THE GULCH
THE GULCH, EUROPEAN DEAD ZONE
Uldiks stood on a ridge with his barons beside him, waiting for the perfect time to strike the Red Legion convoy that was about to pass them.
His Dregs, Vandals, Captains, and Shanks were hiding in the undergrowth, awaiting his word.
Uldiks didn't have a real name. He was cast out from his house. He didn't bother joining with the House of Exile because he had heard bad things about them; he scoured the plains of the Reef, searching for purpose until he met an Awoken named Uldren.
Together he and Uldren formed the House of Crows, running operations across the solar system, stealing from Cabal and other Eliksni houses alike.
He heard the sound of Cabal marching, and motioned for his barons to get into their positions. He watched the road below him with his four eyes. The Red Legion soldiers marched in front of one of their large 'Goliath' tanks.
He whispered into his comms to his friends hiding in the bushes. It was time. The Goliath tank passed underneath him, and he jumped onto its head. The rest of the Eliksni bursting out of the bushes and tackling Legionaries.
Uldiks pulled the shock-cutter from his belt, and jammed it into the head of the tank, cutting it apart before it could fire. All he could hear now was the sound of shock weapons against slug weapons, and the sound of dying Cabal.
He sliced an incoming Legionary in the chest, and beckoned one of his barons forward to extract the secrets hidden in the tank. He hopped down from the head of the tank, and crushed in the heads of two Legionaries below him, spraying his feet with oil.
He ran forward, and personally slew the last of the Cabal guards. Then his communicator started to flash. Uldren had set a trap for the Awoken and it had sprung. Everything was coming together nicely.
Rian's ship flew over the Gulch, a Cabal controlled area in the EDZ. Or at least it was Cabal controlled. Rian and Gariks materialized onto the ground, and searched the aftermath of a large battle.
Strewn about the ground was dead Cabal, and dead Eliksni. But mostly dead Cabal. There was even a destroyed Goliath tank, one that looked fresh and hadn't been fired at all yet. She walked around the dead bodies, and scavenged ammo for John's slug rifle that he was so fond of.
Gariks walked the other direction, scavenging the dead Eliksni for armour and weapons. He stripped off his Dreg armour out of Rian's view, and began to take the pieces of armour off a dead Vandal. He attached the spiky shoulder plates, and then the chestpiece.
Soon he was in fully clad in Vandal armour, and he picked up a shock rifle from the ground. He located a dead Captain, whose armour was too large for Gariks to wear, and looked around its dead body for a shrapnel launcher.
But something off in the distance caught his eye. A dying Servitor. He quickly sprinted towards it and checked to see what parts it needed.
"Rian!" he shouted without attaching the translator to the Vandal helmet.
He heard fast footsteps behind him, and turned around to see Rian slow down behind him.
"You look nice," she said.
Gariks simply nodded, he had no idea what she said. He pointed to the dying Servitor, and pointed out the damaged parts that needed replacing. As Rian examined the Servitor, he attached the translator to the inside of his new helmet.
"It's ether processor is intact," he said, "but it cannot fly, speak, or fight."
"We don't need it to fight do we?" Rian turned around.
"We do not need it to fight, but it would be beneficial. And without all of its pieces in their places it will die out. We must save it."
"Well, I can look around for replacements. How long before it dies out."
"About fifteen planetary rotations."
Rian nodded, and ran off to look for more dead Servitors. Gariks turned away from the Servitor and noticed another dead Captain with shock blades next to its dead body, and he smiled inside his helmet.
THE FARM
THE FARM, EUROPEAN DEAD ZONE
John and Heft hopped over the fence at the end of the football field, each holding large wooden crates in their hands.
They barely talked to each other because of how they experienced most of their Guardian lives by each other's side, so they never had anything new to discuss.
"Sooo, uh, what do you think of Rian?" Heft asked.
"Uh. She's nice I guess," John replied awkwardly.
"Just trying to start a conversation."
"I know."
They advanced into fields of tall grass, the farm just barely in sight behind them. They made it the rest of the way in silence, but when they got to the spot where the ship was supposed to be there was nothing there.
"Did we go the wrong way?" Heft asked.
"No this is definitely the spot," John replied.
He looked around, not only was the ship gone, but Rian and Gariks were nowhere to be seen.
"Maybe they just left without telling us," Heft said.
"Yeah that's probably it," John said, walking up to the tall hill that the ship was normally parked at the base of.
He set his crate down at the base of the hill and sat next to it. Heft set his crate down and set next to John. He lifted the top of his crate up and pulled out a sealed glass of blue liquid. Heft popped the lid off the glass and began drinking it.
"Excuse me but what the hell is that?" John asked, not knowing that Exos could drink things.
"Coolant. Keeps me clean and feeling fresh," he said, and jokingly raised the glass towards John as if he was asking him if we wanted a sip.
John waved him away and stared forward into the deep blue of the night. The nice view of the sky behind the shard of the Traveler didn't last long however, because Rian's ship appeared right in front of him.
He cussed under his breath, and stood up as the ship landed. Rian and Gariks appeared next to the ship. Gariks looked very different. He had much more amour on now than he did before, his helmet had horns on the side and covered his whole face except for his eyes. His shoulder armour had three spikes on each side.
"Uh, lookin' good," John said.
Heft just gave Gariks a 'what's up' nod.
"So you've been out getting Gariks some armour?" John asked Rian.
"Well, he does have new armour and weapons, but that isn't why we were gone," she responded.
"So then why were you gone?"
"Go check the cargo hold to see for yourself."
John started to think this was some kind of surprise. He then entered the ship and walked to the cargo hold. It wasn't a very large ship, but it had multiple rooms. He walked in the cargo hold and saw a big purple ball. It was a Servitor.
The Servitor's 'eye', which was a hollow purple circle, was dim and blinking as if it was about to fail. The armour on the sides was burned and torn, like someone tried to pull it off. Its outer shell was riddled with bullet holes.
"Damn, what did they do to you?" he asked quietly.
The Servitor didn't respond, and if it could he wouldn't understand it. He turned to his right and saw an overflowing crate of slug rifle magazines, Rian probably got those for him. Then he turned and looked at the Servitor's shell again. The bullet holes were made from Cabal weapons. The Cabal tore this poor thing apart.
As John spent time around Gariks he felt like the Eliksni weren't all ugly four-eyed aliens that tried to attack the city. And as far as he knew, Servitors were mechanical. He has heard them speaking to other Eliksni on the battlefield, so maybe they were just artificial intelligences.
"Cabal tried to kill Servitor," Gariks' voice made John jump.
"I've seen these all over battlefields. What do you use these for?" John asked his Eliksni companion.
"Servitors synthesize Ether. Eliksni require Ether to survive."
"Huh."
Gariks walked up to the Servitor, and put his hand over its eye. The eye began to blink slower, it was still conscious, and it seemed to relax near him.
"This Servitor is dying," he said, looking back up at John, "it must be saved. They may not be living, but they think and act as we do. And I am running out of Ether."
John nodded, and Gariks stood up as Heft and Rian entered the room; each carrying a crate of food and water. Heft seemed to not notice the Servitor on the floor, and he just left the room without speaking. John couldn't figure him sometimes.
"So, where do we go to fix this servitor?" John asked Gariks.
"Eliksni foundries, maybe a Ketch even?" he responded.
John and Rian looked at each other.
"We don't have our light, so we might die. But that doesn't mean Gariks has to die," Rian said.
To Rian's surprise, John silently nodded instead of objecting, or yelling at her for saving Gariks instead of themselves.
John finally spoke, "then that's where we need to go."
CORSAIR INFIRMARY
VESTIAN OUTPOST, THE REEF
Seja woke up in a dark room. She was lying on a bed at the end of the room. She looked to her left to see Green sitting on a table next to her bed. She couldn't tell if he was dead or not, but his shell was dirty, and he didn't respond to her.
"You're awake," Seja heard Petra's voice as the room's door opened.
Seja tried to look up, but her stomach felt as if it were on fire.
"Hey…" she said quietly, using all the energy she could..
"You've been out for a while," Petra said, "Ira turned back and pulled you out before the whole cave collapsed."
Seja tried to say something, but couldn't.
"Don't worry, you don't need to use all your energy here," Petra said, sympathetically, "you'll be fine in a bit. Assuming Green isn't dead."
"No. No way he's dead," Seja said confidently.
Seja reached out and poked Green's shell. The shell shuddered.
"Just give him a while and he'll be back up," Seja said.
"Hmm. Good. Well about the mission," Petra began, "it did not go as planned. We couldn't have seen that coming, so it isn't anyone's fault but Uldren's. You said you wouldn't let me down, and you didn't. Uldren may have escaped but we will find him again."
"I knew I wouldn't let you down."
"Well get some rest, and whenever Green decides to wake up, come to me."
Petra left the room, and Seja laid back in her bed; drifting off to sleep.