Author's Note: This is my first writing I've ever shared with anyone, so I'd appreciate all the feedback I can get on it. Thanks and enjoy!
The Forgotten Fireteam
Blake Johnson
Resurrected
Light burst forth into my eyes, blinding me. Am I dead? I asked myself trying to cover my eyes from the burning white. No, I thought to myself, I was dead, so why am I here? Then that's when I heard it, the little voice that sounded so excited, like this was the best day of its life.
"Wakey, wakey Guardian," the voice said to me.
I looked up and saw a small robotic creature hovering before me. As it talked little pyramids around it moved around, expanding out and back in. It's what seemed to be the one talking to me. "Who are you? Where am I? Who am I? And why did you call me Guardian?" I asked, utterly confused, I didn't seem able to remember anything.
"I am your ghost," the ghost said to me, "and we are on the moon."
"The moon?!" I replied, astonished. Then, a couple memories came back to me. Earth, the moon, the sun, and the rest of our solar system.
"Yes the moon," my ghost replied, almost annoyed, "This is where you died after all."
"So I was dead," I uttered under my breath, realizing my feeling was indeed true.
"Yes, and since your no longer dead because I resurrected you, you are a Guardian," he replied, looking around anxiously.
"You keep calling me that, Guardian, what does that mean?" I asked, still confused.
"A Guardian is a defender of the Last City on Earth. You are one of the chosen few who can channel the Traveler's light as a weapon."
"Who's the Traveler?" I asked, just getting more confused, "And what are you talking about using light as a weapon?"
"Wow, you really don't remember a thing do you? Well, I'll try to put it in simple terms. The Traveler is a giant, white orb that floats in the sky. The Traveler uses its powers of light to terraform planets, such and Mars, Mercury, and Venus and gave your kind great technological advancement. You, as a guardian, are able to wield the dying Traveler's light as a weapon to fight against the Darkness."
"So the Traveler's dying? And what exactly is the Darkness?" I asked, continually getting more and more confused.
"Yes, the Traveler is dying. It was damaged in its war against the Darkness, and, before it went dormant, it created us, the ghosts, to seek out those who could wield it's light. Due to that I've been searching for you for a long while, so long I've lost count. Well, not actually, but it's a figure of speech," he said, surprising me with the phrase.
"And the Darkness?" I asked once more.
"Ah yes, almost forgot. The Darkness is the Traveler's ancient enemy. It's been following the Traveler across the universe for eons. As I said before, the Traveler created prosperity, technological advancements, and the increase of the human lifespan, but eventually, the Darkness found the Traveler once again. Your kind was almost wiped out, killed by the minions of the Darkness. I mentioned the Last City on Earth before. I wasn't joking. It is the only safe place left on Earth, the last place the Traveler's light can protect. There are still people left out in the wilderness, trying to make it to the City. Who knows if the will ever make it," he said solemnly.
"I thinking I'm starting to understand," I said, "So, ghost, what do we do now?" I asked, afraid of what the answer might be.
"For now, we find a ship. We need to get off this planet and make it to the Tower. Before you ask, the Tower is the sort of meeting place for Guardians. You'll see when we arrive," ghost said, turning around and heading towards the nearby rock face.
I hurriedly started to follow him, and with it, getting my first good looks at where I was. Everything was grey. It was like a giant expanse of storm clouds had decided to land and create an ocean. Suddenly a name popped into my head, The Ocean of Storms. I liked the name, it had a ring to it.
Then I turned my head to the left and saw something strange. There were huge gashes and crevices in the side of the moon. Once like didn't look like a natural occurrence.
"Ghost, what's that over there?" I asked pointing to the gashes.
"That's where Crota tore through the moon with his sword."
"Who's Crota?" I asked, once more confused.
"To explain that, I'd have to explain to you who the Hive are, and we just don't have time for that," he said, giving me a growing sense of curiosity.
We continued on for another fifteen minutes or so in silence. Ghost seemed to be occupied with something, most likely trying to detect a ship for us to get away from here with.
Then I realized that I didn't have a name for my ghost, and for some reason, I felt that was unacceptable, "What's your name?" I asked.
"What?" Ghost replied, confusion in his voice.
"Your name, what is it?" I asked once again.
"I don't have one. There was never someone to give me one. I've always just been ghost," he replied.
"Well it looks like it's time I give you one. Hmmm…"
I thought for a minute. I didn't know what to call him. Then it hit me.
"I'll call you Kingston, mainly so I can call you King for short," I said smiling.
"Hmmm… I actually don't mind that. Kingston it is. Now what's your name?" King asked me back.
It was then that I realized I didn't know my own name and, since I didn't want to look like an idiot who gave someone else a name without knowing my own name, I had to think of one, and fast. Then I thought of one.
"Mortuus Caelum," I said, getting a feeling of it was right.
"Strange name, it means Dead in Latin. Well nice to finally have something to call you Mortuus," he said with an actual joy in his voice.
"Well you can call me Cael," I said getting a little laugh from King. It was obvious to him I had just made it up, but he didn't seem to mind. He actually seemed to understand.
We walked on for a while making small chat. We talked about some of his adventures out trying to find me. About being fired at by a large militaristic alien species called the Cabal. About how he infiltrated the Devil's Lair in the Cosmodrome, whatever that means. He was halfway through talking about a time he accidentally ran into the gunsmith at the tower when he suddenly stopped mid-sentence.
"I found one!" King said excitedly.
"Found what?" I asked.
"A ship! I found a ship! It seems to be right over this hillside!" He exclaims, hurrying me along.
"Really!" I asked, but it was more of a statement.
"Yes, it's just a little farther!" King stated, reaching the top of the hill.
When he reached the top of the hill, he stopped. I walked up to him, and was about to ask why when I looked down to where King said the ship would be. It was swarming with alien lifeforms. The Hive I believe is what the ghost called them. They seemed to be everywhere.
"What do we do?" I whispered to him, hoping not to draw any attention to us.
"The only thing we can do. We find you a weapon, and we fight through them," he said, dead serious.
"So how do we find a find a weapon around here? It doesn't seem like the kind of place to be holding human technology," I said, showing how much I had missed in the past centuries.
"You were gone before all this happened, but we inhabited the moon, so there is likely some type of old weapon we can find in some of the old buildings around here," and with that, King turned around and started heading back down the hill, towards wherever these building he said where.
We walked for a couple minutes till we came to a path through a walk wall to our right. After about thirty feet we came to a clearing with what looked like an old human settlement.
"This is where we will find a gun?" I asked. I was confused, for it looked more like a small research facility, and that is not where I would expect to find a gun.
"Yes, I am about to check the computer database to see where they are keeping this gun," King said, entering one of the building to access the computers.
I slowly walked in after him, looking around at the metal buildings surrounding us. They seemed so advanced, yet very old. It was clear the facility hadn't been used in a long while. I walked into the building and saw King shining some light on the computer. It must have been doing something because the computer was lighting up. It looked like someone was actually using it. I had started to look at a strange symbol on the wall when King suddenly started talking.
"They seemed to hold some guns in the building directly to the left of us. We should probably go and get it," King said, hurrying off.
Before he could, I asked, "What does this symbol mean?" pointing to the strange symbol I had seen on the wall.
"It's a symbol of the Fallen. It means we should hurry," he said, worry creeping into his little robotic voice.
We quickly walked to the next building, it was clear King was in a bit more of a hurry now.
King opened the door and said, "Quick, grab a couple guns, we should probably be leaving."
I looked around at my options. I saw some rifles, shotguns, pistols, snipers, and some weapons I didn't even know what would do. So I grabbed the two that seemed like I knew them the best. The pistol and the shotgun.
"Now that you've got your guns, we should start heading back towards that ship. We need to get out of here soon. I don't want the Hive to sense us," King said, looking behind him.
So we headed out, but this time, it wasn't a walk, it was a full on sprint. When we arrived back at the hill, King said, "You don't have any armor, so be careful. I don't want you to die on me already, even though it wouldn't be that big of a deal."
"How would my death not be a big deal. I'd be dead!" I whispered angrily.
"Did I not mention? I can resurrect you. As long as you still have light left in you, I will be able to resurrect you, and it is relatively hard to lose your light. So you won't really have to worry about that," he said, and I believed him. It didn't make sense, but none of this really made sense so, why would this.
"Okay, wish me luck," I said to King, then I headed down the hill quietly, I wanted to have the element of surprise.
I slowly moved down the hill, controlling my footstep and breathing so that I didn't release a single sound. Once I reached the bottom of the hill, I finally saw the creatures up close.
They were mostly grey and red, with a hard exoskeleton. They were rather humanoid. They had two arms and two legs. They littler ones were smaller than me, but there was a big one with a sword that was easily taller than me. Then there were there eyes. They glowed green and seemed to pierce my soul, even though they weren't even looking at me.
I tore my eyes away. I didn't have time to examine them now. I had a job to do, and I needed to do it fast.
I pulled out my pistol and made sure it was ready to fire. I aimed to gun towards the nearest Hive's head and… BANG! The Hive fell over dead, and I almost fell over as well. The pistol had a hell of a recoil, one that I wasn't ready for, but I couldn't dwell on that. They knew I was here, so I had to finish the job.
I came out from behind the rock I was hiding behind and shot the next nearest Hive twice in the chest, killing it. I aimed for the next one and it too was dead before it even had time to fire its weapon.
I rolled behind cover, just in time to see a purple energy-like bullet fly past. I really did not want to get hit by one of those. I rolled out of cover and fire the three remaining shots in the magazine. One shot missed, but the other two found their way into a Hive's chest.
I made quick count of the enemies left before I went behind another rock. Nine smaller ones and then the one big one.
That's when I heard a terrifying screech. I looked back from behind cover and saw around ten grey creatures running towards me. I quickly pulled out my shotgun and began to back up.
The first five went down easy, but then I ran out of bullets. The next one I punched straight in the face, and it seemed as if lightning coursed through the creature on connection, killing it instantly.
I didn't have time to take amazement on what just happened, there were still four more of those things running at me. I pulled out me pistol again, quick put another magazine in it and shot one directly in the head. The six remaining bullets I unloaded into the other three.
Once all the bullets were gone, all of those abominations were dead, but in all the ruckus of the creatures, I completely forgot about the others. As I looked up, one of their bullets hit me on my left shoulder.
Dove behind one of the rocks and looked at my wound. I didn't look good, but I couldn't let that stop me. I had to finish them off.
I reloaded both my guns, knowing full well these were my last bullets, which meant I had to make them count.
This time, instead of going around the rocks, I went over it. As I went over the rock I shot a bullet into one the smaller one's heads. Next to me was another, so I tried that electric punch again. It killed the Hive and startled the remaining, giving me a chance to kill two more of the smaller aliens.
Then, for a couple second, instinct took over. My body seemed to be working of its own accord. I saw my arm throw an orb at Hive. When it hit it exploded in a burst of light, killing three of them and blinding the rest.
I used this chance two use the last four bullets in the pistol to kill the remaining two smaller ones. All that was left was the big guy.
The abomination slowly started to walk towards me. Something told me this wasn't going to be as easy as the others.
I pulled out my shotgun, knowing that the five shots in it I would have to make count. Once the creature was within range, I fired two shots into him. All it seemed to do was make him flinch. As I fired a third shot, the creature put up some sort of black shield, completely blocking my shot.
Once the shield was down, the creature made a strong uppercut with its sword. I barely jumped out of the way in time. I fired another shot into him, and then another. They seemed to do some damage, but not enough. I was out of ammo, and out of ideas. I didn't seem able to activate the grenade or the punch, and that meant I was out of luck.
That's when I got the feeling. It started when I remembered that King resurrected me because I could use light as a weapon. Then I got a feeling in my gut. A feeling that I hadn't unlocked my full potential. I let the light flow through me, and the next thing I knew, I was slamming my fists into the ground, shooting arcing lightning out all around me, vaporizing the creature instantly.
I looked at my hands in amazement. I had no idea how I did that. The only way to explain it was that it was if something clicked, and suddenly I knew exactly what to do.
"Good job," King said, coming up behind me and startling me.
"How did I do that?" I asked, still dumbfounded by what I'd done.
"You channeled the light as a weapon, just like I said you could. Once we arrive at the tower, you'll meet the Vanguard, then you'll learn even more," he replied to me.
"To the ship?" I asked simply.
"To the ship," King replied back.
We walked into a large hangar of some sort, and in it was the ship.
It was amazing. It was a dazzling red color, and seemed to shine, even with the small amount of light that was shining through the ceiling. It was sleek and aerodynamic, it looked like nothing could stop its speed. If you looked from above, it looked almost like an upside-down A with the middle filled in. The back had four large engines, most likely used to help break orbit.
"You know how to drive this thing?" I asked because I knew that I couldn't.
"Of course I can," King replied to me in an almost cocky way.
Suddenly, King shown his light-thing on me and I started to feel weightless. Then, suddenly, I was inside the ship with my mouth hanging wide open. If I thought that the exterior looked good, that paled in comparison to the interior.
Everything looked in mint condition. The metal parts still had a shine to it. I looked at the controls. Everything was online. Somehow, the ship had remained intact all these years, like it was waiting for us.
King floated up to the controls and shone his little light on the controls. "You ready to go to the Tower?" King asked me as the ships engines revved up.
"I'm ready," I replied looking up as the ceiling of the building started to retract, preparing for our takeoff.
As the ship took off, I looked back down to the desolate planet. Once the ship activated its wart drive, I knew that I would never look upon it the same way again.
The Tower
When I saw it, all I could think was, wow. It was amazing to see a city formed in the wilderness, especially after all I had seen of this new dark age. Then there was the tower, rising above all, standing as a sentinel for the city.
King flew our ship towards the tower. As we approach, I get that strange feeling of weightlessness and suddenly, I'm standing right in the main square of the Tower. I look around and see bushes, banners, robots, ghosts, guardians, and other people walking around the Tower. I just stood there in shock, trying to absorb it all.
"We should probably talk to the Vanguard. They will want to know," King said, moving forwards towards a set of stairs in front of me.
I followed him, saying, "Hi," as I passed by other Guardians. It seemed they could tell I was new, most likely because I wasn't in a full suit of body armor. A couple of people looked at the wound on my shoulder, giving a nod of respect. They obviously knew what I had fought to get here.
I walked down the steps, and saw what I assumed were the Vanguard. There were three people standing along a long table. They each had different types of armor on. One was in a much larger, thicker armor, while another was in lither, thinner armor, and the last was wearing some sort of wizard's robe.
I walked up and waited for them to finish their conversation.
"The Vault could hold many secrets, secrets that can help us fight back against the Darkness," said the one in the robe.
"It's too dangerous," said the larger one.
"It could be worth exploring. Who knows what he could find in there!" said the smaller one, looking out a window. He didn't look like he wanted to be here.
"We can finish talking about this later, it appears we've got a visitor," stated the larger one, fully standing up. He was a large man, much larger than the others. I couldn't tell if it was him, his armor, or both.
"Yes, who've we got here," the smaller one asked, leaning forward with interest.
"A new Guardian," King said, appearing out of nowhere.
"We can always use for of them. Especially after Mare Imbrium…" The larger one said, trailing off.
"Now is not the time to dwell on the past. Now is time for introductions," the smaller one said, "I'm Andal Brask, the Hunter Vanguard. What's your name?"
"Mortuus Caelum," I replied, trying to put on a show of courage.
"Well nice to meet you Mortuus!" Andal said enthusiastically.
"And I am Saladin Forge, the Titan Vanguard," the larger one said.
"And I am Osiris, the Warlock Vanguard," the one with robe said.
Osiris then glanced at the wound on my shoulder. He then looked back at me with a look of curiosity.
"Appears you had a bit of trouble during your journey here," Osiris said, indicating the black wound.
"Yeah, we ran into some Hive on the Moon," King replied back without hesitation.
"We are full aware what you fought up there. Where did you fight them?" he asked my ghost, obviously more interested in it than in me.
"We were in the Ocean of Storms, looking for a ship to take us to the Tower. I picked up a signal from a still operational ship. Once we arrived we found about twenty Hive guarding the hangar it was held within," King said, never breaking contact with Osiris.
"That troubles me Osiris. Why would they leave a fully functioning ship just sitting there? I think I need to go down there to take a look," Andal said, a slight glint in his eye.
"No, Brask, you must stay here. It is your duty as Vanguard to stay here at the Tower. You know that," Saladin said sternly.
"I know, I know, I know. A Hunter can dream can't he. Don't you ever dream of going back into the field?" Andal asked Saladin.
"Of course, but I don't let it distract from my duties. Anyway, now is not the time to be talking about this. We should gauge the type of Guardian this one his," Saladin said, turning his head towards me.
King gave a nod to me, indicating for me to describe what I could do. So I did. I told them of the lightning. Of the way it coursed through my body. How I discharged it into the ground, and of the feeling when I destroyed that creature on the moon.
"Seems to be one of you Saladin," said Osiris, turning towards some books and scrolls he had lain out on the table.
"What does he mean by that?" I asked Saladin.
"Guardians are divided up into three classes. Warlocks like Osiris, Hunters like Andal, and Titans like myself. We each use the light in different ways, using different abilities," Saladin said, pointing at the others of the Vanguard.
"So now what?" I asked, looking up at Saladin.
"Well the first thing we need to do, is get you a set of armor. Follow me," Saladin said as he began to walk off back down the hall.
We walked back up the stairs, then off to the left down another hallway with signs saying "North Tower." About halfway through the hallway, we came to a door. The door was nothing special, just a plain steel door with a lock on it. Saladin pulled out a key and unlocked the door.
Since the door wasn't very special, I wasn't expecting much from the interior. Man was I wrong. The interior of the room was amazing, and when I say room, it wasn't really a room. It was easily as large as the Vanguards room, if not bigger.
There were rows and rows of armor of all different types. Some were thicker while some were thinner, but still big. They were all different colors. I saw red, blue, green, yellow, purple, black, white, grey, and so many other colors. Some had spikes, some were completely smooth. Some had light or extra places for storage. It was hard to take it all in.
"Go and pick an armor," Saladin said to me, waving his hand towards all the armor.
I looked around, not knowing where to start. There were so many options. Each suit of armor had a name. I saw Kronos Type 1, Mycenae Type 0, Knight Type 2, Neptune 054, and many more. I was about to just choose at random when something caught my eye. On the end of the row I was looking at, I saw a suit of armor that seemed to call out to me, like I was meant for it.
I walked down the aisle, staring at the armor. It was a glorious shade of pure black with a red trim on it. The entire armor was smooth, making it appear even blacker. Red trim ran down the armor in an almost skeletal fashion, appearing to outline a human body. It was beautiful.
I reached out and touched it, just to make sure I wasn't just seeing things, to make sure it was real. "Beautiful piece of work isn't it," Saladin said, coming up behind me.
"Yes, yes it is," I said, almost in a trance.
"It's called the Morning Star V1. Had it specially made for intense combat. It can take a bullet and still has good maneuverability. It's been the pride and joy of my collection. I've just been waiting for a new Guardian to use it, but none have been drawn to it. Until you," he said, also analyzing its beauty.
"Does that mean I can have it?" I asked, looking at the Titan excitedly.
"Of course, as long as you promise to use it as it was meant to be used. Don't do any of that weird scout stuff, like sniping. Use it for combat, and don't be afraid to get up close and personal, it can take it," he said, putting his hand on the breast place.
I looked excitedly back at the armor. "Where can I change into this?" I asked, starting to grab to armor off its stand.
"Your ghost will take care of that. He knows what to do," he stated, nodding towards my ghost.
I looked at King. "Sooo… What is it exactly that you're going to do. Are you going to use some of your ghost magic to create a changing room?" I said with a chuckle.
King, obviously not understanding my humor, said, "No, not that. You'll see."
Suddenly a strange feeling washed over me. The armor next to me started to glow, then it disappeared. Then I started to glow, and I saw the armor materialize on me. The strangest part was the helmet. Suddenly I had a radar and gauges telling me how much ammo I had for my guns, which was none. There were also two boxes and another gauge. One of the boxes showed what I assumed was a grenade while the other showed a fist. The gauge was about halfway full. I didn't know of what.
I looked down at my hands, looking at the glorious armor that was on them. I gave a little shudder of joy. I walked around a bit. It didn't seem that different than before. It seemed a little heavier, but it seemed to help me along as I walked.
"Let's go," I said to King, feeling a lot stronger than I did a minute. I was also pretty sure it was healing my wound, which helped a lot.
I walked out the door with my ghost and saw Saladin standing there, talking to some robot person.
"Hello Guardian," the robot said.
Saladin could tell that I was a little surprised by his appearance, so he decided to step in and explain. "This is Banshee-39, he's an Exo. Exo's are old robots that were seeded with consciousness long ago, and they've also begun becoming Guardians. Andal's friend Cayde-6 is a great example for that. Banshee is also the Weapons Master here in the Tower. He can help you fix up your weapons, and he will also be giving you some new weapons because the ones you came in with just won't do."
"Yeah, those were nice guns back in their time, but we have some more advanced weapons than those these days," he said coolly.
With that Banshee walked back down the hallway the way we had come. Once we were out we started to head back towards the stairs, but we didn't go to them. Went behind and to the left of them, where I assumed he had set up shop.
He went behind the table and grabbed a box. He gently started to pull its contents out of the box. He then pulled out another box and took its contents out as well.
In front of me were sitting two groups of guns. On the left side of the table sat four guns. One of those pistols and three types of rifles. On the right side there were three guns. A shotgun, a sniper, and one other type of rifle I didn't recognize.
"Here we've got your basic weapons. You've got your scout rifles which fire a single shot. Your pulse rifles which fire in small burst. Then we have auto rifles which are your fully automatics. Finally, we have hand cannons which fire slower than scout rifles, but do a deal more damage. Then on this side of the table, we have your secondary's. You got your shotguns and snipers, which I assume you know what they do. I'll take that nod as a yes. The one you probably don't know is the fusion rifle. It has to charge up to fire, but it's worth it. It shoots energy shots that do a good deal of damage. I know you're probably wondering why you need one of each kind. That's because if we didn't, people would choose two snipers, or two shotguns, etc., and they wouldn't be prepared for most situation. This way, guardians have more of a variety for fighting the Darkness. Now, choose one from each side of the table," Banshee said to me, waving his hands over the weapons.
I looked at the secondary's first because I already knew which one I wanted. I picked up the shotgun and said, "What's it called?"
"The Conspiracy Theory-B, it's a part of a series, and this is the most recent. It's a favorite of the Vanguard," he said, caressing the gun. He then handed the gun over to me. I put it on my back and went to look at the other weapons I had to choose from.
I looked at them for a minute, trying to figure out which one I would like the best, but I had no idea. I looked up aske Banshee-39 what he would suggest when I saw a red and white gun laying on a table in the back. "How about that one?" I asked, pointing towards the gun.
"Ahhh, the Suros Regime. Only a few of the gun were made. It's one of those guns you are lucky to get your hands on," he said, looking at the gun.
"Didn't realize it was so rare, sorry for asking about it," I said, a little bummed out.
"Hey, I never said you couldn't have it. I just said that it was rare. I was planning on giving it to someone. A gun's not meant to just sit around, it's meant to be fired at enemies, but I'm not going to give it to just anyone. I want to make sure that you can handle yourself in battle, from your ghost. People tend to lie to get what they want," he said.
So King explained our exploits on the moon, about how I killed the Hive creatures. He went in quite a lot of detail, but I guess he just wanted to make sure he didn't leave anything out of his explanation.
After King had finished recounting our story, Banshee-39 said, "You show promise Guardian. You seem quite adept with weapons, and, as a Titan, can trust that you will use the weapon as it was meant to be used. Now, before I hand it over, I want to explain one thing. The weapon has two firing modes. A slower mode that pushes the bullets at a higher velocity, dealing more damage to your foes. Then there is a faster firing that gets faster the longer you are firing it. You can have your ghost switch the gun between the two at any time," he explained, handing the gun over to me.
I looked down, felt the gun in my hands, and smiled. Banshee saw it and nodded at me. Then a thought occurred in my mind.
"Since I already have the shotgun on my back, and I probably shouldn't be walking around with a gun, where do I put it?" I asked, truly confused once again.
"Your ghost should be able to take care of that for you Guardian," he said, gesturing towards King.
I looked at him, and began to understand. Just like he had done with me and the armor, he had a way of transporting things, I just didn't know where or how. Suddenly, both my guns were transported somewhere.
"Anything else we need to do?" I asked King.
"I believe Saladin wanted to see us in the bottom floor of the Tower. Let's go," King said, beginning to hover towards a door near some boxes.
"How large is the Tower?" I asked King, amazement filling me.
"It's huge, but only a little is used. This floor is pretty much all we use. Almost everything else is no longer in use, but Saladin uses the bottom floors for training Titans, and I'm sure the other Vanguard do the same on some of the other floors. For now, I just enter a code Saladin gave me to activate the elevator. Let's keep going," he said, reaching the door.
King opened the door. There was a small, grey hallway, and at the end of it, elevator doors. King inputted whatever the code was, and the elevator opened. We entered the elevator, and once the door closed, the elevator began to fall at an alarming rate.
"Is this supposed to happen!?" I asked King, yelling at the top of my lungs.
"I have no idea," King replied back to me.
Suddenly, the elevator began to slow down drastically. Then, after a couple seconds, we came to a complete stop and the elevator doors opened once more. Inside was the largest training area I had ever seen, or at least assumed the largest, since I couldn't remember my past life.
The entire room was made out of a shiny metal, that had to be pretty strong. I assumed this because there were many places where it looked like explosives had gone off, and there was barely even a dent in it.
When I say room, I really mean a one room mansion. It was easily three, if not four or five, stories tall. The room was long and wide; it was easily the length of two football fields. I don't know what that means, but it felt right.
It wasn't just a flat room either. It had ramps, small and larger buildings. It had some walls, barricades, and turrets positioned around the room. If you couldn't tell it was a training area, you were even dumber than me, and I remember almost nothing.
In the middle of the room, Saladin had just finished talking to two other Titans. I walked up to him and said, "Who were they?"
"They are two Titans I am personally grooming to take over my position as Vanguard," he replied to me.
"But can't only one person be Vanguard at a time?" I asked.
"You are right in that way, but I can already tell that one of them has no interest in being the Vanguard," he said with a sigh.
"If it's okay for me to ask, why did you choose them?" I questioned him.
"They started simply as my pupils, but I realized I wouldn't be Vanguard forever, so I decided that I would start to train them for becoming the new Vanguard. We will need constant new blood if we are to survive. It's why it's so important to us when a new Guardian is resurrected by a ghost. It's one more soldier to fight against the Darkness," he explained to me, "Now, the reason I had you come down here. You need to learn how to control your abilities. They aren't much of a help if you can't use the properly."
"Okay, how do we do that?" I asked him.
"I want you to punch that wall," he said blatantly.
"What?" I asked in confusion.
"I want you to punch the wall," he repeated to me.
I looked towards the wall in confusion. I knew it had to have something to do with the electric punch I'd done before, but I didn't know how to activate it, but I'm not one to not do what I'm told. I walked up to the wall and threw my fist as hard as I could into it. I didn't even make a dent.
"Strong punch," Saladin said, walking up behind me, "Now watch me."
So I watched him. I watched him as he punched the wall. Then I watched as the wall broke under his fist. There was now a hole within the wall.
"Now you see the difference between your punch with and without channeling the light. This is needed for you to survive out in the wild. You need to focus on putting power into your fist. Once you've mastered it, it will become second nature. Now try again," Saladin said, pointing towards the wall.
I punched the wall, then I punched it again, and again, and again. Each time I tried to focus my power, but it never seemed to work. Then, out of pure anger, I punched the wall again, and I felt power surge to my fist. The wall gave into my will. The hole I created wasn't quite as big as Saladin's, but Ii think it was to be expected.
"Good job. In a bit we will practice again, but for now we will practice your grenade. To do this, you need to think of your grenade being forged out of the light, then, if done right, it will be thrown from your hand," he said to me.
I focused the light into my hand in a new way. It seemed easier this time, probably because I already had practice channeling the light from the punching. It took about fifteen seconds, but I finally formed the grenade in my hand, and threw it towards a nearby building.
After the grenade had gone off, Saladin said, "Good job, now we have to show you how to channel your light in the truest way. With your Fist of Havoc. To do this, you need to channel the light into your entire body, then release it as you hit the ground, or your intended target," Saladin said.
I turned around, closed my eyes, and channeled the light. For five minutes I absorbed light, then, once I felt it was ready, I unleased it into the ground, just like I had done against that Hive.
Then we practiced for hours, going from one to the other, till I could activate them instantaneously. It took a lot of work, and I was very tired by the end of it, but I could tell it was going to be very helpful.
Then, before he left, Saladin said, "You will find new ways to adapt your abilities to make them act in different ways. That is not something I can teach you, but you will learn them in time on your own." Then he left.
"Where is he going?" I asked King, breathing heavily.
"He is going to talk to the Speaker with the rest of the Vanguard," he said to me.
"Who's the Speaker?" I asked, once again confused.
"He speaks for the Traveler ever since the Traveler lost its voice when it was injured. He acts as a source of hope," he explained to me.
Then we went back to the elevator and went back up to the main floor of the Tower. Then we walked back out to where King had dropped me off, and I once more got the feeling of weightlessness as I was transported into my ship.
The First Mission
When I received the transmission, I was helping King go over all the gadgets on the ship. We had to make sure they were actually in working order. So far they had seemed to be working, but there were still a few left to go over.
"Cael, we've got an incoming transmission. From Saladin by the looks of it," King said to me, stopping the scanning he was doing.
"Okay, put him through," I replied.
There was a quiet beep, then Saladin's voice came through, "Mortuus, we need you for a mission."
"Okay, what is it?" I asked, excited for my first mission.
"There seems to be heavier than usual Fallen activity a little way outside the City. I know you haven't encountered the fallen, but I'll have your ghost inform you about them once I'm done. Normally, the Fallen activity wouldn't be a problem, it isn't even close to being big enough the launch an attack. The reason it's a problem is that we have gotten word from a Hunter that he found some civilians out in the wild. I'm worried the force is too big for a single Guardian. He is going to need back up. Your mission is to assist him in fighting through the Fallen and saving those civilians. We don't currently have contact with him, so you will need to fill him in on what is going on. You are to be the wall between the civilians and the enemy. Don't let the Fallen reach them, we don't need any more deaths. I'll send the coordinates to your ghost. Now hurry," Saladin said to us, ending the transmission.
"Let's go, the ship seems to be fine. Anyway, the civilians are more important to me than the ship. As long as we can get there, I think we'll be fine," I said, closing up the panel I had been working on.
King readied the ship, preparing for takeoff. With a blast of wind, we entered the airspace around the Tower, heading towards our destination.
On the way, King described the Fallen to me. "The Fallen are humanoid species of alien. Their proper name is the Eliksni, but most people don't call them that. They survive of differing portions of ether. The more they get, the stronger they are. It's a way to make a chain of command. The weaker ones, called dregs, have two arms as a mark of shame. They usually use a type of arc powered pistol, called the shock pistol, and arc powered knives, called the shock knives. The next step up is the vandals. They have four arms and are bigger than the dregs. They usually wield either wire rifles, which work like snipers, shock rifles, which shoot slow moving bullets that track targets, or the shock blades, which are blades that channel arc energy. Then there are captains, which are bigger, stronger vandals. They often have shrapnel launchers, which shoot three solar bullets that spread out, much like a shotgun, and they also use shock blades, which are bigger shock knives, if you couldn't tell."
"There are also little hovering robots called shanks. They are red and shoot arc powered bullets. They are often used in scouting parties. There are also purple robots called servitors. They are the ghosts of the Fallen in a way. They hack places and give the Fallen life. They are much bigger than me though and boost the strength of the Fallen around it. They also shoot void rocket-things out of their eye, which also happens to be their weak point. They also have a tendency to like to teleport around. It's a good idea to take them out first," he finished.
After King finished his explanation, it took only a few minutes to arrive at our destination; it didn't appear to be very far. We arrived in a little clearing within a wooded area around thirty miles away from the City.
King transported me out of the ship, and I looked around. "Where are they supposed to be?" I asked King.
"They should be making camp here soon. We should probably check the perimeter while we wait. We don't want any Fallen surprises popping out of these woods," King replied to me, taking a look around the clearing.
So we took a look around, getting a lay of the land. It took about an hour to secure the perimeter, and, since we saw no signs of Fallen activity, I sat down on a log and waited for the others to arrive.
After about four hours, I saw the first of the survivors coming through the trees. There were about twenty of them in all. They were being led by a lithe looking guardian, a guardian I was assuming was the Hunter we were looking for.
"Who are you?" the Hunter asked in a ruff voice.
"My names Mortuus Caelum, but you can just call me Cael. The Vanguard got your transmission, and also started to see signs of Fallen activity in this area. They sent me as a precaution. Didn't want to lose any civilians," I said, standing up off the log I had been sitting on.
"Good to know, and my names Nec Terra," he said, holding out his hand in greeting. We shook hands and that's when I finally got a good look at him. Like all hunters, he had lithe looking armor, but it was a little different than most Hunters. For the most part was the ammo containers that seemed to be on every part of him body. I also noticed a few knives on his waist, boots, and arms. The next thing that caught my eye was the fact that his helmet almost seemed to glow. I couldn't quite put my finger on it, but in truth, wasn't sure I wanted to. Like all Hunters, he wore a cloak. The cloak was completely black, making it had to see in the dying light. His gauntlets were smooth. They were obviously not made for punching the enemy like his were.
I then looked around towards the civilians he was escorting. My first impression of them had been that they were completely normal, maybe a little beat up, but normal, harmless civilians. Oh was I wrong. Almost every adult held some sort of weapon, be it a gun or a large stick I had mistaken for a walking stick. I realized it was a weapon when I saw the dried ether of the Fallen on them. They were also a lot more beaten than I had initially realized. They looked like they were barely surviving, which they were. They most likely would have been killed by the Fallen had Nec not found them out there.
"Now that I got you," Nec said, interrupting my thought, "I'll finally be able to get some sleep. We'll be able to take shifts of guard duty instead of just one person."
"So, long do you think it will be to get to the City?" I asked him.
"Probably another three days. It's not too far, but there is hard terrain, which will make it hard to bring them all back at a quick pace," he said, starting a fire.
"Can't we just take them back in our ships?" I asked.
"I know what you're thinking, but it won't work. The ships only hold what, two people? And that's when you're trying. I know it looks like they should hold more, but that's all room for fuel. You need a lot of that stuff when you start using your hyper drive more often," he said, shooting my idea down out of the sky.
There were a couple minutes of silence as we tried to get the civilians organized. After about ten minutes I said, "I'll take the entire shift tonight. I'm not tired, but I'm sure you are. Get some sleep."
"Thanks, and remember to wake me up if you hear anything. It's better to be too cautious than to be not cautious enough," he replied back. He then laid down and went to sleep.
The night went by slow, but I guess that's okay, it means that there wasn't any Fallen to worry about, but it was very tiring.
"Okay, time to move out," Nec said, counting and gathering all the civilians.
Then, without a word, we set off. We walked all day in silence. We knew that if we were loud, we could draw the Fallen's attention.
Then, once again, night was falling and we set up camp. We set the fire, prepared places to sleep, and made sure everyone was settled for the night. Nec and I sat down by the fire, and when we took off our helmets, I noticed that he was looking a little sullen.
"I'm glad we haven't run into any Fallen," I said to him, trying to make him perk up.
"That's what worries me," he said, looking at the ground.
"Why?" I asked him.
"When I'm out in the field, I always run into small Fallen scouting parties, but I haven't since you arrived. That tells me something. The Fallen have noticed us and want to take us out. They are mounting up a large enough force to defeat us. I'm expecting the attack to either to come tonight or later tomorrow afternoon," Nec said, looking at me dead serious.
"Then I guess neither of us will be sleeping tonight," I said with a little chuckle.
"Yeah, I guess not," he replied.
"How often are you actually at the Tower?" I asked him.
"Not too often. After each mission I'll stay long enough to get my weapons and armor in perfect shape, but after that, it's back out into the wilderness for me," he replied, looking towards the Tower.
"And how about your ghost?" I asked him.
"What about it?" he asked back.
"I notice that I haven't seen it this entire time, I was just wondering why."
"The same reason I haven't seen yours. Ghost's only come out when you need them. They go invisible. Well not invisible. Invisible implies they are still there, which, in a way, they are. They can talk to you, but they aren't physically there. It's complicated," he said, trailing off.
"Huh, I never really noticed that, but I am a relatively new guardian. I've only been one for a couple weeks. This is actually my first mission," I admitted to him.
"Explains why you don't know much about your ghost. I just hope you will actually be a help and not hold me back," Nec said to me very seriously.
"I'll try not to," I replied, pulling out my Conspiracy Theory.
"Nice gun," Nec said, eyeing the weapon.
"Yeah, got from Banshee at the Tower. Haven't had a chance to use it though. I still try to take it my weapons out daily to make sure they are in working order when I do need to use them," I said, wiping the shotgun down with a rag.
"What other weapons do you got?" he asked me.
"I got this beauty," I said, pulling out the white and red Suros Regime.
"You got the Suros Regime! How in the Traveler's good name did you get your hands on one of those so early into your life of being a guardian!" he asked, genuinely intrigued.
"Banshee gave it to me, as long as I actually used it," I said, looking back down at the weapon.
"It's a really gorgeous gun. Hold on to it and take care of it. You'll be lucky to ever see another one of those a gun," he said, looking at me seriously once more.
"I will," I replied, putting the gun away, "and how about you? What guns do you have?"
"Well here I've got the Crow's Ascension, a fusion rifle. It has a fast charge rate, making it very useful in situations where I don't have that much time to react," he said, looking at the gray gun he had pulled out.
"It looks real nice," I said, looking at the detailed work of it.
"And this one is my pride and joy, made it myself," he said, a large brown rifle materializing in his hands.
"What type of gun is it?" I asked him.
"Well it used to be and old musket. I found it while scouting an old country called America. I kept it as a memento, but eventually started working on it. I decided to make it into a legitimate weapon that could be used by a guardian like myself. Now it's a sniper rifle," he replied, caressing the weapon.
"I thought you weren't allowed to have two secondary weapons like that," I stated, that feeling of confusion returning.
"Usually you can't, but this one's special. It's an exotic weapon, like your Suros. Exotics are weapons that the Vanguard decided are extremely powerful. They only let you carry one at a time. This weapon can be used as a primary because the design lets you use it at close range better than a normal sniper would," he replied.
"Why do they only let you carry one at a time? Wouldn't having multiple powerful weapons be better?" I asked, confusion once more setting in.
"You'd think that wouldn't you. It didn't really end up working that way. Guardians thought that they were invincible with such powerful weapons, so they made dumb mistakes. The Vanguard decided that one weapon would suffice. I hear they might start doing that with some armor pieces too, but it's just a rumor," he said.
"I guess that makes sense," I said, starting to lose the confusion, "What do you call it?"
"I don't really have a name for it yet. I'm waiting to find that one name that seems meant for it. Haven't found it yet, so it doesn't get to have one," he replied with a sigh.
"I understand," I said.
"Well, I'd love to talk to you more, but we should probably stay on lookout," he said, and then it was quite for the rest of the night.
The sun began to rise in the morning without one sound or sight of the Fallen, which worried Nec.
"We shouldn't tell the others that there is a likely hood of a Fallen attack. They will start thinking every move of a leaf is an attack, and that could be dangerous. So let's just keep this between us," he whispered to me.
"Sounds good," I whispered back.
We walked through the day, watching, waiting. As the sky began to darken, I could see Nec's movements get more watchful. He was worried, and so was I. The Fallen hadn't attacked yet, and that wasn't good. If they attacked now instead of at night, we would be able to save the civilians easier.
Then it was night, and we had to set camp. Tension was rising, the civilians could tell something was wrong, and they were getting scared. Nothing scares people more than what they don't know.
Nec and I both knew that this would be another sleepless night. We couldn't let the Fallen get the drop on us.
As every minute passed, the tension grew. We both knew the attack could come at any moment. We waited for hours. We waited until the sun began to rise once more. As we got all the civilians ready, we actually began to think that we were wrong, that the Fallen wouldn't attack. That we were just lucky. Oh how wrong we were.
We had only been walking for half an hour when we saw the first signs of the Fallen. About 400 meters ahead of us we saw flickers of red, Fallen moving through the underbrush.
We began to slow down. Nec ordered all the civilians to stay together and to stay between him and myself. We slowly approached the waiting ambush. When we were about fifty meters from where we had saw the Fallen, we heard a captain's call to arms, and then all hell broke loose.
From behind trees on both sides of us came the Fallen, humanoid space pirates. They wore red armor covering their heads and bodies.
Nec was immediately into action. He pulled out his sniper and shot one of the four armed vandals directly in the head. He did this three more times before the Fallen could even get close to us.
To not be outdone, I too pulled out my weapon, the Suros Regime. As I saw some oncoming Fallen, I pulled the trigger and let the bullets fly.
I obviously had it on the spin up mode because the bullets started to fire closer together the longer I held the trigger.
The effects were immediate. The Fallen, a vandal and two dregs I believe, got light up and fell to the ground, dead. Many more Fallen had the same fate. Together, Nec and I held back the Fallen, but after a bit, the tide started to turn.
The Fallen started to swarm us in larger numbers, making it harder and harder to hold them off the civilians. Remembering what Saladin had taught me, I used my punches and grenades to defeat many Fallen, but I just could not store up enough light to activate the pure power of the Fist of Havoc.
Suddenly, I saw burst of orange light. I turned my head and saw that Nec was on fire. The fire didn't seem to hurt him though, it seemed to be coming from him. I saw a gun in his hand made purely out of fire, and knew instinctively that this power was not to be trifled with.
Out of the gun came a flaming bullet, killing a Fallen captain. Then, the captain exploded, killing a couple Fallen around it. Then another one, and another one, each one as powerful as the first. The Fallen's army stopped for a second, unaware of what to do. In a matter of seconds their army had dwindle by a lot. Though the Fallen hesitated, we didn't.
We once again lit up the Fallen, destroying almost all the remaining Fallen forces. The rest ran back into the forest, hopefully never to be seen again.
After the Fallen ran off, we checked the civilians to see if they were okay. Some had a few injuries, but we were close enough to the City that they would be fun. In about three hours, Nec believed we would be arriving in the City.
The three hours went by relatively fast. There were no signs of the Fallen, which made us all very happy. The civilians were eager to get the City, so they picked up their pace. At around noon, we finally arrived within the walls of the City.
"I'm going to see the civilians to the hospital, to make sure they are all okay," Nec said to me.
"Would you like me to come with you? I've got nothing else to do," I replied back to my friend.
"I should be fine, but thanks for offering. Well, we should be off. I hope to see you again sometime," he said to me, holding out his hand. We shook hands and went on our way. We didn't really say goodbye, I think we both knew that we would be seeing each other again, and soon.