V2 Chapter 16: The Legendary Commissar's Powerful Connections
"Ibram Gaunt?"
"Yes. That's me."
Gaunt looked at the Inquisitor who had brought him to this dim interrogation room, and felt an uncontrollable surge of tension.
The room had no light source. Only the low-frequency hum of the interrogation servitor systems in operation.
His body was fixed immovably to a cold metal chair. Biosensors covered his skin, and several fine cortical probes had been forced into the flesh at the base of his skull.
These mechanical devices monitored his heartbeat, blood pressure, and neural fluctuations without mercy, to ensure that every word he produced contained no deception.
"Before this, you spent a considerable period of time alongside Colonel-Commissar Duvette Erdmann of the 112th. And you personally witnessed the Daemon Engine's destruction at close range."
"Yes." Gaunt drew a slow breath and answered honestly. He could not make out the person sitting in the shadow, could only feel an oppressive, cold gaze directed at him.
"I am Inquisitor Maysondaire, of the Inquisition." The man in the darkness recited a long, complex identification code in a voice that carried no inflection, establishing his authority beyond challenge.
"I require you to tell me everything that occurred in that engagement. Without omission. In particular, the abnormal performance displayed by the 112th's soldiers."
Gaunt frowned slightly, pushing through the discomfort of the probes, and asked with deliberate calm: "If you want to understand what the 112th did in that fight, why not go directly to Colonel-Commissar Duvette and ask him?"
The room went to a dead silence.
A moment later, Maysondaire's gloomy voice came again. "That is not your concern. Tell me everything."
Before the last word had fully landed, a high-voltage current drove through Gaunt's body via the cortical probes. The shock triggered violent spasms across every muscle group.
The young cadet commissar bit down hard on his lip and produced a muffled sound. When the residual current dispersed, he was breathing in ragged pulls. He began, in detail, to recount everything that had happened to him from the moment he first encountered Colonel-Commissar Duvette Erdmann.
Three days earlier.
The 112th returned successfully to the assembly square before the Dukarala Gate. After the Daemon Engine was destroyed, the remaining Chaos heretics had been swiftly swept up by the Titans and the other Astra Militarum armoured forces that arrived in support.
Duvette stood in the wreckage-covered ruins, closely guarded on all sides by a tight formation of 112th veterans.
Stroud, standing nearby, was scratching at his bald head with visible irritation. The reason: upon learning the Dukarala Gate was secure, Duvette had been preparing to immediately turn around and resume the advance, to bring the war to its conclusion faster. At that moment an abrupt urgent communication had come directly to his personal terminal from the command post. The content was entirely without courtesy: the 112th was to immediately cease all military operations and return to the forward command post.
Duvette asked, patiently, why.
The staff officer on the other end answered with cold flatness: "By the General's order."
Duvette gave a cold laugh and cut the communication.
He cursed inwardly. This damned Imperium. If not for these bureaucrats suddenly throwing themselves across his path, he would already be leading his people to eliminate the enemy's next command node.
Shortly afterward, several of the Major General's adjutants arrived at his position with an armed provost detail. They were outwardly respectful and actually firm: the 112th was to come with them to a designated camp immediately. Duvette raised no objection. He simply waved his hand and had his soldiers put away their weapons and follow.
Over the days that followed, the regiment was installed in an extremely cramped and heavily guarded perimeter camp on the outer edge of the position, under the justification of Warp contamination prevention. Surveillance posts ringed them completely. Nothing to do. In the distance, the artillery kept roaring without pause, day and night.
Duvette was actually reasonably content with this. Better to rest here than throw himself back into the lower hive killing ground. He was even privately, sarcastically entertained by the thought that ideally they'd be kept here until the entire war was over.
But the trouble did not stop.
The first incident: the provost detail, following probing orders from above, actually attempted to forcibly disarm the 112th. The result was entirely predictable. Anderson and Stroud brought the regiment's lasguns off safe and both sides stood facing each other at the camp entrance for a considerable time. Eventually Petrov withdrew the order. Against a Colonel-Commissar with a widely known reputation, forcing disarmament without the Marshal's explicit order was an action that, the moment it triggered a mutiny, would produce nothing but massive problems.
The second incident was considerably more dangerous.
An Inquisitor from the Inquisition. The gloomy-faced man entered Duvette's tent with his retinue, intending to take Duvette away for investigation by force.
Duvette leaned back in his chair and gave a contemptuous laugh. "You're welcome to try that here and see what it gets you."
Watching the Inquisitor's expression go iron-coloured as the man prepared to invoke his authority to suppress all objections, Duvette leaned slightly forward and fixed his eyes on the man's. "Did you not bother to look into me before coming here? Fool."
He reached into his pocket and produced the identity ring that Juno Karol had given him, long before this campaign.
He tossed it to the Inquisitor without particular ceremony.
He watched Maysondaire's expression change with complete clarity. The instant the gloomy-faced man saw which organization's seal was marked on the ring, his pupils contracted sharply.
He stood frozen in place for a moment. Then he handed the ring back to Duvette, did not leave a single polite word behind, turned around, and walked out.
With the crisis resolved, Duvette sat back down at the iron desk in his temporary quarters and returned to the document he had been composing for Marshal Slaydo: a Strategic Planning Revision Proposal for the Formal Prime Campaign.
He reflected, with private wry amusement, that trading on that woman's name still had its uses.
Then another thought struck him.
Having been turned away here, Maysondaire would not simply let it go. The young cadet commissar Gaunt, who had been operating alongside them, he was probably about to find himself in difficulty. That young man had no backing whatsoever to protect him.
He needed to find a way to help. So at the conclusion of this detailed operational report, which covered how to engage a Daemon Engine and proposed revisions to the campaign's strategic priorities, Duvette used a considerable amount of space to write a personal endorsement for Ibram Gaunt.
Then he handed the encrypted data-slate to Commissar-General Delane Oktar, who had arrived at the camp furiously protesting the Munitorum's detention of troops. Using the Commissar-General's independent communications channel, which operated entirely outside the Major General's jurisdiction, Duvette bypassed Petrov's block and sent the report directly through.
Major General Petrov Duval stood before the hololithic display, brow firmly set.
"The Inquisitor truly gave up on investigating Colonel-Commissar Duvette." He addressed his adjutant with something approaching disbelief.
"Yes, General. After being turned away at Duvette's tent, the Inquisitor went to interrogate the young cadet commissar of the 8th Hyrkan instead." The adjutant kept his head down. "But that caused considerably larger problems. Commissar-General Delane Oktar has lodged an extremely strong protest regarding this. He has personally sent a direct communication to Marshal Slaydo."
The adjutant continued. "At the same time, Colonel-Commissar Duvette of the 112th — using Commissar-General Oktar's channel — has also sent a protest to Marshal Slaydo and submitted a report going over your head."
"Damn it..." Petrov kept his voice down, but the words came out regardless.
Now he understood fully. That legendary commissar was genuinely not simple. An Inquisitor prepared to operate like a rabid dog, upon seeing this man, he had backed down without a fight. This could only mean that behind Duvette stood a backing so powerful that the Inquisition itself did not want to casually provoke it. He appeared to have made an enemy of someone he absolutely should not have touched.
But he had nothing to be afraid of. Petrov could only tell himself this. He had been carrying out the standard duty of an Imperial general in the prevention of Warp contamination. Everything he had done was within Munitorum doctrine.
The problem was that in this universe, making an enemy of a legendary commissar with connections reaching to the very top was absolutely not a good position to be standing in. He probably needed to find some way to address this...
Just as Petrov was turning over his options in silence, the staff officer beside him called out sharply.
"Commander! The Marshal is sending a highest-priority communications request. Marshal Slaydo requires all forward commanders to attend an immediate remote conference."