Ultimatum 3: Rule and Be Ruled
"My Kell! Europa's mission was a success. I am going to Venus, to save my former Archons!" reported Gravian.
"I'll head for Earth, back up that team," said Soren.
"You escaped?!" asked Ramiks.
"I wouldn't call it that."
The line stayed quiet a moment.
"Ramiks and I have arrived at our destination in The Reef. We will complete our upload and make all haste to aid any remaining objectives… We will have our victory."
He couldn't hear Soren grit his teeth almost hard enough to crack them before the line dropped.
"Just down two floors more," said Ramiks. He checked his pulse rifle over and looked to Morik.
He found the Kell staring eerily at him, practically motionless.
"Morik?"
The Kell blinked.
"It was you who delivered this knowledge to us. You knew this would happen. Still, it bothers you?"
Morik blinked again, still unmoving for a moment before he turned to continue down the hallway.
Ramiks almost thought Morik wouldn't answer him, until they started down the next staircase at the end of the hall.
"Knowing what will happen," said Morik, "And being forced to see it through are two different things. If it were only a matter of better planning, or combining our strength, taking our conquest like any other…"
They reached the bottom of the stairs.
"I should have been there."
"Then you may have died instead. Or I may have died here. You are not yourself. It was you who taught me to change everything you possibly could, but to accept the things you know you cannot change. I have not lived your teachings well - it has never been my way to follow rules or rigid thinking - but I have tried to become like you.
I have witnessed everything you have achieved since I fell under your banner. Since The Traveler chose me, for reasons I still cannot know. You alone seem to have mastered the balance we needed as Guardians, what the Vanguard want, what the Crucible wants, the Iron Lords, the Nine, even the Drifter. You set rules, you fix your mind on what you believe to be the right way to do things - how the world should be - and then… You don't think.
I can only do the second part. The rules you make, the vision you construct, is beyond me. I have had to trust you to make the path for me, but when you place yourself on it, and me alongside you, there is no thought from me that needs to happen."
If Morik was surprised by Ramiks' speech, he didn't show it. The two kept walking and Morik tilted his head.
"I think I finally understand why you found the Light before any of us, then," said Morik. "The instant the path was before you, when the way was revealed to us, even in our captivity on Mercury, you only needed that first step. You pressed on, with your instinct, while I was weighed down and left behind trying to understand. Variks, too."
Morik stopped walking.
"This. This is why you are my Archon. Why you became my first Archon, despite the steady flow of new Guardians who arrived for our House. Why you are still my Archon. We have never spoken like this, not a single time have you even used my name until now. A House has need of diverse members."
"There was one other time," said Ramiks. "When I thought you might not move, when we escaped on Mercury. Rather than heed my call, even then when I thought your name would drive you forward, you stopped for Viksis. You have always been a Titan by nature."
"And you a Hunter, I realize. Here, at the furthest reaches of our potential, I think we have our proof: we were Guardians, truly-"
Before the two could exchange any other words, the loudspeakers of the base they had invaded keyed. Again.
"We will find you! House Salvation will-"
Ramiks slashed the nearby speaker off the wall with one of his shock blades, then sheathed it. They still had to hear the voice echoing through the halls, but it wasn't right next to them.
"When will she stop wailing like a child?!"
"Be patient," said Morik, "It's almost impossible we will achieve our goal without crossing her path. She will do as she always has since founding this Dark House; she will sit in her throne room and bluster."
Ramiks chuckled. "A rare word. You like those."
"It is fitting. We will show her how useless words are now."
The two continued onward.
Gravian slipped in through a broken window at street level. The building was quiet, as the streets outside were. There, in front of a reception desk, were the bodies of Dreskin and Yviks, at least one Ghost's worth of pieces scattered nearby. Gravian rounded the desk to look at the computer. It was inactive, but powered. Gravian tapped a key and found something still in progress, to her surprise.
A Ghost slowly came around the computer's case under the desk.
"I-... I only just resumed… I thought no one would come."
Gravian looked over the desk at the two Archons.
"No one did," she said. "But I suppose I'm not too late, if you're here. When you finish- Who… Whose Ghost are you?"
The Ghost grew small vines with thorns, and its parts floated outward a bit to make way for them.
"Yours."
The room filled with Vex and Gravian took a step back to turn - when she was grabbed about the head by a Gate Lord. Torch Hammer to her chest, it fired and sent her clear over the desk and into the midst of the horde.
Gravian found herself on her stomach, face to face with Dreskin's body. The room of Vex had already turned to aim at her before she'd even landed, and their guns primed together. The flash convinced her she could see Dreskin's skull under his armor. She tensed her hands, already splayed on the ground, and a Ward of Dawn saved her life.
She couldn't stand under its protection; it had been summoned too close to the ground, so she abandoned it with an ether blink. She put distance between herself and the Gate Lord and threw a Void Wall grenade into the room where the Vex had gathered the most, robbing them of cover behind two support pillars at the same time.
Rather than stay to face them, she jumped backward out another window, rolled backward, and turned to flee down the narrow street. More Vex appeared to block her way, including a Wyvern that immediately began firing at her.
Gravian shot the Wyvern with her Queenbreaker to blind it with sparks, Disintegrated a Goblin in her way for the extra shielding, and drew Viksis' hand cannon. She tackled the Wyvern to the cracked pavement, unloaded the hand cannon into its chest plate to rip off its armor, then slammed her fist through the casing to its Radiolarian fluid.
With fluid motion, she lifted herself into a handstand, flipped forward onto her feet, and broke into a sprint around the building she'd entered. The Vex, rather than follow her, simply teleported ahead of her.
Gravian stopped. The Gate Lord was there in the street too, behind a slew of Vex Goblins and Hobgoblins. Gravian's gun vanished from her grasp and she drew a deep breath. All four of her arms drew in, clenching each hand into a fist as they did.
The Vex opened fire at the Gate Lord's direction.
Gravian leapt into the air.
The first volley flew beneath her.
Void light bloomed from Gravian into a Nova Bomb she launched with all her might, all four arms forward. The Warlock technique flew straight, a Lance, and exploded to the rear of the Vex forces, vaporizing all but the Gate Lord. Gravian landed on her hands and knees, awash in her own light. She closed dirt and moss between her fingers, started laughing to herself where no one could hear her, and stood.
The Gate Lord recovered and leveled its Torch Hammer.
Gravian pulled her hands back again and charged, arms chambered at her sides and head out in front. The Gate Lord fired several times, dead on, and Gravian rushed through every shot. She lost her overshield, base shield, took a shot to her shoulder and even her face, and still continued down the street. When she was close enough, she jumped.
Her helmet and the Gate Lord's eye came within a meter of each other - a brief moment - before Gravian released a burst of Void light as if using a Warlock's Nova Warp. The burst ripped the Gate Lord to pieces and Gravian landed behind where it had been standing the instant before.
She immediately collapsed, feeling numb. Her Ghost remained silent; they both knew what she'd almost done.
Nearly ten minutes later, Gravian was able to drag herself into the room again. This time, she produced her Ghost to inspect the computer out ahead of her and drew Viksis' gun. Her Ghost approached the computer, the false Ghost appeared to attack, and Gravian shattered it with a single shot.
"They were trying to search the files and delete the message," reported her Ghost. "I don't think they realize what we're doing yet. There's nothing here to find anymore."
"Upload and send this location's message again anyway," said Gravian. "We must trust this Mithrax to not be confused, even if it means sending a message twice."
A ship approached outside and slowed to a stop. Gravian and her Ghost could hear the engines, as well as the boots hitting the ground shortly thereafter.
"When you are finished," said Gravian, "Ascend this building and hide. Survive. For as long as you can. Until your light fades."
She turned, sick from her overextension, and holstered Viksis' hand cannon. Instead, she drew a shock dagger from her belt, an heirloom she'd kept from her past life despite Morik's warnings. To this day, she didn't remember who she had been, nor why the dagger felt so important, but she knew in that moment she wanted it to be in her hand when she died.
"If only we had more time…"
"If only we had more time…" reached Morik as a message from Gravian's Ghost, along with a single snapshot of her walking away from it somewhere he didn't recognize. When he thought that was all, bare kilobytes of compressed data probably sent by a subroutine, another picture arrived like an after-thought.
He saw, from Gravian's perspective, the Nova Bomb she'd used.
Unfortunately, he had to blink and tune back in on the conversation he'd been having. Or rather, the lecture he and Ramiks were receiving.
"-were never worthy of being Kell," continued Eramis, pacing on a landing ahead of them. "Do you remember what we called you in House Devils, Morik? I had one name - Shipstealer - but you? Raider, barbarian, scavenger. Coward. You threatened my position only because of your successes, but you always achieved them without honor.
And now where is your House? Where is your power?! Even the frightened chattering of Dregs that you might have been Kell of Kells has faded before The Darkness! You are, as ever, pathetic, weak, a-"
Ramiks fired a shrapnel launcher shot at her, blinked up onto the landing behind her, and turned to aim. His first shot landed, taking her flatfooted and completely by surprise, and his other five were pumped directly into her back and chest as she twisted to try and face him.
"A- And! And…"
And she fell backward, in a chamber suddenly full of silence, to thunk dead at Morik's feet in front of most of her highest ranking subordinates.
Morik knelt, as if he could speak to her though she were dead.
"And you thought to ally with the very thing that did this to us all. We Fell because this Darkness came for us. The Traveler knew it could not win. Knew that we could not win as we were. Instead of prove it wrong, you gave in. And it is your fault now that your House is corrupted, sick, and swayed by madness. In your devotion, you betrayed them."
Ramiks reloaded, the House that had listened to the entire exchange of two Kells suddenly realized what was happening, and Morik stood.
"But we?" Morik looked up at the landing where now Ramiks was flanked by the House of Salvation's Archons. "We will save them."
"Starting," said Ramiks, "With these Archons."
A/N: In My Spirit (feat. Megumi) by Falkkone, originally composed by Shiro Sagisu
Morik and Ramiks' combined roar almost drowned out all the enemies in the room as they summoned Arc light to begin their assault.
"The rest of you, flee!" said Morik. "Flee, that you might be spared, but you won't get far!"
All but the Archons fled.
Kridis, the Priestess, leapt at Morik and four blades of ice grew into swords in her hands. Morik raised his hands, tightened muscles almost causing him to shake, until his palms were head level. A lightning storm, almost like a Warlock's Storm grenade, crackled through the air and disrupted her charge.
Up on the landing, Ramiks turned a blade on Phylaks to swipe her gun aside before she could fire, while his left arms worked together to aim and fire at Praksis.
"Fool!" Praksis stood unaffected, as a barrier shimmered around him. "Did you think we were not prepared for battle?!"
He leveled his own shrapnel launcher as he spoke. Ramiks ducked his first shot, turned the motion into a flip forward and downward, and landed behind Kridis. Morik dodged her first swing, then blinked to the landing to replace Ramiks.
"No preparation," began Morik. He punched Praksis, who staggered despite the barrier.
"No warning!" Morik ducked under a swipe from Phylaks, twisted, and kicked her in the chest from the motion.
"Will save you from me!"
With another roar, Morik floated up from the ground, physically dropped his assault rifle, and loosed forks of Arc lightning like a Warlock in the Stormtrance.
"For Gravian!"
He pulled the light in, yanking the two Archons toward him.
"For Viksis!"
He lashed out with his arms and overloaded the drones in the room giving Praksis his barrier.
The two Archons summoned Stasis to challenge him, and they found that his light, the ambient power radiating from him alone, made it hard to straighten up and look at him. Just recovering from his pull, they didn't have time to stop him.
"For my House!"
An Arc infused punch from Morik crunched through Phylaks' helmet and flattened her in an instant, followed by Morik twisting backward away from Praksis and focusing all his strength on his Stormtrance lightning. Praksis had equipment on his back to create another barrier in an emergency, but he found himself holding up his shrapnel launcher to help direct the barrier and defend against the force behind the attack.
Ramiks, meanwhile, was on the ground level laughing, crossing blades with Kridis. Ramiks had two Shock Blades while Kridis had four Stasis blades. Kridis used her advantage well, displaying excellent awareness of all her limbs and weapons to score Ramiks' shields, until Ramiks summoned two Arc Blades in his lower arms. Suddenly the clash of their blades was a gamble - would she lose a sword to an Arc Blade's slash or would she meet a Shock Blade?
The gamble was lost once, twice, three times - and suddenly Kridis was without weapons in the span of only seconds. Ramiks became a walking tornado of slashing and Kridis went down in a cloud of the ether her body released as Ramiks carved through her.
On the platform, Morik began to straighten and walk toward Praksis, all the while letting Arc light rip from his hands. Praksis could only watch as his barrier unit tore the ether from his body to power itself and try to save his life. He held up his shrapnel launcher with all hands as a wall that might keep his enemy from approaching.
Morik only walked. He closed the distance, held the charge, and came to stand over Praksis. Praksis shrank before him, until he was on one knee, his arms shaking under the shrapnel launcher and barrier… Then only the shrapnel launcher as the barrier gave way.
Morik stared, unblinking, his power equally as unflinching, while the light overtook Praksis and shocked him to his very core. Ramiks watched from the side as Morik flayed his arms wide, finally closed his hands into fists to stop the lightning, let the pause of silence hang, then dropped a Fist of Havoc to vaporize Praksis to a shadow of ashes on the wall.
Ramiks waited for his Ghost to finish the upload while Morik stood at one of the tall windows to look outside. Eramis' base in The Reef had grown vast and almost extravagant as this second Collapse had rolled over the system. Under normal circumstances, Morik wouldn't have wanted to come unless he had a raid team.
"She is dead, then?" asked Ramiks.
"She is. Her Ghost made time to pass on her last words. Her last words…"
He turned from the window.
"And her last wisdom."
"That researcher, Hardiman, was right. Those were not the powers of a Titan."
"He was right. Gravian proved it first."
A comms channel opened.
"No," came Soren's voice, "She didn't. I think I did, by accident."
"Soren?!"
"I couldn't make it through here, either. I'm sorry."
"Soren, give us your location and we-"
The connection went out.