So this is actually a bit of an old story (looks like I finished up the majority of the writing around April of last year). It was something I always thought I would fix up a bit, but I found it again recently and honestly figured it was in a good enough place to share! I hope you can enjoy it, if only as a fun bit of fluff. As always, thanks for stopping by and reading.

EDIT: Fixed formatting. Copy-paste was not my friend...

"Picking up lots of Fallen chatter up ahead," Keela said. She twisted in the air for a moment, her single blue eye seeming to shine brighter than usual. "Mmm... Yes, sounds like at least three squads patrolling. And there's definitely another ketch full of them inbound."

"We'll have time," said Alden. He stood atop the rubble of what used to be a building. His Mark, emblazoned with the the image of a wild white cat, waved idly at his hip, moved by a breeze he could not feel.

"Are you sure? If that ketch shows up and drops an army of Fallen on us—"

"We'll make time. With bullets."

Alden made his way down the other side of the rubble, careful to keep his footing. He wondered what purpose the rubble had once served. Perhaps it had been a grocery store. He had always liked the idea of those. It seemed like it would be nice to have a nice, strong building where you could go to get your food. The only food sellers he could ever find in the City were either hawkers in markets or restaurants with outdoor seating. If what he had heard from the cryptarchs was true, such practices were largely archaic, even for pre-Golden age times. Maybe he could convince someone to try something different, something a little more modern…

"Hey hey, Earth to Guardian," Keela said.

"He's still here," Alden chuckled. "It's these buildings, Keela. Can you imagine how much of our world's history these buildings were around for? If walls could talk..."

"They can't."

Alden shook his head. "You're no fun." The Titan put a hand to his ear as he scanned what was left of the surrounding buildings. He pressed a finger to the side of his helmet to start transmitting on the built-in comm. "Dice, do you copy?"

"I read you," came the reply. The Exo sounded fairly relaxed, but Alden could hardly hear her over the roar of her sparrow's engine. "What's up?"

"Just checking in. How fast are you going?"

"Dunno, meter stopped going up a while ago."

"You sure that's safe?"

"Hell no, I've already died seven times. Takes Lance a few minutes to reconstruct the Sparrow but it all comes back eventually."

"Amanda better be paying you a hefty sum to be trying out those new engines."

"I'd do it for free."

"I know you would." Alden shook his head in bemusement and carried on. He switched on the flashlight on the end of his auto rifle and stepped inside a building. The entire first floor was intact—a rare sight in the EDZ—and it appeared to be a prime location for scavenging goods. Any supplies that could be scraped up here and brought back to the City were things that they didn't have to spend time and resources making themselves. "Keela, let's fan out and see what we can find." As requested, his Ghost materialized nearby and started scanning the room with her own light.

"Do we need any 'silly string'?" Keela asked.

"If it wasn't practically guaranteed to be hard as a rock at this point, I would say yes."

"What about 'Spam'?"

Alden stopped his own search and picked up the can Keela was looking at. "Hmm... Looks tasty, and I think I remember Rahool saying the stuff lasts forever. Send it over." The can disappeared in a blue flash from his hand.

"Propane tank?"

"I'm pretty sure Shaxx was asking for those. Traveler knows what he uses them for."

Keela buzzed and chirped for a moment. "From my research, it appears that humans used to use them to power machines called 'grills', often to create foods called 'hamburgers' or 'hot dogs'."

"Huh. Ah, there's no way that's what Shaxx uses them for. Probably likes to throw them at Fallen and see if they blow up or somethi—"

A resounding pow rang out and something impact the back of Alden's shoulder. His shields took brunt of the impact but it still caused him to stumble. He turned but didn't really need to look. "Contact," he said calmly over the radio. "Fallen scavenging party." The alien beings were hanging back in a building across the street, watching him wearily with glowing blue eyes. The Vandal with the wire rifle tightened its grip and settled itself, the weapon scoped in on him.

"Want some help clearing them out?" Dice asked.

"No, I can handle them." Alden levelled the barrel of his auto rifle at the group of Fallen and pulled the trigger in controlled bursts. Most of the bullets sparked off the concrete in the shadowed building, but he was sure at least one Fallen dropped dead. The rest scampered off with barely a sound. Alden harrumphed and went back to looking for more food.

"Is that what you call 'handling them'?" Dice chimed in over the comm.

"Scared them off, I guess."

"Huh. Doesn't seem like the Fallen. Let me know if anything else weird happens, okay? In the meantime, I'm gonna take this baby up by the treeline."

"Will do. Show those trees who's boss for me."

The silence was deafening as Alden moved further into the decaying city. "We've been searching for almost two hours," Keela said, sounding weary. Alden wasn't sure how that worked. Did Ghosts get tired like humans did? It was probably more of an emotional weariness...

"Hey, attention on the now, big guy," she said.

"Sorry," Alden said. "There's just so much to think about. Never had to consider things like Ghosts in my old life. At least I don't think I did."

The Titan nearly jumped out of his armor at the sound of the clattering object from the building to his left. He raised his rifle lightning quick, reticle trained on the busted window. "Detecting traces of movement," Keela whispered in his mind. "Probably just a fox or something."

"Worth checking out," Alden thought back. He forced down his nerves and chided himself for letting himself get so uptight in the first place. Keela was probably right. Wildlife was plentiful in this region. Why wouldn't something like a fox or mouse be searching for food just like he was?

He vaulted into the building, armored hand crushing what was left of the ancient glass in the window frame. He kept half his attention trained on the motion tracker on his helmet display. There, another small bit of movement, just off to his right. A wooden door was in that direction, all but closed to hide whatever was behind it. He kept his rifle trained towards it but kept his finger off the trigger. No sense accidentally killing some harmless animal. And if it was Fallen... well, it wasn't like dying was too much of a bad thing anyway.

He swung the door open quickly with his offhand and saw—

A human child.

Alden stumbled backward, catching himself on the wall behind him. His breathing quickened again for a moment in the shock.

"What was that?" Dice asked. "You good, Al?"

"Um..." How to put this? Guardians rarely found civilians beyond the City, let alone unattended children. It was a young boy, probably no more than ten years old. He sat huddled in the corner of the small closet. "There's a... snag."

He heard Dice's engines slow. "What the hell, Al, talk to me. Are you hurt?"

"Kid."

"What?"

"A human kid, in this building."

"What are you talking about, there aren't any refugee camps for miles, tens of miles around here."

"He's sitting right in front of me. Just keeps staring." Alden figured he probably made for a pretty imposing sight. He knelt and removed his helmet, revealing the human face beneath. The boy seemed to calm a bit, but just a bit.

"If you're sure you aren't hallucinating, we can take him back to the City with us." Dice was obviously saying what she was supposed to, but Alden could tell she wasn't pleased. Her aversion to civilians still baffled him.

Alden tried to ease closer to the boy, gun set aside and hands raised. "Hey," he said. "What's your name?" The boy didn't react well; he seemed to close in tighter against the walls. If he had been small enough to fit through the hole in the wall next to him, Alden was sure he would've been long gone. Alden changed tactics, taking a cross-legged position on the ground. "I'm Alden."

Still no reply.

"Do you have family around?"

"No."

Aha, progress! "Where are they?"

"The monsters took them."

"Monsters? You mean—"

"The ones with four arms and the weird heads. Armor like you, but smaller." Alden wasn't sure whether to be pleased or offended at that. Regardless of whether this child was roasting him, if there were civilians captured by Fallen, they had to do something about it.

"On it," Keela thought to him. "Scanning for other human lifeforms in a hundred mile radius."

"Maybe we can find them, you and me," Alden said.

"I don't want to go with you," the boy said. "You're a Guardian. Dad said the only thing Guardians care about is keeping their Trivia safe, not people."

"You mean the Traveler?" The boy just looked at him like his point had been proven. Alden sighed. "Keela, can you send him to the ship?"

She materialized in front of him. "It's too far for a transmat of even his size. We'll have to take him back with us." She disappeared from view but was still in his thoughts. "This may be a bad time, but I'm not detecting any other humans in the area. Not ones that are, you know, alive, anyway."

"I worried as much," Alden thought back. The boy's parents were most likely dead. The Fallen didn't tend to take prisoners. It was a miracle he had escaped whatever attack had taken his family. "You need to come with me," he said, reaching out his hand again. "The monsters might come back and I don't want them to get you, too."

The rumble of engines caught Alden's attention and he looked outside. Keela swore and thought to him, "The ketch!" Alden had already seen the craft. It couldn't have been more than a minute away from being in their vicinity.

"Sorry, kid, but we really have to go now," Alden said. He shoved his helmet back on and stepped into the closet and lifted the protesting boy with his left arm. The boy hung by his waist in Alden's grip, kicking and screaming. Alden did his best to ignore the complaints and retrieved his auto rifle with his free right hand. "Quiet down," he urged, "or you'll draw us some unwanted attention."

He barely heard the sound of another wire rifle shot before the blackness claimed him. He floated in void for some time. Death always felt strange to him. In a way, it felt like he floated for an eternity. In real time, of course, it was only a matter of seconds before Keela revived him.

Light entered his eyes once more. Alden jumped to his feet and gripped his rifle, which had somehow not dropped completely out of his hand. He spun, scanning the area and saw three Dregs moving towards him. He lifted his rifle with one hand and unloaded, sending them all to the dust with a spray of gunfire. The boy stood nearby, staring at him in awe.

"You... you died," he said. "And came back."

"That's what Guardians do, kid," he said. "Besides protecting our dear old Trivia of course."

For once, the boy managed to crack a bit of a smile.

More Fallen gunfire sounded behind him. Alden turned to look but made sure to keep his body between the Fallen and the boy. Yes, there were multiple groups of Fallen around them now, their weapons primed and ready. The ketch was getting dangerously close. He looked to the boy again. Had he been alone, he would have taken great pleasure in taking them all these damned Eliksni down.

But he wasn't alone.

He knelt down to look at the boy as shock rounds impacted the ground around them. "We need to leave this place very fast. I need to carry you."

"I can keep up!" the boy said.

"As much respect as I have for you, I really doubt that." Without further talk, Alden scooped the boy up again and took off down the rubble filled streets. Every ten paces or so he would blindfire behind him with his rifle. He opened his comm channel again. "Dice, I'm headed back with the boy, but there's a lot of Fallen around us. I want you to head to our location ASAP for pickup."

"Roger," she replied. "Headed your way now."

"Keela, how long will she be?"

"I estimate about five minutes at least," his Ghost replied.

Alden rounded a corner and found himself in the shadow of the ketch lowering itself above the street. He had never seen one of the Fallen flagships quite this close. Several Fallen jumped from its boarding ramp, armed to the teeth. At least four captains stood among the ranks of Vandals and Dregs.

"Five minutes might not be fast enough," Alden said.

The ketch and all the Fallen around it opened fire.

Alden and the boy with him should probably have been obliterated, but Alden was well practiced with his Light. He had to drop the boy rather unceremoniously, but he was able to throw up a Ward of Dawn in time to stop the blasts. The solid purple Light held strong against the onslaught... for the time being. Alden already struggled to keep the bubble standing.

He tried to concentrate on his surroundings. Yes, his eyes and ears told him that the hail of gunfire was indeed not stopping. The ground around popped with every shockround, every cannon shell the Fallen the fired at his Ward. It could not hold forever.

He could not hold forever.

His eyes found the boy again. He sat huddled by Alden's leg, eyes wide and screaming occasionally at the sights and sounds around him. Were it not for the Ward, he would have been long since vaporized along with Alden.

"They really want us dead," Keela thought. "If they break through and you die, I can't revive you without exposing myself."

"Got it," Alden said through clenched teeth.

"What was that?" Dice said over the comm. He could hear the scream of her sparrow's engine pushing its own limits.

"Nothing, just get over here."

"Did that ketch get to you?"

"Got both of us pinned down."

"And you want me to what, jump on the ketch and knife it to death?"

"You can swing through and pick up the boy without taking too much fire. I can stay to draw their attention."

"You can't be serious, Alden. We're getting you out of this too!"

"No way," he said. He eyed the ketch above. "Just the two of us can't handle a force this big, especially not with a civillian in tow. You need to rescue the boy and get as far from here as you can!"

The attack continued. The Fallen were on all sides of the Ward now and they all seemed incredibly determined to break it, but that was taking time. Any Dreg that dared to venture into the bubble was met with gunfire. One that got a little too close got its face grabbed and smashed into the side of the Ward.

That was when they realized that attacking alone was no use. Together, however…

"Multiple Fallen converging on my Ward," Alden said. "If I fall, assume… well, the worst."

"Alden, just get out of there!" Dice shouted.

He tuned her out. There was nothing to do except stand and fight now. While shells rained on his now cracking Ward of Dawn, several Dregs stepped through it. They swung at the Titan with knives and fired with their shock pistols.

Alden became unstoppable. He swapped his rifle to his left hand; precision wouldn't be necessary here. He sprayed his own hail of bullets into the ranks of the Fallen and lashed out with his free hand. Fist met Fallen face, and the fist won. When the magazine was empty, he threw the rifle in the face of another Dreg before caving in its torso with a powerful jab. For every arm that reached to attack him or the boy, he provided a broken one in return. Every swing of a blade resulted in a shattered wrist or its owner being swung by the arm and sent crashing into its fellows.

But for every slain Dreg, another came to challenge him.

"It's like they sent an entire House to fight you," Keela thought to him. "What gives?!"

"Probably just got in their way," he thought back, never stopping his ardent defense. "I have an idea to give us some space."

"You—no no no, you're not—"

"It's the only way to buy us enough time."

"The boy..."

"He'll be fine. I'll make sure of it."

He could swear he heard Keela sigh in his thoughts. "Do what you have to."

He nodded, mostly to affirm for himself what he was about to do. Traveler be with me, he thought as he looked into the boy's eyes one last time.

The boy looked back and saw the Guardian's determination. And for a split second, his fear seemed to reside.

Alden cleared the space around him with a sweeping kick and took up position behind the boy. He took a calming breath to steady himself.

As the biggest wave of Fallen yet converged on his Ward, he knew he was ready. All it took was a short leap into the air to start. That was all it ever took.

It was the return strike that did the damage.

Dice was grateful for her light-dimming visor in her helmet as a brilliant flash went off from beyond the rise up ahead. She had reached Alden's location faster than she had expected; the new sparrow continued to impress. It appeared that neither the ketch nor any Fallen had noticed her approach, but the flash made her even more concerned for her friend. What was that?!

"Alden has just issued a massive discharge of Arc Light," said her Ghost, Lance. "One of those Titan things, the 'Fist of Chaos' or whatever."

"I know what they're called, genius. But wasn't he just using his Ward?"

"That… that is the puzzling part." Lance didn't often sound confused. A Guardian appearing to use two abilities often considered to be massive drains on one's Light simultaneously seemed too crazy to be true. But as she crested the rise, she could see the truth for herself.

Alden lay huddled in a ball on the ground. She thought she could pick out the small form of a young human boy beneath his much larger form. The Titan's Ward still stood, but only just; seeing the web of cracks covering its surface, she was shocked that it hadn't already collapsed.

"He's still alive," Lance said. "But after pulling a stunt like that, I can't imagine much of his Light is left to him. I doubt there would even be enough between him and Keela for a resurrection."

"Then we get in there before he's dead."

"Didn't he tell you just to grab the boy? I would prefer to stay in the business of not-being-dead."

Dice was too busy taking stock of a rising slope of rubble off to her right. She revved her sparrow hard, angling for the slope.

"What are you doing?!" Lance screamed in her head.

"Lighting the way."

As Dice reached the top of the slope, she yanked up hard and the sparrow caught air. The rubble had taken her high enough that she was practically level with the ketch's boarding dock.

Three shots. Make them count.

Her trained Hunter's eyes scanned the battlefield. Things seemed to be happening in slow motion. Yes, there were good spots, places where more Fallen were grouped together. That would work to her advantage. Keeping her legs wrapped tight on the seat of the sparrow, she let go of the handlebars and took aim.

And the Hunter, Dice-19, drew from the Void a bow and three gleaming arrows.

The first struck home in the center of the ketch's boarding dock. Deep purple tethers sprouted from the swirling impact point, catching Fallen soldiers and ship guns alike. The second landed in a squad of Vandals in the buildings to her right. The last struck a Captain to her left square in the chest, disintegrating it, and tethering three other nearby Captains and several Dregs.

The rain of fire on Alden's Ward was suddenly a fraction of what it had been mere seconds ago, and not a moment too soon; the Void Light of the Ward flickered and went out. Alden did not stir.

Dice recovered her grip on the sparrow and landed as best she could. Perhaps "landing" was too generous a term; the vehicle's repulsors failed from the momentum gained after such a drop, letting it crash into the ground before bouncing back up to normal height. She pulled alongside Alden's still form, giving no regard to the Fallen shock rounds impacting her shields. She hopped off the sparrow and drew her hand cannon, quick as lightning, and popped off several shots into groups of Fallen that had not been touched by her tethers. The Fallen that survived seemed to realize their predicament and scattered.

Now for you, sir, she thought, looking to her downed friend. And of course, there was the child beneath. Dice hefted Alden's body first, lifting him up and onto the still hovering sparrow next to them. The boy, revealed to the world once more, cowered before her. "Relax, kid," she said. She pointed with her thumb at the unconscious Titan. "I'm with him."

With Alden slung more or less securely over the front of the sparrow and the boy sitting in front her, Dice rocketed off on the sparrow. The Void tethers sparked out of existence as she left, leaving behind a small army of very confused and disappointed Fallen.

The room that Alden woke up in appeared white and sterile. He recognized it as one of the usual Guardian medbays in the Tower. We made it back, he thought. How...? He looked around the room and saw Dice sitting with Lance off to the side. Upon seeing him awake, the Hunter stood and came to him.

"Finally awake!" she said. "The doctors were afraid you might not... well..." She gestured to the side towards a table by the bed."

Keela lay unmoving and unlit on the table, laying off-center. Alden sat up and gently put his hands to her. "What... what happened to her?" But he feared he already knew.

"After we picked you and the boy up and got to a safe distance, I tried to check on you and Keela," Dice explained. "She was already weakened at that point from, well... what you did. She was able to summon up enough Light to revive you one last time. After that, she dropped like this."

So it is my fault.

"The boy is safe. He's staying with a family close to the tower. He's alive because of what you did."

The lifeless Ghost shell in his hands seemed to be a vaccuum for those words.

"Is she gone?" he asked. "For good?"

Dice took a deep breath before answering. "I asked around, talked to some Warlocks. Nobody seems to know for sure." She put a hesitant hand on his shoulder. "Don't give up on her. She's strong."

Alden nodded. It should be me. By rights, I shouldn't be alive now. I wouldn't be if it weren't for her.

You brought me out of the dark. I'll find a way to do the same for you.