---o---
"Hope there's no Corpse Starch in any of this."
Zhou Ye cast a mildly suspicious eye over the banquet table.
Not that he was particularly hungry. The Hyperion had plenty of seeds in storage — bananas, apples, watermelons, all manner of things. When he wanted fresh fruit, he simply used the Authority of the Herrscher of Death to accelerate their ripening.
The grotesque culinary traditions of this universe were therefore largely beneath his concern.
---o---
"War is nearly upon us. Does anyone have anything they wish to say?"
The banquet spread before them was lavish, but the Governor's face told a different story entirely. Exhaustion had carved itself into every line of it. The collapsing front lines and the relentless tide of bad news had taken their toll.
There was some good news, at least. The tithe had been paid off several years ago. No risk of the tax collectors showing up mid-campaign to demand their cut. Given how remote Aestia was, the next assessment cycle wouldn't come around for another fifty years at minimum.
But even that relief was cold comfort. An endless tide of requisitions, logistics reports, and resource allocation decisions still demanded his personal attention every single day.
The only thing that had eased his burden lately was a squad of Astartes falling from the sky.
A heavy silence settled over the hall following his question.
Then—
"My lord, please do not worry."
A voice cut through, a touch too bright for the occasion. Zhou Ye traced it to the representative of the Workers' Guild.
"Planetary Governor, in this moment of great peril, only unity will see us through. Each and every one of us is precious. From the moment of our birth, the God-Emperor bestows upon us equal rights and equal duties..."
"...Oh. A Genestealer Cult. Right. Never mind, then."
The speech was impassioned. Genuinely moving, even.
Zhou Ye stared for a moment, slightly stunned by the sheer confidence of it. Then he muttered through his mask's internal channel.
A Workers' Guild. Of course. That explained how Aestia was still managing to supply the war effort at all. Someone had been running a very efficient shadow logistics network. Made complete sense now.
He also had a rough sense of the timeline by this point. Somewhere in the gap between the 40th and 41st Millennium. That placed certain things.
---o---
"Hh..."
Zhou Ye was currently linked to several of the White Scars and to Inquisitor Chris — still disguised as a Servitor in the corner — through his mask's channel. Everything he muttered, they heard.
"Don't expose them yet. We still need what the Genestealers can provide."
Chris's voice came back immediately, calm and measured.
He had recognized what was happening the moment the Guild representative opened his mouth. Ordo Xenos, after all. Genestealers were practically his professional specialty. Having a Genestealer Cult embedded in a Hive World's industrial base was hardly a surprise.
If anything, given the current state of Aestia, a Hive without one would have been the unusual outcome.
The Tyranid fleet was still at an unknown distance. No reason to waste useful cannon fodder before they got here. The Genestealers could wait.
---o---
"I keep getting the feeling this is going to turn into one massive clusterfuck."
Zhou Ye let the thought run through his head quietly.
He already knew about the Tzeentch presence. The Iron Warriors and the Dark Mechanicum were driving a force that included a healthy contingent of Khorne worshippers — the most aggressive possible combination. Now there were Genestealers confirmed in the infrastructure.
What else might be lurking? A Necron Dynasty waking up somewhere underground, maybe?
That would be a textbook clusterfuck right there.
He had to admit — part of him was genuinely looking forward to it.
---o---
"My lord, have no fear. The God will grant us strength. Our great and merciful God—"
The Bishop's voice rang out next, slightly strained around the edges, with that particular quality to it that was difficult to place and impossible to ignore.
He was addressing the Governor directly, winding up for what promised to be an extensive meditation on divine providence.
Governor Aestia looked between the Bishop and the Guild representative, and the ghost of something like relief crossed his face.
In a hall full of scheming functionaries and hollow ceremony, these two had consistently been the most genuinely useful people at his table. The Guild had kept the supply lines running against all odds. The Ecclesiarchy had helped him manage the near-impossible complexity of administering an entire world under siege.
As territory after territory fell, the workload had actually decreased somewhat. But these two had remained reliable throughout.
And now the Bishop was speaking—
---o---
Click.
The sound of a bolt round being chambered.
Qin Meng's boltgun came up in a single fluid motion, leveled directly at the Bishop's head.
He wasn't the only one. Every Astartes in the room moved simultaneously, and in the span of a single heartbeat the entire hall was locked down — boltguns trained on every occupant.
Every occupant, that is, except Zhou Ye.
"My lords—!"
"Nobody move. I am Inquisitor Chris, of the Ordo Xenos."
The voice came from the Servitor in the corner, which shed its disguise as it spoke. Sharp eyes swept across the room, pausing briefly on the Workers' Guild representative.
Genestealer Cult.
He would have very much liked to deal with that immediately. He didn't. The war needed warm bodies, and Genestealer Cultists were extraordinarily motivated warm bodies. He would spend them on the front lines, where their fanaticism could be pointed at something useful, and let the battlefield take care of the rest.
But the Tzeentch infiltrator could not wait. You never knew what tricks a Tzeentch operative might have been quietly setting up in the background. The moment those machinations ripened into something actionable, everyone in this room would have a very bad day.
The Genestealers were a manageable variable. Tzeentch was not.
---o---
"Your Grace," Chris said. "Would you be so kind as to place your hand on this book?"
He ignored the fear spreading through the room like a fog. He crossed to the Bishop directly, produced the tome that reeked faintly of rot and something older, and without waiting for consent, pressed the Bishop's hand down onto its cover.
"AAAHH—!"
The scream came instantly.
Blue light erupted across the Bishop's body. Strange, shifting markings flared to life across his skin. The hand he had kept tucked beneath his robes throughout the entire evening twisted and elongated — and where a human hand should have been, a sharp avian talon uncurled.
BANG.
The boltgun fired once.
What remained of the Bishop's head ceased to be a concern.
"...!"
Governor Aestia went very still, staring at the space where the man he had trusted most had been sitting a moment before.
He had not known.
---o---
The screening proceeded.
The sound of boltguns punctuated the next several minutes at irregular intervals.
By the time it was over, nearly ten of the assembled guests had been found wanting.
The Governor himself passed. Whatever his failings, his soul was his own.
Chris surveyed what remained of the gathering.
"The Ecclesiarchy has been comprehensively compromised by Tzeentch," he said. "But the more pressing concern is the Navigator's Court."