Chương 16: Chapter Fifteen - Burn the Mutant

Octavia was aware of the looks she was receiving, but she didn't care. She simply laughed and kept her finger depressed on the trigger. Her Micro Thermolytic Projector painted a searing line of heat across the wide room she had found herself in. This was one of the big factory rooms within the ship, with large machines whose purposes she couldn't even guess at. The ceiling was high above, with lumens fixed on it to splash light down onto three levels of catwalks and the dozens of massive machines within.

The light was joined by the red glow of her cleansing fire, and Octavia's laughter was joined by the chorus of screaming mutants as they rushed at her with maddened fury. It didn't matter. They were met with fire and melted away. Behind her, Octavia had a squad of some fifteen Voidmen guards. They had lasrifles and pistols, armour, and the good sense not to get between her and the enemy. The room was almost cleared, unfortunately. When she had entered, the place was crawling with mutants.

They hung off the sides of catwalks and some of them were caught in the act of butchering the servitors, Tech-Acolytes and workers that inhabited this great room. Now, the last of the mutants was running straight for her, eyes alight with feverish hatred. She leaned back, and then rocked forwards and spun, delivering a hard kick into the mutant's chest that sent them tumbling back.

These genestealers, for all of their number, weren't too much of a threat to anyone with the proper training and the (metaphorical) balls to be more aggressive against them than they expected. Octavia levelled her gun at the squirming mutant and pulled the trigger. A tiny burp of fire came out the end, then nothing.

"Huh?" she asked.

"You have run out of fuel."

"Oh," she said before looking at the side of her weapon. The voice in her head was correct. The charge indicator was empty. She stepped to the side, then gestured to the mutant.

"Hey, you guys, take that one out, will you? You've got to pull your weight here, you know?" She had run into this bunch soon after gaining her new toy. They had been dispatched to secure a section of the ship, and she had decided to tag along, then tag... ahead? Whatever, she had seen the foe, and she had the fire. The two mixed together very well.

"Thank you, sister," one of the Voidsmen said after they nailed the last genestealer in the head with a single lasrifle shot.

"Do you, ah, need anything?"

"Yeah, like five minutes," Octavia said.

"What are your orders from here?"

"To secure this floor, there are two other manufacturing sections, and we need to meet up with the other squads," he said. She suspected he was a lieutenant from the pips on his uniform, though she wasn't as well versed in reading the ranks of the Voidsmen-at-arms. Her lessons had covered Imperial Guard rankings, and of course she could tell a Sister Palentine apart from a Sister Superior, but that was mostly through osmosis.

"You do that," she said.

"I need a few minutes to reload." He accepted that with a bow that felt oddly unearned to her, but... well, maybe it wasn't that uneared. There were a lot of dead mutants in this room. Kills Confirmed: 49x Genestealers New Point Total: 600 She stared at the prompt, then down at her gun.

"How much was this?" she asked.

"Thirty points."

"Right, right," she said.

"So I can get... twenty more?"

"You could. Though I would question your motivations there."

"Yeah," she replied before looking around. A few of the Voidsmen had noticed her talking to no one and were edging away.

"Emperor protect," she called out, because that seemed appropriate, then she skedaddled away. Fortunately the room was more than large enough that it wasn't hard for her to find a quiet spot. The Voidsmen were busy moving the corpses of the genestealers into a heap. The lost tech priests and workers were treated with more respect. She slipped into a room with a row of lockers to one side, then sat on a bench that ran through the middle. There were two posters just ahead of her.

One of the Emperor with the text THE EMPEROR PROTECTS written across it. Next to that, was another, an image of a Cobra Class Destroyer just like The Broken Scale with a single word beneath. OBEY. Ironic, she supposed. While she liked the Emperor well enough, and abided by... a fair number of the tenets and commandments of the Order of the Shattered Glass, no one could claim that she was the best at that. As for obeying, she was very not good at obeying.

"Okay, so... uh, I need ammo."

"That would be one point for a new canister for your Micro Thermolytic Projector."

"Alright!" she said. New Purchase: Saintly Retributor - Micro Thermolytic Projector - Ammunition Canister Points Reduced to: 599 Octavia blinked, then blinked again when a small box appeared next to her. It was beautiful, with a matte black finish and a clasp hidden within the mouth of a silvery snake. There were even a few skulls on it. She popped it open and then started the process of reloading her gun while she spoke.

"So, you're not a warp daemon, are you?"

"I am not."

"That's what a warp daemon would say," she pointed out.

"That is rather unfortunate. I'm afraid that by that same logic, trust would be hard to gain."

"Yeah, I haven't decided yet," she said.

"I'm pretty sure that just talking to you would have Sister Palentine Androsa cook me alive. But hey, I'm willing to extend an olive branch in exchange for cool toys."

"Are you worried about what your order might say if you appear before them in new wargear?"

"Eh, what're they gonna do? Confiscate my stuff? This thing doesn't look heretical." She raised the gun up, then set it back down to figure out how to replace the canister. She had it a moment later. It was deceptively easy, actually.

"There are ways to make that impossible. Genelocks are relatively inexpensive, and for just a few points, you could buy a catalogue that would lock weapon permissions to you alone."

"Oh... okay, let's do that!" she said. Octavia grinned. She was liking this a lot! Every piece of gear she had ever had access to was novitiate gear. That meant that it wasn't even second-hand. Her robes had the names of nineteen previous sisters sewn into the lining, and while that was, in many ways, neat, it also meant that nothing fit. Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon. She was... challenged in terms of verticality.

So much so that by all means, she shouldn't have been allowed in the order in the first place, but someone had taken pity on her. In her future, it was unlikely that she'd ever be allowed to take a position as a Sister of Battle. Maybe as a clerk, or a secretary, or someone in charge of a laundromat, but never a sister who served on the front line. This was the first time she was getting custom, bespoke items.

"Okay, so I want power armour," she said.

"It needs to be good, though, I want spikes on my power pack, and a big fleur-de-lys on my right shoulder. Oh, and another on my chest. And big stompy boots. Can you do a jetpack?"

"Certainly. Would you have use for one here?"

"Fair point," she muttered.

"Can we make the armour blue? No, the cloth. Make the armour like... black and silver. Wait... do I need an interface port?"

"That would be ideal for better control, but armour that functions without exists as well." She licked her lips, then nodded.

"Okay... let's start with that!" New Purchase: Intermediate Power Armour Points Reduced to: 459 New Purchase: Injectable Nervous Interface System Points Reduced to: 409 She got a box. It was small, with more snakes and skulls. Opening it revealed a device that was shaped like a tube, with a button on one side and tiny ports on the other. She clicked the button a few times, but nothing happened.

"And that is why I won't be giving you explosives with simple detonators. Press the end of the device where you'd like your interface to be. I'd suggest somewhere easy to access but out of the way." She considered it for a moment, then placed the device to the nape of her neck on her right. She pressed, holding in a wince... and nothing happened. Then she felt a trickle of blood running down her neck, just a few drops. When she touched the spot, she discovered a cold metallic ring.

Moving to a mirror on one wall, she rubbed the dust off and stared at the thing on her neck. It was just a small port. Black with unnecessary silver filigree.

"That's it?" she asked. Then she felt cold tingles running across every nerve in her body.

"Oh, that's strange."

"Installed. Now, for the armour, do you want an undersuit first? I can get you something quite decent for a relatively low price. It would assist with temperature regulation and be resistant to cuts and disperse blunt trauma better."

"That makes sense! But it's the armour I want!"

"Understood." New Purchase: Holy Protective Undersuit Points Reduced to: 379 New Purchase: Plate of the Lady of Retribution Points Reduced to: 89 She gulped, that was a lot of points gone, but-- Her thoughts were interrupted when a pair of boxes appeared with a slight whump of displaced air. There was a smaller one atop a far larger box.

"Start with the small one." She set the small one aside and opened the bigger box. Within was armour. Her hands almost shook as she reached for it, but she firmed her resolve and touched the plate. It was warm. The metal was all black, though it wasn't entirely matte. There was a sense that this was clean. The edges were gilded in silver that felt almost like chrome it was so well polished, but that faint blueness was unmistakably real silver, or an alloy of it.

She set the main plate aside and then did the same with the rest. There was a full suit, here. Chest piece, gorget, three pieces for each arm, then the pauldrons. There were small tassets and cuisse and greaves, and even heavy boots covered in a shiny sabaton. Each piece seemed designed to connect to the other, and she could see small mechanical actuators artfully hidden within. A robe was included, in her order's colours. It was fitted to her. And she had to put the undersuit on first.

Grumbling, she opened the small box to find a skin-tight suit in the pale, almost turquoise blue of the Order of the Shattered Glass. She looked around, then stripped in a hurry. She wished she could shower before putting it all on, but that would have to wait. Soon, she was fitting on the armour, and it was all terribly easy. Far, far easier than the complex arrangements needed to fit a sister in their battle plate which sometimes required two or three novitiates helping. The backpack, she discovered, was empty.

"Huh?"

"There was no need for a complex engine. The space can be used for stowage."

"Right, yeah." She wasn't working with standard imperial gear. This was... better. A lot better. There was a lack of history to this though. This wasn't armour passed on through twenty generations, well-worn, well-maintained, but still old. This was new. She came to stand before the mirror again, then giggled. She looked... good? A bit short, still, but the suit looked impossibly clean.

"This had better not be made of something that'll crumple at the first blow," she said.

"It won't. You'll find that it's quite the opposite. Are you not going to wear the helmet?"

"And hide my pretty face?" she asked.

"At least purchase head protection of some sort." She rolled her eyes.

"Fine. Like what?"

"Here, this will do." New Purchase: Saint's Laurel Points Reduced to: 39 The next item was a wreath. Golden leaves, formed into a half-circlet. They were heavy, but when she fitted it on, it didn't bother her, and was even made so that she barely felt it.

"This is nice?"

"It will project a small field around your head, protecting you from most direct fire, heat, and some other effects. It is not as durable as your armour."

"Nice!" The wreath looked... holy, almost. Honestly, all she lacked were a few purity seals, and she could stand next to any sister of the order. No... no, that wasn't right. This was nicer. She could stand face to breast with even a palatine of the order and her equipment, at least, wouldn't look out of place. She grinned and picked up her gun again. Now she just had to earn her spot. And a few more points, too. She really wanted a cool sword, and a proper bolter!