There is a slow, booming clap. The sound barrier breaks every time palms strike.
"This is rich." Savathûn laughs as she continues clapping, her body shaking every time she takes a breath. "They honestly thought you were dead after that miserable attempt of an attack? Guardians never cease to amaze me."
The Witch-Queen reaches an arm out for Cassandra, who's still playing dead on the ground. Her sister doesn't react, which makes her slightly annoyed. She gives the woman a light kick to the side.
"Ow! Don't be so rough…" Cassandra mumbles as she rubs the attacked area, sitting up. "I am your sister after all."
Savathûn laughs again as she offers her hand out again, this time it gets taken and she pulls Cassandra up. "Oh, you and I, we're gonna have some fun." She flicks her finger. "What do you want to begin with? My daughter's about to find the Distributary, we can watch our troops decimate the Awoken."
"Not so fast." The sound of metal clinking against something, followed by dragging. "We aren't through, yet, sis." Cassandra says through gritted teeth.
The Witch-Queen turns around and faces the Warlock, who has her purple-black sword gripped tightly in her hand, the blade part glowing green. "Of course, you'd be a fool. You killed your Worm, didn't you?" Savathûn scoffs.
"Well, come at me, bitch." Cassandra starts to charge forward.
"I don't have time for this for such infantile conflicts." Savathûn chortles and flicks her fingers.
/
Russell has been out of action for a few weeks by now.
He tries to muster the willpower to participate in a fireteam doing anything really; Crucible, patrols, strikes, whatever. He never could find it, instead opting to stay in his room and go through countless sleepless nights.
Whenever he does manage to get some slumber, his nightmares bring him back screaming into reality.
Russell shuts his eyes and looks upwards as he slows his breathing down, in an attempt to ease his heart, which feels like its ripping his thoracic cage open with every beat. The woman to his side stirs.
"Right, sorry, sorry." He mumbles.
She was just a random Huntress that picked him up at a bar in the Tangled Shore.
"Are you like this all the time?" She snaps at him, her voice muffled by the pillow she's speaking into. "Christ, I can't even get a single minute of sleep!"
"You're free to leave, if you want." Russell says, under his breath. "I did warn you about this, though."
"You never specified that you would be full on yelling!" She says, turning her head and rubbing her eyes.
"I'm sorry, nothing I can do about it." He dryly laughs. "I think it would be best if you leave."
"Really? Just gonna kick me out like that?" She says, and the lights come on afterwards. "Christ, you're pathetic."
"Just get out, please." Russell seethes, lightly inching her off of his bed.
The Huntress packs her stuff and leaves through the front door.
"You know, she is right." He says, crossing his arms behind his head and leaning on the wall behind him. "I'm a mess."
Jingles materializes. "Quit your moping around, you need something to shoot."
"Firing range isn't cutting it." Russell groans out.
"Then don't go to the firing range." Jingles replies, then sighs. "You still…miss her?"
There is a moment of silence.
"Yeah."
Then a flash, and he's torn from the real plane of existence then put back in, except in a different spot. He attempts to reach the Ace of Spades that is normally on his nightstand beside his bed but discovers that he is not even in his own apartment anymore.
A soft hand wraps around the wrist that reached, and gently pulls it back so he's laying flat on his back.
"Hello there." An all-too-familiar voice says.
"No-" He struggles. "You're not real-"
"Yes, and no." She stops. "I am real."
"You're dead!"
"I'm not."
"Cassandra, let me go this instant." Russell snarls out, and she lets go. "Thank you."
"So…is it story time?"
"No, don't even bother, just let me sleep."
Cassandra sighs, exasperated. "I teleported you here for a reason, and it's not for you to sleep in my bed."
"Can't do anything about-" His lips are pinched by two fingers, and a weight is applied on his lower body. He looks up and Cassandra is straddling him, and once he's established eye contact, she lets his mouth free. "Oh. Oh."
"Yes, now please, behave." She pauses for a moment. "I never really realized that I still have these human desires." She shrugs.
"Ah well, you're mine for the night." She adds, innocently.
/
Outskirts, EDZ
Sombra yawns and stretches her arms. "Xiao, how long are we gonna be out here?" She asks, somewhat tiredly. "We've been here for forever."
Xiao rolls her eyes. "Quit complaining, the Saboteur's gonna show up any minute now…" She squints and peeks over a small hill that overlooked a long bridge that extended into Sojourne's Camp.
Sombra never really did figure out what the point of all this camping was, but she is getting quite a bit of Enhancement Cores from Xiao out of this. She wonders if it's just her mentor wanting to teach her some Hunter thing or if she wanted to Traveler forbid, spend a bit of time with her student.
"Alright, you know the plan-"
"I smoke bomb it and mow it down with my Recluse?" Sombra fills in, readying her Crucible SMG.
"You need to get a kill with that to activate its perk, first of all." Xiao says. "And yeah, that's about it."
"Can we do some Competitive Crucible after this?"
Xiao groans. "Fine."
Sombra checks her progress on the Revoker sniper rifle, and waits impatiently for Xiao to finish whatever she's doing right now.
/
Nessus, Exodus Black
Lena Oxton fist bumps Crow, who continues the chain and fist bumps Hana Song, ending it with a small, voiced explosion. All three of them look at the collapsed body of Edgar Malcolm who has his bones turned in ways that were quite unnatural and most likely very painful.
"You think we were a bit too rough on him?" Hana asks.
"Nah, he gets that for throwing a Gambit match after not getting first invade."
"Throwing a what match?"
"Don't worry about it."
"And he calls me a child?"
Hana stomps a few times with her mech, making the body lowly hop from the ground, which makes her giggle.
Bastion stumbles out of the Exodus Black, twirling his head and beeping nonsense.
"What are you up to, Bastion?" Crow asks, turning to the Omnic. Bastion fixes him a stare, and tilts his head.
"I don't understand your query, who is Bastion?" Failsafe's cheery voice comes from the robot's voicebox.
There is a low record scratch. "This feels...weird."
The Titan falls to his knees, looks up and throws his arms in the air.
"Whoa, I have guns? Big ones at that!" Failsafe's evil side says, before the AI, in its new enclosure, dashes off somewhere.
/
Russell sleeps in bed with Cassandra, who caresses him close and is definitely intent on net letting him go. He sighs and attempts to rationalize all this.
She's supposed to be dead, but she isn't. He thinks, and runs his fingers in between her hair, which had gotten quite a bit longer than he remembered.
"Russell, I know you're confused about how I'm still alive, considering you shot me three times in the back of the head." She yawns, and lets him go. She sighs, and her eyes flicker away from looking at his. "I really can't explain this whole thing, but all that matters is that I get to see you at least once a month."
He wraps an arm around her shoulder, and presses his nose to her skin. "God, you smell amazing."
"Well, I am in my own universe. Reality can be whatever I want here." The bed under them changes material, this time feeling a lot more springy than the foam mattress.
"Ascendant Realm?"
"Sure, if you want to call it that." Cassandra has a small smile on her face, which turns sad a second later. "It's time for you to go now."
"Damn, I'll see you in a month?"
"I'll see you in a month."
A flash, and Russell is in his bed again.
He starts counting down the days.
And that is the final end of this. I hope you, the reader, enjoyed it. I'm working on other stuff, some of it is on AO3 (same name), although it is mostly shameless NSFW stuff.
Anyways, peace, and may you grow fat from strength.