>>16607700

Titus found a letter waiting for him on arrival, from a mysterious Inquisitor Brund, inviting him to put his services to good use in his secret order.
Titus, knowing nothing about the man other than his rank as an Inquisitor, agreed, and immediately received a message with his first target: a seemingly insignificant Administratum clerk. Titus snuck off to eliminate the target, no questions asked.
While he was gone, Lazarus and Athena learned that Carkass was currently in transit to Scintilla, and would not be available to contact for several days.

>>16607852
Titus assassinated the pudgy office drone with a single bullet, and made his way back to the party.
He tried to dodge the question when Athena asked where he'd been. Already upset with him due to the recent events on Dusk, Athena threatened him, and he retreated into the street.
Athena pursued, and Lazarus tried to separate them.

The sister obeyed his orders, but grudgingly, not fully trusting either of them. Laz's trust is also strained when Titus still refuses to disclose where he was, and the three march off in their separate directions.

>SQUAD BROKEN

>>16607852
So how come Coin was using such a simple tactic?

>>16607933
Sorry, what?

>>16607912
Eventually, for one reason or another, everyone's tasks returned them to the Tricorn, and they met up in the lobby.

>Acolytes?

The woman had a voice like iron, and she introduced herself as Interrogator Kallisti Chase.

>I understand you've been looking for me.

She says Tyrannus will be along shortly, and they'll explain everything. The acolytes are to wait upstairs, in a designated conference room, where she and the Inquisitor will meet them privately.
The team agrees, and heads up to the room.

>>16607947
After a few minutes, they start to wonder why nobody's there yet. Lazarus, paranoid, checks the doors, and they're locked tight, not unlike the 8-inch thick plexiglass window.

A light flickers, and a holographic image of Coin appears at the head of the table.

>>16607981
AW SHIT

>>16607981

Shit's getting real again

>>16607981
He greets them excitedly, and proceeds to blather on about how he's missed them, and how sad he is that the terms of his contract have been revised:
The timetable now requires the heroes to die /today/.

He's just as sad about it as they are, he assures them. He even composed a song to express his feelings.

As he's talking, Laz notices a hissing noise, like something seeping in through the room's air vents.

>By now you've no doubt detected the highly flammable gas being pumped in. As much as I'd like to be down there with you, I have no desire to be incinerated. If I've timed this right, and I have, the last words of my song will be the last words you hear.

And then, Coin sings.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fWCZ7_3dKnc

>>16608017

...

I don't know whether I want to strangle this Coin or give him a high five.

>>16607947
.... I miss Acolyte quest. That is all

this bastard...he's... he's magnificent....

>>16608017
Out of game, the players are informed that this will be a REAL-TIME CHALLENGE.

When the song ends, the room will be filled with fire.

As Coin sings in the background, Lazarus attempts to pick the lock on the door, with no success. The Inquisitorial locks are too complex for his street-quality multikey.

Athena, meanwhile, has her flail in her augmented arm and is smashing at the window. The first few smacks don't do much, but eventually the glass begins to splinter. Titus wants to contribute, but his gun is his only asset, and nobody wants to risk sparking off the gas already in the room prematurely.

Finally, with seconds remaining, Athena puts all her weight into an attack, and shatters the window, the force of her swing carrying her through and over the edge.

>>16608070
Titus leaps to grab her, his body landing flat on the floor, and only barely supporting her weight. Laz makes a flying dive, and grabs onto Titus' ankles.

Just at that moment, Coin's hologram concludes his song, and the upper half of the room becomes an inferno above the team's heads.

The heat is intense, but they manage to pull Sister Athena back from the edge.

They survived an assault on their lives, by a rogue Interrogator, within the very walls of the Inquisiton itself, and in doing so overcome the mistrust that divided them.

Reunited, they pose as a team, because shit has just become very real.

>>16608017

I was honestly expecting this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=go0UBNqQLlc

>>16608186
I'll be honest, that scene was my inspiration.
But there's a fine line between derivation and plagiarism.

>>16608145
Thinking quickly, Athena realizes that Coin said "down there" during his speech, and makes the logical guess that he's above them.

The team races to the roof, where they see a huge guncutter, with white panels and gilded detailing. The name on the side, in gold lettering, is Probat, which Athena translates from the high gothic as "Justified."

Readying themselves for anything, the team assaults the ship. Titus is ready to put a bullet between the assassin's eyes, Athena is ready to smash his smirking face in with her flail... but Lazarus wins initiative, and crits on his nonlethal, unarmed attack roll.

One punch to the face later, Coin was captured... alive.

>>16608249
Once Coin is unconscious and secured, Lazarus sweeps the ship.
Inside, he finds a veritable arsenal, a briefcase of unmarked, nonsequential thrones, and a few more interesting items as well.

-A chastity belt, of a design used by certain orders of Sororitas, with an open and undamaged lock.

-A photo, pic related, with labels under each figure: Vic, Me, Tyr, In & Out, -Gr-(Crossed out), Big R

-An Arbite-pattern riot shield, and a badge to match, bearing the name Horatio Coin.

Although the arbite gear is confusing, to put it mildly, it's the photo that captures the team's attention. Tyr, wearing the badge of an Interrogator, is clearly a younger Inquisitor Tyrannus. The daemon on the far right, although obviously in a different host body, is unmistakably Rashuael -though his wings are full here, while when the team encountered him on Dusk, they manifested as broken and bloodied.

>>16608249
Captcha ate my "photo"

>>16608341
Back downstairs, the team finds that without an inquisitor's support, they're really helpless against the bureaucratic wall that is Special Circumstances.

The interrogators do, however, find a cell for Coin.
Laz fires off a report to Carkass, expecting it'll beat him to Scintilla, detailing the events of the day, as well as his now strong suspicion that Tyrannus himself is behind it all, though his motives are unknowable.

continue, this has me greatly interested

>>16608420

Although the team would have liked to grill Coin, he perished before anything could be wrung out of him. He attempted to escape, not knowing that the party gave strict orders to the guards that anyone attempting to leave the interrogation room was to be executed immediately.

There was much screaming at the realization they'd not only allowed him to die before explaining what was going on, but on top of that they'd allowed a random NPC to kill the man.

Commandeering Coin's ship and re-christening it the Blessed Venture II, the team arranged transport on a trade galleon, and made haste for Scintilla, to rendezvous with Carkass and determine how to proceed.

The flight was longer than expected.

(Taking a break here, if you're reading, please let me know! I'll resume in a few.)

>>16608440
More, please, good sir. This is quite interesting

>>16608440

More please! This is great!

>>16608440
hurry up and get back here and write!

rolled 7 = 7

>>16608440
YOU WILL RETURN AND FINISH THE TALE.

>>16608440
And we're back, thanks for the patience. I realize I could write faster, but why not use that time to review the events of the first thread? It's linked up in the first post!
<<<>>>

Although the trip lasted only a few days for our heroes, a bit of warp turbulence caused them to reach Scintilla a full eight months after they left Malfi.

The ship was blockaded by the Inquisition on arrival, and the team overheard a steward panicking to his friends about how people on ships that get time-shifted like this usually don't see sunlight again.

Following his lead, our heroes boarded the BVII, blasted their way out of the docking bay, dodged heavy fire from the black ships, and landed outside Sibellus, now fugitives from the Inquisition.

>>16608633
Lazarus attempted to do some sleuthing, ideally intending to pursue the leads from the clues in Coin's shuttle, but he, Titus, and Athena were quickly scooped up by arbites.

The team was brought before Lord Arbite Majoris Nikolai Angelus, high commander of the Adeptus Arbites for the entire sector. After hearing their story, he claimed that he could use his influence to get them a retroactive exception from the Inquisitorial blockade.
In exchange, he needed a favor.

Apparently, a few of his men had failed to check in after a routine patrol on a nearby forge world, and he'd rather not deal with the embarrassment of sending his own troops to investigate.

The team accepts, not having much choice, and Angelus smuggles them onto an arbite cruiser bound for Forge World 71-DX.

>>16608676
The acolytes were greeted warmly enough by the eccentric high magos, and a Guardsman who introduces himself as the world's Adeptus Munitorum liason, Captain Benito Sec.

Although everyone is all smiles, they claim to have no idea what happened to the last group of arbites. According to Sec, the men left almost two weeks ago.

Our heroes do some investigation, and discover crates of las carbines -the world's primary export- with re-stenciled labels. Although they were originally slated for several different regiments across the sector, they're now all directed at the Fenksworld 385th -- the very same unit which Sec commands.

>>16608727
After abducting and enhanced-interrogating one of the guardsmen, they learn that the 385th was routed in a massacre due to bureaucratic oversight; someone forgot to properly sign a form, which meant the Fenksworlders got no air support. Sec and his survivors have taken over the planet in order to resupply.
They're not traitors, he emphasizes, they just can't go back onto the field without guns, and the Munitorum is blaming them for the failure and loss of materiel.

Pitying him, Athena knocks him unconscious and Titus ties him up.

They continue stalking through the hallways, hoping to figure out exactly how Sec has gained power over the world.
Hearing the sounds of combat, they race around a corner, and see a shockingly familiar face.

>>16608786
>>see a shockingly familiar face

who, whowhowhowhowhwho?
Damn cliffhangers.

>>16608786

Locked in pitched combat with a pair of skitari, and holding his own, is none other than... Trempan!

>Who?

C'mon, you remember Trempan.

>We do?

Trempan, the tech-priest. Augmetic eyes, giant drill for a hand, you killed his teammates on the Space Hulk mission and left him heavily wounded and barely alive?

>Oh. Oooooh.

None other than... Trempan!

>Trempan! What's he doing here?!

The team comes to Trempan's aid, knowing him to be a trustworthy agent of the Inquisition, and after the fighting is ended asks him what's going on.

He explains that since he was released from rehab a few months ago -not that he holds any grudges or anything- Carkass has had him gathering information on Tyrannus' past, with a focus on his allies. There are some critical business transaction records stored here in the 71-DX's datacrypts.

>>16608845
Trempan joins the team, figuring there's strength in numbers, and before long they find a closet containing the bodies of the missing arbites, as well as their cyber-mastiff. At Lazarus' behest, Trempan was able to re-awaken the mastiff's machine spirit, although full repairs would have to wait for later. The name on the metallic Arbite's Best Friend is "Thrombis," which Sister Athena translates as a High Gothic reference to the healing power of blood. (Platelets, in the 20th century vernacular.)

Emboldened by the discovery of his fallen brethren, Lazarus storms through the halls of the labyrinthine complex, determined to break this case wide open.

>>16608864
Before long, following Thrombis, our heroes are led by the scent of evil straight to the Fenksworlders' stronghold, such as it is.
A massive shootout ensues, where our heroes must pit their powerful, but single-shot, weapons against an entrenched unit with full-auto las carbines.

Somehow, they succeed, though only just, and rescue the young tech-priest novice the men were keeping prisoner.

>>16608919
The magos and the captain are shocked to see our heroes march into the main audience chamber, more so to see Trempan, since they apparently had no idea he was even on the planet.

Then the rescued novice walked in, escorted by Thrombis, and the chamber erupted in chaos.

>Captain Benito Sec, in the name of the Emperor's Most Holy Inquisition, I declare you a murderer and a traitor, and sentence you to summary execution!

Everyone gears up for what promises to be an epic battle... until the magos himself opens up a can of Casual Cyborg Whoopass, the very walls and floor of the chamber coming to his aid and eliminating Captain Sec in a rather graphic fashion.
Upon seeing this, his men drop their arms and surrender.

>>16608928
As Trempan helps the acolytes handcuff the soldiers, the magos and the novice have a heartfelt reunion. In a twist that surprises no one, he is revealed to be the magos' son. Lazarus finds this strange.

>I thought Mechanicus were devoid of emotion?

>Is not a man entitled to pride in his greatest creation?

The team has nothing to say to that, and loads the entire surviving roster of the Fenksworld 385th onto the Arbite cruiser, bound for processing and reassignment to penal legions.

>>16608952
Lazarus had a heart-to-heart with Trempan on the ride back to Scintilla, which had some interesting character growth, and revealed some useful knowledge about the photo they found.
"In & Out" was apparently Coin's idiosyncratic nickname for Integrus and Ledevout Messemacher, a pair of AdMechs who served in Tyrannus' retinue back in the day, before being ejected from the church of the machine god for heresies of innovation.

Trempan also found time to properly restore Thrombis to almost-like-new status. Or as close as anything gets to that in the 41st millennium.

We also got this bit:

>You seem like an intelligent, interesting man, Arbitrator Black. When I kill you in bloody vengeance, I promise you I will take no joy in it.

Lazarus stares silently, unsure what to say to that. There's silence for a while.

>AH HA HA HA. Sorry about that. The look on your face! You know how we "cogboys" are with humor.

Lazarus snorts and pours another round.

>BROMANCE STATUS: ACHIEVED

>>16608845
I thought Trempan was heretic (having been in with a bunch of damn heritics).

>>16609058
It turned out that there was one heretical mole in the cell. Our heroes killed him, along with three innocent acolytes, and nearly killed Trempan himself.

>>16609022
Arriving in Sibellus, our heroes visit Lord Arbitor Angelus, who congratulates them on a job well done, thanks them for their service, and promises they'll face no reprisals for their disregard for protocol.

Trempan excuses himself to collate some research, and Laz leads his teammates to do likewise in the Adeptus Arbites' archives.

He recovers a number of relevant files:

Horatio Coin, MIA 50 years ago, presumed dead. A great big bear of a man who made a name for himself in the Arbite equivalent of Internal affairs. Very clearly not the slim, lascivious assassin we all knew and hated. Disappeared while investigating the case of:

Gregor Sanctus, recruited to the retinue of Interrogator Tyrannus 52 years ago, presumed KIA when =RECORDS EXPUNGED BY ORDO MALLEUS=

Laz puts two and two together, and reasons that Gregor was the original host for Rashuael, pointing out the crossed out "Gr" in front of the daemon's nickname in Coin's old photo.

Another name is flagged as relevant to the search, but Laz intentionally hides that file away before the rest of the team can notice it.

The name on that file, of course, is Lazarus Black.

>>16609109
From the Arbite HQ, the team heads to the Tricorn, where havoc reigns.

Hundreds of men and women of all ages are dashing through the lobby of the huge building, dressed in the uniforms of a thousand ranks and professions.

Our trio of acolytes are able to divine, through the few people willing to spare them a moment, that a distress signal has been received from Inquisitor Carkass, claiming that he has been abducted by Inquisitor Tyrannus.
Naturally the entire Tricorn is on red alert, and a battle fleet is being assembled to assault Tyrannus' private stronghold moon in the Golgenna Reach.

As low-ranking acolytes, lately in service to Tyrannus, the team is naturally denied any access to the operation.

>>16609109
my face when

>>16609175
When they rendezvous with Trempan, he shares his conclusions: The distress call is a decoy. After years as Carkass' right hand, Trempan knows how the man writes, and while the ID code is correct -meaning Carkass has, in fact, been abducted- the syntax is off, written by someone else.
He can only assume it was Tyrannus himself, intending to lead the Inquisition off-track.

Worse news, Trempan reveals that Lazarus, Athena, and Titus are Tyrannus' only surviving cell. Every other acolyte in the man's network has been systematically eliminated over the last two months.

>>16609213
Coin I presume is responsible.

>>16609213
Trempan believes he's worked out a plan to find both inquisitors. He has identified a rogue trader vessel, the Pestilent Destiny, as a deep space relay for the decoy distress signal, meaning they were in contact with Tyrannus recently, and could have a lead on his location.
Unfortunately, due to his long attachment to the Inquisition, the higher-ranking mechanicus are refusing to listen to him.

While he does some more research, he needs the team to abduct he Destiny's seneschal, a lord Bravos Fennec, for questioning. There's no inquisitorial backing on this mission, so it needs to go flawlessly, and that means no death.
Black-bag interrogation, or everyone involved is as good as dead.

>>16609247
A bit of research reveals that the Pestilent Destiny has a long history, under a different name.
Once a noble Rogue Trader dynasty, the last few trader-captains ran it into the mud, until the fleet was reduced to a single ship, renamed by its last late master. "So have we doomed ourselves."

These days, the ship is run by the seneschal, who's doing his best to rescue their coffers with shady jobs, most notably running contraband and illegal intoxicants and delicacies to the nobility.

Titus has the idea of contacting some nobles they befriended in Sibellus during their very first mission, so long ago now.
Outfitted properly, they pose as wealthy gadabouts in search of a chemical thrill, and Fennec is only too happy to help them.

>>16609270
Once they're alone with him, the team knocks Fennec out cold, blindfolds him, and places him on a hover-pallet in the fetal position.
They then take kilo blocks of some exotic drugs and build a little fort around him, and sneak him back into the BV II and get away clean.

Or at least, that was the plan.

>>16609296
Not that anything went wrong. I suppose I should clarify that.

Rather, on the way to the shuttle, our heroes happened to pass a room with the name Horatio Coin on the door.

>>16609304
Inside, due to the time crunch of avoiding discovery, the team didn't bother trying to loot too much, for fear of booby traps or alarms.

However, Athena did find an old photo in a dresser drawer. Rumpled from overhandling, the picture showed four men.
Two wore the uniforms of arbites, and were tied to chairs, while behind them stood Coin (the assassin), and Vic (the as-yet unidentified gunslinger from the other photo). Coin and Vic appeared to be mocking the arbites. One officer was unconscious, but the other looked ready to tear his captors' heads off.

Strangley, Coin had vandalized the image with a red pen, circling all faces but his, and scrawling,

>WHO ARE THEY???

Lazarus identified the furious officer as the Coin on file as an Arbite, but couldn't (or wouldn't?) ID his apparent partner.

>>16609330
When Trempan emerges from the interrogation, he's wiping his drill-hand clean with a damp cloth.

>Just red paint, I assure you. I find it makes people so much more forthcoming.

According to Fennec, the Destiny did indeed do business with Tyrannus, delivering numerous crates of heavy machinery to his new base of operations. Trempan convinces the team that since Tyrannus is an inquisitor, the vessel can be forgiven for trusting him.

After dropping Fennec off at the docks, the team has a brainstorming session, and Titus has another brilliant idea.

>>16609351
Contacting another noble contact, this one more of the hedonistic vein, our intrepid holy heroes sell him their little fort's worth of extrasolar drugs, at about street value.

Easy come, easy go, they say, as the profit of the sale is just enough to buy the team passage on a relatively small light cruiser, and charter their destination: Tyrannus!

And so began the final chapter.

(How many people are still reading at this point?)

>>16609373

you taunt me with this pause, sir.

>>16609373
Still here.

>>16609373
Still reading!

oh gods MAOR

>>16609373
Their last night in the warp, the team had strange dreams.

Sister Athena dreamed of screaming and being smothered,
Titus dreamed of blinding fire,
and Lazarus dreamed of dueling with Vic, the mysterious gunslinger.

The next morning, they emerged into orbit of Obsiden.

For his new lair, Tyrannus chose an abandoned mining planet, which looked from space like a blackened apple core, thoroughly strip-mined to the point where it could no longer support its own atmosphere.

Donning void suits, the team took stock of themselves.
Nearing the peaks of their professions, they cleaned, loaded, and strapped on their high-powered weaponry, their exotic armor, and their special ammunition.

Thinking themselves prepared for anything, they descended to the surface.

>>16609424
Though there were no signs of activity on the planet's exterior, scans detected heat deep below. After touching down near what appeared to be the mine's entrance, our heroes were forced to fight their way in, thankful for the artificial atmosphere and gravity within the tunnels.

At first, the only opposition the team encountered consisted of a handful of Dusk warriors, who were dispatched easily enough.

The next wave of defense they met was led by Interrogator Chase, accompanied by murder-servitors and hefting a rocket launcher.

Screaming, she fills the hall with death, killing her own men in her attempt to eliminate the heroes.
Athena ducked, dodged, dashed, burned a fate point, and proclaimed,

>My turn.

At which point she filled the hall with maxed-out flames.

Thread is archived at http://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/archive/16607700/.

>>16609471
I'd say thanks, except that you misspelled Titus' name.

>>16609461
When the smoke clears, Chase is gone, but bits of her hair and skin have been left behind on the floor hatch she apparently disappeared into, following a hidden service crawlspace.

The team tries to follow, but by the time they get to a full-size tunnel, Chase is gone. From around a corner, they hear a couple of Duskers, who they take out without any real effort.

The simple-minded ferals were apparently guarding a prisoner, a tech-priest in a cell. Half-mad, the admech begs to be released, calling Tyrannus a lunatic and a monster, and says he was forced to do terrible things.

While Trempan hacks the electric cell lock, Laz follows Thrombis, who's tracking Chase's scent. He pokes his steel nose at the rubble of a caved-in hallway.

>>16609525
Damnit, I did say 'Tidus'. Sorry about that!

>>16609525
Titus does his best to comfort the tech-priest -which isn't much- while Trempan rigs up Thrombis to his data slate. This way, they'll be able to see what the cyber-mastiff sees.

The dog inches his way between chunks of concrete and stone, barely able to fit through the narrow space.

>How could she have fit through there?

Someone wondered.

Finally, light appeared on the data-slate.

Thrombis pushed his way into a clear hallway-

-and up against the barrel of a gun.

Without a word, Chase smirked and pulled the trigger.

And the data-slate went blank.

>>16609572
The rage of Lazarus Black is a fearsome thing.
Dropping the slate, he charged the rubble, roaring,

>THROOOOMBIIIIIIIS!

He grabbed a boulder with both hands, and was shocked to find he pulled it away with ease.
Kicking another, he discovered that what appeared to be rubble was, in fact, weighted styrofoam.

Even more furious now at the deception, he pushed his way through, aided by Athena and Trempan, while Titus -weedy, and lacking in upper-body strength- kept an eye on the tech-priest.

>>16609593
By the time they reached the far end of the hallway, Chase was gone... and the despoiled remains of Thrombis lay on the floor.

Trempan began attempting to hack the locked door, plugging himself into the MIU for efficiency.

Athena and Titus, both unschooled in the arts of consolation, watched awkwardly as Laz knelt over his mastiff.

Then they heard the beeping.

>>16609612
The explosion of green gas from the device left behind in Thrombis' crushed skull caught the acolytes by surprise, and Athena took a faceful before anyone knew what was happening.
Laz and Titus got their masks on, and looked to Trempan...
...who stood paralyzed and foaming at the mouth, his arm vibrating slightly where he was attached to the door.

Lazarus was next, feeling a pinch in his neck, and looking over to see the grinning tech-priest holding a needle pistol.

>>16609622
The last man standing, Titus drew a laspistol, and managed to plant a round in the priest's head as he charged, then felt something tap his ankle.

Looking down, he saw that with the priest's last breath, he'd managed to stick one last needle through the thin material of the sniper's suit.

>Son of a...

>>16609633
The acolytes awoke strapped to metal slabs in a laboratory, Trempan still unconscious next to them. Various tubes and wires were hooked up to their heads and bodies.

>Awake! Now!

Lazarus spied the shadowy figure in the viewing window above them.

>Integrus, or Ledevout?

The lunatic screeches that with his brother Integrus dead, he's now both brothers.

>So much potential! Let's see what we can do with you!

Cackling madly, he throws a switch, and the heroes collectively black out again.

>>16609648
Now, for what happened next, each player received a private note detailing what they saw as the chemicals and electricity warped their minds and bodies and unlocked their hidden potential.
Although they take place simultaneously, I'm going to post them sequentially for you.
(Remember, each player only saw his own experience.)

You hear screaming, and you realize it is your own. The agony is indescribable. It feels like your eyes may burst from your skull. Though you cannot see, you feel the walls closing in on you. Through your mind flash the faces of the people you've killed. They come closer, and closer. Your eyes burn, but you chant the prayers taught to you at the officio assassinorum. The temple oaths of loyalty and duty comfort you, and you shut out all sensory input, as you were taught to do in order to focus. The pain is intense, but you survive, though your eyes still feel strange and new.

>>16609653
You hear screaming, and you realize it is your own. The agony is like nothing you've ever felt before, a pressure within your skull, mounting and rising, as if you will burst. You chant the hymns, the sacred oaths you've known by rote since childhood, with every ounce of devotion you can muster, and through the haze of pain you see a golden light. You feel yourself pressing against a wall, an old pain, perhaps it was always there.
The light calls to you, and there is a face on the other side, lost in the glare... you think it could be your father. You push, and the agony becomes greater, the light blinding, but

finally

you

break

through.

The light is warm, comforting, and your screaming slows as the pressure disappears. It was not your father, not in that sense. The face comes closer, smiling proudly, and you recognize it immediately from a thousand thousand icons and paintings.
You come close to him, and though he is the size of all that ever has been, he is at once a man, glorious and perfect. He whispers to you, in words you do not understand, but the tone is clear. You have done well.

>>16609653

You hear screaming, and you realize it is your own. You feel air rushing around you, as if you're moving through a tunnel, and you see a bright white light ahead of you. You recall the sacred law of the Lex Imperia, the will of the Emperor in the word of man. You feel weight in your hands, familiar and comfortable. The light seems to take shapes, of gunfights and lonely nights, surrounded by cold steel and death. A name is whispered in your ear, repeated over and over, and you repeat the coda of the Adeptus Arbites to fight away the whispers.
Memories once lost begin to surface, as if from behind a wall, You remember running the streets at night, clad in nothing but what you could steal. You remember forgotten friends and adventures, and you remember the battle that nearly killed you. Betrayed by one you thought of as brother, you felt your mind slipping away, the damned hell the priests had always promised taking its place. You remember opening fire on friend and foe alike, wounding your friend as he slipped away, clutching his head, blood and greasy white hair sticking between his fingers, and you remember killing two members of the Adeptus Arbites. You see their faces, broken and bruised by your own hands, cursing not you but each other with their final breaths. "Coin!" one shouts before your bullets silence him forever. "Black," whispers the other one as the life bleeds from his chest. The whispers in your ear become louder.
Victus Masters
Victus Masters
VICTUS MASTERS
You remember stumbling, half-dead and half-mad, into an elevator, and collapsing into a pile of bodies you helped create. You cannot remember how long you slumbered, but as memories slowly surface over time, as you somehow know they will continue to do, you swear upon the Lex Imperia that this changes nothing. You are an Arbite.

>>16609653
Although they don't consciously know it yet, when they awaken, the acolytes' natural abilities have been magnified. The power of faith, the far sight and focus, the handiness with a pair of pistols.

Trempan awakens before the rest, and they see a wire reaching from his shoulder into the machine they're all connected to.

He screams in agony, but their locks snap open.

>>16609707
While Ledevout screeches for security, the team help the exhausted, injured Trempan to his feet, and find and gather their equipment.

Escaping through the air vents, the team spies rooms with numerous more Dusk natives, rooms filled with promethium tanks, and rooms filled with a psychoactive chemical they've encountered before, known as forcasia.

>>16609664
>>16609671
>>16609684

glorious

>>16609729
Still unclear as to the rogue inquisitor's ultimate goal, they double back through the vents, and find their way into Ledevout's office.

After a bit of lethal interrogation, the team obtains schematics for the full complex, along with the fastest route to the chapel where Tyrannus has set up shop: near the world's core.

>>16609766
The fastest route, apparently, takes the team through a long cylindrical chamber, the purpose of which is revealed when they step inside and find that gravity need not apply within this room.

From the far end emerge a group of murder servitors, though something is different about these.
It's only when they get close that the heroes realize the human halves of the abominations have been possessed by daemons.

>>16609783
The fight is difficult, but far easier than it has any right to be. Athena's examination reveals that the "daemonhosts" only contain a fraction of a daemon's power, hence their relative weakness compared to a true abomination.

A crowing laugh comes from behind them, and the team turns to see Chase, hunched over under her cloak, holding Trempan in front of her, with a knife to his throat.

He manages to croak out the words,

>I'm sorry.

The team commands Chase to release him, and she apparently obeys, shoving him off into the zero-grav...

...before firing a laspistol right into his back.

>>16609818
Chase sounds like she might cough up a lung from the effort, but manages another maniacal laugh as the doors close between her and the heroes.

>I take the shot.

Titus, you're in zero gravity, over 100 meters away, and the doors are already closing.

>I take the shot.

That's... that's a two.

The bullet enters chase right between her cackling lips, silencing her forever.

>>16609859
Grabbing Trempan and rushing him to the "exit" end of the chamber, Lazarus lays him out on a platform while Athena tries some rudimentary faith-aided first aid.
Trempan tries to speak.

>Black...

Laz grimaces, and replies,

>You know that's not true.

>Does it matter?

>I guess not.


Trempan slips away, but the group breathes a collective sigh of relief when they realize he's simply unconscious, and Athena declares him stable.

Unable to really carry him with them, the acolytes are forced to leave him behind, and simply hope for the best.

(We're coming up to the climax, and I'm typing as fast as I can. How many readers do we still have?)

>>16609884
many

>>16609884

Half the fucking board, at least.

Keep going.

>>16609884
The chapel is huge and circular, with stained-glass panels for ceiling and floor. After a quick examination, the heroes discover to their surprise that the altar has not, in fact, been desecrated or damaged in the slightest.

Hearing noise from below, they peek through the glass, doing their best to avoid being seen.
A man with the accent of a Dusk native says that the prisoner is complaining about the gruel, and wants to know if there's any grilled grox available.

>And you brought this question to me? Are you so feeble-minded that you cannot see I am on the brink of victory? That soon, my armies will bring humanity to the greatest heights of glory? I am trying to save the galaxy, simpleton! I didn't expect an inquisition!

As if you needed to be told, our brave heroes smashed through the stained glass, landing in front of Tyrannus.

>NOBODY EXPECTS THE INQUISITION!

still here

>>16609927
This chapel is similar to the one above, but the pews and altar have been removed. Instead, a setup of plasteel walls has been erected, dividing the room into eight unequally long hallways. At the end of one is Tyrannus, hooked up to various wires and tubes, seated behind a force shield.

Opposite him is Carkass, kneeling and shackled, with a similar hookup. An IV of forcasia is set up, flowing into his neck to stimulate his psychic abilities.
At the ends of the other six hallways are what appear to be generators.

>>16609951
Safe behind his force shield, Tyrannus calls for guards, and monologues to his former acolytes as they mow down dozens of Dusk's greatest warriors.

He describes his ultimate army, one which can send one soldier where the Imperial Guard would need send a regiment. One which would never tire or show cowardice.
One which would turn the power of the Great Enemy against itself!

He gestures at the floor, and looking down, the team sees a room filled with metal slabs, an unconscious murder-servitor on each.

The slabs were attached to a massive machine apparently built around a huge, ornate force spear.

It may or may not be obvious to you yet, but this was the point where Sister Athena pieced it all together.
One daemon, channeled through a stimulated psyker, and split among the bodies of dozens of enhanced human beings, creating a safe, controllable, and immensely powerful army.

>>16609980
Realizing that Tyrannus has gone too far down the path of the delusional radical to ever turn back now, the heroes do what they do best: Blow shit up.

A few well-placed grenades take out the generators, and a sustained blast of Athena's flamer grills a small hill of soldiers.

Cutting a hole in the stained glass, Laz takes three krak grenades from his belt, hooks them together, and drops them onto the spear-machine.

>FIRE IN THE HOLE!

>>16609980
Safe and controllable.
Chaos.

>>16609980
The room below detonates, and the team leaps with precision timing (read: wild guesswork) to ride the shockwave and shattering glass. Draped around Laz's neck, Carkass, whispers an attempt at humor, but he's barely breathing.

The landings among the rubble and charred corpses are about as smooth as could be expected, until the agents of the throne look up and see Tyrannus, still dangling from the wires.

>>16610018
Tyrannus, realizing what's happening, attempts to pray for protection, but he's clearly losing control. Some phrases spew from his mouth in a monstrous growl, and his face begins to twist from his once-noble visage.

>Emperor guide my hand...
>AS FEEBLY AS YOU SHINE IN THE WARP

>Emperor protect my soul...
>AS YOU FAILED TO PROTECT YOURSELF

>Emperor...ooahgh... Emperor, forgive my sins...
>AS I SHALL SIN FOREVERMORE

>>16610039
There's a blinding flash of light as the possession is complete, and a true unbound daemonhost, fueled by massive amounts of psychoactive chemicals in the area, descends from above.
The jagged teeth, sharklike eyes, rippling muscles, and broken, bloody wings on the twenty-five-foot-tall form leave no doubt as to which familiar beast Tyrannus thought he could bind to his will.

Lazarus lights a lho stick, knowing it may be his last.

>Hello, Rashuael.

>>16610058
The mere sight of the unbound daemon is enough to mark those not possessed of superhuman faith. Titus feels his face burning as the flesh melts and distorts, and a million million microscopic cuts break out across Laz's body.

Then it raises a wall of fire around the party, and suddenly they're trapped with the daemon.

>>16610073
> Titus feels his face burning as the flesh melts and distorts, and a million million microscopic cuts break out across Laz's body.

So basically if they survive the encounter they won't survive the Inquisition.

>>16610073
The first round of combat is a wash, our heroes' attacks unable to pierce its natural daemonic toughness.

Then, Lazarus has an idea, and taking careful aim, fires straight up at the same spot where Titus' magic bullet pierced Rashuael's flesh back on Dusk.

Somehow, this works, and the flesh around the wound begins to rot away like a dying gourd.

>>16610093
Enraged, Rashuael sweeps the party up into the air, gravity apparently once again nullified, and sets them into an orbit around himself, so they won't be able to take careful aim anymore.

Titus responds by shooting an incendiary round into a critical hit on the daemon's skull.

The next round, Rashuael summons a half dozen demons, bloated bags of fire, and as he consumes one the rot around his wound seems to shrink.

>>16610107
The battle wears on, and the heroes are barely breathing. Lazarus, feeling confident, delays a turn so he can take two consecutively.

He fires a pistol at one of the smaller daemons, popping it like a fire-filled balloon, the recoil launching him upwards.

>THAT WAS FOR ALAYA!

He fires with his other hand, this time popping a second little daemon, and watching as it was engulfed in its own flame. This shot gives him an angle to his movement.

>THAT WAS FOR ANTON!

>>16610135
The third shot pops the last little horror, and is accompanied by the cry,

>THAT WAS FOR COIN!

The recoil of the third shot propelled him straight up to Rashuael's chest.
Dropping his pistols, Lazarus drew his customized shotgun, shoved the barrel halfway into the daemon's rotting wound, and proclaimed, loud enough for the Emperor on Terra to hear it clearly,

>AND THIS IS FOR MY DOG!


The shot rang out just as clearly, with no less than a TRIPLE righteous fury roll, maximizing bonus damage even beyond the insane amount necessary.

And Rashuael fell.

>>16610161
Ok seriously, are you guys cheating with the rolls?

This is like being there for the Grendel thread. Unfortunately I can't draw.

>>16610172
No need. The dice gods simply heard what Lazarus said, sat back, and went "Damn."

>>16610161
As the daemonic energy departed, the corpse shrank, until beneath the gore, mutilation, and mutation, one might have been able to recognize something of Tyrannus deep, deep beneath.

Athena and Titus simply watched in awe as Laz lit up another lho.

>>16610161
And then the Grey Knights come in with vials of SoB blood, finish off the daemon, kill the PCs, wipe all knowledge of the event and write it down as a great victory for the chapter.

>>16610200
After going back for Trempan, the team signaled their cruiser for pickup. With Trempan over Athena's shoulder, and Carkass over Laz's, our heroes returned to Scintilla for debriefing and epilogue.

Carkass vouched for them loudly and proudly, defending them from claims that they had flown too close to the fire.
He did, however, reveal to Sister Athena that what she thought was a new form of faith-based power was, in fact, her latent psychic ability come to light.
Though she would have to board a black ship now, he promised her that should she survive, he would be honored to train her in the future.

Athena decided to view the free trip to Holy Terra as a gift with a small price.

>>16610208
exterminatused the planet

>>16610223
Titus was offered initiation into the Officio Assassinorium, to begin training as a Vindicare assassin.
They had to first promise him that the machine spirit of his current rifle could be safely transported to his new Exitus before he would accept.

>>16610233
And Lazarus Black, or Victus Masters, or whatever name he might choose for himself, was asked to stay with Carkass, for seasoning, before beginning official training as an Interrogator.

A decade or more down the line, who knows what cataclysmic events might conspire to draw these three together again?

For now, though, their tale is at an end.

And after three long years of battle, Lazarus Black, Titus, and Sister Athena, may finally rest.

Thanks for reading.

1: Go to http://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/archive.html

2: Ctrl-F "Dark Heresy Storytime"

3: Upvote both threads

4: Applaud OP

>>16610268
Huzzah! For the Emperor! And all that Jazz!

I think this is a close to good end as I've ever heard about from a DH game.

>>16610268
Thank YOU, storyteller.

OP here, with one final mention.

Today is Laz's player's birthday.

He's in the process of writing up his own final mission report, in character, with quill on parchment. (Just thought you should know that.)

As a real birthday gift, won't someone illustrate his crowning moment of glory?

Tonight's top story: OP Delivers!

For the love of God and America, keep gaming!

>And this is for my dog!