Halfway up the side of the scaffold, beset by a hundred thousand renewed aches, Chrisenya was forced to admit to herself that Severn was right. This was, after all, quite different from the training field.
It was much more staccato, for one thing: there were brief bursts of activity as she hauled herself over another ledge or up another ladder, followed by a few seconds of simple walking across the plasteel lattice platforms that made up the majority of the scaffold. If she ever felt like it, the option was even fully open to simply collapse against the wall itself and take a breather. She rarely gave herself that opportunity, of course, but it was very much there.
Every repetition of that process brought her higher. One by one, the roofs of the nearest Abbey structures fell away as she surpassed them, and more and more Chrisenya was exposed to the cool nighttime wind of Roctaln III. It looked about to rain again, the heady glow of the planet mostly obscured by threatening clouds. The finish, the top, was a fixed position, not the ever-shifting target that was the approval or disapproval of a Sister-Superior armed with a whip. For all that Chrisenya was sore and slow and burdened by the weight on her back, smuggling illegally-stolen materials out of the Abbey was a strangely calming process.
Chrisenya was rapidly losing track of why she was doing this. Of why she was doing anything, for that matter. All the calm had sapped her sense of purpose entirely and replaced it with layers of self-referential absurdity. Why was she doing this? Because she was doing it. She was absolutely riddled with sleeplessness, and her body was a network of pains.
A prayer to the Empress formed on Chrisenya's lips, but only a few scattered words emerged before crumbling away. The Empress's light formed a brief glimmer at the edge of her thoughts, invoking only the faintest consciousness of their existence before drifting away just as the prayer did. An old fear began to re-emerge: was this all merely a nightmare? Every time she levered herself up another level, every time her eyes drifted shut and had to be forced to re-open, Chrisenya expected to see her mother's face before her, with Misty's brilliantly purple eyes peering out from behind it.
But that moment never came. Against all odds, Chrisenya carried herself up to where the scaffold ended, and silently slipped in through the window of the PDF barracks. The next stage would be difficult as well, but in an entirely different fashion. Technically speaking, the punishment for smuggling, combined with curfew-breaking and entering into disallowed areas, was a lengthy stay in the Repentrium. But the PDF had much greater authority over their own barracks: they were well within their rights to shoot her dead on the spot, and their lasguns were more than up to the task.
Turn by turn Chrisenya crept through the barracks. She valued silence over speed, and so moved mostly on her hands and knees, looking up only to check for the presence of the marks on the walls. In the dark of night, the bare ferrocrete shell of the barracks appeared almost entirely empty and abandoned. Chrisenya could hear the sound of patrolling auxins in the distance, boots stomping on ferrocrete as they muttered to each other.
And then, on the floor, so close that Chrisenya very nearly crushed it under the heel of her hand, a strawberry. Chrisenya had never seen a strawberry, and she hadn't the faintest idea how she knew that the thing sitting on the floor before her was a strawberry, but there it was. The strawberry was the breaking point. All logic immediately fled Chrisenya's mind, all memory and sense overwhelmed by the constant crushing monotony of first the climb and then the lengthy sneaking through an endless labyrinth. It all seemed so pointless, so meaningless, and the absurdity of a fresh strawberry sitting on a ferrocrete floor brought it all into such sharp relief that Chrisenya had to clap a hand over her mouth to stop from laughing aloud.
What am I doing here, Chrisenya thought. What am I doing anywhere? Had she been doing anything at all, she wondered, or was this all just the unending extension of the days of torment seven years before? She had never managed to find the answer to why she had taken the orders, if obligation was a fool's game and her life had meaning after all.
Suddenly, footsteps came steadily down the hall, accompanied by muttering, the first male voice Chrisenya had heard in easily fifty days. He was too quiet to be heard clearly, but as Chrisenya scrambled across the floor to find a hiding spot, she was fairly sure she made out "sneak" and "blast," neither of which were good words to be hearing. A hiding spot proved easy to find: a small ventilation duct, just barely sized such that Chrisenya and her cargo could be jammed inside of it while the patrolling soldier passed them by. That gentle sense of pressure, the overriding fear, stained Chrisenya's ennui and existential dread like ink injected into gelatin; and somehow, an old memory was jostled loose.
...
The door to the holding cell creaked softly as it opened, the aging flakboard scraping against the floor with a sound that was quickly overpowered by the thunking of Sororitas battle-armor against deck-plate. Celestian-Superior Innogen scanned the chamber with two quick flicks of her head, right then left, and saw it empty.
"Saint? Where are you?"
She wasn't called Saint back then. But she wasn't called Chrisenya either, and with each day that passed she could attach what she was called then back to herself less and less.
"I'm right here," said the Saint.
Innogen briefly put on a confused face as she narrowly avoiding bumping her hip against the cell's small table. When she saw who she was looking for, her expression of confusion grew. She knelt down in front of the bed.
"What are you doing under there?"
"I started hearing…" The Saint flinched; she wasn't supposed to talk about that. "I'm praying. This is the quietest place in the room."
"Under the bed?"
The Saint nodded.
Celestian-Superior Innogen shook her head. "Would you mind coming out of there? We need to talk about something important."
"'Empress protect and Empress guide this pitiful vessel, grant strength beyond this mere shell of humanity by the exertion of thine will. Thou art the supreme of all mortal creatures, and only by thine light may I be guided. Forgive this fallible vessel…'"
"We'll have this conversation down here, then. We're about to dock with the Academia Ecclesia Gabriellum. Do you know what that is?"
"No."
"It's a school, for people like you whose families aren't around for them anymore. You're going to be staying there, at least a little while, until one of your aunts or uncles finds you and takes you in."
"I thank thee, my Empress, for all the blessings that thou hast foisted upon me, though I do not deserve them."
Her hands were so much fatter back then. They clasped together tightly as though they might lose grip on themselves while she prayed with pitter-patter words.
"Are you sure you want to stay down there? There's going to be food coming in a couple of minutes."
The Saint looked up at Innogen's weary eyes. Wonder and horror danced across her features. "Will you stay with me? Just for a little bit?"
"Of course I will. I've stayed with you this far, haven't I?"
The Saint crawled forward. In truth, she had stopped hearing things she wasn't supposed to hear minutes ago, but she was still afraid that any second now they might come back. They didn't.
"Atta boy," Celestian-Superior Innogen said, picking her up off the floor. "You're being very brave, I hope you know that."
...
There was no Innogen to help her up as Chrisenya crawled out of the air vent, certain that the patrolling auxiliary had gone. She dusted herself off as best as she could before continuing to where the exchange was to be made, but moved much more quickly than she had before. She was energized by the power of revelation.
What was the bravest thing Chrisenya had ever done? Innogen had called her brave all those years ago, but had she ever actually done anything brave? Was it bravery merely to do what was expected, to receive an order and follow it, or did bravery require something more, something active? Was it possible that climbing the wall, that breaking the rules, that what Chrisenya was doing at that very moment as she slipped through the hallways of the PDF barracks was, in fact, the bravest thing that she had ever done? Chrisenya's thoughts had been muddled for so long, ever since her fall on the training field, that the crystalizing clarity felt like the touch of the Empress.
The second bag, identical in structure to the first but stuffed to the gills with material, was jammed into another ventilation duct and hidden from view by a piece of stray flakboard. It took a few strong tugs to unstick it from the hiding place, at which point Chrisenya set to the process of undoing every buckle on the bag she presently had strapped to her. There was an odd fragrance to the new bag, something spiced. Memories continued to pour forth unbidden.
...
The food wasn't very good. All it was was a bit of dense baked bread-or-something-like-it, a dollop of unnameable processed fruit, and a slab of chewy meat. There was no richness to it, no spice, and hardly any salt. The Saint picked away at it with a fork and knife, barely interested.
It was pretty typical by the standards of the food she'd end up eating on the Gabriellum, or in the Abbey for that matter. Chrisenya hardly even remembered the taste of what she used to have for every meal on Aktranis, and she wasn't sure she'd want to remember if given the choice.
"You need to eat more," Innogen said. "I know it's probably hard under the circumstances, Empress knows I've lost my appetite before, but you've still got growing to do."
The Saint didn't want to talk about food. Between the long days of starvation and the gorge that followed, she didn't like thinking about food.
"You lose your appetite?"
"Of course. There are things you see out here, when you're fighting the good fight, that make your stomach turn."
The Saint shoved a forkful of food into her mouth, then looked up into Innogen's eyes, examining every contour of her greasy, broad features. Then she swallowed. "What's that thing you're wearing?"
"What do you mean? My armor?" Innogen tapped on her bicep, creating the dull clank of ceramite against ceramite.
"Yes, that. It doesn't look like normal armor."
"It's power armor," Innogen explained. "The outer layers are protective, but under that there's a layer of artificial muscle. I'm twice as strong in this armor as I am out of it, and it feels weightless even though it's actually about sixty kilos."
"Does the chest help with that?"
Innogen made a very strange face. "No, the chest is… aesthetic. There's a law, you see, called the Decree Passive, says that only women are allowed to serve in the military arm of the Ecclesiarchy."
It hadn't hurt too much at the time. More of a challenge to be overcome than a proper barrier, or at least that was how Chrisenya had processed it. Still, she wasn't unaware of her perceived gender, and even after so many years she could still remember the sting, no matter how minute.
Celestian-Superior Innogen smirked. "Sorry. If you want to fight for the faith, you're going to have to settle for second best."
"Which is?"
"Well, chances are you're going to end up doing the same thing your father did, ruling House Thannetch and all its affairs, and don't get me wrong, rulership's an honorable thing. But if you want to spread the faith, the rest of the Ecclesiarchy's open to both sexes."
Spreading the faith was good. The Saint shuddered to imagine that there were other people out there who needed it as much as she had and didn't have a Lord Thannetch around to teach it to them. "But you don't just spread the faith."
"No, you're right. But our making war is just as holy as preaching. We bring the light of the Empress wherever we go, and one cannot bring light without banishing the darkness. So long as the Imperium exists, there will be those who wish to destroy it."
Bringing light. The Saint's eyes lit up as she imagined it. Bringing light to a dark galaxy, with boltgun and flamer in hand.
...
The new bag, the goods being smuggled into the Abbey instead of the other way, was substantially heavier with supplies. But even if it had been three times the weight, Chrisenya would not have been slowed down. She was pregnant with glorious purpose, the manic delight of understanding all upon her as she slipped piscine through the enclosure of the barracks.
Chrisenya had been blind for years. Thoughts had been hidden in the back of her mind, suppressed by foreign words, and at last they were being dislodged. There was no happiness in this revelation, mania was not glee, but there was something beyond primitive joy in the grim purpose which had begun to infect Sister Chrisenya. She almost hurled herself out of the window that led back to the top of the scaffold, and she drank in the chill night wind with her hands so tight around the railing that they threatened to crush it like clay.
Gravity was on her side, and for the first time in so very long, the Empress was as well. She had thrust her mind back in time, to those crucial moments when Innogen had steered her life, and through the clarity of experience she had seen something that her younger self had missed. She took the ladder two rungs at a time.
...
There had been a woman named Thebe, who Chrisenya had been quite fond of when she was younger. She worked in the Thannetch spire, for her voice was the most beautiful in all of Aktranis they said. Often, when there were parties, she would sing songs in a long-forgotten tongue that would make the whole air thrum with emotion, be it sombre reflection or lust for life. Chrisenya had watched her often, indulging in the sin of envy as she drew every eye in the chamber.
But despite her beauty, when the tallies had hit the floor, she had made the wrong choice. It wasn't her fault; none could make any complaint about her character, other than that she had made the wrong decision and chosen heresy over loyalty. And it was for that reason that Chrisenya had had the pleasure of watching her die.
It had been during the rescue, towards the end of it, when fighting had turned to dying. Chrisenya herself had been half-conscious at the time, and the half of her that was awake at all was focused on different matters, what with Misty almost entirely out of the nightmare and into reality pushing endlessly against the inside of her skull. And yet, somehow, in the midst of all that chaos, Chrisenya's eyes had opened just a crack, and focused on Thebe's face. She was carrying a jagged knife in one hand and a laspistol in the other, but unlike the rest she hadn't flown into a fury just yet. She was waiting, waiting for the line of battle to shift over her way, when for a brief moment she had made eye contact with Chrisenya. She had looked concerned, as though worried that the stress of the battle would prove too much for the little girl.
And then the first bolter shell had gone right through the middle of her chest, under the ribcage, punching a puckered hole in her torso and leaving a spray of blood that hovered in the air for only a camera-flash moment before the shell burst behind her, throwing her to the floor with an awful crack. Thebe had lived on for just a little while longer, air wheezing through her wound, clawing against the floor, until the second bolt shell had come. It took off her head, her neck, and part of her shoulder, sending one arm spinning madly across the floor. Celestian-Superior Innogen had walked right over her corpse as she led the charge across the chamber, smoke still dripping from the barrel of her bolt pistol.
...
Death was death. It wasn't spreading light or banishing darkness, it wasn't spreading the faith, firing a bolt pistol into a heretic's head was just killing. To dress it up in fanciful language was to obscure the truth, to muddy it and deny the brilliant clarity that was the power to preserve a life or end it. Innogen, wise and skilled though she was, had gotten it entirely wrong.
The Sororitas were holy, yes. Ordained in the name of the Empress, they performed slaughter with an efficiency otherwise unmatched within the Imperium, and Chrisenya was not going to deny her role any longer. She was a holy warrior, and to be a holy warrior meant not merely to fight while having faith, not merely to hold faith in the depths of battle, but to be executioner in the Empress's name. And an executioner must be sharp. She must be cool, she must be hard, and she must understand precisely who and what she is.
Which meant that by acknowledging herself as an executioner, Chrisenya reasoned, she had already achieved more than many battle-sisters did in their entire lives. She allowed herself only a flicker of pride at this accomplishment, before drowning it under the tide of strength that was true purpose. That tide carried her all the way down the wall, through the outskirts of the Abbey, even crawling through the dirty tunnel under the ferrocrete wall. When she stood up in the underground garage on the other side, Sisters Severn and Gwynette greeted her fondly.
"Well would you look at that," said Gwynette. "I'd almost thought you wouldn't make it."
Severn smiled. "Good work, Chris."
Chrisenya crossed the room, feverish with want. She did not even bother to unbuckle her load at first, and instead walked right up into Severn's personal space, grabbed her tunic by the collar, and pulled her down to her level before kissing her firmly on the mouth.
"That was terrifying," Chrisenya admitted while Severn blushed and mumbled to herself. "Incredible, but terrifying. Now help me get this thing off of me, I want to get to sleep as soon as I can. I think tomorrow's going to be different."
