On the bridge of the Rossinante, Pelton stood at attention right behind the command throne where General Balor sat and, not for the first time this day cycle and certainly not for the last, fought down the urge to draw his sidearm and shoot the bastard in the head.
That Pelton was battling these feelings wouldn't have surprised many of the bridge crew, for the Ripper General wasn't the kind of man who inspired loyalty, even in his closest subordinates : like every higher-up in Torredon's shadow cartels, he ruled through a combination of fear and appeal to the greed of others. The hung corpses of the last batch of fools who had disappointed him still hung from the bridge's ceiling, long since dessicated.
What would have surprised the crew was the knowledge that Pelton, who had served as the aid of the Bloodied Crown's director for months now, was actually an undercover agent of the Adeptus Arbites, sent to infiltrate the criminal organization years before the Navy had withdrawn and the whole Subsector had gone to the Warp faster than you could say 'the Emperor protects'.
Pelton knew he would never return to the Arbites. He had been gone for too long, had done too many things he could never take back in order to maintain his cover – some of which would haunt him to his dying day, and for which he would have to answer to the God-Emperor after.
Besides, with the Imperial rule crumbling to pieces all across the Subsector, his already sparse lines of communication with his superiors in the rest of the Damocles Gulf had become unavailable. They probably thought him dead, and even if, by some miracle of the Emperor, he managed to escape the Gap, reach one of the Judges' Precinct Houses and prove his identity, he would most likely be executed as a deserter for failing to follow procedures by not reporting for so long, and probably being compromised anyway.
A smarter man might have accepted the change in his circumstances and tried to make the best out of a bad situation by embracing his cover identity, taking advantage of his relatively prestigious position in the Bloodied Crown for personal gain. But Pelton hadn't joined the Arbites because he was weak-willed or prone to succumbing to temptation. He believed in the Lex, in bringing the Emperor's Justice to those members of the Human race who thought themselves beyond His reach.
He also didn't believe in laying down his life for nothing, which was precisely what shooting Balor right now would achieve. Once, when his superiors had started talking about pulling him out (something he dearly wished they'd actually ordered before the Navy had abandoned the Subsector), Pelton had drawn up plans to kill Balor when he was meeting with another director and framing a third one for the deed, making it look like some kind of play for Jabbus' seat as the Chairman. He had it all set up in his head (he wasn't stupid enough to put such a scheme to parchment, or on a data-slate any renegade tech-priest could have accessed), but that was all for nothing now.
In the current situation, all killing Balor would accomplish was replace one monster with another. The Ripper General had selected second-in-commands who were all cast in the same mould as himself : violent, cruel brutes. Pelton himself had been spared from having to play the part only because what Balor looked for in a personal aide was different than what he wanted in his sub-commanders, and the director had made sure that Pelton couldn't kill him and take over himself – not that he would have tried if he could. The very idea that he might be able to do good by taking over the warband was patently ridiculous : either he would lose his soul and become a monster just as bad as Balor or worse, or he would be killed by another of the Ripper General's subordinates looking to ascend to the directorate by stepping over his corpse.
The viciousness of these men had been proven again by their actions in the Sanguia system. In the months following the arrival of the fleet and its complete annihilation of the local Space Defense Force, the Ripper General's warband had waged a brutal campaign of terror and subjugation upon the world. Pelton had listened to the reports from the troops on the surface, and silently prayed for the people of Sanguia even as they bravely held on against the shadow cartel's reavers.
However, the Bloodied Crown's depredations had abruptly ended a few weeks ago. There were still isolated packs of raiders on the planet, keeping the natives busy and disorganized, but the bulk of the shadow cartel's forces had been recalled to the fleet when the Chairman himself had arrived to Sanguia, bringing both his own fleet and news to share with the Ripper General.
Thanks to the psykers procured by that heretic bastard Jereb, Jabbus had learned that the fleet which had defeated Smile at Adumbria was on its way to Sanguia, having made a detour to Cassandron first. The idea of the cost of such knowledge made Pelton shudder : he had managed to keep close of the mad witches Jereb sold to the other directors, thank the Throne, but he knew they were far from reliable, even by psyker standards.
The intel must be good, though, because Jabbus had taken his fleet with him to Sanguia to reinforce Balor's, with the goal of catching the Cainite fleet right as it exited the Immaterium. Learning that Adumbria was now under the control of the infamous Black Commissar (which, God-Emperor, what had the Munitorum been thinking when it had come up with that name ?), whose slaughter of the Imperial task force sent to reclaim the world he'd usurped from the God-Emperor had supposedly been single-handedly responsible for the mess the defense of the entire Gulf had become in the years since, had been a surprise to the former Arbites.
Personally, Pelton doubted that was how things had happened : it all reeked of someone's efforts to cover their own frak-ups by blaming them on a convenient scapegoat. If nothing else, the fact Cain had killed the Laughing Fiend was a point in his favor. He was still an Emperor-forsaken heretic, of course, but Pelton had been embedded into the shadow cartels long enough to know there were degrees of evil (it was one of the reasons he knew he could never fit in with the Arbites again), and Jeremiah Smile hadn't fallen to the lowest depths of the scale so much as gleefully plunged into them head first.
Due to the Warp Storms which constantly plagued Torredon and the fact that they knew the rebels were coming from Cassandron, there was only a comparatively small region of the Sanguia system's edges through which they could emerge. With the knowledge of how devastating the fighter wings of the renegades had proven at Adumbria, the directors had packed their combined fleet as close to the estimated entry point as possible, in order to overwhelm them with firepower right after their emergence from the Warp, before they could deploy their flights.
Waiting in the void in a state of high readiness for weeks had caused a slew of disciplinary issues, which had been dealt with with typical brutality. Pelton had a hand in that himself, bringing the wrath of his 'master' upon the scum who were getting bored of waiting and clamored for a return to the jungles of Sanguia.
According to Rossinante's chronometers, this was the twenty-ninth day they had spent waiting in the void with nothing happening. So, when the proximity alarms went off, it took a moment for Pelton to realize what was happening – but fortunately, his lapse went unnoticed, as everyone had much more pressing concerns.
"General, we're detecting Warp activity," the Rossinante's Master of Auspex called out. "New ships are arriving !"
"At last," growled the Ripper General. "Sound the general alarm, and send my compliments to Chairman Jabbus informing him that his intel was on point and the heretics are here for us to kill."
Pelton kept himself from scoffing. As if Balor had any right to call anyone a heretic. The man might not openly worship the Dark Gods, but he had broken every oath he'd ever sworn to the Golden Throne more times than anyone remembered long before ascending to the Bloodied Crown's directorate.
The ex-Arbites stayed silent, watching the hololithic projections over Balor's shoulder. To his admittedly limited experience of void warfare, the Cainites' situation was dire. They were surrounded on all sides, caught right after emerging from the Warp, which was when a ship was most vulnerable.
To his own vague surprise, Pelton found himself hoping the heretics would win despite the odds arrayed against them. If nothing else, it would end his current predicament, if only by replacing it with a new, more interesting one.
Areelu Van Yastobaal stood at the helm of Worldwounder as she re-entered realspace, a warrior-queen ready to lead her ship in battle.
With the magi scattered across the Protectorate fleet keeping their ships following Worldwounder's Navigator as they sailed the Sea of Souls, they were able to exit the Immaterium with greater synchronicity than any but the most fine-tuned Imperial fleets could have achieved.
Immediately, proximity alarms began to blare, as numerous ship signatures were detected. The Protectorate fleet had emerged from the Warp straight into an ambush – or so it seemed at first glance. Fortunately, the Protectorate diviners had warned them of the ambush ahead of time. Before they had even left Cassandron, the Tzeentchian magi had performed their rites at the Warmaster's orders, and confirmed his suspicions that the Bloodied Crown had taken advantage of the time they'd spent saving the hive-world from damnation to muster their forces in Sanguia.
A lesser commander might have balked at the prospect of confronting a prepared enemy, but Cain was made of sterner stuff, and regarded the whole thing as an opportunity to break the might of the shadow cartel once and for all instead. As his command, the borgs and tech-priests had spent the journey from Cassandron working to optimize the void-shields' activation sequence and boost them as much as possible, while the crews had run drill after drill until the whole process was a well-oiled, incense-blessed machine.
Meanwhile, no matter how ready the pirates were for their arrival, it was simply impossible to keep an entire fleet with the metaphorical finger on the trigger for the days or weeks they must have been laying in wait. Only a complete fool would try to keep a crew in a state of maximum alert for so long, meaning that either the pirate crews would need to get into position, or they would be suffering from exhaustion – both of which would benefit the Cainites.
It was a race to see whether their shields would come up before the guns of the shadow cartel could fire. Between the trained crews of the Worldwounder and Protectorate ships, and the slaves toiling within the pirate vessels, Areelu knew who she was willing to bet on – and her instincts didn't fail her now. Worldwounder shuddered as her shields were struck by a deluge of enemy fire, but her mistress didn't need to look at the console readings to know that they were still holding strong. She had been captain of the ancient cruiser for decades, and was familiar with her quirks and the song of her hull.
"Void-shields are holding across the fleet," announced the Master of the Vox. The man's role in this battle was of more importance than it had been in most of the previous engagements under Areelu's command : very rarely did Worldwounder fight with so many allies at her side.
"Excellent," replied the Rogue Trader. "Make a note of passing on my compliments to the magi and the crews once this is over, along with double rations for the next cycle as a reward for their hard work. Now, what do we know about our foe ?"
As the auspex returns were processed by the bridge crew with commendable speed, new ship signatures continued to fill in the bridge's central hololithic display, adding to the information available to Areelu. But the Rogue Trader wasn't directly wired into the ship's system like her crew – augmetics, in her experience, tended to interact poorly with warp-craft, though there were whispers that some of the legendary Dark Mechanicum had found a way around this issue.
"We've identified the Rossinante, Balor's flagship," reported the Master of Auspex. "And … yes, we've confirmation from the archives. My Lady, the Jewel of the Void is among the enemy armada."
Areelu's smile sharpened as the two vessels became highlighted on the main display, shining bright crimson amidst the enemy formation. She pressed a rune on her command throne, opening a vox-link to one of Worldwounder's landing bays.
When they had planned their arrival to Sanguia, it had soon become clear that this time, the Liberator didn't intend to spend the void battle safe on a ship's command deck like he'd done at Adumbria : no, this time, he would take the fight to the enemy, leading from the front as he had done so many times before. No one had tried to dissuade him, though Areelu knew many had wanted to. Despite everything, sometimes, it seemed like the Liberator wasn't aware of just how important he was to the cause of the Liberation – his modesty keeping him from realizing what was blatantly obvious to everyone else.
Admittedly, it was one of the traits Areelu found most endearing about him.
"Ciaphas, we have confirmation," she said without preamble once the link was open. "Chairman Jabbus is here."
Areelu's relationship with the Warmaster had evolved during the journey from Cassandron. It had taken some work on her part, especially where Krystabel was concerned, but eventually the Rogue Trader had managed to overcome the Handmaiden's reluctance by making sure she was very involved in the proceedings (the Liberator's own agreement had been much easier to acquire, of course).
The results of all that effort had been well worth it, however, culminating in a series of romantic evenings aboard the ship's spires. Ciaphas had also spent hours entertaining Lucia, who absolutely adored him, much to Areelu's delight. He had mentioned off-handedly that, compared to his own daughter Zerayah at this age, Lucia was much easier to handle. Areelu had to admit that, for all that she loved her beloved child more than anything in the galaxy, she struggled to imagine what a terror Ciaphas' own adopted daughter must have been in her youth.
"Are we sure he's here in person ?" asked the Warmaster – and he was the Warmaster now, his voice firm and commanding.
"The Jewel is Jabbus' personal vessel," Areelu explained. "It's as much a floating palace as a starship. The Bloodied Crown's leader would rather part with his own hands than with it."
Although, considering what she knew of Jabbus, cutting off his upper limbs wouldn't be much of a sacrifice. It wasn't as if he used them for anything, after all.
"Very well. We have the opportunity to break the Bloodied Crown once and for all : let us not waste it. You know what to do, Areelu."
"Yes, Ciaphas." She cut the link, returning her full focus to the battle at hand.
The Protectorate fleet had started to return fire, but was only doing minimal damage to the enemy shields. That was to be expected : apart from Worldwounder, none of their ships had been designed for battle, and there was only so much even the borgs could do to retrofit them in the handful of years they'd had since Slawkenberg had last gone to war.
But, fortunately, the guns of the Protectorate were far from their main weapon when it came to void warfare.
"Deploy the Cainwings," Areelu ordered, her command echoed across the entire fleet.
Within minutes, the void around Worldwounder was full of dozens of Cainwings as the fighters took flight from every Protectorate ship fitted to house them – including the Rogue Trader vessel, which had received a full flight of the incredible engines when the Liberator had taken residency aboard. While Areelu was no expert in void-fighters, she knew enough to understand how devastatingly effective the Cainwings were.
Soon, the viewport was lit by distant detonations as the pirates let loose their own fighter squadrons – which, while much less coordinated and well-equipped than the Cainwings, outnumbered them by an uncomfortable margin. Areelu couldn't waste time watching the deadly ballet, however, for she needed to give orders to the rest of the fleet in order to minimize the pressure the enemy ships could put on any individual Cainite vessel while maximizing the one they gave out in return.
Time seemed to fade away as the Rogue Trader lost herself into her task, until she finally heard someone call out the words she had been waiting for :
"The shields of the Rossinante are down, Lady Captain ! Cainwing squadron's commanders report they estimate the Jewel of the Void's won't be long either."
Areelu grinned. This was the moment she'd been waiting for. They could blow up the two pirate vessels with Worldwounder's guns if they really tried (or if they fired the Fist of the Liberator's main gun, which Areelu had heard a lot about but hadn't seen in action yet), but that wasn't what Ciaphas wanted. The Warmaster hadn't forgotten about the wild psykers Smile had deployed during their last engagement with the Bloodied Crown, or his promise to his aide that they would find out who was responsible for selling them to the shadow cartel.
She opened another link, this one open to everyone in the Cainite fleet even if her message was only addressed to two people, and declared :
"Lord Hektor, the Rossinante's shields have come down : the ship is yours to handle. Do try to take Balor alive if it is at all practical," she reminded the World Eater. "Warmaster Cain, as we decided, you have the Jewel of the Void. Good hunting, Ciaphas," she added.
Krystabel wouldn't be pleased with that last bit, Areelu knew. That was why she'd made sure to broadcast that message to the entire fleet in the first place : the Slaaneshi priestess was surprisingly easy to tease for someone of her vocation.
It would make the victory celebrations all the more enjoyable, the Rogue Trader thought, before focusing all her intention on the battle that still had to be won, even though she knew the lethal blow had already been loosed.
As he charged into another squad of pirates with his chainaxe revving, Hektor reflected that, to Balor's credit, the Rossinante was better defended than the Murderous Jest had been. But not by much, and certainly not enough to make any real difference.
Under the cover of the Cainwings, the transport carrying him and the platoon of USA troopers following behind him had made it aboard without difficulty. The landing bay had been fiercely defended, but they had managed to seize it after painting the deck red. Reinforcements were still landing, as the Rossinante was packed full of bloodthirsty reavers, and Hektor's mission meant that he couldn't spend the time it would take to kill them all himself.
For Hektor had claimed the honor of going for the bridge for himself and his platoon. He was looking forward to facing this so-called Ripper General in person. True, Balor's crimes were insignificant compared to the crowd Hektor used to run with. Yet, from the records of the Worldwounder and Dis Station, it was clear that the man deserved whatever punishment Cain would come up with for him. Balor wasn't as depraved as Jeremiah Smile, but he was still responsible for countless atrocities across the Subsector, and Hektor had something of a personal grudge against officers who didn't care for the lives of the troops under their command, even if said troops were blood-crazed lunatics – perhaps especially when.
Hektor reminded himself that his orders were to take Balor alive. Not that the pirate scum would be glad of it : the Legionary had overheard some of the troopers discussing a betting pool in the USA regarding what fate the Liberator had in store for the Ripper General, once all useful intelligence had been extracted from him. The men and women's imagination had been quite amusing, but Hektor's favorite was that Cain intended to deliver Balor alive to the Imperium's own Commissariat in order to get the bounty on the director's head. It was unlikely, yes, but so was pretty much everything Cain had ever achieved in his life.
The march to the bridge was a long, bloody slog. Even with the Nails silenced by the Panacea in his bloodstream, Hektor could feel the approval of the War God, just as he could smell the chems in the bodies of his foes as he tore them apart. Mere stimulants couldn't come close to emulating the effects of the Nails, but there were still enough of them in the poor bastards' blood that he wasn't surprised they were willing to charge him even after he cut his way through hundreds of their fellows.
Still, there was only way such confrontations could end. A lone Astartes could be brought low by sheer weight of numbers : Hektor had certainly seen it happen before, as World Eaters lost themselves completely to the Nails and charged into the ranks of the enemy until one of them got lucky and scored a killing blow. But Hektor was in perfect control of himself thanks to the Panacea injectors keeping his implants silent, and supported by some of the best soldiers in the entire Protectorate.
Within an hour of landing, the platoon were in front of the reinforced doors leading to the bridge of the Rossinante. They were standing in the bloody remains of the enforcers who had made their last stand here, their heavy weapon emplacements laying down in pieces, their ordnance insufficient to breach through the USA's power armor.
"Breach the door," he ordered, and a pair of troopers carrying explosives immediately set to work.
Hektor nodded with pleasure that the rest of the boarding party stepped back, taking cover without needing to be told. The charges detonated, blowing up a hole through the doors through which Hektor immediately ran through, chainaxe reeving, knowing what an intimidating figure he must make as he emerged onto the bridge.
Immediately, Hektor smelled blood, and the scent of las-burned flesh. Which wasn't unusual, but he'd thought it would only be there after their arrival. Looking around, he saw that the bridge had recently been the site of a fight. Given the position of the corpses, the World Eater could deduce that it had been a brief, violent affair, in which one of the sides had been taken completely by surprise. The survivors were hiding behind cover at the other end of the bridge, except for one, who stood in the open next to the captain's chair – on which was slumped the corpse of a large man dressed in a parody of a Militarum General uniform.
"Did anyone have 'killed by his subordinate before we get to him' in the betting pool ?" asked Hektor in the tense silence that fell on the bridge as the rest of his party followed him and fell into position behind him, weapons aimed but not opening fire.
"I did," replied one of the troopers smugly.
"Congratulations, then," said Hektor with a slight smile, before turning back to the issue at hand. Balor was dead, which wasn't ideal, but on the plus side, he hadn't been the one to kill him, so the Warmaster wouldn't blame him (which was another welcome change from every single commander the World Eater had ever had before).
He was about to address the survivors, to say what he wasn't sure, when one of them slowly stood up, hands held above his head, and walked out of cover. He was young, per Hektor's reckoning (which admittedly wasn't the most reliable, given the paucity of his experience dealing with mortals), with a mop of blond hair which fell in front of his eyes constantly.
"We surrender," said the man, speaking loudly. "Please don't shoot."
Gesturing for the other troopers to stay back, Hektor slowly walked toward the man, until they were less than a meter apart. From this close, Hektor's senses and experience told him many things : most interestingly that, no matter how terrified the man was, he was still holding himself together through sheer strength of will, which was impressive – especially since unlike the dregs they'd butchered on their way to the bridge, his body was clean of combat stimms and other mind-altering chemicals.
"You are the one who killed Balor ?" Hektor asked.
"Yes," the man admitted. "I have wanted him dead for years, and I figured if you were going to kill him anyway, I might as well do it myself."
"Actually, we were hoping to interrogate him," Hektor growled. "He could have provided us valuable intel in our conflict against the Bloodied Crown."
Sure, the Ripper General was a secondary target compared to the Chairman, but taking him alive had still been Hektor's objective. And given the state of Balor's corpse, Hektor couldn't even use his omophagea to absorb memories from the dead director's brain.
"I was his personal aide," the mortal immediately replied. "Everything he knew, I can tell you – and I will, so long as you give me your word we will be spared."
"Hmm. Interesting," Hektor mused. He wasn't lying, and with Balor's reputation, Hektor suspected his personal aide might actually know more about the day-to-day operations of the warband than the Ripper General himself. "Tell me this, then. Why did you betray your master ? So that you would survive ?"
"He was never my master," the man spat. "I had been waiting for the chance to kill him for a long time, and when I realized that your victory was inevitable, I decided I might as well take my shot. He was ranting about how we should fight to the death, and was about to call the rest of the fleet to tell them to blow up the ship rather than let it be captured. I don't know if he planned to go down with it or not – there are escape pods on the bridge, after all – but somehow I doubted he was going to take us with him when he bailed."
Under his helmet, Hektor smiled. He liked this one, and he had a feeling the Liberator would too.
"What's your name ?" he asked.
"Pelton," the man replied, before adding with a weak smile : "but my friends call me Flicker."
"Well, Flicker, I am Hektor of the Cainite Protectorate, formerly of the World Eaters. In the name of the Liberator, I accept your surrender. Drop your weapons and come out," he called out to the rest of the cowering crew. "You will be treated in accordance with the rules of war as decreed by Warmaster Cain, and given a fair trial for any crimes you may have committed under Balor's employ; but unless you really frakked up, you won't be summarily executed."
Which was more than any of them could have expected from the Imperial Navy, whose treatment of captured pirates went from a quick las-bolt to the skull to being handed over the Mechanicus for conversion into a servitor. Some of the crew might be lucky enough to be drafted into the lowest echelons of the Navy instead, especially if they had been civilians who had been forced to join the pirates when their own vessels had been seized, but that was little better given the conditions on the lower decks of most Imperial ships.
Pelton shagged in relief. Not all tension left his body, because he wasn't an idiot, but he visibly relaxed, or at least gave a good impression of it. As the USA troopers advanced across the bridge and began taking the crew into custody as well as seizing control of the Rossinante, Hektor idly wondered how long it had been since a son of Angron had accepted anyone's surrender.
"Worldwounder, this is Hektor," he called out after opening a vox-link to the flagship (technically, Liberator's Fist was the Protectorate flagship, but since Cain was operating from Worldwounder and Van Yastobaal was in overall command, they had transferred the title for the operation). "The Rossinante's bridge has been secured. Balor is dead, but his aide has surrendered and offered to share what he knows."
"That will have to do, then," replied the Rogue Trader's voice. "Send them across as soon as it is practical. Lord Cain is closing in on the Jewel of the Void. This will all be over soon."
Tempting fate like that was usually something Hektor was cautious about : his memories of the Long War were fragmented and tinted blood-red, but he recalled enough to know that the Warp seemed to take words like these as a challenge. But given the Liberator's prowess and the composition of his boarding party, the World Eater couldn't think of anything the Chairman of the Bloodied Crown could have in store which might pose a genuine threat to Cain.
As the Van Yastobaal transport sped through the ongoing void battle toward the Jewel of the Void, I silently cursed the circumstances which were forcing me into peril once again.
It I had my way, I'd much rather have stayed aboard Worldwounder, with a powerful void-shield and several layers of thick plating between me and enemy fire, rather than the comparatively frail shell of the transport. But, once the diviners had revealed that the odds we would face the leader of the Bloodied Crown were non-negligible, my chances of doing so while retaining the respect of the lunatics surrounding me had vanished. Had we been facing only Balor, I could have pretended to grant the honor of battle to one of my oh-so-faithful lieutenants, but with Jabbus himself present, I simply had no choice.
Especially since I had promised Jurgen a shot at the mysterious Jereb Auric, the man who had sold the wild psykers Hektor had faced aboard the Murderous Jest, and the head of the shadow cartel seemed the most likely source of intelligence on the trafficker's location. Since it would have taken an act of the Emperor to make Jurgen leave my side, I had to choose between risking my skin by taking part in the boarding action, or risk earning my aide's contempt.
With what I'd seen Jurgen do in the past, and the other factors in play, I'd ultimately decided that braving the Jewel of the Void was the lesser of two evils. Besides, I told myself, it really shouldn't be all that dangerous.
Of course, I was under no illusion that this would be easy. A man like Jabbus didn't survive without taking his personal security extremely seriously. The fact that he was here at all, within range of us, was a strategic mistake only explained by the fact that he hadn't known we had diviners who could forewarn us of the trap.
Which made sense in my book : the Bloodied Crown were pirates, after all. The most experience they had with witches were the wild psykers they trafficked, and those were as different from the Tzeentchian magi as it was possible to be while still being crazy enough to dabble in the stuff in the first place.
Anyway, the Jewel of the Void was certain to be a veritable fortress, full of the best fighters Jabbus' considerable resources could buy. Still, I had seen the USA take on enough foes by now to be confident they would emerge victorious in the end. Part of me had worried that Areelu might regard my taking USA troopers over her household guards as a slight, but fortunately, she'd been the one to suggest it in the first place, so I was reasonably certain I was in the clear.
Jabbus' caution was manifest in the position of his ship within the pirate fleet. Even though the shadow cartel had been certain they would catch us by surprise, the Jewel of the Void was still hanging in the backline of their haphazard formation. This was the reason why our flight was taking entirely too long for my liking, to the point that Hektor's own boarding party had managed to seize the Rossinante by the time we began our final approach.
I wasn't too surprised about it, to be perfectly honest. They were led by a Space Marine, after all, and one with thousands of years of experience in such actions to boot. The news that Balor had apparently been killed by one of his own people before the World Eater could get to the bridge was more unexpected, but I didn't much care about it, as I was preoccupied by more personal concerns.
Not even the wealth of a Rogue Trader could make the experience of being inside a gunship flying through an active void battle comfortable. Between our power armors' boots being mag-locked to the deck and the transport's gravitic fields, we were spared from being tossed around like peas in a can, but the fraction of the momentum which still bled through to my frail human body inside my wargear was still unpleasant in the extreme.
I forced the discomfort down, all too aware of the fact that I was surrounded by people whose image of Cain the Liberator would hardly benefit from me puking inside my helmet.
I wasn't piloting the Liberator Armor this time : the suit I had worn on Cassandron was still undergoing repairs, and it was ill-suited for operating within the confines of a spaceship in any case. True, such had also technically been the case in the underhive of Primus back on Cassandron, but breaking a wall to make way in a starship was an entirely different proposition from doing the same in the underhive, what with the hull being the only thing between me and the infinite void of space.
Instead, I was clad in my customized suit of Slawkenberg power armor, with my trusty chainsword and trophy bolt pistol hanging from my waist.
Another source of unease was that, from the inside of a transport, there was nothing I could do to improve my odds of surviving the trip. I could only hope that the Cainwings (a name I still regretted not stopping from taking root while I had the chance) would be motivated enough by the fraudulent reputation I had cultivated to keep their precious Liberator safe. But entrusting my life into the hands of anyone else, let alone a bunch of heretics piloting machines designed and constructed by another bunch of heretics, was a challenge to say the least, so I forced myself to stop thinking about it and took another look at my surroundings in a mostly vain effort to distract myself.
Aside from two squads of Khornate soldiers, the transport also carried what had, much to my horror, become my own personal retinue of dangerous, overpowered freaks. Jurgen was there, of course, as was Malicia. Though one of them was an unbound psyker and the other a murderous, pain-feeding xenos, I had (much to my consternation) grown used to their presence, to the point I actually felt relieved by the fact they would be with me in the fighting to come.
However, I could not say the same from the latest addition to my retinue. Akivasha was seated in front of me, wearing the same black bodysuit she'd worn during our raid on Hive Septimus on Cassandron. The Vampire Paragon hadn't asked whether she could accompany me : she had just been in the landing bay when I had arrived. I knew better than to damage my image by unsuccessfully arguing with her, of course, and the appearance of me agreeing to her presence had kept anyone else from trying to dissuade her, which was probably for the best all things considered.
On the one hand, after seeing her go toe-to-toe with a Daemon Prince, I had no doubt regarding her martial capabilities. On the other hand, I was all too aware that the reason she'd joined the expedition in the first place was to maintain access to my blood, which I was very keen on keeping inside me rather than down her throat.
Oh, she had been very diplomatic about it, and certainly hadn't cornered me in a corridor to drain me dry – not that she would have had an easy time of it with Jurgen and Malicia at my side. But I could feel her eyes on me whenever we were in a room together, watching me like a piece of grox-meat, and it wasn't a feeling I enjoyed. Even now, her head was unerringly fixed in my direction.
Of course, had I known what perils awaited me aboard the Jewel of the Void, I would have been much less ambivalent about Akivasha's presence.
AN : Happy holidays, everyone ! Barring a miracle from the Muse, this is likely to be the last chapter I publish this year - meaning that, yes, AYGWM will be completed early in January of next year. While it isn't outside the bonds of possibility that the next chapter will be finished before then, there is no way I'll be able to get the epilogue done in time, no matter how many goats are dragged to the Muse's bloody altar.
Initially, this chapter was going to be much longer, but I ended up cutting it as part of a rework and a decision to have more Cain POV, rather than jumping between characters as I had initially planned for Sanguia's events. After all, not knowing exactly what manner of danger Cain will face next along with him is part of the fun of these stories.
So, the next chapter will be mostly Cain POV, and I think I'll try to have more of these going forward. If it doesn't work, I'll get back to a more balanced mix, but that's a problem for my future self.
As always, I hope you enjoyed reading this chapter, and I look forward to your thoughts, theories and suggestions.
Zahariel out.