Commissar Larkson silently nods to her CO, before turning to stride away and rejoin her squad.


Valeria approaches her team with rigid posture, her hands clasped behind her back. "Alright boys, I've had a word with my superior, and-"

She pauses, and raises an eyebrow. "Wait, did the Cogboy just say boyos?" she asks, slightly perplexed by such casual lingo amongst a member of the Machanicus. The Commissar then gives a small shrug, and picks up where she left off. "As I was saying, I need to have a word with all of you, away from prying ears. Follow me."

She turns and strides over to a nearby alleyway, or some other relatively secluded location. Once the squad is huddled around her, she fixes them all with a stern glare, her expression serious. "Two things, troopers. One, we need to figure out how deeply the heresy here goes. Interview civilians, take prisoners, and otherwise find out the extent of this rebellion. If possible, enemy combatants are to be captured alive, and brought to my superiors for processing. The second thing..." Her mouth curls into a scowl.

"I will speak with you on-the-level. That information I shared regarding the you-know-what was highly sensitive and classified? Forget I said anything. That knowledge is strictly need-to-know, and no one else needs to know. You no longer need to know, and it would be bad if anyone else where to know it too. Do not tell your comrades, do not tell your friends, do not even tell our new little Cogboy who's name I don't even know yet," she remarks with an idle wave of a gloved hand at Zaphriel. "As soldiers of the Emperor, you have a duty to Him to not muck things up, and letting that info slip would be quite a mucking up. The sort of mucking up that would get you all executed, and me sent to a penal legion. So. Keep your traps shut, got it?" she flatly growls.

Yes, it was a bit less formal and professional than she preferred, but she needed to get the point across to these soldiers. And by being a bit more informal and "human" with them, she figured they'd be more willing to listen to her and give credit to what she had to say, rather than just writing it off as "whatever the stuffy Commissar is prattling on about."

Certainly it would be a more effective and less messy tactic than just bolting one of them as an example. Though that option wasn't off the table...