The mercenary leader and two of his guards led Dellenger to the head servant's office. It was about as small and dingy as Dellenger expected, about two metres in length and 1.5 in width.
One of the guards closed the door behind them, and the leader turned to Dellenger.
'What in the Emperor's...frigging name that was so important the Inquisitor couldn't just have mentioned over a secured vox network?'
Dellenger drew his laspistol and aimed it at the leader's skull. 'This.'
He stepped back to gain enough room to cover the leader and his guards, and they raised their hands.
'What the hell are you doing?' snarled the leader.
'I just wish to talk,' said Dellenger.
'Talk? Talk! With you waving a laspistol in my face.'
'Yes.'
The leader exchanged glances with his guards. 'G-go ahead then? He said.
Dellenger raised the recorder and replayed the vox exchange between Karmen Kons and Inquisitor Draven.
'W-what do you think playing that will do?' said the leader. 'Make us turn against our employer?'
'I hoped it would.'
'You understand we are the Sons of Dispater, we never betray a contract, and if we do, we will be hunted down and killed.'
'So, people in your organisation have reneged on a contract?'
'...Yes.'
'What if you renege with all of your people and do so for an incredibly powerful Inquisitor's backing?'
'We already have-'
'You are aware that we work for an Inquisitor?'
'No.'
'So, Inquisitor Draven didn't bother to inform you of this and that he was willing to bomb a building with you and all of your men inside if we refuse to co-operate?'
'If we try to betray him...'
'Not if he's has a gun to his head,' said Dellenger, as he twitched his pistol pointedly.
The mercs exchanged glances again.
'And we have a way to negate that potential bombardment. Or, to be more accurate, we have a way to stop that potential, which is happening as we speak.'
'The hell does that mean?' said the leader.
'It means what I just said,' said Dellenger. 'What else could I have meant?'
The Sons of Dispater leader raised an eyebrow.
'Fine,' said Draven as he finally stopped pacing and turned to Attelus. 'Why if you refuse to tell me, I can just get one of your foolish people to talk instead.'
Attelus' eyes widened. 'They...don't know as much as me.'
'Oh, I'm sure they don't, but they will know enough; the psyker Karmen Kons seems to know much. Should I ask her first? I have interesting ways to make psykers talk; you should know this being supposedly a part of the Ordo Hereticus, and hmm.'
'Hmm?'
'I found it...strange how quickly and easily she gave up when I told her I had you as a hostage too. Just how much does she know?'
Attelus frowned, and his eyes fell to the floor.
'I have a loophole to your threat,' said Draven as he leaned forward, so they were almost nose to nose again. 'You said nothing about me being unable to skin your face, or alternatively, skinning you from the toes and up to your skull, bit by bit and making her watch. In fact, I might get all of your people to watch. That will be fun.'
Draven grabbed Attelus by the hair, revealing his scar; once I am done with you, this scar will be the least of your problems to your oh so pretty face. Get him up! We are going to the Refectories.'
Two pairs of hands hauled Attelus to his feet.
'Do not think you can outsmart me,' said Draven. 'And now I am finished with these Administratum drones...'
'N-no!'
The Sons raised their autoguns, aiming at the heads of the kneeling Adepts who cried out in shaking fear.
'Think on the bright side, Attelus Kaltos,' said Draven. 'Their deaths are going to be quick and painless, and, well, your death is not going to happen. But your life is going to end; it is going to become nothing but a world of never-ending agony.'
Draven's eyes lost focus, and he reached to his micro-bead.
'Who-? What-?' Draven's gaze snapped to Attelus, and his jaw dropped. 'You cannot possibly have done this!'
There was a pause; Draven's face twitched, his jaw clenched. 'I have this little shit in my custody; you would not dare bombard the Counting House!'
Attelus grinned.
'Get that frigging smile off your face!' Draven shrieked, his eyes wide. 'How dare you! I do not care if you are a Space Marine; I am an Inquisitor of the Holy Ordos, and you will stand down, in the God-Emperor's name!'
'What do you mean "The Emperor is not a god?" That is heresy of the highest order; you will burn for this! Burn!'
Draven rolled his eyes, then the surrounding Sons of Dispater all seemed to reach for their own micro-beads almost at the same time.
'Order everyone to stand down?' said Draven. 'Surrender? Surrender? Screw you!'
The Sons began to glance at Draven up and down, back and forth, which interested Attelus. They all wore re-breathers so Attelus couldn't tell what they were saying, but their body language indicated confusion, anger and argumentation.
Meanwhile, Draven kept ranting and raving into his own micro-bead, with who must've been Kalakor, and he didn't notice the guns begin to aim at him, one after the other. Attelus glanced about as more and more mercs slowly were doing the same.
Finally, Draven seemed to realise what was happening. 'What-'
'Excuse me, Inquisitor,' said one of the assassins, Emperor only knew which one. 'But please drop your gun, surrender and have your forces stand down.'
Draven's jaw dropped, and Attelus felt his binders begin being loosened from his ankles and wrists. The Inquisitor looked across every inch of the room as if trying to find something, anything to get get out of this, but he found nothing.
The binders came free, and another guard approached Attelus, then handed him his gun and sheathed power sword.
'Surrender, Inquisitor,' said a Son. 'Or we will open fire.'
'But-but you are The Sons of Dispater!' cried Draven. 'I thought you never betrayed a contract.'
'Yes, but this is under orders of Master Hadrel himself, and you were going to bomb the Refectory from orbit if this little fool acted out, with half of our people along with it.'
'Yes, I was! But...Emperor damn it! Damn frigging mercenaries.'
'Drop the bolt pistol and get on your knees, sir.'
Draven snarled, breathed out once, twice, then raised his bolt pistol for his own skull.
Before anyone else could react, Attelus activated his sword and sliced through Draven's forearm.
Draven shrieked in agony and fell back, holding at his stump.
'No,' said Attelus. 'No, easy way out for you, you psychopathic bastard.'
But by then, Draven had already fallen into unconsciousness.
Two Sons of Dispater brought in a stretcher for Kolmoroff as Attelus approached her.
'Are-are you okay, mamzel Kolmoroff?' he said as he knelt beside her.
'Of course, I'm not okay, you little fool. I think I broke my hip,' she said through clenched teeth. 'It hurts like frigging hell.'
'I-I'm sorry, if it wasn't for my people and me coming here, this would've never happened.'
'Oh, just shut up; there is nothing to apologise for, we are servants of the Imperium of Man, and this is a part of the service. You should be apologising for not getting the balls to not tell that bastard anything earlier.'
'I-I'm...sorry?
'That's much better, boy.'
The Sons placed the stretcher on the floor and carefully lifted her onto it, but even still, she cried out in pain.
'I also learned what you are fighting against,' said Kolmoroff as she grabbed his sleeve. 'What that bastard Etuarq did to you and that world, by the Emperor, I would have liked to join you to bring him down, but I'm too old, too weak and set in my ways. So you frigging swear, you swear to me you won't give up, and you won't baulk again if a shit-head like that bastard holds me or anyone hostage like that again!'
Attelus' heart began to bash. 'I...'
'You frigging swear, or I won't get my hip fixed.'
Attelus sighed, wanting to point out the obvious irony but held his tongue. 'Okay, fine. I swear.'
Kolmoroff studied him for a good few seconds before finally nodding and letting go of his sleeve. 'Alright, that'll do, young man. That'll do. But if you don't keep that promise, I will haunt the shit out of you after I die. You understand?'
'Understood.'
Then the mercs lifted Kolmoroff and took her out of the chamber; Attelus watched them leave.
'Sir?' said one of the mercs making Attelus flinch.
'What?'
'Is what you said true? Some people I work with are from there; they said it was an asteroid or something.'
'About the destruction of Omnartus?'
'I left a lot out as Draven saw, but yes.'
The merc straightened and exchanged looks with his surrounding comrades.
Attelus' vox beeped, and he accepted the call.
'Attelus!' Karmen cried. 'Thank the God-Emperor; you're okay.'
'I'm fine, but that psychopath. Draven murdered several people over here. Is everything okay over there?'
'Yes, none of us are hurt; Dellenger saved us. He heard my conversation with Draven over the link and recorded it and slipped out before the Sons closed in on the Refectories used it to get the Sons to change sides. Thank the God-Emperor.'
'You should really be thanking Dellenger, Karmen,' said Attelus. 'If it wasn't obvious already, this more than proves he's more than worthy of becoming a Throne Agent. Anyway, it also helped Kalakor managed to infiltrate their ship and seems to have taken the bridge.'
There was a pause.
'I shouldn't be surprised; he is a Space Marine.'
'Well, even that's an impressive achievement for an Adeptus Astartes. Anyway, I'll head on over there now.'
'Good, see you soon.'
Attelus cut the link and headed for the door, but one of the mercs grabbed him by the shoulder, and Attelus instinctively tore it free.
'What!' Attelus snarled.
'There's uhh, one problem, sir.'
'Uhh, what's wrong? I...I'm sorry I killed so many of your people.'
'It's...not that, but thanks. No, the Inquisitor still has a stealth void-ship hanging over this building it's piloted by his men.'
Attelus rolled his eyes and sighed again. 'Of course, it is.'
He looked down at the unconscious Draven, whose stump was being bandaged over by another Son of Dispater. Then Attelus drew his autopistol and racked the slide. 'Get me a link to that void-ship, then, and let's just hope they care whether their boss lives or dies because I sure as hell wouldn't.'
'But, sir,' said another Son. 'If they didn't care if the Inquisitor lived or died, wouldn't they more likely co-operate with you?'
Attelus frowned and fixed the mercenary a glare which caused him to flinch and raise his hands.
Then Attelus' micro-bead beeped again. 'Kalakor?'
'It is I,' even through a tinny vox connection, the Space Marine's inhumanly deep voice reverberated through him. 'As you may have assumed, I have taken the bridge of the Inquisitor's flagship The Xenocide.'
Attelus smiled, such a subtle title, just like its master. 'And how the frig did you manage that?'
'I am a former Alpha Legionnaire and Raven Guard Marine and had worked alone for centuries; this type of warfare is my speciality. After...incapacitating their astropath and cutting off their external vox, I made the workers within the ship rise up in rebellion. It took the enemy by surprise as I led them against their brutal overseers. It did not take long for them to overwhelm the remaining Inquisitorial Stormtroopers then take over the bridge. I am an Angel of Death in their eyes, you see.'
'I...see,' said Attelus, swallowing, Kalakor it seemed was even more dangerous than he could've imagined. 'You uhh didn't kill their astropath, right?'
'Of course not, I distinctly said, "incapacitate" I know how important an astropath is for our mission. But for all intents and purposes, now the ship is ours.'
Attelus couldn't believe it; they went from having no ship, nothing to, well, this.
'Excellent, yes, frigging good job, Kalakor. The Sons of Dispater mercenaries under Draven's employ have joined our side, and the Inquisitor has been incapacitated and captured.'
'Good, good work to you as well,' said Kalakor. 'You have a void-ship above the Counting House. Do you wish for me to have it shot down?'
'N-no, we can take care of it,' said Attelus. 'Thanks for the offer, Kalakor. Talk later.'
And he cut the link.
Attelus sighed yet again, by the Emperor; this was one hell of a day.
One hell of a day.
Inquisitor Jelcine Enandra sat at her desk, reclining in her beautiful leather back chair while reading over the latest reports from her acolyte cells all across the Calixis Sector. She would've usually had her Interrogator Arlathan Karkin do it, but he was down on Scintilla leading a cell investigating into Chaos corruption in one of the Magistratum precincts. According to his last vox communication, it had proven true, almost all of the enforcers and detectives had fallen, and they, Arlathan and his men, were in the midst of taking them down. She'd left Arlathan on it as he was a former Magistratum head detective and, well, it seemed he didn't need her guidance much anymore. He'd come a damned long way from being a sleazy, corrupt, cowardly bastard who fainted at the sight of admittedly utterly terrifying daemonic creatures just three years ago.
He was almost on the verge of earning his Rosette; Enandra just hoped that he would continue her undermining of the Ecclesiarchy because she'd been so busy that she hadn't done much about it yet.
She sighed, rubbed her eyes and spun in her seat to gaze out her window to face the smog covered Scintilla amongst the stars below. By the Emperor, she hated that world; it might have been the capital of the Sector. Still, to her, it seemed just another shitty, pollution engulfed hive world where billions of poor, pointless humans toil endlessly for generation after generation. She'd grown up on a feudal world Sepheris Secundus, that while it wasn't as technologically advanced, it was the same thing, the peasants toiling non-stop under a cruel, greedy king and his lords. She would have shared the fate of those peasants if it wasn't for her master taking her in as a teenager, somehow seeing her potential before she could even begin to. Enandra wasn't just of the Seculous Attendous philosophy but a Recongregator too and had six acolyte cells on Sepheris Secundus fighting to try and change the world.
Fighting pointlessly as the damn Amalathian cells were always fighting against any change. There was no end to their advantage as they had the backing of the nobles, and Enandra was hands-off with those cells; she didn't want the Ordos Calixis finding out she was a Recongregator; they were already suspecting her being a member of the Seculous Attendous.
Recongregators, the blighted fools. She wasn't like other Recongregators; she didn't want sudden sweeping change across the Imperium that would be destructive and foolish, and she knew how important it was to keep the cogs always moving. But she couldn't let the rampant injustice and horrible treatment of Imperial citizens the galaxy over to continue. She had to do something, and damn it; she was an Inquisitor; she had the capabilities to do something about it.
Her radical tendencies had caused the rift between her and her master, the now-dead Inquisitor Devan Torathe. When she'd been made a full Inquisitor a full century ago now, she'd once believed his Amalathian rhetoric, but that changed when-
Enandra's chain of thought came to an abrupt halt when her vox-link chimed. She checked the identification code; it was her astropath, Corin Veril.
'Veril,' she said. 'How can I help you? Or are you calling me to help me escape this bureaucratic monotony?'
'I believe that is a redundancy, mamzel.'
Enandra grinned as she stood, swaggered over to her side table and began pouring herself a priceless drink of Sacra into one of her shining crystal glasses. 'I suppose it is. So, as the children say during these times, "what is up"?'
Veril cleared his throat. 'I have just translated a new communication and, it is, it is...interesting.'
She took a sip of her Sacra and stretched her long limbs to try to get rid of the tingling running from her feet to her knees. She'd been sitting for hours now. 'Interesting, how?'
'First, it is from the Iocanthos system.'
That made Enandra pause. 'Iocanthos, I do not have a cell or any investment there, not yet anyway. Enough building up the intrigue, Veril, as Attelus Kaltos says, would you just "cut to the chase", please.'
Veril was silent for a good few seconds. 'It is...fortuitous that you mention young Attelus Xanthis Kaltos, as I have verified that it is from him.'
Enandra was so surprised she almost dropped her drink and spat her precious Sacra in a spray across the Adamantium wall, so she forced herself to swallow it all. Causing her to fall into a coughing fit.
'Mamzel! Mamzel? Are you alright? Shall I fetch you a medicae?'
It took Enandra a good half a minute to gain control of herself again. 'I'm fine, it's fine. Emperor damn, did they inform you how?'
'They neglected to inform me of that important detail, mamzel; it was...brief. But they did claim they are calculated to arrive in the Scintilla system in only a week's time.'
'How are they able to travel from Iocanthos in a week?'
'I do not know, but it is a more pertinent question to ask is how they managed to travel to and from the Gothic Sector in just over four weeks time.'
Enandra frowned; she had a good idea how she'd expected Attelus and the others to travel to and from The Gothic Sector fast, but not this fast. 'Indeed, assuming they actually went to Sarkeath. Did he say if their mission was a success?'
'He did, but no details. I do not understand this, mamzel.'
Enandra clenched her jaw and sipped her Sacra. She wanted to tell him whether he understood or not didn't matter, but she stopped herself. 'Hopefully, we'll understand in a few week's time.'
'Hopefully indeed, mamzel.'
'Is that everything, Veril?'
'Indeed so, mamzel. Shall I reply?'
'Yes, inform them we are still at Scintilla and will meet them on the system's outskirts when they arrive.'
'Understood, mamzel.'
Enandra switched off the call and looked out her window again. So, it was confirmed, Attelus was cooperating with the Eldar, even using the webway and he, and by extension Adelana, have been keeping it a secret behind her back for the past three years. Anger shivered through her, and she closed her free hand into a fist. Did this occur during the Omnartus Incident? And if so, how didn't Selva find the memories of this when she delved into his mind?
That last one was easy to answer; a Farseer had placed some kind of subtle mind block on him that somehow managed to allow his thoughts and memories to be read but only those he allowed, and most psykers would be none the wiser for it. Enandra wouldn't put it past one of the incredibly powerful Farseers of the Eldar to be capable of such a feat.
Attelus Kaltos had proven an...extensively capable agent his Adeptus Mechanicus enhancement allowing him incredible, inhuman speed, agility and strength. But he also had a sharp mind, and despite his belief of him "sucking at being a leader", he had the potential to be an incredible one. He got on her nerves, though he seemed to get on everyone's nerves from time to time. His penchant for annoying self-loathing, over-sentimentality, over-confidence, hypocrisy, smugness and the tendency to get overly lost in his thoughts and overthink things and his "eccentricities" were only a few of his flaws that tended to rub people the wrong way. But for all his flaws and traumas, Attelus had a strange charisma about him which seemed to inspire others to not just work with him but inspire them to be better people, a fact the young man, despite all his self-awareness, seemed utterly unaware of. Again, the quintessential example was Arlathan Karkin, who confessed to Enandra during an intimate moment that Attelus' fight to overcome the horrid odds and victory against the daemons on Omnartus while Arlathan had laid useless and unconscious, unable to fight alongside his men who'd been slaughtered en-mass was what inspired him to re-think his mentality and change. To inspire others like that was something Enandra had worked to develop over decades, but it seemed to come naturally to Attelus. However, he seemed to bring out the worst in some, too, Marcel Torris being a good example and not unjustifiably as well from what Enandra understood.
Maybe she should have made him an Interrogator as well.
She sighed and sat back in her chair; Enandra should give him the benefit of the doubt, though, after everything the boy had gone through. He would think she was pitying him right now, but it wasn't; she understood the burden he bared more than he knew. He was following the philosophy Enandra herself espoused, "we do what must be done" or as Attelus had once put it "anything and everything to win." And she had hinted he had her permission
Enandra was just worried; when it came down to it, would Attelus maintain loyalty to her or the Eldar? She knew he held very little respect or thought toward the assassin cult he supposedly held allegiance to, so Enandra never worried about that. Still, the confirmation of a third entity he worked with was disconcerting, to say the least. The Eldar were fickle creatures at best and...
With a sigh, Enandra sat back at her desk; here she was overthinking like that little fool and began reading over the reports again. She would reserve judgment until he arrived; she had a pile of paper to get through until then.
