V2 Chapter 144: Duvette. What Nerve You Have.
On the way to the crusade flagship, Duvette kept his mind on the same problem.
He had to pull Slaydo back from the Chaos corruption. First he had to find the source of it and destroy it, then cut off whatever channel was still allowing Chaos to reach the Warmaster.
After that, it would come down to Slaydo's own will.
Duvette leaned against the shuttle's interior wall and looked at the hatch ahead of him. Slaydo was over a hundred and sixty years old. Even a Warmaster of the Imperium was not beyond the reach of time.
He did not know if Slaydo could hold.
He did not know how Slaydo would face him.
In the middle of these thoughts, the shuttle had already closed on the crusade flagship. Its hull went through several guidance corrections, then eased into the hangar bay.
When the rear ramp came down, a single officer was waiting.
The officer's face was expressionless. He rendered Duvette a brief salute.
"Follow me. The Warmaster is waiting."
Duvette said nothing.
He came down the ramp and took in the hangar around him. The flagship's bay was as busy as ever: loading servitors, armourers, naval ratings, and patrol soldiers all moving about their tasks. Everything looked much as it always had.
That normalcy lasted only as long as the hangar.
On the way to Slaydo's compartment, Duvette started to notice what was wrong.
Officers and soldiers in the corridors had tight expressions and faster steps than usual. Someone was arguing over an assignment order number. Someone else was pushing another over corridor access clearance, and both fell immediately quiet the moment a patrol unit approached.
The atmosphere across the entire flagship was one of pressure.
Everyone watching their own back.
Duvette stopped paying attention.
He dropped his gaze and followed the officer ahead of him.
They reached a compartment at the upper level of the vessel. The officer stopped and indicated the sealed half-automatic hatch.
"The Warmaster is inside. Go in."
Duvette gave a nod and stepped forward.
Just as he moved to push the door, two of Slaydo's personal Storm Troopers raised their hands simultaneously and stopped him.
One of them spoke. "No weapons inside."
Duvette looked at them for a moment as though committing their faces to memory.
The two soldiers did not give ground.
"The Warmaster's orders."
Duvette was quiet briefly, then unclipped the power sword from his hip and removed the plasma pistol, hanging both on the weapon rack beside the door.
He stepped forward again.
The two Storm Troopers stopped him again.
"We will also need to search you."
This time, Duvette stopped.
His brow came down. His gaze settled on both soldiers. The next instant, something came off him that felt like a predator choosing the moment to move.
Both Storm Troopers were veterans who had seen considerable combat. They still stepped back half a pace.
Duvette said it low and very clearly. "No one in this crusade has the standing to search me except the Warmaster himself."
"If you obstruct me again, I will not object to settling it here."
Both soldiers opened their mouths slightly, still intending to say something.
At that moment, Slaydo's voice came through the communicator beside the door.
"Let him in."
The two Storm Troopers lowered their heads immediately and stepped aside.
Duvette did not look at them again.
He pushed open the half-automatic hatch and walked in.
The compartment appeared to be the Warmaster's private office. It was not a large space. Battle-zone maps hung on the walls. The desk was covered in documents and data-slates. A compact star chart projector stood to one side.
Three people were inside.
Slaydo sat behind a solid wood desk, looking down at a document. Hanging from his chest was a small figurine carved in the likeness of Saint Sabbat.
In Duvette's vision, both the figurine and all three people in the room glowed red.
He took that in at a glance and moved his eyes on.
Standing beside Slaydo was a young man with a particularly clean-featured face, holding a data-slate, waiting for the Warmaster's instruction. At a greater distance stood a tall armed guard.
Duvette looked past both of them and walked directly toward Slaydo.
The young man immediately spoke.
"The Warmaster is working through documents."
"Please wait beside the door."
Duvette glanced at him once. The new Chief of Staff's uniform was pressed with excessive precision, every cuff-fold appearing to have been measured with a rule.
His voice carried a particular quality of condescension even when not raised.
Duvette kept walking.
The young man's expression stiffened. He appeared to conclude that his authority was being challenged by a Major General-Commissar. His voice went up.
"Major General-Commissar Duvette. Be aware of your standing."
Duvette finally stopped.
He turned and looked at the young man. The look he gave him was not brief.
In that instant, the Chief of Staff who had stepped into Macaroth's position, second only to the Warmaster in the entire crusade, found the words stop in his throat.
Duvette was unarmed. The other man had one of the crusade's most capable fighters standing at his side. And still a thought surfaced: if Duvette decided to act here, he would be dead before he could stop it.
The young man's fingers went rigid against the edge of the data-slate. Some of the colour left his face.
The tall guard registered the shift in atmosphere. His palm moved to the power sword at his hip.
Then Slaydo finally put down his document.
He looked up at Duvette.
"What nerve you have, Duvette."
Duvette inclined his head slightly.
"I wouldn't say that."
Slaydo made a cold sound.
He rose slowly from his seat, his gaze settling on Duvette with the weight of an edge.
"You absolutely would."
"Tanith. You dared delay the pace, dared to adjust the warzone deployment without authorisation."
"Menazoid. You dared to seal an entire planet, dared to conceal intelligence about the ruins from me."
"General Delavere. You dared open fire within the crusade's own forces, dared to make an Imperial fleet stand down for you."
Slaydo came around the desk and moved slowly toward Duvette.
"When did the 112th Combat Group become your private force?!"
"When did the Inquisition become your personal warrant?!"
"Do you believe that winning a few battles means you can ignore my orders? Do you?!"
Duvette did not argue.
He understood this was not the moment for it.
Slaydo continued to pace around him.
"You have talent, Duvette."
"Which is precisely why you are dangerous."
"Too much has gathered around you. Armies. Fleets. The Inquisition. A Rogue Trader house. And now an Archmagos of the Adeptus Mechanicus."
He stopped at Duvette's side, and his voice went darker.
"Are you planning to rebel?"
Duvette remained silent.
Slaydo appeared to read the silence as admission. His tone turned colder.
"I am reclaiming every military authority you hold."
"The 112th Combat Group returns to crusade command structure direction."
"Your Major General-Commissar authority is frozen with immediate effect."
"As of today, you are reduced to standard Commissar rank and transferred to a penal unit. You will learn what obedience means."
The new Chief of Staff, hearing all of this, let something briefly cross his eyes.
The tall guard kept watching Duvette, hand still on the sword grip.
Then Duvette raised his head.
He looked at Slaydo.
"Macaroth was removed on similar grounds."
Slaydo's eyes went cold instantly.
Duvette continued. "Warmaster. You have changed."
"There was a different way we would have had this conversation."
"What you are now—"
"Silence!" The roar came out of Slaydo. "Are you refusing orders?"
The sound of it made the documents on the desk tremble.
Duvette looked at him, and something complicated moved through his eyes.
He let out a quiet breath.
Then, in full view of everyone in the room, he reached up and removed the peaked cap that marked him as a Commissar.
He set it on the table beside him.
He took off the black greatcoat and set it there as well.
With the coat gone, only the close-fitting black undershirt remained. Duvette's hands hung at his sides. His posture had become very relaxed, which made it considerably more dangerous: the last moment before something strikes.
The young Chief of Staff's colour finally changed.
The tall guard drew the power sword.
Slaydo looked at Duvette with fixed intensity.
"What are you doing?"
Duvette looked at the Warmaster, and there was a trace of something that looked like apology in his eyes.
"I'm sorry, Warmaster."
"I would rather not hurt you."
The next instant, Slaydo's furious roar filled the room.
Duvette moved.
Everything he had came out at once, and he drove forward at the Warmaster with explosive speed.
His objective was clear.
The Saint Sabbat figurine hanging from Slaydo's chest.
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