Untouchable

9: Return

They return to base emptyhanded weeks later. The mood among the guardsmen is, as Lynch predicted, poor. Even though most never entered the only cave system where there was anything worth inspecting word has gotten around. It is a little bit past midday when they land, tired, hungry, filthy. Lynch is expected in the meeting room, the colonel requesting an update, so they waste no time.

The double doors close with her on one side, Lynch on the other. The hours drag on as command combs through what little information they could bring back inside the meeting room. Holly does the same in the hallway outside, stomach growling.

What they found paints a cheerless picture. Four dozen children or thereabout, six noticeably pregnant women, one man with a heavily curved back and twisted leg. The weak and vulnerable. All dead now. The caches were stolen food, medicine, weapons, blankets. Mostly food. The traitorous guardswoman may have been stealing provisions because she had learned children were starving, not because she had thrown her lot in with Chaos.

And yet. The locals were extracted. Those that remained were officially classified as the enemy months ago. The guardswoman knew that. Providing the enemy with food carries with it the punishment of death by starvation, according to Jarvis. The guardswoman knew that too.

And yet. The locals that remain seem to be in possession of visible mutations almost one and all. This could give them reason to fear that extraction might not be their salvation. The condemnation of all that remain would then brand even the innocent merely trying to survive as the enemy.

And yet. When they were given a second chance, they responded with throwing a frag grenade. The act of a single individual, perhaps, but none in the room voiced a willingness to accept the generous offer. But then again, they were children, probably told that the guardsmen would only harm them.

No guardsman had shown them how to use the grenade though. To Holly, that suggests the use of drop-points rather than interactions. Understandable, considering the distance to region 27G. There might be underground tunnels, a system that connects some of the mines to allow the unseen transportation of goods. There was recorded activity on the surface, so it is unlikely that they missed such a tunnel during their search of the cave system. Between the river and the terrain, few ground vehicles could have made it from camp to 27G on its own. Part of the way, yes, a tunnel system after that, possibly. That, or they should take a closer look at the navy.

The thought unsettles her. If the navy is compromised, that can leave them isolated, left to starve and freeze to death, regardless of any further daemonic activity. If confronted, they might attack the base from a comfortable distance. There is barely any anti-air equipment on Eden 39 that she is aware of. The known enemy is underground for the most part, occasionally crawling along the ground. There is no need for it.

Perhaps she is jumping to conclusions. Suspicion and paranoia are the illegitimate children of Ordo Hereticus, according to the inquisitor. Holly has seen no evidence that the navy has been anything but exemplary. Lynch is pleased with them. They have accepted the no doubt subpar local transportation aircrafts and made do.

Who oversees the usage of the aircrafts? The navy or the guard? Who logs the coming and goings of them? Would Lynch be able to get access to those records? If she asked him, would he tell her?

As she stands and watches the polished double doors she wishes, not for the first time, that she could just inform them of her affiliations. Demand the information she wants. Act the Interrogator, rather than the trusted Acolyte. Take an active role in uprooting the corruption that evidently has made its way into the local Imperial Guard.

Untouchables don't become Interrogators, certainly not inquisitors in their own right. She knows that. Who can trust an untouchable with such power? And at any rate, she lacks the necessary social skills, struggles to read expressions, interpret tones. It would be a poor Interrogator who needed to consult their retinue to understand if their target were being disingenuous. If a hand on someone's back was inappropriate.