For twenty-one years Departmento Munitorum Waystation 362was the only

home he had ever known. Son to an Imperial Guard Logister and an aid to a high
ranking Commissar operating from the Waystation; for him and his two siblings,
service to the Imperial Guard was not a matter of choice, but a matter of filial duty.
His sister followed in her fathers footsteps, having sought training from the
Administratum with special dispensation afforded to her well respected for to act as
her mentor through her education, she was assigned to a mobile guard unit. His
brother went directly into the Guard infantry itself, zealous to fight against all those
who would beset mankind. He left on the very first tithe ship two days after his
seventeenth birthday, never expecting to see his family again. But, as luck would
have it, he was stationed as a member of an Administratum security detail far from
any frontline and sent word often. He never knew his mother. Her work kept her far
away for long periods of time, forced to keep her whereabouts a secret from her
family due to the clandestine nature of her assignments. She could only ever remain
long enough to spend a short but precious year with her small family when she
would give birth to a new addition before being called away to another battlefield
somewhere in the sub-sector.
Despite her devotion to her duties she had an endless well of love and
warmth for her family, abundantly apparent during their time together between the
years that they were oft times kept apart. When she was home her life was lived
only for her children and her partner, always doing her best to make it seem as
though she had never been gone and would never leave again. Those days though,
always felt so short lived.
It was on her return voyage from one such mission that it all came crashing
down into oblivion like a dying star releasing its final glow. The heavy fighting on
Typhon IV, a small hiveworld on the fringes of the sector, had finally subsided and
her commissar and his unit were recalled to station. It is said that to remember
anything from before the age of three is impossible, but Alaric remembers precisely
the look on his fathers face that day, as if it were imprinted into the core of his
being. He had received word that she would indeed becoming home, enroute with
the remainder of the reserve flotilla. Being tied at his fathers waist for the entirety
of his infancy, Alaric had never seen his face contort and creat an expression like
the one he saw that day. At the age of two, he could not possibly understand what
his fathers tears and expression could mean, so he cried.
The alien expression that overcame his fathers face, as he now understood,
was an expression of utter and overwhelming relief and joy. His mother and her unit
had been in the direct vicinity of intense shelling on Imperial positions and a
dangerously penetrative rebel advance. His father had not received word of her for
almost eight months and had fallen deeper and deeper into despair the longer he
suffered without word of his partners well-being. The reunion would be the first
time that Alaric would get to meet his mother. She had left on assignment only a

few tear filled weeks after his birth. The joy of her return would be short lived, and
the reunion never happened.
Only days before Aurora was scheduled to arrive, Alarics father received
another urgent communique through Administratum relays and Alaric received his
second earliest memory; another expression he had never seen on his fathers face
before. Not knowing its meaning and seeing his father collapse to his knees, tears
falling freely from his eyes, he followed the example and cried. But now, the tears
were joined by his brother and his sisters despair. Upon hearing the sound of their
fathers fall, the data-slate hanging loosely from his fingers on the floor, they knew,
without words, they knew.
The entire returning flotilla was caught in a warpstorm and disappeared from
this plane of existence in the blink of an eye. The anomaly had taken the naval
astropaths and navigators by complete surprised and overwhelmed their mental
capacities. Their heads had exploded like grenade bursts and a moment later all
was gone, leaving a black torrential rend in real space that did not dissipate for
another twenty years rendering the entire area unnavigable, jamming transmissions
and clouding the immaterium almost indefinitely. It would later be said that it was
the final retribution of the ruinous powers for thwarting their chaotic machinations;
a petty and disastrous spite to sour an otherwise glorious Imperial victory. Never
would Alaric see his mothers face, feel her warmth, or know the overwhelming love
of his family made whole. That had been taken from him forever, and he would
never forget.
As happens with all things, time scabbed over the wound and the family
remained united, though a deep scarring remained. Though Alaric had no real
memories of his mother like his siblings did, his father, being the ever dutiful
Logister that the Administratum had trained him to be, filled Alarics days and
nights before being tucked into bed with stories and images of his mother and their
time together as a family. His father had recorded nearly every moment of their
days as a complete family, fearing exactly what had come to pass. As his children
lay in bed he would sit at their side holding up their imager display and recount to
the with his near perfect memory every detail about that particular day. Some of
these stories were still clear and vivid memories in the minds of Alarics siblings,
especially his sister who shared his fathers gift for memory, but he always felt
unintentionally marginalized by his siblings shared joy in their mothers memory, as
if he did not belong within the fabric of the family that had been. Over the years it
left an unspoken distance between the three children, being unable to empathize
with losing a mother he had never known and feeling an entirely different sort of
grief because of it.