly easily.
"No," he said, shaking his head. "I couldn't just sit back. Backward and heathen though they may be those humans in that galaxy are still human. They may still be brought to the Emperor's light, in time, and abandoning them to the depredation of vile alien machines is - it does not sit well with me. At least not on this scale."
"There's a scale?"
"You're an Inquisitor, you're well aware that there's a scale."
The Imperium lived on sacrifice, after all, and it would have been foolish to suggest otherwise. It's continued day-to-day existence relied on sacrifice. But there was necessary sacrifice and there was waste, and to waste human lives - or to spend them for purely personal gain! - was unacceptable. They were to be spent wisely, and for a greater cause. The greatest cause.
"Just testing," Loghain said.
"And was that the correct answer?"
"Who said there was a correct answer?"
"Yes well, quite. Thank you for that, Loghain, now I have more things to worry about, wonderful," Jarrion said, pinching the bridge of his nose. Loghain took the first drink of her drink since she'd arrived.
"You're welcome, Lord Captain," she said.
A little under a week later they had arrived. Or at least a little under a week onboard. Outside, it had actually been a little over a week, as far as they could tell. Either way they'd made fantastic time, all things considered, and all were happy to have made port at last - a proper, Imperial port without an alien in sight.
Jarrion's lists had indeed arrived ahead, though not by much, and while a fair amount had been ordered and arrived a not inconsiderable amount was still apparently in transit. It was looking as though they'd be in port for a good little while, and they'd certainly be very busy. Lots to do!
Even now, mere hours after having moored up, Jarrion was stood before one of the port's looming, armourglass viewing windows, watching a practically ceaseless stream of lighters and lifters and other utility craft zipping back and forth between the station and the Assertive, transporting men, material and all manner of everything.
Torian was standing next to him, and he was being dictated to.
"-and be sure to contact Stryker Nine about another transfer. Might be an idea to make it double the usual - we haven't lost many ratings but we'll be needing labourers soon, I feel. If they can make it here within the month that would be ideal, but I'll understand if not," Jarrion said and Torian's head bobbed as made a note.
"Lord Captain."
Stryker Nine being a penal colony that House Croesus often made use of for injections of manpower, owing to its practical location relative to many of their holdings, especially Port Mercian. They had a long-running, healthy and happy relationship. House Croesus needed strong backs, Stryker Nine always needed more space and fewer mouths to feed - both got exactly what they wanted, everyone was a winner.
Even the prisoners. Especially the prisoners.
Penance was infinitely preferable to suffering pointlessly without ever a hope of attempting to atone, after all, and dying in service to the Emperor (through one of His loyal Rogue Trader servants) was better by far than dying for nothing, mired in one's sins.
Better to die for the Emperor than to live for yourself, as was known.
A cough from behind caught Jarrion's attention and he looked over his shoulder. He saw, to his lack of surprise, Loghain. She had a bag slung across her shoulder. Thale was behind her, as it was often Thale's preferred approach to appear quietly behind anyone who felt the need to appear quietly behind Jarrion.
"This is where I get off," Loghain said.
"Leaving us so soon?"
"Told you you'd miss me. Don't worry, I'll be back before you set off again."
"Maybe I'll set off unexpectedly and without warning."
"I'll still be back in time. Early, in fact. Just you watch."
"Joy unbounded…" Jarrion muttered. Loghain didn't say anything in response, though, and when Jarrion finished glancing back through the window at his ship and back to her he found a very stony look on her face.
"We joke, Jarrion, you and I, but what you stumbled across is important. Very important, in fact, and for a lot of reasons. Not only does it present - as you like to drone on at length about - an exciting opportunity, it also presents a possible risk. What if these Reapers come and make short work of all our new friends, aliens and humans alike? What if they stumble across that hole you're so sure no-one could possibly find? What if they come here and decide their work isn't done yet? That is a problem, a possible and probably unlikely problem, to be sure, but a problem all the same, and one that has landed in my lap. A problem I am going to handle, ably, so that it is no longer a problem the Imperium will have to worry about," she said.
"You do pick your moments to take your vocation seriously, Loghain."
"Don't ever mistake my laid-back attitude for a lack of zeal. I didn't become an Inquisitor by accident, Jarrion."
That was the second time she'd used his name like that. The first he'd been willing to let slide, but now Jarrion felt he needed to make a point.
"That's Lord Captain," he said, crisply, but Loghain shook her head.
"Not here it isn't, not if I don't feel the need. We're back in the Imperium now, Jarrion, which means there are rules again, and they're on my side this time. I don't see much to be gained from making an issue of this, but I think it is something that you should bear in mind. Yes?"
A moment of somewhat tense silence followed. Jarrion thought about saying one thing, thought better of it, hesitated, licked his lips and eventually settled on:
"Yes."
"I knew you'd agree. As for my attitude, as you say, well - if some dismiss me as less of a threat because I appear to be somewhat lackadaisical that can only serve to benefit me. People let their guard down if they assume you're not taking things seriously. I'm sure a canny Rogue Trader such as yourself can appreciate being underestimated, hmm?"
This wasn't going the way Jarrion had planned.
"Quite. Presumably also related to how you have given absolutely no indication to me or anyone else as to what it is you are actually doing or intending to do now, before now or in the future? What no-one knows about no-one can interfere with? At least not intentionally," he said.
"Really are the sharp one, aren't you?"
"Wonderful. And as upbeat as I try to be, Inquisitor, even I cannot remain hopeful that you'll ever explain why it is you've attached yourself to me, or ever did in the first place."
"Maybe you'll find out one day."
"Hah. Chance be a fine thing. Maybe I'll get to be a High Lord. Maybe, uh, Robute Guilliman will get up and start walking around again," Jarrion said, casting his mind around for something amusingly impossible and surprising himself with something out of left field. He hadn't thought about Ultramar in a long, long time. Nice place. Very clean.
Loghain just smiled at him.
"Anything's possible."
He did not like that smile.
"Yes well, until then I suppose this is goodbye, is it?" He said, briskly, rocking on his heels and very deliberately checking his chronometer.
"Goodbye for now," she said, putting particular emphasis on the last part.
"Wonderful. Best of luck, Inquisitor. The Emperor protects."
He made the sign of the Aquila at this, and she returned it.
"The Emperor protects, Lord Captain."
+++MEANWHILE, IN ANOTHER TIME, ANOTHER GALAXY, SOMEWHERE VERY SECRET+++
The Illusive Man was smoking and reading through reports. Smoking and reading through reports was something that ate up a lot of his time. You didn't stay a healthy number of steps ahead of everyone by not doing your reading, and there was always a situation developing that he needed to keep an eye on. It was neverending.
The smoking was just a bad habit. Not unduly unhealthy, not for him, but still a fairly bad habit all the same. One he felt he was allowed, however. Everyone had their vices.
Everything that was happening was happening more-or-less how he had expected everything would be happening, which was gratifying. Nothing he read surprised him. There were a handful of Collector sightings reported, though they seemed to be keeping a wary distance from any human colonies for now, albeit a wary distance that was decreasing with each sighting, and with enough sightings to suggest that it was more than one ship.
He tapped out some ash and continued.
The team attempting to retrieve the Reaper IFF was having some level of success, form the sounds of things, but their reports were getting more ominous with every update. Soon the reports would stop, The Illusive Man knew, but if their rate of progress didn't degrade too much they should at least have the IFF ready by the time that happened, then it was just a case of having it picked up.
Shepard could do that. She was reliable, for all her faults.
And speaking of Shepard, The Illusive Man noted that she had at last left Illium, which was good, and was from the looks of things was back to building and strengthening the squad, which was also good. She'd need to.
Jarrion and his intriguing spaceship had also left Illium, which was less good because he and it had then promptly disappeared, not showing up in any of the places it had previously been seen to visit. There was the possibility they had simply gone off exploring, but that wasn't his usual behaviour, and so this was a possible concern, him being such a noteworthy and unexpected asset.
A possible concern but not a pressing one.
Despite Jarrion's reluctance in taking up any of the generous offers put to him for access to his ship or for some of his weaponry (though, The Illusive Man was going to have to have a word with Shepard about the ones she'd somehow managed to get her hands on, something he had found out about in very short order) there was slow but steady progress being made with those Imperial items that Cerberus had been able to acquire so far, at least according to those reports he'd just read.
Nothing tangible yet, but good, steady progress all the same. This was adequate for now. For now. If there was nothing tangible by the time he read their next report his attitude might change but for now, it was adequate. Acceptable.
He continued to browse, unruffled, until he noticed a fresh arrival. This wasn't unusual. Just about everything that came in went past him first, albeit after passing through a data-filtration system of his own devising. What was unusual in this case was it's source, as it was coming from someone who he knew for a fact was dead, a man stabbed in the eye at a diplomatic function for reasons that were still unclear.
Or at least, coming from someone who knew the man's security credentials.
Curiosity piqued (not something he often experienced or enjoyed much), The Illusive Man took a nerve-steadying drag before lightly flicking a fingertip and opening up the message. It was blank, but it did have a file attached. A file with unusual formatting. An audio file, apparently.
It took the computer a second to work out how to get it going, and when it did he heard:
"Hello. We are sorry about your man, but these things happen, don't they? You may not know me, but I know of you. Inquisitor Loghain of the Holy Orders of the Emperor's Inquisition would be my lengthy and formal title, but you can shorten it to Inquisitor if you prefer. I feel it might benefit both of us to meet."
What a convenient space hole.
Also, I don't really have anything approaching a handle on how to do The Illusive Man as he's only shown up, like, twice and I've even less of an idea of what Cerberus, you know, information protocols would look like so I've no idea if him sitting there and just reading everything is something he'd actually do.
But I've always been more of a 'half remember the details and make it up as I go along' kind of guy than 'spend five seconds to see if the wiki has anything on this' kind of guy.
We all have our vices, as said…