Page 528
Medical side of the imperium.My particular discipline is that of materia medica, for human medicine was my original calling. Our understanding of our own vital mechanisms is vast and admirable, but we can never know too much about our own biology and how to protect, repair and improve it. It is our burden as a species to exist in a galaxy riven by war, and where war goes, so flourish its hand-servants injury and disease. It may be said that as each war front advances, so medical knowledge advances too. And where armies fall back in defeat or are destroyed, so medical knowledge retreats or is forgotten. Such are the lapses I seek to redress.
Page 528
Interesting becuae the implicaiton here is of some fairly constant and rapid contact amongst worlds of the sector for disease to spread. Worlds cna't be quite so isolated inside a sector as often implied.By the third month, Uhlren's Pox had also broken out (apparently miraculously and spontaneously, given its unknown process of dispersal) on Genovingia Minor, Lorches and Adamanaxer Delta. Four separate centres of infection, right along the leading edge of the Imperial advance through the sector. At that point, the contagion had spread to the civilian population of Genovingia itself, and the Administratum had issued a Proclamation of Pandemic. It was said the skies above the cities of that mighty world were black with carrion flies and the stench of biological pollution permeated every last acre of the planet.
I had a bureaucratic posting on Lorches at that time, and became part of the emergency body charged with researching a solution.
Page 529
hive city of some kind?And I, I was sent to Symbal Iota.
Symbal Iota, where it is not covered in oceans that are the most profound mauve in colour (a consequence, so I understand, of algae growth), is a hot, verdant place. Rainforest islands ring the equatorial region in a wide belt.
I made 'fall at Symbalopolis, a flat-topped volcanic outcrop around whose slopes hive structures cluster like barnacles, and there transferred to a trimaran which conveyed me, over a period of five days, down the length of the local island group to Saint Bastian.
Page 530 -
It takes an Imperial Navy Frigate ten days to cross the warp between two systems. Evidence leands more towards inter-sector travel, which means less than 200 LY but at least 10-15 LY. Call it 300-500c and 7,300c.It had taken ten days to cross the empyrean from Lorches to Symbal lota aboard a navy frigate. Now it took half that time again to cross a distance infinitesimally smaller.
Page 531
hospice has a "psychic choir"I looked up from my devotions to find the sisters gone. I could feel the subliminal chorus of a psychic choir mind-singing nearby. The cool air pulsed.
Page 532
- here we receive mention of an Insane Asylum for the "brave warriors of the Emperor" - the IG in other words. Amusingly is that in the Cain novels such places are also noted as prime sources for recruitment into making of servitors.had understood, from my research, that the Hospice of Saint Bastian was home to a holy order who offered sanctuary and comfort for those brave warriors of the Emperor's legions who were too gravely wounded or disabled by war to continue in service. I knew the place took in the damaged and the lost from warzones all across the sector. But I truly had no notion that the damage they specialised in was wounds to the psyche and sanity! It was a hospice for the deranged, individuals who presented themselves at its gates voluntarily in hope of redemption.
Page 534
ambulatory ear trumpet. How gothic.Another man now spoke. He was older than all, crooked and half-blind, his wrinkled pate dotted with liver spots. A flared ear-trumpet clung to the robes of his left shoulder with delicate mechanical legs.
Page 536
40,000 man regiment(S) plural, but 20,000 armor/and troops.Forty thousand Lammark Lancers, virtually the full strength of the Lammark regiments. Twenty thousand Fancho armour men and their machines, and a full company of Astartes, the Doom Eagles, shining grey and red.
Page 536
- in cold conditions, ice can get inside lasguns and "dull their chages" - presumably it will sap power from the powerpacks.It was as cold as a bastard. We had winter dress, thick white flak coats with fur hoods, but the ice got in the lasguns and dulled their charges and the damned Fancho tanks were forever refusing to start. It was day, too.
Page 537
50:1 kill ratio between AStartes:Guard.We were besieged for five months, despite six attempts by the Doom Eagles to break the deadlock. Faith, but they were terrifying! Giants, clashing their bolters together before each fight, screaming at the foe, killing fifty for every one we picked off.
Page 537
Asartes dies of Uhren's pox. Evidence suggests it was not a natural disease, as it was hinted as being associated iwth a Plague daemon of nurgle.On the tenth day, a Doom Eagle fell victim. In his torment, blood gouting from his visor grilles, he slew two of his comrades and nineteen of my men. The disease had overcome even the Astartes purity seals.
purity seals were expected to provide protection.
Page 538
Also released a lunatic. Dangers in naming a daemon it seems, or at least the powerful ones.With great reluctance, he spoke it. It wasn't a word at all. It was an obscene gurgle dignified by consonants. The glyph-name of the plague-daemon itself, one of the ninety-seven Blasphemies that May Not Be Written Down. At its utterance, I fell back off my stool, nausea writhing in my belly and throat. Kalibane shrieked. The sister collapsed in a faint and the novitiate fled. Baptrice took four steps back from the doorway, turned, and vomited spectacularly.
The temperature in the corridor dropped by fifteen degrees.
Unsteady, I attempted to straighten my overturned stool and pick up the artificer that the novitiate had knocked over. Where it had recorded the word, I saw, the machine's parchment tape had begun to smoulder.
Screaming and wailing echoed down the hall from various cells.
Page 539
Gorilla servitor to the rescue! This servitor seems alot m ore aware/intelligent than some. I ownder if the difference between sane/living and dead components is a factor.Then Kalibane, bless his brave heart, flew at him. My devoted servitor rose up on his stunted hind limbs, the bionics augmenting his vast forelimbs throwing them up in a warning display. From splayed foot to reaching hand, Kalibane was eleven feet tall. He peeled back his lips and screeched through bared steel canines.
Froth dribbling from his tusked mouth, Ioq smashed Kalibane aside. My servitor made a considerable dent in the wall.
Page 539
Staff tazer. Even medical staff can be armed in the imperium.I swept my staff of office around and thumbed the recessed switch below the head.
Electric crackles blasted from the staffs tip. Ioq convulsed and fell. Twitching, he lay on the floorboards, and evacuated involuntarily. Baptrice was on his feet now. Alarms were ringing and novitiates were rushing frantically into the corridor with harness jackets and clench poles.
Page 541
results of the plague.They said Warmaster Gatus incinerated the enemy from orbit, and ships were sent to relieve you at Pirody Polar. They expressed horror at the extent of the plague-loss. Fifty-nine thousand men dead. No count was made of the civilian losses. They said that by the time the relief ships arrived, the Torment had been expunged. Four hundred men were evacuated. Of them, only one hundred and ninety-one are still alive according to the records.
PAge 541
- Astartes apochecary (Doom Eagles chapter) stated to be a "Head and a half taller" than a Guardsman.He was huge being, of course... Astartes, a head and a half taller than me, wearing a cowled red robe over his Doom Eagles armour. He lifted specimen bottles from his narthecium, and held them up to the ever-present light.
page 543
A Chaos disease in other words.I went cold. Colder than I'd ever been before. The idea was monstrous. The Torment had been more than a waster of lives, it had been sentient, alive, deliberate... planning and moving through the instrument it had corrupted.
Page 544
Chaos biowarfare.My work assisted in that. The blood-froth was like the Torment, engineered by the Archenemy, just as sentient. Fifty-two medical officers, sources just like Valis, were executed and incinerated.
Page 544
suspensor chair for a veteran/insane guardsman.Limbless, wizened like a seed-case, he hung in a suspensor chair, kept alive by intravenous drains and sterile sprays.
Page 545
mechanical opticsHe straightens up, stretching his sore back. Removing the manipulators, he lays them down on the workbench and raises the optical enhancers from in front of his eyes. Balancing them on his forehead, he rubs his tired eyes with his fingers. He's worked with mechanical optics all his life, yet has steadfastly refused bio-implants of his own, maintaining that the optics he was born with would see him to the grave.
Page 546
the opticals above have 100x magnification.He turns back to the workbench, flipping the opticals back down in front of his eyes. The component swings back into view, large as a fist. He picks up the manipulators.
A crash, as something falls behind him.
He spins round, and something fills his vision, the opticals fighting to make sense of the image, magnified hundreds of times.
Page 546
Yes, a legitimate mention of technobabble in 40k. *sigh*. heavily augmented pilot and cogitators speak at rate of 30-35 words a minute at least, assuming 2000 is several thousand At 3000 its 50 words a second.Inquisitor Anselm watched the red crosshairs of the nav-comm playing across the face of the pilot as he straggled to keep the shuttle on its computer-assisted course. The pilot's right hand was jacked into the shuttle's controls and his bio-eye scanned the clouds for the first lights of the landing bay. Technobabble issued from the cabin speakers as the cogitators spoke to the pilot at a rate of several thousand words mixed with binary codes a minute.
Page 547
body comforming seat.The shuttle docked, and the pilot unplugged himself from the console, pale from the concentration needed for their landing. Anselm unbuckled himself, and felt his seat relax, its shape melting away from his body.
Page 550
Some planets are very safe it seems. So mcuh for the "Galaxy is full of war" meme."Eremet, do you have weapons here?"
"No - this site has been active for years and we've never had any problems with hostiles. It's away from the main trade routes, we have no trouble from pirates or xenomorphs. The Imperial zoologians who surveyed the planet found no indigenous life that posed a threat, and the planet itself has a green security rating."
Page 552
Rock "hard as adamntium" if taken literally. Able to withstand hundreds of drill bit.. though we dont know anything more than that.We had to excavate heavily in order to get past it, as sensors indicated that the city continued for some way beyond it. Took some doing, I can tell you. This rock's hard as adamantium. Wore away hundreds of drillbits, but in the end... Ah, here we are. As you can see, what we found was well worth the effort.
Page 554
Suspensor trolly.Anselm, his mind already on the work ahead, guided the trolley as its internal suspensors moved it forwards.
Page 557
- unknown entity (later dameonic in nature implied) humanoid shape, as "fast as a Tyranid."
Page 560-561
Exterminatus to handle a chaos threat."I'm ordering immediate evacuation of Barathrum and requesting back up from an Astartes kill-team. I want Terminator squads to scour this place and if they find nothing I will be recommending full Exterminatus.
Barathrum is a threat to the Imperium. The Imperium is a city built behind high walls and these frontier systems are the unknown beyond. It is our job to defend those walls and what shelters behind them, whatever the cost. If there is the influence of Chaos at work here, then I will stamp it out. It is unfortunate but necessary - I will be demanding that the explorator mission here be relieved of its duties and subjected to rigorous review."
Page 561
A rather compassionate and reasonable inquistor, by Inquisitorial standards."I did not show weakness, Grogan, as you well know. It is not weakness to show restraint. What you did on Tantalus was unprecedented and unnecessary. To destroy a planet because of an insurrection that was limited to one city was arrogant, and typical of your approach."
Page 561
- Here it is heavily implied that Inquisitors will, when circumstances warrant it,. engage in diplomacy or negotiation with rebels/heretics, or possibly even aliens. This shoudl not be surprising. The Inquistiion, for all its fanatical elements, has always been rather pragmatic. They will deal with aliens (eldar or Tau) if the situation warrants it, they will even deal with daemons if important enough (Horst in Shadow Point, or, of course, Eisenhorn.) Dealing with heretics probably isn't surprising in the least. Sometimes the Inquisition will employ Daemons, heretics or aliens. (A Kroot has been an Inquisitorial agent, for example, and there is of course Cherubael.)"Tantalus was under your jurisdiction. The insurrection should have been crushed. Instantly. Diplomacy is only useful after force has driven the other side to the table. Alone, it is a tool for the weak, for effete
Imperial ambassadors. The Inquisition is not a tool, it is a force in itself. As I'm sure you remember."
Of course, teh Inquisition also likes to make its own rules. It will negotiate with, but it won't neccesarily double cross (or plan to double cross) its enemy somewhere along the line either. Or keep its promises, if such should be detrimental to the Imperium itself.
Page 563
- its worrth noting here that the Ecclesiarchy plays a role for the Inquisition in translating languages (a dead language.) This is probably through one fo those branches of the ADeptus Sororitas used for translators or some such. It is interesting though, as this gives the Ecclesiarchy some measure of power and control over information - since they are the ones doing the translation, any information they receive would naturally (or coudl be) filtered through them. Similar to the technical dependence on the AdMech, really."A transmission has arrived from the Ecclesiarchy with the translation of the hieroglyphs."
Anselm opened the door cautiously.
"Come in. What does it say?' Eremet came in, looking behind him before he closed the door. Silently, he handed a dataslate over to Anselm.
The transmission was coded and bears the highest seal of your Ordo. I cannot read it."
...
"Inquisitor Anselm, this transcription is for your eyes only. What it contains is reserved for the highest level of the Ordo and the Ecclesiarchy. The information cannot be revealed to any outside our order."
Of course, a page later its also noted that the Ecclesiarchy also apparently sent Inquistiors out, which is not supposed to be the case. (Maybe they meant "witchhunters", which are kind of like inquisitors but not the same organization.)
Page 564
Doors of promethium. Either meant to represent fire, or somehow you can make solid promethium."Amaril knew that Szarach'il could not be killed, nor banished by his powers, diminished as they were by the months of battle. Instead, in a final act that destroyed his mortal body, he bound Szarach'il behind great doors of prome-thium, sealing them with words of great power such that he should never be released."
Page 567
- Hellgun that fires bullets/shells. They showed up in toher novels, like the Elucidium short story.The gun recoiled, there was a flash of light and he saw the shell hurtle towards Cantor. Before it could impact, there was a shimmer in the air as if the very fabric of reality had turned to glue. The bullet slowed, stopped, then clattered to the floor, inert. Then the handle of the hellgun jumped in his hand.
PAge 569
Again hellgun firing shells.His hellgun, lying unnoticed against the wall, flew into his hand. He raised it, towards Anselm... men slowly, shakily, upwards until it pointed towards the ceiling.
"Get.... out!" Grogan croaked and pulled the trigger. The shell flew upwards and hit the ceiling. There was a moment of awful silence and then a tremendous roar. The ceiling shattered above the daemon and an instant later, a cascade of molten lava fell, obliterating Grogan in a waterfall of glowing heat.
Page 572
Ecclesiarchy priest ministering to mutants. I rather lik ethat Yakov despite being proud, actually seems to care about their wellbeing, at least for the children despite their looks. (This is of course a Gav Thorpe short story, so this is made of total awesome.)Yakov looked at the boy. His shrivelled right arm and leg gave his otherwise perfectly human body a lopsided look. It was the children that always affected him the most, ever cheerful despite the bleakness of their future, the ghastliness of their surroundings. If all the Emperor's faithful
had the same indomitable spirit, He and mankind would have overcome all evil and adversity millennia ago. Their crippled, mutated bodies may be vile, he thought to himself, but their souls were as human as any.
Page 576
Karis Cephalon. Setting for much of Gav Thorpe's Inquisitor RPG and countless related subplots and short stories - some by him some by other authors.Every one of Karis Cephalon's ruling class could afford to lose a thousand slaves, but medical supplies, bought at great expense from off-world, could cost them half a year's profits.
Page 590
Thius is from a las-pistol wielded by an inquisitorial agent. If it literally vaporizes half the face, it might vaporize 1/4 to half the head.. 1-2 MJ maybe. On the toher hand it might be simply meaning "exploding" part of the head, which could be single double digit KJ (laser death ray page) or possibly triple digit (since the skull has a fair bit of bone) Fits within the broad range of values regardless of how you interpret it, in any case.Yakov's first shot took a charging cultist in the chest, punching him off his feet. His second blew the kneecap off another, his third taking him in the forehead as he collapsed. The investigator's laspistols spat bolts of light into the cultists fleeing for the door, while the boom of Lathesia's heavy pistol echoed off the walls. As Yakov stepped into the room, one of the cultists pushed over a brazier and he jumped to his right to avoid the flaming coals. A las-bolt took the traitor in the eye, vaporising half his face.
Page 591
Custom virus acquired from the AdMech, that could custom attack mutants. Given the diversity of mutations, this means its some sort of biological (or mechanical) mini machine (nanowank?) or there is some common thread to such mutations that makes them targetable but not target humans.But he couldn't just have them culled; the entire economy of Karis Cephalon is based on mutant labour and no one would allow such a direct action to threaten their prosperity. So, he imported a virus which feeds on mutants. It's called Aether Mortandis and costs a lot of money to acquire from the Mechanicus.
Page 591
the strength of the barrier between chaos and realspace is highly variable, hence the importance of rituals and such, since alot of factors can evidently influence this."The reason the governor has acted now is because of a convergence of energies on Karis Cephalon,' the man told Yakov slowly. 'Mystical forces, astrological conjunctions are forming, with Karis Cephalon at its centre. For five years, the barrier between our world and the hell of Chaos will grow thinner and thinner. Entities will be able to break through, aliens will be drawn here, and death and disaster will plague this world on an unparalleled scale. It will be hell incarnate. If you wish, for your help today I can arrange a transfer to a parish on another world, get you way from here."
Page 593
One hour to cross a planetary system. Could be in a chaos held system, so may not represent normal acceleration (even if we shorten the distance).The Chariot of Lord Quillilil has been sighted entering our planetary system, my great and gracious lord.' the officer announced, once Ferag had impatiently signalled him to continue. "It will arrive within the hour."
Page 594
heh. soul sucking.His mouth was also changed. It could pucker into a long tube, half the length of his arm, with which to suck pure magical energy from the souls of others.
Page 594
- the star system has eight planets. five of which are inhabited.He was ruler of an entire planetary system within the Imperium of Chaos, called by outsiders the Eye of Terror. Five of the system's eight planets were inhabited. Several billion beings all lived in dread, in obedience, in utmost respect and adoration, of Ferag Lion-Wolf.
Page 595
- Chaos Champion uses magic "instantaneously" over a distance of "miles" (its in the air)And from the fingers of master magician Ferag Lion-Wolf there issued streams of raw magic, crossing the intervening miles instantaneously, sizzling, swaying, touching all three shark-craft and the dozen disc raiders.
Page 596
Neat trick.Ferag raised arm and tentacle and swept them through the air, making magical passes. There came an immense rumbling sound. The huge edifice all around them was coming apart. Towers, terraces, galleries, halls, all separated and began gyrating in the air, performing a gigantic dance. The landing bay on which they stood also took part in the display, whirling lazily through a cloud and back again.
Then, with meticulous precision, everything came together again. Stone block met stone block in silent harmony, mortared together as before. In seconds the palace had reassembled itself.
Page 598
Purple Stars Marines. Mentioned in more than one Barrington J Baylet story."I served the Purple Stars for the next twenty years, learning all their ways, going on their campaigns as a scout, as a messenger and in countless other roles. At the end of that time I was judged fit to be transformed into a Space Marine. I was given the extra organs, the progenoid glands, the sacred gene-seed. For two hundred years I served with the Purple Stars, and saw more action than I could hope to relate, eventually rising to the rank of company commander. I particularly distinguished myself in a raid on a tyranid hive ship"
Page 599
time dilation in EoT isn't constant."I could not begin to regale you with my adventures, or say how long I have lived. In the Eye of Terror a day is a thousand years, a thousand years is but a day, and time means nothing, until death comes."
Page 600
Interesting Nurglite tactics.As for the Nurgle horde... a vast, filthy Chaos daemon, a great unclean one, had been at its head, and he had come up with a special tactic. The millions-strong army had been rotted with amoeba plague. Its soldiery were no longer separate individuals, but combined into one sticky, putrid mass which came rolling on, engulfing everything in its path.
Page 604
Sameter described. Seems to be partly agri and partly industrial.Sameter is a dismal place, and its morose air matched our mood. A slovenly, declining agrochemical world in the heartlands of the Helican subsector, it had seen better days.
Page 604
hive stacks (Hab stacks) may possibly be kilometres long.The looming piles of the hive, the shelf-like stacks, each one kilometres wide, the bristling lights, the smog. Hive towers rose up, as vast and impassive as tombstones, etched with lit windows. Chimneys exhaled skeins of black smoke.
..
The lower airways buzzed with small fliers and ornithopters...
Page 606
Inquisitorial forensic examination can identify planetary origins.Three of Molotch's hired guns, three of the men we had slain in the battle on the Hinterlight, had proved, under forensic examination, to have come from Sameter. From this very place, Urbitane, the planet's second city.
Page 608
surviving inside a hive. Scholams offer a way out as well as a useful propoganda tool for the Imperium, at least if they don't get into the hands of the corrupt.Existence in the wastelands west of the hive offered a lean choice: scavenge like an animal, or bond into a gang. Either way, life expectancy was miserably low. Municipally-sponsored scholams, offering a bed, food and a basic education that emphasised the values of the Throne, represented an escape route. Reasonably healthy, lice-free, qualified youngsters could leave such institutions with a real prospect of securing an apprenticeship to one of me hive guilds, a journeyship, or at least a decent indenture.
Page 610
Again indication of the size of hab stacks/blocks.Morpal's place was a four-hectacre loading dock of iron, stock-brick and timber hinged out over the vast canyon gulf of the West Descent, an aerial thoroughfare formed by the gap between two of the hive's most colossal stacks. Beneath the reinforced platform and the gothic buttresses that supported it, space dropped away for almost a vertical kilometre to the base of the stacks. Ostensibly, this was a ledge where cargo-flitters and load-transporters - and many thousands of these craft plied the airways of the West Descent - could drop in for repairs, fuel, or whatever else the pilots needed.
Page 611
Page 611All this and more was visible from their collective thoughts, which swirled around the loading dock like a fog. I was five kilometres away, in a room in a low-rent hotel. But it was all clear enough. I knew what Mingus Futir had eaten for breakfast, what Fancyman D'cree had stolen the night before, the lie Gert Gerity had told his wife. I knew all about the thing Erik Klass didn't want to tell Morpal.
..
Surface was easy. Deep mind was harder. Morpal Who Moves and his cronies were well-used to concealing their secrets.
Ravenor can predict and give detailed warnings to his agents.+Harlon. Morpal's signal will be a double finger-click. Your immediate threat is the grey-haired gig-man to your left, who has a dart-knife. To his right, in the leather apron, the rigger has a pivot-gun, but he will not be able to draw it as fast. The flit-pilot in green wants to prove himself to Morpal, and he won't hesitate. His friend, the one with the obscura-tinted eyes, is less confident, but he has a boomgun in his cab.+
PAge 612
Nayl threw another man aside, and grabbed the edges of Morpal's buoy-chair. The Mover yelled in dismay as Nayl slung the frictionless chair sideways.
"frictionless" float chair.
Page 612
Hecutor 10 with a range of 15 metres.Nayl slid the Hecuter 10 from his bodyglove and calmly shot him through the head at fifteen metres.
Page 613
PAtience Kys is also precognitive or able to read minds, to a certian extent.She knew for certain it was Rigorist Knill even before he opened the oubliette hatch. Just part of her gift, the same thing that allowed her to win at cards or guess which hand a coin was in.
PAge 613
Bio-coded glow globe that operates on its own.A glow-globe coded to Knill's bio-trace bobbed at his shoulder and cast its cheap yellow light into the cell.
Page 615
apparently juvenat work can make a person looka s well as feel any age.. including 400 lol.Prefect Cyrus was anything between forty and four hundred. Slim, and well-made, he had undergone so many programs of juvenat work, making his flesh over-tight and his skin hideously smooth and pink. His eyes were violet and, Patience believed, deliberately sculpted by the augchemists to appear kind and fatherly.
Page 617
Telekinesis can boost the strength of physical blowsShe ducked sideways, putting a little of her gift into the kick she slammed at the old soldier's bellly. Knill lurched away and crashed into a table, knocking pewterware onto the floor.
Page 617
Another TK feat.Ide was swinging the baton down again to smack her shoulders. She froze his hand. IDe gasped, sweating, terrified, as an invisible force slowly p ulled his powerful arm back and drew the baton away from her. She let it smash Ide in the face.
Page 617
Kys TK abilities can send people flying. She has enough fine control to rupture blood vessels though as well.Patience looked at Knill and he flew backwards t hrought he air, slamming into the table again so hard it went over with him. She looked at Cyrus, and snarled as she simultaneously burst all the blood vessels in his face. He fell down on his knees, whimpering.
Page 617
sustained TK pushing a burly former guardsmen.Patience held out a hand and Ide went sprawling over on his back.. and continued to slide down the length of the hallway until his skull crashed into the stone doorpost.
Page 617
By now Kys is getting tired of shoving people around.Patience ducked Souzerin's first slash, then hurled him backwards a few steps with a twitch of her mind. She was getting tired now.
Page 617
Kys can turn small objects into deadly weapons as wlel as pushing people."I'll take that," Patience said, ,and ripped the medal from Knill's tunic with a mental flick. She slapped her outstretched palms against Knill's dented skull and blasted him away into the murals. The ancient plasterwork cracked under the heavy impact and Knill fell limp onto the floor.
Souzerin came in again. Knill's medal was still hanging in the air. Patience whipped it around and buried it in Souzerin's cheek.
Page 618
Carl is a Inquisitorial hacker.Carl had a particular talent in the use of cogitators and logic engines. Since our arrival, he had spent many hours in the census archives of Urbi-tane. "I've been tracing the file records of all three men. It's laborious work, and the records are, no tittering at the back, incomplete. The names are officially logged and genuine, but they are not connected to any local bloodlines. Soto, Zhan and Frell are all common names here on Sameter, but there is no link between any of these men and any family or families carrying those names. In other words, I believe they chose the surnames themselves. They chose common local surnames."
Page 620
Commentary on "Youth Scholams" - something I gather which are along the lines of Schola Progenium, but for members of a given planet. They still follow the pattern of "educating and training for specific tasks" but rather than for just the Imperium (necceesarily) they seem to be in also commercial ventures. Though, as noted, the governmental arms like the Ecclesiarhy, the Munitorum, or the Guard do run their own (probably to facilitate recruitment.)There were millions, nay billions, of institutions like it all across the Imperium, wherever hives rose and gross poverty loomed. Many were run by the Ecclesiarchy, or tied to some scheme of work by the Departmento Munitorum, or the Imperial Guard itself. Some were missionary endeavours, established by zealous social reformers, some political initiatives, some just good, four-square community efforts to assist the downtrodden and underpriveleged.
And some were none of those things. Carl and I inspected the records of the Kindred Youth Scholam carefully. On the surface, it was respectable enough. Its register audits were a matter of public record, and it applied for and received the right grants and welfare support annually, which meant that the Administratum subjected it to regular inspection. It was approved by the Munitorum, and held all the appropriate stamps and marques of a legitimate charitable institution. It had an impressive portfolio of recommendations and references from many of Urbitane's worthies and nobles. It had even won several rosettes of distinction from the Missionaria.
Page 620
a "graft".. computer trickery.A graft. A legitimate dossier that has been expertly designed to overfit previous records and eclipse them. Done well - and this had been done brilliantly - a graft would be more than adequate to bypass the Administratum. But we servants of the holy ordos had greater and more refined tools of scrutiny to bring to bear. Carl showed me the loose ends and rough edges that had been tucked away to conceal the basic deception, the long tortuous strands of inconsistency that no one but the Inquisition would ever think to check, for the effortt would be too labour-intensive. That was ever the failing of the Imperium's monumental Administratum. Overseeing hives the size of Urbitane, even an efficient and ordered division of the Administratum could onyl hope to keep up with day to day proceessing. There was no time for deeper insight. If one wanted to hide something form the Imperial Administratum, one simply had to place it at the end of along line of diversions and feints, so far removed from basic inspections that no Administry clerk would ever notice it.
Page 621
Twelve digit citizenry number on Sameter. Not sure if this means the total population or if they just over-digit things to allow for future potential."Here's the giveaway. Three digits different in his twelve digit citizenry numeric, but changed here, at birth-registry date, where no one would ever go back to look. Berto Cyrus was actually a stillborn infant. The Prefect took over the identity."
Page 623
use of servitor skulls in a game."Standard rules, Vevian. One per player. Open choice. Body weapons only, although I'll allow a gun per pawn for jeopardy work. Guns are not to be used for taking the quarry, as I have no need to remind you. Gunshot death or disintegration voids the game and the pot goes to the house."
.
"Servo-skull picter, as standard. House will supply eight. You'll each be allowed two of your own."
Also "disintegration voids" - vortex weapon?
Page 626
Some mateirals are opaque to scanners.But lutillium, apart from its monetary worth, had value as a substance opaque to scanners.
Page 626
Autopistols using caseless ammo, as indicated in earlier editions."Surprise." she said, and buried a caseless round in his forehead. The rear part of Ide's skull burst like a squeezed pimple and he fell on his back.
Page 626
- Shaped charge wall/door/window breaching explosives (Nayl using it.)Then a shaped charge blew out the casement behind them in a blizzard of glass and leading, and Harlon Nayl swung into the hallway. He had a large automatic pistol in his left fist.
Page 626
Neural disruptor.He took a neural disruptor from his belt in his right hand and walked over to them, cracking each one comatose with a fierce zap from the blunt device.
Page 626
Commisar pistol blows off limbs.Fewik knocked Carl over with a blow from his baton, and Souzerin raised the battered bolt pistol that he carried since his days in the commissariat. He fired at Kara, but managed only to blow off Knill's left foot and his left arm at the elbow.
Page 627
Ravenor's sensory abilities.Panic had seized the scholam. I could feel it, breathe it. Hundreds of children and young adults, terrified by the explosions and gunshots. And a deeper panic, a deeper dread, that emanated from the minds of the rigorists and tutors.
I hovered towards the main gate, Wystan at my side, and ripped the ancient doors off their hinges with a brisk nudge of my mind. Inside the entrance way, half a dozen tutors and rigorists were running towards us, hoping for a speedy exit.
Page 627
Ravneor's TK ability.My psi-wave threw them all backwards violently, like the pressure blast of a hurricane. Windows shattered. They tumbled over, robes shredding, flying like dolls or desperately trying to grip onto the floor.
Page 628 - Patience Kys is identified as being a telekine "raw but potentially strong"
Page 628
neat trick.The device was very small, no larger than a hearing aid implant.
..
The device was a trigger switch, coded to Cyrus's thumb print. An advanced piece of tech. Down on the floor, helpless from the wound Kara had delivered to his leg, Cyras had plucked this device from his pocket and activated it. And the scholam's entire data archive had been erased.
Page 629
The Imperium seems to be filthy socialists.. although housing and supporting 900+ children is a bit hard even for them."Inform the Administration that welfare assistance will be required, but not yet. No one is to be rehoused or re-homed unless they've been examined. Why do you frown?"
Page 630
psychic defense.A layer of mendacity cloaked Cyrus's thoughts, like a cake of dried mud. A mind-trick, one of the many taught by the Cognitae. I had been expecting as much. For all his fear, Cyras was still a product of that heretical institution, and therefore had to be unlocked with precision. If I'd just burst into his mind telepathically from the outset, I might have damaged or destroyed many of his locked engrams. But now I had a solid lie out of him, and that lie revealed the way his mind-shields worked: their focus, their strengths, their inclination.
Page 631
Servo skull.Moments later, a varnished human skull hovered past through the gloom. Tech implants decorated the back of its cranium, and lights shone in its hollow orbits. A sensor drone, sweeping for her.
Page 631
another servo skull.. amde from an animal.After another minute, a second drone - this one built around the skull of a dog or cat - skimmed past and made off in another direction.
Page 631
operational range of Patience Kys' sgift. at least int erms of sensing.She slowed her breathing, and deliberately encouraged her mind to do the sort of tricks that usually happened unbidden. She reached out. She could feel the area around her in a radius of ten metres, forty, sixty. The shape of the geography: the sloping trench to her left, the broken columns ahead, the line of burned-out habs to her right. Behind her, the sewer outfall pouring sludge into a cracked storm drain. She sensed bright sparks of mental energy, but they were just rats scuttling in the ruins.
Then she sensed one that wasn't.
This spark was bigger, human, very controlled and intense. Right ahead, beyond the columns, moving forward.
Page 632
The "jack" in question is body armour or an outfit of some kind, described as an "armoured jack".The pivot-gun roared and the hunter was knocked off his feet.
...
The hunter's jack had stopped the worst of the ball round.
Page 632
shielded again psychic power.Patience gasped. There had been no spark off him at all. Either he was shielded, or his mind just did not register to her gift like regular human minds.
Page 632
again protection against psychic powerbut the killer's balck skin-suit again rendered him proof against her power. It was too slippery. She couldn't get hold of anything except-
Page 635
Another psykic defence trick.Substitution was another standard Cognitae mind ploy. Anticipating psychic interrogation, the brotherhood mnemonically learned to replace the details of true memories with engrammatic euphemisms. Narcobaron, for example, could stand for procurer. Game might stand for purpose. It was a simple but almost unbreakable deceit. Well-schooled, aCognitae brother could mask memories with metaphors. He could not be caught out in a lie, because he wasn't lying. The truth had been erased and replaced with other facts. Using such echqniues, a member of the brotherhood might withstand the most serious psyk-scrutiny, because the truth was no longer there to uncover.
Page 636
Ferro armored and apparently shielded against scanning. But they can intercept signals from teh servo skulls and home in on them.The manse was ferro-armoured, and shielded, but our scanners lit with the buzz of electromag activity inside.
"Signals!" Kara reported. "They're running drones out into the slum."
"Can you track them?" I asked.
"Working..." She adjusted some dials. "I've got a lock on nine. Covering a hex-grid twelve by ten. Map comparison... Throne, these archives are so old! Here we go. An area known as Low Tenalt."
Page 639
- "chameleon cloak" - probably something along the lines of cameoline.A figure suddenly appeared ahead of her, across the sea of trash. A small male, or perhaps a female, who'd been down in cover behind the remains of a yard wall, hidden by a chameleon cloak.
Page 639
hi explosive autopistol rounds as powerful as a grenade. No idea how big a grenade.. could be 20mm, 40mm, or hand grenade. Somewhere in power of a bolt round perhaps?The hunter - and it was celarly a female - stopped in her tracks, and produced an autopistol. She slammed in a clip and ifred three times at the manufactory.
The shells must have been high-ex, because each impact went up like a grenade. Sections of the manufactury ruin blew in, and the Dolors went very quiet suddenly.
Page 639
Las round punches straight through a torso. ARmor of segmeented plating.There was a loud crack, a peripheral flash of light, and the female hunter jolted suddenly as a las-round went clean through her torso. She crumpled without a sound.
Her killer appeared, directly ahead of Patience. She skidded to a halt. He was big, and wore segmented plating over a coat of green hide. A glowing augmetic implant covered one eye. He had a las-carbine in his hands.
Page 640
Ravenor lifted dude 20 m up and dropped him. ouch.Two las-rounds struck the front of my chair and fizzled off harmlessly. I found the hunter as he was about to fire again, and picked him up. He yelled in fear as he left the ground, dragged up into the air ten metres, twenty. Then I let him go.
Page 640
self explanatory."I heard shots." Kara voxed. "Are you all right?"
"Fine." I replied.
..
Kara was about a third of a kilometre away to my right.
Page 640
bounty hunters using a chainfistThat was when the two hunters, twins clad in silver-grey skin sleeves, pounced. One pinned her arms from behind, the other came at her with a chain-fist.
Page 640-641
Waring.I knew I had no choice. I had to ware her. It wasn't something she -or anyone else I knew - enjoyed, but it was necessary. Besides, we had trained for this. Kara Swole was a particularly receptive candidate.
The wraithbone pendant around her neck lit up with psychic-energy. Kara's body suddenly animated again, but it was me moving her. I had taken her physical form over, put it on like a suit of clothes.
PAge 641
effect of chainfist.The partner's forward-thrust chain-fist, which had been sweeping at Kara.’me met the ribs of his fellow hunter instead. The whirring bite-blades of the gaundet weapon punched clean through die man's side in a shocking welter of blood and torn tissue. He screamed as he died, his whole body quivering in time to the rending vibrations of the glove's cycling blades.
Page 641
Shotgun round knocked person back eight metres.But by then Kara/I had grabbed up her fallen riot gun,. Her puppet hand racked the slide. A single, booming shot blew the hunter backwards eight metres.
Page 644
Ravenor keeps in track both via vox and telepaty."Why? I was just listening in, and Ravenor suddenly went off-line!"
"The vox?"
"The vox is still live! I mean his telepathic link just scrambled! Was that you?"
Page 646
A plasma hand cannon. Ravnoer's chair can't defend against plasma fire.and drew his Etva c.II plasma cannon, a pistol-sized weapon more than capable of burning clean through my armoured chair.
Page 646
Psycannon.With a simple tap of my mind, I fired my chair's psi-cannon. The hunter's corpse slammed back through the wall of the pumping station. Even before it had hit the wall, every bone in that body had been pulped by concussive force, every organ exploded.
Page 646
Private use untouchable."Untouchable?" Frauka asked, casually indicating the limiter around DaRolle's throat.
"Uh huh. You too?"
Page 656
Self explanatory."What could this psychic "dissonance" you complain of be, but the cowards trying to fog our minds and cover their tracks?"
"These eldar savages keep a thing called a world-spirit, revered. They-"
"I know what is a world-spirit - and what is the stink of a farseer!"
