With regard to the Black Liquid the dead Engineers infected with it simply

whoever was in the Ampule Room at the same time as the Last Engineer would have ALSO been thrown into Instant Cryo Suspension as EVERYTHING IN THAT ROOM got Locked Down the moment the door slammed shut. But no other fleeing Engineer bodies ever turned up. So, THERE'S A DOORWAY OUT of the Ampule Room that was never mentioned.

I don't see why you assume the stasis would be instant, or even applied to them, as for all we know, only the last one, who lost his head was infected. And we don't know if they did die, and were later moved by other engineers,or what, but, if you notice the black mural of the Xenomorph, it looks door shaped. And it looks to be the same shape as the door where the dead engineers are piled. I think in fact, that where they are found is the other side of the door with a Xenomorph depicted on it - Judging from the map and the conversation between Fifield and Janek.

HyperNova i think your right there, it might've been a Xeno that got him? But only Engineers appear on their video logs? Isnt the muriel on the back of the big head?? The Engineers could've made all the muriels whilst being stuck in the room?? Another way out of there could maybe be the eyes of the big head =O...they are always shadowed.

The headless 'Engineer' was infected with black goo, that's why it was oozing out of him when Shaw tried to reanimate the head. The others had holes in their bodies similar to chestburster attacks, so they presumably died from direct contact with Xenos, and were piled up in the corridor. The carved depiction of the Xeno inside the Temple is bigger than the Stone Head, and is behind it, but not on the back of it. The other side of that carved mural is the door where all the dead engineers are piled up.

It still creeps me out a little bit when you think about all of those dead space jockeys all piled up. That almost seems unatural the way a panicking group of engineers would all back up into a wall (door). They're all in the dark all of them dead from some absolutely horrific circumstances from the black goo/xenomorph outbreak. Is it possible if a type of deacon-xeno got loose and killed them all, then dragging them to the door only to be piled up to be used later?

What is interesting about that pile of engineers is that some appear to not only have burst chests but holes in their helmets as well and given that the ampule chamber door was open before it shut on the infected engineer's head, one can easily surmise that hammerpedes went loose and they were implicit in the outbreak. Do they lay embryos in their hosts? What is interesting about Lindelof's commentary is that he explicitly states that the hammerpedes 'have the capability of [i]infecting[/i] humans.' Since the hammerpedes are essentially worms, given that worms are egg layers it follows that the embryos that they lay in their victims would grow into egg laying queens; they fill in the missing link in regard to what came first; the Queen or the Egg? The xenomorph has always been described as an hermophrodite; they shed skin and appear like worms in their larval stage. Don't you think it makes perfect sense? Remember the deacon was born attached to a placenta when it was born thus it follows that it wouldn't be an egg layer since it developed in bipeds. "Here we see these little worms, which we understand is going to be the beginning..." - Lindelof

Ive found a clear pic of the dead engineers in the pile. The four at the back didnt have there backs to the door, they were facing it, it looks like the were trying to force it open. All the dead engineers had holes in their heads, no chest busters. I think (regard the engineer that got decapitated) when the doctors tried to reanimate the head it exploded . This was to show us what happend to the pile of dead engineers. Ill try and find the pic

A couple of Engineers definitely had burst chests, Milburn even comments on it. In this pic there is a Jockey on the bottom right with his chest blown right open as well as a punctured helmet - [img]http://www.prometheus2-movie.com/media/prometheus_hd_stills_dead_jockeys.jpg[/img]

Here's a thread that commented on the dead engineers - http://www.prometheus2-movie.com/community/forums/topic/20052

I'm just wondering that as with the retrieved head still had remenants of the black substance still witin it it shows that 'he' was fully fledged 'infected' or at least 'dosed up' on it. I think that maybe the reasoning behind all of the holes upon all of their bodies was that they just exploded from the inside out and only certain sections of their bio-suits were acting as points of weakness enough for the exploding body from within doing that for what ever reason and as it did so found the path of least risitance to the outside of a pressure suit. Other exstenuating circumstances could may well have been a contributing factor to the strickend Engineers desise. They are all piled on top of one another because they were all panacking to get into the room for a potential cure if ever there was one or at least something to reduce their symtoms at least. The age old adage: "Prevention is better than cure". It makes me think of the poor souls whom were lead to their deaths in Nazi death camps, similar piled up bodies due to extrenuating tragedy going on about them all. It at least makes you wonder when you observe it in a similar context with Prometheus film. It may not be the explenation to the conundrum but it was something to think about.

I really hate to throw a spanner in the works, but was the Engineers head infected before or after it was decapitated ?

Well what we all see at least on screen is that the holo-recording of the Engineers running happens followed by the seal coming down upon the failing one towards the end of the hologram viewing. Then the Prometheus team finds it, they take it back to there ship to which they apply electro;osis of sorts that re-animates its iterior mechanisms (biological in orientation as far as we can tell at this point) then it explodes so it seems safe to assume that it was already about 'Him' and within his particular type of bloodstream before the decapitation. There could have been some puddle of it in there 2000 tears or so ago but I would hedge my bets that he and all were running from an apparant realisation of what they had gotten themselves into and thus were trying to make it back to where vere they were heading to affect some kind of escape and possible cure for what they knew was surely coming for them both in the shape of what ever they keep looking back at during the holo-recording and what ever they know may well mutate out from within them or mutate them into something else far more hideous lest they bring about some sort of an antedote for the crisis they all find themselsves now involved in during the time these events took place in their ancient history.

OK, we a see a group of engineers head towards the main ampule room and the last one in gets decapitated. Now the problem I have here, is that there is no sign of any engineers in that room apart from the decapitated head. When Fifield and Milburn are told of the ping that is one click west of them, they are looking at a pile of bodies which are west of the ampule room. They then head back east to the ampule room where they meet up with the cobra huggers. If the cobra huggers have developed from the worms that were already in the main ampule room , then what caused the ping? I think that the engineers were running from something and they got infected in the ampule room. They got out through some unknown door that we have not seen, but it puts them in a westward direction. This leads me to believe they were being chased and were using the ampule room to double back on themselves to get to a juggernaut.

And then they all climbed on top of each other to die. Sorry. Couldn't resist..

Excellent point Major Noob, some things just don’t seem to stack up properly. The engineers must have made an exit out of the ampule room somewhere before dying . If someone or something stacked the bodies after death, then why leave the decapitated engineer where he was. I’m pretty sure cobra huggers are’nt too well equipped in the stacking big dead bodies department Which brings me back to the mysterious ping. IMO that is the big unknown.

The ping was something else and to me at least it was one of those 'Pups' that was stuck inside one of the corridors right before David opened up th door to the armory. I really think the 'pup' was picking up on a sleeping engineer in cryo-stasis. Every five minutes the cryo chamber/pilot room activates to continue giving him oxygen and nurishment to him. Thats what I think that 'ping' was and why David volunteered to go and check it out. Guess what he found a sleeping engineer untouched from the outbreak. Its like the Orrey of the ship slows everything down in the cryo-stasis pods lowering his heartbeat and respiration.

You've been paying greater attention than me, I assumed the ping was the unconscious Engineer's heartbeat. From the Pup that was stalled at the Orrey door. I'll have to give the scenes with the hologram aboard the Prometheus a closer look. But we do come back to the bodies, and inasmuch as they do look stacked, I always got the feeling they were clambering over each other, wanting to get through the door they're piled up against. I just assume thats a door. As if they rushed it in a panic. And died from within. :D

Holy Cow Annunaki I pretty much just duplicated your post! Ah, well, we're of a mind. But I think that Engineer was infected too..

@batchpool. I think the decapitated engineer was infected before he died. When he died the 'process' stopped. When the doctor reanimated the head the process restarted and it exploded. @annunaki. I totally agree with you guys about the pups picking up the engineer in cryo. What else could it be?

What the engineers were running from is a combination of an outbreak and a fifield style contamination. To say the least there must of been more than one person contaminated, for more an a dozen powerful engineers to run away from them.

water is the key to a good mutation,they said that it was 32 degrees inside the mound and the water wasnt frozen the water is screwed in the mound thats why firfield came out jacked up,when the double helix was destoyed at start of movie the rite away anew one was made it because engineer fell into all that water,down river bout 200 yards will pop out a predator mutated from an engineer by black goo.in the head room is a relief of a predator if you look good enough

and yes i found it its big as day,you cant miss it,

and yes i found it its big as day,you cant miss it,

the bodies are there because they wanted to try and cover the door up build up the bodies so that you couldnt see the door at a quick glance,be horrified at a stack of bodies then move on.slight of hand ask david blaine he will tell you all about it

To all That's the thing that gets me also : Did milburn and fifield get into the ampule room through the door that was left open or did they found another entrance into it ? If the engineers left the same way they came in I assume that the only reason they went there was because they : 1 Needed a physical barrier from whatever was chasing them . 2 The black goo that infected The decapitated engineers infection would become inactive in the ampule room as the atmosphere in it was prone to making the goo inactive as the ampules were unsealed and the air pressure was higher and there was some gas that makes you cough. that all point to a chamber that makes the goo inactive . Hence an infected engineer might be safe if we assume that the goo works through absorption via the skin as well because if it was ingested orally what is the point of going to the ampule room as other engineers who were infected through spatter(as I suppose the decapitated engineer was ) would get infection (I guess - dropped or broken ampule ?) That's my take . The non infected engineers would leave the same WAy they came out and went down opposite direction they came from . I guess something cornered them from both sides - maybe 4 or 5 ultra morphs (from the chestbursted engineers in the orrey room ) and those very powerful sliding jaws did the rest - but milburn noted that something burst out of them . Maybe ultramorphs who could inject like the original xenomorph in alien DC and but that the substance was so reactive that it simply exploded there where it was injected or is it possible that the ultramorphs could spit black goo that caused the infection ? Some thoughts .......... Peace And nice discussions

Given what has been previously said in this thread and many others I am probably going to sound completely insane at this point, but I don't think the engineers were infected by the goo in the ampules. I think it is the other way round, and the engineers infected the goo.

This is my thinking of what happened. There was an outbreak of some sort near the cargo bay. These engineers were infected but did not realise at the time. They head towards the ampule room to get away, and the door shuts to form a quarantine area. One of their members looses their head in the process. This group of engineers is already infected and they corrupt the atmosphere in the ampule room which corrupted the goo in there as well. The engineers become zombies like Fifield, and like Fifield become compelled to return to the juggernaut by whatever route they collectively take. The installation is also a giant reactor which feeds air and controls the temperature throughout the entire installation. We are given clues to this because of the temperature variations. I think the sub zero temperature that is mentioned is to turn water into ice and render it inactive, so that the humidity of the atmosphere in the ampule room does not react with the goo.The only engineer alive is the one on the juggernaut because that has its own life support system and atmosphere, and is therefore quarantined from the rest of the installation.

Batchpool- this is very cool. It might also offer a reason for Ridleys choices for the Fifield attack scene. The Engineers we saw piled may have been mutated, but not severely enough to burst out their suits, at least not entirely, by having grown to monsters half again their size. There is an Hitchcockian element to Prometheus, yes?

If an uninfected Engineer is able to launch a man into the air with a punch, then one infected is a good reason to run.

I know what they were thinking when they were running..........."we should of made guns too, damn i wish we made guns"