ARCANA (40K Perpetual Quest)

[ ] Elocutors

As you trudged up the stairs, you felt your gut curdle in anxiety and fear. God, why had you agreed to this stupid, nigh suicidal plan? Less than one in a hundred who ventured to Gorgoroth returned! It was an Omnissiah damned Dark Orkium, one of the most dangerous, brutal places on the planet! And yet, and YET, for some insane, short sighted reason you had decided that losing a finger was worse than marching into a green hell!

Maybe it wasn't too late. Maybe Dragovax would still let you take her up on her offer. You'd have to work but you'd be able to, theoretically, make the payment next month! Hell, you had ensured the Sisterhood had an entire fleet of Warbikes! That had to earn you a little credit.

...No. No that wouldn't work. You knew how Dragovax and the Sisterhood operated. You had already shown considerable weakness, weakness they WOULD take advantage of. If you showed any more, they would eat you alive: even if you survived this they would still seek to abuse and use you.

You had to do this. You had no choice, if you ever wanted to be free and alive. You sighed as you entered into the chapels chamber. You didn't know any priests of the machine god to confide in, but Eli would be, hopefully, a decent substitute. Today, the auto-hymnal was quiet, the mechanical gears and reels and wires not moving, its speakers emitting no noise. Normally, you'd consider that a good thing, but you winced as it allowed you to hear the argument.

"We can't keep doing this, Father! The Book of the Emperor says-"

"Eli, Son, do not lecture me about the word of the divine. If the Emperor wanted to lift these people up, he would-"

"We have a spiritual duty-"

"Our only spiritual duty is to the faithful-"

Father Eli was arguing with another man, a skinny, frail looking man, with sharp, severe features and a scowl, clad white garb in comparison to the black frock of Father Eli, with a sharp, upturned collar that reached to the mans ears, his chest emblazoned with a two headed eagle stitched into the cloth. The pair of them weren't shouting: no, they were perfectly quiet, their whispers only audible due to the strange, sanctic acoustics of the chapel chamber. But an argument didn't have to be loud to be terrible, something you knew very well. Some of the most bitter arguments were also the most quiet, the most venom coming from the softest of sources.

Awkwardly, you waited, doing your best to not eavesdrop.

Eventually, the older, more withered man snarled, and stomped away into the back of the chapel, raising his hands in frustration even as he passed beyond the threshold of the area beyond the chapel foyer, voice hard and dry and cracked even as he sneered out the rest of his twin rebuke and permission. "Fine, but I refuse to endorse your insane antics, and neither will I permit Santica resources be wasted on it: a diamond is no fit meal for an empty pit!"

Father Eli sagged a bit at that, sighing as he wiped the sweat from his brow, an exhausted, tired look in his face. Right, probably the right moment to announce your presence. You cleared your throat, and the priest nearly jumped out of his skin, leaping almost a foot off the ground even as he went ramrod straight. "Starchosens Tit!" He shouted in surprise, only somewhat calming when he sees it's you. "Ulysses my son, don't do that! I'm not as young as I look!"

"Appologies, Father, my intent was not to scare you," You say, somewhat formally. "I am here seeking counsel."

Father Eli immediately stops, his face taking on a grim expression, likely seeing your inner turmoil. "Very well, Child," He said, softly, "Tell me what ails you."

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The telling, in its entirety, takes ten minutes, after the pair of you shuffled off to a small study, far in the back of the chapel, the walls filled with books and tomes, a massive desk in the center. Every so often during your telling, you are interrupted by Eli, who asks questions. 'Why did you carve a fake idol?' 'Why are people buying fake idols?' 'Who are the Sisters' 'Whose Sharky?'

Eventually, you finish explaining what was happening, and for a moment, silence reigned. "I...I am not going to lie, Father, I am afraid," You admit, doing your best to maintain level breathing even as your hands tremored, your heart skipping the odd beat out of a terrified sort of arrhythmia, even as you felt the black scrawl of anxiety creep its way up your spine, an infernal tingle in the back of your skull born out of the sort of terrifying fantasies that occupied your mind. "I am deeply, deeply afraid."

The priest, silently turning, walked over to the desk, stride firm and resolute, pulling it open one of its myriad chambers and reaching in to retrieve some item, and pulling out...

Was that a laspistol? It certainly looked like one, but you had never seen one of that particular make before, slim and elegant with a long, stout barrel, gilt in gold and silver, liturgies carved across its surface in reverence: a sleek yet powerful looking thing, something that at first seemed like an assassins weapon more than anything you would encounter in the Outskirts. "Normally, I'd offer to pray with you," He said, a grim, resolute look on his face, but at the same time soft and full of...that one emotion, the one you weren't entirely sure of its significance: the best you could describe it as was worry, but not for his own sake. "However, there are times for prayer and times for action. This is a Hotshot Lasgun: Karnos pattern, artisinally crafted by the Arch-Magos of that forgeworld centuries ago, and was gifted to me..." His eyes misted up a bit as he trailed off, before he took a deep breath and continued, voice heavy with remembrance. "...By a very good friend, many, many decades ago, very, very far from here, because they thought it would help me, at the time a virtual stranger to them in mortal peril, survive. And now, I'm giving it to you."

What.

That was...if it was true, it was absurdly generous, an act of magnanimity you could not comprehend: what did he gain from this? How could giving this to you benefit him? It made no sense, you could see no sane reason he would make this offer to you of all people. "You...Father, that is a genuine relic," You say slowly, trying and failing to figure out the racket here, because one certainly existed, it had to. "You can't just...just give it away!"

Father Eli shrugged, heedless, no sign of deception on his face, even though such a thing made no sense. "Says who? The God-Emperor has no rules against such, and neither does the machine cult. It might be the most valuable thing I own, true," He said, with a slight, acknowledging nod of the head. "But, well, it does no good for it to be gathering dust in a drawer."

"I...genuinely, in good conscience cannot accept," You say, mildly, it dawning on you that, perhaps, there WAS no racket here. No logical, sane reason for him to be doing this. He was, genuinely, entirely out of charity and generosity, giving you something...something incredible, something worth more perhaps than the entire fucking Shanty. "This is...Father, I'm desperate, but this item is..."

Not fit for your hands, you almost say, unable to unglue your eyes from the laspistol. This...you weren't exaggerating when you said it was a genuine relic. An actual piece of mechanica, not the mere hedgemechanics you dabbled in or tech-mat auto-building, but a piece of holy craft by an Arch-Priest of the Machine God. You were just an Outskirts, hands not fit to sully such a precious thing.

However, even if you were reverent of it, you felt the other half of your being, the less reverent and more self serving part of your being war with you, tempting you by how useful it would be, trying to convince you of the utility of such an item. Wouldn't it make our survival assured, it whispered darkly. Even in the hands of a dog, surely such a divine artefact would protect us. Take it: we'll make it up to the Omnissiah later.

"Son, I'm not going to force you to take it, but you should at least consider it," Father Eli said, softly, telling easily how torn you were by the sight of your half outstretched hand, your eyes betraying the inner war you were fighting.

[ ] Pragmatism- You take the gun. Survival at all costs. Survival at all costs. (Gain Karnos Pattern Hellpistol, a hybrid Marksmanship/Gunslinger weapon that provides +10 to all skill rolls, ???.)

[ ] Devotion- No. You weren't worthy to wield such a fabled item. It deserved better than an outskirts con-man. (???, +3 Fate)

[ ] Survival: Sell it to the Sisters. Clear out your debt all at once: the gun would be worth more in better markets, but getting more for it would take time. No. This was a holy relic. Survival be damned, you would die twice over before you'd let this blessed item be handled by the Sisters, nor would you simply sell it to someone who would neither care about its significance or treat it with the deference such an artifact would deserve.