Sisters, Part One

What's this, two posts in one day? Well here it is, the next story to be told.

----

“That… was… awesome!”

As the movie ended and the credits began to roll, the room that the Cohort had made into a sort of makeshift rec room aboard the Demetrius Vox erupted into cheers and chatter. Ruby for one had to admit, the movie had been good. Really good. It had been a long time since she was so engrossed in what was essentially a popcorn flick, complete with cheesy villainous dialogue and one liners.

“Did you see how that one guy was hacking and slashing those Grimm?” Nora exclaimed. “Incredible! And those Custodes have gun spears! How cool is that?”

“I’m kinda surprised that they got Spruce to come out of retirement to portray the lead,” Coco commented. “Didn’t he quit acting after the Ninjas of Love movie, something about production difficulties? I kinda didn’t think he fit the role here.”

“Better not hear Blake say that while she’s awake,” Yang answered, said Cat Faunus dozing peacefully on her shoulder. At some point, Blake had fallen asleep during the flick. And considering how comfy she looked curled up next to Yang, she didn’t want to disturb the woman.

“Well I think the actor fit the character. The actress that played Salem seemed a little too enthusiastic though.” Weiss stood up, stretching her legs. “I liked it, even though I’m not really a fan of action movies.”

“Nah, you like those sappy love stories more,” Nora poked her in the shoulder.

Weiss shot her a glare that just made Nora laugh. “I will have you know that they are called romance, and it’s art!”

“What about you Velvet?” Nora asked the woman sitting to her other side. “I thought you’d be all over the movie.”

“Oh?” The rabbit Faunus perked up. “I liked it, but I was just thinking about the special effects.”

“What Vel said, I didn’t even know they could do half of that. I couldn’t tell if the Grimm were real or fake. And how’d they get the lead guy and the others into those giant armor suits?”

“Special effects obviously,” Velvet stated. “I think they used computers to make them? And I’m pretty sure they used forced perspective for a lot of the shots with the Space Marines.”

“Huh, cool.”

“What, did you think those were real Grimm?”

“Maybe a little? I mean it all looked so real.”

“They allegedly repurposed one of the big ancient ones the cogboys gave to Atlas for the special effects, apparently. You know, like the systems we use for simulations in our helmets and stuff like that.”

“Huh, that actually makes a lot of sense.”

“Well, it was a lot better than I expected it to be.” Ruby got up herself, deciding to head to her office to check on the last member of their squad. Emerald didn’t want to watch the movie with the rest of the group, and Ruby didn’t exactly blame her. The girl had a reason for sitting this last movie night of theirs out, that being she simply hated being reminded of her past. That entire year was one giant bad memory that a lot of people hated remembering and did their best to forget, and Emerald was no exception.

“Stepping out?”

“Yeah Coco, I got some paperwork to check on. “G’nite y’all.”

“Nite sis.” Yang waved her goodbye as Ruby stepped out, heading out the door and down the passageway to the former cargo space that has for the past few years acted as the office for the Sororitas stationed aboard the Vox. Even Sisters had to do paperwork, and they needed some place to do it after all. Most everything they needed had been packed up for transport already, their presence on the Vox soon to draw to a close.

It had been an exciting five years, Ruby reminisced. A lot of different battlefields, and a lot of people helped. She had seen things she never would have thought to be real, fought nightmares she never knew existed, and had seen horrors that she prayed she would never have to experience again. But soon she and the rest of her squad would be home amongst their friends and families.

She stepped into the office, walking over to her desk. It was occupied like she expected. Emerald was there, dutifully typing away at the cogitator still sitting on the ratty metal desk that Ruby had called her own for the last few years. It wasn’t one of the baroque models she’d seen around, but one of the sleek Atlesian designs that the Mechanicus had approved for export offworld. Emerald was so focused on the screen that she hadn’t been aware of Ruby approaching. She placed her cybernetic right hand on Emerald’s bare scalp, the surprise of the cold plasteel eliciting a yelp from the woman. A rare sound, from a woman sworn to eternal silence.

“Hi Ems, how’s the work going?”

Emerald turned to look at her. Almost done, she battlemarked with a smile. You startled me.

“Sorry Em, I didn’t mean to.” What paperwork they required to take back to Beacon had long since been packed up and stowed. She was going to miss the Vox, it had become a home away from home for quite a long time now. “Hopefully this time tomorrow, we’ll be aboard Welledge and on our way home. Gonna miss the Vox though.”

Welledge Station. It was the star hold that had been constructed by the Mechanicus to act as a sort of hub for incoming and outgoing ships. It got the name from the fact that it had to be built outside the gravity well of Remant’s star system and its gravity well. A now well-known caveat of Remnant was that of the strange Warp-disrupting effect that radiated outward from the world, which prevented virtually all vessels from transitioning to and from Warpspace while within it. Any Warp-capable vessel wishing to depart Remnant first had to spend days or more reaching the edge of the area of effect before making a jump to Warpspace. Attempts had been made to force the issue, both exiting out and jumping in, and they’d all ended in disaster in one way or another.

Home? Emerald asked.

Ruby smiled. “Yeah Ems, home,” she answered. “I know Yang is looking forward to being back at least.”

What about you?

“It’s… complicated for me.”

Emerald nodded in understanding. Gently she took her hand, the prosthetic one, carefully inspecting the mechanical limb. The prosthetic was somewhere between temporary and permanent, as Ruby had yet to have the time or means to construct something to act as a true permanent replacement for the missing limb she’d lost the year prior. Emerald didn’t need to ask about it, the question clear.

“I have a replacement in the works,” she reassured the mute girl. “So don’t worry about it. I’ve got a friend making a better one for me.”

Emerald smiled and nodded. She glanced past her, and Ruby became aware of another entering the old office. She glanced back around to see the newcomer. “Hey Ren,” Ruby said. “How’re the guys?”

Ren smiled in reply. “Things went well, I think. Just came to check on Nora and say good night.”

“Thanks.”

“Oh, and Yavis will probably be around soon. He’s going to want to go over some things with you before we return to Remnant.”

“All right, good to know,” Ruby smiled. “Hey, what was it you and the others did for fun by the way? Yav was intent on keeping it a secret.”

Ren nodded and chuckled. “It was Brother Allistarus’s idea actually,” Ren smiled. “We went through something low impact in the simulator. I didn’t know traveling fair entertainers could be so… disconcerting.”

Ruby chuckled, leaning against the desk. “That sounds like Al all right. I never knew that he had such a strange sense of humor though.”

Ren shrugged. “He does, doesn’t he? Well, good night Sisters.”

“Good night, Ren.”

Ren nodded and left, ducking back through the door. That part of the vessel had yet to be converted to accommodate the larger frames of Astartes, something that would no doubt happen when they arrived in port and the Vox could be refitted into a proper Strike Frigate. Ruby sat down next to her fellow Sister, and started helping her with the last bit of busywork they needed to do before retiring for the night.

[hr=1][/hr]

“Wow, that’s actually impressive.”

Welledge was massive, Ruby observed. The star hold was for the most part modeled after other such Imperial installations, four spokes radiating from a central spired hub. Two of the spoke arms had been styled after the utilitarian design aesthetic of Atlas, while the other two were patterned in the baroque, gothic architecture so prevalent across the greater Imperium. All along the length of each were weapon emplacements, massive Macro and Lance batteries dedicated to defense of the station.

“They built this in a decade?”

Nine years and eleven months,” Coco clarified. “Most of it was prefabbed though from a forgeworld and mass conveyed here. Or so I heard at least.”

“It feels like they had just started putting it together when we were last here,” Nora spoke. “I can’t wait to see the inside.”

“Calm yourself Sister,” Ruby chided her teammate and subordinate. “We’ve got to set a proper example for the reception. You can sightsee after we’ve arrived aboard.”

“Yes ma’am.” As Nora had grown older, her bursts of child-like wonder at things had grown fewer and far between, tempered by the weight of duty. But she still had those moments, and Ruby and no doubt Ren cherished her for it.

Speaking of. “Sergeant Yanis, how are things on your end?”

“Acceptable,” the Lamenter Sergeant and her old schoolmate replied. Yanis had always been the quiet type, the silent muscle of Coco’s old team. Even after his induction into the Lamenters he had remained quiet and steadfast, the sort of personality that meant when he spoke, people listened. “Three of us, myself included, will need replacement wargear. As I understand it, the Atlas Development Division has something to show both of us?”

“They do,” Ruby said. “Some new wargear they’ve created in the last few years, as I understand it.” Besides the opportunity to play with some new stuff, Ruby was looking forward to meeting Penny again. “But I mean personally. How are your people, their families?”

“I can’t speak for some of them,” the Sergeant spoke. “I know both Allistarus and Winceslaus have families they want to meet and vice versa.” A beat passed, and Ruby could almost see the man smile through the vox-link. “As for myself, a cousin I didn’t know I had reached out to me.”

“Oh? Well, that’s good to know.”

“What about you, Palantine?”

“Me?”

“Indeed.”

“A father,” Ruby said. Her and Yang’s dad was still teaching at Signal. After Beacon transitioned into becoming the home of her Order, it had fallen to Signal Academy on Patch to continue teaching Huntsmen and Huntresses for the Kingdom of Vale. In the two decades since it had grown considerably in size with the influx of students from the mainland kingdom and the faculty needed to teach them. Her dad had also found someone else since then, but Ruby set that out of her mind for the moment.

“Positions,” Sister Rose ordered. The dromon they were being ferried by maneuvered into one of several of Welledge’s cavernous docking bays, the pilots guiding the craft into a pre-assigned cradle. The airframe shuddered as it set down and the station’s gravity asserted its own over the craft. Behind her, her Sisters and Brothers were in formation, as were the additional Guardsmen assigned to their group. A light turned green in front of her, and the dromon’s forward ramp lowered to the deck of the docking bay.

It was time.

“Forward,” she ordered. Ruby stepped off, her armored boots echoing off of the steel floor of the dromon as she led her group out onto the station. Crescent Rose rested comfortably in her gauntlets, her ever trusty weapon and partner throughout her life, first as a huntress and then as a Sister Sororitas. As she stepped down the ramp and onto the station proper, she took in her surroundings.

Her power armor’s helmet showed her everything. The crowd that had gathered to welcome her was impressive, hundreds if not thousands had crowded into the hangar bay to watch them arrive. Balconies above were also lined with people, a swarming crowd gathered to welcome prodigal sons and daughters home. She saw a few staff from Beacon that she remembered, faces old and new. A trio of Astartes, one of which she recognized as the newly-promoted Captain Thracin of the Lamenters’ Third Company. He was technically Sergeant Yavis’s commander when Ruby wasn’t around, and was no doubt there to welcome and debrief his Brothers under her care.

Standing by the Lamenters were a pair of Sisters, both of whom Ruby instantly recognized. The first’s armor was black and bone-white, same as the rest of their Order. The other’s armor traded the bone white for red, her helmet’s faceplate styled after the original mask she once wore. Twenty years ago they would have been at each other’s throats, both literally and figuratively. And now…

Now, thanks to a Miracle, all that had been present at Beacon that night had become brothers and sisters by all but blood.

“Halt,” she gave the order, and their formation came to a stop. “Canoness Goodwitch, Preceptor Branwen,” Palatine Ruby Rose addressed her superiors. “It’s good to see you both again.”

----

“So, these Lamenters Sergeant Kerrick, how much do you know of them?”

High above on a balcony overlooking the arrival of the newcomers, a young-looking woman observed the happenings below. She was clad in a black, form-fitting bodyglove that showed off much of her toned physique. Over that she wore gray trousers and a thin gray jacket, with a pair of black boots completing her ensemble. Her long, green-colored hair flowed down to her waist in a single braid, a stand out from what one might consider to be normal shades of hair. The only hint she was anything more than a mere spectator, aside from the Deathwatch Marine standing next to her, was the small emblem affixed to a chain necklace around her neck. A stylized I that represented the colossal amount of power invested in the individual bearing it.

“No, not personally,” her companion replied. The Astarte and oldest member of her retinue stood head and shoulders over her, the man’s giant build in contrast to her petite. “There were a number of Lamenters within the Deathwatch, but I did not know any of them personally as they were on different Watch from myself. I knew other sons of Sanguinius, but I doubt that would be helpful here.”

The woman hummed and nodded. “No, I suspect it wouldn’t. I was hoping to have at least one unbiased account regarding them before arriving at their homeworld, but it seems I’m going to have to be the one to author it.” The Lamenters, at least from what she had gleaned from various reports both old and new, were somewhat atypical of Astartes chapters. Rather than the pious and callous altruism many Astartes Chapters demonstrated, the Lamenters held an unusual degree of care and compassion for humanity, and a steadfast refusal to abandon the helpless and those in their care. Despite that, or perhaps even because of that, they seemed to be the subject of an irrational amount of scorn and ridicule, from many different sources. Part of it had to do with what happened in Badab the century before, but much more seemed to have been drawn from the void and predated that accursed war.

“Well, what I do know indirectly is that their chapter is generally thought to be cursed.”

“Cursed?”

“The so-called ‘Cursed Founding’ it would seem,” Kerrick explained. “They also tended to view themselves as unlucky.  Allegedly they had a word for it, what they termed ‘Lamenter’s Luck.’”

“Really?”

Kerrick nodded. “Bad luck befell them constantly, or so I was told. After just a few years, all that remained of those within the Deathwatch was a solitary dreadnought, who for a time thought himself the last of his chapter.”

“Unlucky,” the woman hummed again. “Perhaps there was something to that?”

“Was?”

The woman chuckled, running a hand down her solitary braid. The green hair caught the light cast by the overhead sconces, making the strands seem almost iridescent. “It would seem their luck has turned, I dare say.”

“In what way, Inquisitor?”

“They have a new homeworld, a shiny new fleet of warships, a chapter at full strength,” she began to explain. “A far cry from where they stood a century ago. Whatever bad luck has befallen them in the past certainly seems to have left them be these past two decades.”

“Inquisitor, far from me to inquire about my superiors’ thoughts and motivations, but may I ask your thoughts as to why it is you came here exactly?”

“Information?”

“Pertaining to?”

“Them,” she gestured down at the crowd below. “I’m curious. I want to see their people, that world’s culture. Also, there is the nature of its people that has piqued my curiosity, but it’s not exactly within my purview to pass judgement I don’t think.”

“Would an investigation be more suited to one of your sister Ordos?” Kerrick asked her. “The Malleus or Hereticus?”

“Perhaps, perhaps not.” The crowd below had begun to disperse as the welcomed Astartes Brothers and Sororitas Sisters were ushered onward into the station proper. Likewise, the crowds within the viewing boxes to their left and right began to empty out as well. “I am not the first from the Inquisition to make the statement that these… powers, that the inhabitants of Remnant possess might be something much worse than what they seem to be. However, I also cannot deny the advantages they offer to those who possess them. Such is that their world’s name has been muttered more than once within the Senatorum Imperialis, either with scorn or, dare I say, with envy.”

“I see.” A moment passed in silence. “Are you tempted?” Kerrick asked her after the moment passed.

The Inquisitor understood the implied question and smiled. “Are you, Sergeant?”

The temptation was one a lot of people in the know had no doubt felt, of gaining a modicum of real power for a meager price. The price of which was simply visiting the world of Remnant and allowing one of the locals to, and to quote a report she had read, ‘unlock their Aura.’ For obvious reasons, that knowledge and information had made a lot of people nervous upon learning about it.

To that end, she was privy to some information from a covert delegation of the Inquisition that had been tasked to investigate the world and what was going on there. Their findings were inconclusive, but the Malleus operative could not find any trace of the demonic, nor did the Hereticus find heresy at work beyond the scattered paganistic beliefs of a world newly brought into the Imperial fold. There were questions about the nature of the local hostile wildlife, but the Xenos operative of the group had been ill-equipped to deal with the ‘Grimm’ in any investigative manner.

As for the Lamenters, it had seemed they had earned their redemption after their penitent crusade and were not keen on squandering the Emperor’s forgiveness of them. In the past couple of decades they had struck out afterward from Remnant, aiding worlds in the neighboring sectors at the bequest of the Lord Commander and dealing with threats wherever they cropped up. Again, no signs of taint, heresy or the Xenos were found amongst those Space Marines the group interacted with, despite whatever prejudices any of the trio might have had.

By all accounts, whatever the case and whatever was going on, the Ruinous Powers for a change weren’t at play. It was something unexpected, and the group’s consensus and recommendation at the time had been simply to wait and watch.

“I do wonder what my brothers would say if I spent too long here on this world and gained such an ability.” The Black Templar smiled, a rare act from a typically stoic son of Dorn.

“As I understand it, your Chapter lacked Librarians until recently?”

His gaze darkened. “Yes, until recently.”

The Inquisitor understood it to refer to the Primaris inducted into his chapter. Kerrick himself were what the Marines referred to as ‘Firstborn,’ in contrast to the Primaris. He’d yet to undertake the process that allowed a Firstborn Marine to become like the Primaris, out of personal choice it had seemed. The Inquisitor had been careful to not prod Kerrick on the subject, regarding his views of these new Space Marines. As the Inquisition understood it, many Space Marine Chapters had been deeply opposed to the Primaris and their induction into the ranks of their Chapters. Only under the threat of excommunication delivered by the Adeptus Custodes had some of the more stubborn Chapters relented.

The Inquisitor also knew from past learnings that the Black Templars had shied away from psykers in their ranks, Librarians and the like. In fact, they despised psykers of all kinds, purging them wherever they were found. Being all but forced into having them by edict of the Lord Commander would have no doubt shaken their doctrines to their foundations, and would have possibly even led to a great deal of internal strife within their ranks.

“Well, I have no desire to stick around, in case you’re wondering. I for one am not eager to gain psychic abilities, or even something analogous to them. In fact, I’m pretty sure that if my old boss was still around, she’d come find and chastise me for being so reckless. No, I take that back, she’d shoot me for misplacing my brain.”

“I suppose that is... Refreshing to know, my lady.”

The Inquisitor chuckled. At that. Behind them, the door that lead to the private balcony opened. “Inquisitor Cleat?” A voice came from behind them.

Xemelda Cleat, Ordo Xenos, turned to look at the newcomer, recognizing them immediately as the officer that had welcomed them to Welledge the day prior. “My lady,” the man spoke, “Lieutenant Beck is ready to see you now.”

“Ah, finally. It would seem the Lieutenant is quite the busy… man…” Xemelda trailed off. “Five seconds, Carlylie, impressive.”

The officer’s look was first one of surprise, then nothing at all as their form began to flow and dissolve, reaffirming into the shapely and curvaceous body of another member of the Inquisitor’s retinue. The Callidus Assassin’s face and body were hidden by her full-cover bodyglove, her eyes by the garment’s red lenses. “What gave it away this time?” She asked with a sigh.

Xemelda smirked. “The face,” she explained. It was too plain.” I still remember what that officer looked like.”

“Wait, really?”

“Yes, really.”

Carlylie turned to the Deathwatch Marine, her mouth opening to ask a question.

“Before you opened the door,” Kerrick answered the question before any had even been asked.

“What?”

“Your heartbeat was the tell,” Kerrick explained. “His was elevated both times he met with us. Yours was even and regular.”

“Bwa… what.”

“The two of us are used to working with the Inquisition. Many aren’t.”

She pouted, “I wish I could hear heartbeats through doors.”

“Carlylie, what of the Lieutenant?”

“Oh, of course,” she nodded. “He really is ready to meet you.”

“Good.” Xemelda stepped away from the balcony edge. “Well, let’s go bargain our way to Remnant, shall we?”