[QUOTE="greendoor, post: 13425092, member: 394"]

There were no enemies.



For a moment Caelia considers throwing the grenade anyway. Better to blast away this filth than to see it for one more moment.



Reluctantly, she reattached the grenade. Flame would be better, and it should fall to the Sister Superior.



Then it started to speak. She fought hard to tune out the voices. She half considered emptying her mag into the thing and seeing how it liked blessed bolt shells.



Then the lights dimmed.



Caelia immediately turned, covering their flank, rifle rising to her shoulder. "The Emperor protects! Foul power, we counter your pride with our humility and our trust in the God-Emperor!" She half shouted, half sung, to drown out that Emperor damned voice.



It seemed the ideal moment to attack, assuming their foe didn't know about their autosenses. She scanned the precinct, looking for any sign of attack. She trusted in her Sister Superior to deal with....the thing in the room.

[/QUOTE]

[QUOTE="Zeitgeist Blue, post: 13363591, member: 10163"]

Eriko sings the songs as soon as Palais begins them. Beyond benedictions to the Emperor, they provide a soothing light among the darkness they move across now. And for that she is grateful to her Sister-Superior for beginning. Her whole body, once tense throughout their excursion into the compound, relaxes a little though she is just as ready to explode into combat as she always was.



Then soon they come across the central security station's entrance, the heart of the Enforcer compound.



Eriko positions herself behind Palais as her Sister-Superior places a hand on the entry-pad.



Eriko sighs in defeat at the scene before her. She was expecting depredations from the cult, yes, but not to this degree.



Palais steps inside, hate-filled voice biting out every word as she demands those responsible show themselves. Eriko is quieter as she follows her Sister-Superior inside. Her eyes ache and her ears strain as if trying to hear the unheard whispers of the Enemy.



Still, she does not back down from the madness. She is clad in Faith and the Emperor's light and no amount of desecration would she fear.



"And lo, though the daemons of the Dark Gods gather around and about." A song begins on her lips, barely heard on the vox but none the weaker for it.  "And though all the tribulations of the darksome realm press close upon my soul."



She begins a slow circuit around the room, not venturing too far from her Sisters, as she continues to sing softly. She peers at the woman's head, carefully and quickly darting her eyes away before anything worse than the dull ache catches on. There is nothing here but the scrawlings of the desperate and the mad, she reminds herself. No illness for her to cure, no mystery to solve.



No meaning to the words but demented pleasure to the makers. Nothing of value but everything corrupt.



"Still shall I walk in His light."



She returns to her Sister-Superior's side and slowly shakes her head.



"Cowards. There are no Daemons here, Sister-Superior, but cowards who know not to face us." Her narrowed eyes roam the room once more, looking for signs of the heretics responsible. (Awareness roll?) "We should leave. Burn this then leave and their heresies will be nothing but ash, because that is all this amounts to."



Then she turns and announces as Palais had, loudly and to any listening. "You've had your fun, but we are taking away your toys and this vandalism ends now! Hear us, cowards?"

[/QUOTE]

Palais steps forward as the three of you sing to the Immortal Emperor. Your eyes ache to look upon the sigils of the Archenemy, the shapes seeming to swim about in your vision, their words crawling up your ears as half-heard whispers. And yet, still, you pray.



"Hear His footsteps," Palais calls out, solemn. "The Emperor marches with us. This is the sound of His coming. This is the sound of your doom!"



The lights seem to brighten. The whispers cease as suddenly as they began, and though the symbols of the foe hurt to look upon, you do not flinch or quail before them, but meet them with defiance in your hearts and voices.



[Willpower Test Success. Corruption and Insanity resisted.]
"The Emperor protects!" Palais cries aloud as she raises her handflamer, and unleashes it upon the holoith projector. And then, there is so much light. There is a sensation, like a shift in pressure as the flames sweep over the eight-pointed star and consume desecrated skull. Tongues of fire leap up from the burning projector, igniting the trails of entrails that run across the room, scouring away mad scrawls and dark runes, replacing them all with cleansing warmth and light. Ashes fall across your pauldrons and helms as Palais empties her flamer, the web of flesh and skin withering away before the flame.



[Awareness Test success] As Palais begins to reload, intent on scouring away the rest of these blasphemies, Eriko sweeps the room for any concealed foes, shouting for them to emerge, but there is nothing. Just the desecration of a body, torn into so many parts and scattered about to some twisted purpose. The woman was clearly diseased, touched by the Black Rot, but there are no signs of decomposition. This woman must have been the last to die. More curiously, there isn't any sign of the local insects in the room, at all.



"Still shall He show me the way and drive back the noisome and the unclean!" Palais cries, taking up Eriko's prayer as she empties the second canister of fuel into the corrupted room, scouring away the filth and desecration. Then an alarm begins to blare, the lights flashing emergency red. You do not cease singing even as the air fills with a mist of fire suppressant, a torrent of water and foam running down your visors. Icons are dragged down by the force of the torrent, the dreadful runes and symbols beginning to run down the walls in red and black streams. Still you sing, and the military grade promethium burns bright despite the noble efforts of the suppressant systems to beat its light back down.



"Eriko. Check the cogitators for auto-picterr footage. Caelia, guard the door. I...I will reconsecrate this ground."



Eriko, you turn to the cogitators, cleaning off the foam and ash that swirls together across its surface. The console blinks, having seemingly already had a prayer-key input sometime ago and never been relocked. You have access to a great deal, from door to precinct reports and personal logs, as well as saved footage from the cameras. At current, you check a live-feed of the auto-picters. Some are of no use, having been covered by the nests of the fly-wasps. Checking through the others, however, you see empty hall after empty hall, bodies of the dead appearing on screen after screen. Hope nearly arises for a moment as you see a pair of figures behind the food counter in the cafeteria, but on closer inspection they're a pair of work servitors sitting in the cafeteria, blindly slopping down food onto an overflowing counter covered in buzzing insects.



Then you switch to a picter for the precinct's kennel and you are surprised to see the cyber-mastiffs still moving about their cages. A servitor pouring out a bag of dog food seems to offer explanation at first, until you notice a second figure sitting up in the corner, cocking their head as though listening. A man in a filth-ridden Enforcer uniform stands up, unslinging a drum-barreled shotgun as he checks the barricade at the front of the kennel. In the clear light, you can make out the man's face clearly. Haggard, with an uncomfortable-looking rash and eye with bags so bad they almost look like bruises, but untouched by the black rot. A survivor.



Then, another screen takes your attention. Figures moving through the main hall toward the security office. Bulky shapes, shambling forward at a slow but measured pace. Servitors, you realize after a moment. Combat Servitors, judging by the heavy stubbers replacing their right arms. One of them is dragging something in its left arm, leaving a thin trail of black and red across the rockcrete.

[Awareness test success]



Caelia sees them a few moments later, four burly shapes resolving down the hallway. There is no attempt to hide as they march forward, bionic eyes glinting scarlet in the light, their heavy armor plates shining brightly due to the Enforcer colors they bear.  They stomp forward with no apparent need for haste, the grinding of gears and stamp of heavy boots barely audible over the fire alarm. Their weapon jerk toward the Sister of Battle, but do not fire.



"Fire Alarum detected in security station," one of the servitors blurts. It gutters to a halt, staring at Caelia for a moment. "Error, unidentified persons in the security station. Not on authorized visitor list or personnel list. In the name of the Lex Baptismus, the Cardinal, and the Holy Magistrate, cease and repent. You will identify yourself."



"Identify," the other three Servitors chorus. "Or be purged."



"Unlawful breaking and entering of Enforcer property is punishable by: Summary execution, twenty years consignment to penal labor battalions, public flogging, no less than two days consignment to the stocks, a fine of no less than one hundred denarii, and/or a verbal warning," The servitor intones. "You have the right to admit your sins. Withholding anything is punishable in a court of law. You have the right to talk to a Ministorum cleric for spiritual guidance before we ask you any questions. You have the right to have a cleric with you during questioning. If you cannot afford a cleric, one will be appointed for you before any questioning if you wish. If you decide to answer questions now without a cleric present, you have the right to make repentance to a cleric before judgement is exacted."



"Do you understand your rights as they have been read to you?"