Brother Librarian

Thought for the Day:

Call no man happy until he is dead.

Day 1

Jonah Orion was beyond irritated, almost to the point of anger. Centuries of teaching initiates and neophytes, as well as the Lexicani (Newly initiated Librarians), have taught him patience, but this was ridiculous. The only thing keeping him from destroying everything in a 10 kilometer radius was the fact that he had some dignity, he was certain that they had no idea what they were doing, and killing them would spark a large, unnecessary battle. He was weakened after a battle with a Daemon Prince, he couldn't afford angering a horde of xenos.

That's it, nothing else.

Were he any other marine, he would be killing everything. The Black Templars wouldn't have paused to even consider a non-violent solution, and the Angry Marines would have inevitably gotten angry, which generally leads to destruction and killing. And a myriad of other chapters would have done the same.

He was sitting, like the proverbial eye of the storm, as a swarm of dirty, filthy, xenos scrambled about him. He ignored them, however, they obviously couldn't harm him, if the remnants of several metal objects, likely of torture knowing the xenos' tendency for that sort of thing, littered about the floor were any indication. He was happy that he still had his armor, and happier still that the xenos hadn't tampered with it. A glance in the corner revealed his Force Staff and Power Sword. He could only just make out with his superhuman eyes the shimmering field that denoted the shield of his Rosarius. He was happy to see he still had it, the necklace was a powerful relic, a symbol of the God-Emperor, and the personal Rosarius of Reclusiarch Mikelus, it would be a shame and a dishonor to lose it while in his possession.

There would be some measure of time before the xenos would notice that he was awake. His warp presence was tightly bound, his face shadowed by the psychic hood, and it was incredibly difficult to tell whether a creature with 2 hearts is awake or not judging solely by the heartbeat. He used this time to observe his surroundings.

White walls, bright lights, sanitary environment. He deduced torture chamber, a fairly well-crafted and clean one at that.

The xenos had equipment surrounding them that could be used for 2 purposes: healing, and torture. Doctors or 'doctors'.

They were frantic, or at the very least excited: the discovery of an unconscious Space Marine is a prize for any war-band, to be sure.

He examined the xenos with a critical eye, the better to determine how to kill them most efficiently. He noticed their equine bone structure, their wide, expressive eyes, their flimsy wings, their glowing horns...

Strange... they bear a striking similarity to horses of ancient Terra...

He recalled the time he fought alongside a Guardsmen regiment, he had never bothered to learn their name and the engagement was quick, clean, and hardly anything to remember. Were he not a Blood Raven, both gifted and cursed with photographic memory, he would have forgotten the insignificant skirmish long ago. However, there was something about the guardsmen that he had found interesting: they rode horses.

As ancient humanity had spread across the galaxy, the domesticated beasts of Terra inevitably followed. Horses being among them, and being one of the few that survived to this day. As they served Mankind in the dark, unknown past so they served Humanity now, in the dark and mostly unknown present. Good beasts, loyal but stupid, and could carry a good bit of weight, the Feral worlds that still made use of them found them to be indispensable.

Were they not speaking, standing in a structure that they had built, and examining him with what could only be curiosity in their damnable eyes, he would have called them a miniature version of the common horse.

The winged and horned ones would have been a human-induced mutation to allow them to better survive in the wilds, where man could not always keep them safe. But now they were just another sub-sect to the xenos race that he was prisoner of.

He grinned slightly, amused by the direction his thoughts had taken: Librarians were quite infamous for that; thinking back on a subject to the point of distraction, sometimes in the middle of conversation. The Angry Marines thought that their Librarians were 'EMO FAGGOTS!' (Their exact words, as he recalled) but the truth of the matter is that Librarians just have too much time on their hands. They are driven to maintain and study in a large Librarium, they are obviously going to have far too much time to think.

He forced himself back into study of the xenos.

Their language was a bastardized version of Low Gothic, that much was certain. He could make out a word or 2 here and there, but much of it was babble. It was understandable that the xenos spoke Low Gothic, many xenos species do as it is the most common form of language in the galaxy. Though it came in many, many forms, a speaker of Low Gothic could mostly understand another speaker, unless they came from vastly different areas. That just goes to show how large the Imperium of Man was: the common language could be translated an innumerable amount of ways,

In fact, he could probably learn the language given a short period of time just observing them, though he could learn the language much faster by tearing it from their minds with his own. Unless this was a species of psykers, which was why he was acting cautious: by not revealing himself in the warp as much as he could.

He was a mighty Librarian and he could hide much of his presence in the warp, but nothing can ever not have a presence in the warp, not while it lives. He was confident that even if they were psykers, they would be unable to break his mind. He had battled an entire Hive Fleet psychically for weeks and was the only survivor. The number of men who have done that and lived can be counted on 1 hand: himself, The Emperor, and Chief Librarian Tigurius of the Ultramarines.

That's it, though there are probably more, these are the only reported to have survived.

A sudden thought struck him...

If horses were from Holy Terra...

And these xenos looked like horses....

Which means they might be descended from horses....

Does that mean they are not xenos?

He would wrestle with this question for 3 days.

Shortly after wrestling his next discovery into the ground.