Heresy Hidden, Heresy Horrid

         The sun was setting, that was the slang they used on Gavrin Prime for the end of the day cycle, though there was no actual sun to speak of as Gavrin Prime was a hive world. Here in the lower hive, crime was rife... There he sat within the confines of a seedy lower hive booze den, sipping upon the pint of obviously watered down ale, though truth be told, not as watered down as most of these scum bars, so this was obviously one of the higher class establishments of the underhive. He sighed and set his glass down, glancing around the bar. Where was he? He thought to himself... Lateness was one thing he had an intolerance for, and his contact was late... He ran a hand through his long, oaken brown hair and shook it loose a little before picking up his drink once more and forcing himself to take another swig... He had to at least look like he belonged here, right?
         The door to the tavern swung open and the harsh, bright, artificial light of the day cycle’s end shone in to the establishment, causing many to squint and shy away from its radiance. Three men stepped in, a number of jokes ran through his mind as he glanced up, but then he stopped as he noticed they were armed... The first, and assumedly the leader, had a shotgun resting casually over his shoulder, the second, a smaller, leaner looking man, had two auto pistols braced and swinging from person to person, covering the room. The third, a big brute by human standards, had a rather hefty sledgehammer, probably stolen from work detail.
“Listen up!” Exclaimed the first, his accent was thick and marked him as a definite local of the Gavrin underhive, eastern district from what he’d gathered so far from being here. “This is a good ol’ fashioned stick up, we’ll be comin’ round with bags fer y’all t’place yer valu’bles in to... Keep it nice, quiet an’ simple-like and no folk’re gon’ get hurt, alrighty?” The man stood and grinned, staring down the three would be thieves and before the first could bring his shotgun to bear or the second could bring his pistols around on him, the first man, the loudmouthed leader, dropped to the floor, dead, a small hole burnt into his skull from the las bolt. He stood there, staring at the other two, laspistol in hand and smirk on his face, “Well gents, there’re two ways we can do this... Either you go to the arbites on your own and turn yourselves in, or I take you there myself...” The man with the auto pistols fired, the crack of the solid shelled weapon rumbled incredibly loud within the confines of the bar but his target wasn’t there, he’d ducked back and upturned his table for cover, “Or, option three... You shoot at me and force me to kill you like I did your boss...” The auto fire kept on spattering against the metal table, ricocheting around the bar, smashing glasses all around until finally the infamous click-click-click of the gunman running out of ammo.
The man swung and rolled from behind the table, firing another las shot, taking the gunman by the knee but miscalculated and had to force himself to roll further to dodge an oncoming downward hammer blow from the big guy, this caused him to clatter into another table. He frowned and hurriedly scrambled to his feet and waited for the behemoth of a man to charge once more, which of course he did. He waited, waited, waiting until the very last second before reaching for a sword hilt within his coat and there, in a split second and an arc of crackling blue light, he stepped aside and past the hammer wielding brute. There was a moment of stillness, of silence until the brute’s hammer snapped clean in two at the shaft, then so did the brute at the waist. The man holstered his pistol, ran a hand through his hair once more, shook the gore from his blade and then deactivated its crackling power field. The sword itself was a beautifully ornate, long bladed, straight edged sabre, the weapon of a master duellist... He sheathed it and sighed, glancing to the three bodies, noting the gunman crawling for the door... He stepped to the man and placed a boot on his back “Now then fella, option one, or option two?” The gunman raised his hands and whimpered, “O-o-one, sir, di’nt mean no trouble, jus’ needin money sir, tha’s all...” And with that, the man raised his boot and the gunman hurried from the bar as fast as his busted knee would carry him.
He sighed, turned and gave a smirk and a nod to the barkeep “Sorry for the mess, I’ll pay for the repairs of course... Oh, and another round please...” And with that, he sat once more, at a different table this time, one that wasn’t upturned and full of bullet dents. He glanced to his coat pocket as a beeping noise rang out. He pulled out his dataslate and opened the message, [---Imperial Coding: Encryption Level 5 – Sapphire Clearance Required---]. The man placed his thumb upon the print reader of his PDA and it beeped in acknowledgement, opening the message. ~Inquisitor Armitage, I trust your work on Gavrin is going well? I expect to find a report within my inbox soon. This is just a courtesy message really to see that you’re still alive and haven’t turned traitor on us... Just a little joke there, but seriously Sebastian, you do need to report in more. Looking forward to hearing from you, hope all goes well. I’ll keep the amasec on ice for your next visit. Yours, Lord Inquisitor Vice.” Damn Vice, cocky pup making a joke about him turning rogue? Sebastian smirked, mental note... Next time I train an acolyte, make sure they don’t pick up my sense of humour too...
Sebastian sighed and made short work of his drink. It looked like his contact wasn’t going to show up tonight. Well, he hoped perhaps the rest of his team had perhaps had better luck with their investigations... He checked his chrono readout and yawned, it was late, even for him, and so he settled his tab and decided to return to his rented lodgings for the night... Another fruitless day... It was looking like Gavrin was becoming quite the waste of his time...

The night cycle passed uneventfully, which was a welcome change for Sebastian. He awoke at 09:00 Imperial Time and checked his dataslate for any new messages. Aside from the usual social messages from colleagues who actually have access to his ‘public’ contact handle, one message particularly caught his eye. ~Mr. A, my sincerest apologies for my non attendance last night. I had some other pressing issues that required dealing with. With your permission, I would like to rearrange for a meeting this evening, in the same establishment perhaps? Yours, Horatio Velt. ~ Velt, Sebastian wasn’t sure what to make of Velt. He was a merchant, a planetside liaison for the trade ships that landed here at the hive docks but recently, he had tried his hand at selling a more precious commodity, information. Everything could be found out, for a price, and Velt seemed to have the reputation for acquiring such a commodity... It was a long shot, but Sebastian sent a reply to say he would much rather meet at a different establishment, another booze den known as the ‘Silver Aquila’. He sighed, stood and moved to the bathroom to go through his usual morning hygiene routine, finishing off with dressing and fastening his hair back, today with a white ribbon.
After checking through his weapons, holstering them and fastening his sword sheath to his belt. He was ready to face the day, whatever that may hold... Sebastian opened a channel to his team, all placed strategically throughout the underhive of Gavrin, trying to uncover anything with regards to their mission... The mission... Tch, this one was going to be hell, hell to plan, hell to prepare, hell to pursue, just another day at the office... “This is A, status?” A deep, raspy voice was the first to reply, “A, K here, all clear, nothing to report, continuing with objectives...” The second was a distinctly feminine voice, “B here, nothing on my end either, I’ll keep you posted though Sebbi!” Sebastian winced, he hated that nickname... The next voice was a very proper, clear and authoritive male, “V reporting in Sir, all clear on the west, continuing with your orders. V out.” And finally, another voice, again male, though younger, fresher almost, “J, there may be something, I’m going to look more into it and then post you the details...” With a smirk, Sebastian made his way out of the rented establishment and off to make some investigations of his own...

The light reflected from the lens of Jabel’s omni-visor as he proceeded to run a diagnostic of the building he was surveying with his auspex. He read four bio signs inside, all of humanoid mass and temperature, so this didn’t look too difficult, but then, he was only here for reconnaissance. Jabel was masking his heat signature and other such giveaways that sensors may pick up on such as odour or excess moisture. This came as second nature for Jabel, as he was one of the Imperium’s sanctioned psykers, beings of potentially limitless and world ending power as they could quite literally tap in to and draw energy from the warp, manifesting it to their whim. Jabel specifically focussed in the field known as Biomancy, altering the biological states of himself and those around him, which was quite handy in a combat situation as, with the slightest of thoughts, Jabel could patch up even the most potentially life threatening wounds to  nothing but a light bruise. He’d been scoping this building for two days now from his abandoned apartment across the street. The same four people seemed to stay there, all suspected cultists of The Enemy. He shuddered, even the very thought of The Enemy’s presence was enough to send a shiver down his spine, as if a block of ice had just been placed internally at the base of his brain...
There had been other visitors to this establishment, one of which, through some research, had been noted as a certain ‘Celvar Frasik’. Frasik was a known arms dealer with an Arbites felony list as long as a land speeder. This had piqued Jabel’s curiosity, why was a known arms dealer associating with suspected cultists? Well, okay, that was obvious, to deal weaponry of course, but why did they want weapons in the first place, what were they planning to do? Four was too small a number for any form of assault, which could only mean they had more likeminded individuals, perhaps even a great number more, perhaps even a small army waiting in the sidelines to be equipped and sent to battle... Sure there were Arbites and PDF troops should that happen, but in a confined hive such as Gavrin, a surprise assault on such a large scale would be potentially catastrophic. He blinked, his auspex blipped as another signature arrived. It was Frasik, again...

It was quiet on the east side, too quiet for Vekrim’s liking. Vekrim was formally a platoon sergeant of the Mordian 112th and so had seen his fair share of fights so all of this sneaking around malarkey just wasn’t his cup of recaf at all... He sighed, forced to wear civilian garb for the purposes of stealth but he so yearned to be wearing his pristine, finely pressed, crisp white uniform of his beloved 112th.
There was a lot of negative speculation and naysaying with regards to Vekrim where other troops of the 112th were concerned, as he was the son of one of the Lord Generals so many doubted his rank had been earned by actual merit. And as he’d been swept up by the Inquisition, he’d never had that chance to prove himself by achieving a higher rank by his own doing. He’d always  resented the Inquisition for that, and by proxy, resented Sebastian for being an Inquisitor, but that aside, he knew Sebastian was a good, strong hearted individual, like every good warrior should be. So, for now, that was good enough for Vekrim, that and this was the Inquisition... You just don’t dilly dally and frak around with the Inquisition.
Vekrim had been scouting out a hab tower for the duration of his investigation so far for any leads. He’d been tipped off by Jabel (Another one he wasn’t sure about, damn psykers...) that there was a man by the name of Frasik who currently lived within this hab tower. Sure enough, for these past two days, Frasik had been residing at this address. There was definitely a link here, and that was something worth exploiting. He sent a coded communiqué to Sebastian, informing him of the situation and to try and get here by ‘nightfall’.
Sebastian glanced over the communiqué on his dataslate and sighed, nightfall, that would be troublesome as he was supposed to be meeting Velt this evening, near nightfall, so he wouldn’t have much time. He responded accordingly with an open ended message along the lines of ‘Possibly...’ before returning to his grilled grox burger with the finest in synthetic cheese that the Gavrin underhive could muster, which, wasn’t very fine at all... He coughed, forcing the mouthful down his gullet before swigging heavily on his cup of recaf to wash down the horrid, rancid aftertaste.

The stench of oil and coal smoke stung Kronic’s nostrils. He was perched atop the roof of an office building within the confines of an industrial yard. The sound of the machinery was distractingly loud, or, it would have been if Kronic was a normal human. Kronic is perhaps the most interesting of Sebastian’s entourage, as he is the most mysterious, very little is known about him. Kronic is what is referred to by the Imperium as a ‘Mind Wiped’, essentially meaning that for whatever crimes he may have committed, he had been subjected to a ritual cleansing of his mental pathways, removing all traces of memory and a great deal of personality from the subject. This punishment is reserved for dire crimes, but those not considered meritable of arco-flagellation. The process essentially renders the subject into an autonomous  yet highly skilled servant in whatever field they best suited before the process. In Kronic’s case, that was obviously as a fighter. Kronic had a knack for being able to use any weapon he could get his hands on, often turning up to a fight with a weapon that quite frankly, not even Sebastian knew where it had come from. It was a running joke amongst some of Sebastian’s closer comrades that the reason he kept Kronic around is that the Inquisition didn’t quite trust him enough to allow requisition of an arco-flagellant.
Currently, Kronic was observing this industrial plant through the scope he had attached to his long barrelled, high velocity hunting rifle. He’d received word from Jabel that a potentially high amount of weaponry was either being smuggled planet side or being made right here under their noses. As this was the largest factory unit, and thus capable of making such a large number of weapons, this was the obvious place to look, but so far he’d seen nothing to warrant further investigation, so he waited, not moving, barely even breathing, not even so much as a blink of his eyes. He simply waited, watching, focussed.

The shipyard, the one place that made the ‘cultural’ district of the underhive look hospitable. This was Blu’s turf, she loved places like this. She had a knack for finding things out; she always seemed to settle well whenever they came to a new hive planet, probably because she was a native to Necromunda, the worst of them all... Regardless of the planet or the culture, she always seemed to fit in and as such, made for an excellent investigator, gathering information from the locals, always able to work her way into groups, get the titbits she needed; and probably a few free drinks on the way. She was good, she was very good, and she was also, through years of field work in Sebastian’s employ, a stealth specialist... She wasn’t too bad on the eyes either...
She ran a hand through her electric blue hair, no doubt the reasoning behind her name, and sighed, taking a long, easing drag from her lho-stick. She glanced over to the shipyard before returning her attention to the docking requests she’d managed to ‘acquire’ somehow. In situations like this, it was probably best not to ask how and where she managed to get such important items, she just did, and as it progressed the God-Emperor’s holy work, questions remained unasked.
So far, nothing seemed out of the ordinary, and even she knew that she wasn’t good enough to sneak on every ship in the dockyard to check whether they were carrying the cargo they said they were. She recognised a few names on the dock list, known rogue traders, some she’d even had the privilege of travelling with from time to time, though privilege was a strong word, as like Sebastian, being a hive worlder, Blu hated inter planetary travel... It just wasn’t, natural...  She yawned and stood, tapping Sebastian’s comm-bead signal into her auspex so she could find him. Might as well see the boss man and give her report personally...