Spoiler: Macharius
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Quote Originally Posted by PotatoGolem View Post
Macharius watched the interviews with interest. The heresy shocked him at first, but he trusted the Inquisitor to root it out. Still, it couldn't hurt to be cautious. He had his spymaster assign men to watch the popsicles, making sure they did nothing untoward. As for Felidae, she tended to follow him anyway, and had no command role. All that was needed was to tell the purser that all her purchases needed to be routed to Macharius for approval and make it clear to lower-ranking officers that she did not have any command authority.

When the last interviewee left, he turned to the Inquisitor. Inquisitor, I apologize for the presumption, but I must ask: why do you tolerate such heretical thought? Many of the views expressed are punishable by excruciation and immolation. I would condemn them to death as heretics, but for the fact that they may have use to you. Are they corrupted by some enemy? What is to be done?
"A worthy question, Lord-Captain!" Mathius boomed, leaning back in his chair. The metal creaked under his weight, but didn't give. "There are a few reasons, and I think you deserve to know them. The foremost one is simply that allowances must be made for humans coming from a culture far removed from our own. These are men and women of the Imperium, it is true, but the Imperium of ten-thousand years ago. Those men have tread the same ground as our legends, and seen things we could only imagine. One of the take-aways from these interviews is a glimpse at just how much the Imperium has changed. So that's one." He raised a massive hand, counting down on his fingers. "Two is closely related. They have knowledge that can never be replaced, a wealth of historical information about the daily life of our distant ancestors. To quote the motto of one of the Astartes chapters, 'Knowledge is power, guard it well.' This sort of knowledge is worth preserving, if we can. Three... I'm not the Hereticus. I don't have the luxury of seeing in black and white. My Ordo studies the Xenos, though such knowledge is forbidden to most."

"A scenario, Macharius, to illustrate." Kohl said, suddenly. The scribe had stood up, and was packing his auto-quills and dataslates away into a shoulder bag. "You are on an alien world. You have been cut off from your transport by hostile xenos. You have killed most, but now you are out of ammunition. On the ground is a xenos pistol, dropped by a fallen enemy. Do you take it up and kill the last few, thus preserving your life for future service to the Emperor, or do you die with honour, because to use Xenos technology is heresy?" He finished sweeping the last few slates into the bag and straightened, turning to face Macharius. "Another scenario. You have encountered a human culture on a world that has never known Imperial contact. You ask them if they venerate the God-Emperor, and of course they do not. Do you burn them as heretics, or do you call for missionaries, and reach out to them with the truth of the Imperial Creed?"

"To answer your other questions, I don't think they're corrupted," Mathias said. "There are tests for that, should you wish to implement one. No, I think that they simply don't know better. They have had less than a year to process a truly vast paradigm shift. They are loyal servants of the Imperium. I believe they'll come around, given time. I understand, however, if you don't want them in your crew. Answer honestly; would you prefer that the Inquisition take them?"


"Copy, Sting. Nothing over here either." There was a pause, the vox crackling into the silence. "I don't like this."

Macharius' two ships fell back, drifting on minimal power. Systems went dark across the board, everything non-essential shutting down. The lights fell, replaced by the dim red glow of the emergency luminators. The distant hum of the drives quieted, the two ships a silent void in space. The Sting's augur arrays, constructed for just such purpose, continued to run, searching the void for any signs of other ships. The officer in charge of the auspex station flicked through different bands, waiting and listening, watching the readouts.

"Lord-Captain!" Inquisitor Mathias joined them on the bridge, crossing the distance from the doors in great strides. None of his retinue were with him, save two of the silent bodyguards in black carapace. "What's the situation? Are we evading?"

"Got something, sir!" The auspex officer reported. "Debris field in low orbit. Metals, mostly. Some pretty big chunks in there."