‘You must look to your own salvation, Colonel, for I offer you none. I am an instrument of wrath, shorn of compassion. I exist only to bring death and ruin to the Imperium’s foes, and I will expend no resources shielding the weak.’
Iron Captain Caanok Var during the Valkathian Cleansing
No Iron Hand can claim to have rid themselves entirely of their flesh, yet few have come as close as Caanok Var. How long exactly he has served the Chapter is unclear. This is fitting, perhaps, for one whose form is an amalgam of his predecessors.
Iron Captain Caanok Var has commanded the elite veterans of Clan Company Avernii since before the manifestation of the Great Rift. One of the Chapter’s most experienced warriors, he has led his battle-brothers in many bitter conflicts, demonstrating a strategic genius to rival any of the galaxy’s Chapter Masters.
No battle-brother better encapsulates the dichotomy of the Iron Hands than he. Though largely shorn of his own flesh and outwardly as dispassionate and calculating as any machine construct, Var still harbours a burning fury that he finds to be a shameful trace of his Humanity, one that no amount of surgical excision has been able to vanquish.
Caanok Var’s cybernetic left leg once belonged to Iron Father Karax Gaarman, recovered after his death during the Siege of Tessar. His bionic arms and augmetic hearts are said to have been crafted in the dying days of the Horus Heresy. Only one of the Iron Captain’s bionic components – his right eye – was crafted specifically for him as a commendation for his crucial role in the Varakon Decimation, a rare honour indeed, and one reserved only for the Chapter’s finest and most respected champions.
In addition to his ancient augmetics, Caanok Var bears to battle a number of master-crafted items of wargear. His Terminator armour – heavily modified to his own specifications – has embedded into it a potent logic engine, the Cerebrex. This unique device, salvaged during some long-forgotten conflict, interfaces with Var’s own cybernetically enhanced brain, enabling him to process a stream of incoming reports and battlefield data at speeds impossible for even a Space Marine’s unaugmented mind.
Twin servo-skulls, Dextrum and Sinistrus, constantly drift around the Iron Captain’s form, analysing atmospheric conditions, tallying battlefield casualties, evaluating threats and ensuring Var remains apprised of the wider tactical situation even when engaged personally in heavy fighting. His chosen weapon is a relic from Clan Company Avernii’s own armoury, the power maul Axiom. Believed to be based on weapon designs from ancient Terra, Axiom is capable of crushing most infantry and can even pose a threat to heavily armoured foes, such is the potency of its disruption field.
Under Caanok Var’s steely leadership, the veterans of Avernii – also known as the First Company – have played a crucial part in a number of bitter wars. The invasion of the Stygius Sector, undertaken by a combined force of Night Lords and Thousand Sons, saw Var lead his battle-brothers to war on multiple occasions. Though Imperial forces suffered a grave strategic defeat in the wider conflict, Var’s strike forces won several tactical victories, most notably routing Ahkrek Deathshriek’s Night Lords from Mordian. Indeed, Var’s strategic genius saw the Iron Hands outfight and defeat the numerically superior Night Lords force, liberating the planet from the grip of Chaos.
The Noctis Aeterna has seen Clan Avernii’s warriors thrust into yet more heavy fighting, and Medusa’s proximity to the Eye of Terra ensures a constant stream of requests for aid flow to the Chapter planet. The Iron Council can scarcely respond to every desperate petition for reinforcement. Thus, the Clan Companies of Medusa have been directed only to those war zones considered of the utmost priority. Belis Corona, Agripinaa and Thracian Primaris are amongst those worlds and systems to have benefited from Clan Avernii’s aid. Agripinaa in particular has been identified as exceptionally important to continued Imperial war efforts in the region, and Caanok Var himself has been dispatched in response to the forge world’s requests for reinforcement. Whether he and his battle-brothers arrive in time to help shield the beleaguered forge world remains to be seen.
