Dellenger had been fighting to lose his tail for a while now, but they kept after him no matter how hard he tried. He counted at least seven of them, and while their numbers helped, it'd been a long, long time since he'd had such trouble with enemy stealthers, a fact he should not have been surprised at; this was Inquisitorial Black-Ops, a whole new, foreign world to him, despite how much it hurt his pride. Dellenger tried to rationalise it by thinking the enemy was using some kind of tech or sorcery to be able to stick to him like adhesive. On the very first official mission as a Throne Agent, it seemed he'd found his match was pretty damned soul-destroying.
It had to be their main enemy's agents; Dellenger had first-hand seen their skill and enhanced abilities. It had to be; if it was them, it was unlikely he could defeat them, maybe one, but two? Three? But he couldn't keep this dance going on for much longer; he had to turn and confront them soon. Why did they have to choose him?
A stealth battle like this was a complex, subtle thing. Dellenger knew they wanted him to lead them back to their hideout, but he sure as frig wouldn't let that happen, not until he was positive he'd lost them, which seemed to be more and more implausible now, much to his frustration. So, he needed to find a good place to try to ambush them, but until then, Dellenger needed to keep moving and as chaotically as possible. He couldn't go to the base, but he couldn't avoid that part of the city either, as where he did go and where he didn't go would likely clue their enemy into the general position of their headquarters. He couldn't stay too long around it either.
Dellenger had a map of Quorasita in his pocket that he'd looked over dozens and dozens of times since they'd left the Audacious Edge a few days ago. But looking at a map was an entirely different thing than exploring the city first-hand, hence why they'd been doing this scouting mission in the first place. It was also likely their enemy had been in the city for longer than them, so they knew the best places for an ambush far better than Dellenger.
As he leapt over another alleyway, he felt the presence as it lunged the gap just after him. A frigging presence he hadn't noticed until now.
Dellenger landed and spun, his knife drawn and flashing in the moonlight as he slashed out desperately. The monomolecular blade sliced through flesh and rib, much to Dellenger's surprise. The figure cried out in agony and fell onto his back, writhing on the rooftop, allowing his comrades to close in.
Four figures seemed to emerge from the night, their forms reflecting their surroundings in a bulging, distorted way. The only thing visible was their rebreathers. Behind him, Dellenger felt three more moving in to surround him... The fact they have cameleoline over camoleoline cloaks already spoke of their technological capabilities. They ignored their writhing, dying comrade on the ground. An inhuman act Dellenger knew their enemy's agents were more than capable of.
Dellenger dreaded talking to these fools, so he stayed still, knife raised and beneath his camoleoline cloak, took hold of his lasgun.
'Who are you?' said the vox distorted voice; it croaked from the grill of the middle one on the left side and sounded like a droning ornithopter blade. Dellenger made sure to keep his attention forwards as the way the voice echoed made it seem they didn't want the hearer to know who'd said it, but it was obvious to his attuned hearing.
It only took Dellenger a second to consider his answer, and he couldn't help but let a smile cross his face as he said, 'Serghar Kaltos.'
One of the figures started slightly at the mention of the name, and it took a good few seconds for the speaker to reply. 'As in the infamous assassin, Serghar Kaltos? You do not fit his description.'
Dellenger shrugged; they had no idea how much information they'd just given away from just that one sentence alone, if they weren't grox shitting him, of course. Dellenger was never the best at reading people, especially when he couldn't see their faces.
The speaker didn't say anything more, but Dellenger could hear the faint click of a connecting vox-link and the muffled exchange of conversation but couldn't make out the words, and to their credit, they kept their gazes strictly on Dellenger so he couldn't tell who was speaking to whom.
After a few seconds, the vox clicked again. The speaker said, 'Even with the possibility of reconstructive surgery, we do not believe you are Serghar Kaltos, even with how you have managed to evade us until now.'
Dellenger just shrugged again.
'Who do you work for?' demanded the speaker, seeming to realise the futility of asking Dellenger his name again.
'Take a wild guess.'
'You are Inquisition.'
Dellenger didn't reply; he didn't even blink.
'You are Inquisition,' said one of the other enemies behind Dellenger's back. 'We knew you would come despite our best efforts. But you have fallen into our trap, and when there is one Inquisitorial fool, there is always more you are like vermin and-'
The ranter was interrupted as Dellenger opened fire with his lasgun, racking a fully automatic barrage that perforated through the four enemies in front of him in a burst of pink haze. At the same time, Dellenger dropped to the deck, so the impressively rapid gunshots of the remaining enemies spat through empty air. Their suppressed autoguns were familiar wet kisses in Dellenger's ears.
As he fell, Dellenger dropped his knife, took a photon-flash grenade from one of his pouches and tossed it behind him, hoping to hell and back their masks didn't make them immune or else he'd be very dead, very soon.
The sound of their warped, pained cries almost made him convulse with relief, and he rolled to face them, Lasgun shooting. Two of the three were cut down and thrown off their feet. But the last one managed to let off a few blind shots, but it didn't last long before Dellenger had retrieved his knife, lunged the distance between them and plunged the tip through the attacker's shoulder, and together they crashed on the roof. Dellenger pinned the attacker by the throat with his knee.
Dellenger twisted the blade, causing the man to gurgle and gasp, the attacker's fingers scrambling against his thigh.
'You're a talkative one, aren't you?' said Dellenger. 'If you keep being talkative like that, you'll be spared the agony that will make my knife in your shoulder seem like nothing very soon.'
Attelus awoke with a start and couldn't help crying out as his mind comprehended the fact he was a good four hundred metres off the ground and hanging off the surface of a sheer cliff face. Luckily he was still wearing his re-breather, so his cry was a mere muffled mutter in the wind. Despite fighting the urge, he looked down to the forest canopy long below and had to fight to gain control of his heart as it crashed inside his ribcage, making every inch of him pulse painfully with the fear.
He hadn't meant to fall asleep; he didn't even know he'd fallen asleep.
It took Attelus a few minutes to calm himself down, doing so with long, slow breaths, but when the panic disappeared, so did the adrenaline rush, which allowed the pain to rush back. The ache eclipsed his every inch, causing him to cry out again through gritted teeth.
Gasping and groaning through gritted teeth, Attelus pushed his forehead against the rock, begging for the pain to stop or abate even slightly. Hoping Faleaseen's voice would emerge into his mind, she'd magically stop it, but it never happened. He'd pushed himself too hard and too fast, even beyond his enhanced strength and endurance. But time was of the frigging essence; he had to.
The pain didn't subside, but his body seemed to acclimatise to it, allowing Attelus to look up finally. There was no sign of the top of the plateau, only the ninety-degree overhang at the wall's top, but he knew he only had about fifty or so metres left to climb.
Attelus rolled his eyes, fifty or so metres that'll probably be harder to ascend than the last two hundred metres combined. He slipped his hand from the climbing glove and began to try to rub some feeling into the other while checking the time on his wrist chron. He only had a few hours before dawn. He very much wasn't looking forward to traversing that overhang. He'd been given rushed as frig lessons on climbing before flying to the surface, he'd received a few over the years, but nothing prepared him for this. Attelus had been somewhat blase about falling before, but now he was desperate not to, even more so than if he knew he'd die permanently. He sure as frig didn't want to go through this shit all over again. Then if he fell again, he'd have to try again and...it'd be like that mythological figure of ancient Terra Scykiphus who the gods cursed to push a boulder up a hill until he reached the top, where it'd roll back down again. It seemed to be a fitting comparison to this situation right now.
After rubbing the other hand for a while, Attelus exhaled, and after three exhales, he tugged the blades from the rock. The act made more pain course up his arm, making him growl again. It took him a long time to raise his palm and try to push it back into the rock, but he didn't do it quite hard enough. The blades bounced away in a shower of sparks. The impact jarred his pain beyond before as his arm flung down, falling right for his thigh, but he managed to stop it from punching into muscle tissue even through the pain and his whirling mind.
Roaring with the agony, Attelus cursed with all his heart Enandra's name for sending him on this assignment, his father's name for being a psychopathic shit-head, Soloston's name Etuarq's name. Even the Emperor a few times, as he repeatedly banged his head against the cliff.
According to his wrist chron, it took him about six minutes to regain control of himself, but it'd felt like hours.
He shot his attention upwards; after everything he'd been through, this was nothing. This was physical pain, which was nothing compared to the mental and emotional pain he'd endured.
Roaring, he smashed his palm into the rock above, then tugged out the blade of his boot gauntlet, making pain blast up his leg; he growled out, but he endured it as he kicked it back into the cliff.
He dreaded how much exhaustion and the agony was going grow to be when he finally, finally reached the top and how he would cope with that during the infiltration itself, but by the Emperor, he frigging well will make it. He frigging well will!
Dellenger turned to Arlathan as he, Tathe and Karmen approached. The scout stood guard at the door to the bathroom they'd used as an improvised prison for the captive. Dellenger saluted smartly, but much to Arlathan's chagrin, the newly minted Throne Agent's gaze was on Tathe, not him. Arlathan let it go; they'd been working together for so long that it must have been instinctive rather than purposefully disrespectful.
'How fairs the prisoner?' said Arlathan.
Dellenger turned to Arlathan as if he'd only just realised he was there and shrugged, 'Kept silent, mostly, beside his pained moaning, of course. Especially when Halsin looked him over.'
Tathe nodded. 'They managed to keep up with you, huh? That scares the crap out of me.'
Dellenger shrugged again. 'I'm just hoping I managed to take down the...enemies capable of it.'
'Any ideas how they managed it?' said Tathe.
'Technology? Psychic crap? Sorcery? I've got quite a few ideas, while I'm trying to qualify it to be anything besides "they're better than me" or "I'm losing my touch" or both.'
'Remember, you are still recovering from your injuries, Dellenger,' said Tathe.
'And you are still coping with the loss of most of your comrades, as well,' said Karmen. 'So your psychological capabilities are in flux, as well. Please do not be so hard on yourself.'
Dellenger's gaze met hers for a few seconds before he pursed his lips and looked to the floor, and silence hung in the air.
'Alright,' said Arlathan, trying not to speak through clenched teeth. 'We need to speak to the prisoner, please.'
Dellenger nodded, opened the door for them, and they walked into the bathroom. Two Stormtroopers sat on a pair of battered old chairs watching the captive as he sat with his back against the northern wall, his wrist cuffed to the steel drainage pipe. His head slumped forwards, and his shoulder was wrapped in bandages. The prisoner's gaze shot up at them as they entered. He seemed in his middle age, with a scraggy greying beard and long hair that covered much of his face. His skin seemed pallid and unhealthy, his hooded eyes ringed by almost black bags. His deep frown was distinct even behind his beard and fringe. Karmen in her power armour stole his attention the most, that and maybe because she was a damned good-looking woman.
Arlathan approached the man and clicked his fingers beneath his nose, making him look up at him.
'Hello there,' said Arlathan. 'I am Interrogator Arlathan Karkin of the Holy Ordos. You know what that means don't you?'
The captive gave Arlathan a slight nod; his dark eyes twinkled with rage and hatred.
Arlathan crouched before the man, so they almost came nose-to-nose. 'Good, good, so you must have a good idea that my title is literal? That I am well versed in the art of interrogation and that I will make you talk, no matter what, so, can we just dispense with all that pain and effort and time, and you just answer my questions, please?'
The captive tried to spit in Arlathan's face, but he was ready for it and tiled his head out the way just in time.
'They always do that,' said Arlathan as his hand shot out and clasped around the man's mouth and began to squeeze, making the captive growl out. 'It's such a cliche now. So, if you want the opportunity to try spit in my face again, please co-operate.'
The man kept groaning.
'Nod, if you understand me.'
The captive managed a nod, so Arlathan let go.
'So, are you going to co-operate?' said Arlathan.
The man tried to spit again, but again Arlathan dodged it. 'So predictable,' he said and looked at one of the Stormtroopers. 'Get me my kit, please.'
The Stormtrooper stood. 'Yes, sir,' he said, then left.
Sighing, Arlathan looked over his shoulder at Karmen. 'You ready?'
She nodded grimly, they'd done this many times together over the years, but he knew she hated this despite her strong adherence to pragmatism. Despite his act, Arlathan didn't enjoy it either, but they were short of time and had no choice in the matter.
Arlathan looked back to the captive. 'I gave you the opportunity to do this easily. Remember, what is about to come next is your choice. A choice you will soon come to regret very, very soon.'
So lost in his world of pain and the whirling, horrific wind, he didn't notice the overhang until he hit it with his head, but Attelus was climbing so slowly, it didn't hurt at all.
He looked up at it, struggling to comprehend that he'd finally managed to make it. Then the realisation that this would be by far the hardest part of this damned climb.
Shaking himself back to his rather tenuous sanity, Attelus slipped his hand out of the climbing gauntlet and switched on his wrist auspex. It took him longer to achieve such a feat than it should've; the pain had slowly whittled away, and now it felt like everything from his neck had been hollowed out, like he'd been decapitated, and his body had developed a sapience of its own. A sapience that made him miss the activation stud four times before finally finding it. Attelus did feel it shudder into life and, along with it, came the spreading of painful pins and needles, which travelled up his arm and caused Attelus to clench his teeth and curse. It also connected wirelessly to his micro-bead, allowing him to hear the alarm without others hearing it too.
It didn't go away either as it seemed to zip around beneath his skin across his every inch.
While fighting to ignore it, Attelus checked the wrist auspex; no sign of any life signs above him, but the stone and rockcrete could be playing hell with the readout. Enandra had given it to him for this mission; it was a bulky ancient thing that eclipsed much of his forearm that Enandra had "inherited" from her former master after the battle against his forces on The Imperial Crusher three years ago.
Attelus looked up at the black void of the overhang again and hissed a 'shit' through his clenched teeth. He wanted to look down but fought the urge, now was the worst time to look down, and the terror at the prospect of falling was stronger than ever. Especially because a long time ago, the unwelcome image of him being impaled on a tree, dying and coming back to life into a world of unfathomable agony over and over again had flashed through his mind.
A fate worse than death, indeed.
Inhaling and exhaling three times like before, Attelus tugged out a gauntlet and then, with a snarl, smashed it into the stone. Much to his relief, it stuck fast; he pushed a button on the gauntlet, making the blades curl and crunch to stick horizontally deep inside the stone. Attelus then punched the other one in, keeping the blades straight.
Hyperventilating now, Attelus then pulled the blade on his boot gauntlet, and it dropped so fast it made his heart sink before it stopped, hanging out in empty air. That made him really dread pulling out the other foot.
He clenched his teeth and, without any more hesitation, tore the second boot out. The world became a haze of utter terror as his body swung out, making more pain cut through him and to cry out.
Gasping, Attelus could no longer keep himself from looking down past his dangling boots and to the trees hundreds of metres below. It seemed to hypnotise him, but it didn't send a wave of terror through him; instead, a strong sense of pride hit him. He had managed to climb this without anyone else's help; he'd managed to climb a surface designed to be impossible to climb in a matter of hours. He doubted anyone else had worked this over the centuries this place had existed.
Frig it; if he'd managed to make it this far, he could make it all the damned way.
Attelus tore his attention upwards and ripped out his gauntlet, and plunged it into the stone again. He pushed the button to make the blades flatten, then made the blades straighten on the last gauntlet, pulled that out and pushed it in further onwards.
It was a frigging slow process, much slower than he could've imagined; his pain addled, exhausted mind forced him to stop for a few seconds to fight to remember which gauntlet had its blades curled and which one didn't. He also had to keep glancing over his shoulder to make damn sure to keep track of his position in conjunction with the edge.
After what seemed like days, and his upper body throbbing with constant agony, Attelus found the edge. He halted there as close as possible, and it allowed him to look up to the top of the wall.
Much to his disbelief, he only had five or so metres left!
Emboldened by this revelation but still making sure to check his gauntlets, he tore one of them out and, with a growl, plunged it into the wall. He never thought that beginning to climb up a vertical slope would be such a relief, and slowly, he began to ascend.
It took him a good ten minutes to climb high enough to be able to plant his feet. As he did, the urge to stop and just take a short rest hit him, but he clenched his teeth and shook it away. Now would be the worst time to take a break, so he continued clambering upwards.
He made it about halfway up when the ringing in his ear penetrated his hazed mind, and he froze. Attelus had no idea how long the ringing had been going for before he'd managed to comprehend it. The shadow of movement above caught the corner of his eye; it was about three metres away, moving behind the buttress close to the edge.
Attelus cursed through clenched teeth; just his frigging luck that right now, one of the Sisters of Battle patrollers just so happened to pass by now! The damned auspex had been a pain in the arse, but he may have failed to spot her at all if it wasn't for that.
His mind reeled as the movement flashed closer and closer. The powerful wind wouldn't allow him to hide beneath his cameleoline cloak. He couldn't risk just staying here, so he had only one choice. Attelus looked down; that horrible view was no longer inspiring; it just made the vision of him impaled on top of a tree, dying over and over again. It made agony shoot through his diaphragm. He glanced up and down a few times, hoping the shadow would slow or even stop, but by now, he should've known his luck would never allow that to happen. So he began to tug out the blades one by one until only his right hand remained.
'Shit!' he whimpered. 'Shit! Shit! Shit!'
Then he pulled the last gauntlet out.
