by Jak Snide » Mon Apr 04, 2011 8:40 am
Mithras looked around the tattered remains of the tent as Gunner and Mikolas hefted the heretic off the ground, scooping up a fractured and blood-stained data-slate lying next to an overturned table. Cryvus, noting a lack of dark and foreboding tomes, ran to a nearby servitor and tried to goad it up the stairs. It complied, no longer possessing a will or thoughts of its own. The chamber shuddered and the acolytes began to feel a pressure behind their eyes. They ran, throw the straining doorway and up the stairs with their captive and evidence. The sorcery gave way a moment later with an ear-splitting crack, the laws of the natural universe reasserting themselves. Any who looked back would see that the chamber was little more than storeroom now; one overflowing with splintered wood, stonework frozen mid-flow and dozens broken corpses embedded in the fusion of matter. Whatever had been left behind in there was gone.
The chapel was as they had left it, the confrontation with Theodosia only having taking a few minutes. There was a commotion outside, the local arbites having arrived in force only to be blocked by Inquisitorial authority. The stormtrooper-medicae began to tend to the acolytes wounds. Julius and the others made sure Theodosia was restrained, taking mono-blades to his augmetic limbs to ensure he wouldn't escape. A search of the rest of the chapel proved fruitless; any incriminating or illuminating evidence had perished with the drug factory, though its loss was by no means catastrophic. They had a prisoner, most likely a major player in the operation and one who would reveal much given the proper encouragement. The trail may have gone cold here but, with any luck, whoever commanded Theodosia would be found eventually.
As Cryvus inspected the servitor he'd recovered he realised that they had also fulfilled another objective; though she'd been mangled and augmented the servitor still bore the face of Saia Strophes. How Laurent and Julia would react to her fate was not something he looked forward to.
---
It turned out that they didn't have a chance to deliver the bad new to the Strophes. Inquisitor Skane summoned them back to orbit upon receiving news of their success, the [i]Verdant Glory[/] being just as they remembered it. Theodosia was secreted away, the skeletal figure of Interrogator Sand appearing as if by miracle now that there was a prisoner to question. Skane didn't keep the acolytes for long, dismissing them after they'd given her a brief account of what had transpired in Ambulon. They were told to get some rest, have their wounds seen to and, of course, prepare the detailed reports that the Inquisitor seemed to love so much. It was clear that the mission had come to its conclusion, however, and for the first time in nearly a week the acolytes could begin to relax.
(Sorry it took me so long to get around to this post. A number of things have kept me distracted but, at long last, we've come to the end. Post your final posts, whatever that may be. Emphasising specific things in your report, musing over the mission, bothering the others or just crashing into bed are all acceptable. When you're done I'll dish out XP, write up the final post and figure out what to do next, if anything at all. Direct your attention to the OOC thread.)