[@Kratesis][@Andreyich][@jbeil][@BCTheEntity]


A dozen Sisters had made their ways to Athega Tertius alongside Inquisitor Kliment, each of them willing to lay down their lives in protection of his own, and although four of them had indeed paid the ultimate sacrifice it was clear that none of those present had come off of the worlds surface without a change having overcome them; what sort of change depended entirely on the individual in question, for the Inquisitors part he had had to restrain himself for declaring Exterminatus – that most final of solutions – upon the whole planet. He had only been dissuaded from that course of action by cooler heads, taking his frustration that Chaos had been able to penetrate this far into [b]his[/b] sector on the vastly unfortunate De'Shard.

For an entire month he tortured the prisoner, the only one out of the nearly thirty heretics taken alive to not break under his ministrations, others turning swiftly from mortal men into gibbering messes. Things started well enough - timelines established and facts set into rockcrete, names and numbers given even as the capital of Athega was put back into order and the Planetary Governor replaced – but as the time progressed, time which he frankly did not have, things began to take a turn that would have even Kliment confused.

De'Shard, for all his obvious heresy, neither considered himself a traitor to the Imperium nor saw what he had done on his homeworld as anything other than the true path. When questioned he simply repeated that it had been [i]her[/i] will that it as done, that [i]she[/i] had come to them with an entourage much like he had and told them what they needed to hear and how to go about it. 

“She was beautiful,” he sputtered one day from his toothless mouth, “like one of the Saints from the windows of the cathedrals.”

“What do you mean?”

“She had a way about her, a halo of light that blinded everyone...and..and she was impervious to harm, truly blessed by our Emperor.”

[i]Our[/i] Emperor he had said, something a true blasphemer would never say as willingly, but the blazing light in his eyes was almost as fierce as that of Confessor Mazzini; it would not be too far to say that it scared him.

Days later he received word from the Canoness-Preceptor herself, an urgent message that was encrypted to the highest levels of the Sororitas, concerning a soldier of the Guard who had fallen into a deep coma-like sleep. It was said that she had simply collapsed in the middle of the battlefield and not awoken since, prayers and hymns coming unbidden from her lips even as no other part of her body moved, and more superstitious 'witnesses' even claimed that a faint aura had began to radiate from her. There was a small addendum to the message, one that stated with some certainty that, in spite of having received no wounds on the field, she was dying.


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“I have been ordered away,” half-coughed the Inquisitor, a grim look on his face as he addressed those Sisters that had made it through the shitstorm and were now gathered about him in the bowels of the [i]Imperator Gracili Ferro[/i], the frigate giving off slow groans as it made its way through the warp and back toward the Preceptory on Taniea Primus, “it has been an honour to serve with you all.”

Kliment was never a man to give speeches, but as his eye focused on each of the Sororitas – those still among the living – he could not help but feel a swelling of pride in his chest, truly these were exemplars of Imperial might and faith combined into one being.

“Fresh orders await you on Taniea, so I have been told, but they will have to be pursued without me I am afraid.” He gestured to their ranks with a false smile on his weathered face now, “Sister-Celestian Blandine has been assigned to lead you on your next task, one I know you will complete with as much fervour and dedication as you would if I were still here.”

It would be another week before he left, the frigate coming out of the warp in the correct location and his 'guests' sent back to their chambers in the magnificence of the Orders fortress, perhaps some may even be given leave to take in the wider planet at large? Hospitallers were always in high demand in the Hive Cities, for example, and Horacio could always bless and lead the faithful in prayer and service.

As for Kliment and his activities...that was classified.


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“We have failed, my master.” Came a voice from the darkness, one among a multitude of shadowed figures sat about an oval table. The voice was higher than normal yet certainly masculine, reedy but with an air of underlying authority, a practised way of speech that had not come naturally and was in fact a deception.

“There was no failure, Carfax!” Snapped back a deeper voice, digitized edges indicating an altered larynx at least, “Athega Tertius was simply a test, and one I may add that – in spite of local interference – worked perfectly as a demonstration.”

“Piffle! Utter dross. How can Jowan be serious? How?!”

“[b]Enough,[/b]” boomed another unseen speaker, this one sat at the head of the table, unseen talons scraping against the wooden surface, “both of you will silence yourselves; the next test will soon begin, and the subject must not suspect a thing.”

“They do not, I assure you.”

“Good...good, you will receive details in due course. Let the faithful spread a bit, give our Imperial overlords some time to rest, for they will need more than a doddering old fool this time.”

Silence reigned for moments, only the soft sound of breathing to be heard in the darkened chamber, before the 'leader' spoke up once more.

“Immortality through Faith.” They proclaimed.

“Immortality through Faith!”

It was a refrain which echoed through the corridors and hallways of the ancient structure, all the way down to the medical bay where the subject lay – the feminine form almost in stasis, or so it seemed – those words ringing off of the walls and into the mind of the ostensibly unconscious figure.

[i]Immortality Through Faith.[/i]



[h2][End of Act I][/h2]