Secret War: Warhammer 40,000, Ben Agar [list of ebook readers .txt] 📗

said the woman.

"Yes, a pict I took," I said.

"The guilt you must feel," she said.

"Is overwhelming," I said.

"But it's not your fault," said Adelana. "No, really, how were you supposed to know it would lead to that."

"I should've..." I said, tears welling in my eyes and my hands balled into fists. "I should've known; I should've done something. But I was so caught up in selfishly saving my own arse."

"Wanting to live isn't selfish, Attelus!" Adelana cried. "I think many others would've done the same. Although maybe you wouldn't have succeeded, you mustn't let your guilt overtake you! You still have to stop that Etuarq monster!"

I looked down at her, shocked.

She sighed. "Thank you for telling us, Attelus. It must've been taken a lot of courage to have done it."

"Yeah," breathed the woman. "Hell yeah."

"I thought you'd hate me," I said.

Adelana shrugged. "After what you said in the ship before, I did some soul searching. You were right; hate is one of the things wrong with the galaxy. So I won't hate you, I can't. You were just a pawn in this; I see it now."

She frowned. "But I'm not sure I'm grateful that you saved me. You did it for selfish reasons and..."

"And?"

"Just give me some time, please," she said. "Just let me have some time, too...I've gotta think moreover."

I nodded. "Yeah, more than fair enough, I will hopefully see you sooner rather than later," I said, getting the hint and slipping my hands into their pockets, then turned and left.

 

 

Still escorted, I walked back to my quarters; it was only a few doors down from Adelana's.

When the door slid shut behind me, I stepped inside and let out the most protracted sigh yet. The exhaustion hit me again, along with the many aches and pains of my injuries.

I stumbled in and threw myself onto my bed; I laid there, staring up at the gunmetal grey ceiling.

An entire world dead, it was hard to believe. Hard to comprehend that humanity had such insane power at its hands.

How many billions of years did it take for Omnartus to evolve and change into what it was? Only to be reduced to fire and ash in a mere hour.

Again, I tried to sleep, but my mind was awash with thoughts. I still couldn't believe Adelana didn't hate me even after finding out the rather central role I'd played in the destruction of her homeworld.

She seemed almost to feel sorry for me. I didn't need her frigging pity.

But on second thought, the way she looked at me, it wasn't pitying, not really. On the contrary, it seemed almost to be admiration. Now she knew what I'd been through, the horrors I've had to endure.

The visitation alarm shrilled suddenly, making me flinch in fright, and I let out a pained groan.

"Whaaat?" I growled as the door swished open, and Darrance stepped in.

"Apprentice," he said with a formal nod.

I didn't reply, just glared at him balefully.

"I hope I'm not interrupting your brooding," he said.

"What do you want?"

Darrance sighed. "Alright, alright, I can't really blame you for being upset right now."

"Oh, good to hear!" I said sarcastically. "Good to know you understand."

"I've been working on things; with Glaitis dead and Hayden in a coma, I am now the senior-most assassin in our organisation," said Darrance. "I thought you should be updated."

I sat up on my bed. "Life goes on, I guess," I sighed.

"I visited Hayden just before," he said. "The medicaes say he will live but will need an augmetic to replace his shoulder."

I frowned and looked to the floor guiltily; I'd forgotten about poor Hayden entirely in everything.

"And what about Jelket?" I asked.

"He will live, too," said Darrance. "Don't know how he made it; it's almost miraculous."

I nodded. "Good, that's good."

"I have also written up an astropathic communique I will send to Glaitis' cult," he said. "It's too dangerous to send it now; the Space Marine fleets are searching the solar system for us as we speak."

My expression darkened. "And what does it say, exactly?"

"Pretty much everything," said Darrance with a shrug. "Excluding your psychic enhancement, of course, and your apparent manipulation of Jeurat Garrakson."

"You're sure that's wise?" I said.

"Yes," he said without hesitation. "If we are to one day stop Etuarq, we'll need all the allies we can get."

I grimaced. "What if they're secretly allied with him?"

"What if they're not," he countered. "Besides, if they are, he had probably informed them of everything anyway; now they think we trust them."

"That sounds awfully like backwards logic to me," I said.

"Does it?" he said with a smug smile. "You seemed awfully quick to trust this Inquisitor; how do you know she isn't secretly allied with Etuarq? It's one of your many weaknesses rearing its ugly head yet again, can't say no to a pretty face, can we, Attelus?"

I sighed. "Under the circumstances, we don't have much of a choice to trust her, Darrance. But yes, perhaps you're right."

"Trust nothing, suspect everything," intoned Darrance.

My frown deepened, and I briefly considered telling him of my suspicions, but for some reason, I quickly decided against it.

"What are you going to do now?" said Darrance. "Lay there and keep on mopping? Or something constructive? I'm going to the bridge; you coming?"

I raised an eyebrow. "We're even allowed on the bridge?" I said.

Darrance shrugged. "Not sure; I thought I might try."

Then a thought hit me. "Why are we still here?" I said while straightening, my eyes widening.

"What?"

"Why are we still in the system?" I elaborated. "Why haven't we escaped into the warp already? It's too dangerous to stay here, just too dangerous."

Darrance shrugged. "To watch Omnartus burn? Confirming its destruction, maybe the Inquisitor is completely sure in the stealth abilities of the ship."

I shook my head. "I doubt it's just that if she's so sure, why were her forces readying for a fight?"

Darrance shook his head. "And You would know why it could be just in case."

"Hmm, perhaps," I conceded with a shrug. "But I still feel..."

"You coming or not?" said Darrance impatiently.

"Yeah," I said. "Yeah, I think I will."

 

 

To my surprise, we were allowed onto the bridge and even more surprising, Helma and Arlathan were chatting with Enandra. The Inquisitor was back in her power armour and sat cross-legged on a solid, copper coloured plasteel throne in the bridge's epicentre, like a regal queen of old. Flanking the thrones' was the mute psyker, on the right the Stormtrooper sergeant, who was now helmetless. His handsome square-jawed face was insanely masculine, almost on par with an Astartes, his red hair typically close-cropped and short of a soldier.'

I'd half expected it to be the same bridge in Faleaseen's vision but found it couldn't have been any more different. I wasn't sure what to make of that.

"Why are we still here, mamzel Inquisitor?" I heard Arlathan ask as we came close, stepping through the constantly moving crew. "Shouldn't we have left already?"

I smiled, glad I wasn't the only one who'd come to such thoughts and once again impressed by the detective's intellectual acumen.

They glimpsed Darrance and my approach, and all of them turned to us.

"Ah!" said Enandra, smiling and waving at Darrance and me. "Colohris had voxed ahead that you would be coming; it's good to see you both!"

"Mamzel," I said with a polite, slight bow, my hands held behind my back.

"I agree with Arlathan," said Helma abruptly. "Why are we still here?"

Enandra sighed. "I guess, after everything you've been through, you would be suspicious of me. I understand. I said that all of you held potential; this emphasised even more now. I see you are already asking the right questions; that is good, very good."

My eyes narrowed. "I am surprised you approve of that," I said.

She smiled and looked at me, sidelong. "Knowledge is power, young Attelus, and sometimes knowledge can only be won by asking the right questions."

Enandra tilted her head and smiled wider, placing her fist against her cheekbone. "Or by shedding and bleeding enough blood, but you would know this more than anyone, wouldn't you, Attelus?"

I couldn't help but smile and nod back; yes, I did. Or at least I thought I did.

I hoped I did.

I was wrong; I didn't know, of course.

She sighed again and reclined back on her throne, stretching her legs and placing her palms behind her head.

"I want you to know that you can trust me," she said. "I want all of you to know I am not like Glaitis or Taryst. That I am willing to share my plans and truths..."

"But only if we ask the right questions?" asked Helma, her eyes narrowed approvingly as her arms folded across her chest.

"At first, yes," said Enandra. "But once you have shed enough blood and bled enough blood that you won't have to anymore."

"Are you going to tell us or not?" Darrance said through clenched teeth.

"Of course I will," said Enandra sounding amused at Darrance's impatient tone rather than annoyed. "You asked the right question; I will give you the answer you deserve. But my psyker Selva will have to take certain liberties with your thoughts to make sure it won't leak out, understand?"

We glanced at one another in hesitation; no one liked the idea of a psyker rifling around in our minds. Especially me.

Enandra raised a hand. "She will not erase your memory of it; just make sure it will be hard to rile up this information by another of her kind. Just a security precaution, I assure you."

Eventually, all of us nodded our approval.

"Good," she crooned. "As I had said before, knowledge is power; this also includes, know your enemy..."

 

Four hours later, I was back in my quarters. Enandra had given me back my sword, and I was stripped to the waist, my pale white skin glistened with sweat. Training slashing and slicing, stabbing and stepping. Every attack of the unactivated blade whistled and sung with absurd brevity. I could've sworn it followed a split second after I'd finished.

Inquisitor Enandra had told us her plan; it was audacious and detailed but leaned on assumptions a bit too much for my taste. But she didn't have the luxury of farsight that Glaitis did. Or perhaps she did; perhaps that was why she could plan on such assumptions, I couldn't know. Her psyker hadn't done anything intrusive, just blocked our surface thought so that we couldn't speak of it verbally. So I didn't know the details. It'd worked on me, or it'd seemed to for Selva.

With a snarl, I side kicked the air, then cut diagonally upward. I'd been training for a good hour now, how I was managing to do it after everything I'd gone through today. I didn't know, but some energy drove me onward despite my aching limbs and horrid weariness. It was anger, I supposed, and pain, the pain of a different kind than that echoed in my body.

I'd practised for another ten minutes when the visitation buzzer chimed again.

I let out an animalistic growl and kept attacking the air, some of my considerable skill lost in my anger at the interruption.

A good ten seconds later, there was another chime, and I snarled, "go away!" Even though I knew whoever was at the door couldn't hear me. I didn't care who it was; I wasn't going to answer.

The third shrilled so long after the second I'd thought whoever it was g up and gone.

I flinched in fright and finally stopped my training, wiped the sweat from my forehead with an arm, then absently, skillfully sheathed my sword and stormed toward the door.

"What the frig are...!" I roared but wandered off in my sentence as the door swung open to reveal it was Adelana. Her attractive face set and hard, but I could still see her eyes very briefly glance me up and down in appreciation. She was holding my beaten, torn, and bloodstained flak jacket before her.

It took me a few seconds to regain myself, stammering stupidly in monosyllables.

She blinked away tears and shook her head in bemusement.

"Can I come in?" she