Black Crusade: Broken Chains

[blackouttwo]

"Alarm. Security breach. Prison riot in progress. All Stormtroopers to your stations. Lethal force authorized. Alarm. Security breach. Prison riot in progress. All Stormtroopers to your stations. Lethal force authorized..." -Vox-alert during the prisoner uprising on the Inquisitorial prison ship Chains of Judgement, 232.614.M41
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Spoiler: From the Private Records of Inquisitor Jetak Kolaire, Ordo Hereticus, 119.816.M41

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"The matter of the Chains of Judgement is one that I have little interest in, but Inquisitor Kervo, one of my colleagues in the Ordo Xenos, has made a bold offer and a respectful request that I look closely at what is known of the vessel's history, and its cargo and crew at the time of its disappearance, to see if I can find any potential connection regarding noble families with known ties to the ongoing Severan Dominate secession attempt in the Periphery."

"Why agents of the Ordo Xenos are looking into a prison ship lost to the Warp two-hundred years ago for a connection to a secession that has only been treading water, if that, against the Orks and Imperial Guard out on the sector's edge for a mere seventeen years is completely beyond me, but I will certainly dispatch a senior acolyte cell to investigate Inquisitor Kervo's activity on Ryboth for possible answers. Once Cell 29 has made planetfall on Iocanthos to investigate that trivial matter regarding the Ghostfire refinery, we'll make for our new destination with all due haste."

"Meanwhile, the records my agents uncovered from the data-crypts of the Tricorn Palace on Scintilla were fragmentary, but Drachen and Reid were able to compose a fuller picture of the ship based on its history, a few manifests dating back to just before the ship disappeared, and the transcript of its last astropathic transmission before the vessel was lost to the Warp."

"Back in 487.M39, the Chains was an Iconoclast-class destroyer that was captured by Imperial forces during the Angevin Crusade. Originally, it was a vessel in the ownership of a pirate wolfpack that had taken to attacking the Crusade force's flanks as it pushed into what is now the Calixis Sector's Golgenna Reach. Considered too poorly-armed to be of much use were it to be pushed into service with the Imperial Navy, and containing a substantial hold that could be easily converted to prison blocks and stasis crypts, the vessel was handed over to the Inquisition, whereupon it was refitted as a prison ship tasked with conveying heretics, captured xenos subjects, and renegades from across the sector to Scintilla for interrogation or specialized incarceration."

"Much of the space once given over to weapons and munitions was converted into prison holds, and at any one time the Chains had the capacity to hold upwards of 10,000 prisoners, with special solitary stasis chambers reserved for the worst of them. Records indicate these stasis chambers were fitted with a specialized kill-switch protocol to terminate captives upon system failure or power-fluctuations compromising the integrity of any stasis caskets. A prudent measure. Better a heretic die than escape, even if they could've been interrogated."

"With so much space given over to cells, there was little left for a large contingent of guards. To compensate for this, the Inquisitors of the time opted for other measures. The vessel was given added security in the form of a complex system of gates, locks, turrets, gun-servitors, and other arcane systems leased from the Adeptus Mechanicus between each level. These systems were intended to isolate and contain the prisoners in the lower levels of the ship while the rest of the crew carried out their duties in the mid-decks and upper levels. Packs of murder servitors were assigned to patrol the lower decks at regular intervals and converge on containment breaches, ensuring that should a prisoner somehow escape his cell, he would not get very far."

"Suffice it to say, the security measures worked. The vessel served its assigned role effectively for approximately two millennia with few containment breaches, and no successful escapes. The ship went where it was needed to pick up captured heretics, and journeys were made at regular intervals to Scintilla to transfer captives to the Tricorn Palace, just as planned."

"However, upon the last journey the vessel made, an Inquisitor of the Ordo Malleus took command, a man by the name of Renthor. By all accounts, Renthor was an unpopular one among his colleagues, but all records of his activities prior to taking command of the Chains of Judgement are classified by data-locks and encryption-warden spirits my retinue has yet to decipher. Fera assures me she's 'working on it.'"

"The most we know is that Renthor was under suspicion by many of his colleagues. Numerous references exist in the records of other Inquisitors active two centuries ago, many of them mentioning an Inquisitor Renthor, Ordo Malleus, active at the time - almost certainly the man in command of the Chains at the time of its disappearance. They refer to him as a driven man who was involved in numerous acts that could be construed as cases of his adherence to potential Radical doctrines. This was never confirmed, but many Puritans in the Calixian Conclave absolutely cried foul when he took command of the Chains of Judgement."

"At any rate, the last known location of the Chains of Judgement was in a system near Port Wander and the Koronus Passage. Renthor intended to take the vessel to Port Wander to collect a prisoner from the local Arbitrators, a Rogue Trader found guilty of smuggling xenos relics into Imperial space from the Koronus Expanse. Astropathic choir transmissions from Port Wander verify the prison ship never arrived. The astropathic transmission before the Chains of Judgement's last Warp jump was the last anyone had heard from Inquisitor Renthor, reporting the commencement of Warp translation and a simple 'situation normal.'"

"And, on that note, I've been analyzing known crew records and manifests along with Jerp, and we've confirmed that none of the crew aboard the Chains of Judgement had familial or business connections to any of the noble dynasties known to have ties to the contemporary Severan Dominate secession in the Periphery today."

"The prisoner manifest is another matter, however, and Jerp and I are currently going over it with a fine-toothed comb, but we anticipate nothing substantial or deserving of further investigation. I don't know what Kervo hoped to achieve by requesting that I waste my time like this, but he made a considerable offer for it, and I would be remiss in my own duties as an Inquisitor to simply ignore the potential of what he promised in return for my efforts."

"End of log."

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1300 Hours Chains of Judgement Shipboard Time

139.816.M41

Rimward Edge of the Calixis Sector

Ship Status: Adrift in the Warp

The lights of the stasis crypt flicker, decaying power transfer systems and ancient cables shorting out, only for an instant.

The lights stabilize once more.

They flicker again.

And this time, the six stasis chambers arrayed throughout the room deactivate.

You have awoken, the feeble lights of the stasis crypt greeting you as you stumble from your casket. Strangely though, no armed guards or armored troopers stand waiting with manacles ready. Looking around, you see others like yourself emerge from their own caskets, all of you dressed in simple sack-cloth robes. The room's ceiling is low, and the stasis crypt is lit only by two flickering emergency luminen globes. You also note the walls and floor are thick with dust and age.

You cannot help but wonder how long you've slept.

Besides the caskets, there is a cogitator column in the center of the room, a flickering display screen in one side. The screen is still operational, albeit covered with dust, with a blinking series of status updates.

Spoiler: Cogitator Screen

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The first entries in the cogitator’s memory list your names and the dates when you were interred. A notation indicates you were to be taken to Scintilla for interrogation and summary termination. A second notation mentions that certain items in your possession at time of capture were held in 'Investigative Laboratorium 5.'

Following this are three months of regular and identical weekly status updates from your caskets, interrupted by this message:

[Alarms triggered in main prison hold - General prisoner uprising in effect - Emergency lockdown protocols active - Sealing Sanctum Gate between prison hold and upper decks]

[Sealing Stasis Crypts 1-20 on Medicae Deck 3 - Sealing Investigative Laboratoriums 1-5 on Medicae Deck 3 - Medicae Decks switching to tertiary reserve plasma power generators]

[Lockdown protocols in effect, pending uprising resolution]

[Pending]

[Pending]

[Pending]

Scrolling through the updates, you quickly realize via the datestamps that they continue for two hundred years. You have been interred in these stasis caskets for over two centuries.

Eventually, you reach the final message in the cogitator’s memory.

[Reserve power generation below 1 percent power - Unable to maintain operations on stasis crypts - Unable to maintain lockdown protocols]

[Initiating termination protocols on stasis crypt inhabitants]

[Stasis Crypt 20 termination protocols overridden. Stasis crypt 1-19 termination protocols active.]

[Stasis crypt operations switching to emergency standby - Stasis caskets deactivating - Lockdown protocols inactive]

There is a single, closed hatch in the wall of the stasis crypt. The hatch is clearly not sealed, and can reasonably be pried open.

[Inigo Montoya]

Location: Stasis Crypt 20

Agata blinked, slowly. She was fully awake in less then ten seconds, but she took her time blinking and playing the slow to wake teenager. It was an act to throw off any guards. Maybe she could make her escape...
To her surprise, there was no one there. No guards with manacles to bind her hands and strange looking men that her powers could not affect. She stared around the room, noting the dust and general disrepair of the place. She had been in the tube for a long time. To long, something must have happened. Her mind started to race ahead, but she took a deep breath, coughed, and started to stretch. She remembered her lessons from so long ago.

"An assassin must be calm. If you aren't calm, you're dead. These stretches will help you maintain your calmness."

She slid out of her robe and began to preform her stretches. She preferred to do them without the weight of cloth to throw her off. Once she had finished, she put her clothes back on and walked to the center of the room to examine the central pillar. She was unfamiliar with this technology, but she had seen her guards examine it. A message system of some sort. She went to examine it herself, not noticing the other cyro-crypts in the room.

[Shadowcaller]

Ivy breathes out as she slowly comes to her senses, starting to look around in the room, the lack of guards not bothering her. Something had obviously gone wrong here judging by the all the dust on the walls. She is a black-skinned woman that can't be much older than thirty whose most remarkable feature is her blond hair which appears to be her natural hair color if one can really tell the difference between natural and dyed haircolor in the grim dark future. Neither tall nor short or slender nor plump she has a well-trained body that also manages to be feminine at the same time.

So she was still alive she thinks to herself, in fact, she had been alive for hundreds of years if that panel was to be believed. Her parents and everyone she knew were dead at this point. Just when she thought she was going to die before them. It was laughable Here she was betraying everything and everyone and yet she gets to live another day. If this was an act of some deity, it had to be some kind of punishment.

She looks at the others emerging from the chamber she tsk's to herself. Couldn't they at least have given them proper robes instead of these rags? Without proper clothes these strangers would be harder to read, she would have to stay back a bit and pretend to still be catching her breath as they would reveal themselves to her. Chaos worshippers were always a pain to deal with but she would need them to get out of here alive. Soon enough a leader would take charge of this group of misfits and she would have to make herself trustworthy of them. Things were a mess right now but now that she had lived for more than two hundred years it would be a shame to suddenly die now. Hopefully they wouldn't a silent bunch, that would mean she had to take charge.

[UncleWolf]

Ivy and Agata will find a third woman stride past them to look at the console without a word. She's tall with a muscular build and her rags do little to hide the fleur de lis tattoo that covers her entire back. She takes a moment to brush her stark white hair from her eyes as she frowns at the console. "Someone saved us instead of letting the protocols kill us." She points out before turning around to look at those present. Her left cheek sports a tattoo identical to the one on her back except this time it has been cut upon, marked out by a symbol devoted to the Blood God. Her eyes are pure blood-red pools, lacking pupils or whites, and even more disturbingly the air around her body seems to shimmer ever so slightly as she gives off the scent of ozone, The Warp itself seeming to bleed around her.

"I'm heading to the Laboratorium." She says before heading to the hatch and attempting to pull it open. From the expression on her face she doesn't seem to approve of her current comrades too much. That said, she is quite obviously a Sororitas and even if it isn't obvious, the console would mention such most likely.

[Deathkeeper]

"Hold, woman." comes a rumbling voice from the largest casket. With slow deliberate movements the chaos marine steps forth from the casket. His skin and size are usual for such beings. The enormous horns on his head are not.
"We are unarmed save for our flesh and our minds, and though for some of us the latter is more capable than others, should there be automated defenses the guns would tear you apart like paper. We'll need to find equipment, though I doubt they have anything in my own size besides that which was mine when they took me. We'll need what force we have." he says, loudly rapping his knuckles on one of the remaining unopened caskets beside him.
"Bon Matin, heretics! Chaos has need of you!"

[ThirdEmperor]

His eyes clench tighter shut at the knock echoing through his bedchamber, and it's then that Thanius Dolor realizes he's awake at all.
The eyes crack open, and second by second the dust of centuries shakes from his bones, willing life to the electronic circuits running alongside his veins. A binary crackle fills his head, each thought backed with a thousand little factoids springing up through the miles of microscopic silicon track printed upon his skull. A casket. He's in a stasis casket.

And has been for two hundred years.

Fumbling for the inner catch, the techpriest pushes his way out of the casket in a rush of stale mist. His footsteps are heavy and clunking. There is little of the original flesh left, and what is there is ancient, an ugly dead white. A breastplate replaces his chest, steel running down his arms and legs, shunts that extend into trailing metal tendrils sprouting from his shoulders. A cage encircles his balding head, plunging spikes into the skull below.

"One side, please." His voice is a tinny croak, tubes winding down from the bottom of his jaw to slide beneath the plate of his chest. He pushes forward, towards the console, giving the other inhabitants no more than a passing glance. They can wait. He needs to know. His metal fingers clatter heavily against the keys. "Ingram Retigun and Sorrow." A Sister and a Space Marine are easy enough to name as he scrolls through the stored data. "I am Thanius. And you two?" The heretek glances to the remaining pair, although only for a moment.

[Halae]

The rapping on her casket wakes Sierra up. Unlike a few of those present, she looks unmutated by the warp - red hair, hazel eyes that blearily blink open to look around the chamber, a decently muscular body.

After a moment, she jolts out of the casket with a push, fully aware. Seems she's ready for a fight, but with no guards present, she's left wondering what's going on. She steps out of the hatch and frowns, before looking up at the big chaos marine, "How long?"

She steps out into the room, her brow furrowed, as she goes over to the terminal to see what can be seen, not waiting for an answer. She scrolls through it with a growing look of distress before finally stopping and slamming a fist against the wall, "Centuries!?" She holds back the urge to cry. Davian... he's dead. He's dead now.

The inquisition kept her from getting to him in time.

They'll regret that.

[UncleWolf]

"Evidence Laboratorium Five." Sorrow says as she sets her hands on the hatch. "That's where the console said our equipment was put two centuries ago, Traitor." She adds before attempting to haul open the hatch. As large as the thing is, her muscles bulge, nearly as large as they can be naturally. The way she says Traitor is far more matter-of-factly rather than accusing.

[Shadowcaller]

While half-pretending to lean against the wall for support Ivy watched the others for just a few moments and she already had a vague idea who they all were. They all stood out a bit in their own way.

There was the lean red-head whose first act was to slip out of her clothes and stretch. Anyone that had at least a fleeting interest in the female body ought to give her more than just a brief glance.
Quiet, immodest, agile, lean. Her first guess would be an assassin considering where she was, commoners didn't care much about modesty. She had no idea about the god she might be serving though.

Next up was the white-haired woman who didn't need much of of an introduction. Unless she was doing a hell of an impersonation, she was obviously a fallen sister of battle. Those blood red eyes (seriously?) even suggested she was with Khorne. She had some leadership qualities though but she wasn't sure she wanted to get too close, Khorne followers were aggressive.

Then came mister marine, built like something out of a parody. They looked so much better with their armors on, those muscles were just too much. But speaking of parody, he was talking like he was in one. 'Heretics! Chaos has need of you'? She knew marines were monster-versions of real people, but was this guy for real? It didn't help that he probably could kill the rest of the room if he wanted to, unarmed and half-naked as they were. Still no idea about his god though, but probably not Tzeentch.

She almost felt sorry for the next red-head that came bursting out of the casket, she almost looked... innocent. Perhaps someone who'd just fallen? The way she reacted when when she saw found long they had been asleep did suggested she still had something to lose, unlike everyone else there. Perhaps she had some potential then. She had to investigate this further.

The fifth one was interesting too, build like a ancient royal mummy coming out of it's sarcophagus Ivy could have easily mistaken him for a dead man if it weren't for the fact that he spoke. Had something gone wrong with the stasis chamber or was he just a follower of Nurgle? Since she couldn't think of any other god who'd keep their follower in that state. She's so distracted by this undead pharaoh that she almost misses the fact that he's addressing her. She suddenly stands straight and glances at the console.

Name? He was asking for a name? She could barely remember what aliases she had used when the Inquisition had captured her and she couldn't see the name from here with red-head #2 in the way. Delinda? Nagi? Best to just go for the truth then, after two hundred years it wouldn't matter anyway.

Ivy manages an quick but elegant bow to the decaying man, even in this horrendous attire. "Ivy Ethelburg at your service, sirs and madams." As she bows down her head she sneaks a glance at Sorrow as she opens the hatch. Traitor? Interesting way to phrase it. "Let's all give Sorrow a hand shall we? It's our only way out." Though despite her suggestion she makes no move to actually help the fallen sister of battle. As strong as she was, she was no match for Ingram and didn't want to be standing in his way when he tried to open it.

It should be noted that her name isn't on that list.

[ThirdEmperor]

Sierra might be surprised to find a hand upon her shoulder, and the techpriest looking down to her with as much pity as his ruined face can allow. The lips can hardly move and the the brow is lost in wrinkles, true, but there's still enough of the eyes to offer sympathy. "This too shall pass." He says in that metallic grating of a voice. And then, to the rest, "And I will follow in a moment. First I need to get my bearings."

Which starts with investigating this console.

[Inigo Montoya]

Location: Stasis Crypt 20

Agata hissed slightly when she had heard how much time had passed. 200 years? Was anything on her planet the same? Or was it another world among millions in the Imperium? Well...no matter. She had seen entire governments rise and fall in the span of six months. What was 200 years? She had already left her home and as long as her skills were sharp, she'd always have a use. The most important thing right now was to take stock of her fellow...'companions', for lack of a better term.

The most noticeable was the giant with horns. A space marine, and given his...rather direct language, one in service to what the Imperium called 'Chaos'. She mentally shrugged. One god was as good as another in her mind. She never had much time for religious reflection.

The woman the marine spoke to was...strange. Stark white hair, massive tattoo on her back and an aura that nearly made Agata nauseated. She almost smelled of blood.
The third person Agata noticed was the one who had spoken. She seemed the most upset by this development. Perhaps she has...or rather, had a family.
The...man placing his hand the mourning woman was the oldest man Agata had ever seen. He seemed like he was just about to collapse into a pile of dust with every moment. But there was...a resiliency to him. One that wasn't natural. Perhaps it was the cybernetics.

The last person was perhaps the most interesting. She was observing everyone with an intensity similar to Agata's, but much more open, even disguised as it was with her leaning against the wall. She was searching, but not for the things Agata was. This woman, Ivy, was obviously wary of attacks from...well assassins. A guard, or some sort of noble. She would bare keeping a close eye on.

These thoughts flicked through Agata's head in a matter of minutes, as she looked up over the screen, the list of names of everyone here. ...Not quite everyone though. Ivy's name wasn't on here. Curious. A new arrival? Or something else? The old man, Thanius, was asking her name. She considered lying, but decided it wouldn't do much good. She honestly didn't know if the name she called herself by was even hers, or just a cover.

"My name is Agata. And our equipment is in Evidence Laboratorium Five? Good. I believe we will need it sooner rather then later."
Her thoughts drifted to her training again as she spoke those words.
"Always speak the truth when possible. The truth is easier to come up with then a lie."
Yes, that was the truth alright. They would need guns as soon as possible.

[Halae]

Stasis Crypt 20

Sierra lets out a long, shuddering breath, before she stands upright. She looks at Thanius and nods to him in thanks - it's always nice to get some support from someone who has most likely been there before. Sort of. "I'm Sierra. If I'm reading this right, the other stasis crypts, which were being used for people as bad or worse than us have already been opened, and I doubt a great number of them are going to be friendly. We need a few things right now; the situation on this ship, and the gear to enact a plan." She starts walking off "Let's head to the vault. If we meet someone we can beat some information out of along the way, all the better."

She seems... unusually focused. Sierra is pushing herself into a role, a style of thinking, to avoid dealing with her grief right now. Grief can come later, when she's not surrounded by heretics that might not look kindly on a crying woman. Thanius, at least, seems sympathetic, but the others... she doesn't know them. Though she supposes the may come to know them.

[Deathkeeper]

Ingram nods.
"A sound deduction. Come, let's go. I'll blast anything that's too stubborn for flesh and bone to fell." he says. A few madwomen, a cyborg, seems normal enough. Can't pick and choose when you're stuck naked on a rock with some very important thing to retrieve.

[blackouttwo]

Prying the exit to the stasis crypt open, the sight that greets you out in the hall is more of the same: Dust and empty hallways. Clearly dark and disused, the hall you exit into has obviously fallen into disrepair. Several large void-rats and a dust spider or two scurry away into tiny, corroded ducts and the nearby shadows as the glow of your stasis crypt's emergency lighting spills into the filthy corridor. The corridor itself is choked with the unmistakable sign of dead bodies, decaying slowly for decades.

The corridor to your right has caved in entirely, from a collapse in a deck somewhere above you. Obviously the Chains of Judgement is on its last legs. The corridor to the left, at least, is clear enough to walk down, but the bulkheads are clearly collapsing from the lack of maintenance. Exposed wiring and plumbing, some of it falling apart, are visible through collapsed or damaged access panels.

Judging from the dents and blast marks all along the walls, there was clearly a battle here at some point in the past two centuries, probably the initial prison riot. Several bodies with caved in heads, and obvious ancient lasburn marks from the guards' hellguns, combined with what are visible cuts in decayed flesh, litter the floor of the hallway. No visible equipment remains. If any of the dead here were guards, they were stripped of their equipment long ago, and if there were any left it'd likely be corroded to worthlessness unless it was maintained.

There is a distant sound of the engines humming somewhere near the upper decks, even after decades of possible lack of maintenance. On the corridor wall opposite your stasis crypt's door is a sign painted on the wall, an arrow pointing down the corridor to the left. It reads 'Investigative Laboratoriums.' With any luck, Investigative Laboratorium V remains accessible. And untouched.

You might be able to scavenge an improvised weapon from the surrounding wreckage - a fragment of scrap metal or a solid pipe of some kind to use as a club or a shiv. It would be better than simply going without until you could get your equipment, but the psykers would be less restricted than most, and those with legacy weapons would probably prefer to go without until they can get their weapons of choice back.

Those who wish to move on know exactly where to go.

[Shadowcaller]

Ivy stands back as Sorrow manages to pry the exit open. Looked like she didn't even need the marines help, pretty impressive. She waits a moment to see if anything hostile or dangerous would make it's presence known before she peers past the fallen sister of battle and out the corridor. Hopefully no one would decide to take this opportunity to stab her in the back, it wouldn't make much sense killing her now but she had come to expect irrational acts of betrayal by now. It's what she did.

"Looks safe, but as for the situation of the ship, it's not good. Looks like a prison riot happened here a couple of centuries ago and no one has redecorated ever since." She walks out into the room and attempts to find a suitable improvised weapon. Gotta be something in here.

[Halae]

Sierra takes a bit of broken pipe out of a corner and swings it about a couple times to test the weighting, adjusts her grip, tests the weight again, and nods, apparently satisfied, "I have a lot of good equipment I want to recover. If it hasn't deteriorated with time, anyways." She grunts, and waits for the rest of the group to finish their own searching.

[UncleWolf]

"Sorrowsong waits for me. I know it." Sorrow says, ignoring her surroundings as she looks at the sign for the Laboratoriums. The blade would never accept her using something else if it were waiting for her. The Ex-Sister will walk barefoot over and on the bodies if they are in the way, paying them no mind as she follows the signs.

[Inigo Montoya]

Hallway

Agata stepped carefully into the hallway, picking her way through broken glass and sharp bulkhead that might cut her exposed feet. As she got closer to a few of the bodies, she bent to examine them, always making sure her back was to a wall. She didn't trust any of these people, and now the woman who had been wailing earlier had a club. If she was going to attack them, Agata wanted to make sure she saw it coming.
Pushing thoughts of betrayal aside for the moment she examined the corpses, having seen her fair share of prison riots. She had even started a few herself.
"Whatever happened, it didn't start here..." she said, more to herself then to anyone else. Her eyes drifted down, trying to find a pair of boots or shoes or anything really to cover her feet, when she spotted a sharp piece of bulkhead. Tearing off a bit of the guard's decaying uniform, she wrapped the cloth around one end and pulled, coming up with an improvised weapon of her own. She didn't want to go unarmed, she wasn't sure if her equipment would still be functioning, and the last thing she wanted to do was let some guard or noble know about her powers. The Imperium took a dim view on people like her, that much she knew for certain.
As she stood, her eyes drifted at all the damage this area had sustained. A sudden mental image of her being impaled by a falling piece of plumbing sent shivers through her spine, and made her look up uneasily. Holding her new 'sword' at her side, she looked back at the techpriest, and called to him.
"You. Cyborg. Thanius. Is this...safe to walk across?"

[ThirdEmperor]

The cyborg glares at the stubborn console, and leans down to gather up the segmented mental limbs that drag upon the floor behind him, draping them over one arm. His footsteps thudding through the metal corridors, he trails along after the rest.
Because why not? They lead away from this dust and age, and whatever waits beyond is best faced in numbers. If the whole lot of them should happen to be cackling mad, well, that's good company to him, and at least there's some drive to them. Some reason to follow or be followed.

For now it'll be the later for Thanius, although he pauses to give Agata a questioning look when she falls still at the edge of the hallway. "If it's safe for me, I'm sure you will do fine." And he stamps his heavy metal foot upon the rusted ground, looking up to dare the ceiling to fall. "Feeling a little, ah, timesick? We'll get our legs back soon enough. I for one would be quite interested to know who let us out, because, if you look here," A gesture to the broken bodies. "There's been more than one riot since our sleep, and the protocols were to flush us should violence erupt. Somebody has been cancelling that order through the years."

[Shadowcaller]

As Ivy picks up what she scarcely would call a weapon before now. She really had hit rock bottom now hadn't she? There was one thing being a servant of a dark god was one thing but being reduced to wearing sack and wielding a crude club? This was the rock-bottom caving in and revealing depths previously unheard of.

She turns to the ground and sees that they are pretty tense themselves, paranoia and chaos went hand in hand by the look of it and some of these people didn't even seem to realize how far they had fallen yet. The one calling herself Agata was a mere child and Sierra didn't look that much older. "Let's just focus on the getting out part first shall we?" She tells Thanius with a smile. "I'm sure a lot of you are nervous right now but it's going to be okay, we have a lot of people here who are very good at staying alive and we're all on the same side here. We all want to get out of here." She assures the group before turning around and walking further down the corridor. She made sure Sorrow went first though, she seemed determined enough and she was curious about this weapon. She had seen named weapons before, it was something she once had sought to earn herself.

[Deathkeeper]

Ingram chuckles.
"Pathetic Imperials. Look at where their precious loyalty has gotten them."
He looks at the woman giving such a pretty speech.
"This battle is old. The place falling apart is far more likely a threat than anything to use that club on. I would say that there are likely still some automated defenses, and a few prisoners that were released recently. If they are as sensible as you all in wanting to see us all free of this Imperial tomb, there won't be trouble. And otherwise they probably won't suffer much. I've never been killed by a doom bolt." he shrugs dismissively.
C'est la vie.

[blackouttwo]

The trip to the Investigative Laboratoriums is uneventful. The four other laboratoriums are unopened, the doors unpowered but unlocked. You pass by them as you approach Laboratorium 5 in a hallway; No one's been along to open them, yet. The other prisoners in this part of the ship may be on their way, or their crypts may not lead into the Laboratoriums from this side. Hard to say. Investigative Laboratorium 5 is a different matter entirely. As you approach, clanging can be heard inside the chamber. The door is unopened on this side, but the sound is unmistakable. Someone's beaten you to your equipment. Some chatter in Low Gothic can be heard on the other side of the door. Similar accents.

"This looks nice."

"Here. Lascannon. Good condition."

"Are you mad? That thing'll blast a hole in the bulkheads!"

"Desperation, mate. We only have so much ammo for our gear."

"Fine, mate. If you think it'll help...Oh, this is nice." An experimental, brief revving of a chainsword can be heard.

"Keep it down! We don't know what's on this ship after all this time!"

Whoever it is, they haven't noticed your approach, and the door's still shut.

The important part is this: Someone is touching your stuff.

[Halae]

The group will have a moment of warning from the look on Sierra's face. It's a terrible sight, bloody murder shining in her eyes and her face contorted into an expression normally only seen on berserkers.

"My weapons."

And then she slams open the door and charges forward without uttering another sound, swinging her pipe for whomever it is that decided to lay his hands on her precious equipment. Specifically, whomever it is that decided to pick up the chainsword. If she can take him out of a fight quickly, the others will likely not have any weapons in hand by that point, and the others can move in to handle the situation.

Besides, there's gotta be one or two psykers on her side.

[UncleWolf]

The moment Sorrow hears the chainsword her entire demeanor changes. She no longer has eyes or ears for anything else and charges in right behind Sierra. Her eyes catch sight of the black chainsword, still glossy with polish after all these centuries and the white angelic beauty on the hilt still smiles gently, wings spread. Her vision narrows to only that and she doesn't care who or what is holding the blade anymore as her right fist lashes out with all her weight behind it.

Anyone watching her will see her face as expressionless, but her goal is perfectly clear to everyone there.

That weapon was her's.

[Inigo Montoya]

Investigative Laboratorium 5

Agata heard the voices. She stepped back, and tried to duck into the shadows. Her training covered situations like this. All she had to do was remain calm, and...
She did a double take when two of her traveling companions stormed the the Laboratorium. Including the woman with the tattoo, strange aura, and without a weapon. Mentally swearing, she stepped out of the shadows, and looked into the room. She saw five scavengers, trying to take what they considered rightfully theirs. Agata sympathized for a moment. After all, she had just been looking to do the same thing. Still, they were taking /her/ stuff and she wasn't sure if she'd ever be able to find another cloak that fit her specific needs.
She considered running in and attacking like her 'allies' had done, but dismissed the thought quickly. She was not built for stand up combat. She was built for ambush. Her main means of defense when attacked like this was...A memory came up from the back of her mind.

It was hot that day, and she had been standing in the sun for hours. A sandstorm was coming, and she could feel the wind against her face. Some of the other children said a spirit lived in the desert, and when it got angry, it made a storm. She wasn't sure if she believed them. Her teacher snapped his fingers, drawing her attention. "You have been gifted with the power of the mind. It will be several years before you can learn how to use it well, but I will show you what you are capable of." The man made a fist, and then slammed it into his palm, glaring at a training dummy. A pause, and then several black balls of electricity came from his hand, towards the target he had been looking at. Howls filled the air, and a terrible smell made her retch. When she finished, she looked up and saw the target was destroyed. He called it a Doombolt.

Now she raised her fist, as she had been taught, and brought it down, staring directly at another man in the room, this one armed with some sort of massive gun. If he brought that thing to bare, it would make short work of them. She poured her entire concentration into the action, not holding back. If she was going to reveal that she had powers, she was going to make the effort count. The black balls of electricity began to form, and she grinned as the flew towards their target. Suddenly, a ghostly wail picked up in the room, and hot wind started to blow.
No. It couldn't be. Not here. There was no sand! There was no desert! But the wail was the same as the one she had heard so many years ago. She heard, or thought she heard, a voice in that gale.
"Did you forget about me? I never forgot about you."
She tried to scream, but fought back the panic. Not here. Not now. However, that brush with the past still left her feeling light headed, and the wind took advantage of that, knocking her to the ground. As she looked up at the ceiling, she wondered if she would ever escape the desert.

[Deathkeeper]

Ingram's eyes flash with anger. Foolish girl, can she not even handle the Warp without getting it all over everyone else?
He reaches for the energies of the warp, but the idiot's blasted winds keep him from being able to hold on to anything. One would think that being so frustrated would make it easier to focus on his loathing for the foolishness of foolish fools. The black grip of the Warp slips through the fingers of his mind, and with a curse he steps back behind the wall out of sight of the gun-toting idiots.

[Shadowcaller]

As soon as she hears people talking about weapons on the other side Ivy's first thoughts isn't how to reclaim the weapons, it's how to stop Sorrow to rush inside and do something stupid.

She raises her hand to gesture for them to stop but it's already too late, the sister of battle has already rushed ahead and so has Sierra. Just brilliant. Now she was stuck between helping the damn fools or stay back and see what happened. But in her hesitation something acts before she can, and suddenly she feels a strong wind coming behind her and taking a hold of the robe she's wearing.

Her first instinct is to move out of the way, dodge whatever was coming up behind her, since it couldn't possibly be wind up here. Stepping to the side and pressing herself against the wall she looks in both directions, what in Sekh's holy balls was that?!

[ThirdEmperor]

"Hold fast, friends!" His metal fingers close painfully hard on Agata's shoulder, pushing her on as the arcane wind threatens to bowl the lot of them over. In great, stomping steps he advances, feet locking to the floor via magnetic force between each stride. With a grimace of effort, Thanius catches Sorrow as well with his arm around her back, and throws the both of them forward once the terrible storm has howled past down the ancient corridors. "And go to it!"

[blackouttwo]

Sergeant (former) Cadius Boggart, of the Sinophian 223rd Infantry Regiment of the Imperial Guard (taken into custody by the Inquisition on rightful suspicion of heresy following a brief deployment to the Fydae System) is not having a very good day.

He wakes up in a stasis crypt with the rest of his squad, realizes they've all been sleeping for 200+ years, discovers the ship they're on has been in the Warp for all that time, and then, upon finding the weapons they had when they were captured, decides they need more guns from the investigative laboratoriums that hold the equipment of the other inmates.

And then the door opens, he and his men get bum-rushed by a group of other convicts, he gets a nasty bonk on the head with a pipe club (should've worn his helmet), then another convict hits him in the chest like an oncoming freight train with a punch, knocking the wind out of him. Meanwhile, his squad's heavy weapons expert is hit with what looks like a psychic attack.

And then the sudden wind knocks Pharod, his squad's tech-expert, over.

And then the attackers are upon them. The only thing Boggart can think is 'Crap.'

[Shadowcaller]

As the winds calm down, Ivy accesses the situation and she only have to look at Agata to understand what just happened. A psyker. A teenage unsanctioned psyker. Practically a walking time bomb. The inquisition must have had a very good reason to keep her alive.

But none of that matter at the moment, what mattered was putting a end to this brawl. She storms into the room with the improvised club held high. "CEASE AND ****ING DESIST!" She roars to get the fighters attention. "We're all on the ****ing same side here, if you don't stop right now there are soon to be a lot of dead bodies on the floor. I have a unsanctioned psyker and a marine right behind me if you want to test that theory." She points her thumb backwards at Agata and Ingram.