Chapter Fifteen

The Stepstones. The Summer Sea.

Despite having come a family of good breeding back on Cadia, Major Gwynenya 'Gwen' Ionael had not until recently risen as high in the ranks as she would have liked. She'd always know that even with the number of fighting women in the Imperial Guard that her gender would hold her back, as the higher ranks could be a bit of a boy's club, proven by the fact that were only a few notable Lady-Generals in the history books. Jenit Sulla was a role model of Gwen's just not for her writing.

At least the Lord-General knew talent when he saw it, so had he promoted Ionael to the rank of Mayor and sent her off to command the newly formed 2nd Thrax regiment. When she'd first joined them she wondered if she'd be set up to fail what with the regiment being made up of only a few hundred members of the Imperial Guard, more than eight thousands native warriors and a couple of thousand of navy armsmen, but she'd come to realise than she'd been given the chance to prove herself just as capable as male officer and perhaps even better if she could turn this rabble into an effect regiment for the Rogue Trader, who would need the regiment to fight in his wars of conquest.

Ionael knew that the size and composition of Imperial Guard regiments were not standardised across the Imperium; the number of individual Guardsmen alone can vary enormously between regiments, with some being only a few hundred strong at founding-strength, whilst others possess tens of thousands of fighting troops. The 2nd Thrax would be one of the larger regiments she'd ever seen in action.

Her task would be to turn these men and women, they had some navy armswomen as well, into a 'standard' Imperial Guard regiment. She didn't just have foot soilders to work with, she also had several organic fighting and transport vehicles, in this case, horses that she would need to find a use for. She'd already had some ideas about that and soon they would be tested.

As for The Unsullied, they were separate from everyone and weren't even men by some standards, but at least their mutilations meant she didn't have to worry about them getting out of hand and raping some poor woman, and according to what information she'd been given that was a common thing to happen during conflicts on this world. She would punish very harshly any man who was caught doing that even the savages of this world didn't deserve such treatment and there were plenty of whores around.

Right away she'd figured the hard part in dealing with The Unsullied would be getting them to put down their spears and shields to exchange them for an autogun or better yet a lasgun. They would do willingly, but they'd have to adjust their fighting styles. She'd soon figured out that it would be better to let them keep their weapons since they would only be fighting other savages and they could have an autopistol to fall back on.

To the Major, this seemed sensible and as she watched the Unsullied fight from a distance she decided to keep going with that idea and to have the regiment update its fighting style as The Unsullied were replaced over time due to their casualties. Right now the native warriors were butchering their way through the inhabitants of a coastal town that served as a pirate haven here on the island of Bloodstone.

The Rogue Trader wished for this island to serve as his base of operations during the coming conflicts and it would be so since he was the Emperor's will made manifest when outside of the parts of the universe controlled by the Imperium and she was much further away from Holy Terra than she'd ever imagined.

Major Gwynenya Ionael was pleased to see from a suitable distance that the short training sessions she'd put the navy armsmen and women through was paying off. They had hundreds of horses from the Free City of Astaphor and other places, and while the Unsullied didn't ride the navy forces took to it easily enough and there were plenty of instructors around willing to help train others to ride.

As for the troopers that made up the regiment they could fire an auto pistol while still controlling their mounts. The pistols had suppressors attached so as not to needlessly upset the horses, which were not bred as war mounts for the most part, and firing from horseback provided to be a good way of chasing down those that ran from the Unsullied. The pirates and slavers had few steeds.

"Ma'm we have an important prisoner for you" reported one of the veteran guardsmen from Cadia that she'd brought with her "She claims to be a noble of some importance".

During her discussions with the Lord-Captain, they'd decided what to do with anyone captured. The pirates and slavers would be shipped off to the Ad-Mech to be turned a varity of servitors that were needed for the building work as well as other laborious tasks. She had a feeling that lucky ones would meet quicker ends than becoming servitors, however, she didn't wish to dwell on that, if half the horror stories about the cogboys did to people were true then simply killing all of the scum would be a mercy.

As for the civilians, most of whom had been captured and enslaved by the criminals, they would enjoy a slightly better life under Imperial rule as surfs bound to serve the regiment or the Rogue Trader here on these islands, or be shipped off to Ameros. The Stepstones were rather pleasant if you didn't mind the pirates and slaves, they were tropical islands with clear blue waters filled with fish and land that could be farmed. Once cleared of the trash they could become quite productive.

"And who are you," asked Major Gwynenya Ionael of the possible VIP prisoner.

The captive didn't answer right away so the Guard officer supplied what information he could.

"Major, this 'noble' was found in one of the drinking establishments in the pirate town" he explained "She tried to kill one of my men, but she was too drunk to do much damage. Been drowning her sorrows I think".

The pirate women was very upset.

"You bastards sunk my ship with one of your flying machines" she complained.

Sinking all of the crude wooden vessels had been part of the planned conquests of these islands as it gave the scum no way to flee or reinforce each other, not that they seemed the type to care much for their neighbours. The Major knew that there was a lot of shipping in this part of the world so securing the trade lanes would be an important part of turning this world into a productive Imperial planet. Sure they would have sunk a few trading vessels while taking the islands, but once the conquest was over trade would flourish.

"And you are?" asked the Major.

Again the pirate didn't answer.

"Hang her" ordered Ionael.

That got the attention of the pirate.

"I'm Yara Greyjoy!" she called out.

That got the Major's attention.

"Wait a moment" she commanded.

The Greyjoys were the ruling family of someplace called the Iron Islands. Those islands were due to be conquered sooner or later and likely the Lord-General would want the raiders of those islands brutally crushed to ensure that they wouldn't rise during his rulership. Ionael couldn't have agreed more than plan. Scum like these pirates and raiders were worse than the xenos in her mind as the aliens at least hadn't betrayed their own kind. To turn your back on the Imperium made you only worthy of a painful death even if she often gave such slime a quick one for the sake of efficiency.

Yara Greyjoy almost got a quick death regardless of her family name, but Ionael had realised that this Yara would know a lot of the Iron Islands and this could be useful to the Lord-General when it came to invading this prisoner's home. The Priesthood might also wish to talk about the Iron Born in case their infidel faith contained any teachings he deemed too dangerous to be adapted into the worship of The Emperor. The Major had been to enough worlds to know that each culture worshipped his Divine Majesty in their own way and that not of those ways were harmless.

In the end, the Mayor decided to hand over the noblewomen to the Inquisitor, who was most qualified to handle such matters, he would break the pirate and learn anything she knew that was worth knowing before putting a bolt round into her skull. Or perhaps they let her live in case she had some use. If so then she'd be due for a nice, long mind cleansing.

This was the process often utilised by the Inquisition to remove things too dangerous for a person to know, or memories that were too dangerous to bare even for the strongest mind. In most of the cases when someone knew too much, the answer as far as the Inquisition is concerned is simple: death, be it a well-deserved execution or the blessing of the Emperor's Peace. But for a small number, a different solution is found, mental cleansing, a laborious process.

Through the combined use of specialised machines and telepathic intervention, some or all of the subject's memories are selectively erased and thought patterns altered. The resulting individual is then something of a blank slate to be rewritten, and in extreme cases, entire new personalities and skills are imprinted directly into the mind. The mind-cleansed are effectively reborn and remade in the image of the Inquisition's desire, complete with whatever implanted skills or personality traits are required.

Yara Greyjoy's memories of this world would too useful to destroy, but the more personal stuff could be removed and she could be made loyal to the Imperium or just kept as a bartering tool if the Greyjoys were deemed worthy of any diplomacy. The high ranking officer didn't care enough to ever find out which.

"Give her to the Inquisitor" ordered the Major "We have other matters to attended to".

These islands wouldn't conquer themselves.