"Just how long has it been now Bell? How long have I called the empty void of space my home?" I said in an overly dramatic tone.

In a brilliant flash of light a orb-like construct covered in angular purple spines and facets appeared and regarded me with it's singular "eye". It regarded me solemnly for a moment before turning to look out of the front of the ship's cockpit at the endless expanse of stars arrayed before us.

"It has been two years since we were forced to flee," Bell replied in a soft feminine voice, using a similar tone to what I had used, and then in a more serious tone. "If you want me to be more precise I could list months, days, minutes and seconds."

"Nah, then it would be just too depressing." I said with a faint, humorless chuckle.

We continued to look out into the void in silence, reminiscing about days long past and far out of reach. Two years ago I was cast out of the Tower and am now hunted for a crime I did not commit. Two years ago the Speaker, the Traveler's head priest and mouthpiece was murdered. I can still picture the crime scene in vivid detail.

I had just finished up business with the local traders, exchanging Glimmer and my other collected goods for rations and ammo for my next excursion to Mars when I heard it. The Speaker's gargling cry seemed to echo through my helmet and I rushed headlong into his chamber. By the time I had arrived I was too late to help. The speaker was sprawled across the bottom few stairs, his entrails spilling out in a brilliant splash of red on the polished metal floor. I of course looked for the killer but found no clues other than a discarded sword. My sword, a modified Bolt Edge with a shorter blade than others of it's ilk, designed to be wielded in one hand, the same one I thought was safely stored away in my armory, my personal emblem, a red silhouette of a diving bird, engraved in plain view on the hilt.

And that is how the others found me. The Vanguard had rushed to the Speaker's chamber, most likely drawn by the Traveler's voice and found me crouched next to the Speaker, bloodied blade in hand. I had started to speak but was cut off as a blast from a shotgun nearly tore my head off. Commander Zavala fired upon me again and I ran. I did not think I just ran. Since I was the only person linked to the crime and I had not turned myself in for questioning or allowed them to kill me (permanently this time) the Vanguard put a bounty out on me and I had been running ever since.

I missed my friends and my fire-team back at the Tower but they had turned their backs on me as well. I had even tried to meet with my team to have them hear my side of things but they just set an ambush for me. Even those I had once called brothers and sisters offered me no chance to explain, simply believing me to be guilty. I was alone except for Bell, the ghost that revived me as a Guardian all those years ago.

"Hey, eyes up Guardian we got contact!"

I was quickly jolted back to reality by Bell's words. Looking out the window I saw that there was indeed several ships inbound on our location though I could not make out any markings or specific models to indicate who had found us. I jumped into the pilot's chair of my ship, which I had named the Burning Dove, and prepared weapons.

"They hailed us yet?"

"Not yet but I would not expect them to, even if they are Guardians. No one seems to want to give us the time of day out here anymore so just expect them to start shooting."

Just as she finished her sentence bright flashes and thumps filled the air as the first of the ships came into weapons range and began to light us up.

"We need to get out of here Guardian! They aren't from the Tower, my readings indicate that those are Fallen scavengers. If they get us there is no chance of us getting any mercy."

I grunted and began to weave the Dove through the flak as best I could. It was a virtual wall of fire out there however and several blasts hit the hull and knocked us around. I was silent as I wove through the flak, concentrating entirely on keeping us alive. Just as I thought we may have gotten clear of the worst of it I felt a particularly powerful blast slam into the rear of my ship.

"Damage report Bell!"

" Main engines are offline and the warp drive is a no go. We are barely coasting along on our secondary engines and maneuvering thrusters."

"Any bright ideas as to getting out of here Bell?"

Bell was silent for several minutes, her facets spinning and dancing about and she scanned for any possible escape route. All the while I was trying my damnedest just to keep us alive in the dogfight and not get turned into a pile of slag. I had managed to blow a few of them away but there were still at least five ships out there gunning for us when I heard Bell's voice again.

"Aha!"

"Got something?"

"Yeah but you are not gonna like it," She said. "I am transmitting the flight plan to the nav-computer. Let the auto pilot take over and get to the turret. I'll make sure things go smoothly up here."

I nodded and climbed down the ladder that was just behind the cockpit into the turret's control area. Looking out through the smoldering wrecks of the Fallen fighters I had shot down I could see the others forming up for a strafing run. Taking advantage of the tightness of their formation I unleashed a hail of shots into their midst crippling two of them.

"Alright," Bell called out. "We are going through that mess and then I got a reading on a wormhole. We are gonna go through it."

"We're doing what now!?"

"Hold on!"

Bell ignored my question and the slew of curses that flew from my mouth as my ship dove through the firestorm once again at speeds I knew the secondary engines could not burn at for any good length of time. Blasting through the Fallen formation I could see the wormhole readings on my monitor that Bell had mentioned and it was growing closer and closer.

"You may want to hold on to something."

"If we make it out of this Bell we are gonna- WOAH!"

Suddenly it felt like the entire universe stretched and then rapidly snapped back into place. Dematerializing my helmet I vomited all over the floor. Once my insides settled I shakily raised my head and looked at the turret's view-screen and was utterly shocked at what I was seeing. Below us was the nighttime side of an Earth sized planet... and it was populated. Glowing lights that could only be cities dotted the continent and small satellites whizzed by us as they circled the globe. Turning the turret eyes locked to the screen I saw a shattered moon hanging lazily above the planet. I could not fathom what could cause a moon to shatter in such a way but it was an impressive spectral to say the least.

"Bell you seeing this?"

"Indeed I am. It appears we have stumbled upon a possible Golden Age colony that survived the Collapse," Bell was silent for a few moments before she spoke again. "Then again maybe not."

"What's up?"

"I am not detecting any technology of similar caliber to what exists currently on Earth and according to their global network they have yet to achieve manned space flight. Also any military grade encryption I did encounter in my search was so primitive I was able to break through in less than a second."

I looked again at the planet. To think of all people searching for any remnant of pre-Collapse civilizations I, the renegade, was the one who discovered this.

"Any chance we could land somewhere down there and make repairs?"

"Actually yes. There is a large non populated forest we could land in. Also, while we are down there I would like to investigate some strange readings I've been getting."

"What kind of strange readings?" I asked, curiosity piqued.

"Something down there is generating Light, and not a small amount either."

I was stunned. That meant at one time or another this planet must have been visited by the Traveler, as it was the only being known to give Light, unless there was some other explanation yet to be discovered. It was definitely worth looking into.

"Alright lets do it."

The trip to the surface was a rather eventful one. With only our backup engine and maneuvering thrusters working, landing was a lot harder than normal. In fact if it hadn't been for Bell's excellent timing and my piloting skills I am pretty sure we would have crashed and died at least twice. Once on the ground however things calmed down and my Ghost began repairing what she could while I explored with an almost child-like wonder of the massive green trees that surrounded us.

I had always loved the trees that grew in gardens back at the Tower. I would often climb into the higher branches of the taller trees that grew there and just perch there humming to myself. Cayde-6 once likened me to a songbird and the comparison quickly turned into the Exo's nickname for me. Whenever he would see me he would call out "Hey Songbird!" much to my outward embarrassment, though secretly I loved the nickname. Cayde had quickly become like a father to me and as my mentor in the ways of the Hunter class of Guardians he provided me with all the guidance I could ask for.

"Hey Guardian? I have need of your assistance."

"What's up Bell?" My tone clearly letting her know I was irritated at having my exploring interrupted.

"The local wildlife has become rather curious and hostile. I would appreciate you clearing them out before they tear our hull apart even further."

I grumbled and sighed. Ghosts were not combat capable and as such relied on their Guardians for protection. Sometimes I wished the Traveler had given them at least an Arc based stunner or something and had once tried making a shell with such an attachment for Bell but to no avail. I just wasn't tech savvy enough to even come close to making a ghost shell, let alone a stunner. The amount of times Bell got in trouble and needed me to bail her out of it was becoming ridiculous though. For being the smarter of the two of us it always seemed to be her getting into trouble in the field.

"Alright I'm on my way."

I drew The Last Word from its holster on my hip and jogged back to the ship. The hand cannon had seen me through a lot and had the stopping power to put down almost anything. I had proven this when I used it to kill Oryx (alone I might add) on his Dreadnought. Arriving at the clearing I had landed the Dove in I stopped and stared at Bell's hostile wildlife.

"Werewolves? Does this planet really have werewolves?"

"Beowolves actually," Bell corrected as she materialized next to me "The people of this planet call them that apparently, and they are just one species of a group of beasts that they call 'the creatures of Grimm' or just Grimm for short."

By this time the beasts had noticed my presence and began to stalk warily towards me, snarling and growling as they did so. The lead beowolf was larger than the rest, standing at least two feet taller than the next biggest one and was covered in white bony armor. It's blood red eyes bored into mine as we faced off and without warning it sprung forward with it's jaws opened wide.

Reacting the instant I saw the creature move I dove to it's right and blasted it's flank twice, sending the hulking monster into two smaller creatures, who were killed almost instantly by the sheer weight and multitude of spikes landing atop them. Turning quickly I snapped my left hand out and watched in satisfaction as two knives found their mark in the heads of two more of the smaller Grimm. Jumping straight up now I leveled Last Word and blew four more of the smaller wolves brains out, reloading as I fell to the forest floor.

By now the pack was pretty much decimated. All that remained was the big guy I had shot earlier and two of his smallest pack mates. To be completely honest I was shocked that it had managed to survive the massive rounds at all. Not much withstood those. Staggering to a standing position it glared at me with such an overwhelming hatred that it felt like a physical wall of negative emotion struck me. Slowly we circled each other looking for an opening, neither of us wanting to make the first move. With a whistling of sharp claws through the air our stalemate was broken.

I was not fast enough to dodge the attack and watched helplessly as my shields shattered under the blow and I was flung like a rag doll into the branches of a nearby tree, Last Word flying from my grip in the process. Twisting myself around in the tree so that I could crouch among the branches. I caught sight of my opponent stalking towards me with what I could have sworn was a malicious grin on it's face. Thinking quickly I came up with a risky, if not totally suicidal, plan.

"Bell, activate cloaking and take the Dove into low orbit. Wait for me there. I'll see if I can kill this thing on my own. If I don't make it just try and resurrect me there."

"We don't even know if you'll come back! Being so far away from the Traveler I don't know if the resurrect function will even work!"

"Just do it!" I snapped as I dove from my perch drawing my knives.

Reluctantly Bell did as I asked and the ship shimmered out of existence before flying away, leaving me alone with the Beowolf and my bad choices. Twirling and slashing I engaged the monster, ignoring the battered and broken feeling that my body was giving. Several times a claw would slip past my flagging defense. With a final desperate lunge I tumbled under the outstretched claws of the beast and scooped up my fallen hand-cannon. Twisting around I lined up the sights while channeling Sol energy through myself and into the gun. The shot that blasted into the Grimm disintegrated it instantly leaving behind nothing but a memory.

Collapsing onto the ground I groaned. My battered body had finally decided to give out and I could not move, even if my life depended on it. I tried to reach out to Bell through our mental communication that all Ghost – Guardian pairs possessed but it was to no avail. The distance was to great and my brain was too foggy to form the link anyway.

"Come on! The fighting sounded like it was coming from over here!"

A voice drifted to my ears. It shocked me to hear another human voice out here, especially since it was supposed to be a non-populated area according to Bell. Not soon after I heard the thudding of approaching feet. Cracking open my eyes I watched as a woman with white hair tied up into a bun rushed into the clearing along with several androids and two armored individuals who I could only assume were soldiers. The began to canvas the area, taking in the carnage with careful eyes and the professionalism that came from years of training.

"Specialist Schnee, we have a survivor!" One of the androids announced as it stood over me.

The woman from before rushed over and gently lifted me into a sitting position against a nearby tree. She eyed my gear and took stock of my injuries. Something seemed to catch her eye and she leaned forward reaching for my face. Instinctively I flinched away but couldn't really do anything as she released the clasps holding my helmet on and lifted it away slowly.

"It's just a young girl."

A/N: Whew! That was fun! Hey guys and gals, it sure has been a while huh? To be completely honest I have no excuse for not being active on this site and updating my other story. I mean it wasn't like I had no free time while I was in the Army and I did a bunch of writing for fun. Hunting Remnant's Demons just wasn't at the forefront of my brain I guess. And then I got medically discharged and had even more free time while job hunting and still didn't write anything for it. I am just a lazy person apparently. Now that I am writing again I will work on a thorough edit/rewrite of Hinting Remnant's Demons and get that back up and going but for now enjoy this new stuff while you wait! Peace out guys and gals!