Page 28

Miniature Sarcophagus

“A ristedes! Wake up!” came a stern woman’s voice. Casus slowly returned to consciousness, having fallen asleep in his seat a few hours prior. A set of ominous, purple-glowing eyes stared down at him from a pale, narrow face framed by black hair at the sides, blunt bangs tracing the woman’s browline in a dull V-shape, intensifying her already owl-like countenance. The glossy blackness of her hair was broken up by eye-like sigils in white, defiantly remaining congruent even as her hair shifted about, creating an unsettling appearance. Casus was accustomed to the idea of having eyes in the back, and he was slowly growing used to Lady Blackhand’s detached second set of eyes, but this woman felt more all-seeing than the two of them combined, exuding an aura of constant, unwavering vigilance.

The Witch Inquisitor, Yazata Heptaxia.

She wore a partially unbuttoned satin shirt and tight black pants with cutouts on the outer sides of the thighs. It was a mode of dress similar to Casus’ own, but the similarities ended there. Of the countless differences between the two of them, the most obvious were the “Black Bindings” visibly crisscrossing Yazata’s skin, visible upon her thighs, over the very top of her chest, and going all the way up her neck, even peeking out of the bottoms of her sleeves. Eldritch symbols shone upon them in hues of purple the same as the glow of the inquisitor’s eyes. A rapier-hilted bar mace hung from her belt, held by steel rings rather than a scabbard. It was a weapon of countless diamond-shaped, razor-sharp facets.

She walked away from him the moment she saw he was awake, turning to the one-way observation window. A minimalistic control console rose from the ground in front of the window, with a handful of black cables leading down from it to beneath the floor. Yazata’s footsteps were punctuated by sharp click-clacking sounds, not because she wore heels, but because her feet were metal, as were her legs all the way up to the knees. Her trousers were bound down to her prosthetics with those Black Bindings of hers, leaving them exposed halfway up the calves. The craftsmanship was of a standard equaled by few—they were Inner Relics, after all, made by the church for Yazata specifically. Rather than mimicking human anatomy to the fullest extent, her prosthetics traded biomimicry for improved functionality and resilience with a simpler, more heavy-duty foot and ankle design.

There was no need for her to speak of the situation; Seer was doing all the talking that was necessary.

“I’ve got him! The little shit’s fuckin’ pinging me! Can you hear me, inquisitor?! I know where Semzar Hashem is RIGHT NOW!” Seer yelled in desperation, doubtlessly because he worried there was not much time.

Yazata reached for the console, and with the flick of a switch, the observation window shifted to go both ways. Pressing an adjacent button, she took a mouthpiece in hand and spoke. “You may now give your testimony, we are recording.”

Seer continued without the need for any further prompting. “He’s been intermittently pinging me for the last hour or so. I didn’t speak up until I was sure he was in one place and not just passing through. It’s the mansion on Mirzaii Two.”

“Old Ishmail Two-snakes’ mansion… isn’t it owned by a Silversword administrator?” Casus mused aloud. He didn’t know who exactly owned Mirzaii Two, but he knew her position due to the controversy surrounding her acquisition of the property. Ishmail had been a once-famous ex-contractor who pioneered the Twin Serpent Voidkey design as standard equipment for his agency’s full-member contractors. The so-called Iron Adder Agency competed fiercely with the Silversword Agency for dominance in Audunpoint’s early years but collapsed after Ishmail’s disappearance under dubious circumstances.

“I wouldn’t know about that. I just know that Semzar likes to host his degenerate parties there. It’s where this happened to me, so I won’t weep if you send a saint to level the place,” Seer replied, gesturing to his visor with hatred seeping from every word.

“Just a moment,” Yazata said into the mouthpiece before hanging it up and once more turning the window back to a one-way mirror.

“Was that enough information for you to decide on a plan of attack, Aristedes?” she asked, an undercurrent of annoyance in her voice. He couldn’t blame her. He was withholding information from an Inquisitor. That was to be expected from civilians and even witnesses, but not from coworkers, even less so from apostles, and absolutely not from Pilgrim Banisher apostles. Casus fully understood where she was coming from, because he hated it too, but he couldn’t reconcile his own sense of right with betraying Lady Blackhand’s trust.

Casus got up, and walked to the table that occupied a third of the room’s floor space. It was a “Strategic Planning Unit SPR-4735-C.” It was an enormous and highly advanced piece of machinery, combining a massive memory bank called a Memory Obelisk , countless memslate slots, a cognition engine the size of a small building, all feeding into a combination of projector lenses and a geomantic mapping module. The module was a mass of thaumetically treated “clay” that could work as an erasable writing surface, form a 3D map, and perform several other fancy functions that rarely if ever got used. Unsurprisingly, these things were rare due to their impracticality compared to simpler and more modular solutions.

He exerted quite a bit of force pressing one of the large buttons on the side. A loud CLACK betrayed the fact it set a great clockwork mechanism into motion. The SPU whirred to life, the scribe-automata underfoot coming alive and reading off of the Memory Obelisk as the boot sequence.

“I need to ask a few more questions. Patch him through and keep it open; just let him see,” he said. Yazata did as asked, and stepped away as she began walking around the room’s perimeter to reach Casus’ side without breaking his sightline with Seer.

“I’ll ask simply. Do you know of any means of entry into the mansion that wouldn’t be on official maps or blueprints?” Casus questioned. “Secret entrances or passages through the mansion, illegal tunnels for trafficking contraband…”

“Or people,” Seer finished, his reluctant tone betraying the fact he did know. He sighed, leaning forward in his chair, grasping his head. He ran his hands over his visor, then emitted a noise of annoyance as his vision was overtaken by smudges. While cleaning the outer shell with his shirt, he began talking again.

“When Semzar ’invited’ me to that mansion, I was led through one of those tunnels. The ones that nobody but its builders and their victims know about. It was connected to the mansion’s underground supply line. I can point out where it was on a map; it was this underpass somewhere near… I think it was somewhere near Jafarnejad Gardens, with the big tree.”

“That’s nearly ten kilometers by air from the mansion…” Casus thought aloud, operating the SPU. The lenses set around its outer edge came alive, projecting a map of that section of the city. With the adjustment of a slider, he turned it so that Seer could see it from a bird’s eye view. Immediately, he pointed out the spot.

“There. Some stones on the left side look out of place. Not sure how it opens; I couldn’t see. Probably a combination of illusion and deterrence field.”

“You let us deal with that . How much did you see inside the tunnel?”

“I already told you. The tunnel goes on for a while, twisting left and right, loads of sealed off side passages from the looks of the walls. Some of ’em are just locked doors, and some of ’em are just bars, like the rusty barred ones off of old elevators. Saw some nasty shit behind those, but it all looked to have been abandoned for a while. As for the subterrain, it looked like a private tram line or something. It’s way too nice to not be on maps.”

Casus shifted the map. Both the projection and the clay model shifted, showing a sprawling, vein-like tangle of tunnels and vents.

“Looks like it connects the mansion to several other buildings; they even come under the same deed as the mansion. A butcher shop, a grocer, library, anything you would need without having to interact with the common rabble ,” Casus mused as he inspected the map.

“One more thing about the tramline—it was flooded. Wasn’t much. About two, three finger-widths of old rainwater. Won’t stop you, but they’ll hear you coming.”

Casus nodded. “Very well. You’ve been helpful.”

He glanced at Yazata, and without him needing to say a word, she once more separated them from Seer. With that, Casus got to work, operating the giant machine with gusto. It wasn’t the most practical device; it didn’t conform to more common standards of design and learning it had been a nightmare, but Casus couldn’t help but love the SPU. It was as much a holy relic of the Inner Wheel as it was a machine, possessing a sense of the sublime not found in its mass-production counterparts. In a few minutes, he had a plan of attack worked out—not because he could think that quickly, but because he had considered this possibility before. Audunpoint’s subterrain layer wasn’t quite as vast as those of capital cities, but there were so many ancient and forgotten passages from the city’s time as a Jas’raban metropolis that there was no chance in hell to keep track of them all.

The SPU rendered the subterrain on the clay layer, while the surface level was projected above.

“You want me to lead a contingent of ‘Red Hood’ semi-autonomous graft-beasts, encircle the mansion, and mount a direct assault? Truly?” Yazata questioned for the third time.

Nodding, Casus reaffirmed his intent. “I will join up with Lady Blackhand to infiltrate through the subterrain while the security force is distracted. After we eliminate Semzar and his officers, we will be able to mop up the rest from within and without. Should we falter, other tactics will remain viable.”

Sighing, the witch-inquisitor agreed. “Very well.”

“I expected you to outright object to the plan. I even prepared two alternatives,” Casus admitted.

“I am an Inquisitor, even if my direct combat capabilities are on the lower end. If I could not stand against odds like these, I would not qualify for my title. I must admit that I am curious. What were these alternatives of yours?”

“The first one… I shan’t say. It is neither relevant nor interesting. As for the second, I intended to enlist the aid of a particular independent contractor by leveraging personal connections as well as dipping into mine and my sister’s money.”

“Who?”

“An… unpleasant individual. One I would rather not deal with if I can help it. He recently purged a Hazard Zone and lost the entire payout on collateral damage, including any claims on Archon-forged items. His combat capabilities are some of the best out of anyone within my reach, but the strings are wrought of razor wire dipped in corrosive venom…” Casus trailed off for a moment as the mental image of that madman floated up from memory. He banished it, and refocused on Yazata. “Fortunately, you didn’t veto my plan. Thus, there is no need to involve him.”

The part he didn’t mention was that he was afraid of that man. Trying to rope in the man known as “The Cleaner Krait” was about as extreme as trying to get official help from the public-facing church, while posing far greater personal danger for Casus. The one upside was that doing so would allow him to bypass the church bureaucracy. In short, it was an absolute last resort.

“Speaking of combat capabilities…” Yazata looked sidelong at Casus while zooming in the clay model. “Are you certain this ’Lady Blackhand’ is qualified? I admit that her track record, assuming it is accurate, would be impressive for a low-ranker, but this is not a matter that can be resolved by a handful of low-rankers, even if you yourself are borderline. Semzar Hashem alone is known to possess a near-cap archetype and a high third-order voidkey, and we do not know who will be with him. His father’s presence would all but guarantee the failure of this endeavor.”

“Semzar is a fool who lacks the skill to properly make use of the power he has stolen from his hosts. He is no different from some grafted-to-the-gills Kartier brat,” Casus responded, also shifting the clay model. “Moreover, he fears his father as much as he hates him, doubly so given the current circumstances. You yourself confirmed the truthfulness of Seer’s testimony regarding the Hashem Family’s internal political state. Between us and Semzar, Semzar has the greatest personal investment in staying apart from Damrus.”

After a shallow nod of acknowledgement, Yazata interrupted. “But he is likely to be accompanied by individuals who could be a real threat. A threat to you or even I, let alone a relatively unknown low-ranker. Make no mistake; I trust your judgment, Aristedes, but I would prefer more than a single man’s testimony.”

Casus didn’t like deception. It went against his nature. But nonetheless, he opened his mouth and said, “With all due respect, Inquisitor, I would not bet against Blackhand even if she were stripped of all wards and surrounded by gunmen.”

And Yazata didn’t sense a lie because there wasn’t one. The feat of deception which took place was not one of spoken words, but of the mind; Casus wrenched his own consciousness away from everything Yazata didn’t know that she had a right to know. He forced himself to not think about Blackhand’s status as an unlettered apostle, nor the fact he had leveraged his status to secure the option of access to a voidkey beyond her qualifications should she require it. Casus did not have the power or the guile to keep such a requisition quiet should it go through, so he kept it to a possibility rooted in the truth of his recent training. His plan, at this moment, was to bring it up with Blackhand and let her decide, hoping she would make the wise choice. Some part of him genuinely believed that she would manage to secure a third-order voidkey before then; if only to avoid having to put her trust in the church.

They separated after going over the details, with Casus loading the map and the plan of approach onto a memslate before leaving to join up with Blackhand. Yazata would, in the meanwhile, continue interrogating Seer until the time came to rendezvous at the staging point, which was a randomly selected safe house that was close enough to be practical but not the single closest, on the off-chance it was being watched.

Meanwhile, elsewhere in the city…

***