[9]

The excerpt below is from the morning of 110.738.M41, after the raid to rescue Nika and our own interrogations. Again, the full transcript is appended, but I have excerpted the part that seems to matter. I got the information from Nika herself, but this is more reliable than my memory.

Excerpts from Transcript: Interrogation of Nika​ 

The subject appears to be in her middle thirties, but may be younger or older depending on lifestyle. Light skin, brown eyes, straight brown hair. Slim, fatigued, and in average health. Distinguishing features: dense freckles.

Interrogator: No sensation of supernatural or unnatural activity? None at all?

Nika: No. No… none.

Interrogator: No unnatural Fear?

Nika: What? I don't get it. Of course I felt fear. I thought they'd find me, I was terrified.

Interrogator: Never mind. Proceed with your report. Why did you signal for extraction?

Nika: They were coming for me. An autocar followed me home.

Interrogator: Why think it was you? Other people live at that hab.

Nika: I… I guess it was just a guess. I think I saw something I wasn't supposed to.

Interrogator: Guesses are fine. Tell me.

Nika: Can I go back a little and explain?

Interrogator: Please do. Have some more water. Take your time.

Nika: All right. All right. You know the basics of the Sanctifying Truth, right? What everybody knows about them?

Interrogator: Yes.

RECORD: The Sanctifying Truth sect first became publicly known in the city of Tarosk in the year 732.M41 and rapidly spread across Gaervalt. Its main teaching is that honesty could restore individuals and communities damaged by sin to a state of holiness. It claims that 'Three pillars of truth support sanctity: honesty towards others, honesty towards institutions, and honesty towards oneself.' As of this date, 110.738.M41,it is a tolerated heterodoxy sometimes encouraged by the Church and actively encouraged by the Administratum.

Nika: Well, it works. The honesty stuff really works. My life was a disaster and it fixed it, it hurt but it fixed it, at least at first. And my factorium's productivity was up ten percent, even though just a few of us were in the sect. Ten percent. That never happens, ten percent.

Interrogator: I believe you. Proceed with the explanation.

Nika: All right. But there are levels to it. Levels that aren't for outsiders. They talk about truths that regular people are too dishonest to have earned. And truth about institutions isn't just not lying, it's questioning everything. You're supposed to believe what's true, but to do that, you're supposed to believe that sometimes you're being lied to. Which, I mean, sometimes, obviously—people make mistakes, bad people get authority sometimes. But they want you to question everything.

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Interrogator: That isn't in any of their official publications. Might it just be your one local chapter?

Nika: I guess. Anyway, I went to a priest to confess because I didn't like the way it made me feel, and I ended up agreeing to keep an eye on them and say if they went any further, like something that the Church would need to correct. Heresy, I guess, but… but…

Interrogator: Heresy is the correct word. It just means 'teaching error.' Most heresies can be firmly but gently corrected. Only a few require the remedy of the gun. You are not suspected of anything like that. Go on with your account.

Nika: Well, nothing happened for about a year. They all knew I wasn't committed like they were, and they acted like I was their friend, but I wasn't welcome in some groups and projects. Anyway, I overheard some people talking. Documents and reading and revelation. So I thought they had some secret writings, and that would be the truths regular people hadn't earned. Like secret scriptures.

Interrogator: When?

Nika: Yesterday. So I snuck in and looked at them. There was an office where regular people weren't supposed to go, but there wasn't a guard, and just an old lock, and I… um…

Interrogator: We already know you used to be a thief.

Nika: Well I got in and looked at them, and they weren't secret scriptures at all, they were just a bunch of places and future dates all over the city, with notes like 'high power conduit' and 'vox override circuit' and I know one said 'load-bearing pillar, 10kg demolition charge.'

[The Interrogator spends several minutes attempting to extract useful intelligence about the documents Nika saw, but her memory of the specifics remains vague.]

Nika: I wanted to take it, but I saw somebody coming and I tried to play it cool and leave. But I guess they knew what I did, because they followed me home. They knew where I lived anyway, my, the man I was living with, he… God-Emperor, he's probably…

Interrogator: Mikhael Krast?

Nika: Yes.

Interrogator: He is dead. I'd offer condolences, but all evidence suggests he died trying to help them kill you.

Nika: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I. Anyway. I called the vox-code the priest gave me for emergencies and I hid in the vent, and I heard a lot of shouting and banging, and then I saw the aircar through the grate in the vent, and then it was like there was a war on my floor for a minute, and then I heard the Battle Sisters…