Ciaphas Cain

The creak of the old hangar's rusted hinges on the outskirts of the Valhallan outpost sounded like the most beautiful music Cain had heard all day. The Commissar pulled his high-collared fur coat tighter, seeking refuge from the piercing, icy winds of this frozen world, and finally took a deep breath. Here, amidst the stacks of supply crates, it didn't smell like Jurgen. Cain sincerely appreciated his adjutant's phenomenal diligence, but the man's specific, pungent body odor in the confined space of the command headquarters could rival plasma weaponry in its destructiveness. Having sent his loyal servant off to clean the treads of the heavy machinery, Caiphus hoped to steal an hour of silence to check his pocket watch and take a sip of contraband amasec.

His fingers slid lazily along the hilt of the chainsword at his hip. By all calculations, the enemy forces of the forty-first millennium were meant to strike the central defensive lines, where the grim Valhallans were currently digging trenches into the permafrost. For Cain, this abandoned outbuilding on the edge of nowhere remained the safest place: while the vast Imperium of Man was consumed by an endless, grueling war of extermination across the galaxy, he simply wanted to sit in the warmth. Cain was just about to settle onto a crate when the floor beneath his feet gave a perceptible shudder.

In the distance, an air-raid siren wailed hollowly, announcing danger at the base perimeter, and a second later, a heavy metal sheet of the warehouse cladding buckled inward with a deafening screech, flying aside under a crushing force from the outside.

Cain instinctively stepped back two paces, shifting into the shadows between the crates to leave himself room for a quick retreat toward the emergency exit. His left palm rested on the hilt of his chainsword, while his right carefully disengaged the safety on his laspistol. The Commissar's inner voice shrieked in terror, demanding he run back to stinking Jurgen and his melta, but the mask of the grim Hero of the Imperium was already habitually fused to his face. Piercing the settling dust and torn metal with a tense gaze, he froze with the flawless, icy composure of a combat officer. Despite the panic, beneath his tall Commissar's cap and the scar upon his rugged face, he looked exactly like a propaganda poster in his sharp black uniform. Fixing his penetrating gaze upon the breach with a slight, ironic squint, Cain spoke in a low but pointedly polite and cautious tone:

— The situation on the perimeter has changed, I take it? Report the status; I am listening intently.

Damn it, not this... It's too far to Jurgen for his melta to help me, so right now it all depends on whether I can maintain this fake Commissar's mask and not betray my panic. I have to make whoever is standing before me believe in my composure, buy a few seconds to assess the danger, and at the slightest threat, shoot to kill. Just please, don't let my fingers slip from the grip...