The enforcers gripped their weapons tighter now, raising them to the boy. Both Carrell and Martha tensed, ready to leap on the boy with but a word from Hargrave. Instead, those cold green eyes softened again, pulling a small square of bone-white cloth from beneath his robes and catching the vile glob with a speed that betrayed his appearance.

His voice came again, something cold and slow, steady as iron. “Know this, boy, what I am offering you is salvation, you’re a fool that burns away your life and threatens reality itself by the crime of your existence. I want to absolve you of this, to have you pay for your crimes with service, rather than your life.” The chair beneath Hargrave shifted as he rose to his full height, standing over the table, though he wasn’t as tall as the guards that stood with the psyker, he seemed to dwarf them. “I am giving you a choice, either work under me and with my acolyte’s to better stop the vile beings that inhabit our galaxy, or decide to be independent, and live as a free man, for all of the second you’ll have before there’s a bullet through your brain.”

The air turned cold upon his words, the boys quivering stopped, his teeth gritted tighter. Carrell caught Martha again in the corner of his eyes, a look somewhere between admiration and worry being forced to not display upon her face.

Hargrave’s stern face turned to a slim, thin smile.

“So, boy, what is your name?”

“Dread.” The words came quickly, the boy’s eyes narrowing as the faintest glisten of liquid formed upon them.

Hargrave’s thin smile flattened once more. “Dread? I asked for your name boy, not what a wiser man in your position would be feeling.”

Quickly, the diminutive teen stammered “No, no, really, it’s my name, Dreadeleon Jessail, Dread for short.”

The inquisitor merely allowed himself a grunt, placing the spit-stained cloth upon the table in front of him and sliding it over to the boy. “I believe this is yours? You’re to retire to your quarters with Carrell and Martha, they will explain your duties.” His eyes slowly wandered over the two armoured men still restraining the boy. “Remove his restraints, besides the collar of course, you are relieved of your task, return to your stations.”

Their response was wordless, nothing but the sound of the heavy locks that tied the chains to his collar being released and the sound of heavy boots striking metal as they left the room and stomped down the hallway.

Hargrave’s eyes swept slowly over the three people that remained, surveying them at his leisure. Carrell felt a chill on his back and shifted awkwardly in his seat, awaiting a drawn out speech or further reprimand from the Inquisitor. Instead, he merely rose again, one hand swinging outwards to the door. “Retire to your bunks. Martha, Carrell, you shall see that arrangements have been made for the boy to stay with you.”

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Carrell had to quickly bite back his protest, the narrowing of Martha’s eyes told him she had done the same. The boy was quiet.

He remained that way until the trio had found there way to their room. It was a point of Hargraves that groups of acolytes stayed in the same living quarters. Though it had always been something that Carrell had wanted to question, he had never quite mustered the spirit to waste the inquisitor’s time with something he supposed Hargraves might find to be ‘trivial’.

Dread’s first words since leaving the presence of the inquisitor were somewhat vulgar and very, very loud. “What the fuck.” The boy’s arms flung animatedly outwards as he looked from Martha to Carrell, then back to Martha.

True enough, the Inquisitor had made ‘arrangements’ so that the boy could stay in the room. What these arrangements were, however, were a mattress on the floor at the centre of the room, along with a raggedy blanket that seemed far, far too big for the mattress or the boy who was supposed to lie upon it, whilst also being made of an extremely thin fabric.

Martha glanced to Carrell for a single moment before murmuring “The Divide...”

True enough, the sheet of fabric that was bunched up on the mattress was none other than the sheet that Carrell and Martha had been using to separate their rooms since the night they had been stuck together.

It was something Carrell could never understand, the Sororitas apparently was uncomfortable with the man changing beside his own bed. None of the soldiers that Carrell had served with showed the same discomfort, so he’d figured that the Sororitas were merely a prude sort. He had learned over their time together that he was pretty much right on the mark.

Notably as well, a new locker had been screwed into the leftmost wall on the room, three lockers now standing side by side, the first two were for Carrell and Martha respectively, bio-locked to their owner. The third was likely to be the psykers.

The three of them slowly retired to their own beds, the day had been long, and the night would be short. Or possibly infinitely long, considering they would be travelling through the warp. There was of course some protest from the boy, but after realising his pleas for an actual bed were not being heard, he eventually resigned himself to slump onto the mattress and fold the blanket over himself.

Every member of the trio lay in bed.

Not a single one slept.