Disclaimer: I own nothing of any sort or kind. Credit for the original idea goes to Bombsquad. All original original ideas go to their respective owners.
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Mars-class cruiser The Merciless Purge, lead ship of the preliminary strike force of the Crusade of Enlightenment. Currently in warpspace.
Inquisitor Eriquehart Grigor looked out the transparent viewport at the swirling tempest of colours outside the ship and shuddered slightly at the sight. Patterns and shapes were created and destroyed in an instant, hues and shades of all colours assaulting his senses. A seething mass of potential power… with a conscience. And a loathing for mankind. Grigor hated warp travel. Every time he saw the warp, he felt something's eyes on him. Navigators would say it was psychosomatic, but Grigor knew something was wrong whenever he saw it. And he could see it now.
He pulled his eyes away slowly, as if he was afraid the space outside would cause mischief without him looking over it, and stared down at the data-slate on his desk.
On it was the plans Tyrus had drawn up. Grigor stared at it, and sighed in reluctance.
From the highly censored reports the Adeptus Mechanius had sent the Inquisition – Grigor smiled at the irony – Tyrus had found a way, using several scholars and xenotechnicians, in which the Halo network could be destroyed permanently. They gave their findings to Tyrus, for which he thanked them, paid them and then had them killed, as a precaution, of course.
The scientific methods and conclusions repeated themselves on the data-slate, its message read by uncaring eyes. Grigor deactivated the slate and turned to face the maelstrom again.
Pure, unaltered Chaos lay outside the ship. Only a few meters of titanium and adamantium separated him from safety and complete obliteration. He placed a hand on the viewport, and particles of colour formed a halo of blue smoke around his fingers.
"My duty is to the Emperor and the preservation of man," he said out loud, "any man who doubts me, challenge me now or nevermore." The words of Sebastian Thor rolled around the room, to the ears of an absent audience.
What is our purpose? Grigor didn't say. Our duty is help the poor, blind and simple men of the Imperium, who have no doubt nor care for the true reality of their existence.
His other hand started to rub the top of his head in a distracted fashion, a rasping sound coming from his fingers on his stubble. They are the sheep and we the shepherds he thought miserably, while we defend the sheep from the wolves and storms, we provide them shelter, food and care. They are our flock and we are to protect them.
But even the most skilled shepherd fears the day when the sheep look at each other and the shepherds and think, 'Why them and not us?'
No matter how well-bred and trained the flock, there will always be one who does that, the doubter, the dissenter and the most dangerous of enemy; the one who thinks he is equal to us.
What chance has a shepherd against an enemy who wears the same face as his flock? What can a shepherd do in the face of such audacity except perform the ultimate punishment?
All shepherds know that to keep a flock healthy, the sick, the malformed and the runts need to be culled. But to keep a flock a flock, the questioners are to be culled too. Only by doing this, can the shepherd protect his herd.
Grigor lay down on his bed and closed his eyes, trying to ignore the fluorescent lights that penetrated his eyelids and reflected themselves on his brain.
My duty is to the Emperor and the preservation of man, of that there is no doubt, Grigor thought lucidly, but it is only us who can protect man from themselves. Curiosity and questions must be quashed, or they will try to stop us defending them. The learned man is our greatest threat. Let us deal with it before it can threaten us. Strike before our enemy knows we are at war with each other.
I am the shepherd, the Imperium my flock, and the Halo the doubter… Grigor glared at the lights tormenting his sleep. Let no man doubt how willing I am to perform my duty…
He looked back at the data-slate. But am I willing to sacrifice my entire flock to defeat the doubter…?
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Xenos languages/ciphers decoding chamber I.
Aberfeldy leaned against the bulkhead and closed his eyes wearily. The harsh text and graphics from the screen had beaten out a relentless tattoo across his eyes, pounding the front of his skull with a painful drumming sensation. He looked across at the rest of his retinue, searching the alien database for information on the Halo. Thelonius had put on his goggles to provide some pretend protection. Styx was practically falling asleep at his station and Ibrahim was using his artificial eye absorb the data, his other eye red-raw and dry from the screen.
He turned his too-wide gaze to the servitor beside him and studied hi- it, he reminded himself hastily. He tilted his head and felt himself recoiling slightly in disgust. It was hard to believe that such a twisted being, so alien and vile… could have once been human.
The servitor turned its head to face Aberfeldy, but its dead eyes focused on nothing but air.
To think… they volunteered for this…
"Hey!" It was Thelonius. "I think I've got something!"
The group immediately huddled around his terminal as a diagram appeared, displaying the unmistakable outline of the Halo.
Thelonius muttered under his breath, whistling nonsense tunes as data-text flowed across the screen in a stream of information: …hallowed artefact was forever known as the Halo, and all would remember their power…, …but the great enemy came, their numbers drowning the light of the stars…, …was beaten back, but at great cost to the forgers of the Halos…, …only the kin of the Covenant are granted sublime use of these artefacts, none others…
Thelonius, given permission from Aberfeldy in the form of a nod, pulled out a data-slate, plugged it into the terminal and began to record the data. Minutes passed in silence, only baited breath relieving the dull hum resonating throughout the room.
As soon as Thelonius pulled the slate away from the terminal, Aberfeldy walked over to the cog-door and pressed the nearby button to open it.
Nothing happened.
He tried it again.
It remained steadfastly shut.
"Thelonius?"
Thelonius scuttled over to the door panel and inspected with a critical eye. The front of the panel was removed in a moment, revealing a numberpad which was quickly typed upon. Still the door remained shut.
"That's queer…" Thelonius said slowly, stepping back from the portal. "That was an emergency code. It should've opened automatically with that…"
"Well, why didn't it?"
"Weerll…" Thelonius muttered, stroking his salt-and-pepper stubble with a gloved hand. "There are only two possible and plausible explanations. Either," he ticked off the point with a finger, "the door has lost all power, which seems quite unlikely as this is a primary research station orbiting Mars, or…" he paused.
"What?"
"or…" he continued, "the Tech-priests deliberately locked this door." He looked at Aberfeldy suspiciously. "Now, why would they do that?"
Aberfeldy felt the pinpricks of sweat coming out on his face. Why would Youngman have any suspicions? He thought quickly, he couldn't have realised for definite I was lying…
"I'm quite sure there must be a perfectly reasonable explanation for this, Thelonius," Aberfeldy said, sounding as if he was trying to convince himself, "there's no need to jump to paranoid conclusions…"
The door activated and began to roll back.
"There we are…" Aberfeldy trailed off.
The two gun-servitors trod into the room as the group retreated slowly, their heavy bolters twitching like a nose sniffing for prey.
"What's the explanation-" Aberfeldy began, drawing himself up haughtily.
The servitors crouched and laser-sights rested upon his chest.
"-RUN!"
Shells flew around the room, noise deafened the group as they ran for shelter, muzzle-flares lit up the servitor's pallid skin. A hastily aimed round missed Styx as he leaped behind a terminal. The bolt smashed into a docu-servitor, detonated, and split it apart in a flash of sparks and fire. The two halves twitched spasmodically before curling up as if in pain.
Ibrahim shot back at the servitors, lasbolts sparking off the metal implants and burning grey skin, who responded by advancing slowly, providing covering fire as they did so. Fragments of metal showered the group as they huddled behind the scarce cover. Ibrahim fired another volley to the same effect.
Styx burst out from behind his shield, opening fire upon the two sentinels. Bullets ricocheted and buried into armour and flesh. One servitor keeled over in a cloud of oily smoke, sparks emitting from its chest erratically. The other returned fire on Styx, who promptly dived away from the bolter shells exploding around him.
Ibrahim struck while the servitor was looking away from him. Two knives slid into his hands silently, a faint blue sheen surrounding them. A couple of slashes, snake-like, and the servitor collapsed, blood pooling around its gaping stomach wound.
Abefeldy peered around from the bulkhead he had flattened himself against, drawing a stubber out from one of his holsters as he did so. A brief look around at his group to note they were ready; Styx with his two autopistols, Ibrahim with the lasrifle and Thelonius with his looted shotgun.
Aberfeldy cautiously sneaked past the two servitors and poked his head outside into the corridor.
A veritable hail of lasfire spattered the doorway as he leapt back into the room. An amplified voice resonated through the explosions:
"You have lied to the servants of the Machine-God and you have misplaced our trust. Prepare yourselves for death."
Styx grimaced as more gunfire splashed into the room. "So… no first offence punishment?"
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Youngman's smirk was hidden beneath his re-breather as he watched automated gun-turrets and servitors pour rounds onto Aberfeldy and his ilk. There was one thing that Youngman despised, and that was being lied to. A bolter shell exploded near the door, showering the corridor with pellets.
A very fitting end, Youngman thought smugly.
…priority-type transmission from approaching craft…
Youngman rolled his eyes and drew his attention from the fire-fight in front of him.
Transmit transmission.
He stood still for a moment as the message ran through his mind via his MIU, then clenched his jaw. His hands forming fists unconsciously, he slowly transmitted the stand-down order to his minions. A few seconds passed, and a massive energy spike was recorded by the internal sensors as a teleport lance engulfed the decoding chamber, removing all four traitors.
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Aberfeldy came to with a jolt, surprised that he came to at all. Tech-priests were not famed for their leniency, having invented memorable punishments including the horror-inducing 'Death-masking' punishment. However, Aberfeldy seemed to be all in one piece. The only minor aberration was that his limbs had been chained to a throne of sorts. He pulled at them, resulting in no give from the restraints.
There was a mild cough from in front of him. He looked up slowly at the figure sitting opposite from him across a mahogany table, and cringed.
It was Inquisitor Eisenhorn.
"Aberfeldy. So good to see you have awoken from your ordeal. I apologise for your current position-" Eisenhorn indicated the chains, "-but I felt that it was better than the alternative. Now do tell. What brought you to infiltrate this Covenant vessel – undercover as well – when it was made quite clear what was to happen from the Inquisitorial court?"
Aberfeldy swallowed nervously and felt the Inquisitor's probing gaze upon his face. "It was just for some reassu-"
"Don't lie to me."
Aberfeldy shuddered as he felt the sensation of another psyche across his mind. Undoubtedly Eisenhorn's.
"Well, sir…" Aberfeldy started slowly, "…I was not trying to subvert the court's ruling. This you must now from the start."
Eisenhorn nodded, then waved for him to continue.
"While I know that Inquisitor Krypmann is one of our most esteemed Xenos experts, I knew that he would have revealed data he thought to have been pertinent…" Aberfeldy trailed off, thinking of the phrasing of his next sentence. "…By going to the source of the data, I would be able to reach a more valid conclusion as to what would be the most sensible conclusion."
"You believe that Krypmann misled the court?"
"Be realistic, sir. Of course he did. And it would not be possible for an independent court to charge him on two counts. One, he would have hidden his tracks to well, and two, it would seem hypocritical to have made a decision concerning allegedly flawed data." Aberfeldy looked at Eisenhorn with a calculating expression. "I thought it was most unusual that you made such a sweeping plan on such flimsy evidence."
Eisenhorn shrugged vaguely. "To be frank, I knew something had to be done in order to make some sort of resolution. To have recessed the court would have resulted on multiple independent crusades to resolve the issue, which would have weakened us excessively. By making a conclusion, I lessened the chances of such crusades. However…" Eisenhorn's watery eyes thinned, "…that seems not to have completely rid the Inquisition of such rebellious attitudes. Which leads me back to my original question."
Aberfeldy nervously tilted his head from side to side. "I felt that we were not taking the correct course of action concerning the Covenant, hence my little escapade on Mars…" he trailed off, "…excuse me, but what happened on the space-station? The last thing I recalled was immanent death from the hands of the Tech-priests."
"A simple threat to their position and a hastily arranged teleport lance ensured your escape." Eisenhorn smiled patronisingly. "The Adeptus Mechanius are strong, but do not think they would ever risk an outright refusal against an Inquisitor, especially when the said Inquisitor has several cruisers to support his argument. Oh, your henchmen are in the ship's brig, where I am led to believe they are in… relative comfort. Continue."
"Well, we were allowed access into the alien's computer, and found something on the alien device. I didn't have time to analyse it thoroughly myself, but Thelonius copied the data into a data-slate…" Aberfeldy trailed off as he noticed Eisenhorn hold up a data-slate of depressing familiarity. "…Yes, that one."
"How fortunate. For you see, I have just been over-looking it myself. Most of it you need not bother yourself with..." Eisenhorn waved dismissively, but Aberfeldy noted the posture which indicated his was lying, "…it just reinforces the idea for the original plan. Now," Eisenhorn stared at Aberfeldy steadily, "I am left to think about what to do with you. On one hand, you purposely preformed an act which could have lead to the disobeying of an Inquisitorial court order. Punishment is, of course, death."
Aberfeldy swallowed.
"On the other hand, you have provided me with valuable information concerning the Halo network which I could not have achieved myself. For that, I am thankful."
Eisenhorn stood up and began to pace the room. "Your independence and ingenuity are very dangerous, Aberfeldy. Such qualities in a soldier would result in severe punishment from a commander. It would seem pertinent that I follow their example. However..." Eisenhorn's lips twitched, "…such individuals remind me somewhat of myself."
He placed his hands on Aberfedly's shoulders. "I am going to allow you to escape punishment, and, as a slight reward, allow you to join my fleet on our next journey."
"And what would that be?"
"Why none other than shadowing the Crusade of Enlightenment…"