An undetermined amount of time ago, the capital of the Sub-sector Terminus Obscura was a planet in turmoil. Below swirling dark clouds churning with ash and oily smoke stood a hive city in conflict. On one of the many contested sites amongst collapsed hab-blocks, the muffled roar of battle had faded.
From the gloom, a lone female figure emerged. The flickering lights from barely functioning street lamps revealed her sharply defined face - high cheekbones and a pair of steely green eyes. The woman wore a tailored greatcoat of dark crimson and black, its gold trim catching the dim light, and armor plating underneath it hinting at the lethality of her profession. Slim, lean, and bald, she moved with a predatory grace, her boots clicking on the cratered streets slick with blood.
Around her was the aftermath of fierce fighting, a city still screaming in silence. Ash and cinders drifted through the air like snow, settling over shattered hab-blocks and broken roads. Crimson trails stained the cracked plascrete, marking where the dead had fallen - some human, some barely so. Smoke coiled from ruined vehicles, the stench of promethium and charred flesh choking the air, and somewhere in the distance a vox-caster buzzed prayers in broken liturgies for the dead.
Lumbering through the devastation like scavenging insects over spilled food were groups of servitors, their augmetic limbs clicking and whirring as they moved under the supervision of robed tech-adepts. Overhead, Valkyrie gunships groaned as they banked away in patrol formation.
The woman continued walking as she observed one servitor drag a corpse from a destroyed armoured carrier before turning a corner around a ruined building, and found crimson-black Stormtroopers guarding the path to her destination. She approached without fear, the elite soldiers saluted before calling out her rank and name.
'Interrogator Rexine.'
Rexine nodded and walked past the checkpoint, eventually reaching a clearing where a few great pyres of fire were burning. At the heart of this spectacle, surrounded by a few vicious looking individuals, stood a massive imposing man.
Standing still as stone, the man was clad in gore-smeared golden power armour that reflected the flickering flames. In his gauntleted hand was a force sword that hummed softly. The man's enormous Astartes-like pauldron bore the unmistakable emblem of the Inquisition, the same emblem mirrored again on his storm-grey great cape that billowed in the scorched air. Multiple servo-skulls hovered beside him, streaming holographic data that lit up his face in fluorescent green, revealing ruined handsomeness.
The man's once-regal features had been worn down by time and duty, reshaped into something colder, harsher, with an expression unreadable beneath the weight of age and experience. Straight, ashen grey hair fell to his shoulders in a disheveled yet menacing fashion that befit a warrior-king. Half his upper right face had been replaced with the cold gleam of a metallic skull, the lower half of his face was dominated by the unyielding jaw of a man who had clenched it through too many trials, too many executions.
Rexine stopped in front of the man and bowed deeply. 'Lord Solimus, I arrived as summoned.'
The Grand Master of Ordo Terminus Obscura shifted his stone cold gaze from the data feed to her before responding with a gruff and powerful voice. 'What is your assessment of the situation?'
Rexine lowered her head further. 'Under control. We acted quickly, and got lucky.'
Solimus thought for a moment before shaking his head. 'We were quick, yes. But this is no luck. We were forewarned and thus, prepared.'
The interrogator gingerly looked up. 'You meant those astropathic messages from Inquisitor Thorn, my Lord?'
Solimus nodded slowly. 'Thaberus always had a knack for stumbling into important places and events, this Syrine under his care is intriguing. She would soon be gathering a lot of power in a time when we are cut off from the rest of the Imperium, a dangerous prospect for an untested individual…' He trailed off, turning his gaze to the huge flames where vague shapes of twisted and broken dead could be seen combusting in the blistering heat.
As the inquisitor lord brooded in silence, a small mob of servitors entered the area, carrying more of the recently purged. Rexine said nothing, she watched as the servitors moved the cadavers into the scorching fires, knowing full well Solimus was contemplating on an important mission for her. The dead burned, the pyres roared with flare-ups as fat dripped and hissed into the flames from the new arrivals.
Another moment later Solimus nodded to himself, his decision made as he turned to face Rexine. 'You will go to Nusquam on my behalf and verify the integrity of this so-called Holy Daughter. Make sure she is no threat to the God-Emperor's realm.'
'What if she was found wanting?' Rexine asked.
'Then you will enact Sanction Exitus with my expressed permission.'
'She will have powerful allies. The Mechanicus, the Sororitas and maybe even Inquisitor Thorn himself…'
'I will provide you with the necessary resources,' Solimus cut her off. 'For the duration of this assignment you will be granted the full authority of an inquisitor. Take this, consider it to be the final task before your elevation to the rank.'
'I will not fail you, my Lord.' Rexine declared, then turned her gaze to Solimus' stretched out gauntleted hand.
Resting on the open left palm was a highly personalised rosette of the Inquisition—a stylised "I" held by dragon claws, glowing blood-red in the flickering light of the surrounding flames.