I’m still a Skeptic on our Jean-Baptiste Emanuel Zorg friend.
Although Rannick does make great points about how Zola is undermining weeks of espionage. What is confusing me is he communicates his mistrust in Zola to us after the mission. Why are we trusted with this information? What point does Rannick want to make by telling us that our superior is not to be trusted or to keep an eye on her and report to him? These seeds of doubt don’t seem like throw away lines. We do have to go along with whatever our mission director(s) tell us, after all.
I’m curious how Rannick will fair in upcoming missions, will he have more of a presence? Maybe I’m looking into Rannick too deep, and he was right to intervene only when the situation deemed itself necessary.
Rannick is the right hand of Grendyl, in lieu of direct orders from Grendyl he effectively has command.
He has already found one traitor on the ship and after Zola’s actions on this mission it is prudent of him to urge us to report on any suspicious behavior she may exhibit in the future since she is technically the person we report directly to. We have already proven ourselves trustworthy and capable, doesn’t remove suspicion from us but it is unlikely we would have gone on the off the books mission had we known ahead of time it was not approved.
Edit 1: Sire Melk, Hadron and Commodore Hallowette… Well, they’re probably not in the same chain of command, since they likely report to others than just Grendyl. Hallowette most definitely reports to Shipmistress Brahms first and foremost.
Melk, Hadron, Sefoni and even Masozi are probably around the level of Morrow as part of Grendyl’s retinue as various specialists (Morrow being guardsman, the Melk being the adept, Hadron being the Techpriest, Sefoni the psyker and Masozi the scum, using Dark Heresy career paths) based on the common way Inquisitors organise their forces.
Once you’re in the Inquisition, some people retain their previous titles but it doesn’t really mean much within the Inquisition, with the ranks of Explicator, Interrogator, Inquisitor and Grand Inquisitor being more relevant. Zola and Rannick, because of their rank, are probably being groomed to become inquisitors themselves.
Krall and Hallowette are definitely external and probably more aligned to Brahms than Grendyl.
There’s not really enough about Brunt anywhere to really say where he lies.
To my knowledge, the Interrogator is the Inquisitor’s Apprentice, and the Explicator is the Interrogator’s Acolyte subordinate on the path to becoming an Apprentice, so that tracks completely.
Quartermaster Brunt is DEFINITELY the Grand Inquisitor, or at least he has enough money to be after he made my Ordos Dockets go from “folding” to “jiggle-jiggling.”
Ordos Dockets feel like company script to me. Useless outside of the Mourningstar and probably useless within the greater Inquisition too. It’s another funny money layer but in lore so we can’t buy a good time in Tertium.
Pretty much the same impression I’ve gotten of him OP. I wish we’d have more level headed mission commanders like Rannick and Morrow instead of the annoying money grubbing can do no wrong cnt Hallowette and I know da wae Masozi.
I can’t tell if Zola has a substantial amount of faith in us, or if she doesn’t care who dies as long as the enemy is vanquished. Maybe Zola needed one of the Twins alive for another, more insidious reason.
Either way, my loyalty lies with Rannick because he’s calm, collected and patient. He’s also a G for attempting to keep us out of harm’s way by calling us an Emergency Extraction. Masozi refused to help us because she was probably on leave and tweaking on Stimms, but he stayed calm and gave us the Sanction Redactus on both of the Karnak Twins, so that we didn’t have to deal with the risks of capturing one of them! Respect.
He’s in with their lot. That’s why he shot his colleague in the level 30 video; to avoid exposure.
And that “message” we have to beam out from the radio station. Hmm.
I wouldn’t say that he’s a Traitor. Rannick seems to be a cold and calculating man, both are typical aspects of an Apprentice to an Inquisitor. If anything, he’s the least likely to be a Traitor on the Mourningstar except Grendyl himself.
Zola, on the other hand… She’s obsessed with protecting Atoma, it’s heavily implied that she personally knows at least Rinda Karnak and Captain Wolfer, she’s emotionally unstable and knowingly sends the Strike Team off to fight their way to into a trap just so that she can get her hands on one of the Karnak Twins. That’s almost the perfect recipe for turning someone to Chaos.
Rannick manages to handle all of Zola’s mistakes very elegantly and the Rejects come out of the trap alive - and the Twins don’t.
Giving depth to the supporting characters is certainly a step in the right direction: and the Emperor knows how much more is needed, because (if we exclude Hadron) they are as flat as ironing boards. Indeed, in the case of Zola and Morrow, they are even worse than flat: they are wannabe tough guys. They try so hard to appear tough, but without any factual evidence that can actually prove their toughness.
Furthermore, now Rannick has earned my infinite respect because he did what I always wanted to do: silence that useless pain in the arse that is Zola. For this victory alone I will follow him to the Eye of Terror.
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