Brother Librarian

Thought for the Day:

The ends always justify the means.

Jonah was off to a great start in this place. At first, it hadn't gone so well, but a little trickle of Warp-power and the Space Marine's problems were gone. No more memory of him at the hospital, no more records of him at the hospital, no more being stuck at a hospital, he washed much of the blood off of his armor, enough to look presentable. It was a good day thus far. Sure living in the forest wasn't the height of the civilized world, but it was better than some places he had had to sleep or, in some cases, stay awake for weeks at a time.

The worst part had been those records, they were almost as stringent and detailed as the Blood Raven archives. There were even scans of him that highlighted his unique body. He was happy to find that, actually, as the various organs and modifications were still present and not at all damaged. His Secondary Heart, the Ossmodula, the Biscopea, the Haemastamen, Larraman's Organ, Catalepsean Node, the Preomnor, the Omophagea, the Multi-lung, the Occulobe, Lyman's Ear, the Sus-an Membrane, Melanochrome, Oolitic Kidney, Neurroglottis, Mucranoid, Betcher's Gland, and finally the Holy Progenoid Glands and Black Carapace all were present, undamaged, but unfortunately moved to accommodate this pony body. He even still had canine teeth, which was great for him. Pony or not, he was not going to eat those disgusting protein supplements.

Blood Ravens have 2 mutations in their Gene-seed. 1) their Sus-an Membrane is broken, not only can Blood Ravens not enter the hibernation the Membrane is for, they also do not have R.E.M sleep, and coincidentally don't dream. They literally sleep like rocks, they are either fully awake or fully asleep, no in-between, which is great for Chaplain and Librarian lectures as it's obvious who is awake and who is not. 2) No one's really sure in which organ their Photographic Memory is held in, but since all the brothers of the chapters have it and did not have it before they entered the chapter, it is considered a mutation, a really useful mutation, but a mutation nonetheless.

The Blood Ravens also produce many psykers, most often after the Gene-seed has been implanted, but that's beside the point, a complete coincidence, and not a mutation.

Enough with history:

Now his mission was to blend in with the locals until he can call on his brothers and hopefully Exterminatus. How can a giant blend in with the locals, you may ask? Jonah Orion was born on Typhon Primaris, the Blood Ravens recruit as much as they can from the local humans as the tough jungle and its inhabitants breed strong warriors. Unfortunately, there weren't very many left even before the Inquisition blasted the planet into an uninhabitable hell-scape. Jonah was part of a tiny minority inside the chapter that was recruited from Typhon, though Thaddeus was the only man to be recruited from Meridian in several hundred years. The reason Jonah would be able to so easily blend in with the local ponies is that he was uniquely gifted by his heritage in sneakiness, something all born of Typhon possess.

While one could hardly equate blending into a xenos society with blending in with the jungle, he saw no difference. Both were equally terrible, with similar risks of death and damnation.

That river had done him good, his armor too. While he wasn't as adept as Techmarines, he could practically hear the Machine Spirit purring in pleasure. The Machine Spirit of this particular armor and he were good friends from almost day one. He couldn't say the same for his first suit of armor, that Machine Spirit had hated him only slightly less than xenos and heretics. The only time Jonah caught a break from the foul thing was during battle. When just wearing the armor casually or immediately before a mission when it wouldn't impact anything, the Machine Spirit would mess with him. Seizing up joints, turning off motor assist, sending electric current directly into his Black Carapace. It would stop once he met battle, but it was beyond irritating.

In fact, that was how he had learned to remove his armor in an instant. Just back from a tiring, week-long mission, and the first thing the Machine Spirit does is lock up his knee joint, sending him flat on his face. He, in a fit of rage, used his warp power to get this damn armor off of me!!! And it worked, the armor immediately flew across the room in all directions, causing a small amount of damage to everything. His mentor at the time, the future-Traitor Isador Akios, had congratulated him, in an extremely bemused fashion.

A rather useful ability, all thing considered. But he hadn't taken off the armor, he was more at home with it on than without. Just as he was more comfortable with his Force Staff than without, the Power Sword had been Gabriel's idea, and he had used it more than once against the daemons.

He sat under a tree nearby the river, and thought on everything he had learned.

These xenos-horse-ponies... they were clearly of Human origin. Their technology, their mannerisms, their language, their entire bloody species was clearly Mankind in origin. He would have to do a DNA test to be sure, or ask an Apothecary to help, but he was certain they were related to horses. As if it weren't obvious just by looking at them, they were Equine in nature, though they clearly had a few differences. Horns, wings, a surprising flexibility, picking up things with their hooves. He had noticed that last one while mindlessly looking through the cabinet for records pertaining to him, he had been acting normally, as though he had hands. Then he thought on his hooves and was incredibly confused as to how they were working.

Honestly, the ponies were probably just induced mutations by some Mechanicus Genetor's experiments at creating an improved horse breed. For all he knew, it had happened many thousands of years ago, the project had been abandoned, the test subjects set free, and then they developed and created a society.

Mere conjecture, of course, but it was a fairly good, though a bit outlandish, theory. He had heard of, and even done, far stranger things.

It took him a long time to come to that conclusion, days actually. With the eternal patience of a man who didn't sleep for days just to read some interesting bit about history, it was still stretching his limits.

But he needed supplies, food, money, shelter. Things that living beings need to survive. While he wasn't above eating the grass for sustenance as these pony-experiments seemed to be able to do, he was still a proud Astarte and it would take a long time before he would suffer the indignity.

If the memory of those Pony-Medicae were correct, there was a farm nearby. Something called Sweet Apple Acres. They presumably grew a fruit called Apples, that were sweet. Farms always had work available, and could always use an extra hand. A warrior-monk he may be, and never had he ever used a plow, but he could try.

Ponies used gold pieces called bits for money.

He had a plan, though he was wary of entering the Warp to see the future. He was afraid of that psyker he had felt, pervasive like the emperor's influence, but far less powerful. But it definitely knew of his existence, if not his location.

His plan, though unassisted by warp-sight, was thus:

1) Go to Sweet Apple Acres.

2) Inquire as to a job.

3) ????

4) Profit!