Meet the new Boss, Not the Same as the Old Boss...

Introduction.

The acolytes have all returned to the Corvus from their various new assignments and training locations to find the ship much the same as they remembered it. If anything it's in better condition than before...well lit, the recycled air is fresh and the few human members of the crew seem happy with their lot...several of the acolytes conclude that Luciens absence seems to contribute to the ships human crew members morale.  The teams individual quarters have all been left much in the condition that they remember them and they all soon settle back into their previous routines.

Without Crow in command to manage the large previous number of acolytes many of them have returned to their original careers or have been transferred to the service of other Inquisitors. There are approximately a dozen other acolytes who are currently still (on paper at least) in the service of either Crow or Wroth and these have been managed by Lucien based on instructions or priorities transmitted to him by Inquisitorial authorities though the general concensus amongst the ones spoken to by the returning acolytes is that he seems to consider the duty a massive inconvenience. The problems with this particular method of management is compounded by the fact that Lucien is often missing for weeks on end and further complicated by the fact that no-one enters engineering at all anymore without a very, very good reason. The high council of the Inquisition in this sector have come to the conclusion that an Inquisitor is needed to more efficiently organise the missions and they've despatched one to take over...

Inquisitor Meridina of the Ordo Malleus 

The most senior qualified individual is unfortunately Inquisitor Meridina of the Ordo Malleus who in their only previous meeting allowed the team to walk into a compound with a Heretic armed with a daemonic weapon without pre-warning them in any way even though she was apparently completely prepared for the eventuality herself...

She has arrived on the Corvus earlier today, taken over Crows quarters for herself and her entourage of guards and has summoned all the 'team' to a meeting that afternoon...well...ordered them to attend a meeting if the truth be told...

Kallos, Atellus, Lyra, Mann and the two new members (Varn and Xanthis) arrive at one of the meeting rooms on the luxury crew quarters. Inquisitor Meridina has yet to arrive but there are a dozen Guardsmen in Inquisitorial Storm Trooper uniforms stationed around the edge of the room and they're armed with what look like well maintained weapons. One by one they take their seats around the table and await the arrival of the new boss.

She's half an hour late, a move obviously designed to stamp her authority on the meeting which would have worked perectly if it wasn't for the fact that Lucien hasn't turned up yet either...

"Im sure I made the start time of this meeting quite clear" she says, while conveniently ignoring the muttered comments about her own timing... "Where's that glorified caretaker of yours, Magos Baptiste?"

The answer to this question is somewhat obvious to any-one who knows him...engineering...or disappeared into the criminal underworld of the nearest planet for reasons that are never adequately explained.

"No idea, then? It's exactly this lack of discipline that has necessitated my appointment..." She calls over two of the Troopers "Go find him and bring him here...immediately..."

The raised eyebrows and sideways glances that this somewhat ill thought out order elicit in the rest of the acolytes appears to go unnoticed by the Inquisitor.

She then drops a pile of dataslates and paper files onto the table. They are labelled with the names of a number of planets visited by Crows acolytes over the last few years...evidently she's been doing some research on her new charges.

"This team has a history of in fighting that would get you executed in any even semi disciplined military unit" Several of her guards nod sycophantically in agreement at this point "you three in particular have shown an intolerable lack of discipline..." "do you have ANY explanation for your actions?"

Atellus, Lyra, Mann who are evidently the target of this accusation are quick to defend themselves but it's evident that the particular advantages of this competitive internal dynamic or lost on their new 'manager' despite a well reasoned explanation from Atellus*

She continues as if they hadn't even spoken, "I'm convinced that this lack of unit coherency is a prime reason why your survival rate for new team members is so poor...though the theory has also been put forward by several senior Inquisitors that it seems suspicious that NEW members expire so quickly...it's almost like your deliberatly preventing your group from being monitored in any way..."

All the teams arguments about the level of danger that the team has been exposed to over the years and the inherent likelihood of death that such missions inevitably result seem to fall on deaf ears...it's becoming increasingly obvious to all involved that Inquisitor Meridina likes the sound of her own voice but has an amazing case of selective hearing when it comes to counter arguments.

"No adequate defence for that accusation either...well that brings me to my next point...."

Before she gets a chance to make that point the door to the room slides open and in walks Lucien and five large Cyber Mastiffs, four stroll towards the corners of the room and the fifth stays by his side. As Meridina turns to face him he grabs the chair from her side of the table that she was obviously intending for herself and drags it noisely to a position on the other side of the table where a perfectly adequate empty seat was already available and sits himself down, the largest of the dogs sits next to him. Though the rest of the team are dressed somewhat casually, Baptiste has turned up to the meeting fully armed and armoured. The surrounding guards look towards the door expecting their comrades to walk in...however they don't...

One of the guardsmen walks over "where are the two guards who were sent to fetch you?"

Lucien doesn't even look up "Maybe they got lost..." he then chuckles which is a bit of a shock as none of the team have ever heard him laugh about anything before...Xanthis's knowledge of the Adeptus Mechanicum has lead him to believe that the 'Rites of Pure Thought' that he has allegedly undergone should have purged all emotion rather than enhancing it..he concludes that it is deliberate attempt to annoy the Inquisitor, though why he's unsure of...

As the Guardsmen steps forward Lucien unholsters a massive calibre hand gun, the rest of the troopers come alert....and he pulls out a tool-kit and starts to dismantle the gun on the table-top as if nothing was happening around him at all...

Meridina seems genuinally rattled as her carefully considered 'dressing down' of the team seems to be falling apart in the face of the teams unique methods of doing their job."Where was I?"

She pauses to gather her thoughts before deciding to return to the offensive,

"The amount of daemonic incursions that seem to occur around your team is unsettling to say the least." "I know of senior Malleus Inquisitors who have encountered only a couple of daemonic entities in their entire careers yet you seem to stumble across them on a weekly basis..." Even this could be considered tolerable if it wasn't for the number of gigantic holes that appear in every one of your mission reports"

"Atellus, you went missing during one of your first missions and apparently survived a confrontation with Ghast...alone...though how seems to be suspiciously absent from the report..."

"Kallos, You and Lucien went to interrogate a subject on Coscarla and she was never heard from again..."

"As for the rest of you...."

There's the sound of a weapon being chambered and the guards jump to attention again...The sound comes from Lucien chambering the weapon after he's assembled it. He then casually puts it back in the holster he got it from originally as if nothing happened.

Meridina finally seems to realise that acolytes who have fought and defeated hordes of Xenos, Greater Daemons and disrupted and destroyed city wide cultist organisations are not so easily intimidated by a few vague accusations and a dozen guards they could probably wipe-out in a heart beat and not break a sweat doing it...

"This is getting us nowhere" "You" she points at Lucien "prepare engineering for an inspection...I'll be visiting at MY convenience..." "I'll decide what to do with the rest of you later..."

She turns to leave and the guards move to follow. Lucien gets up out of his chair at just the right time to get in the way of the guard who spoke to him earlier and says something quietly as he walks past...The guard turns to reply and then appears to change his mind about doing anything about it and hurries after the Inquisitor...

After the last of the guards are out of the room Lucien produces several bottles of extremely expensive Amasac and several glasses from somewhere and pours everyone a drink before using a selection of mechadendrites to slide the glasses towards the team members both old and new.

"I don't think she likes us very much" he says somewhat obviously, "So how is everyone then?"

* I wished I'd have wrote this down as it was such a wonderful example of bullshit and half truth's combined with outright lies made up by Atellus's player (Toby) on the spur of the moment that I was almost convinced myself, lol.