A/N: Sorry for the delay before this post, busy busy.
When the trio transmatted into being on the landing gantry, Holliday was waiting for them.
"That ship treating you right?" she asked by way of greeting, grinning at Minerva.
"No complaints," Min said.
"You let me know the instant you hear anything rattle. I'll get her up to snuff."
"I hear Gen rattling," Kalina said with a smile.
"Must be the singular marble in your head you're hearing," Gen replied back, just as jovially, and Holliday laughed, before tilting her chin at Minerva.
"They want you down in the Archive. You been there yet?"
"We'll get her down there," Gen said, and the three started off across the bay and into the Tower proper.
"Remember, Mini," Kalina said as soon as they were out of Amanda's hearing. "Whatever they found or learned about your past, you don't have to know it if you don't want to. Like Saladin said, the Vanguard aren't going to force you."
"I agree," Gen replied, "But you'll probably want to consider it. I don't know the reason you're having them but your past memories seem insistent on being remembered. Might not be a bad idea to get them back into your head faster than slower, especially when it looks like you're probably going to end up remembering whether you want to or not."
Min nodded slowly. "Tear it off like a bandage, you mean."
"Might not be a bad idea," Kalina said. "Right now, it's kind of like water torture, isn't it? A drip here, a drab there, never knowing when more is coming, all disjointed and random. You're handling it ok now but if it gets much worse who knows what could happen?"
Min thought back to the flashback she'd had when Eris had reached for her, and charging in to kill that SIVA infected servitor, and wasn't sure at all she was handling it ok at all. Perhaps sensing her thoughts, Lev chimed in.
"Just remember, if you do decide to know, that life isn't what matters. It's not who you really are. This Minerva is who you are. No one is going to hold what happened centuries ago against you."
I might, Min thought, but only nodded again. Her previous fears had surrounded the thought that the prior her might have been some kind of monster- a killer or maniac or degenerate. Also thrown in were fears of remembering loved ones, family or children or friends, and having to deal with the pain of their loss all over again. Now, as she glanced at Kalina out of the corner of her eye, she found a new fear had joined those prior. What was she going to do if she remembered a previous relationship? A lover or a spouse that may have meant everything to her and that she'd lost or hurt badly?
She had referred to the name Nastya several times now- what if she was someone of that sort? Someone she may have watched die, or even caused to die?
Seeing Kalina laying dead outside the Temple had been what had set off her insane charge of the servitor, and her flashbacks during her rage rang around the name Nastya. She'd felt gored, something so valuable having been torn from her, even though she knew it was ridiculous. Kalina was dead, sure, but she'd be alive again in moments, none the worse for wear. Binky was safe and had been in the process of healing her, with little risk. And yet, even knowing that, Minerva had felt as if part of herself had been torn free.
Were the feelings she felt toward Kalina, because of Kalina? Or was part of her deep, subconscious mind taking what she had felt for someone else in an entirely different life, and projecting them onto the Awoken? Min was terrified that it was the latter, given that she'd said Nastya's name back on the moon while looking at Kalina's face, and given her reaction when Kalina had died in front of the Temple.
They wound down through the Tower again, following unfamiliar paths, until they arrived at a large pair of doors. As they stepped through, Min's worries about her past life and memory flashbacks melted away for a moment and all she could think was, why on Earth have I not come here before now?
The Patchwork Den was Kalina's little PT sanctuary; the Archives were that but on a massive scale. They stepped into a round room cluttered with mismatched tables, chairs, and lamps, with various throw rugs softening the concrete floor. The room itself seemed to extend upward at least three stories with a spiraling walkway, draperies or tapestries hanging here and there covering what Min thought may be doors into other rooms. Ringing every floor, stuffed almost haphazardly, were books upon books upon books.
An engram reader flanked a counter just before them, behind it yet another old and dusty tapestry that had been pulled to one side and hung over a bolt. Past that, the door to yet another room.
An Awoken man in a hood stood near this counter, Ikora Rey and Eris Morn nearby. All three turned to look at them as they came in.
"This is our Titan now," Ikora said, and the Awoken man smiled at the three as they drew nearer, nodding familiarly at Gen.
"I know that look," the Awoken said, eyes glinting with good nature as he looked at Minerva. "That's a look that says, 'where has this place been all of my life?' I don't usually see it on a Titan."
He stepped forward and offered his hand to her. "Hello, Minerva. My name is Rahool. I'm the Master Cryptarch for the Tower. It is good to finally meet you. Gen, good as always to see you. And you must be Kalina?"
As he shook the Hunter's hand as well, Ikora came up to his side. Eris was still showing a reticence, hanging back near the counter. Minerva appreciated that she was trying more and more to respect the effect she had on the Titan. In truth what Min felt toward her was less repulsion now, and more sad pity, and a fear that her previous panic attack might repeat itself. The moon, and the Hive, had helped her to understand the former Hunter a lot more, and to respect all she had done and come through.
"Thank you for coming, Minerva," Ikora said. "Zavala had something he needed to attend to, so he is unable to be here. We've found some more information regarding what the Hive may be doing on the moon."
She indicated for the three to come over to the counter where Eris remained waiting. A pile of books and scrolls littered the top of it. Rahool shifted several to the side with a casual but not careless sweep of his hand, and brushed off a scroll that was already unwound. He looked up at the three as if he were used to peering over the top of spectacles, though he wore none.
"I and the other cryptarchs have been digging into the Archives and sending out feelers to all potential sources we have, to find whatever we can regarding the Hive and their rituals from before we lost the moon. Eris was able to help us to find a copy of Toland's journal, which has a great deal of information."
He touched one of the dusty bound books to his right almost reverently, then tapped the scroll. "And there was this, which seems to bear out what Toland has to say. Does this look familiar to you, Guardians?"
He turned the scroll as the three clustered in close and peered down. On it was a sketch of Hive thralls, hundreds of them, gathered around a brightly glowing shard of stone the size of a small fist. Hovering near the shard, cast into stark shadows by the stone's glow, was a Wizard.
"That looks a lot like what we saw in that big chamber," Kalina said. "Only the glowing rock was much bigger than it shows here."
Eris reached out and opened Toland's journal, flipping almost expertly through the pages until she found what she was looking for. "He speaks of this Ritual here," she said, her three eyes flicking up to Minerva. As always, to her it was as if Kalina and Gen did not exist at all. "The Hive are seeking to drain the Traveler of its Light, using a shard of the Traveler itself."
Min raised her eyes from the sketch to Eris in surprise, and felt a ghost of a chill, a faint thrill of cold, lift the hairs on her arms. She ignored it.
"That stone that was floating in the middle of the room was from the Traveler?" she asked.
"So it would seem," Ikora said grimly. "And there is more."
She looked at Eris, but the strange woman was still staring at Minerva as if her gaze was a fly caught in a web. It didn't shift until Ikora gently touched her shoulder, and the triple eyes blinked as if coming out of a stupor.
Flipping through a few more pages, searching, Eris said, "The Ritual must be stopped, but even halting it will not be enough. What remains of the Traveler's Light has already been greatly weakened. So long as Crota lives, the Hive will soon invade and overwhelm Earth. The work that we five originally set out to the moon to accomplish must be done. Crota must be killed. Toland believed that he could be found in the Ascendent realm. This we knew, when we journeyed with him on that fateful day years ago. However this, I did not know."
She landed on a page and spun the book to face Minerva. Reaching out slowly, Minerva picked it up and looked down at the spidery writing, the language – as most beyond Russian- unfamiliar. Lev moved closer over her shoulder. As he had done with Watership Down weeks ago during her first trip into the Patchwork Den, he translated it's writing in clear Cyrillic letters hovering over the page. Min read, then her brows knit and she looked at Ikora.
The Warlock met her gaze steadily, almost sadly. "It is as it sounds," she said.
"What? What's as it sounds?" Kalina asked. "Mini, what does it say?"
Minerva looked back at the words. Her fingers felt numb, her body far away as she read.
"'It is understood that all of the Choir is gone save Verok. She and her mate Alak-Hul will be a not insignificant obstacle. If she chooses to Sing, or has the chance, we are lost. No one- even the Lightborn- can withstand the Deathsong. To hear it is to fall into death; one not even Ghosts can save us from. If we move quickly and carefully, I believe we can take her by surprise, sunder her viper's head before she even knows we are there. She is not the one that concerns me the most.
"'No, the true fear- beyond Crota himself, beyond the Ascendent realm- is Ir Yût. I have learned at some great cost that the Deathsinger, the Choir Mistress herself, still lives. She dwells in the Ascendent realm, and fawns at the foot of Crota's throne- we shall not be able to kill him without first slaying her, and a single note of her harmonies will tear the life and Light from our bodies. We cannot take her by surprise as we might with Verok. I must search deeper. I must search the Sword Logic for the way.'"
"There's another one of those damned things that knows the Deathsong?" Kalina asked. "I thought they were all dead? I thought Verok was the last one?"
"It seems we were incorrect," Ikora said as Gen took the journal from Min and began to page through it, looking confused and grim.
"I knew my knowledge on the Deathsong was shaky at best," he said as he did so. "But this seems impossible? A single note will kill a Lightborn? Eris, was Toland one for exaggeration?"
"No," Morn said. "And I knew no one then or now who knew more about the Hive than he. You will not find fault on that end."
"Then how-?" Kalina kept looking between Min and Eris as if the latter had somehow indicated the former was about to spontaneously turn into a small dog. "I mean, he's got to be wrong here. We know he's wrong. Min heard Verok singing the Deathsong to her. A lot more than a single note. She's still here, still alive."
"Yes, she is," Ikora said, and regarded Min.
"It's all incredibly fascinating," Master Rahool said. "The Deathsong is indiscriminate- to hear it would hypnotize and kill almost instantly anyone from the oldest and strongest of the Lightborn to a Lightless babe in cradle. I daresay only the Traveler themself could endure the Song for any length of time."
"So then I was wrong," Gen said calmly, looking up from the journal. "It had to be another Song that Min heard. Something meant simply to hypnotize or control, rather than kill."
"I don't think that's the case," Ikora told him. "I had considered it, but it doesn't logically follow. Verok was the only Hive we knew of that was still alive who knew the Deathsong. We know that those who have heard it peripherally suffered great pain with no physical cause, just as Minerva did. From what Minerva described to us about her confrontation with Verok, the Wizard was trying to kill her, not merely hypnotize her. It's physical attacks, the way it went after her Ghost- she had nothing but death in mind for our Guardian. If she knew the Deathsong and intended to kill Minerva, why would she Sing any other?"
"What do you mean, 'heard it peripherally?'" Min asked. "If the Deathsong kills all who hear it, who would survive to experience that pain?"
"Like most of the Songs, the Deathsong is targeted," Ikora said. "Remember, all Lev heard was a whining sound, because Verok was not Singing to him; he was not her target. The target has to be held in the mind of those Singing, and it has to be a joint vision for the Choir. All of them together, singing the Song, could destroy a world- but they must all hold in mind which world they are destroying; they could, for example, stand on Mars and Sing in Choir and destroy the Earth- but Mars itself would not shatter."
"However we have reports from those bygone days of one or two members of the Choir Singing to an fireteam of Lightborn," Rahool said. "Some were closer to the Singers than the others. Those closest, who heard the Song clearest, died instantly. Those furthest away- far enough to barely be able to hear anything- only fell unconscious, and then reported the feeling of pain lingering after with no physical cause. You must hear the Song and be targeted to die. You must hear it loudly and clearly, to die quickly."
"So there's a range," Gen said thoughtfully. "One must assume, the more Singers, the further the range, just as the greater the power of the Song. Those that didn't die instantly were those who were just outside of that effective range."
"So that still doesn't explain Mini," Kalina said with obvious exasperation. "She heard it right up close, clear as a bell, and she didn't die."
"Yes," Ikora said, and touched her chin lightly with one hand, tapping her finger to her lips and looking at Minerva as if she thought mere scrutiny would give her the answer. "And we do not understand why. It should not be possible. But then, much that surrounds you is strange, Titan, as you know. Enigmas on top of enigmas."
"So, what are we looking at here?" Minerva said quietly, looking from Eris to Ikora and back again. This conversation was leading in directions she did not like.
Ikora dropped her hand. "Plainly, the Hive are performing a ritual to drain the Traveler of its Light. This we know. They have bred an army with intentions of invading Earth- already forward scouting parties have been found on home soil. This we also know. Toland's fireteam, with the exception of Eris, went up to the moon and never returned. Eris came back with her Ghost dead and her Light drained, and with an inexplicable feeling that you, Minerva, are the only one who can go back to the moon to put a stop to the Hive and return alive. This has proven true, for you and your fireteam, granted-but true nonetheless."
"I have felt this from the beginning, though I cannot explain why," Eris said intently. "To stop the Hive, one must stop Crota. To stop Crota, one must first confront and destroy Ir Yût, the Deathsinger- but none can survive the Deathsong. None, except you, it would seem."
Min was leaning on the table, trying to absorb and wrap her mind around everything she was hearing. Here, in what appeared to be a completely unconscious gesture, Eris reached out and laid her hand gently on Minerva's. For the first time since they'd met, Min wasn't seized with a surge of repulsion. In truth, she barely noticed Eris had touched her at all, barely noticed the poor dark woman leaning almost intimately close, as if she meant to kiss Minerva's ear, or whisper into it. A dark, lonely yearning was in Eris's voice.
"You must go back to the moon. You must stop the Ritual. You must cross into the Ascendent realm, find Crota's Throne, slay the Deathsinger without succumbing to her Song. Then, Minerva…"
Here her other hand moved in, joining its mate and enfolding Min's.
"Then, you must slay Crota with his own Sword."