Inquisitor Brigitta Al'Anoud stared at the wall of her cabin lost in thought. The cabin was mostly devoid of creature comforts. The furniture that was there was top quality and remarkably comfortable, but devoid of the bling or other objects meant to show power.
She had no need of such things.
This was her sanctuary; few ever came here.
She was pulled from her thoughts by her vox crackling to life.
'My Lady, you are needed on the bridge.' The ship's XO said.
'Very well. I will be along shortly.' she said, standing up. Making sure she was presentable, she left her quarters for the bridge. They were out of the warp and Lyra would have stated if there was an actual problem. Not to mention the alarms.
"Report." Brigitta said as she arrived on the bridge. Captain Enos was just sitting down in his chair, his salt and pepper hair still damp from a shower. Other crew members moved back and forth; it was busier than normal due to the shift change.
"Brigitta." Veran, her Navigator, said in a clipped voice, bowing. "We are going to struggle with the plotted course ."
She frowned, sitting down in her chair and pulled up the plotted course. North. They had received rumours of a possible rebellion. Reports were conflicting if it was chaos or not, so she wanted to swing nearby to see what was going on.
"Why?"
"The warp is becoming unstable. I can see great storms off in the distance and they seem to be spreading."
Brigitta chewed her lip in thought. "So we wouldn’t make it?"
"I cannot guarantee we would arrive in any reasonable time, so I cannot recommend it." She didn’t doubt his feelings. It was far better to be safe than sorry for travelling through the warp, and he had never given her reason to doubt him before.
That would affect her plans though.
"And east?" She asked. She had another point of interest out east from them. It was a far lower priority, but if it wasn’t caught in the warp storm, it might be worth a detour. At least it would cross off something that had been on her list for a while.
"That would be better. It should not be affected. But even then, it is not clear. I would need to plot a course carefully."
"Good. Work with Enos to get our headings. It won't affect our delivery of the Paladins, correct?" They had been lucky. Rather than needing to take the Paladins back to Titan, they were to rendezvous with a Grey Knight ship that would be taking them to another conflict.
If it wasn’t possible, she might be able to swing them with her. After all the journey had taken them 20 years and would take a similar amount back. More now the warp was unstable. So a few years on deployment was nothing.
But it might start to strain their relationship, so best to avoid if possible.
We are several years from the system we will be meeting them in. So should not run into any difficulties.
She thanked the Navigator, glad he retreated back to his cabin. When he was out of side the rest of the bridge seemed to heave a sigh of relief. While not the most mutated Navis Nobilite, it was still off-putting to most. It was one of the many reasons their workspace was cordoned off from the rest of the bridge.
That and the risk of him getting corrupted by chaos was too high.
The captain, with his help, would organise the route through vox. Oddly Veran insisted that all meetings be face-to-face. Why that was she had no idea, but having worked together for decades, she put it down to one of the navigator's many quirks and moved on.
"Seraphine please update our agents on the change of plans. Also, warn our network that the warp might be unstable and to prepare."
"Will do Inquisitor."
Looking at the star maps, she would need to double back on herself. The drop-off point with the Grey Knights were core wards, closer to Terra. Luckily, Veran had already highlighted a major warp lane they could use to get most of the way east, shaving years off the journey.
That was particularly welcome as she wasn’t even sure what she expected from the tip-off. The rumours spoke of a suspicious cult, with a hint of sedition, flagged by a local priest. The planet in question wasn’t especially important, at least strategically, being a Cemetery world. I planet given over to the care of the dead.
Continent-sized graveyards, with massive mausoleums all to mark the site of a huge war. She didn’t know what war, but had it in her data bank if she needed to find out. She thought it was from the time of the Great Crusade, when the holy warriors of the Emperor killed a xenos empire, at great cost to themselves.
Regardless, while the world wasn’t crucial to the defence of the Imperium, many of the surrounding systems were. Some even had chapter home worlds. So a chaos incursion there could be catastrophic.
If there was even a problem in the first place. The intel hadn't even been properly corroborated. The priest himself was long since dead, the concern having been raised before she had even become an Inquisitor.
But the cogs of the Administratum had finally turned and the report was filed to end up on her desk, so to speak.
It was down to her to investigate. Probably to find a dead world or one long since corrupted by the forces of chaos, or finally just the raving of an overzealous priest.
She hoped it was the last, but she would serve the Imperium nonetheless.
She sat surveying the bridge for a few moments, enjoying the seamless transition before locking her cogitator and heading for her quarters once more. She nodded to her crew, greeting them by name as she passed them. She might not be able to do that with every one of her crew members; there were void born that she and had would never meet, but in the upper corridors, she made sure she knew the names of everyone she was likely to meet.
It was an easy way to build respect and trust.
Once she reached her quarters, a message was waiting from Luthen-8. Lucien's credentials had been updated. Faster than she expected… good. With that, he was now officially fully raised to the rank of an Inquisitor, and his Rosette would now match his identification.
With him no longer her apprentice, she would need to consider the next apprentice to train. It couldn’t be any of her inner circle. Firstly, those like the captain didn’t have the right skills and those who did, didn’t have the inclination or the right temperament. Like Rhassia, who would make a very good one but had no interest or Seraphine, who didn’t have the personality for it.
Obviously, none of the newer members would be considered. None had stood out in the first place, but they hadn't been tested sufficiently for her. Zardelle might be a candidate one day, but she held off for several reasons. One she was a valuable asset, and she wasn’t ready to give her up just as she got her.
Yes, it would be years even if she were made an apprentice then and there, but that wasn’t the point.
The other reason was that she didn’t have her full measure quite yet.
It would be decades before she would be considered, although moving her into the inner circle was far more likely. She was already considering it. She had been in a similar position in her gang, so she had some experience with it.
She also wanted her to be invested; she was an incredibly valuable asset.
She could wait a few years to find the right person.
It was her duty to find the best person for the role. Becoming an Inquisitor Acolyte was a large responsibility, not to mention becoming a full Inquisitor. They had to be the right person to not fold under that pressure or worse, become corrupted by it.
Brigitta tisked in frustration. She did have a perfect candidate, one she had been grooming for years and was ready to be slotted in. But unfortunately they had vanished into the warp on another mission, never to return. They were presumed missing in action, but she held out hope that they might turn up at some point.
False hope, that it was.
Turning away from the cogitator, she headed for her meditation room. She'd felt something different within herself recently, ever since the battle against Domikio. At first, she thought it was chaos-related, but had not been able to find anything. Nor had the Grey Knights noted anything when she carefully brought it up.
She of course didn’t ask if they could feel any corruption within her. That would be a mistake, but she asked them for some help testing her defences, allowing them to catch a glimpse past her shield.
Since it wasn’t corruption she had decided it was a hidden, undiscovered strength, her trials and tribulations strengthening her. Or the Emperor was pleased with her service and had helped her in some way. It didn’t matter for now. She would keep an eye on it, but she could put the added strength to good use.
---
Zardelle ducked, allowing the fencing blade to pass just by her ear, ruffling her hair, before surging forward. Her low guard shifted and flowed into her combination of jabs and slashes, forcing her opponent into a corner, unable to dodge the final blow.
Her practice blade slammed heavily into her sparring partner's side. Once it connected, she stepped back, ready to start again.
Her opponent had a different style than she was used to. But training with Aleric for years had exposed her to enough styles that once she had her eye in, she had quickly adapted to the new variant. She estimated the trainer was on par or maybe slightly better than him with a fencing blade, but still a lesser combatant.
He had so many more tricks she had to be wary of.
For example, that final sequence would never have worked.
"Enough." The Lady Inquisitor said, from where she was standing in the corner. Next to her was Rhassia, also watching her fight. They were all in one of the many training rooms aboard the Penumbral Spear, a generously sized room with all the equipment you could ask for.
From blades to weights and a shooting range. There were even other rooms that could be set up for drills, like clearing a building or in the larger ones, even a town.
Zardelle took a few calming breaths to get her adrenaline back under control before bowing to her sparring partner and then putting her equipment away.
Being amongst the Inquisitors' crew reminded her of a saying Aleric was fond of. 'The more everything changed, the more it stayed the same.'
While they had still been on the hive world, she had been slotted into a small but elite team to combat any signs of chaos. They had been able to use overwhelming force in each encounter, so none of them were a true threat. Only a few of the cults even had a chaos spawn amongst them. The rest were just poorly supplied cultists.
The actual designation for them was Cellular cults, which meant they were all in cells that didn’t talk to each other. This made it very hard to clear up most of the time. They had cheated and taken out the head at the start, so picking apart the rest hadn't been too arduous.
Zardelle had been working hard to understand her new environment. As her mother always said, 'Knowledge is the only luxury no one can take from you.'
So she wanted to understand as much as she could about her role in it, as she could and there was a lot to learn, but she had found herself thriving in it.
Rhassia had been especially helpful in this, always offering advice and helping her where she could. She wouldn’t say they were friends, not yet, but she could see that happening one day.
While she was learning and settling in, she couldn’t help but be frustrated. She was so used to being part of the decision-making and hearing all the latest intel; being out of the loop was difficult. She was selfishly glad there were so many gangers on board, so she still had many she could talk to.
Even if she didn’t fight with many of them anymore. Although that was changing.
Her team, led by Mohal, was effective. Mohal had been in some form of combat longer than she had been alive. First in the Imperial Guard regiments and then in the Inquisitor's service. He was cold, hard and blunt, and she could honestly say she didn’t like him.
While annoying she wasn’t in command; she couldn’t fault the man for his skill. In the many missions they had run on, she rarely had cause to question his commands. The few times she did were around the uses of her abilities, and he had quickly adapted to the new dynamic within the team.
Some members had been swapped out for her gang members. Mostly those who were used to her aura and could hack even if for only a moment.
"Zardelle." Inquisitor Brigitta said. "Impressive progress. I didn’t believe Rhassia's praise of you, but seeing is believing.
"Told you." Rhassia said, smirking next to her. She had thought Rhassia was cold when they first met, but now they were on the ship, she had relaxed somewhat and more of her true personality came through. "That final combination was nasty. I don't think I would have been able to stop it. Especially not when you are in your armour."
"Thank you." Zardelle said, smiling, quietly pleased about the praise.
"Have you got it back?" Inquisitor Brigitta asked.
"Ivan has returned it." She had worried it would be confiscated, but luckily it hadn't been. Firstly, because she was so valuable, but also because it fit her too perfectly and no one had the skills to refit the armour for others to work on.
Some of the tech priests might be able to, but many of them looked distastefully at it and refused to work with it.
She had almost started to take Aleric's skill for granted, and it was only now she didn’t have it that she realised once again how lucky she and the gang had been.
She missed him, even with the occasional message; it wasn’t the same. Same with her parents and her sister. Peggi in particular, was her greatest confidant. Even the sparing with him had always been informative as he would pull out one trick after another.
The Quartermaster Ivan and Magos Occularis Secundus had been blown away by her power blade. Not by the item itself but by the exquisite maintenance done on it. Their words, not hers. Apparently, the blade was stronger and more effective than it had a right to be.
The rather basic blade had been updated and tinkered with until it was a masterwork, one of the best they had seen, of that model anyway.
There were of course better power blades.
The Inquisitor still kept her distance, a few steps back, in account of her aura. She'd always had control over it, mostly thanks to her parents. Emotions made it hard, particularly negative ones, but under their careful attention, she had mastered the skill.
That was taken to another level thanks to the exercise she now did. She still had doubts that Aleric found them in there, but she trusted him and knew he wouldn’t harm her, so she didn’t look too deeply once he asked her not to. But that was Aleric. If she didn’t know him better, she swore he did it on purpose to look mysterious, but she knew the little shit was utterly oblivious.
Like he had been to women's advances. He had his head in the clouds.
The Inquisitor pulled her attention once more. She had just been turning away when she paused and looked back "We have an officer meeting tomorrow at 0200. I want you to join us."
"Yes Inquisitor." Zardelle said, a slight smile on her face.
As the Inquisitor walked away, she moved closer to Rhassia. "Is there anything I need to know for the meeting?"
"Not to sit at the head of the table. That’s a good one." After laughing, she carried on. "But other than that, not really. You won't be expected to join in, although feel free to ask if you have any points to raise. Just be careful not raise too many. You can always talk to me afterwards if you need anything."
They chatted as they walked, before separating at the mess hall. Zardelle still had several hours of reading she wanted to get through before she had to leave. Not to mention a shower. That was a weird thing on the ship. She could have as many warm water showers as she wanted.
Out of habit, she did them sparingly, but that had been a greater shock than it probably should have been.
Enos would be off his shift on the bridge, and she was looking forward to sitting down to talk to him for dinner. It had quickly become a highlight of her day. At first, she had found the time travelling remarkably boring, even with all the training and learning she was doing.
She had bumped into Enos in one of the observation rooms. It had been between jumps and she had gone there to look out over the solar system, since she still found it fascinating to look at. She had found him there, painting of all things.
She had never had much interest in art, or at least not much exposure to it. But she had been fascinated by it, and they got to talking.
Now she spent as much time as she could learning to paint from him.
---Imperium: Hive Cities Scavenger (Tier 2) - IIWarrior (Tier 3) - VIImperium: Hive Cities Danger (Tier 2) - IIIHuman: Hand to hand (Tier 2) - IIITerra Federation: Technician (Tier 3) - XTerra Federation: Software (Tier 3) - VSharpshooter (Tier 3) - VISelf (Tier 3) - XIReverse Engineering (Tier 2) - IImperium: Canine Handling (Tier 2) - IVAkashic Throne (Tier 1) - IBlade Mastery (Tier 3) - VIIPhysics (Tier 1) - 11Glyphcraft (Tier 2) - IIBlueprints (Tier 3) - IIIActing (Tier 1) - IMathematics (Tier 1) - XIBiology (Tier 1) - XTeaching (Tier 2) - IIMachine Spirit (Tier 1) - IChemistry (Incomplete) - VII