Chapter 4
Two elongated ears extended above the underbrush, one twitched to the side momentarily sensing something. The owner of the ears inched forward through the long grass, revealing a pink twitching nose leading brown inquisitive face.
The rabbit bounded forwards a bit rising up on it's hind legs sniffing the air, testing the air around the strange object invading its territory.
"Fuzzy…" Agama whispered.
The sound of shattered glass cut through the ambient sound of wind slipping through evergreen trees. The rabbit darted back into the brush leaving a crooked trail of wavering grass as the only evidence that it had even been there, and two small brown spheres on the asphalt where it once sat for a moment.
"We're losing light!" Agama called out at volume.
She sat on the saddle of Castide's sparrow tilted to the side as far as her geometry would allow.
"We've already lost it!" A muffled voice called back from the dilapidated building behind her.
"Daylight!" She called back. Whips twitching in irritation.
"AHA! Found it!" Castide exclaimed as he emerged from the building.
Cradled in his arms were two different bottles each containing a similar brownish liquid. Castide's face twisted in the best lop-sided grin his exo face can achieve.
"Happy?" Agama asked as she rose into the air trying catch a last glimpse of the retreating rabbit/
"Of course. This stuff is rarer than an ahamkara starring in a center ring theatre group. You can't replicate whiskey like this. Just one of these bottles would fetch enough glimmer to fund Kreth's research for another lifetime, all while living it up in a penthouse at city center!" Castide enthused.
"If we have a city to go back to." Agama said.
"Wind right out of my sails Aggy." Castide replied, gingerly wrapping the bottles in his cloak.
"I'd miss Krethlynn. I won't forgive you if something happened to her that we could have done something about." She said, looking at him pointedly
"Of all the people in the city, guardian or no, Kreth is one we don't have to worry about." He said.
"That wily bitch probably saw it coming." He added.
"You're right about that. But the vanguard, the people, Cas they need our help too." She said.
"They've got that one asshole, ya know, the one we helped out with the vault and Oryx. The mute with the chicken-shit ghost." He replied.
"Oh, them?" Agama queried.
"Yeah the one that never takes off their helmet and dances all the time." He answered.
"We should still go." Agama interred.
Castide saddled his sparrow and fired up the turbines.
"let's move then." He said.
"Hey, by the way I decrypted those files and I'm positive that was you in the video, that third file confuses me a little though. It reads like an after-action report on you and your companion."
She said. "AFTER you were taken to Deimos…"
"I thought Deimos was dead, nothing on it, just a rock." He said
"Just a construction depot and warehouses according to vanguard archives, but this file we got from Agamemnon indicate something there we should consider. The report says both of you were found dying near where the traveler broke atmosphere, opened up by an unknown projectile, dying in transit to NS-5 depot." She replied.
Castide grunted. "We take back the city. Kick some cabal heads in. Make sure what little friends we have are safe, see if we can help anyone, then we go to Deimos and figure out our shit."
"Sound like a plan?" he looked at Agama while revving the sparrow's turbines.
Agama nestled into a saddlebag.
"Let's just make sure Krethlynn is safe first, I'd rather not have to rely on any other cryptarch for our needs. Plus, I like her… And she likes you, which is rare for a cryptarch by the way, showing any kind of favor towards a hunter..."
"Yeah yeah, all glimmer and gunpowder. That's all we are." Castide responded.
He twisted the throttle and shot off into the dusk.
Krethlynn Vale stood over a dead Psion, her blue-gray skin shimmered with an otherworldly pearlescent sheen as her neon gold eyes danced inquisitively. Her fire-red hair tied neatly into a bun at the back of her scalp with the sides buzzed clean. All her features enhanced and shining from the scene in front of her.
Her aircar, a year and a half of glimmer salary, in flames.
Her apartment bloc, five thousand glimmer a month for two bedrooms one and a half bath with a lavish patio that housed her daffodil beds all grown from ancient seeds looted from a pre-golden-age seed bank, also in flames.
She looked left down the street towards the city center just in time to see an errant missile slam into the building that housed her office, library, and lab.
She let her jaw fall as she gasped.
"Got it open! You sure this takes us outside the city?" A voice called behind her.
Krethlynn stamped her foot onto the chest plate of the dead psion.
"We should take this with us, I need to study it." She said.
The warlock stood from the grating she was looking in and stomped over to Krethlynn.
"You will get your chance to study them, lots of them, only they'll be alive, angry, and armed, if we don't get the hell out of here NOW." She said as she grabbed Krethlynn's wrists.
Krethlynn looked at her longtime friend with half hooded eyes.
"Fine." She said as she shook her hands free from her grasp.
"This will take us outside the wall, but I need to stop at a junction box down there. I need to send a message."
The warlock looked at Krethlynn, dumbfounded.
"Who would you call using a junction box in this city, during a siege, that would answer!? The warlock asked.
"I'm not using the box, just the transponder inside it." Krethlynn elaborated
"do you have a ship readily available to us right now? No? Didn't think so. Grab the body."
Krethlynn responded.
"I am not grabbing the body, it's still warm… And twitching." The warlock said, fists on hips.
"Hmm. Good point, Pallowa might try to eat it." Krethlynn said, bring her finger to the tip of her nose in thought.
"Let us be on our way then." She added as she walked over to the storm drain access and dropped in, a single shallow splash marking
"Dex, remind me why we're friends with her." The warlock asked.
"Stimulating conversation, has good taste in music..." Her ghost turned to look at the burning apartment. "Had an extensive whiskey collection."
Brexley Shaan ran her hand through her short cropped black hair, emerald eyes rolling upwards in irritation.
"Oh! And she actually likes you. With your social skills that, in itself, is quite a feat. I don't mean to be rude, but I do think its time this whole, loner bit came to an end." Dexter rambled on.
"You know what they say. Pack and the wolf and whatnot." Her ghost concluded as he zipped down into the drainage grate.
Brexley sighed, Kicked the dead psion, picked up her shotgun, and dropped down the hole. "Who the hell is Pallowa?" She thought to herself as she fell into darkness.
A pair of yellow-green eyes watched Castide as he dismounted his sparrow, and tracked him as he moved towards the open berth of his ship.
Castide's footfalls came quieter than the rustling of leaves and the rippling sound of the camo netting covering his ship, until one didn't.
A snap echoed through the clearing as faint chuckling sound erupted behind him. He looked down at the pieces of bone and flesh his boot fell upon, as the sound of rustling grass grew louder.
"Did not leave enough food out." Was his only thought as his world turned sideways.
The large best tackled Castide to the ground and continued to rub its head all over Castide's prone form, stopping only to sniff at his pouches and satchels, eliciting a loud purr as it did so.
"I gave that one to ya." Castide said to the large feline pinning him to the ground.
"Eeeeeee!" Agama squealed as she zoomed in to nestle into the neck fur of the large black lynx, wrapping her tendrils around its neck.
"Oh, my big buddy boo! I missed you." Agama cooed into the beast's fur.
Castide saw the blinking light at the comms panel blinking inside his ship and pushed the large beast off him.
"C'mon Pallowa, someone needs a ride." He said, as he stood and moved into the cargo bay of his ship.
Agama rode as the cat padded along on the heels of Castide.
"Is it from Krethlynn?" Agama asked as she rolled off Pallowa's back and into the air.
"Yup, at the rendezvous point we decided on. Seems like she's been there for a day or two… With company." He answered.
"Company huh." Agama said flatly.
Castide jogged out to his sparrow and pushed it back into the cargo hold of his ship.
"City under siege Aggy, the woman lives near the outer wall. So most likely a refugee or two"
He said as he cinched up the sparrow into the roof of the ship, strapping its runners to tie-downs bolted to the ships frame.
"We can hold about six or seven, any more than that and it'd be standing room only." She said as she zipped out of the hold.
"And with the way you fly, Hah!" She called back, as she flew around the ship releasing the tie-downs draped over the ship and collecting the stakes left in the ground.
"We can make trips if need be." He sighed.
Castide toggled a control panel just inside the bay door as Agama whistled in dropping a collection of stakes into a container at his feet. The camo netting flapping loosely in the breeze, retracted at several points along the ships fuselage, drawing itself in and pulling taut along the hull.
Castide stepped out check for any catches with the tarpaulin system.
His ship was essentially his home, while he had several safe-houses peppered around the system, his exploits caused him to take on a more nomadic approach.
A Minerva class prototype jump-ship that cost him fairly large sum, and more than a few insane (and possibly illegal) favors for Amanda Holliday. Heavily modified to his specifications that included a larger than normal cargo bay, the tarpaulin system, a tweaked and lightened NLS drive, several hard-point mounts for various munitions, four supercharged vector-thrust engines, and then the reason he fell in love with the ship in the first place. A nose mounted gun-turret with a massive three barreled 30-millimeter cannon.
Castide and Dane-7, who worked in Daito's R&D section spent many hours scribbling notes and formulae on napkins, while drinking their weight, and nearly the bar's stock of whiskey and rum, designing the gun and its systems.
One night of tinkering and one too many bottles, they inadvertently destroyed half of the lab they were building it in, when Dane decided it was time to test the elemental induction system.
Castide grinned at the memory of Dane lifting his arms under the spray of the fire suppression system in the lab and exclaiming "Rain!?", then gesturing out to view of the city they had just created. "But the skies are so clear!" Dane yelled, gesturing to the view before collapsing into a fit of boisterous laughter.
Much to Castide's surprise the next morning, Dane wasn't removed from his position at Daito, but promoted.
"C'mon Pallowa!" Castide called out chuckling at the memory.
The large cat reluctantly getting up from it's 'leftovers' and padding into the ship.
"What are you on about?" Agama asked, floating over to where the feline sat.
Castide hit another few controls and the boarding ramp slid into the ship, armored doors swinging out then back in again sealing the trio inside.
"Just reminding myself why we should put off Deimos for a while." He replied.
"Ah. So now you're thinking a living future bests hunting a dead past?" She asked.
Castide took off his cloak and tossed it onto a cot near the front of the ship and climbed into the cockpit.
"The past is dead Aggy, it isn't going anywhere." Castide Answered.
Toggling switches above him and lightly draping the cockpit seat harness over his shoulder, as the ship whined to life.
He shifted to look back at her and the yawning fur-ball she rested next to.
"Just reminding myself that we should do our best to keep those that have a future from joining it."
He eased back a control and the ships engines whine became a roar. Outside the world fell away as the turbines vectored thrust played around, keeping the ship level.
Castide tapped in coordinates on the navigation system and a waypoint pinged on the curved heads-up display. He pushed the throttle forward and the craft shot off, clipping the tops of trees on its ascent picking up speed, and streaking of into the clouds.
Brexley Shaan shivered as she poked at the smoldering fire.
"Three days Kreth." Brexley said.
Krethlynn stirred in her sleeping bag.
"Good morning! Day three Kreth! Where's. Our. Ride?" She said at volume, enunciating the last three words, each with a prod into the sleeping bag.
Krethlynn opened her eyes and sighed. She twisted and turned, looking like some overgrown floundering grub as she moved to glare at her friend.
"Well…" She started, unzipping her bag and scrambling to stand.
"He's never been one to be on time, always finding a new rock and hard place to waltz into, or some watering hole to wallow around in." She explained while pulling on her long coat and sitting down on a crate to pull on her boots.
"Of course, we can assume that because you lost your light, that he lost his light as well." She ran the fingers through her shock of red hair, tying it off in a quick ponytail.
"Which could mean he's dying or dead, although that is very unlikely. Castide is quite tenacious you see…" She rambled on. "Why one time I joined him on a little expedition to Mare Nectaris. And this massive ogre had him…"
Brexley looked up at her chattering friend, her emerald eyes wide with disbelief.
"Castide." She breathed out, interrupting Krethlynn's narration.
"Castide-1. The renegade. You called Castide-1!?" She exclaimed.
"He's hardly a renegade, Brexley." Krethlynn said.
She stood and walked to the back end of the worn down building they were in.
"The vanguard wouldn't sanction his investigation due to some kerfuffle they were up in arms about, so he… uh…" She paused.
"Went left when they told him to go right." She said shrugging, with a teasing smirk on her face.
"He knocked out Zavala! I was there! Cayde was laughing! Ikora looked Genuinely surprised! A whole squad of peacekeepers were laid flat, and three of them actually needed to be resurrected!" Brexley elaborated wringing her hands, and looking off at nothing.
"Ah… Yes… I was hoping that since you were a recently found guardian, that you hadn't heard about that particular event." She said as she pulled a crate off some shelving.
"It was my first time in the tower Kreth, I hadn't even shaken off the knowledge that I used to be dead." She said standing up hugging herself.
"I still have the entire footage of the event." Dexter chimed in.
"One of the only two copies since the gag order. One in my memory core, one in Shaxx's ghost's." He said.
"I would very much like to see that one day, Dexter." Krethlynn said as she procured two ration packs from the crate.
"Breakfast?" Krethlynn asked a little too cheerily, holding out one of the rations to Brexley.
Brexley Shaan Sat back down, already exhausted.
"I'd rather have a drink." She sighed, rubbing her temples.
"Well since this is one of his safe-houses…" Krethlynn said as she turned back to dig in the opened crate.
"I can accommodate that request, although it is a bit early for it." She added turning around with two glasses and a bottle of caramel liquid, clinking the together and winking devilishly.
Brexley let her arms fall limply and leaned her head against the wall to regard her friend for a moment before holding her gloved hand out.
"Gimmie." She said.
Castide banked his craft low around a mountain peak off in the distance he could barely make out the walls of the city, the sight of the traveler blocked by great plumes of black smoke.
What he could see of it didn't look like the great white orb he knew, it was covered in black scales with ridges running at different angles from some giant mechanical claw.
He reached up and toggled a control, causing a shimmer to ripple along the canopy glass.
"That's a lot of cabal." Agama said gesturing towards the ships peppering the sky around the city
Castide grunted and ran through the channels on his communications unit until he found one with an intermittent squawk.
"Hotel tango sierra Hestia, copy." He called onto the channel.
The squawk was cut off by static and a gruff voice answered.
"Shattered shards Cas, I knew this mess wouldn't give you any problems." The voice said.
"Yeah, nothing I couldn't handle Dane, how are you holding up?" Castide
"By holing-up Cas." Dane-7 replied.
"Got about 400 souls down here with me in a bunker, courtesy of Daito. I knew something was up when a bunch of D-O ships launched off. I scrambled to get these folks down here when I saw the tower light up." Dane finished.
Castide looked out towards where the vanguard held counsel, his glaring green eye reflecting back at him in the glass as he passed by the massive burning torch that use to be the tower.
"We got a lot of lightless guardians down here with us Cas. Had to drag them in kicking and screaming. How are you holding up?" Dane asked his voice sounding grave through the channel.
"Same boat Dane. Looks like they've constructed some kind of shell around the traveler, cutting off the light." Castide answered.
"Any plans to deal with this situation, or have the powers that be, finally lose their ability to come up with inspiring mottos?" He asked.
"Vanguards been quiet, we don't know if we even have a vanguard anymore. Word is that the tower was the first hit. Last I heard is that the EDZ is the place to be, even had some guardians mumble something about something there in their fever dreams. We've got an access tunnel we use to bring in, and move out things we don't need anyone looking at. Lets out in a nice little secluded place, so we have been ferrying small groups out when we can." Dane explained.
"Dane, I've got a small errand to run, but I'll be back to help when the next chance comes up." Castide Said.
"You gettin' soft on me one-eye?" Dane asked incredulously.
"Don't worry about me, go pick up that ninnyhammer we call a cryptarch. Yeah, I know why you're in town. We'll either meet up in the EDZ, or in the great beyond. First rounds on you, whatever outcome." He finished.
Castide stared out towards the city he was slowly circling.
"First rounds on me Dane. Good luck." He said
"Good luck Cas. Hestia out."
The channel died and reverted to its random squawking. Castide shut down the comms unit and angled his ship towards the south.
Brexley sat in one of the blasted-out windows of their hideout, her finger tracing the rim of the glass next to her. She leaned her head against the window frame and looked up at the rocky out-cropping. It formed a cave of sorts shielding the derelict building from most of the high altitude winds.
She took a swig from her glass and grimaced a bit.
"Hey Kresh!" she slurred loudly
"What was this place?" she asked swirling her glass above her head.
Krethlynn was packing snowballs and placing them in various patterns on the plateau in front of the building. She stopped her task and looked at her friend with one eye, then looking up at the outcropping.
"Ooop!" She hooted as the motion cause her to roll back from her crouched position onto her rump.
"Uh…" She looked up and around, she saw her glass in the snow some short ways from her, and began to crawl towards it.
"It'sha… mmm." She said pausing to sip from her glass, holding a finger up.
"An old geo-thermal venting fashility." She said. "Plant is on the other side of the mountain. Pipe all it's exhaust up through the mountain and out up above ush." She concluded gesticulating wildly.
"You're drunk!" Brexley called out.
Krethlynn raised an eyebrow as she regarded her friend. She calmly picked up one of her snowballs.
"I'm shorry Pluto." She whispered to the snowball and flung it towards Brexley.
The snowball hit Brexley square on the nose causing her to yelp in surprise.
"Hah! Not drunk enough apparently!" Krethlynn yelled.
Brexley looked at her friend with surprise, gulped down the rest of her drink, and began packing a snowball from the drift next to the building.
Krethlynn looked up and muttered "Oh shit." Into the glass she was drinking from and started scrambling for the concrete barricades surrounding the building, gathering snowballs as she did so.
"What are they doing?" Agama asked.
Castide looked out towards where Agama indicated.
He pulled up a zoomed image on the ships targeting system.
"Snowball fight it looks like." He replied, chuckling.
He flew into the safehouse's coordinates in a slow spiral, checking for threats as they approached.
"We'll break it up in a minute." Castide said.
Krethlynn ducked Brexley's oncoming onslaught.
"Don't hit whiskey!" She yelled and pointed to Brexley's left.
"Huh?" Brexley said, looking off in the direction she pointed.
"Hah! Gotcha!" Krethlynn exclaimed, shaking the half-emptied bottle as she threw her chilled ordinance.
Brexley screamed as she pulled off her coat using it to shield herself.
A sound of roaring turbine followed by a brief blast of warm air overcame them with enough force to send Krethlynn toppling over her barricade, and blowing Brexley's outer cloak into air, causing her to lose balance enough to collapse in the snow.
A seemingly magical doorway opened in front of them amongst the scream of jumpship engines.
A ramp extended out and down as Castide appeared in the doorway.
"You rang Kreth!?" he yelled out.
"Is that a cloaking module!?" She yelled back.
"Yeah, don't tell Cayde!" was his response.
"C'mon Brexley!" She called out to the confused warlock.
"Our. Ride. Is. Here." She exaggerated every word with a finger into the snow.
Krethlynn clambered into the ship hugging Castide.
"I've got stories." She slurred at him.
"Pillow!" she squealed and stumbled into the ship, tackling the large cat.
Castide held out his hand to the warlock approaching his ship.
"Daylight's wasting!" He called out.
"It's barely noon!" Brexley called back trudging towards the open berth, stopping only to pick up the bottle of whiskey before walking up the ramp.
She ignored his proffered hand entering the ship, only to have her snow-packed boots deny her, as she fell.
Her fall stopped short as she felt an arm wrap around her, she felt the bottle slip out of her grasp, and the other arm belonging to the one who arrested her fall shot out and snatched it before it could shatter against the gangway.
"I have better stuff, but a waste is still a waste." He said to her, pulling her upright and setting the bottle back in her hands.
She glared at him and wordlessly moved past him into the ships hold, setting herself down on a cot attached to the framing inside the ship. She uncorked the bottled and took a swig staring at the wall opposite of her.
A weight depressed the fabric she was sitting to her left, she looked towards the intruding presence expecting the renegade hunter. She yelped in surprise when a furry face containing two yellow-green eyes and a wet nose bump her cheek, while eliciting low, constant rumble.
"He likesh you." Krethlynn cooed at her as she curled up in the cot with Pallowa between them.
Brexley looked at Castide with eyes full of fear.
Castide Winked at her as he worked the controls to bring in the ramp and close the bay doors.
"Don't worry. He'll only eats things considerably smaller than he is. His name is Pallowa." He said calmly as he strode to the cockpit.
Brexley looked at the large cat with eyes wide. The large felin purred and softly headbutted her cheek.
"Where's your ghost?" Castide asked as he paused before climbing into the pilot's seat.
"Right here sir. Ready to.." Dexter started materializing above Brexley.
"Aggy. Find out what he knows." Castide cutting him off.
"Will do." Agama replied floating in closer to the warlock's companion.
"Oh my…" Dexter said as he took in the visage of his own kind.
He took in the vex chromed frontier shell with harpy sensor whips waving in the air behind her, but what threw him off completely, was the jagged plasma burned piece of steel jutting out from her lower quadrant.
"You have seen some things." He said.
"I'll tell ya all about it. After you fill me in on some details we're missing." Agama replied moving towards the rear of the ship.
Brexley hugged the bottle close and leaned against the framing of the ship.
"Even his ghost is terrifying." She muttered to herself.
"Wait until you see his guns!" Krethlynn mumbled out as if she heard what Brexley muttered to herself, promptly falling asleep curled up on the cot next to her.
"Strap in." Castide called back as he looked back into his ships hold.
"This should be quite a trip." He muttered to himself as he pushed the throttle forward.