I do not own Destiny. Nothing at all.
A male warlock stood alone, balancing at the tip of an old radio tower, and watching the Cosmodrome as night fell. His armor was as white as snow, with the only other color being his black visor, which was in the shape of a delta. His robes had a metal collar that resembled an eagle, and they ended at his ankles. His helmet had a visor, with to spikes that protruded outwards towards the back. The bottom half of his body was covered by light weight plasma-resistant plates, along with boots made of shock-absorbing hyper-gel.
The warlock made a sound similar to a sigh and leaped from the top. Before he reached the ground, he blinked upwards to about 4 feet in the air, and landed, finishing with a roll. He pulled out his gun, a modified SUROS DIS-43. It was white, with a black eagle decorated on both sides of the gun. It's holographic ammo counter was orange, instead of blue, along with it's holographic SUROS RED-DOT sight, which was also orange.
He held out his hand and a pure black ghost appeared in his hand. A few clicks and beeps came from the ghost before a feminine synthesized voice spoke. "Would you like to transmat to the ship?"
"Sure." Said a deep mechanical voice. A few seconds later, he disappeared in a flurry of particles.
Earth's Orbit, 'The Infinity':
The warlock reappeared in his ship, which was black, and had two large turbo engines on each side. He sat down in the pilot's seat and entered coordinates for the Tower.
The warlock sighed. It had been a year since he's been to the Tower. The only reason he was coming back was because he was requested to by the Speaker.
The ship went into warp travel as the warlock sat in his seat, watching as the stars passed by. He pulled out his second gun, which was a black Hakkë sidearm, with a white slide. It had a small light blue light on the side of the gun, signifying that it did arc damage. He pulled the magazine out and examined the bullets inside, his thoughts roaming aimlessly. That is, until the Tower came into view. He slid the mag back in place and stowed his secondary.
Last City, Tower:
'The Infinity' passed over the Tower as the warlock transmatted out onto the Tower Platform. He looked around briefly, before hurrying into the Hall of Guardians, leaping 3 steps at a time. He went right to Ikora, who was examining a few maps on the table and talking to Cayde-6. She looked up from the table when she noticed the white warlock approach, and frowned.
"The 'White Knight', I presume? And to what do I owe this pleasure?" She asked sarcastically.
The warlock didn't say anything and took out his ghost. Ghost beeped for a few seconds then spoke. "We have come here by order of The Speaker. It has been a long time, hasn't it Ikora?" She asked the warlock mentor.
Ikora smiled. "Yes it has, Xedra. Now tell me, why haven't you visited in a year? We thought you went rogue or you died." Ikora said. Cayde gave a small wave to the 'White Knight', who gave a nod of acknowledgement.
Xedra, the warlock's ghost, beeped again. "We've been roaming for the past year. And we've also identified a new threat."
Ikora turned serious then. "And that would be?"
"Oryx, father of Crota, and The Taken King. We found his ship, along with the remnants of what seemed like an Awoken attack force, but they were wiped out. We dubbed it the Dreadnaught," Xedra said,"it has a powerful super weapon that cleared a hole in the Rings of Saturn, but we haven't seen it in action." The ghost explained.
"Maybe you could ask The Vestian Outpost for some information? I'm sure there are survivors." Xedra offered.
"I don't know about that. But we'll try." Ikora replied.
Zavala was listening in on the conversation and decided to speak his mind. "Okay guardian, I'm putting you in a fire-team, and your mission is to get a transmat beacon on the Dreadnaught. Put some patrol beacons down as well, but be careful." He said.
The warlock nodded. He turned to leave until Xedra blocked his way. "C'mon Caleb, at least say bye-!" The warlock cut Xedra off with a light knock on her shell. Behind him, the three Vamguard mentors smiled.
"So, your name's Caleb?" Cayde said. The warlock turned around and sighed, eliciting a grinding sound from his throat.
"Yes. I am Caleb-13, guardian 'White Knight' Delta-116." Caleb spoke in a deep mechanical voice.
"Can you remove your helmet? It would be nice to see the face of our fire-team leader." A new voice spoke from behind Caleb.
He turned again, to see a female Hunter in shiny vibrant green armor, along with a green, single-piece cape and a green Hakkë hand cannon strapped to the side of her thigh. Her black helmet was hawk themed, with a green visor.
There was also a female Titan, with black and white armor with the Dead Orbit logo and two glowing white Titan marks on each side of her waist. Her helmet was the generic type III armor, but it had what looked like purple disks embedded into the sides.
The Hunter had spoken, and from her voice, she wasn't an Exo. The Titan had yet to say a word, so she was an unknown at the moment.
"Might as well." Caleb grumbled. He pressed a button on the side of his helmet, which caused it to slowly disintegrate into blue lights, revealing a white Exo head with a scratch running from the top right of his forehead to his lip. His eyes were light blue along with his mouth light, but his eyes were partially covered by a plate which made him look like he was angry.
"So, you're our fire-team leader, huh? Well, my name's Sandra Oaks, and this here, is my friend Aurora Salis." The Hunter said, pointing to the Titan.
Sandra extended her hand to Caleb, who took it and gave it a firm shake. She cringed slightly at his grip, but managed to hide her pain. She smiled when he shook Aurora's hand, expecting him to kneel in pain, but instead got the opposite as Aurora's hand twitched, before she let go and clutched her hand.
"Just how strong is he?" She murmured under her breath.
"So, when are we leaving?" Caleb asked, turning towards the three vanguards.
"Today. We need that information. Eris will be overseeing this as well." Zavala said. Suddenly, an engineer ran up to Zavala.
"Sir! A Cabal base on Phobos has sent a help beacon! They've been overrun by an unknown enemy!" He said.
Zavala nodded, an turned to Caleb. "You heard the man. Go to Phobos, and see what is happening."
Caleb saluted out of muscle memory, then began walking away. The three vanguards raised an eyebrow at the gesture.
_Hangar Bay:
Sandra and Aurora followed Caleb to the Hangar, where they met Amanda Halliday.
"Hey Caleb! Long time no see, eh?" She said cheerily.
"Yes. It is nice to see you again, Amanda. I'm sorry but for now we are in a hurry. After this, how about we go for a little gathering?" Caleb asked as he walked towards his ship. Amanda grinned.
"Okay! But you better be there!" She called out to him. He gave a wave over his shoulder and pressed a button on his metal collar, causing his helmet to reconstruct over his face.
He climbed into his ship, and launched out of the hangar. Sandra and Aurora soon followed, blasting into the nearest wormhole.
"Alright, so everyone knows what our objective is, right?" Caleb asked his team-mates.
A beep resounded over the console. "Travel to Phobos and observe enemy attack."
Aurora spoke in a silky voice. Caleb deduced that she was an Awoken.
"Good. Let's see what this is all about." Caleb said as the three ships came out of the wormhole.
Phobos:
Caleb, Sandra and Aurora landed at the edge of a cliff. Caleb pulled out his modified SUROS DIS-43, Sandra pulled out her Hakkë hand cannon, and Aurora pulled out an Omolon scout rifle.
They walked along the edge and passed a dying Cabal legionary. Caleb bent down and spoke in it's native tongue. "Torphuga ejo lo konjustive?"
The Legionary looked up and gave a grunt before speaking. "Pejaloug koloung mwehastrou. Lougma... Valus Ju'Aug..." The Legionary said before he died.
Caleb closed the eyes of the soldier and continued on. Sandra walked beside him. "What was that?"
"I spoke to him. He had to join the military for his family. Said his commander was Valus Ju'Aug. He told me he should be inside, but the 'Dark Ones' had overrun the base."
"That's a lot of information from just a few words." Aurora said.
"A few words in their language are equivalent to maybe one or two sentences in English." Caleb said with a shrug. They walked out onto a large open valley that was filled with debris.
Sandra made a low whistle. "What happened here?" She said, as the entrance was blown wide open. Aurora pointed at the newly opened entryway.
"I guess we'll find out inside." She said. She took off with a sprint, followed by Sandra, while Caleb was jogging at a slow pace behind them, occasionally stopping to scan a few things in the environment. Aurora turned around.
"Hey Caleb! Hurry up, would you?" She yelled across the field. Caleb held up his index finger as if to say, 'wait'.
"Wait for what?!" Aurora yelled.
Caleb calmly pressed a button on his helmet. "I am scanning the environment. Our mission is to observe the situation here, is it not?" He said through the radio.
Aurora was silent for a moment, before she opened her intercom. "Yes. You're right."
Caleb calmly walked over to the two female guardians by the entrance. "I'm just about done with that anyways. Let's get going."
The three walked into the base, looking around them for any signs of enemies. Suddenly, they heard a loud grinding noise coming from the elevator shaft, and looked just in time to see a Cabal Legionary try to get out of an elevator, and get squashed by another falling shaft.
"Walog hakuwa. Jorung shilong poraga." Caleb whispered, making a sort of praying gesture towards the shaft.
"What was that for?" Sandra asked.
"I'm paying my respects to him." Caleb replied simply.
"Why?"
"Many cabal here are forced into the military, with the threat of their family's execution hanging over their heads. That's why the cabal are so strong. Their soldiers will do anything to keep their family safe." Caleb said in a sad tone.
"The Legionaries are honestly good at heart. But their commanders are a bunch of dicks." Caleb said again.
"I... I see." Sandra said. Suddenly, Calb held out his arm to stop her. She looked up at him, to see him holding his glover finger to where his lips would be. A loud cabal gurgle came from the hallway ahead. Caleb aimed at the entrance, and slowly turned the corner. Up ahead was a cabal Centurion, struggling against some sort of glowing black essence that was trying to suck it in.
Calb rushed forward to help, but it was too late, as the Centurion grew too weak to fight the essence any longer. The cabal Centurion was sucked into the black hole, and it vanished. Everyone was silent, until Caleb pulled out his ghost, Xedra.
"Xedra, can I have 'that' gun, please?" Caleb asked his floating companion.
Xedra was silent for a moment, before she made a few beeps and a white Omolon scout rifle with red liquid matter inside materialized into Caleb's hands, while his other scout rifle vanished into particles.
(A/N: Caleb's gun looks like the Tlaloc except with red liquid inside and the three rings at the back are glowing red.)
"Thank you." Caleb said to his ghost.
"What gun is that?" Sandra asked, holding out her finger to touch the shiny white surface.
"I made this gun, with a little help from Omolon of course. It's still in it's testing stage, but so far it works better than the Hung Jury SR4 that Dead Orbit has." Caleb explained.
Aurora looked down slightly while looking at her Hung Jury in her hands. Sandra touched the surface of the gun, finding that it was very smooth through the sensors in her gloves.
"What is it called?" Aurora asked.
"Omolon Test-178, designated 'Lunar Eclipse'." Caleb replied.
"Why Lunar Eclipse?" Sandra asked.
"Me and the guys at Omolon decided that name because during a Lunar Eclipse, the Moon, which is normally white, turns red. And the gun is white and red, so..."
The two females gave a small nod, before facing ahead. Sandra dropped her hand and pulled out her hand cannon again.
"Follow me. I know what this is. I've seen it many times before." Caleb said as he lead them to through the base.
"How many times?" Sandra asked.
"Too many." Caleb's voice sounded almost, sad.
Sandra realized that she struck something and ended the subject there. "Let's go." She said.
Aurora nodded, and Caleb silently followed. Sandra now led the way, while Caleb was in between the two females. They rounded another corner and saw a large open area, and suddenly the radio crackled to life.
Eris Morn spoke from the other side of the channel. "Whispers, like finger tips on my mind!" She hissed, "I will... endure."
Sandra whistled, before taking out her ghost, with a white shell along with silver linings, and scanning a mass of black glowing goop. Her ghost claimed that the goop was trying to teleport inter-dimensionally, but it required a living host.
"Thanks Remus!" She said to her ghost, who dipped slightly with a few beeps and chirps.
"You are very welcome!" Remus replied in his enthusiastic, synthesized voice.
"You guys go on ahead, I'm going to, uh... pay my respects to the Legionaries." Caleb lied, but it went undetected by the other two.
"Okay, but don't take too long." Sandra said.
Caleb nodded, and the two walked off. As soon as they were gone, Caleb reached his hand out and touched the goo. It seeped into his arm, and Caleb could feel it meld with his Light, leaving an almost painful feeling, even though his sense of pain was dulled due to his status as partly a machine. Caleb made a sound similar to an irritated sigh. Xedra popped up next to him.
"Don't worry Caleb. We'll get her back and rid you of this curse. I promise." She whispered.
A few clicks came from inside his throat. Then the clicking stopped, and a human male voice spoke instead. "I hope so Xedra. I can't live in this shell for much longer. I'll go insane." Caleb said, his voice full of depression.
Xedra floated in front of him. "You shouldn't do that right now. What if your teammates heard you?"
"Whatever. It's not like it matters anyways. Once we reach the Engine Room, Oryx is gonna take them and send me off again, taking even more of my comrades." Caleb replied solemnly.
"I don't like it either, but I can't do anything against the Darkness inside of your body." Xedra said.
"I know."
Caleb sighed again before giving a soft chuckle. "You know what's ironic?" He asked. It seemed as if he were talking to himself.
"What?" Xedra asked.
Caleb chuckled again. "Here I am, as a slave of the Darkness, trying to convince myself that I'm a Guardian of the Light. Go figures."
"Don't talk like that."
Caleb sighed. "Can you really blame me? After all that's happened, I'm still out here."
Xedra clicked a few times, trying to read her guardians emotions. He was very good at hiding it, although wearing an Exo for a second layer of skin didn't help because it concealed his face most of the time.
"Caleb, we need to get back to your fire-team. There is still a chance that you will defeat the Echo of Oryx there. It could even only be an ultra classed Taken. Who knows. Normally, the Taken are very weak individually, but they appear in overwhelming numbers. So really, all you need to do is have someone take care of all the small fry while you get busy with the big one. If there even is an Ultra Class at the end."
"I wouldn't be surprised." Caleb muttered under his breath.
Caleb grabbed Lunar Eclipse and reverted his Exo shell back to normal, resetting his voice to sound like the male Exo voice box.
"Let's go." He said. Xedra beeped and dematerialized into his armor.