Luisa and I had gone in to the Tower on a special request. The two of us met Cayde in the Vanguard room. Ikora and Zavala were there too. Luisa made a face at me as I was really wary of Ikora despite her smiling at me.
"You wanted to see us Cayde?" Luisa questioned, getting the Exo's attention
The Hunter commander motioned us closer.
"Alright, listen up you too." he whispered, "We need to get a team, you two, on the Dreadnaught to shut down its main gun. Only way to do that is-"
He was cut off
"Cayde," Ikora said, "What are you whispering about?"
The Exo laughed nervously, "Nothing. Nothing."
He quickly turned back to us, "Contact me when you land in the Cosmo."
Luisa and I exchanged a look as we left.
"What the hell was that all about?" I asked Luisa.
"You're asking the wrong girl," She replied, "I certainly don't know what's going on. Whatever the case, Jayden, we have orders right from the big boss's mouth."
"He's not technically my boss though."
"True, but I am."
There was a card she hadn't played in a while.
"Alright ma'am," I was being sarcastic, "What is our mission?"
"Gods damn it Jayden..."
I laughed.
She set her hands on her hips and gave me a look.
"Oh c'mon, you had to have seen that coming!"
"I suppose so. Meet you down there."
She transmatted to her ship. I went to mine. We'd signed the launches off as patrols so as not to attract attention. When we were airborne and bound for the Cosmodrome I opened up a channel.
"Cayde we're in route, what exactly are we doing?" I asked.
"Okay," Cayde said, "It turns out Crota does have a father, and his name is Oryx. He's come all the way out here just to kill you. Don't worry we aren't going to let that happen. Oryx commands the Taken from aboard the Dreadnaught so the only way to stop him it to get you aboard. But we can't do that without a stealth drive. Lucky for us, I hid one on top of the old colony ship."
"How do you know it's still there?" Luisa inquired.
"You better hope it's there. You're not getting on that Dreadnaught if it isn't."
We descended to the Cosmodrome landing outside of the maintenance area where the launch site was. The last time we were here we were hunting Sepiks Prime. As soon as we got there we saw fighting between the Taken and the Fallen.
"My stealth drive is hidden in the ball on top of the old colony ship. Get up there and grab it fast." Cayde informed.
Luisa and I made our way up. I had Tlaloc drawn ready to go if we needed to. Taken Vandals and Knights stood between the Fallen and our way in. We engaged.
"Cayde, we've got a problem down here!" I called.
"Let me guess. Four arms, wear cloaks, smell real bad?"
"Not Fallen. Taken."
"I thought we'd have more time. Push through them."
We were already ahead of him. We made our way passed the Taken and slipped into the launch facility. We slipped down towards where we had fought Sepiks. I smiled when we saw the husk of the dead Servitor.
"Hey Lu." I called.
The Hunter turned to me.
I leaned up against the dead bot, "Remember when Sepiks Prime was our biggest problem?"
I felt her roll her eyes. We pressed on ahead.
"Okay," Cayde said, "You should come up on a locked door. There's a trick to get it open so let me know when you're there."
We ran down a hallway carefully watching our step. The last thing we needed is one of us to get Taken. We found Cayde's locked door but we ran into a complication when we did. The door was cracked. I cautiously slid it open half expecting something bad to happen. Nothing did.
"The door's already open, Cayde," Luisa said, "We're inside."
"And the Flux Grenades didn't detonate? I've gotta get out of this tower."
We worked our way up the stairs. I made not that it looked like a large bomb had gone off in here. Maybe those grenades did detonate.
"How bad is it?" Cayde asked us.
I glanced out of a hole in the wall, I saw Taken all over the place being held back by both the House of Devils and the House of Scar.
"Taken everywhere." I reported, "Fighting the Fallen."
"Then we don't have much time. Get to that ship."
Luisa and I got to the top of the boarding tower after about fifteen minutes or so.
"Okay you should see an old bridge. It took me days to get it working. Take it and you'll be on the launch platform."
I immediately noticed a problem. Besides the fact that it was super rusty and looked ready to fall apart, the bridge only led us back a short distance and over the edge to our deaths. I made a face. Luisa tried messing with the controls to get it to move but had no luck.
"Cayde, someone moved the bridge. Destroyed the controls." she told him.
"Yeah that's the Fallen, probably trying to keep the Taken off their backs. See if you can-" he stopped
In the background I heard Ikora say something.
"Uh yeah..." he said, "Gimme a sec, Dagger."
The channel went dead. I summoned my Ghost.
"You have anything?"
The little machine clicked, "There's a terminal on top of the tower, if you can get me up there I can reroute the power."
I made my way up and left my Ghost there to reroute the power from a terminal we found there. There was a dead Vandal there too. It probably would've destroyed the terminal had it not been killed first. I heard a clanging noise. Metal began grinding against metal as the bridge began moving.
"We've got it moving." I said via comns.
"Get across it and find my stealth drive. Also it's a little unstable so watch yourself on that bridge."
As soon as I stepped foot on it, Luisa yanked me back. Metal groaned and whined before the middle section of the bridge collapsed. I watch it sail toward the ground before it disappeared beneath the snow cover.
"That could've been bad..."
We cleared the jump to the Colony ship with ease.
"Alright Cayde we're on the platform. Any idea where we should go?" I asked.
"Yeah. Up."
We met the Taken as soon as we took a step. They were only Thrall though.
"I'm getting real tired of the Taken's shit..."
I drew Raze and started swinging. I cut down the Taken with no problem. A disc of lighting flew passed my head. It zipped up to a metal ledge and blasted a Vandal to ash. We took to that ledge and looked around.
"Well the stairs are blocked so now what?" I asked.
I saw Luisa looking over my shoulder, "Hope you're in touch with your inner ninja."
She sprinted towards a hole in the wall and jumped out onto a water tank. She then climbed her way up onto a maintenance platform which overlooked a vault style door I didn't see. As soon as she landed though she shade-stepped back just barely able to remain on the ledge. A blast fired out of the door. I threw a firebolt around the corner and a Taken Phalanx rushed out batting at the flames. Luisa stood and kicked it in the back knocking it off of the tower.
"See ya next fall!" I taunted.
"Really?" Luisa replied unamused.
We headed inside and worked our way up a stair set pushing passed the Fallen. I took notice of their armor color. These were from the House of Devils. We made it to another dead end. Luisa however found a way up into the rafters. She helped me up and we crawled through the place. At one point we hit the remains of a steal beam just barely wide enough for us to cross one behind the other.
"Don't look down." Luisa warned me
Of course the first thing I did was look down after that. I froze for a second. We were at least fifteen stories off the ground. The forces below us looked like ants now. My eyes snapped level when Luisa stepped off of the beams to safety. I made my way to her slowly. We crossed over again, this time on wider supports and climbed up to the next floor, Taken and Fallen battled all around us which made me worry a little. If the House of Devils were here they were most likely scavenging for resources. If they found Cayde's stealth drive we were screwed. We struck down everything in our way.
"If you can hear my sister, I'm sorry." Raze apologized.
"Why, what's she saying?" I asked the blade.
"Very explicit, not safe for work kind of things that I dare not repeat."
I didn't see Luisa complaining so either she couldn't hear Bolt Caster speaking or she was simply ignoring it. We made our way inside and found a lift the House of Devils had used to get to the top floor. We took it and landed in the ball of the ship. As soon as our boots hit the ground we were met with Fallen. They turned their guns but a force blasted them down killing all of them instantly. Standing before us was a shadowy hive wizard. This one was male though and bore the hammer shaped head that we had seen on Phobos. It was Oryx and he was not happy to see us.
"WHAT CROTA BEGAN I WILL NOW FINISH!" he yelled.
The shadow raised a hand and bolts of void fired from it. We dove aside.
"Wasn't expecting Oryx himself to be here!" I commented.
Luisa had Bolt Caster drawn, "I don't think that's him, Jayden."
He chanted in a language that sounded like a mix of Latin and Greek. Maybe it was more ancient than that. Whatever the case, with every chant came flurries of void bolts. I fired at it with Tlaloc and Luisa threw Bolt Caster's disks at it. Oryx retreated disappearing into the darkness. I lowered my weapon.
"Is it over?"
More chanting and we were met by a squad of Taken Psions. As soon as they hit the ground they started multiplying. I killed them as quick as they could make copies but it was getting us no where. The Psions mounted an assault pushing us back.
"This is bad, Lu." I said shooting anything that wasn't human.
"We've had bad before." she replied, unloading Hawkmoon and switching to Zhalos Supercell.
"This is worse!"
The Psions closed in. I was ready to say a prayer to whatever god would accept me I guess back to wherever the hell I went when I died last time but stopped mid prayer.
A rocket whipped passed me blasting a score of Psions apart. Smaller rounds emerged from the fire and tracked the remaining ones killing them. I'd never seen a rocket like that before. I didn't ask instead I pushed back up. Thanks to whoever was firing those rocket, we managed to get back into the fight with this shadow. The Shadow rushed me, a large blade over his head. I drew Raze and parried, deflecting the blade with my own.
"We meet again, Willbreaker." Raze muttered.
We clashed multiple times before Luisa interfered with her sniper rifle. The shadow growled irritated. It let go of its sword and with that free hand fired void blasts at her. I didn't see if she avoided them or not. I used what strength I had left and slipped passed the blade. I spun back and stabbed the blade behind my back catching the shadow in the gut. I pulled the blade free. The figure growled. Apparently stabbing it through the gut with a sacred sword only made it mad. A rocket smashing into it. Those strange blue rounds appeared from the blast and tore through it. The shadow burst into black and white flames and was consumed by the void after a moment. It must've had enough of us.
"Whose rockets were those?" I commented.
Some Fallen came up the lift. I didn't react fast enough. Instead a Titan soared in from above us slamming a Fist of Havoc into the ground. He stood and the single bull horn gave him away.
"Lord Shaxx." I commented. He had a rocket launcher on his back. It was the same one I had seen when I first met the old man.
"Gjallarhorn..." I gasped.
Most exotics could only be heard by their users. Gjallarhorn was different, Gjallarhorn could speak to anyone bearing the mark of an Iron Lord or Iron Wolf. I had never seen it used before now, having only ever seen Shaxx cleaning it or it hanging over the Crucible desk in a glass case. I didn't think it actually functioned much less that it was exotic.
"Hello, young Wolves." it said in a sweet sounding feminine British voice.
"Gjallarhorn." I greeted bowing slightly.
Shaxx stood, "I was merely observing you two until that shadow showed up. I would rather not have you two killed in an unfair fight."
"Thanks for the help," Luisa said.
"Hunter, your sword has quite the vocabulary." the launcher commented.
"Pardon my sister, please." Raze said, "She gets angered easily."
"You two make a formidable force." Shaxx told us, "With some more advanced training I believe you two could slay Oryx once and for all, as you did Crota."
"We will beat him." Luisa said, "I've got a score to settle with him."
"Then I bid you both farewell."
The Titan went back to his ship via transmat.
I sighed, "Man to have sent a force like that after us, Oryx must really hate us."
"Yeah. You know, killing Crota and all."
I opened a channel, "Cayde, we're in the ball. Are you sure it's still here?"
"It's like all things," Cayde said, "you've gotta know where to look. Tell your ghosts to enter frequency 5982."
Our Ghosts did that and our HUDs adjusted accordingly. A box wavered and faded away, it wasn't real! In its place was a pile of the drives.
"There they are." I said.
"Transmat a couple out of there. Oh, and if you find anything else in there, leave it for me. There will be treasure for everyone on the Dreadnaught."
We brought that up first before we went to our ships. The two of us flew back to the Tower and off loaded the drive. We did so in secret per Cayde's request. I met Luisa on the patio.
"So you think Cayde's going to rig our ships for this one?"
"I don't know. Honestly I wouldn't be surprised if he decided to throw a ship together just for this mission."
"Hmm..."
"Let's not worry about it right now. C'mon, I messaged the others already, we're meeting for drinks."
"Awesome! I'm down."
We made our way there. After that I don't remember much.