Author's Note:

Sorry about the lack of updates for a while. A new job took me by surprise and I burned through my backlog before I thought about it. Even when I tried to sit down and get this chapter written, it was always going to be late. Now it's almost a month late, and since this is my most popular story, I'm sorry about that.

I hope you enjoy this chapter, which is much less serious than the last one and just a little extra long for reasons.

Thank you for the support, and any follows or faves that can help me get above the lewd section of Warframe fics would be appreciated. Also advice, opinions, and ideas.


Doan Tana was in trouble.

It was sort of her own fault. What did she think was going to happen when she came up with a plan to trap a Tenno inside a Grineer vault?

I have it on good authority she didn't think it through. The exact thought process involved an understanding of just how impregnable those vaults become after an infiltrator - Tenno - has already broken in, followed by the conclusion that trapping a Tenno would be a perfect opportunity to see another one.

-She wasn't bored.-

-No, you're very pretty. You're just not a peachy purple Nova with a Pyra syandana.-

-Secret. Secret, come back here. You have better things to be spending your platinum on. No, don't you-

-Yes, it's off. I turned it off. If you still want it at the end of the story, I'll let you get it. Understood?-

In any case, Doan was running for her life, because the Nova had escaped and decided that Doan was the obvious culprit in her capture.

It took approximately a third of a second for Doan to discover that running directly away from a Nova was suicidal. Besides the obvious problem of bullets, every Nova can create wormholes to travel long distances in literally no time.

Fortunately, those long distances require line of sight. That meant Doan was turning corners, slamming doors closed, and triggering lockdowns every few seconds, all while radioing back to her squad.

"Open Sector 13H! Close 12H! Hurry to 15M, I need backup!"

Which, unfortunately, was too many instructions, too quickly, and left Ind hurriedly relaying commands to the rest of the squad that consisted of, "open, open, open!"

Needless to say, Doan was giving her cybernetics a run for their money.

-Run for… it's a pun. It's funny!-

-Are you going to be like this all day?-

-Fine, then I'll just finish this whole story without any interruptions. It'll be-

-That's just petty.-

-Shush and listen to this.-

Doan barely made it into the hangar in sector 15M faster than the Warframe following her, and the lack of more than a squad of Grineer in the room made the situation perfectly hopeless.

Without any other options, she ran for the nearest transport, yelling, "Tenno scum are coming! Tenno scum are coming!"

A few of the Grineer in the hangar roared battlecries and one dove into the transport, neatly solving the problem of Doan having no idea how to fly the thing. The transport lifted off, Grineer charged towards the direction the Tenno would be coming from, and Doan herself spun the transport's turret to face the oncoming enemy.

Bullets started to fly before the Warframe entered the hangar, and not a single one hit. The doors opened and the Nova wasn't even there anymore. She fell from the air in the center of the hangar, energy rippling outwards and bullets flying. An entire squad of Grineer died in a beautiful little chain reaction, then pellets of antimatter slammed into the transport, blowing holes in its side until Doan was sent scrambling, then thrown from the wreckage.

She landed with typical Grineer grace, flat on her face perhaps twenty meters from the red-hot wreckage of the ship. Luckily, despite her relatively clever nature, Doan's skull is as robust as any Grineer's, and she pushed herself to the side in time to save her own life.

The blade that came down on her only took the two outermost fingers of her right hand. Doan screamed, rolled onto her back, and drew her sheev left-handed as the Nova came at her again.

She was nowhere near fast enough to stop the attack.

There was a resounding clang as the blade hit, very different from the sound Tenno blades usually made when hitting Grineer armour. Definitely more of a "ting" than a "schlick-AAAAAGH!"

So Doan Tana opened her eyes.

I'll just go ahead and say it. Secret was there, sword on sword with the Nova. Doan watched as Secret pushed the other Warframe back, then put away his sword and started gesticulating fiercely.

Obviously he wasn't just waving his arms around, he was in the middle of a conversation, but Doan assured me it looked simultaneously confusing, terrifying, and ridiculous watching Secret wave his arms around at a slightly-shorter Warframe until, with a visible huff, the Nova threw her arms up, walked to the edge of the hangar, and threw herself out into space.

Which, now I think about it, would have been an incredibly dramatic conclusion to the argument if archwings hadn't been rediscovered a month prior.

This left Doan getting back to her feet as Secret loomed over her and both of them staring awkwardly.

"You saved me," Doan said first, for lack of a better way to phrase the question.

Secret nodded, then slowly raised hand, one finger up, and brought the other hand to his chin.

Doan took this to mean that he would only save her once, and almost thought to bring up the first time they'd met before realizing that it might be a bad idea to mention he'd already saved her more than once. He might decide to stop being so generous in the choices to not kill her.

After a few seconds, Secret snapped his fingers, drew out a scanner, and scanned Doan.

Doan stood still, unsure if the snapping fingers had been some sort of warning.

-Of course she wasn't posing. Who poses standing partway up, one arm in front of themselves, and teetering off balance?-

After a few seconds, Secret was done and, with a wave of his hand, he walked towards the hangar entrance and disappeared out into space.

This left Doan in the middle of a room filled with bullet holes, the fizzling remains of Grineer troops, and a transport with one side missing and still steaming from the heat.

Then her squad arrived.

"Doan's alive! Doan's alive!"

Ind, obviously. Everybody else had their guns out and were grumpily scanning the room for the Tenno. Ind, on the other hand, sprinted across the room and gave Doan a very clanky hug.

"Tenno scum?" she asked, far less worried than she should be.

"Gone," Doan answered.

Before she could explain anything, her squad started cheering. By the end of the day, the entire base was talking about how she'd scared off the Tenno scum.

This led to days of celebration during which Doan was the center of attention, which complicated the following matters a little. Luckily, the focus tapered off after several days, which left Doan open for a meeting.

-No, we're not going to address how you got there in time.-

-It's not stalking, it's called an information network.-

-No, I call that part prioritizing. Now hold on while I skip to the main event.-

The meeting was, according to certain biased and inconsequential individuals, considered a kidnapping. The brats who hold that opinion will remain unnamed, and we shall continue on with the understanding that Doan was convinced to take her leave of her squad and the safety of the local Grineer outpost, whereupon she was provided transportation to the nearest orbiter by Secret and Silence.

The orbiter was, of course, mine, and…

-You know that, no matter how loud you speak… or laugh… I can just edit it out, right?-

Doan's first words when she stepped onto the Orbiter were not a good sign.

"Why did you bring me here? Back off or I destroy your ship!"

I, being the experienced Tenno's companion I am, reacted accordingly.

"Why does she still have her Gorgon?! Miss Tana, please don't shoot!"

-Stop laughing. I'll have you know I've reduced the upper limit on the Orbiter's speaker frequency since then.-

And Miss Tana lowered her gun, because she is a reasonable and respectable individual who asks questions before she shoots.

Questions like, "how do you know my name?!"

I answered as best I could, reassuring her that, "I know everything about you, Miss Tana. I've researched your weaponry and tactics, the promotions and accolades you've received, and especially the modifications to your armour design based on your unique biological def- differences."

-I'm editing that out. I don't even know how you can laugh that loudly. Anyway, how was I supposed to know that wouldn't reassure her? It's my job to record complete histor- would you please stop laughing?-

-I'm going to record a bit about how you're a little whiner who… um… does… stupid stuff…-

-I hate you so much right now.-

-I'll practice lying and do it anyway, see if I don't.-

-No… I won't…-

So this reassurance did not reassure Doan, unfortunately. She lost her temper just a little and yelled something about spies and scum in an accent even I could never quite parse. Secret, however…

-I'm not saying it.-

-No. We can stop the story right there and forget about it. Then we'll see-

-You're the worst person ever.-

Secret… saved the day… All it took was raising one hand and looking at Doan's Gorgon and Doan quieted down long enough for me to speak.

"I'm sorry for any rough treatment these brutes might have put you through, Miss Tana. Secret and I-"

Doan looked from my avatar to Secret with a sudden clack of armour.

"Secret?" she asked, and for a moment I thought she hadn't recognized him all this time. "You call him Secret, too?"

I admit that, up until that point, it hadn't occurred to me that it was unusual.

"Of course," I told her. "That's what you named him. Him and Silence."

Silence knocked the bulkhead with her elbow, hard. I sighed.

"Rather, Silence is what Ind Cusd named her."

Silence, brat, nodded in a smugly satisfied way.

"We've-" I cut off as Secret pointed at my avatar in an overly accusative way. "I've recorded thirty-seven attempts on your life, from within the Grineer hierarchy alone. The latest… misunderstanding by a fellow Tenno was what finally prompted… corrective measures."

Doan managed to give me a very good suspicious glare, considering she was still wearing her helmet. "What do you mean?"

"Corrective means-"

She cut me off with a wave of her hand. "Correct is fix. Fix what? How?" She turned to look at both Secret and Silence. "Why?"

See? Ind wouldn't have asked that. No soup-for-brains would have asked that. You don't get "why?" from many Grineer besides Tyl Regor, and that man's rattled as a Furbolg hitting atmosphere. Full speed.

Secret and Silence were, obviously, no help. They looked at each other Silence tapped her faceplate, and Secret just shrugged and walked up to stand beside my avatar. Which, in a way, was sort of supportive. Just a fleshy kind of supportive.

-You're welcome a lot.-

"Well, we obviously don't want you killed, Miss Tana, so we have to-"

"Why?"

That struck me silent for a few seconds. Here was the cleverest Grineer I'd yet seen, standing on a Tenno orbiter with one Warframe in front and one behind, interrogating an Orokin Cephalon, with no idea why we didn't want her dead.

Secret shifted uncomfortably and Silence strutted past Doan so that the three of us stood in front of her.

Well, they stood. I manifested my avatar.

-I'm not interrupting. You're interrupting. There are certain differences with digital life that need addressing.-

-Well, look at it this way: Doan was basically standing inside of me when she waved that gun around.-

-Yeah. Exactly.-

Doan gripped her gun tight, not threateningly, but as a sort of militaristic security blanket. It was cramped in the Orbiter, and she was standing beside the sparking, steadily busy Foundry. For just a moment, though, I paused all the noise on the ship so that what I said could be heard properly.

"Because you're Secret's friend, Miss Tana."

Silence pointed to herself.

"And Silence's."

She added a wobbling, noncommittal shake of her hand.

"Sort of," I translated.

Doan said nothing. She looked at each of us in turn, then, without a word, sat down. Secret and Silence traded looks and probably Sendings, then both looked at me, as if I knew what to do with a dumbstruck Grineer.

Doan just sat there, clutching her head, gun held between her legs and chest.

"Miss Tana?" I asked tentatively.

"No," she moaned. "No, no, no…"

Let's be clear here: we didn't know until years later how critical this moment was. Even when we found out about Grineer Indoctrination in more detail than passing mention, we didn't connect it back to this, because we didn't know the true extent of it.

And so Doan Tana sat there on an enemy ship and tried to process words that she couldn't physically think.

She started to crack, she told me. The mind, even a Grineer mind, is only so malleable, and Doan's wasn't ready.

That was the day I… I nearly killed Doan Tana.

Thank the Void for Secret. He saw the danger, even if he didn't know exactly what it was, and reacted with the reflex and impulsiveness of a Tenno. He stepped into the Arsenal, switched Warframes in moments, and hurried to Doan's side.

She didn't respond initially. Not until Secret reached out a hand and put it atop one of Doan's. Then Doan, still holding her head in pain and confusion, looked up.

For just a moment, her shock overrode her other thoughts, and she saw clearly.

"S- Secret?"

Secret nodded, one finger to his faceplate, and used Nyx's powers to force the thoughts troubling Doan to the back of her mind. Still there, still dangerous, but at least temporarily postponed and, hopefully, her choice to deal with as she wished.

-She blames you every time she forgets things now, though.-

-She does. And she even does it with the Grineer. "Oh no, the Tenno made me forget the plan, sir, so I just did what I thought you would do."-

-It's doesn't matter if it sounds convincing, she's lying to Grineer.-

-Yes. And Ind backs her up.-

Doan and Secret knelt there for little longer as Doan caught her breath, which left Silence and myself watching awkwardly. Luckily, Doan gathered herself before I had to resort to talking to Silence.

The Gunner stood stiffly, then visibly relaxed, loosening up and nodding slowly.

"You will help me not get killed?" she asked hesitantly, still shaken.

Secret nodded.

"Good. Then it is Tenno serving Grineer," she concluded, gaining confidence. "Like when we cleansed the Infested ship together."

Secret tilted his head and looked back at me, clearly doubting the wisdom of our actions.

I was a bit more eager to go along, considering how badly things had gone when I'd tried to control them.

"Yes," I agreed quickly. "That's exactly what it's like."

Silence crossed her arms petulantly.

Secret was hesitant, but he agreed, too, nodding once.

Doan tilted her head, then very slowly reached out and touched the horn that came up from above the Nyx frame's forehead and went back along her head.

"Two are better," Doan said with certainty, fingers tracing the path where one of Loki Prime's horns would have been.

Secret nodded with agreement, then stepped into the Arsenal again. There was a flicker of Void energy, and Nyx was replaced with Loki Prime, done in grey and silver.

Then Secret raised his hands and focused. It took almost ten seconds, but he managed something most Tenno don't even bother to try.

A decoy of Doan Tana flashed, faded, and then fully appeared in the room.

Doan leaned in to peer at her doppelganger, then started to walk around it.

It was good work. Though nowhere near the illusion a Mirage might have managed, it had physical substance and Doan was able to touch it.

Once it seemed Doan was done poking and prodding the decoy, it turned and, under Secret's direction, walked into the Arsenal.

This was where I came in. Changing armour can be hard, especially in semi-corporeal Void constructs, but this part was simple.

With barely a thought, I recoloured the decoy. I don't remember the exact colours, but they were ones that Secret had approved.

"What do you think, Miss Tana?" I asked.

Doan looked at the decoy, hesitant to say anything, until I changed the colours again.

"There are as many options as you can think of," I assured her, flashing through a series of palettes. "I imagine it's hard to develop preferences on those drab Grineer vessels, but if you have a request, we should be able to accomodate."

Secret nodded confidently, knocking the back of his fist against Silence's. To say the pair had worked hard finding pigmentations for the occasion would be an injustice. Most Tenno haven't been so active since the Old War.

Doan watched the whole process with uncertaintyuncertainly, but it took a long flurry of colours before she eventually raised a hand - not the one holding her gun - and I stopped showing the variety of pigments we'd tracked down.

"How will colours make me not get killed?" Doan asked.

Secret and Silence shared a look, then both waved their hands, as if warding off the idea.

"Oh, no," I explained, "that wasn't what this part was for. We have armour for you, if you'd like it, but the colour is just… Secret, help me explain."

Secret, of course, crossed his arms and tilted his head at me in disbelief.

-Well, it was your idea. I always look like this. What do I know about "fashion"?-

-More like you just like seeing me squirm.-

At that, I was mostly stuck, so I just said, "it might help let Tenno know not to attack you, I suppose. Besides, since the armour is going to look a little different, anyway, it won't hurt to colour it up."

"Which armour?" Doan asked, looking down at herself.

It was then that I realized the detail I'd left out.

"The armour we made for you," I explained. "Your armour, as soon as you've chosen the colours you'd like."

Doan processed the words in a moment, nodded, and strode up to the figure in the arsenal. She put her gun on her back and started pointing at parts of the armour, naming and changing colours for each part. It took almost an hour. She turned out to be almost as picky as a Tenno. Worse, with her bad eyes, she had to spend several seconds checking each part to be certain she liked it.

I should be grateful. I've heard some of the stories other Cephalons tell. I can't imagine having to coo over this and that colour swap while a Tenno self-consciously changes palettes and syandanas and armours for hours on end.

Finally, Doan stepped back and gave a satisfied nod.

Then, with an imaginary poof, the decoy disappeared.

-I add it in, mentally.-

-Yes, every single time.-

"Enter the Arsenal, Miss Tana, and we can give you your new armour."

And she did. She just stepped in, like it wasn't a problem. Obviously she was thinking that if we'd wanted to kill her, we'd have done it in any given second in the last hour, but it was still impressive.

It is not easy to outfit a Grineer. They're made up of strange bits and bobs that didn't quite "bit" or "bob" properly. Doan was no exception, and even with the scans Secret had taken, there were some quick changes to be made.

When she we'd gotten the armour on, though, and she stepped out of the Arsenal… I was proud. I admit it.

Tenno-built armour, the armour I'd built for Doan, wasn't the same as what she'd had before. It looked like it, at least in shape, but on the inside it was better in every way. Fit for a friend of a Tenno.

Doan looked down at herself in disbelief, then up at the two Warframes standing in front of her. Secret and Silence shared another look and probably a prolonged Sending, then Secret stepped forward with the finishing touch in his hands.

It's impossible to pretend he didn't seem a bit silly, walking up to the towering Grineer Gunner with a golden scarf in his hands. It was a soft thing in a room of the most dangerous people in the system. Doan looked down at him, at the piece of cloth, and without a word she let him put it on her.

Gold settled against the blue and crimson Doan had chosen and completed it. It was a lucky guess, but it looked like he'd planned it all along.

"The fibers are thin," I informed her as she reached up to touch it, "but they only seem delicate. They'll flow around most blades and absorb laser fire."

She ran her hand through it a few times, then met Secret's gaze.

Secret reached up and put a single finger against Doan's faceplate. He held it there for a moment, until Doan reached up and copied the motion, one finger against Secret's faceplate. They held that way for a second, then Doan stepped back.

"Nobody would believe me, anyway," Doan muttered.

Secret nodded his agreement and started to turn towards the flight area. Then he stopped and turned to my avatar.

"We shouldn't," I told him.

He crossed his arms and so did Silence.

"This was supposed to be a quick thing, to take advantage of change blindness. We're going to run into problems with object permanence if we…"

I trailed off. It wasn't exactly that the brats had changed their stances, exactly, but apparently there are different levels of arm-crossed pouting. Don't ask me, I don't have a body.

-You were absolutely pouting.-

-Legitimate negotiating stratagem? Ha! Right, and I'm a handheld.-

Well, it doesn't matter. It worked. I caved. What can I say? They're cute, even in the murder-suits.

"Miss Tana," I asked hesitantly. Silence urged me on. I gathered my wits and contin-

-Yes, wits. Plural.-

...gathered my wits, and continued, "if you would like, you are free to stay, for just a day or two. It…"

Secret mimed a handshake behind Doan's back. Silence did an over-the-top impression of a Grineer being impressed.

"...It might be a good opportunity… for the next time the Grineer ask… let the Tenno help them."

Doan looked up at my avatar, then at Secret and Silence, and made a sound like the Solstice Celebration had come three times this year. She managed to refrain from hopping up and down, though the force of her nodding did clank her helmet against her armour a few times.

Once she'd calmed down, she said, in a voice of measured enthusiasm, "yes. We should do that."

Secret and Silence fist-bumped again, and I started making preparations for a non-Tenno guest.

For those of you Cephalons who've never had one: don't.