While the Dark Angels tracked the lingering scent of Chaos, Axion's colossal mechanical fleet finally arrived in this remote system. Though integrating the various fleet elements had taken time, the Iron Men's energy-tracking technologies were far more potent than those possessed by the Imperium.
The Dark Angels had veered off course, taking a circuitous route to regain Abaddon's trail, but the mechanical fleet had never lost its quarry. The energy wake generated by warp-traveling vessels diffuses in specific directions and patterns. By harvesting these decaying energy signatures and processing them through advanced algorithms, Axion could recalculate the fleet's heading and time of passage with surgical precision.
Particularly when the enemy made no effort to mask their wake, their destination was, for Axion, blindingly clear. Though the sub-light engines of the Iron Men were ancient by Imperial standards, they were significantly faster. The massive mechanical fleet soon detected the Dark Angels' fleet loitering on the system's fringe.
Axion, however, had no intention of hailing the Emperor's Angels. He felt no need for the assistance of these fragile genetic warriors. Furthermore, he was responding to a distress call issued by a Deathwatch fortress; the Dark Angels had not requested his aid, and he felt no obligation to report his combat findings to them.
The standard protocol for an Iron Man was simple: track the target and achieve total annihilation. If the Dark Angels could detect the presence of Chaos on the planet below, Axion certainly could as well.
Lion El'Jonson, wary of an ambush, had held his fleet back, sending only two vessels into the orbit of the anomalous planet. Axion harbored no such concerns. The mechanical fleet surged into the system, filling the void and initiating a comprehensive sweep for Warp signatures.
Abaddon found himself momentarily grateful that he had hidden his fleet within a sub-pocket of the Warp. He had originally intended to ambush the Dark Angels, but now he could only pray that his brother, Falkus Kibre, moved faster. If Kibre could secure the ancient vessels within, Abaddon believed they could finally slip the noose of the Iron Men's fleet.
…
Axion scrutinized the entire system through the lens of energy-vision. The local vacuum was saturated with traces of empyric energy, but of the five planets, only the one shrouded in thick green mist showed distinct residual Warp signatures.
Though this world did not appear to fall under Imperial jurisdiction, the peculiar green vapor drew Axion's immediate attention. Under energy-vision, the mist shimmered, a clear indication of a massive energy source dispersing through the atmosphere.
The Iron Men's landing was neither subtle nor restrained. Massive mechanical hulls choked the orbit, sandwiching the Dark Angels' Strike Cruisers and Battle Barges between them. Swarms of transport craft carrying the machine legions cut through the atmosphere, heading directly for the surface. Destroyer-class Heavy Automata were deployed via low-orbital drop.
The scale of the global insertion nearly ignited the planet's atmosphere. The last time a world had suffered such an onslaught was during the campaign against the Leagues of Votann's ancestral worlds in the Galactic Core.
The turbulence from countless transports utterly disrupted the planet's weather patterns, tearing gaps in the heavy green mist. Great swathes of land were revealed, occasionally exposing sprawling architectural complexes.
On the surface, Sentry-Troopers assembled into perfect geometric phalanxes. Armored Wardens marched at the vanguard, forming an unbreakable front line. Peltast Sniper Automata took up positions in the rear alongside long-range Armored Warden variants, while Destroyers and Vengeance-class machines waited for their targets to be designated.
If necessary, orbital strikes would rain down from the heavens, or Punisher-class Mega-Titans would be dropped directly from the void. Automatons accompanying the troops conducted environmental analyses, streaming vast quantities of data back to the fleet.
The toxic air posed no threat to the Iron Men. However, the machines on the ground were unable to determine the exact nature of the green mist. The energy readings within it were remarkably stable; no matter how the mist was stimulated, it showed no signs of volatile change, possessing instead a unique, self-restoring resilience.
The landed legions quickly swept the surface. Axion was unsurprised to find the Dark Angels and mortal troops who had landed previously. The mechanical columns ignored the makeshift Imperial camps, marching straight toward the ruins at the heart of the architectural complexes.
There were six such complexes distributed across the planet. At the center of each lay a gargantuan vertical shaft. Even though deep-scanning was hampered by the high-energy mist, ground-based calculations provided Axion with more detail. The six metal shafts were aligned and bored completely through the planet's core.
It was evident this world had held a special significance in ancient times. Furthermore, Axion identified numerous military facilities dating back to the Federation era among the ruins. Yet, his database contained no world matching this terrain, especially one hosting such a high density of artificial installations. Clearly, this had once been the site of a specialized Federation institution.
While the surface was explored, swarms of machines leaped directly into the six massive shafts. After a vertical descent of over ten meters, the units identified a shift in gravity. They adjusted their postures mid-air, coming to rest horizontally against the vertical metal walls.
In the shaft of one particular ruin, Axion discovered something distinct: the wreckage of a small Adeptus Mechanicus frigate. The hull was riddled with blast craters and structural failures, the entire vessel torn into fragments.
Nanomachines were released from the mechanical units, swarming over the wreckage to devour every data cell within the frigate's remains. After meticulously sifting through the layers of corrupted "junk" data, Axion pieced together why the ship was there.
As early as 833.M35, a Mechanicus Explorator fleet, consisting of a single Planetary Ark and several frigates, had stumbled upon this world. Even then, the planet was already choked by the strange green mist. Because their scanners were hindered, the Explorators had deployed several landing parties.
Some teams were killed instantly by the toxic fumes upon landing, but the more cautious survived. They scouted the ruined complexes and discovered the vertical shafts. External surveys suggested the shafts were large enough to accommodate starships.
Erring on the side of caution, they decided to send a single frigate into the depths. They reasoned that a warship, even a light frigate, offered better protection than any other form of exploration. In these ancient reaches, one could never be too careful.
However, as the frigate approached the shaft, the local gravitational constants shifted violently. The ship was forcibly wrenched into the center of the vertical bore, subjected to overwhelming gravitational shear from all directions. The vessel was torn apart by the stress, its remains scattered like shrapnel across the interior walls of the shaft.
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