Stars and Shadows - Chapter 4

Sikari can’t help letting out a grumble as she walks into the building. The structure itself is glorious and blocky and ornate in a subtle, powerful way, as one would expect, but it hardly makes its shadow any more comfortable today than it has in the last time she was here, a long time ago. A towering building, half bunker and half spire, the architecture is even more blunt and aggressive than the utilitarian constructs in the lower Hive, especially against the alabaster backdrop of the massive walls separating the rest of Utoria from the High Spires. Every wall is angled to deflect incoming fire and fortify the structure, almost like a prism, every opening either a window for outpouring violence or a trap to draw the unwary into killzones. The Precinct Fortress is castle and prison both, reshaping the horizon for nearly two-thirds of a city of over a billion people who live downHive of it. For most of her life, most of her friend’s lives, it’s been there, a crouching, hungry, powerful thing ready to swoop down and take her away to a deep, black place, forever.

Walking into it, then, despite how much she’s changed since the last time she saw it, is still… intimidating. To say the least.

The low grumbling is the only thing she allows herself, though. Beyond that, her face is a stone wall, her body posture a practiced, military blend of at ease and poised into a proper stance. Her uniform, always kept to a high standard, is pristine after the hours of maintenance removing even the smallest of wrinkles and stains, and she’s corrected any faults in the holsters at her hip, a gilded, overcharged laspistol and ornate sword at her side. The pistol cost her nearly a year’s wages, and almost doubles the heat of a more standard form they’re usually assigned, and the sword, while a Thaumic blade, flickers from poor production, more useful as a regular blade than as anything plasmic. It’s finicky enough she’s had to learn not to let its field rip her hand off mid-use, watching out for the change in pitch that tells her its containment field is going to break. The first was a gift to herself, the nicest thing she’s ever owned. The other was a gift from her superior upon her promotion. They both say a lot about her.

Behind her are the more professional members of her squadron. It’s a measly showing: Marquis, Jacobi, Liones and Michael are all she can bring. Anyone else in her squadron would set off enough alarms in the building that at best, it would take them hours to get through the paperwork and potential arrests. Commissar Tarrick, of course, was well aware of this; he was probably counting on it, at least a little. Having an entire squadron placed under the authority of an Arbiter and then not having even half of that squadron show is a ridiculously pathetic showing to say the least, and certainly not a good first impression of the commander of that squadron.

She breathes, slow. It’s the best she can do. She clutches her pistol at her side possessively, resting her hand on the butt of it out of habit and drawing some small amount of reassurance from the familiar feel and weight of it.

The interior of the building is just as austere and intense as the outside, black stone and granite making up the tight hallways while keeping the opening foyer as a massive, archaic room, reflecting the massive Imperial Crown adorned in gold along the back wall and the many defensible entrances to other parts of the fortress. She moves forward to the main desk, occupied by four servitorial drones, all equally professional in their sleek-black augmentations. “Designation and purpose of visit?” the closest one asks in an upbeat, artificial tone.

“Meeting with Arbiter Quentin, as an enhanced security detail and requisitioned squadron, reporting for duty” she replies, smoothly and professionally.

The servitorial is of a higher quality than most she’s seen, but it’s still haunting to look at. One of the potential fates the towering building and its enforcers might take one off to; criminals deemed too dangerous or too unworthy of the normal sorts of rehabilitation or work programs can be… altered. Made to give penance in perpetuity, even as they wither. This one is expensive, whoever it once was buried under a mechanical face-plate and limbs, the enforced cyborg nature of the implants working perfectly with the original body for an improved servant.

It twitches, very slightly, as she speaks up, before a glowing smiley face appears over its visor. Sikari tenses up, subtly enough that only Jacobi notices, stepping slightly closer to her. He’s more at home than she is here, though no one is ever comfortable in the house of the Emperor’s Justice; still, it means a lot that they noticed, and the maybe half-inch closer hes stepped to her means more than she’s willing to tell. She’s spent most of her life hearing about what happens to underhivers in this place, and it’s all too easy to picture some of the half-hidden turrets above them morphing out of their alcoves and centering their sights on her, or that the shadows hold powerful half-humans and Enforcers ready to take them apart.

Then the moment passes, the fear is gripped and reined in, and the servitor’s glowing smile is perfectly normally disturbing. “Your appointment has been found, Sergeant Sikari Hiveborn,” it intones in that same peppy mechanical chirp. “Please proceed towards hallway 62B, room designation 13. Await further instructions within. We thank you for your service, and hope you have a productive endeavor ahead.”

Without bothering to reply Sikari follows its instructions, suppressing a shudder and heading out towards the room it designated. Despite the armored, defensively built structure of the building, it’s also standardized, and before the servitor can ask if she requires a guide she’s already on her way, formulating how to get there. The hallways all look alike, but if one knows the layout, the grid for the less secretive parts of the building is easy to memorize and navigate. It takes them 20 minutes, three more than if she’d taken the guide, but they arrive on time ten minutes early to the meet.

Their early punctuality is offset by the Arbiter already in the room, seated against the far wall, weapon unholstered and laying on the table in front of her and pointing towards the door.

Again, Sikari tenses, hands on her holsters in an instant and feet planted, ready to duck down and retreat into the hallway. Jacobi follows her lead, only noticing the weapon after but mirroring her instantly, while Marquis is already half out of the holster before he notices and stops. Liones almost keeps up, his training kicking in where his instincts fail to, but Michael blinks like a confused child, stumbling back a bit.

Sikari freezes like that, however, when the weapon remains unfired, the Arbiter’s posture remaining entirely relaxed. Their face isn’t angry, or surprised, or even the grim, fatalistic glare that sometimes graces Commissar Tarrick before he fires on a deserter; it remains impassive, calm, collected, analytical, taking in her measure and the measure of her men. Her eyes track left to right, picking up on the mannerisms and response times of each of them, her body never moving.

The entire exchange takes less than a second, Jacobi recovering an instant before Marquis this time, changing stride so quickly that his initial reaction could be confused for simple hesitation. Michael blinks and is back to parade-posture as quick as he can, followed by Liones (with a slight grimace). Only Marquis takes long enough to matter. The sound of him sheathing whatever he grabbed isn’t missed by the Arbiter, and her eyes shoot to him. He quickly bows his head as he follows the rest of them into the room, part of the performance; Sikari is sure he isn’t exactly chastised.

She herself takes a second longer, her left hand leaving her sword but the right lingering over the pistol, even as she corrects her stance and walks confidently into the room. Whatever the gun is, be it a threat or a promise or simply a test, she’s faced enough big guns both literal and not to know that one doesn’t show weakness to it, though she does not apologize for her reaction. She does keep her head bowed slightly, and as she fully enters the room bows considerably more, bending at the waist and making the sign of the Thrones as she comes back up, fingers lined up in two half-circles to make a crown-shape. Her squadron copies her, each of them flashing the sign in parade-form unison.

The Arbiter nods, ever so slightly. “Welcome, Sergeant,” she says, her voice soft as a whisper. “Your punctuality does you a service.”

“Thank you, Arbiter Quentin,” Sikari replies, holding the crown a few seconds before standing upright and making eye contact. “It’s an honor to be at your will.”

Tau is a barely-settled colony system. Utoria is a hive-world, its cities all holding tens of millions, with little between them save manufacturing. Neither of these facts make for comfortable living. While most still have personal living quarters, many workers on shift can be assigned to barracks, entire work crews, engineering teams and logistical scribes all eating and sleeping in shared spaces for weeks, often seeing nothing but those living spaces and work stations that entire time. This makes for literally two generations of people that have lived, worked, and procreated all in metal boxes side by side, without sky to hold them save on festival days.

Gangs are, of course, common and violent. The illusion of power, recreational drugs, sex, the illusion of freedom and a family beyond the one forced into being all around you; all of it makes for easy recruitment. There are hundreds of them, many of them making homes for themselves between the walls, in abandoned service tunnels and broken down habs, or even in the depths of the waste processing chambers of the city, all fixtures of the underhive. Some of the gangs do grow, over time, becoming whole organizations and taking over sectors of cities in all but name, and in cases like these, the local Enforcers are called in to break them apart and punish those who deny the Imperium’s authority.

But then there are the more serious crimes. Nothing an underhiver could commit. When a Noble starts skimming from the Imperium’s taxes, when worship of non-Throne make begins to spread, when an outbreak or organization of Artists go mad together, when a new genoplague rears its head-

Then come the Arbiters.

Trained, it’s said, on Terra itself, the holy Mother. The Law they uphold supersedes Nobles, planetary Governors, the Blessed Sciences, even military command. Each and every one of them is judge, jury and executioner on cases where such things are applicable, and simply executioner where they aren’t. They are blessed with tools beyond any save high-command, the machine cult, or the Thrones' own warriors; there are tales of Arbiters hunting warlords with a host of mind-linked cybernetic beasts, of calling down orbital precision fire, of hunter-killer guns whose flechettes can track by genome and never miss.

While an Arbiter could operate freely on any planet they arrive at, independently of their technology or preparedness, it’s a great source of pride amidst Enforcers and some nobles to have these accommodations prepared. It’s slightly funny, Sikari thinks, that the ultimate judge of the Emperor would decide to instead use a small and undecorated office, a room dedicated to just enough space to seat a few Enforcers, a desk to hold data-slates and paperwork, and a back wall dedicated to file cabinets and a small private server.

It rather suits her, Sikari realizes. Arbiter Quentin is a brutish woman, though with her rank it’s impossible to know how old she really is. Her face, the only skin showing beneath the armored black and red bodysuit she wears, is covered in scars, shaved and nearing true disfigurement but somehow never connoting weakness from the one who bears them. Her eyes, their grey and red coloration giving away their cybernetic nature, looks at them like one might look at tools, and that total visible lack of empathy makes Sikari shiver very slightly. Arbiter Quentin gives the impression of a weathered tank, armored and deadly but bearing the scars from all the enemies they’ve run beneath their treads.

“Are you aware of the purpose for which you’ve been assigned to me?” she asks, her voice never rising above a whisper.

“My orders are to guard and defend you with my life and the lives of my squadron, lord Arbiter,” Sikari replies, “and to follow any and all orders you grant us.”

The Arbiter nods, once. “You will see very little of me,” she tells them with absolute certainty. “You will follow my orders and act as support for my Enforcers. That is all.”

Sikari frowns. “What type of engagements are we likely to encounter in this mission?” She asks.

“Unclear. My purpose here is classified, as will be all of the work you undertake, but suffice to say that the corruption in this city runs deep. My task is to find it, hunt it, and kill it. You are to be the tools from which this objective is met.”

They pause for a moment to let their words sink in. “I will be entirely clear, Sergeant. Tools are to perform as needed Do not take this work lightly, or you will find yourself and your squadron given the Emperor’s mercy, by my gun or the enemy’s.”

“We’re no strangers to combat my Lord, as I’m sure you’ve seen from our file. Further, my troop has above-average knowledge on the intimacies of lower-hive combat, which I appreciate has framed some of your decision to choose our squadron for this mission.”

“Oh? And what knowledge might that be?” the Arbites asks, her tone indicating no question at all.

Sikari hesitates before answering, already wary for the trap. “We’re all drawn from on-planet, ma’am. Myself, and most of those not present, are Underhivers, and while we have not acted as a squadron in Utoria as a combat unit before, we’re familiar with the sorts of violence that occur beneath the city among gangers and mutants alike, sir.”

The Arbiter nods, her face as hard to read as it has been throughout the conversation. The two women face each other, both of them aware of each other though Sikari is sure that her own healthy fear of the Arbiter hopefully outweighs any interest the latter has in her at all. It’s stupid to assume she doesn’t know about the exact makeup of Sikari’s squadron already, including the warrants still pending for some of them. It's pretty clear that the woman in front of her knows that Sikari knows, too. An Arbiter and a Guardswoman; Sikari’s been beneath her boot since her name was assigned. All that’s left is to polish the boots as best she can.

Which is to say, as of yet, none of them have been shot where they stand.

“Good,” Quentin replies. “There’s been unnatural activity in the Underhive recently. Movements of large amounts of individuals, most unidentified. They’ve come higher than most gangs, indicating a confidence that comes either from strength or political backing. You will take your men to sector 12, subsection 182, with a small group of Enforcers circling the perimeter, and enter a known meeting spot for these individuals, deploying immediately. Wipe all of them out, save two. These two shall be returned to me intact enough to both feel pain and speak.”

Sikari bows deeply at the waist. “Thy will be done, sir,” she says.

“And the Law be upheld,” the Arbiter replies.

It isn’t until she’s out of the building that she lets herself breathe properly again, deep breaths and letting them out slowly. Not wise to show too much emotion this close, or at all for a while, not when there’s eyes still on them.

“By the Emperor, that woman’s terrifying!” Jacobi says behind her, exhaling a breath like a panicked animal, a nervous laughter following as his adrenaline gushes out all at once with no outlet.

Before she can reprimand him, Marquis slaps him upside the head hard enough that he nearly tips forward, catching himself on Michael’s shoulder, which leaves the smaller man almost falling too. She hears Liones snicker and hears them all tense as she stops pointedly in the middle of the street. Immediately she’s back on the move, walking forward, and they fall into step behind her, a bit of tension alleviated. She waits until they’re around a corner, well away from the plaza surrounding the Precinct, before taking a sudden step back and slapping Jacobi upside the head about twice as hard as Marquis did.

“Damn, Captain!” he yelps, stumbling forward with a hand to his head. “I was panicked! Excuse me for being a teensy bit scared of lady Titan back there!”

She looks at him imperiously, letting him get a bit nervous in the silence, before giving him a little half-grin. “I was thinking more of a battle tank, myself, but I suppose buff ladies intimidate some of us more than others.”

Liones snickers a bit louder this time, and surprising her, Marquis joins him, and before long all of them are leaning against something or other, chuckling uncontrollably. She signals them when they start to get too loud but even she has trouble holding back a snort. Jacobi protests weakly, saying something about preferences, damnit, but he’s drowned out by his own giggling.

“Emperor be praised, but you can see how she’s got the sort of power she does,” Jacobi squeezes out between laughs. “Judge looks like she could walk through a steel wall and then have it apologize for being in her way.”

“She looks like if you saw her in a dark alley, you wouldn’t know to praise the Emperor or piss yourself!” Michael manages, and at the surprising humor from the meek guard, Sikari can’t help but finally let loose that snort, which gets them all started again.

It takes minutes for them all to calm down, but eventually they do, letting the echoes fade. She sees that the laughter helped, even as she sees the worry, the tension that comes with preparing to enter a battle. She doesn’t think any of them can feel the weight of eyes on them as much as her, but there’s plenty to fear in any gunfight.

“Well gentlemen,” she says quietly, “let’s see if we can’t make it through this, hmm?”