Furies
Lacoan VI, Caligari sector, Imperium of Man
Kate was oddly comfortable inside the clear tube. The pad she lay on was thing, but just enough tot take the chill out of the metal. She was dazed by all these sudden changes and fear was rising as the rumble of engines faded. The masked face of Metrodora Thelema appeared in her view and the Magos' was kind.
"Not long now, Kate." The Magos promised. "Just stay quiet. Whatever happens is not your fault or your problem. I was asked to do this by my superiors and I need to for my own reasons as well." She did something and a hum built around the tube. "Just a few minutes and we can see about making you more comfortable."
"Cog!" The voice that gave that shout was female and furious! Kate jerked as the Magos did. But something wafted through Kate and she relaxed.
"It is all right, Kate." The Magos said to the drifting girl. "They are angry and they have cause." She turned away slightly and spoke to someone else. "I surrender to the Emperor's justice, Sororitas."
"What did you say?" Came from the other as metal clad feet sounded close at hand.
"I surrender to the Emperor's judgment, Sororitas. Not yours." The Magos was firm now. "Burn me down and face the consequences for usurping his right to judge. My kind wronged yours. Mechanicus did a horror that culminated here. That caused a grievous loss to the entire Imperium. My life is not yours! It is the Emperor's!"
"Liar! Your kind don't believe in the Emperor!" The other snapped as someone shoved the Magos away from the tube Kate lay in.
"I do not believe as you do, Sororitas, no." The Magos was still speaking even as someone else bent over the tube. Kate stared up at a featureless mask that was covered by oddly familiar symbols. Flowers? "My faith is reserved for the Deus Mechanicus, but I do acknowledge the Emperor of Mankind has dominion here. I submit to his judgment for what transpired here."
"Were you involved?" The other left Kate's field of view and she felt movement now. The tube was moving and the voices kept up with it.
"Does it matter?" The Magos sounded pained now. "I was not personally involved in what happened here. My duty was to my posting in the Chernobog system. That said? A Magos Biologis did the unthinkable. She did something that any right thinking female would find anathema, even one of my kind. We were all horrified when we found out the truth of what had been done. That Heretek…" That was a spat epithet. "...earned every ounce of pain that was inflicted on her and then some. She may have doomed us all with her madness. We Biologis cannot match your Orders' fury, Sororitas, but all of us who have not completely sundered our emotions understand it all too well. I submit to the Emperor of Mankind's judgment for the crimes of my peer."
"You know what we will do." The Sorotitas (whatever the hell that was, Kate had no clue!) actually sounded shaken for a moment. "Don't you?"
"I do." The Magos replied.
"And you choose to do it willingly." The other sounded almost respectful.
"I was sent to try and heal the rift between our orders, but I have my own reasons." The Magos snapped. "As I say, I was not involved, but some of my research was used without my knowledge or consent. You lost a sister. We all lost a hero and I lost my faith in my order. I went to my Genetor after the dust had settled here and demanded answers about some things that the Magos who did this could not have known. The Genetor told me. She had no reason to deny a validated request for information from another Magos. She gave it to the Heretek who did this. I am an unwilling accomplice to the crime that was done against the Imperium here. I demanded the Omnissiah's judgment and it was denied me. So, I demand the Emperor's judgment."
"You did not do this." Was the Sororitas arguing?
"It does not matter!" The Magos snapped right back. "I do not know what part I played in this horror, but I did have a part in the Daughter's loss. I must be punished. This rift must end or the horrors will grow."
"And this one?" The other asked as the tube continued on its way.
"This one is odd." The Magos was calm again. "She was found in a place of horrors, but she is not touched by that horror or any other. She is protected somehow. She is hurt and very confused by much of what has transpired. I have left detailed records for the Sisters of Serenity. Her name is Kate Bishop and that is all we know of her except that her brain is degraded in some way. There is damage, but it seems to merely be intended to confuse her, not hurt her. The Inquisition would like answers, but knows better than to demand them of you or the other sisters here. I submit myself for judgment."
"If you are asking for His judgment, that is not for me to decide, Magos." The other said after a moment. "I am a Battle Sister. No more, no less."
"And I am a criminal!" The Magos snapped.
"I am not denying your request out of hand, Magos." Was the Sororitas trying to calm the Magos? "But such is for a Cannoness to decide, not such as me. Even without all of the politics involved, this is far above my station."
"I.." The Magos sounded subdued now. "I apologize. My emotions have been extreme since I discovered the truth. Even with all of my upgrades, I am still human in that, it seems. There are times I truly envy those who excised all of their emotions. She used my work, somehow. She did this and we all continue to pay for her madness."
"Betrayal is never pretty." The Sororitas agreed. "The ship and codes are not Mechanicus. You serve the Inquisition?"
"I did. I asked leave to take this pilgrimage. To ask for the Emperor's judgment here. To try and heal the breach." The Magos said quietly. "The Inquisitor I served didn't have to grant it to me, but she did. I do not know why and I know better than to ask such questions of the Inquistion."
"So very true." The other scoffed. "We will not be wantonly cruel, but we are what we are."
"I know." The Magos said quietly. "This one needs help. I do not know how or why she was dropped in our laps, but she was. She is very confused and very scared. Please, Sororitas." She begged.
"We will take her to healing and you to confinement." The other promised.
"Thank you."
Some time later
Kate was moving again, through light and darkness. Through gold and red. Then it all went away. She woke to comfort as a soft, incredulous voice sounded nearby. Young?
"Oh my god! Father, she is here!" Kate jerked back to wakefulness aware of several things. One, she lay on a surface that yielded underneath her. Two, she wasn't restrained at all. Thre- Wait a minute! Her mind wasn't fuzzy! The brainwashing had been undone! Kate took a deep breath and opened her eyes.
Kate lay on a bed of some kind in a room that was dark, but not gloomy at all. Light shone from candles all around the room, but it didn't 'quite' cut the gloom. She was instantly aware of two forms standing nearby. Both of them looked human on first glance, but they were not. One was a dark haired male in ornate golden armor who radiated golden power. The other was a dark haired female who seemed oddly indistinct. Her golden, red and white armor was adorned with flowers like the face Kate had seen before had been. Both were eyeing Kate with awe and more than a bit of sadness.
"Don't tell me anything!" Kate pleaded! "I cannot know! What I do not know, I cannot betray when they interrogate me!"
"I know." The female stepped close to Kate and laid her hand on Kate's. It looked transparent, but Kate felt a pressure and comfort. "You are very brave, girl."
"I am very scared but I had to. We looked so many ways, tried so many things. Nothing worked." Kate was babbling through tears now as the other held her hand. "I am sorry! I tried to-"
"Shhh." The other's free hand came up to touch Kate on the lips. "It is all right, Kate Bishop. You are a human facing insane beings who most would call 'gods'. Fear is completely understandable. Elizabeth never came here that we know of and Lorinos got stepped on when he tried to take power in the wrong places. Neither of them are here now. Relax, girl. We have you."
"I have to go!" Kate pleaded. "If they don't- If I don't- …"
"Easy!" The woman commanded as she sat beside Kate and took both of the crying girl's hands in her own. Her face was desolate as as she held Kate. "Father?"
"What you came here to get can do what you wish, Kate Bishop, but there is always a cost for using such power." The voice from the other should have resounded around the room, but his control was as impressive as his power. "I am sure you are willing to pay, but the cost is not always to the wielder."
"I know." Kate said weakly. "I am ready."
"I am not." The woman said with a growl as the man nodded to her and vanished. "Girl… I have been called crazy so many times, but this… This is nuts!"
"They both want me." Kate said weakly as the other stay and comforted her. "I can do it!"
"You are not a murderer, Kate Bishop." The other shook her head. "Asking you of all people to kill her is cruel even for Elizabeth's madness. Death is part and parcel to life but killing people changes the killer, often in ways that no one can foresee. Even with all my age, even my Father with all of his power, we cannot know what will happen if you kill Elizabeth. Neither can she."
"We ran so many simulations. None of the other Elizas know what will happen either." Kate was calming. She took deep, cleansing breaths and focused herself. "I will do what I have to."
"Kate Bishop, please. Take time to heal." The other begged. "You need time to relax. To let your mind un-clench. You were just brainwashed for god's sake!"
"I had to be confused when I cam here. I have no idea where I am or how to get back. I cannot know where that weapon is!" Kate snapped. "If I do, I will tempted to come back, to find it, to use it. I don't want to be a killer, but there are times when it is needed."
"Times, yes." The other said firmly. "The world you live in is very different from ours. Death stalks our stars and walks beside every human in the Imperium. But this? No." The woman shook her head. "You need help and the non-militant Sororitas will help you." Kate was suddenly woozy! Drugged?
"Kay! No!" Kate pleaded as the room suddenly got dark around Kay's sad face Then it got bright. The pure human girl was awake again as Kay recoiled.
"You need help too, My Daughter." The Emperor of Mankind reappeared in the room, a huddled form at his feet. The Magos! "This is not for me to judge."
"Father…" Kay rose to her feet, staring at the red robed form that was quivering at the feet of the golden armored form. The woman was trembling in rage. Or was that something else?
"This one wants to die. Choose well, Daughter." The massive form nodded to Kate Bishop and winked out again!
"I…. No!" The semi-transparent woman snarled at the red robbed woman and turned her back on the cowering form. "Go away, cog! I want nothing to do with you!"
"I understand." The Magos' words were very quiet in the room. "How many times did the Mechanicus hurt you? Kill you trying to understand or duplicate something that cannot be?" She huddled even more into a ball. Then her head came up, just a little. "And then… The last. You cannot believe me, but I am sorry. If my life be the cost of coming here and saying that, then so be it. I do have one question and you have no obligation to answer. Is it true?"
"What?" The woman called Kay all but threw the question at the red robed woman. She still had her back turned and her face was a rictus of rage. "Is what true?"
"Is it true that the Machine God that I have revered for most of my life is a C'Tan?" The Magos said very softly and Kay went still. The standing woman turned halfway back to the other so she could see both her and Kate. Kay's face was remote. "If so, then many things that never made any sense to me finally do and I am damned."
"A fragment, not a true C'Tan." Kay said very quietly, her rage gone as quickly as it had appeared. "If it were a true C'Tan, there would be nothing at all alive on Mars. Maybe the whole system."
"I see." The Magos bowed her head. "My life is yours, Daughter. For sins done to you and your blood. Take my life if you desire. There will be no retribution."
"You didn't know." Kate quailed as she realized she had spoken! Neither of the others moved or looked away from each other.
"Lady Kay, my research on the Drukhari has to be what the Heretek used to meld your blood daughter's body with the soul stone of an Eldar." The Magos continued as if Kate hadn't spoken. "That is the only thing I think she could have used! If so, I am-"
"Stop!" Kate wasn't sure where this sudden urge to interrupt had come from, but she tried to get up and swayed as she sat up. "It wasn't you!"
"I wanted vengeance on the Drukhari." The Magos still did not look up. Kay stared from the Magos to Kate and back, her face unreadable. "They took me. Hurt me. It was a very long time ago, but I still remember it. I still have pain to this day from their torments, their toxins. It is all in my mind, but no less real."
"But you didn't do it!" Kate tried to stand and fell back to the bed, her head spinning. "Whatever happened to you, Kay, she didn't do it!" She pleaded to the standing human.
"I am an accomplice, Kate Bishop, no less guilty for the lack of physical presence." The Magos was still in a heap. "My research…" She broke off as Kay spoke.
"That is why it didn't kill Georgia!" Kay seemed stunned as she stared at the red heap of robes. "The powers are incompatible. The soul stone should have fried Georgia's mind as soon as it was attached. Liriel fought hard to keep the energy from hurting the girl, but it should have before she realized what was happening, far before she could stop the flow. Your work?"
"I don't know." The Magos said weakly. "I was researching Elder and Drukhari energy. Trying to understand the biological foundations of their power, hoping for a weapon against the Drukhari. My own understanding is so limited. I could not find a way, so I gave up on that and focused on healing."
"I see." Kay looked from Kate to the Magos and back again.
"I came here ready to die. You and your sisters have every right to rage for what was done to you." The Magos said weakly. "I am conflicted. If I have been serving a C'Tan my whole life, then I have hurt the Imperium that I was and am sworn to heal."
"The Imperium of Man is dying." Kay said softly. "Its death throes have taken ten thousand years to reach this point and there is no cure. Nothing anyone can do is going to stop that. It was given a mortal wound by Horus when he struck down my Father in orbit over Terra so long ago. The fragment of the Void Dragon that is imprisoned on Mars was intended for careful study but in the madness of the Heresy, so much was forgotten or willfully lost. No one knew what it was or why it was there. It had time to seep into everything despite my Father's best safeguards."
"There can be no forgiveness for what the other Magos did, Daughter." The red robed being said firmly. "And I helped."
"What the other did should have killed both Liriel and Georgia as soon as the soul stone was attached." Kay replied. "She had no idea what she was doing."
"That doesn't change the-" The Magos jerked as Kay reached down and pulled her right off the ground. Magos was quivering in Kay's grasp as Kay stared deep into the sole flesh and blood eye that graced the Magos' face.
"You came here ready to die to atone." Kay said softly. "Are you willing to do something else to make amends?"
"There can be no amends!" The Magos said weakly.
"No forgiveness. No mercy. Only war." Kay muttered under her breath. The Magos nodded, but Kay wasn't done. "There is another way, Magos. A far harder way. Will you try or will you fall?"
"I don't know." The Magos admitted. "What way?"
"Kate Bishop needs help." Kay said slowly even as Kate tried to parse her way through all the sudden changes. "She is led along a path that leads to horror and pain. She is not from our reality. She is from a better place." The Magos looked at Kate who was still trying to stand. "She is stubborn, I will give her that but she is human. Fragile. She hasn't seen what we have. She needs help, Magos. Will you give it?"
"You could command me and I would obey." The Magos said weakly. "You have every right to!"
"Not this." Kay said sternly. "Where she goes next, you may not able to come back from. It may cost your life or your soul."
"And she goes to face this… alone?" The Magos asked as Kate fought to speak, but her tongue seemed frozen now. What was happening?
Kay needs to see that not all Mechanicus are evil. She knows that in her mind, but her heart says otherwise. The voice of the Emperor came to Kate's mind and she relaxed. And you do need help, Kate Bishop.
I know. Kate took a deep breath and nodded. "What I have to do, I have to do alone, Magos Biologis Metrodora Thelema."
Kay looked from one to the other. Then she smiled! "But you do not have to walk the path to that fate alone!"
There was a flash of bright golden power and then, Kay was gone. No,, actually Kate and the Magos stood somewhere very different!
The walls, floor and ceiling were all golden and golden ornamentation shone everywhere. Flowers were engraved in many places too. Kate had bare moments to see several small golden and white flying things around the pair before an irate female voice sounded and a golden form appeared nearby.
"What now?" Brianna Executor was not a happy Orokin.
Kay was a main character in my fanfiction Inquisition Games
I know this has been very confusing, but it has all been about Kate 'remembering' a plan that both Elizabeth and Lorinos tried to subvert for their own reasons. It will make more sense shortly and we will stay in my version of the Tenno's universe for a bit now.