Haley excels in crafting gruesome stories of unprecedented, galactic horror to indulge readers in the grim darkness of Warhammer. He often writes scenes of a terrible fate from the victim’s point of view, showing readers what it’s like to face the worst of the worst deaths in a universe filled with monsters, daemons, and other terrible things.
Also, he writes good supporting characters, giving them an appropriate amount of depth. These characters meant to flair up the protagonist are interesting themselves yet don’t take away from them.
Another aspect of his writing is his short, startling statements. Haley uses these statements to really emphasize different ideas in the text. Usually it helps to show the grisly nature of a fight or death.
Mordin wasn’t a right man. He was quiet, more so than people liked. His left arm was a little too long compared to his torso. Usually, it awkwardly lays limp at his side. The hair on his head was constantly greased with the oils of the under factoriums. Sometimes the chemicals even discolored it. He consistently smelled of sweat and dirty fuel tanks. No one talked to him, and he didn’t talk to anyone.
Yet his most ostracizing feature wasn’t any of his physical features or his behavior. People couldn’t trust him. Everyone near him felt it, in their bones, that something about him was off. No one said it, but they all felt the same indescribable feeling. Mordin knew this, and disregarded it. He did desire to be like everyone else, but he thought that to be impossible. For as long as he could remember, there were things he could see that others can’t. Often it came in the form of a warning. Many times he would move his hand right out of the way of a loose piece of metal crashing through the conveyor belts. Twice he dodged a ceiling fan crashing down, seconds before impact. There wasn’t any indication of his coming demise, he just knew to move out of harm’s way. He knew this wasn’t normal, especially with the many work accidents that cut limbs and crushed workers in an instant that he had witnessed.
Mordin couldn’t know for sure the cause of his ability, but he had his suspicions. These suspicions were the reason he kept quiet about his senses. He had heard stories of other people with abilities like him. They were quiet, awkward people that one day showed what they had that others hadn’t. Sometimes they went missing after the appearance of mysterious agents; other times they were simply hung by the neighbors in their hab block. And so, he kept quiet.
It was an ordinary day on the hive world, a day twice as long as earth’s. Mordin went down the elevator shaft along with dozens of others, screeching through metal as it descended further into the planet. After some time, they arrived at the rhythmic stamping of pistons they had been familiar with all their lives. Into an hour of the day’s work, Mordin’s senses triggered. He quickly stepped back from the metal plate he was about to grab off the conveyor belt, immediately becoming more alert of his surroundings. However, a few heartbeats later, nothing happened. That was strange, even for him. Mordin’s sense of danger had never failed him, not once. He was too reluctant to return to his position without eyeing the ceiling and engine blocks humming nearby.
“Hey, you don’t get paid to stand there. Half your credits. This hour. They’re being removed from your cut. Get back to it dammit!”
Mordin looked up to see the greasy pig-face of his overseer, his brow creased with the stupid rage his position allowed him to hold. Mordin went back to the belt and tore the piece of metal from it. The overseer’s fat chins wobbled as he turned to bark at other unfortunates. He didn’t think much of his boss, his sense was wrong. If so, does that mean he could actually not be a psyker? Maybe he never had a supernatural ability. Maybe he was wrong about his assumption. After all, that’s what it was, an assumption. He never knew, he wouldn’t talk about it. He couldn’t.
Then it struck again, stronger than before. A pang of terror swelled up in his stomach. Yet still, there wasn’t any danger. His mind told him everything was normal, but his soul screamed out to get away. He forced himself to keep working less he lose more of his cut; his eyes kept darting around to find anything out of the ordinary. Nothing.
That was when the first physical sign of danger had begun. A growl. A hideous sound emanating from the dark corner of the overseer’s tower. He stopped his work once more and stared at the shadows.
“Did-uh, did anyone else hear that?”
His coworkers ignored him, knowing he would soon be barked at again. Yet it wasn’t a yell of anger that came from the tower. No, it was a short scream of pain. Everyone turned their attention from their machines to the source of the sound. He fell, splatting down into the grated floor. Then the true source of the sound fell down with him. Leaping onto the corpse, a giant, hunchbacked creature with four limbs, each ending in claws, tore into it. It ripped a chunk of flesh and viciously devoured it into its needle teeth and maw. The alien face looked up, yellow eyes with thin but deep black pupils. Before anyone could react, Mordin included, a gunshot rang out, followed by many more of its kind. Mordin hadn’t taken his eyes off the creature, but he didn’t see a single shot make contact. He looked back for a second to see many men around the unit lying dead. Many more were holding guns pointed at their coworkers. The sudden noise left, the only sound was the now unmanned machines continuing their tasks; without the noise of men talking and yelling, it was oddly quiet, especially compared to the panic running through his mind. One of the men that still stood next to him looked over, his expression calm, and simply spoke.
“We are the genestealers, humanity’s time here is over now.”
Mordin’s jaw dropped as a quiet gasp of horror escaped. Genestealers, xenos from far away places that would came into human society, implanting their genes into large chunks of the population and spreading. Generation after generation would breed until they were passable as a human.
“You’re a psyker Mordin, come, let it eat your flesh. You’re very special.”
Mordin wanted to run, but he couldn’t. His fear of a danger unlike anything he had seen kept him stationary. His coworker held him in place as the beast walked on clawed feet towards him. It took him a moment to realize the blood on the beast's chest was of his own; his choked gurgling made him realize it was his throat, or the lack of one.
Guy Haley writes galactic horror that captures an audience through gore and violence; Mordin is set up as a character before being brutally murdered. The dialogue of the overseer is meant to utilize Haley's short statements that are powerful and reinforce the grim theme. Mordin as a character also has a lot of negative things described about him, further establishing a theme of darkness. The supernatural and alien elements are key components of his work, also being seen in the short story.