A successor Chapter of the Iron Hands: the Sons of Medusa.
They were renowned for their tenacity, coldness, and extreme reverence for machinery and firepower.
Their arrival meant that the Hive City's upper echelons had finally abandoned the fantasy of relying on "internal healing."
They were preparing to burn away the abscesses on this rotten soil in the most brutal, most thorough way possible.
The landing site was a massive loading platform in District Five that had been cleared in an emergency.
Normally piled high with containers and rusting machinery, it now stood unnervingly empty.
Stark white industrial searchlights illuminated every inch of the ground in minute detail, magnifying every old stain and scratch on the steel floor.
As an "anomalous organism inspection officer" and a "civil servant with outstanding recent performance," Lynn
had been granted permission to observe from the sidelines and stood far from the center.
He was with several dozen other tight-faced Adeptus Arbites officials, guard officers, and a handful of low-ranking bureaucrats.
They looked like an honor guard, yet also like goods awaiting inspection.
There was no welcoming ceremony, no lengthy speech.
As that low-frequency pulse became a tangible roar that pressed against their eardrums,
an iron-gray Thunderhawk gunship, its lines hard and angular, like a massive rock beaten into shape,
pierced vertically through the chemical haze that perpetually shrouded the air above the platform and landed steadily within the designated area.
Scorching exhaust from its engines seared the ground, raising shimmering heat waves and baking the air dry and scalding.
The hatch thundered open.
What emerged first was not a figure, but a cold breath mingling high-grade lubricating oil, coolant, purifying ozone, and something deeper, almost the scent of metal itself.
Then ten towering figures marched out in formation.
The Sons of Medusa.
Their Power Armour was uniformly emerald green, with distinctive clan insignia only on their pauldrons.
The pure white, hard-lined emblems symbolized their lineage and heritage from Clan Magara within the Iron Hands.
The warriors of this clan were known for their obsessive pursuit of heavy firepower and mastery of complex machinery.
Even more striking were their helmets, all pure white, reflecting a cold, merciless sheen beneath the searchlights.
The visual sensors on their faceplates glowed a dim red, like embers in a Hellforge.
Their steps were perfectly matched, heavy and precise, and even the low hum of their Power Armour's servo systems maintained an astonishing degree of synchronization.
It sounded less like ten warriors walking than the components of a vast, intricate war machine moving smoothly.
There were no wasted movements, no exchanges, and even the sweep of their gazes carried a programmed efficiency.
At the sight of the arrivals, Lynn and the other officials immediately made the Aquila Salute to show their respect for the "Emperor's Angels."
Lynn also took the opportunity to sweep his gaze quickly over the squad, drawing on his knowledge from his previous life and what he saw before him to try to analyze their loadout.
The sergeant at their head was more powerfully built than the other warriors.
The command markings on his pauldrons and the faint, light-distorting Iron Halo behind him proclaimed his status.
An enormous Heavy Bolter hung at his waist, with a gleaming Power Axe on the other side and several Melta Bombs secured to his breastplate.
He was the brain, the blade, and the final switch for annihilation.
Close behind him were four warriors carrying Heavy Bolters.
With massive gun bodies and thick ammunition belts, they were the pillars of sustained firepower, responsible for suppressing and sweeping away any enemies that dared to appear in groups.
The other five warriors carried different weapons: three bore fuel tanks on their backs and held fearsome flamethrowers with dark, deep muzzles.
The remaining two carried even bulkier Meltaguns that radiated dangerous energy fluctuations.
They were the purifiers of entire areas and the destroyers of heavily fortified nodes.
This was a Magara Devastator Squad born purely for destruction.
It had none of the flexible combinations common to a Tactical Squad, only a doctrine of delivering saturation firepower to reduce everything to scorched earth.
But that was not all.
After the first Thunderhawk, a slightly larger Thunderhawk Transporter with even more rugged lines slowly descended.
When its hatch opened, what poured out was not more Space Marines, but Servitors.
Large numbers of human remnants, subjected to brutal mechanical modification and retaining only basic biological functions.
They moved stiffly but in order, each carrying or dragging heavy ammunition crates, fuel tanks, spare weapon modules, and even small mobile gun carriages.
They silently joined the Space Marines' rear, like unconscious supply tendrils extending from a war machine.
Clan Magara's obsession with "mechanization" and "sustained heavy firepower coverage" was on full display.
The Hive City's officials instinctively held their breath, and even the governor's representative, the most practiced of flatterers,
looked helpless before that array of cold white helmets, his prepared welcome stuck in his throat.
The sergeant stepped forward, his iron boot striking the metal floor with a clear echo.
He ignored the representative entirely. His white helmet turned slightly, its dark red lenses sweeping over the mortal officials before him.
That gaze held no warmth, no appraisal, only a purely functional scan.
"Data terminal interface."
His voice sounded through his helmet's amplifier, steady, low, and utterly devoid of emotional inflection, like a mechanical voice.
The representative froze for a second before hastily signaling his subordinate to present the prepared Dataslate.
That sergeant-Lynn later learned that his name was Cassius-
took the Dataslate and plugged it directly into a port on his vambrace.
The dark red lenses flickered a few times. After roughly a dozen seconds, he handed the Dataslate back.
"All public security incidents, anomalous disappearances, and energy anomaly reports from the past five years.
Raw data. Within twenty-four hours."
His demands were concise to the point of brutality.
"Local armed forces need not accompany us. Avoid friendly fire. Prevent information leaks."
There was no room for discussion. This was a notification.
The Sons of Medusa launched their first purge on the first day after their arrival.
Just like their parent Chapter, the Iron Hands, they placed efficiency above all else, like machines.
Through the access he now enjoyed to internal channels, Lynn obtained a heavily redacted after-action report that still offered a few glimpses.
The target was an abandoned synthetic protein factory on the border between District Six and District Seven.
Intelligence indicated that a medium-sized Tyranid spawning nest had formed there, gathering a considerable number of mutants and possibly even Purestrain Genestealers.
The course of the battle received almost no detailed description. The focus was on the results and the characteristics of the site:
"The target area has been thoroughly purged.
Approximately twelve hundred to fifteen hundred mutant biological units confirmed eliminated.
Site examination indicates that all hostile units were struck by heavy bolt weapons or high-energy Melta weapons. The vast majority were completely destroyed or vaporized."
"Combat left significant alterations to the terrain.
Metal flooring and structures in the primary engagement area show extensive melting followed by solidification, forming distinctive wave-like or splash-patterned vitreous deposits.
Some load-bearing columns were penetrated by Melta weapons or melted and deformed.
High concentrations of ozone, metal vapor, and characteristic particulates from the complete incineration of organic matter remain in the air."
"Multiple markings consistent with the 'Sons of Medusa Chapter-Clan Magara Tactical Regulations' were found at the site.
Simplified runes representing purification and mechanical blessing, etched into molten metal using Melta weapons or lasers.
Spray-painted markings unique to the clan, imitating the patterns of cooling lava, remain at several key nodes."
In the report's conclusion, the recording officer used a phrase often heard throughout the Imperium to describe the area-"a place baptized in steel."