The hood was pulled off of Inessa's head. She closed her eyes quickly as light painfully filled her vision. Then, her bonds were cut and she crumpled to the cold deck like a marionette whose strings had been severed. She laid there for several long moments, willing the pain to subside so she might move again. She dared to open her eyes, slowly letting them adjust to her surroundings, for the blurry grey shapes to resolve into the familiar sight of armed troopers and metal walls.

When she finally managed to pull herself to a sitting position, slumped against a wall, most of the other captives had been freed. She looked over her fellow captives briefly, seeing they were in much the same condition as her, before her eyes came to rest on the officer standing among them, their apparent rescuer. She considered his words, trying to piece together some coherent narrative in her head of what had occurred. Then the body was dragged in. The sight of the Inquisitorial icon on the corpse’s chestplate caused a sense of utter dread to fill her. 

Her delusion that these rescuers were her allies was suddenly shattered. The Inquisition was the hand of the Emperor himself, and to act against an Inquisitor was to invite death and damnation upon oneself. These men before her were traitors. 

Inessa Laen remained where she was, as much from the paralyzing thought of facing inquisitorial stormtroopers in combat as the pain that came with every shallow breath and movement. She had seen tempestus scions in battle once before and had heard the stories of Inquisitors, she’d be little match for either on her best day, and she was no traitor. She watched some of the other captives start gathering up their own weapons with a grim expression, her violet eyes silently condemning them.