EotS Chapter 15: Mutiny
·
Oct 8
67
Previous chap has been edited as always, fixed some random missing words here and there and reworded a bunch of other things. Notable change is that Konstantin made sure to warn Fritz about his hunch, even if he can't outright say he suspects the rebels are chaos worshippers.
Savant Militant Konstantin of Zamor
The remaining grundians are sent flying by the telekinetic force that annihilates their leader, and I give them no time to reorient themselves as my laspistol flies into my hand and I execute them one after the other.
The veil of the warp was paper thin now, roaring into my ears despite the wards and barely held back by little more than prayers and well wishes.
It makes me hesitate as I reach for my force staff, but only for a moment.
The time for fear was past.
The staff buzzes in my grasp and my chestpiece is telekinetically pulled secure as I grab a few air filters and attach a gas mask to my belt.
Within seconds I am moving out of my quarters and stepping over a dozen corpses, determined to seek the closest imperial line of defense and assist them in putting down whatever the hell was going on right now.
A gurgled cough stops me, and I look down to find the naval cadet assigned to the sanctum holding a bloodied hand over his throat, staring at me with fear and despair in his far too young eyes.
"Tsk." I clicked my tongue and leaned down, focusing my will and commanding his flesh to invigorate. "Sorry kid, I'm not too good at this."
His eyes widen a bit, and then quite a bit more as the technique begins its work. His strained gurgle becomes an actual scream of pain, and he quickly begins to thrash around in an attempt to escape it.
I holster my pistol and yank him up just as my technique ends and I am left staring down a wide-eyed teen.
And as much as I wished to reassure him, something told me patience would cost us dearly.
"What is going on?" I demanded as he began breathing heavily. "Steel yourself Cadet! What is happening to the ship?!"
"M-m-mut-tiny." He chokes out as I set him down. "M-must pr-prot-tect Navigat-tor."
"Then that is what we shall do." I grunt and a naval armsman's shotgun flips into my free hand and I shove it into the kid's own shaking arms and start to move. "Stay behind me and keep up."
It takes me only a few steps before I hear him hesitantly do so and we march deeper into the sanctum.
Corpses piled on corpses are littered across our path, strongpoints ran over by sheer weight of bodies and turrets broken by improvised explosives simply thrown at them haphazardly instead of placed for maximum damage.
The Grundians' tactics appeared inept at best, but they had the numbers and the willingness and determination to use them.
The slaughter only grew as we neared the sanctum proper and soon we heard sounds of intense fighting ahead of us. We picked up the pace, and entered the Navigator's antechamber behind the enemy as they charged the Navis Nobilitae house guards.
The elaborately armored soldiers stood guard next to the heavily damaged blast doors leading to their charges, and they took cover behind literal piles of Grundian bodies.
There must have been around five hundred of the mutineers to the house guard's twenty, and yet they were still holding their own with precise hellgun fire.
I wasted no more time contemplating as I stepped into the open, summoning the widest possible flame I could and flinging it into the foe's back, orchestrating it into spreading further as the honor guards pressed the attack from the front.
A shotgun barked from behind me, taking down a mutineer and I grunted in approval as the kid reloaded his weapon.
The Grundian's did not break and panic and instead became a wave of roaring flesh as they threw themselves forward with no heed for their own lives, the cry of "DEATH TO THE CORPSE EMPEROR!!!" On their lips.
Grenades detonated, and I ceased weaving the flames in favor of clumping them together to make the detonations as efficient as possible with my telekinesis but even after dying by the dozens every second their sheer weight began pressing them forward.
All my instincts suddenly screamed at me, and I shoved the Cadet aside and rolled us into cover as an infinitesimally tiny portion of the warp manifested on the ship, disappearing and pulling back a flicker of a second later and nearly leaving me discombobulated on the ground.
But I'd been faced more than mere overstimulation on Terra, and I quickly rolled back onto my feet and resumed my slaughter of the traitors while preparing to react to whatever was summoned.
Except instead of a summoning all I saw the Navigator's kid clutching at her forehead while her house guards tried dragging her back through the now open door, a hundred or more completely fleshless skeletons frozen mid movement spreading out in a cone in front of her.
She had opened her third eye in the middle of the ship.
We were lucky we weren't daemon food.
Even as I felt a shudder of pure fear go down my spine, I still made sure to incinerate any cunt who tried taking the opportunity to shoot her as she was finally dragged in and within the next few minutes the last of the rebels fell and the las fire finally stopped, and my chestpiece sported a few fresh scrapes and pockmarks.
Dodging laser fire was not something mere mortals were capable of.
"The Emperor protects!" I called out as the guards finished checking on each other.
"The Emperor protects, Savant!" One of the house guards called back. "The Lord Navigator will rejoice that you yet live."
"Let's not count ourselves safe until this mess has been dealt with, eh?" I chuckled and stepped out of cover and started walking to their blockade, followed by the Cadet. "Is the household well?"
"They are uninjured, thank the Emperor." The man half-signed the aquila with his off hand. "The Lord and Lady are keeping the ship steady. We will ensure the Heiress is not put in the line of fire again."
"Good." I sighed to myself in relief. "Have you called for reinforcements?"
He nodded. "A company of Mavians has been dispatched. There was an attack on the bridge that your Colonel headed off so they have been freed up to act. He will be moving in to clear out the heretics' barrack module now."
I frowned and began to pace. "That makes no sense. If the heretics wanted to take out the bridge they would not have sent so few men to be repelled that quickly. And the attack on the sanctum seems half-hearted at best."
"What are you suggesting, Savant?" The Cadet asks, still a bit shaky but not panicking anymore.
"These are not their main targets." I mutter. "Which leaves-"
"The warp drive, or the gellar field generator." The house guard hisses. "We need to relay this to the Lady Captain immediately!"
"Cadet, do you have a map?" I ask as the soldier starts voxing the rest of the ship. "One I can follow directly to the drives?"
He shakes his head before his eyes harden and he says: "No, but I do know how to get us there."
"The house guards need to stay here." I do not attempt to dissuade him. "We will be going in alone."
"I am Quintus of house Maxentius, and I am no coward." He grinds out with all the indignation of a teenager hardened by strict discipline. "The gellar field generator is closest, we must secure it first."
"Then so be it." I pat his shoulder lightly and look to the house guard, the man merely giving me a grave nod of respect before I decide we had dawdled enough and move to leave the chamber.
The further we got away from the sanctum the more chaotic our surroundings became.
Battle raged all around us as desperate loyalists held the Grundians back, sometimes even their own crazed crewmen had to be gunned down as the civilians were grasped by the warp madness.
We helped whomever we could afford to as we pushed forward, gathering a small group of six armsmen brave enough to follow us and leaving the rest to hold their ground and wait for help and thus securing a supply line, shaky as it was.
Our mad dash was leading us towards the enemy stronghold but instead of the mass of heretics I was expecting as we reached the corridor passing by the entrance to their barracks, I found an entire battle going on as two large groups of Grundians exchanged fire.
Both sides were vicious in their intent, and nearly every shot was fatal as their grey coats failed to stop the high powered las shots of their rifles.
My witch sight quickly revealed the reason behind it as I saw the ones hunkered up on the outside were being led by Commissar Marcus alongside a few squads of Mavians.
The instant I confirmed this, a heavy weapons team on the other side of the battlefield burst into flames that rapidly spread to the rest of their lines, blinding and killing them as I approached the loyalist position.
"Stand down soldiers!" The familiar voice of the Commissar called to the loyalist penal legionaries. "They are on our side."
"Even the fucken' witch stayed loyal?" A one-eyed man with bandages covering half his head spat and grinned a toothless grin. "So much for the oppressed rising up, eh?"
"What was that, Corporal?" Marcus shot him a look.
"Nothin' sir, Commissar sir." He salutes, still grinning.
Marcus contemplates smacking him for his cheek but settles on simply ignoring him for the moment in favor of facing my group. "Savant. You are far from your post."
"Situation demanded a rapid response." I rattled off immediately. "Bridge and Navigators are secure. We suspect the enemy will target the drive or field generator."
The penal legionnaire spits on the ground again and many of the soldiers around us begin cursing.
"Damn it all." Marcus mutters quietly. "We were planning on trying to reach the Colonel Commissar but an attack on either the warp drive or gellar field generator will be fatal to the whole vessel."
He rubs the sides of his head for a few moments before grunting and rounding on his tiny contingent of Mavians. "Sargent Hickins, Sargent Willson. You are with the Savant. Obey his instructions and ensure nothing happens to those generators!"
My latrine buddy salutes quickly while the other hesitates. "You sure sir? You want to trust your back to these?" He looks at the loyalist Grundians.
"Oh we'll take real good care of him, we will." The Grundian Corporal hacks a laugh.
"They defied the enemy when it was far easier to join them." Marcus doesn't so much as twitch at this. "They will do their duty and hold this position until reinforcements arrive."
The way the Sargent's eyes trail to me make it clear that wasn't the real reason he hesitates but seeing the Commissar stay unmoving all he can do is grunt and start herding his men into an assault formation.
A minute goes by as I share as much information as I can with Marcus and soon our group of eight grows by another twenty.
The strong point was the last bastion of loyalist forces in the area, and our path to the generator became much more difficult now that every face we met was that of the enemy.
They were disorganized, busying themselves looting whatever they could get their hands on or eating and drinking whatever their victims carried on themselves as they slaughtered them, but there were still hundreds of the bastards, and we were forced to push through them all.
The armsmen guarded our flanks while the Mavians, proven and blooded guardsmen all, led the charge, leaving the defensive positions for me to deal with while they cut down the chaff with las rifle and flamer.
Twelve still fell to enemy fire, four of the armsmen to repeated ambushes, and eight of the Mavians to return fire, their flak armor worthless after two or three las hits, and not covering them fully besides.
They remained unbroken despite this, and soon we reached our destination.
The final traitor screamed as I pulled him towards me, and directly into and through the scrapped together autocannon he was trying to aim in our direction, and we stood before the great gate leading into the gellar field generator chamber that seemed to have been ground through with some great saw.
It was surrounded by the corpses of Skitarii and a few tech priests, and judging by the amount of burned flesh around them the enemy had paid a heavy price to push past them.
But pay they did.
And once more I felt a sense of foreboding as I stepped over the threshold and into the generator room, the others following after me while covering every single possible line of fire both above and below.
My feet sped up as I heard noise coming from within, the sound of bone striking metal and sawing through it with great violence.
The description seemed to impress itself onto my mind despite having no previous knowledge of such sounds, and it quickly proved accurate as I reached my destination and saw an immense three meter tall figure hunched over what I suspected was the Magos charged with keeping the generator running.
A jagged horn sprouted from one side of its sickly green head, its limbs were malformed, and its fat covered torso was cut up in multiple places, leaving its intestines to hang out in the damp sickly air surrounding it as it went about its work hacking the tech priest into tiny pieces.
Or so I had hoped, as the daemon slowly turned towards me, a wide and cheerful grin on its deformed face as it raised its bone-carved hacksaw. "Come child." Its voice, kindly and sickly, slithered and ground through my ear canals. "Come and accept Grandfather Nurgle's embrace."
Random stuff go!
Invigorate(biomancy): Supercharges natural regeneration. Not perfect but does the job.
Navigator's Third Eye: The main mutation of the strain, allows them to gaze directly into the warp, and for the warp to gaze back at them as the saying goes, giving them a narrow but powerful set of psychic abilities that are usually exceptionally deadly to both body and soul.
Naval shotgun: The preferred weapon of naval armsmen, mostly because they have a very hard time shooting through walls and thus accidentally killing their wielder.
Nurgle: Chaos God of plague, entropy, suffering, decay, nature and an infinity of other related domains. The big poo poo fart of the universe.EotS Chapter 16: Incursion
·
Oct 9
69
Savant Militant Konstantin of Zamor
Merely standing across the Plaguebearer sent a wave of nausea through my entire body, it felt as if I had worms crawling across my skin, like I was covered in the worst filth imaginable, like despair and surrender were the only options when faced with the truth of this universe-
My mind overflowed with spite as the warp answered my call far too eagerly, setting the daemon aflame as the energies that touched it went rampant and fled into the mutilated bodies of the nearby heretics and fallen Mechanicus.
'Oh, you motherfucker-'
The corpses burst into clouds of green pus and dozens of Nurglings manifested from the miasma, cheering and chittering as they began their hobbled charge.
All the while the Plaguebearer ignored the flame that consumed its flesh, displaying no distress whatsoever as it began trudging directly at me.
Rapidly securing my gas mask I began barking orders. "Fire at will, don't let them get close! Flamers cut off the flanks!" And then blasted the Plaguebearer with another ignition, making it stumble and hack a cackle as its flesh began to grow back against the flames.
Unfortunately for my men, they were far less prepared to face the horrors of the warp than myself, and my orders were obeyed only partially as half of them began wild firing with none of their previous discipline while the rest stayed standing still, stunned and terrified.
A few of the Mavians dropped their weapons and began dazedly stepping back away from the charging mass of plague green.
Only the armsmen seemed to stay somewhat collected at the sight of the true enemy, but they were only two, and their weapons failed to find purchase on the sheer mass of the charging daemons.
Brick shook himself from his daze and brought his flamer up, disgorging the flaming promethium into a clump of Nurglings, only for one of them to be launched by the others directly through the flames and at his face.
A telekinetic slap sent it flying back, breaking it against one of its own with a wet squelch and giving the guardsmen a bit more time to reorganize.
That was all the attention I could afford to take away from the main enemy as its leisurely walk slowly turned into a heavy charge, a guttural roar on its deformed lips that quickly turned into a mocking cackle as a telekinetic wave slammed into him and only managed to stop him in its tracks.
My own face twisted and I coated it in warpflame once again, finally making it flinch as one of its legs had its tendons snap and fail to hold it up fully.
Screams of terror and desperate battle cries echoed all around me now.
Gritting my teeth I began summoning a more powerful flame to finish the daemon off only to step away as a Nurgling bit through the stomach of Sargent Willson next to me and spread its arms wide as it rushed to hug my leg.
My force staff twisted through the air and slammed into the tiny deamon, rending its flesh with its psychic field and banishing it instantly, and leaving my attention plastered firmly onto the rapidly depleting number of my allies.
Which was all the distraction the Plaguebearer needed as I pushed power into my legs and dashed away from its wide swing, evading its massive bone-saw by hair's breath.
It grinned as I glared at it, summoning flames directly from my hand and bathing it in its entirety, making it rapidly stumble as it began to speak directly into my mind.
'Why struggle when you know defeat is inevitable?' It spoke with an almost fatherly inflection even as it crumbled. 'Rest. Lay down your arms. Give up.'
I roared as I cut off the flow of the flames and brought my staff over my head, smashing it into the horned Plaguebearer and bursting its head and banishing it back into the warp, all the while its cursed words still grated against my mind.
'You are already too late, child. Your ship will welcome Grandfather's embrace. Why fight what is inevitable?'
I stepped back with a gasp, stumbling slightly and rounding at the ongoing battle just in time to see Brick finally be overwhelmed and ignite his promethium tank, detonating the daemons trying to devour him while the last Nurgling was shot into pieces by a wide-eyed Jaremy.
A Jaremy completely covered in cuts and bites, missing chunks of his flesh and stumbling against the distant wall, gasping for air as his veins visibly blackened and his skin turned deathly pale.
All around us were dead imperials, missing chunks of their bodies to bites and necrosis, and with terror and panic carved into their faces. Whenever the faces were spared the Nurgligns' hunger.
My eyes absently trailed to what I could only guess was Marian's corpse, still holding his weapon even as he fell. A few paces behind him I saw Stocke, curled up on himself and dead without firing a single shot.
And just to the side was the kid… The only one not terrified in his last moments even as he was missing large chunks of his torso, the sole expression on his face was fury.
Ice spread under my feet.
"So… This is it then?" Jaremy spoke wetly as I stood there like a stunned idiot. "Think ma and pa would be proud their kid died a daemonslayer?" He shot me a bloody grin.
"They would." I half whispered.
He chuckled and winced in pain. "I can feel it spreading in me you know. It's telling me to embrace it. It's telling me I will survive if I do."
His face twisted in disgust. "I won't let it." He spat and raised his las pistol to his head and growled through gritted teeth. "FOR. THE. EMPEROR!"
"No!" I reached out but he had already pulled the trigger, burning a hole straight through his brain and making him fall completely limp against the wall.
I am unsure of how long I stood there, staring at the corpse of a man I had hoped to call friend, and by the time I blinked myself awake all the corpses were covered in psychic ice, just as frozen as their final expressions.
The daemon's words echoed through my mind again. The parasite wished to mock me and break my spirit, but its mockery was a reminder that my work was not done. The traitors were targeting the gellar field, and I was the only one who could do anything about it.
Except I did not know the way, not without my guide…
'It's do or die then.' I closed my eyes and grit my teeth so hard they began to audibly creak, and then I opened my mind fully to the entire ship.
The warp roiled against me, scratching and screeching and demanding but also revealing all I wanted to know. The nearby wall flash froze and was blasted through with a force bolt, and my legs burned as I pushed them to move as quickly as possible.
Towards the increasingly unstable warp drive.
Col Garett Fritz of the Mavian 32nd Foot
"Strategium secure Colonel!" The leader of his grenadier guards barked. "We found the Colonel Commissar!"
"Hett, with me." Garett waved the Commissar after him and walked into the room.
The few heretics still hiding out inside had been cut down before they could even try to surrender, but the number of bodies within was far greater than the 'fighting' suggested and the reason behind it quickly became apparent.
A small circle of fallen stormtroopers surrounded what appeared to have once been Colonel Commissar Baldemar, if the ripped clothing and cap he could see around the pulled apart chunks of flesh could be trusted.
"Frak." Garett spat. "Those hellguns are still hot."
"It appears so." Marcus agreed without inflection. "We were late by mere minutes."
Blank tone or not, Garett had learned to read the Commissar by now. "Holding your position was the right choice." He tried to not sound too reassuring.
"Commissar Baldemar would agree." Hett inclined his head slightly.
Scowling at the core of his regiment's discipline moping, Garett reached down and retrieved the gore covered power sword the traitors had left abandoned as their back line was attacked and promptly shoved it into Hett's unexpecting arms.
"The loyalist grundians are now your problem." Garett informed him. "Congratulations Captain-Commissar."
Hett hesitated only for a moment before going to salute.
But then something strange happened.
The ship seemed to groan under some distant force, a shuddering quake passing through it and shaking their footing.
And then something pushed against Garett's mind, a flash of images and impressions that sent him stumbling back and groaning in discomfort as his grenadiers held him up.
"My lord!" Captain Vickers waved in front of his face while Hett looked down at him with suspicion. "My lord. What happened?"
"That fucking witch!" Garett cursed as he pushed the grenadier holding him up away with his elbow. "We need to get to the warp drive. NOW!"
Plague Sorcerer Vito
"Faster you mewling worms!" He cursed at the cultists draining the loyalist scum of their blood and preparing the ritual. "Faster or I will unleash my fury upon you!"
His manic expression turned even more unhinged as they flinched and sped up. There was a time when these exact fools would shove and kick him for his 'curse'.
He was weak then, unable to fight back as his lacking psychic might limited him to being a flesh bound vox for the pigs in charge of Grund II's slave mines.
But Lord Morgurag saw his worth and taught him the Primodial Truth. He showed him the way of Grandfather Nurgle and freed him from the chains of the Imperium.
None could stand against his psychic might now, and his new 'brothers' knew it.
He only needed to give Grandfather's gift to three before they managed to finish the ritual his Lord had taught him. It would save him from the fate of his lessers and grant him ascension once his tribute was accepted by his loving Grandfather.
The loyalists would be too busy fighting his minion at the gellar generator to stop him now, and all would follow his design.
The warp drive shuddered and groaned as more and more of the Grandfather's domain seeped in, and Vito felt triumph rise in his bloated throat.
Except suddenly he felt a pulse of power that sent a spike of dread down his spine, his hands beginning to shake with that familiar terror he had discarded when he came into his true might.
'This-' His mind twisted in panic. 'This cannot be!' His shivers grew as he leaned against his staff and turned to the gates where the feeling was coming from. 'I am the one with the power!' He screamed in his mind even as the sorcerously strengthened gates began to freeze over.
"Do you hear me loyalist scum?!" He screamed at the hurricane of power just about to tip through. "I AM IN CONTROL!" He grasped his ritual knife and went to offer the first sacrifice when the gates burst into thousands of tiny frozen pieces, spreading through the chamber like shrapnel as they were suddenly ignited in flames that bit into his servants.
His terror grew and he could barely breathe now as a figure stepped through the new opening, covered head to toe in burns and cuts, a large gash in the side of his face slowly wriggling closed even as he walked, and pure power twisting in those pale empty eyes.
The warp roiled with a cry of vengeful fury.
Vito recognized the singed robes and staggered once more. 'No, not again!' He cried in defiance and terror, and summoned his might to bring decay to the loyalist slave only to find that it simply fizzled out before the approaching tide.
Something flickered through the air as he made to roar his defiance, and he stumbled back another step, fearfully looking down only to whimper as he saw the familiar handle of a misrecordia sticking out from his chest.
He looked back up pleadingly only to meet those eyes utterly bereft of mercy, and then his sight disappeared behind a wall of pain, for not even Grandfather's blessings able to stop the sublime agony of warpflame licking at his soul.
The chaos sorcerer, a mere step away from his rightful ascension, crumbled out of existence.
Col. Garett Fritz of the Mavian 32nd Foot
They followed the trail of destruction with a morbid sense of amazement, passing by broken strong points and hundreds of slaughtered heretics and slowly growing to understand that not a single traitor in their way was allowed to survive the Zamorian's rampage.
Garett ignored his men's warnings as they reached the back of the ship, shoving his way into the warp drive chamber only to stop as he saw the entirety of the floor had been charred black and the sole remaining trace of the traitors were a few unburnt bones sticking out of the edges.
The drive itself was flickering with rampant motive force, and it looked nothing short of desecrated but thank the Emperor, it did not seem like it was about to explode.
Or so he prayed.
And in the center of it all sat Konstantin, ass planted firmly on top of a metal crate and facing away from them as he stared into nothing.
Garett surveyed the area again, and sighed internally as he approached the psyker, once more ignoring his grenadiers' warnings as he walked up to him fiddling through his inner pockets and pulling out one of his premium lho sticks.
The psyker still didn't look up as he stood next to him, but he did accept the stick, planting it in his mouth as it lit up on its own and taking a deep drag.
They stayed there in silence as the troops moved in and secured the warp drive, what was left of the ship's Mechanicus contingent following suit just after them, screeching outrage in their inhuman tongue before they began chanting at the machines and countering whatever foul sorcery the heretics had committed to the great device.
Seeing Captain Vickers hesitantly approaching him, Garett patted the psyker's shoulder, ignored the charge of static that passed through his hand, and quietly muttered. "Well done soldier."
He left the psyker to his devices and lit up his own cigar. 'What an absolute mess.'
Random stuff go!
Plaguebearers: "Basic" daemons of Nurgle, the rank and file as it were, big slow and incredibly tanky they spread disease and hack you up real good.
Nurglings: Lesser Nurgle daemons, tiny green gremlins with far too much cheer for something that rotten. Like all things Nurgle they are deceptively tanky, and very difficult to take down by two panicked half-squads of guardsmen.
Force weapons: Psychoreactive wargear that amplifies psychic powers and grants greater control over them. The psychic fields they emit make them even more effective against armor than their powered counterparts.
The force staff is by far the worst at this melee application but still more than enough to smash through power armor when necessary.EotS Chapter 17: Aftermath
·
5d
61
Minor edits hath been bestowed upon the previous chapter.
Captain Domitia Constanza of the Saturnine Tithe
She could feel her vessel tear and shudder through her command throne, the grasping hands of the immaterium slowly seeping through her faltering gellar field even as battle raged on her mighty decks and decimated her crew.
Their chances of survival grew more slim by the minute.
Captain Domitia smiled despite this, and her bridge crew drew strength from it and they kept relaying information and orders with renewed vigor.
Such was the duty of a Captain, even in the face of certain doom.
Except the pressure suddenly began to lessen, and the signals from her stern became legible again.
Her Vox Master gasped so lightly most would have missed it and she waved for him to speak.
"Excellent news, Ma'am." The heavily augmented man snapped a salute. "Colonel Fritz reports the warp drive has been secured. The heretics have failed."
Chatter was strictly forbidden on the bridge deck and something she usually punished by flogging. She kindly ignored the sudden relieved cheer of her entire officer cadre; they were wise enough to keep it short.
"Any word from Graccus?" She asked the Vox Master.
He tapped his cogitator for a moment. "The Lord Navigator informs us we are nearing our egress point. We may begin translation into realspace within the hour. The Magos warns the drive is stable but failing, it may not survive our exit."
"Then we best make the most of it." Domitia declared. "Prepare the fire crews. Quartermaster, I want a full report on the damage the moment we translate. Helmsman, begin calculations. This might be our closest shave yet."
""Yes, ma'am!""
For all the sudden energy on the bridge there was no skipping the long wait that came after her orders were heard, and time seemed to slow to an agonizing crawl as they neared the moment of truth.
"Begin translation!" Domitia ordered from her throne and her vessel shuddered as they pierced through the veil of the warp.
Her ship shook beneath the immaterial waves, and for a moment they were nearly thrown completely off course, but with one final dying sputter their warp drive pushed them on, and they were back in realspace.
She allowed herself an exhausted sigh as she leaned back into her command throne. They had survived.
Now to find out who she was going to keelhaul for this damned mess.
---
Savant Militant Konstantin of Zamor
The moment I felt the ship leave the warp again, I let myself collapse onto the floor and simply spread my arms while breathing in pure relief, incidentally startling the shit out of the two grenadiers Fritz decided to have sit on me until we were out of danger.
Wisely they kept their fingers away from any triggers.
"Finally." I whispered, completely ignoring the duo as I once more could enjoy the act of thinking without some daemon trying to use my soul as a slurpy.
Apparently pulling in damn near my maximum throughput of warp energy had consequences, and my mental wall had been cracked open to the point it might as well not exist at the moment.
It really was no wonder why most major psykers went completely insane if this was what they felt since the moment of their awakening.
'Well, I wasn't about to start dealing with that on the regular.' I decided and sat up with a grunt, beginning the long and grueling process of rebuilding my defenses better than they were before.
It was only hours later that one of the grenadiers decided to bother me, lightly shoving my shoulder with the butt of his hellgun. "Oi, psyker. Commissar's here."
I opened my eyes and the man took an instinctual half-step back before grunting and offering his hand. "Up you get."
Taking it and getting pulled up I dusted off my freshly replaced robe and gave the man a nod before leaving my quarters again, coming face to face with a thoroughly exhausted looking Marcus.
Of course, the Commissar wouldn't allow something that simple to pull him down as he looked me over. "Good, you are no longer shaking. How are your wounds?"
"Only minor sprains left." I shrugged as he began walking down the hallway and followed him. "Didn't want to risk anything non-critical while we were in the warp."
"Wise." He notes and keeps walking for a good minute, passing by naval ratings and armsmen and a few Mavians not currently celebrating their survival in the barrack module.
"The Captain is furious and demands an accounting." Marcus informs me. "She is likely to question you."
'So quickly?' I blink, and then shrug again. "I have nothing to hide."
He frowns slightly. "Are you certain?"
"Am I being accused of something, Commissar?" I meet his eyes without flinching.
"The bodies we found at the gellar field generator…" He works his jaw. "Some among the naval officers have voiced suspicions."
"An incursion, Commissar." I explain tersely. "The ice is merely the result of my… outburst after the fact."
"I see." Marcus says neutrally.
I scoff. "Please, don't pretend you don't know exactly what we are headed for on Simeus. This was just the prelude."
His face twists with distaste as he grunts in hesitant agreement and begins walking faster.
"How badly did we get battered?" I ask as we enter an elevator to the upper decks, the few naval personnel giving us plenty of space to talk.
"Only some nine hundred and counting among the 32nd." He informs me after a moment. "Of the Grund legion only five thousand loyal soldiers remain."
"Huh." I voice. "More than I expected."
"Quite." His lips thin. "An entire third of the regiment remained loyal, and their efforts are the only reason the rest of the ship was not overwhelmed. Colonel Fritz has seen fit to grant me captainship over what remains."
He did not seem particularly thrilled about the promotion.
But I was feeling like being a little shit at the moment, so I offered him a lazy salute. "Congratulations, Captain-Commissar. You are more than deserving of the honor."
His face remained blank as he dryly stared at me, but my still open senses clearly caught the annoyed amusement momentarily dancing around his soul.
The lift stopped moving and we were quickly led through the considerably more opulent and open section of the ship and towards a large meeting room containing Fritz and his closest advisors as well as a dozen people wearing the signature deep blue and white of the Imperial Navy.
Courtesy demanded I address the Captain first, and the old, oddly tan woman met my eyes without hesitation as I saluted. "Ma'am." And only then looked at Fritz. "Sir."
The Mavian made a grumbling noise and waved me over. "Sit, psyker. This promises to be irritating."
The trio of burned lho stumps on the metal tray in front of him told me that was an understatement.
"Good, we are all here." The Captain spoke with a voice that was used to wielding absolute authority. "Now can someone kindly explain to me how we managed to miss twenty thousand heretics boarding my ship?"
"It was the Guard's duty to see to their own." One of the naval officers, the Shipmaster, says with a sneer, looking at Marcus who sported a new sash that signified his rise in rank. "Clearly, they were too busy aiming for each other's seats to bother doing their duties."
Marcus stands up and glares at the man, hand resting on the pommel of his power sword.
"There!" The officer glares. "Already they plan another mutiny, my Captain!"
"Sit down, Hett." Fritz barks at him and then glares at the Captain.
"Maxentius, stand down." The old woman orders a moment later in a tone that promised pain. "If you have an accusation to make, do so properly, otherwise keep your mouth shut."
"Apologies, ma'am." The suddenly pale man stutters out.
"Maxentius?" I mutter, a bit too loudly as all eyes quickly find me. "The kid, Quintus. Who was he to you?"
He glares at me with clear hatred as he grits out. "My son."
Ah. "He died well."
"Died well?" He asks almost disbelievingly, and it did not take a genius to catch on to the fact he believed I was the one to kill him.
"Maxentius." Captain Domitia hisses. "Ten lashes."
The man's jaw shuts with an audible click.
"Savant Militant." She looks over to me. "I have multiple conflicting reports across several decks talking about your presence. Report your actions after the mutiny."
I see Fritz straighten up in the corner of my eye. "Permission to discuss forbidden warp lore pertaining to the Great Enemy, ma'am?"
Her eyebrows twitch slightly upwards. "Granted."
I quickly describe being woken up and healing Quintus, much to his still very silent father's discomfort, and my following actions in the Navigator sanctum which quickly get confirmed by the present Vox Master.
Marcus also confirms he permitted my scramble through the ship.
"The gellar field was already taken when we arrived." I voice hesitantly. "A Plaguebearer was present."
The naval personnel react exactly as one might expect, making religious symbols and cursing like well… sailors.
Not caring for their discomfort, I go on. "Additional plague manifestations joined as soon as we engaged the daemon. We ultimately banished them, but the troops and personnel accompanying me fell in battle."
"And yet you did not." The Captain notes, not accusingly but leadingly.
"A battle psyker's duty is to dispatch immaterial threats." I respond tersely. "I was prepared for them; my men were not."
"Your men?" She quirks a grey eyebrow.
"They were assigned under my temporary command." I elaborate as Marcus nods in confirmation. "The armsmen followed Cadet Maxentius."
Almost as if awoken by the name, the Shipmaster shudders but keeps his mouth shut.
"I see." The Captain taps her table. "Go on."
I proceed to explain the rest of the battle, getting the rather… interesting bit of information about my kill count surpassing two thousand overall traitors during my little rampage.
My memories of it were still a bit fuzzy, seeing as I was just barely holding on against possession the entire damned time.
"It is my opinion that the Grund system should be treated as compromised by the Enemy." I declare as I finish describing my execution of the sorcerer. "If they managed to sneak in so many traitors onboard without a veteran Commissar noticing they either have too much influence on the world already or someone powerful enough to befuddle Imperial leadership long enough for their incursion to be missed."
"You believe we should notify the Inquisition." The Captain says slowly.
"Yes."
The expected fear and suspicion radiate from both ends of the room, but no one feels like butting in while the Captain deliberates.
She ultimately makes a vague noise of agreement but doesn't comment one way or the other.
Well, so long as it wasn't my problem anymore.
Fritz, who had been fidgeting for a good twenty minutes now, finally has enough and slams his hand onto the table before him. "Will someone please explain to me what in the Emperor's name with all this talk of demons and enemies already?! You are acting like a bunch of damnable cogboys."
The Captain blinks before smiling so sweetly one might just miss the cruelty hidden underneath. "Gladly, Colonel."
By the time she was done enlightening the good Colonel of the truths of the warp and its dangers, the man looked like he thoroughly regretted waking up that morning.
'Sadly, there was no coming back from this one, Fritz.' I laughed bitterly in the safety of my own mind.
The meeting went on for another hour as both sides traded shots and veiled accusations while attempting to have a productive discussion about losses and supplies.
Captain Domitia remained silent for most of it, and only when she saw both sides had thoroughly exhausted their vitriol did she decide she would simply blame the Grund system and seek satisfaction there.
The naval officers were not satisfied, and the guard was insulted and defensive but at least they were no longer at each other's throats.
'At least that is over and done with.'
"One more thing." Captain Domitia said while looking at me. "We have decided on the blame but we spoke nothing of merit. And all reports seem to agree on one thing. You saved my ship, Savant."
Most of her officers murmur in discontent, but not in disagreement, while others offer me nods of respect and praise.
Not being a dumbass, I simply incline my head and keep quiet.
"Colonel Fritz." She turns to the Mavian. "See to it that your battle psyker is promoted and given a commendation for his service. Anything less would be an insult."
Wait what?
Fritz simply grunts at that. "Was thinking along the same lines, ma'am."
"Good." She smiles thinly. "It will take us a while to finish fully scanning the system. Strategy meeting is postponed to tomorrow. Dismissed."
I left the room in something of a daze; still not quite caught up to the fact they didn't try to toss me out of an airlock for daring to do the right thing.
So distracted was I that I completely missed the naval officer approaching me from my side, and he had to clear his throat to catch my attention.
"Shipmaster." I greeted him politely, on guard despite the respectful distance his entourage stood at.
"Did he…" The weathered veteran spoke quietly, his voice filled with pain. "Did he truly die well?"
"With fury for His enemies on his lips and courage in his heart." I said softly.
He swallowed whatever he wanted to say and merely nodded. "Good, that is… good."
He remained standing there for a while engaged in internal conflict before simply lowering his head and leaving, likely to see to his punishment.
Sighing at the broken man's retreating back, I gestured for the two grenadiers still following me around and left for the elevator.
Getting back under those wards sounded glorious right now, and I needed to check on the Navigators.
I hoped the warp drive going pop didn't torment them too badly.
Command throne: The seat of a ship captain, lets them get direct feedback from their vessel through the use of an MIU implant.
MIU/Mind Impulse Unit: An implant used for direct interfacing with machinery, a basic must have for most Mechanicus personel, and anyone aiming to operate something like a ship or a titan.
Cogboys: Term "normals" use for Mechanicus, in this case Fritz was getting pissed at the fact everyone was trying to sound vague and using terms he could not understand.
As for why things went as they did?
I pretty much spelled it out throughout the chapters.
A battle psyker's main task is countering warp bullshit on the battlefield, and a warp incursion aboard a ship definitely counts there. Him going ham on daemons is literally in his job description.
Naval officers deal with warp bullshit on a far more regular basis than their ground based counterparts seeing as they do the whole travelling through the warp on a regular basis thing, so they know how to deal with an incursion aftermath and are usually far more well informed about Chaos.
The Captain demanding Konstantin be promoted is pretty much a matter of honor after he pulled everyone's ass out of the fire. Blame might have been thrown around but all responsibility for a ship's fate rests ultimately on the shoulders of the captain.EotS Chapter 18: Gifts and Promotions
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2d
55
Had one of those evenings yesterday that made me lose the will to breathe air for a good while so I ended up procrastinating until I fell asleep, apologies for that.
My original plan was to start doing 3 chaps a week starting next week but I'll try to keep it 4 for one more so you don't burn me at the stake like the foul lazyass that I am.
Minor edits hath graced the previous chapter.
Savant Militant Konstantin of Zamor
I left the Navigator's sanctum feeling both bittersweet and irritated.
Graccus was as outwardly jovial as before but there was no missing the tightly controlled despair he radiated whenever he flapped his freshly sprouted third arm around… Or mentioned his currently comatose wife.
He was an incredibly strong man.
And his daughter was following in his footsteps.
She had obviously been shaken by the act of ripping hundreds of souls out of their bodies but everyone around her was widely encouraging of the act, if not of her leaving the fortified chamber of her own volition.
Listening to me regale her of the orchestrator's death brought a wide smile onto her face, and a frown on mine as I grew increasingly frustrated with the fact I managed to miss another psyker.
That the ship was massive and I was placed under wards made no difference, it was something I could not let happen again.
All in all, I was very happy the family had survived a warp incursion and wished them the best if this was the last time we saw each other.
Why was I irritated then?
"Is that all, my lord?" A cultured if youthful voice, and the source of my current headache, asked.
"Not a noble, kid." 'Yet.' I shook my head. "And yes, that is all I possess for the moment."
He seemed almost baffled by that fact. "Forgive me but one favored by house Belisarius must-"
I cut him off. "We are flying to a warzone. Practical concerns come before all others."
The navigator-blooded voidborn made a face but quickly bowed.
He was tall for his age, with raven black hair and excessively pale skin and eyes ever so slightly too big for his head, much like the rest of his kind.
"As you say my lord." Her said politely, adjusting the red collar of his servant's uniform. "Shall I go procure supplies then?"
"We need to visit the Colonel first. He will decide if you can stay around."
His eyes flashed with horror even as he bowed again.
Sending Graccus' concubine-born son back to his father would be an incredible disgrace upon the kid, and as much as it irked me that a person could unironically be considered a 'gift' and 'token of appreciation' I did not want him to suffer for no good reason.
That and the human children of navigators tended to be much more at ease around warp phenomena, which was something I could appreciate, and something his father wasted no time in pointing out.
I made sure not to shudder as I momentarily imagined the… logistics of him existing in the first place.
Sitting cross legged on the floor I decided to burn the image out of my mind by following the Navigator's other point and closed my eyes, drawing my will to them and directing them to change to my preference.
The challenge of such subtle changes was not in being powerful enough to affect them but being precise enough to pull just enough power to do the work and not a tiny bit more.
Learning how to do it had been a thoroughly grueling experience, but learn I did, and as I stood and reached for a tiny piece of shiny metal I used as a mirror I couldn't help but agree with the Navigator.
Having the violet eyes of someone warp touched definitely looked far more personable than sporting the Astropath's empty stare, and I was rubbing shoulders with too many 'normals' not to care for my appearance.
'It also makes me look like a sister-fucker.' I snorted nostalgically at the distant memory of that one never-finished series of books. "Come, Valmar. We best get going."
"At once, my lord!"
Well, at least he did not lack enthusiasm.
-
"There you are." Fritz grunted as I reached the strategium where only a few officers were going about their business. He furrowed his brows as he met my eyes. "You could have done that at any time?"
"The Scholar Preceptor on Terra thought it would be a good lesson if I kept the 'mark of failure'." I told him dryly. "I'd say I've learned it by now."
How the hell was I supposed to know my mental wall would cause the soulbinding process to try and fry my brain in the first place?
"If you say so." He huffed, amused by the clear irritation in my tone, and stood. "Come with me." He led me through a back door of the strategium and into a much smaller reception room preceding his chambers where Major Grant and Commissar Marcus were going over some documents.
The two stood as we entered.
"Get on with it." The Colonel waved at them and Marcus approached me with crisp steps and a scroll and box in his hands. "Savant Militant Konstantin of Zamor, for deeds in battle that went beyond the call of duty you are hereby awarded the Eagle Ordinary. Wear this mark with pride."
I saluted as he pinned the silver eagle to my robe.
"You are also awarded a promotion to Savant Warrant." He went on in his clear and official voice. "You may now take command over squads or singular vehicles when required and may requisition superior wargear from regimental stock."
Savant Warrant Konstantin of Zamor
"Thank you, Commissar." I saluted again, receiving the same gesture from all three of the officers. Even Fritz.
"It was well earned." Marcus almost smiled.
"Speaking of requisitions…" I trailed off wile pointing at the voidborn behind me. "Did Lord Belisarius say anything about my new… Follower?"
"He did." Fritz waved off the clear concern in my voice. "He can stay around for now. It's up to you to convince the Lord General to keep him around when I'm rid of you but I wouldn't worry too much."
The kid damn near crumpled onto the floor then.
"Ah." I voiced at the reminder.
"Forgot about that, huh?" Fritz chuckled.
"I will admit the Mavian 32nd has grown on me a bit." I said with minimal sarcasm.
"And you've grown on us, you damn witch." He said so hesitantly it was almost painful. "But orders are orders." He shook his head and sighed. "We wanted to make it a bit more of a ceremony, but we are only half a day away from orbit and we can't exactly afford to waste time now."
"How bad is the situation?" I asked immediately.
"Bad." The Colonel huffed. "Simeus III is a two hive world, and one of them is already in heretic hands, what was the name again, Grant?"
"Hive Carolus, sir." The woman told him.
"Right. Carolus is a complete loss." Fritz nodded. "And the other one, Simeus, is currently under assault. Our lads are holding their ground but they are getting battered."
"Isn't the Lord General supposed to be in this system?" I asked incredulously.
"He is." Fritz said dryly. "And he decided to send most of his forces to reinforce the rest of the subsector while he waits for reinforcements here."
"The Simeus system is the subsector's crossroad when it comes to warp routes." Major Grant spoke up. "Holding the strategic position is the right decision…"
"And I'm not saying you're wrong, Grant!" Fritz thew a hand up. "But he could have at least kept enough force to actually hold the damned planet!"
Commissar Marcus scowled. "I suspect the good Lord General did not expect the dead to suddenly join the forces of the traitors."
'Oh hell no!' I screamed internally even as I weakly asked. "The dead?"
"Indeed." The Commissar nodded gravely. "Some manner of disease has been spreading throughout the hives for years, and it seems to have… metastasized." He rolled the word awkwardly. "Now it raises the corpses of the infected, corpses that obey the enemy."
I felt an odd twitch pass through the left side of my face while I momentarily couldn't feel the other but Marcus proceeded as if nothing was happening.
"Merely protecting our soldiers from infection is stretching the local Mechanicus and order Hospitaler thin. The situation is very grave."
"And we are heading right into it!" Fritz said with false cheer.
I screamed internally.
"To face the enemies of man is the honor of any servant of the Imperium." The Commissar responded. "No matter the form of the enemy."
"Give me a heretic to fight and I'll do it any day." Fritz grunted. "I can't swing my baton at an infection."
"Then it is a good thing we were warned to prepare environmental equipment." Marcus smiled thinly and all three were now looking at me like I could pull some magical solution to the Curse of Unbelief out of my ass.
I did make my best attempt. "When in doubt, apply promethium."
-
I avoided the rank and file soldiers as I left the strategium and made for the armory. Fritz may have grown to tolerate me now but the Mavian soldiers were another case entirely.
Rumors had begun to spread about just what happened at the gellar field generator and the cautiously accepting soldiers now looked at me with renewed fear and suspicion.
None of them would try anything, of that much I was certain, but neither did they want me in their presence.
It stung a little, but there was no point in trying to convince them of anything. The less they knew the better their chances of dying in ignorant bliss.
The armory itself was a mess of activity, entire squads of soldiers and naval ratings carrying crates to and fro the main hub while somehow managing not to bump into each other with every other step they took.
Cornelius himself looked swamped as I approached alongside Valmar, only to momentarily still as he noticed me, and look through me as he spoke. "What do you want?"
"Carapace armor and my pay." I said after a moment and pointed at Valmar. "And flak for the kid."
"Wait here." The Quartermaster said in a dead tone and left.
That one stung a fair bit more, I admitted with a clenched jaw.
"Here you are." He returned with a small crate. "Anything else?"
"No." I shook my head slowly. "That will be all, Quartermaster."
He made a noise that was something between a grunt and an 'uh huh.' And I took the unspoken 'fuck off' for what it was and left back for my quarters.
-
The segmented composite plating still felt a bit heavy and awkward on my shoulders as we marched into the hangar and the kid tried to look dignified as he walked around in standard issue guard flak.
At least he managed to scrounge a proper gas mask for himself and knew which way to point my standard issue las gun.
Not that I was about to let him anywhere near a combat zone. The only reason he was coming with us was that we were landing at the planetary strategium for a meeting with Lord General Jeronimus Kyne.
We were quickly directed to the Colonel's persona Valkyrie and the flier took off the moment the ramp closed behind us and we secured ourselves to our seats.
I almost chuckled as I noticed four flamer troopers amongst the two dozen grenadiers accompanying us, but the reminder simply made my mood sour up as we left the confines of the ship.
Chatter was minimal as we flew, and I almost begun to hope against hope that nothing would go wrong when the vox operator jolted and began adjusting the boxy radio.
"Sir." He spoke after a moment, eyes wide as he hesitantly turned towards Fritz. "The enemy has breached the southernmost gate of the upper hive. The Lord General orders the entire regiment be deployed to push back the enemy."
"Hah." Fritz chuckled lightly, sounding almost unsurprised by the development. "Forward the orders to Grant and tell Konstanza to request landers from the other ships in orbit. We will show Lord Kyne the strength of his new troops." His eyes found mine then and he merely nodded.
I allowed myself the slightest grin as the Valkyrie jolted and sped up into the atmosphere.
Voidborn: Humans born in space over generations, have some minor adaptations to such an environment but not different enough to be considered abhuman. Usually minorly distrusted as a matter of course.
Navigator-born humans: Children between a navigator and a human are invariably born human, they are usually raised as guards or servants for the navigators who tend to use their high station to live pretty decadent lives before their constant mutations make that impractical.
Curse of Unbelief: Chaos zombie virus.
Order Hospitaler: Sisters of battle but medics, not combat focused but combat capable.
Naval rating: Basic menial ship crew.