Krix-13, 78 Miles North of Mar's Equator, 1 Week After Xol's Defeat
The fight outside of the bunker was fierce one. But despite the Cabal's best efforts, there was no way of catching the speeding Guardian. And now-
The royal blue hunter was a royal purple. Much to his dismay- and his ghost's delight- the blowing dust of the Red Planet had slowly been embedding itself in the hunter's suit during the drive, quickly changing the color to a dull shade of purple. And with all of the acrobatics and tumbling hunters normally employ in a firefight- he was kinda stuck that way. Krix gave it only a few half-hearted brushes before giving up and grumpily heading toward the door.
"Ana?"
"Yes?"
"The Cabal are cleared out. If you wouldn't mind sending Beeper the access code you mentioned that would be great."
"Copy that, security code is on route… now."
Krix sauntered up to the door, kicking a Psion corpse out of the way as he reloaded his 18 Kelvins. "Alright Beeper. Time to do what you're paid for."
*Deepboop. Bling-WEEEEEEP. Boppy-dip.*
"I know you're not actually paid. It a figure of speech."
It only took the ghost a couple seconds before the door began to move. "Ok, door's opening."
Eagerness permeated Ana's voice. "Roger that! If you don't mind, I'm going to be watching through your visor. I can't wait to see what's inside!"
Krix gave a little chuckle as he swung 18 Kelvins up and stepped into the dusty bunker, slowly swinging the weapon around from corner to corner. It was dark, the only light coming from the door and small status LEDs blinking weakly. Computer terminals lined the long room in orderly rows, terminating in a small side room full of filing cabinets.
"Hey, uh… Krix?"
"Yeah?"
"You mind turning on a flashlight or something? Because I don't know how you're seeing anything in that pitch-darkness, but I can't see crap."
"Huh? Oh yeah, sorry. Beeper, you mind?"
As his ghost turned on his flashlight eye Krix quietly turned off his internal infrared. He didn't even notice that he had turned them on in the first place. Weird.
After sweeping the main terminal room he stepped into the side room. Dusty filing cabinets lined three of the four walls in the room, all of them locked by archaic looking keyhole-style locks. He slid his 18 Kelvins into his thigh holster and slowly scanned his surroundings.
"Huh. It looks like this is where one of the Brays stored some of their solid copy files. Could be anything in there. Here, do me a favor. Would you mind setting a transmat beacon? I should be able to get Jinju to calibrate it so it just nabs the cabinets. And while she's doing that I can walk you through the process of getting Big Red access to the terminals in the main room."
Krix shrugged. "Sure, no problem."
He walked into the middle of the room and slammed down a beacon, stirring up a huge cloud of dust.
He sneezed. The infuriating tickling feeling in his nose stayed, causing him to start muttering to himself as he worked in the dark room. "Now why the heck do I sneeze? Do I really need to clear stuff out of my respiratory system, or did some engineer back in the golden age go; 'Oh, you know what would be funny? What if I programmed Exos to sneeze? you know, because they have no other physical need for it other than to annoy them and make them uncomfortable? Yeah, I think it'll be a great idea.'"
He glanced to his right, where his ghost was tittering uncontrollably by a workstation. "It's not funny you know!"
*Weep-da-beep! WeeeeeeeOOP!*
"Oh shut up, Beeper."
/
It was a goldmine. At least, Ana thought it was. She was having a mini-party over the comm system as Krix made the long ride back to the Futurescape.
"Jinju! Check out this invoice! Dad must've REALLY been into wines from some place called 'Château Thierry'. Huh. Betcha 100 glimmer that's in France. Or maybe old Belgium…"
This went on for a good thirty minutes. Krix, despite having only met the veteran hunter less than 12 hours before, was soon laughing along and marveling over the seemingly minor finds Ana was making among the aged papers.
After a period of relative quiet he could hear Jinju's soft voice come over the coms.
"Ana?"
"Yeah?"
"Come look at this. I was searching through the email records from that bunker, and while most of it is of no consequence-things like the Futurescape's construction reports- I found something you might like."
There was the sound of a cascade of papers shifting around.
"What'd you find?"
"Apparently a photographer took a family photo during one of the Bray's vacations and accidentally sent it to Clovis II's work email. Take a look at this."
There was quiet over the radio. Krix could almost feel Ana studying the photo.
"Is that… it that the whole family?"
"As far as I can tell? Yeah. See, that's you. Jeez you were cute as a baby. There's Willa… she doesn't look as evil as I thought she would. Huh. Oo! Both Clovis's. Anton. Slyvie. It even looks like that's Elsie as a toddler. What are the chances we find this in all of these old construction records?"
"I dunno… But I'm glad we did. You mind sending it to my workstation? I just can't believe… that's my entire family! As far as I can tell at least. Pre-Rasputin too! Jinju, this is awesome!"
Krix quietly cute the feed, the scream of the sparrow and the roar of the wind rushing to the forefront. "I don't really think Ana remembered I was still on the line. We'll let them party."
A quiet chirp of confirmation echoed in his ear.
They rode on, the trailing dust cloud slowly shrinking in size as they transitioned from the sand of the equator to the harder ground of the northern belts. Krix's mind was quietly churning.
"Beeper?"
*Wheep?*
"Do you remember the Red War? The Hangar? The Reclamation?"
*Deeeeep…*
"You remember what got me on my feet after we lost our Light?"
He could feel Beeper shake himself.
"Oh. Well you remember what happened during the Reclamation?"
*Cheepers. Bling?*
"Yeah. The sensor suite. Targeting programs. Heck, the small unit tactics that no one else knew about. The weapon handling techniques the other guys where talking about. I don't think other Exos have that hardwired in their heads."
*mm. Bobbity boop*
"Yeah. If they did I don't think as many of us would've died during the War. Where did they come from? Why am I the only one who's got stuff like that? I've been noticing little things over the past few months… haven't you been seeing it too?"
Another silent shrug.
"You're my ghost. Stuff like that I thought you would notice."
*…Bweeeeeep… blopbip.*
"Well… I didn't know that wasn't normal either. But here's the thing: someone downloaded those into my head. Either that, or they were already installed when I was implanted. If I can find out where that happened, I might be able to figure out exactly what they are, and maybe get rid of them."
He dodged a rock outcropping with a sharp skid, throwing up a curved tidal wave of red dust before shooting back straight.
"Or not get rid of them. At the very least, if I understand where they came from and what their capabilities truly are, I might be able to use them more often without having to be in life-or-death situations. At the same time… that might take a while."
Beeper stayed silent.
"Then again… what else do we have to do? More strikes? More patrols? This might actually be something interesting to do."
By the time he had finished the trip back up to the Futurescape his mind was made up. He was going to look for his origins as an Exo. See what he could find on why he was special. Granted, the Vanguard didn't like it when a Guardian did that (rephrase- they REALLY didn't like it), but did that stop Ana? And her search for herself and her past was proving key in the Warmind's reawakening. Who knows? Maybe he'd find something big he could donate to the Last City's defense at some point.
He skidded up to BrayTech's door and lept off of the Azure. He noticed Beeper transmat it into his inventory compartment in his backpack. "You do know we're going to have to ask her if we can keep that before we take it right?"
Beeper just shrugged and settled in on his Guardian's shoulder.
Ana was still sitting on the floor, surrounded by ancient yellow documents, eagerly writing down notes and organizing the mess.
"Boy, you've got one heck of a mess up here."
She glanced up for just a second before returning to her work. "Yeah, there's a lot of good stuff in here. This find was a treasure trove for Golden Age historians. Camrin in particular is gonna love it. Thanks for getting it here. I appreciate it."
Krix nodded and leaned back against the wall, subconsciously taking out a knife to polish. "So uh… you mind if I ask you a question?"
She shifted to another stack of papers. "Sure. Go ahead."
He slowly brushed his thumb against the blade, testing for any rough spots. "I've got a friend of mine. A Guardian. He's… interested in doing some research."
She glanced over her shoulder at the lounging Exo. "Oh? In what?"
He squinted down the length, spotting a slight oscillation in the edge. "History. Maybe Golden Age, maybe not. He said he wasn't sure. It's a… personal thing, for him. Very personal. And given your background in that type of thing, he was a wondering…"
Without moving his head, his eyes moved over to her. Ana slowly raised an eyebrow.
"…if you might have any tips on where to start?"
She nodded. "Ah. I see. Well…"
She got up and headed over to her console, quietly flipping a switch. "Woops."
She turned around and folded her arms. "Ok. Does your friend happen to be a blue Exo hunter?"
Krix shrugged, a slight grin illuminating his auditory LEDs. "Maybe."
She laughed a bit. "Yeah, I figured. So, starting point? You gotta narrow down what you're looking for."
Krix shrugged, his well-polished knife sending glittering reflections dashing across the ceiling. "Honestly? No idea. I only just started thinking about it recently. I've got nothing better to do, so why not?"
She nodded again, looking more thoughtful. "Well, if that's the case, first check yourself for clues, especially the stuff you had on when your ghost found you. Shoot, I woke up with my keycard still on me, so I was rather lucky in that sense. And given you're an Exo, you should have an ID number we could run through our data bases once we have access to them."
She thought a bit more. "And two? Have your ghost show you where you woke up. Ya never know, but you might be able to find something interesting laying around. I mean, more often than not you won't find anything- The Guardian woke up outside the Cosmodrome in one of those cute little Russian cars and nothing else- but it wouldn't hurt to check. And who knows? Something might jog you memory."
Krix nodded and pushed off of the wall. "Sounds like a plan. Thanks, I owe ya one."
She scoffed and shook her head. "No you don't. We only might be even for you getting this stuff to me. If you've got any more questions or would like some more advice, you know where to find me."
Krix tapped his knife to his head in a rough salute before sauntering back down the stairs. "Will do. You mind if I take that sparrow with me?"
She waved dismissively; her head already buried in another stack of BrayTech stationary. "Na, I'm never gonna use it. Help yourself."
Calling one last thanks over his shoulder he stepped outside and pulled his hood back up over his head. "Well Beeper, you mind showing me where you found me?"
*meeeeeee… Bip. Blobbity.*
"Well SOMEONE sounds enthusiastic."
/
Krix-13, Nessus Orbit, 1 ½ weeks after Xol's defeat
The mottled orange-green moon filled the Alpha Umi's viewscreen.
"Dang." Krix glanced down at the readings he was getting. "There's a crap ton of Vex on this little moon. I wonder what I was doing here." A notification popped up on one of his many side screens. "Oh wait, is this an active Guardian patrol space?"
Beeper nodded and spouted off a long string of beeps, clicks and whistles. Krix's on-the-go translation speed was still… lacking in some areas. It took him a bit to figure out everything his damaged ghost had said. "Ooooh, a new one huh? And Cayde found it. Interesting."
He shrugged as he reached up and flipped a few of the switches on the roof. "Where am I heading again?"
*Bleep wheep. Wreeee-oop.*
"Sounds good."
They made landfall in a secluded area of the beautiful cubic forest moon and started walking. To Krix's surprise, there was a good amount of local wildlife present, despite the terraforming the Vex had subjected the planet to. And as they walked, they passed many rusted shards and pieces of some great Golden Age ship, overgrown and damaged by Fallen scavenging.
Beeper lead him toward a small, exposed hill, where a clump of broken-down tech laid scattered on an outcropping on the top. The cubic rocks jutted out of the dense undergrowth, forming a sort of uneven staircase pointed up. The area overall was oddly quiet, and as soon as Krix stepped foot at the base of the hill he felt like a somber wariness settle on his shoulders.
Beeper felt it too, apparently. His whistles were particularly quiet as he gestured at the top of the hill. *Beep. Weeeee…*
Krix slowly climbed, eyes locked on the crest and the junk sitting there. When he got to the top, he took a quick scan of the surrounding area for enemies before shifting his attention to the destroyed tech at his feet.
Burn marks marred the outer casing of the shattered machine, whatever it was. His earliest memories of his Guardian-hood was just starting to come back. This was the same comms array he used to call a way out.
Something caught his interest. "Beeper, check this out. These Vex blast marks. Some of them are centuries older than the ones from my first day."
Beeper stayed silent, simply looking around.
Krix stood up and squinted at some shapes nearer the base of the hill. The rims of his eyes rotated as he switched to Infrared. He could see more unnatural remains scattered around the base of the hill, and on the rise leading up to where he was standing. He spotted a handful of areas that looked like they had been shallow pits a few centuries before, lined up at the foot of the mound.
Something in his brain clicked. "Fighting positions."
*Wheep?*
He scanned the hill again. Now he could detect the remains of probably scores of ancient Vex goblins lying hid under the undergrowth and the dirt, forming the foundation for the ones he added that short year ago. "There was a fight here. A big one, too. Where exactly did you find me?"
Beeper gestured toward a clear spot next to the ruined device.
Krix glanced back and, having not switched out of infrared yet, saw a different shape sticking up out of the dirt near the machine. He stepped over and kneeled down, switching back to his normal sight.
It was the com array's memory bank. "Beeper, see if you can access the last few transmissions on here."
His ghost nodded and scanned the device, pulling what data he could directly from the machine. He then projected a list of sent and received signals. What was left of them anyways.
Krix quickly scrolled through his short conversation with the Corsair that picked him up all that time ago (seemed like decades, to be honest). The last five transmissions where what surprised him though- both the sent and received messages where mirrors of each other, almost as if the array had sent out a signal then later received that exact same message.
Krix hit the most intact one.
Immediately his voice boomed back at him from his ghost as Vex gunfire echoed in the background of the transmission. "Any nearby ships! This is th-h-h-h- …-ck! Our craft has crash-landed on the Centaur Nessus, designation 7066! We've suffered heavy casualties fro-0-0-0-o-m the local Vex forces in the area, and are in need of imme-e-e-e-e-dzzzt support!" a loud blast echoed in the background, obviously disrupting the speaker. "HYDRA! Riot, get your ATGM on that bastard right now!" The hunter stood transfixed as he listened to the sound of desperate battle in the background. "Mayday, mayday, I repeat! The cre-e-e-e- n-n-n-need immediate evac, we're being hunted b-y-y-y-y dzzzzzzzt! …amn it, Proctor, take over the mic!" A new Exo voice acknowledged with a panicy 'yessir!' started making more calls. The new voice was shaking, almost crying as the sounds of large-caliber automatic gunfire answered the screeching battlecries of charging Goblins. Krix could see the hillock now, what it must have looked like all of those centuries ago: fire, fury, and metal machines fighting like wild dogs.
"Mayday, Mayday! We've crash-landed on the Centaur Nessus! Please, there's only a fe-e-e-e-e-w… e-e-e-ft! Is anyone out there?!" An Exo's scream sounded from the recording. Krix's face turned stone cold as he listened. He recognized the young Exo's voice. He could hear his own now in the background, letting off long bursts of gunfire as he and the rest of his squad made their last stand around the only lifeline of the crew. "Proctor! Keep that comms array up! Ri-i-i-i-dzzzzt! Shift your fire right and handle those flankers! Lily! Get that LMG back up NOW!" He could see Riot in his mind's eye, missing a leg and surrounded by empty ATGM tubes, fire at a squad of rushers and blow them to hell, before being stepped on by a massive minotaur and ground into the dirt as he screamed. "RIOT! FUCK!"
The loud BZZT of the recording ending snapped Krix out of his trance. His head was starting to hurt. He glanced at the records of the couple other transmits from the same time period.
"They had our comms blocked the entire time. The Vex were just looping it through their time maze and we never knew." He glanced forlornly around the hill. "our entire fight was for nothing. We died for nothing." He shook his head. "And they were laughing at us."
He sighed and saw something else in the dirt. Something he should have remembered from the day he was Risen.
It was a limb. An Exo arm, the wires long gone, leaving behind only the strong Titanium 'bones' and the shape-plates on the forearm. The hand itself was surprisingly intact though. Krix gently dug away, trying to reach the rest of the body- the same one he had recovered his first rifle from. Why? He didn't know. As far as he knew, it could just be another one of the Marines he dragged to this suicide mission.
After a little bit he reached the head. The body was laying face down, the back of the skull utterly destroyed from some sort of energy weapon, most likely from a Vex Hydra. But the face was intact, lightless eyes staring out in despair. Red and white paint chips could be seen pressed into the dirt.
When he turned it over something flashed in front of his eyes, so hard it immediately caused a migraine on levels he had never felt before. In that moment it was as if he had just been dumped right back into the firefight as an invisible spectator, Vex rounds flying over his head as he watched the Exo crawl away from a smoking crater.
He knew who this was.
He could hear her voice, dim and out of focus, masked by gunfire, but he knew it was hers. "Krix! What do we do?! I don't want to die like this! Not after everything!"
"KRIX!"
With a grunt, he dropped the devastated head and grabbed his own, blinking as he tried to sort out the torrent of… things flying around in his brain. Beeper was at his side in a flash, his normally annoying whistles soft and comforting.
He groaned again as the voices and the flashes subsided and the quiet of his surroundings took back over. "I'm… I'm fine. Just… ow."
*Wheeple?*
"Yeah. More flashbacks. I guess. Just pieces, though."
He stood up and looked back down at the body. "I remember her, I think. Not- not her name. But her voice."
He glanced back up, scanning for reinforced Titanium. He counted twelve other Exo bodies scattered nearby, all damaged from Vex weaponry. Strangely no organic remains… just Exos. The remains of his recon team.
And Vex. Plenty of Vex.
He walked over and sat down on the outcropping that overlooked that nearby valley. Beeper settled onto his designated spot on Krix's shoulder.
Krix slid down his hood and sighed. "Well, best I can figure I was in a military Exo unit that got wiped out by the Vex as we tried to send a distress signal of some sort. In the middle of absolute nowhere. I guess the next step is to search the bodies to find some sort of identifying… stuff. ID chips or something."
Before he could get back up though, both he and Beeper heard a distinct female voice, ridiculously chipper, yet full of eager, wary hope: "Lieutenant?"