Editing Grimdark Tarzan (section)

== Chapter 9 ==
Of the proud host that had set out to reclaim the Greystoke for the Imperium of man, precious few remained. The Inquisitor still lived, as did Tarzan and Magos Archimede, but beyond that they counted a mere six sisters of battle and nine storm troopers. A shot rang out, the Emperor's mercy: make that eight storm troopers. They would not be able to secure the area, but they had driven off a chaos threat, and with the use of a homing beacon, they would yet be able to claim the site.

The field was awash with blood and gore, the stench of dead and dying everywhere, but every death had been worth it to the Inquisitor and Magos. As they approached the ship's doors, their allies scavenged the bodies of the dead for supplies; the fallen would not need them anymore.

"Would you like to do the honors?" Callen asked Archimede

The techpriest replied in binary. His assistant had been slain in the battle, so no one could translate what he was saying, but his tone conveyed his answer.

Extending his mechadendrites to the door, he began manipulating the delicate machinery that would allow them entry. He needn't have bothered, there were gaps in the ship all over from what had obviously been a forced landing, but there was a sense of ceremony to the whole thing.

It did not take long, the doors of the ship had meant to protect against the hazards of space, not cunning entry by a half-man half-machine (well, more than half at this point). In mere moments, the doors opened with the -whoosh- of a time that had promised a bright future instead of the dark one it had turned out to be.

Wounded but able, the rest of the force staggered over to the opening and followed the two men inside. As could have been expected from the outside, the inside was completely and utterly destroyed. Once delicate machinery lay hanging from consoles overhead. Panels were smashed, the mechanical innards they had once protected exposed to the elements and worn away.

These rooms would have to be examined later, stripped down to their basest parts and every bit of data mined, all to be reviewed by the Adeptus Mechanicus, but these were merely the outermost rooms of the colony ship; the greater secrets, that which they would have desperately protected, and might still be protecting would be further in.

While the other members gaped at what seemed to be the lost miracles of mankind, Callen and Archimede pressed onwards. However, even they stopped for a moment when they came to what had been the cold sleep room. Some chambers had been likely been crushed by the sudden impact, the occupants inside killed due to the trauma, but those had been the lucky ones. Others had been trapped in their chambers, slowly suffocating as the systems that had been keeping them slowly failed when the generators had been responsible for them were destroyed or had otherwise gone offline; their partially preserved last moments depicted their desperate attempts to escape. Cruelest of all were the ones punctured by crude weapons and other tools; they had been the ones who survived the odds, only to be slain by simple malice.

The others had caught up to them at this time, and many were similarly affected, with several of them swearing oaths of vengeance on the creatures of the planet that had attacked the defenseless humans so.
"Imagine if, somehow, one of these ancient humans had survived, preserved in stasis, until this day. What ancient wonders we might have learnt from them." Inquisitor Callen trailed a hand over the shattered glass of one pod, "the creatures of this planet shall burn for this". This statement was met with grim nods from his fellow Imperials; not only did these beasts worship Chaos, but they had also deprived humanity of what might have been a great boon. Even Magos Archimede let lose a binary stream of agreement

Tarzan alone remained quiet and contemplative. He looked upon the cold and decomposed bodies, the bones that remained, and the utterly empty beds where not even dust lay. Had he descended from a small group of survivors, who, thawed and unused to the harsh world, had been cut down one by one until only he was left to be taken by a kind-hearted native creature? He could not even begin to imagine the life he might have lived had the ship not met with tragedy.

The group continued on in somber silence, the joy at reaching the lost artifact all but gone. But still, they moved with renewed vigor, their mission all the more important with the knowledge about the cost of human lives.
They walked up, then down, then up again. They stepped sideways through ruined archways and collapsed corridors, following a trail that only the Magos seemed to identify. Eventually even he stopped, coming to a halt in front of two intact doors, and the speakers in (what was once)his throat thrummed with noise.

"This is the door then, magos?" asked Callen, and was answered by a short screech that he had long since learnt meant agreement. He looked over the vault, and came to a conclusion. Turning to what remained of his retinue, he commanded them, "Spread out and search, there are doubtless controls to this somewhere. The magos and I shall remain here and see if we can somehow access the insides." A trooper approached with a demolition charge only to be waved away, "Do not bother. Wonders from Mankind's past would not budge an inch at such things. And even if they did, we cannot risk harming what is inside."
The remaining soldiers split up in teams of two and three to explore the nearby wreckage. By singular coincidence (or perhaps not), Tarzan and Janna ended up together. Eyeing a stairwell that lay half exposed down a corridor, Janna led the way. The two walked in absolute silence, both still thinking about the colony ship's dead.

The staircase had partially collapsed, but Tarzan had grown up in a jungle, and leaping the gap was of no challenge to him. Reaching down, he helped Janna ascend to the next level. Before them lay banks of monitors, and Janna made a mental note to inform the Mechanicus that this was a high value room. On flickering screens, they were able to see some of their comrades in different parts of the ship; the area that they were in must have once been a security office, now useless in the aftermath of a great failure it had been powerless to prevent.

More interesting were a row of monitors that seemed to be stuck on an eternal playback, showing events that the fading artificial intelligences had seen fit to remember before they too had gone to the long dark. They depicted the Lepris and other vile creatures stalking the halls of Mankind's once great ship, desecrating them and slaying the humans still in their pods. From the images, they had occurred at different times in the planet's history. They could not have happened mere hours apart, several details, such as excessive overgrowth, made Janna suspect that there were decades, centuries, millennia even, between events. She felt her hands tighten into fists and her face twist into a snarl as she watched the past.

But her fascination with events were nothing compared to Tarzan's, who had fixated on one screen. In this one, the latest, seeing as the ship seemed to be in its current state, depicted a female Goril fleeing down the halls, chased by a pack of Lepris. She fled down a narrow shaft, and then the scene shifted to another room. It had previously been part of the main chamber, but had collapsed, and by some miracle was still receiving power. There, almost on a pedestal, was a single active pod. The scene depicted the Goril looking in with curiosity before hearing a noise behind her. A look of consternation crossed her fact, before she wrenched the door open and took the inhabitant, a sleeping baby. She fled immediately after, and the last pic was of the Lepris arriving too late in the chamber and finding it deserted.

Tarzan placed one hand on the screen and one hand over his chest. He managed to gasp, "Mother!", before breaking down into tears, realizing that the ship truly was once his home, and how it could so easily have been his tomb. Unsure of what to do, Sister Janna put a hand on his shoulder as the giant man wept.

It did not take long for Tarzan to compose himself, but she wondered if it was due to acceptance or a simple refusal to show weakness in front of another. Her commbead buzzed, the Inquisitor was calling her back to the front of the vault. She briefly considered leaving Tarzan to his grief, but he strode in front of her, leading the way back.

With a tired voice, the Inquisitor questioned the group assembled in front of them, "Have you found anything that might open these gates?"
He was answered by a chorus of negatives

"Of course you haven't... Well, luckily I am here. With my help, Magos Archimede has manged to unlock a secret of these doors" Pressing his hand against a small section of the metal, a hand sized scanner was revealed. "Here is the keyhole, and now all we need is they key. Someone return to the bodies and look for a preserved hand. It is desecration, I know, but some indignities must be suffered for the good of the Imperium"

However, before any could move, Tarzan strode up to the scanner and placed his hand on it.

"What are you doing, you sav-!"

A mechanical voice spoke in a long dead language <DNA profile accepted. Welcome back, Captain Burroughs>, and with that, the doors began to open.

Momentarily rendered speechless, Inquisitor Callen was the first to recover, "Well, we shall have to look into that, but first, our prize". Taking the lead as if it was his by right, Callen strode into the vault, followed by Magos Archimede, then the Sisters and Tarzan, and finally the stormtroopers.

Inside were not precious minerals, nor technological databanks or stores of weapons. Instead, lining the walls in row upon row were stasis tubes, with monstrous organisms growing within them.

"As expected" Inquisitor Callen said with a smile.