3. Initial Interrogation Report (Part Three)

Grand Inquisitor: Fabius Bile is dead.

Prisoner (leaning back, his expression strange): I'm not surprised.

Grand Inquisitor: Your expression seems to say otherwise.

Prisoner (immediately smiling): And now, my lord?

Grand Inquisitor: Being slick won't make that flicker of grief you just showed disappear, Omegon.

Prisoner: Grief? No, no, I think you misunderstand. How could I possibly pity a heinous piece of scum like Fabius Bile? To die by the hand of his own Primarch was an ending far kinder than he deserved.

Grand Inquisitor: A pale defense.

(The prisoner shook his head and said no more.)

Grand Inquisitor: I have several new questions for you.

Prisoner: Bile's research?

Grand Inquisitor: That is one of them. I had intended to save it for last, but since you brought it up, let us discuss it first.

Prisoner (after a brief moment of thought): I generally did not interfere with the direction of his research, except... well, never mind. In any case, whatever he wanted to study was his own business. I provided him with a site, protected his person, supplied materials, logistics, and even certain technologies that could help advance his research.

Grand Inquisitor: And you truly demanded nothing of him?

Prisoner: Nothing. I understand that sounds difficult to believe, but that is the truth.

Grand Inquisitor: Very well. Now let us discuss the covert depredations you and your Legion carried out over these ten thousand years. The Imperium knows little about you. Even eyewitness reports are pitifully scarce. I would very much like to know how you managed that.

Prisoner (smiling): One must not forget one's tradecraft. But I can assure you of one thing: we have not infiltrated any Astartes organization. Not a single one.

Grand Inquisitor: Then the hardest-hit area must have been the administrative departments. You reactivated