Far south of the Last City lay the territory that used to be the United States. Nuclear strikes had destroyed many major cities. Fallen had systematically destroyed outlying towns and communities. Miles of what had been farmland had been reclaimed by the wilderness, becoming scrubby, ugly swamps or scrawny forests.
Old Chicago had escaped nuclear bombs, but conventional bombs had destroyed huge swaths of it. People had briefly rebuilt portions, then moved on as the Fallen became too aggressive.
Charon landed her ship near Edgeston on the west side of Lake Michigan. Buildings still stood, mostly, although trees and bushes had grown through many of them, and roofs had collapsed. The road where she landed was pieces of old, crumbly asphalt with wide spaces of earth in between.
"This looks depressing," Phantom remarked, staying close to Charon's shoulder.
"There's a few more ghosts in this area," Charon said, pulling on a hunter's helmet. "We're going to try to meet up with them. The rest of you, hunt for your Guardians as you like. I'll follow you."
The three ghosts zipped to the nearest building and set about exploring, playing their bright scan beams over the debris inside. Charon sauntered after them, watching her HUD inside the helmet. She had exchanged her heavy Titan armor for lighter Hunter gear - a leather chest piece, heavy canvas pants with steel reinforced knees and shins, and sturdy boots. She had brought a cloak, but left it on the ship. It was a sunny day, and even the gear she wore was soon far too warm.
The ghosts worked in a grid pattern, scanning everything in one block before moving to the next. They discovered several corpses and examined them closely, then moved on.
"I thought you didn't want a Guardian," Charon remarked, watching Peach, who was nearby.
"I'm gathering data for the Vanguard," Peach retorted. She scanned a sagging staircase with a haughty sweep of her beam.
"Liar," Phantom thought to Charon.
It was slow, boring work, but relaxing and sort of interesting, too. Charon hunted through the ruins, herself, calling the ghosts to check out corpses. As the ghosts passed each one by, Charon silently apologized to each corpse. Maybe a different ghost would find them, someday.
The evening of the third day, Charon built up a campfire and was roasting fish she had caught. Preoccupied with cooking the fillets to perfection, she didn't notice the newcomers until Phantom poked her in the back and said, "Hey, new guys."
Two new ghosts flew up and floated at a short distance, looking at the Guardian and the fire. Charon smiled and beckoned. "Come on, don't be shy. I'm helping ghosts find their Guardians. Want to come along?"
"Yes, please," one said. He gave his companion an encouraging nudge, and they flew forward together. One had a generic gray shell, but the other was damaged, half its shell segments missing.
"I'm Oliver," said the gray one. "This is Sentry, and she's hurt."
"Oh, you poor thing," Charon said, setting her fish aside. "Come here. Let me see."
The damaged ghost flew cautiously to her and turned to let her see the broken metal. The shell had been torn away, but it had protected the delicate core.
"I have some spare shells," Charon said. "Would you like me to replace this for you?"
"Yes, please," Sentry said softly. "I can barely fly."
Charon dug into her backpack and pulled out a box of shells. She had brought along a set of camouflage colors - green and brown - to give ghosts an advantage in the wild.
All five ghosts flew up and wistfully examined the new shells. Sentry's pupil shrank to a dot. "I can pick one of these? You're sure?"
"Whichever one you like," Charon said.
Sentry pointed out a forest green one with defensive spikes at the end of each segment. "That one. It'll make me look fierce."
Charon gently unscrewed the old shell. "What happened to you?"
"I was caught in a bad storm back in February," Sentry replied. "A tree fell on me. I was pinned for days and had to leave part of my shell behind."
Charon made soothing sounds. "Poor brave girl! We'll have you fixed up in no time."
In a few more minutes, Sentry was zipping around in her new shell. The other ghosts were delighted. They chased each other around the fire, Phantom included, as Charon ate her dinner.
They all slept on Charon's ship. She stretched out on the floor in a sleeping bag with Phantom snuggled beside her. The other ghosts found various nooks and corners to rest in for the night. But in the morning, Charon awoke to find all five of her little friends sleeping on top of her blankets, cuddled up to her for warmth.
This made Charon extraordinarily happy.
As the days became weeks, she grew attached to her little pack: timid Beef, forthright Galahad, proud Peach, careful Oliver, and nervous Sentry. Phantom took it on himself to tell them the rules. He thought of himself as the boss ghost, since his Guardian was the one looking after the pack. The other ghosts held him in awe, all the more when he told them his story of courting Charon and being locked in a cage.
After a long day of hunting through ruins and wreckage, Charon and her pack gathered around a campfire and talked. They all looked forward to this, as June approached and the daylight lingered later and later.
"What do you think your Guardians will be like?" Charon asked them.
Phantom said, with a sidelong look at her, "I like my Guardians how I like my coffee. Strong and hot."
"You drink coffee?" Charon asked him, as the other ghosts laughed.
"If I did, that's how I'd want it," Phantom replied.
"Well," said Oliver, "I'd like my Guardian to be more like chocolate. Dark and sweet." When the others laughed, his eye blushed pink and he hid behind the pile of firewood.
"How can you compare your Guardian to food?" Beef asked. "My Guardian will be like a bright, burning star."
"That's rich, coming from a ghost named Beef," Peach said acidly.
Beef joined Oliver in hiding behind the firewood.
"Hey," Charon said. "Be nice."
Peach rolled her eye.
"I'll play," Galahad said, spinning his maroon shell. "I'd like my Guardian how I like my coffee: just a wee bit nutty."
The ghosts laughed, and so did Charon. "I've known some nutty Guardians," she said. "You may get your wish."
Sentry said, "I want my Guardian to be like espresso. Powerful."
The group laughed again. Charon motioned to Peach. "How about you?"
"I'm not thirsty," she replied. "Translation. I don't want a Guardian."
"Why not?" Oliver asked, emerging from hiding. "That's why we were made, right?"
"Was it?" Peach said. "I don't remember the Traveler giving me orders. I don't have a prime directive or anything. Ghosts obsess about Guardians. What's wrong with just being a ghost?"
"Um, it's lonely?" Phantom said. "And the wilderness is big and dangerous?"
"You're bonded, Phantom," Peach said. "Your opinion is invalid."
"I haven't been bonded that long," Phantom snapped.
The other ghosts stared at Peach. "How can you not want a Guardian?" Sentry said softly. "Don't you have that sense of your Guardian's spark?"
"No," Peach said, a little too loudly. "I'm fine the way I am."
"Ignore her," Galahad said. "She's been alone for too long and it pushed her over the edge."
Peach protested that she was not crazy and she liked being alone.
Charon said, "Is that why ghosts bond to one particular spark and not others?"
"That's right," said Galahad. "We were made for one particular spark. It's what we're hunting for."
Charon looked at Phantom. "How did you bond with me, then? You're my second ghost."
The ghosts looked at Phantom expectantly.
He drew in his black shell like a tortoise trying to hide. "Well, I ... I don't know. Your spark was broken, but it was just ... right. I knew it as soon as we met. But I'd never seen a broken spark before, and ... your ghost had died ... I didn't know what to do."
"Weird!" Beef exclaimed. "Are there a lot of severed Guardians? I wouldn't mind being a second ghost."
"Not many," Charon assured him. "I was the only one in the Tower, last I checked."
Beef sighed, his big shell drooping a little. "I knew it wouldn't be that easy."
"I think," Phantom said slowly, "that we're made for a certain type of spark. But there may be multiple kinds of that type. If I had found a different Guardian, they would have been a lot like Charon."
"If that's true," said Oliver, "then it improves our odds of finding Guardians."
The other ghosts nodded, encouraged.
Peach floated a little apart, her segments sitting slightly crooked. Had she been human, she would have had her arms folded. "You're all obsessed. Get a hobby, guys."
Charon smiled at her. "What's your hobby, Peach?"
"Gathering data for the Vanguard," Peach said loftily. "I don't need a Guardian to help people."
"What happens when you find your Guardian?" Charon teased. "Pretend you don't see the spark?"
"There's no Guardian for me out there," Peach said. "I've looked for seven hundred years. And you know what? I'm tired of it. So I'm going to do something useful."
"We've all been searching that long," Sentry said softly. "I haven't given up."
"Me, neither," the others chorused.
Peach huffed. "Fine, go on hunting. Me, I'm doing other things with my time."
Sensing the other ghosts getting mad, Charon said, "It's all right, everyone. You all make your own choices. Now, who wants to play Twenty Questions?"
Ghosts loved guessing games and logic puzzles. Charon spent each day trying to think of something that might stump them for more than thirty seconds. The pack cheered up and forgot about their disagreement.
As they drew closer to the ruins of downtown Chicago with its skeletal skyscrapers, a line of bad weather moved in. Charon and the ghosts found themselves out in thunderstorms and pouring rain. The ghosts kept working, only taking cover when the rain reduced visibility to nothing.
Charon offered them the shelter of her shoulder bag. The five ghosts huddled inside, dripping, as Charon took cover in a building that still had part of a roof. She sat on a chunk of concrete and watched the rain slowly flood the street.
"Hostiles detected," Phantom said suddenly. "Four Fallen dregs headed this way. Looks like they're looking for shelter."
"Auto rifle," Charon barked, leaping to her feet. Phantom transmatted the weapon into her hands.
"Ghosts, stay hidden." She set their bag behind an old counter, still topped by a rusted cash register. Their blue eyes peeked out from under the bag's flap, terrified.
Charon stepped out of view of the doorway, lifted her rifle to her shoulder, and waited. Phantom disappeared.
Before long, the four dregs dashed up on all fours, splashing through the flooded street outside. They burst through the doorway with screeches and hisses, shaking water off their limbs. They were humanoid, with long, wiry limbs and sharp claws. Their faces had four eyes and a set of jaws lined with sharp teeth. Each alien wore armor patched together from scrap metal. These were the lowest caste of Eliksni, and made do with the cast-off supplies of their superiors.
One of them turned and caught sight of Charon.
The alien had a split second to yell in surprise. Then Charon blew its head off. A blue gas spurted from its neck. The other aliens drew knives and guns. There was a short, hot fight as Charon shot one more alien, then fought the other two hand to hand. She stabbed one alien with its own knife, then broke the neck of the other with a fist wreathed in fire.
Silence fell, broken only by the rain outside. Charon stood panting, watching the aliens to make sure they were dead. After a moment she laughed and straightened. "I miss my plate armor."
Phantom appeared and healed several deep knife cuts on her arms. She wiped off the blood, inspected her torn shirt, then returned for the ghost bag. "Everybody all right?" she asked, opening the flap.
The five ghosts looked up at her in awe.
"You killed all the dregs?" Oliver said.
"By herself!" Peach exclaimed.
"Guardians are so strong," Sentry murmured.
Galahad flew up to Charon and bumped his shell into her cheek in an awkward attempt at a ghost kiss. "That was astounding."
Phantom immediately chased Galahad around and around Charon, until Galahad dove back into the bag.
"Nobody kisses my Guardian but me!" Phantom snarled.
The other ghosts laughed.
Charon pulled him away from them, back into place at her left shoulder. "It's all right, silly. He didn't mean any harm."
Phantom muttered something unintelligible.
Charon slung the bag's strap over her shoulder, then examined the dead aliens. "Garbage weapons, as you'd expect," she remarked, snapping a knife blade in half. "But where there's dregs, there'll be the rest of their ranks. Vandals and such. You ghosts be very careful."
"We will," chorused the pack, peeking at the aliens in fearful fascination.
After a while, the rain slackened. Charon scouted the neighborhood for aliens before she let the ghosts resume their hunt.
That night, it rained again, so instead of a campfire, they went aboard Charon's ship. She ate a box of rations and played guessing games with the ghosts.
But as the evening wound down, and the ghosts were seeking out their preferred corners for the night, she found Galahad hovering nearby, in his dark red shell.
"Do you need something?" Charon asked him.
His blue eye roamed the interior of the ship for a moment. "Would it be all right if we entered the city district tomorrow? With the skyscrapers?"
"Sure," Charon said, blinking in surprise. "But why?"
"I have a feeling," Galahad said, shifting in midair.
The other ghosts peeked out of their spots at him, interested.
"You mean ... your Guardian?" Charon said.
Galahad nodded. "I've detected sparks before. But I can feel this one, even though we're still miles away. It's sort of ... calling to me."
Phantom phased into being in a swirl of blue particles. "Does it sing to you?" he asked in excitement. "Like a musical instrument?"
"Yes!" Galahad replied. He glanced around at them all, then flew in a circle. "I've almost found my Guardian. What do you say when you first meet them?"
The other ghosts pelted him with advice. But Galahad turned to Phantom. "You're bonded. How did you introduce yourself to Charon?"
"She knocked me out of the air with a door," Phantom replied.
The pack shrieked with laughter.
Galahad laughed, too. "Let's hope that doesn't happen to me!" He turned to Charon. "What should I say?"
"Well," Charon said slowly, noticing that all the ghosts were hanging on her every word. "You introduce yourself. Find out your Guardian's name, if they remember it. They're usually confused and disoriented. Sometimes they're frightened. You'll want to be very gentle and helpful. They'll probably have lots of questions. Just guide them to me, and I can fly you both to the Last City. It's only a few hours from here."
Galahad nodded and moved his shell back and forth, like the ticking of a clock's hands. "Gentle. Helpful. Yes." He flew in a few circles. "What if they don't like me? What if I've chosen wrong and I get someone like Dregden Yor?"
"He wasn't evil in the beginning," Charon pointed out. "And his actions weren't his ghost's fault. Your job is to support your Guardian. Heal and help them in every way you can. Be their friend. It's what you were made for."
All the ghosts sighed longingly, except Peach, who made a sound like a snort.
Galahad paced around a few more times, then flew to his perch in the cargo railings on the ceiling. Charon crawled into her sleeping bag. Phantom settled on the pillow beside her head.
"I'm glad he'll find his Guardian tomorrow," Phantom told Charon privately, through their Light bond. "No more kissing my Guardian."
"You hardly ever kiss me," Charon thought. "Why get so upset?"
Phantom did, pressing his warm eye-light against her cheek. It felt very much like a kiss.
"Because," he said. "I almost lost you to another ghost. It makes my Light dim even to think of it. I don't mean to be a possessive brat, but ... but Charon ..." His voice dropped, filling with emotion. "I still worry that you'd rather have Simon back."
Simon was the name of her first ghost, who had been killed in combat.
She curled her fingers through the segments of his shell and drew him close. "Phantom, I've told you before. I love you for you. Simon may have chose me, but I chose you."
Phantom made a sound like a glad sob. He flicked off his eye light and pressed his shell against her chin.
Charon held him until she dozed off, trying to alleviate her poor ghost's massive insecurity without quite knowing how.