Eriko rapped at her gorget in annoyance, as if that alone could have stopped Storm of Summer's inconvienient stumbles. This was not the first time that it had happened to her nor, she feared, would it be the last. Her armour, so ready to be first to jump into the fray, proved timid when words and image was needed more than bloodshed.
Inconvenient. Annoying. She dared to say that it was even shy.
The servitor's say their cheery farewells and turn around, revealing the body dragged along. Eriko shook her head at the sight.
"The compound's defenses stay strong at least," she notes to Caelia. "Which lends weight that whatever happened here happened because someone inside had turned to the Enemy. Or already was, just waiting for the right moment to strike."
She heard Palais' steps and turned to her Sister-Superior. "I will make a last scan through the facility to find anyone else, Sister-Superior. If one survived then perhaps there are still others, Emperor willing."
And with that Eriko stepped inside the reconsecrated ground. She needed to complete her search, which were so rudely interrupted by the wandering Servitors.
(OOC: Finish searching through the cogitators. If a roll is needed then spend Faith for +20.)
Eriko stepped back into the room, and Caelia returned to guarding the door. The threat was over, but this place still was not secure. Privately, she thought the precinct would not regain that status until it was burnt down to the foundation.
One could never be too paranoid with the dark powers.
But to do that, they would need to find any survivors and evacuate them, and then leave. So she awaited word from Eriko or the Sister Superior.
(OOC: Wait for Eriko to finish, then go in search of the survivor. Keep on guard with sanctified bolts loaded)
The precinct is a graveyard, inhabited only by corpses and the barely-alive Servitors. A second glance through the pict-screens shows little contrary evidence. A second survivor, clearly incapacitated with their stomach wrapped in bandages is visible in a section of the kennel, and a second glance at a feed of a lavatory reveals that a third officer that you initially presumed dead seems to still be alive, their festering chest rising and falling shallowly. Three survivors and two barely alive out of a station with over a hundred officers. A glance at the reports of the station's full complement blessedly suggests a good third of the station was absent during the siege. Perhaps some yet live somewhere in the district but you can only fear many claims in the riots or by the cultists-including the precinct's captain, whose disappearance likely is part of the reason the station collapsed so thoroughly. One patrol, you note, was deployed to the Carmine Towers shortly before contact was lost.
Though the holy words speak to the power of ignorance, something motivates you to look through the picter recordings. It takes you several minutes to figure the systems' controls and perform the proper rites to placate the machine's unsurprisingly agitated Machine-Spirit before arriving at a recording a few days ago. The footage, poor quality, and spitting errors, appears on the screen. At first, you see nothing but hear the sounds of muttering and whispered prayers. The footage resolves on a figure in an enforcer's uniform, its features touched by the black rot. The voice, female, begs for the Emperor's mercy before trailing off into incomprehensible static. Another Enforcer approaches and rests a hand on their shoulder. They begin to say something low, and then the woman turns and shoves the second figure back. They stagger back, gesture with an outstretched finger and shout something incoherent The two figures shout and scream at one another for some time before the tape runs dry.
You skip ahead to two days ago. The room is empty, but there is no sign of the shrine. But there is dried blood smeared across the cogitator you're now working on, and near where the second enforcer had stood. Worse yet is the static, twisting and shifting around strange splotches scrawled across the cogitator and floor. It's not video corruption, you don't believe, but as you look the static seems to begin resolving into...Shapes. Gunfire rings out from outside the security station, a scream ringing out and cutting off as the footage, blessedly, ends.
The next file plays automatically. A figure in enforcer armor matted in blood and filth paces back and forth, muttering madly under their breath. Filth festers in the corners of the room, mad drawings of uncanny figures crawling up the walls. You swear the camera footage seems to bend toward these strange markings, as though trying to reveal more, but you keep your attention on the figure. Beneath their patrol helm is a face wreathed in disease and strange, trifocal boils, that might share some resemblance to the figure you saw in the first clip. Was that the same head you saw in the midst of the shrine.
The door suddenly slides open in the footage, and several figures step through. These are a motley group, dressed in the scattered assortment of civilian clothing, industrial gear and ammo belts and military kit you have become familiar with fighting the Cult here. At their head woman in a shimmering cloak and scale armor, a lasgun in her curiously tattooed hands. The enforcer steps forward, throwing her arms wide. The words she speaks grate through the cogitator's speakers.
"Night after night I've heard the song! Every night, the same dream of the opening gate, and the chorus of wings. You...You were in my dreams. Brothers, I greet you in the name of the Plaguefather,
Nurgle!"
The audio-casters crack at the naming of the word, hissing as though trying to cycle the name. Again you hear it,
Nurgle, like a whisper of the rattling machinery.
Nurgle.
The lead figure glances to the figures behind her, and then plants a fist straight into the enforcer's face. The diseased enforcer thuds against the holilith projector, half turning just in time for the butt of a lever-action to strike her across the rim of the helm. The cultists close in about her, hissing incoherent abuse.
"But-The song! The song, we were to sing in the choir together! We're brothers, sisters!" The enforcer's voice cracks as fists and kicks rain down upon her. "The Plaguefather loves you! Why won't you-"
"Quiet, infidel," The cloak clad woman spits, drawing a long-knife from her belt. "But fear not. You will sing, for sure. Sing to true gods, not the false choir or the false throne. But Many Gods, of Old Shadow. Your head will make a fine warning to wayward Daemons who recognize not the Crown of Thorns."
The first cut digs into the meat of the enforcer's neck. The cultists begin to chant, the words as hauntingly beautiful as they are incomprehensible. For a moment, you find your eyes dragged to the spectacle of violence, of pain and fear, lulled by the lyrics of the chant. But you have seen these magics before, in the bloody hands of the Disciples of Xethos, and you pull yourself away from the enticing horror. You hammer your fist into the button to cut the recording.
You notice Palais' hand on your pauldron, her other hand clenched on the hilt of her chainsword. After a moment, she relaxes, tilting her helmet toward the door. "There is a saying about the mind being like a fortress. Always remember to keep the doors locked, Sister."
Recovering the Enforcers proves easy. The one in the toilets is, despite the Black Rot, mostly stable. A fresh set of bandages prevents any blood-loss from the disease, and some immune boosters should protect against the secondary infections that are the primary cause of death from schechin. Your arrival at the kennels might've been more troublesome if you weren't stomping forward in beautiful scarlet armour.
The Enforcer at the barricades drops their autogun as you near, his mouth dropping slack. "The Sisters of Battle?" He blubbers, tears streaming from his eyes.
"Last I checked, yes," Palais says. "We've come to aid you."
He slumps back, almost toppling to the ground. "The Emperor protects. I said the Emperor protects..." He weeps.
After helping the Enforcer to his feet, the torrent of blubberings that come from his mouth is difficult to parse, but you manage. He explains much of what you know, how the enforcers retreated into the precinct under siege, only for disease and distrust to run rampant among the survivors. He himself fled to the kennels after a group of officers tried to burn him at the stake, blaming their infection on him. He hesitates a moment at that.
"Said I 'twas a witch, if you can believe it. Me! I told 'em it's the damned Pelagers that spread the disease, not me, and they had the gall to say I was probably half Pelager. Bastards," he mutters before continuing. The other officer with him he recovered in the aftermath of a fight over medical supplies, tending to her with medicine reserved for the cyber-hounds. They'd survived mostly on the kennel's copious amounts of dogfood, which he'd shared with the hounds.
"About yesterday, maybe the day 'afore, some civilian looking types wandered in. No idea why the Servitors didn't stop them, though I did hear a few gunshots. Had to scare off some after they tried getting in here. Ain't going to let anyone eat my dogs, for sure. Or well, kill me."
His partner shows early signs of the Schechin virus, but no signs of secondary infection or bloodloss as yet. He seems...Absolutely clean. No physical signs of the disease at all. Exhaustion and filth, plenty of. Maybe a cold by his sniffling. But not the black-rot.
There are two last things to check before you leave. The Armoury and the garage, the former of which has clearly been pillaged. Someone's taken what looks like a las-cutter to the hinges on many of the lockers, and autoguns, shotguns and sniper rifles are missing in abundance. The scarab armored cars in the garage, blessedly, have not been successfully forced, their thicker doors resisting the attempts to cut through them, at least before the heretics fled.
Returning outside, you see the rest of Squad Palais arriving alongside platoon of PDF foot infantry, an officer with extensive augmetics (And a servant carrying an umbrella for him) at their head.
Palais strides forward to meet your Sisters. "Sisters, good to see you. The precinct is a loss, unfortunately. But the Hospitallers are secure. Let's get these Servitors to the forward chapel and retrieve Vennedes."
Maria clanked to a halt and returned the half-aquila. "Sister Maria of Squad Palais, bless your timing but not your driver's luck Lieutenant Laroe. Witch Hunter Zayneth is particular about our timetable, so do you require assistance freeing that truck, or can it be abandoned for now?"
She restrained herself from too much scorn at whoever'd planted the truck so firmly. Still, it didn't add any confidence about this frivolous seeming officer and the swarming PDF they were to continue on with. After the fervent efficiency of the Hospitallers and even the firm dedication to wider strategy from their former detachment, it did not impress.
It's difficult to tell someone's expression when they've replaced their face with metal, but years of serving alongside armoured sisters have taught you much about body cues. Like the slight slump in Laroe's shoulders indicating his disappointment.
"Well, I certainly suppose it has been difficult maneuvering the trucks through this area. Dismounting seems like a right proper idea, milady!" he begins but twists his head as another PDF trooper runs over and hastily salutes. "What is it, trooper?"
"Uh. Sergeant Acadius' truck just uh, bent an axle, sir." The PDF gestures down the street at a second truck, surrounded by a rather flustered looking group of soldiers and a red in the face NCO.
The lieutenant waves a hand dismissively. "Well, if that isn't a sign I don't know what is. We were going to have the unit dismount and continue on foot regardless. Spread the word, trooper, that we're following the Sisters into the fray!" Laroe says. He half-turns to a man in a veteran sergeant's stripes. "Oh. Do call for a tech-priest, Sergeant-Major, and remind me to have the good sergeant and his driver flogged later."
He turns back to you. "Well. Let's go give these cretinous heretics what-for, no?"
Your trip through the rain-slick city streets is largely uneventful. Even in the rough terrain, it's not too long until you regroup with the rest of Squad Palais, outside a sealed up enforcer precinct. With them are a tattered handful of officers who look worst for wear. The PDF squads that had accompanied them greet their newly arrived counter-parts and make ready to return to the bridge.
"Sisters, good to see you. The precinct is a loss, unfortunately. But the Hospitallers are secure. Let's get these Servitors to the forward chapel and retrieve Vennedes."
