Lost

Tenno were weapons.

This had been known since the dawn of Orokin. Most had forgotten the origins of the Tenno, the legends had faded from the memories of fragile humankind even before the Collapse of the Empire. Few agreed what Tenno were. Grineer believed them to be monsters. Corpus believed them to be machines. Some humans thought them warrior gods others saviors or protectors. But no matter who was speaking of them, all agreed on one thing. Few beings in the Solar System could possibly match Tenno for speed, skill and savagery one on one.

That said, Tenno were not invincible.

Get out of here. The weak voice of the Loki who lay sprawled on the floor was clear even as his remaining life force pooled out as blood would have from a human body.

The corridor was a mismash of metal and twisted, bio-tech flesh. The former Corpus ship had been overrun with Infested even before it had run afoul of something far worse that scattered packs of feral Infested. The Tenno strike teams that had come had been prepared. Or as prepared as they could be. Nothing could have possibly prepared them for what they had found though.

You are our flesh. The voice of the monster called Lephantis sounded through the link all Tenno shared bu the Mag warframe that strode to stand over the fallen Loki ignored that as she fired her Brakk hand cannon again and again. Each blast took out two or three of the various beasts that were charging her but there were so many of them.

Karen! Go! The Loki begged again as he tried to activate his revival protocols again, but they had been disrupted by whatever the Jordas mass had done to ambush the Tenno. He was dying and when he did? His energy would not be recoverable. He would be gone forever. Karen would not allow that.

It had been a bloody battle from the very beginning. Eight Tenno had answered the Lotus' call to stop the latest of the Jordas Golem's forms to appear. They had traveled to the messy section of space near the Eris planetoid and found the Jordas Golem in a habitat that it had created for itself. As always, it hadn't been hard to find. It always formed the same kind of ring, maybe some kind of instinctive behavior? It helped that the Jordas Golem was the size of a small spacecraft.

The Tenno had been prepared. They had brought their weapons, their powers and a number of specialized pieces of equipment to disrupted the Infested in the area. That was the only way to get through the huge mass to reach its vulnerable sections. Anywhere else, the damage that Tenno could inflect -even as great as that was- was healed almost instantaneously by the huge twisted form. That hadn't been the problem. The problem had come when they had breached the first set of blocked doors and come face to face with another abomination. One that had no business being there.

Lephantis was a smaller Infested mass. Not that smaller was anything but relative, it still dwarfed any warframe ever created.

They had entered the room and been under instant attack. The floor of this ancient ship had been so weakened by the passage of centuries and Infestation that the first anyone had known of the enemy's presence had been when the strike team's dedicated healer, a Trinity, had vanished through a hole without even a scream. Her energy had gone back to her ship and she had deployed another warframe to rejoin the team but by then, things had gone from bad to worse. Lephantis had attacked and despite the team's preparations, they hadn't been ready for waves of infested, attacks form under the floors of the ship they were traveling on and whatever the hell Jordas was doing. The next set of vaults they had managed to get to through heroic efforts hadn't yielded to the machinery that was supposed to curb the Infestation in the area and allow access to the ancient ship's systems. They had been stuck.

That was the point that the team leader had called a retreat. Honor was all well and good, but dying for no gain was pointless. They could not match the Infested numbers and even their impressive firepower made little difference when Lephantis' heads appeared and disappeared from the floor at will. Hitting the exposed sections of the massive creatures three heads was far more difficult than normal and it hadn't been easy even when it had been ensconced in its derelict nest. Now it was nearly impossible. Not quite, but close.

The Loki had managed, through sheer skill and maybe a bit of luck, to hit one of the heads in a vulnerable spot with a high power sniper shot from his Snipetron. The misshapen mockery of a Corpus helmet had exploded and the Tenno had immediately been heartened. But only for a moment. That was when Jordas had sprung its real trap and all hell had broken loose.

The energy field that had surrounded the mass had changed and every Tenno felt something akin to physical pain. Whatever the field was, it interfered with Transference energy, the energy that most Tenno used to augment their own abilities with the aid of the Zarimon children. It had obviously been created to hurt Tenno, but how or why, no one had any inkling of. As soon as she had heard, the Lotus had immediately ordered the team to flee, fearing that their energy could disrupt their energy beyond the point of recovery. There was no point in sticking around and the Tenno understood that. They had fought a horrific fighting retreat back to where their ships had adhered to the hull of the ancient starship turned monstrosity. But only three Tenno ships could dock at once. The team had come in through a hole that had been blasted in the side of the monstrosity and said hole had healed over. The only other way out was through the engines which were now blasting at full power and not even an Archwing enhanced warframe could survive that.

The eight Tenno had looked at one another for a moment and then they had taken position. The leader, old and grizzled warrior named Percival who wore a Rhino warframe, had ordered the first group to egress and they had. But that left five Tenno to face an onslaught while the three ships had left and three more had docked. Even as fast as Tenno assault ships could move, such took time.

Time Jordas and Lephantis used to attack.

It had been a classic battle. A horde of bestial flesh on one side, speed, fury and skill on the other. Tenno blades and bullets met Infested claws in a story that had been repeated since the very beginning of Orokin. The Mag and Loki had used high ground and high powered weapons to whittle down the enemy, targeting larger masses with speed and precision that would have made any human sniper weep with envy. The remaining three, Percival in his Rhino, an Excalibur and the returned Trinity, had fought on the ground, sweeping entire swathes of Infested aside as they kept the landing area clear as only Tenno could.

Then Percival had fallen.

Whatever had hit the Rhino had been intense enough to break right through his Iron Skin and drop him completely to the floor. The Trinity had been at his side in moments while the others had provided cover, and her powers had revived him, but… He hadn't.

The Rhino had lain still even after the Trinity had finished her work. That didn't happen. Tenno were not immortal, but they were damn close since they were energy instead of flesh and blood. They had the ability to reconstitute themselves after horrific injuries, but it always took resources that were not infinite. At least the artificers had figured out how to keep from needing platinum every time. But this was different. When a Tenno was revived in the field buy other Tenno, it was quick and efficient. But Percival did not come back. He did not rise and return to battle. Indeed, his warframe might have been a lump of metal now.

With Percival incapacitated somehow, the team leadership landed on Aeron who detested leadership, but always stepped up when needed. He had ordered the other two to escape with Percival's body. Maybe the Healers could do something. Maybe someone could figure out what had happened even if they couldn't save Percival. The Excalibur had obviously wanted to argue, but he was too well trained to do so in the field.

That left Aeron and Karen to face the horde but neither were stupid enough to let the monsters get close. Aeron was incredibly mobile in his Loki warframe and while Karen wasn't quite as able to get to high perches, he could get her to them easily enough with his Switch Teleport.

The problem was that even if the ships docked, the Infested were swarming throughout the area now. Even Ancient tentacles couldn't reach the high perched Tenno, but the Tenno could not reach their ships either. Neither of the remaining Tenno had Energy Siphon artifacts equipped. Aeron had a rifle augmenting one and Karen an artifact that spewed corrosive materials over everything in range. Messy, but highly effecting against any Infested with armor, like Jordas and Lephantis. If they had been close enough, some enemy bodies could have been scavenged for power, but that was suicide for two lightly armored warframes.

It was a standoff.

A standoff that did not favor the Tenno. Infested were nothing if not adaptable. A call of help had resounded through the system and dozens of Tenno ships were now converging on the area, but even with their skilled aim, both embattled snipers were running out of ammunition.

That was when it happened. Karen had been aiming at an Ancient down below that had a filthy purple aura around it when a stunning impact had knocked her right off her perch. Some kind of Infested she hadn't even seen had blindsided her. Probably a flier of some kind, nothing else could have reached her. Before she could even panic, she felt the familiar sensation of a teleport engulf her and Aeron's form had suddenly been plummeting in her place. She had screamed even as he had hit the floor, his Dual Skana had come out and steel death had torn through the ranks of the Infested. But they had been ready for it. He hadn't been.

Even as she had slung her rifle, drawn her pistol and thrown herself from her perch, she had known it was hopeless. There were just too many Infested. She wasn't halfway down before Aeron was hit by a blue glowing tentacle and his warframe shimmered as its energy was drained by the Disruptor. Loki warframes were many things, they were not durable. By the time she landed, he was on the ground, his energy pooling out like blood.

Her raised hands heralded the last of her energy sweeping every single enemy in the area off its feet to compact into a magnetized sphere. Crush was an incredibly powerful ability when used in a crowd like this. She hadn't bothered to count how many Infested were in the area, it didn't really matter. Too many. Her power failed and she gasped as every single enemy she had grabbed fell, many never to rise again as the forms they were. They would reconstitute in time, but it would take time. If only she had the time to repair Aeron's warframe before it failed completely, they could…

Time was something Karen did not have as another horde charged into he room. She stood over her adopted father's failing warframe, her Brakk spitting defiance as she readied herself for oblivion.

But then the Infested paused in mid-charge. Something… She couldn't understand why they had stopped but she threw out her hand over her father even as the timer on his warframe clicked off the last icon of his energy. The green energy that healed warframes swept down from her just in time and he gasped as his systems knit back together.

Karen, you moron! Aeron said with a growl as he swept to his feel, swords ready, but none of the Infested were looking at them!

I wasn't going to explain to Jak why I left you to die. Karen said flatly as she stared at the Infested who were running out of the room now.

So now we both die! Aeron retorted as an explosion sounded from just outside the room. What the? There are no Tenno here. Are there? He spun to where the ships were supposed to be, but groaned as he saw Infested flesh covering the holes in the hull. The hull has healed. We need to find another way out.

"Worry not, fair citizen!"

Both Tenno spun as a loud voice sounded from nearby! Then music! Loud music! Weird music! It shouldn't have been audible, this area was partly vacuum. But it was. They could do nothing but stare as the Infested that had been clogging the door vanished in an explosion like the one that had sounded before. But what took the horde's place had both Tenno freezing.

The robot was huge. It had two legs and a long cylindrical object on its top. It was familiar! An Ambulas unit! But it was white instead of black and… What was on its back? Corpus mechs could not carry riders! But this one was!

"You will want to duck." The form on the back of the machine said firmly as he tipped his wide white hat to them. His face was obscured by a wide black mask of some kind. A red scarf surrounded his neck. He held a Vasto pistol in hand, but too looked odd, silver instead of gray or gold like a prime. Karen dove to the side, Aeron at her heels as the Ambulas aimed at the docking area.

What happened next was entirely predictable. The beam that came from the Ambulas bot was exactly the same as Tenno had faced when Corpus Executive Frohd Bek had revamped every Ambulas unit to a newer and more deadly design. Both Karen and Aeron had faced the new Ambulas units in battle. They knew exactly how dangerous that beam was. But it was not directed at them!

A massive scream sounded as the humongous bolt of energy tore through the Infested flesh clogging the docking apertures as if it wasn't even there. Karen stared from the holes where she could see her ship and Aeron's approaching back to the bot which stood there, its massive weapon smoking. Then it jumped and she bit back a scream as one of Lephantis' heads came up through the floor where it had just been.

Move! Aeron called as the floor under them rumbled. Karen rolled and ran as the floor buckled. She and Aeron made it to the holes and had to wait for their ships to fully dock. Both stared back at Lephantis, weapons ready. Then both went still in astonishment at the sight that met them.

"You will take no more lives this day!" The strange being on the back of the Ambulas called as his Vasto roared. It should have been a pitiful weapon against such a beast, but Lephantis roared as it bit deep into a vulnerable spot. Aeron took aim as well, but the head had closed up. The other head was swinging a massive blade made of flesh, but the Ambulas unit avoided it nimbly. Again, the Vasto roared and the rider's aim was uncanny. Whoever he was, he was good! He had almost Tenno level skill with that pistol.

Karen was out of ammunition for her Snipetron Vandal so she had her Brakk out and aimed, but at this range, she would little more than tickle the beast. She wasn't about to get any closer, she wasn't stupid. She heard her ship latch. She saw Aeron jerk as well. They could go. But...their rescuer… He shot the Infested head and it fell to lay still.

"Go!" The man or whatever he was called. "This foul evil doer will face justice! Either from my pistol or from Silver's mighty hooves. This is not your fate! Go!"

Again the pistol roared and Karen stared as the head that aped a Grineer simply exploded. She did scream as the floor fell out from under the Ambulas unit. She darted forward with Aeron at her side. She stood at the edge of a huge pit like Lephantis preferred to make in its nests. The music got louder and faster and explosions sounded even as Karen stared down at chaos.

Lephantis was the second largest known mass of Infested flesh in the solar system, It was big, powerful and heavily armored. It was also slow and ungainly compared to any Tenno and the Ambulas unit was far faster and more agile. Even as Karen stared, the cannon atop the bot fired again and one of the heads blew up. It hadn't been open! It hadn't been vulnerable! Had it?

What the hell? Karen asked as the battle unfolded below.

We need to go. Aeron laid a hand on her arm. Jordas is moving. Indeed, she could feel the vibrations as the ship sized Infested started to move, never a good thing when that happened.

But… Karen waved at the form just as another head blew up. The small figure atop the bot was firing almost nonstop with his pistol. He seemed to hit everything he aimed at.

I don't think he needs our help. Aeron said dryly as the last head fell and Lephantis disintegrated. And he can hear us.

That wasn't supposed to be possible. Tenno close range communication was supposed to be secure. If it wasn't… That wasn't good for any number of reasons.

"Worry not, fair citizens." Karen jerked back as the Ambulas unit jumped right out of the pit to land in front of them. But its weapon was not aimed at them and the rider's pistol had vanished. "Only those who fear justice should fear me."

He reached down to Karen and something dropped from his hand. She caught it instinctively. It was a small round, probably for the pistol he used. But the tip, the bullet...was that silver? He tipped his hat to her and then the Ambulas unit spun on its heels and darted away. Karen was sure her jaw hit the floor and she was sure Aeron was just as stunned as the Ambulas unit took another pair of steps and vanished in the haze of an Orokin portal.

"Hiyo Silver! Away!"

The two Tenno stared at each other and then ran for this ships. But both had the same though on their minds.

What the hell?