RESURRECTION

"Guardian?" a voice asked, softly at first, then its voice increased in volume. "Guardian. Eyes up, Guardian!" I woke up, my back erect against a rusted car. I saw a steel orb with eight rounded tetrahedral prisms in a symmetrical pattern. "It worked," the voice said to itself, "You're alive!"

"I just woke up from a nap. What makes you think I was dead?" I asked the orb.

"You were a skeleton two minutes ago," it said. "And I am a ghost, your Ghost."

I stood up, and looked around. "Wait a minute," I said. I walked over to one of the cars and saw a skeleton whose head was caved in. Then I asked the Ghost, "How long?"

"I beg your pardon?"

"I was dead for how long?"

"I don't know. Two or Three Hundred years?" Then we heard a screech, a high-pitched screech that sounded like a mixture between a wolf's howl and a Xenomorph's scream. "Fallen!" It whispered. "I need to get you to the city." Then it disappeared. "I still with you, but we need to move."

"Alright, Alright. I'm moving." And I did, quickly. I ran along a path towards a giant wall that I never saw before. Rusted, like the cars. My Ghost said, "The Divide. Kept Old Russian secrets in, and the Fallen out."

I lingered on the word kept but couldn't help noticing the masses of old cars. "How many people were left to die?" I asked the Ghost.

"About 7 to 8 billion in the year 2415. That's when It came."

I climbed a flight of stairs. "It?"

"The Darkness. The Traveler's enemy, creator of Vex, animator of the Hive. It came and crippled The Traveler and almost destroyed Humanity. The Great Purge was its effect, and our downfall. Until the Guardians came."

"And I'm a Guardian now, which is?"

Then we heard garbled voices in the room above us, no doubt the Fallen. "You'll find out soon enough," it said.

I climbed another flight of stairs into a pitch black room. The Ghost lit itself up and said, "We need more light if we want to get past the Fallen. I'll see what I can do," and floated away to the apparent opposite corner of the room.

Then, the lights flickered, and lit up the whole length of the room. Two kilometers from where I was standing, hundreds of thousands of Fallen were crawling on the walls, the bridges, the floor, and the ceiling. "Okay. We need to move!" shouted the Ghost. I began looking around for a weapon, any weapon. Then I found an old Russian assault rifle, labeled the Khovstov. "You know how to use that thing?" asked Ghost.

"No clue." But I gave it a shot. Two Fallen jumped out, and I shot both. I just killed a life, let alone two. I moved down the hallway, and another Fallen dropped from ceiling, and landed in my face. Upon instinct, I thrust my palm into its face, and the 2-armed Dreg fell. "You're a warlock," The Ghost remarked.

"Yes?" The Ghost began thinking in his head, for I could sense his thoughts. I asked him, "What prophesy?"

"We'll talk when we get back to City," it demanded. As he said his last word, Three more Fallen dropped from the ceiling, all of them were decapitated. I kept moving forward, then turned left just in time to avoid a shot from a Vandal on a bridge in front of me. I jumped onto the bridge, and shot the sniper. Then I crossed the bridge "How about now?" I asked the Ghost.

"No. We need to get to the city." I opened a loot cache and found a shotgun and sniper rifle inside, took both and some shiny blue cubes with me, and proceeded to the next room.

Four Vandals dropped, four Dregs burst through the floor, and four Shanks crawled out of the walls. "They didn't bring the whole armada? I'm disappointed." I pulled out my sniper, shot the two snipers and the shanks, whipped out the Khovstov and killed the remaining Vandals, then charged in and melee killed the Dregs.

"Why are you disappointed?" asked the Ghost.

"Do you understand jokes?" I asked it.

"This is 2761. Nobody has time for jokes."

I stopped. "2761!?" I shouted, "DO YOU MEAN TO SAY THAT I'VE BEEN DEAD FOR NEARLY SEVEN HUNDRED AND THIRTY YEARS?!"

The Ghost looked like its usual self, but I detected shock in its eye. "I'll tell you everything as soon as we get to the City."

After a long corridor, I finally reach the other side of the wall, and breathe fresh air again. As I walked into the field, I asked, "What was this place?"

"An old Cosmodrome, fitted to send humans beyond Earth, and its Sun, using jumpships," my Ghost said.

"Let me guess, I'm about to find out what those are too."

"Yep."

"Great," I said sarcastically. "Are you going to answer any of my questions?"

"Well,-"

Just then, we saw a flare in the sky, which turned into a warp point for a ship. "Fallen Skiffs? This close to the surface!?"

"I know, MOVE!" But it was too late; the skiff dropped its Fallen passengers and left. I could also see another ship above me, significantly larger than the skiff. No time for sight seeing, you just got shot! I turn around. The Dregs are hissing, Vandals' ether leaking, and Shanks whizzing. I pulled out the shotgun, blew the Shanks away, shot half of the Fallen, then switched to the auto rifle to kill the remaining Dregs. Ahead of me, about half a kilometer away, stood two more snipers. Fire with fire. I pulled out my own sniper, placed one shot in a Vandal's mouth, and placed another in between his buddy's eyes.

I took some time to look at the scenery. Snow on the ground, nighttime, and a lot of buildings that look like OKB-1 architecture: rectangular, lots of space between buildings, some higher or bigger than others. There was grass, but only in small patches that poked through the snow. Come to think of it, the landscape wasn't covered in snow either. The ground was dry and cracked, though you couldn't see the cracks either.

When I looked down, I realized that my shoes were worn, and my gauntlets were starting to tear. When I get to the City, they better have some durable threads.

I went into the next building, named Dock 13, and after a winding hallway, I came across a pack of Fallen, and one of them looked like he had 4 horns on his mask.

"Tres, a mus kii," said one, presumably their Captain.

"Ba ma kre la!" shouted a Vandal.

Have they found me? I jumped out, shot down 4 Vandals, threw a Vortex grenade at their Captain. The Captain dodged it, but 3 Dregs weren't so lucky. I shot 3 bullets into each of its arms, then delivered 4 more to its mask, sending him to the ground.

"Rahn akri no frili!" it said.

"If that means you can't die, then I've already busted that claim."

"Is there Darkness?" it asked with its dying breath.

"Only in you," said the Ghost. Then the orb floated over to the ship, hanging by some cables, and looming over the Captain's dead body. "Its old, possibly ancient. We'll be lucky if I can fly this thing."

"Or get to the City in one piece," I said.

"Right." Then the ghost disappeared, and the ship was activated. At that moment, 13 more Fallen began to crawl out of a hole in the wall to my right. One was carrying a weird-looking, 4 barreled shotgun.

"RRAAAAAAA!" it shouted. I raised my Khovstov, but my Ghost said, "No, you're not ready," and I was teleported inside the jumpship. "I need to bring you to the City, remember? But we'll come back for them."

"I can take them." But the ship was in the air, and pointed west.

"No, you can't. We'll get you some new armor, and weapons. Then, we'll decide if you can go back."

As we took off, I could feel the presence of an unknown figure, standing on the roof of the Dock. Friend or foe? I'll find out.

The figure stared at the ship. She thought to herself, Is this Ghoul the Guardian of Legend? The One from the prophesy? Then she vanished, in thin air.