A/N
I'm still here! Just a little late is all!
Apologies for the delay, I was hoping this would be done by Wednesday but I ran into some delays along the way. Still! We're back and I'm still at it! Trying something new with the chap title, I've started putting the story word count in the Title so you can know how many words to expect outside of the author's note and reviews. Comment if you like or hate it, and if you like it I'll keep it, hate it and it's gone!
Now, last thing, this chapter is a step back from where we were previously, I needed to do this to show some more of Louise's time on mercury and set up the next chapter a little better. That, and I kinda jumped the gun on cutting the Mercury arc short so some vital info got missed, (oops) that was the last straw before I started properly planning everything out.
Alright, you know the drill reviews are down below, enjoy the chapter!
Mercury 3 years 6 months Since Risen
Louise's head felt fuzzy as she slowly opened her eyes.
Her entire body still felt incredibly heavy and drained after her little or as Saito put it ridiculously over the top and completely unnecessary, nova bomb surprise trick. So what if she hadn't realized she was capable of pouring so much void light into a single charge? The whole point of learning was trying new things, and hell, if she was going to survive on this planet she was going to need more than a few tricks up her sleeves. Although, the side effects that she was now experiencing seemed pretty harsh.
Raising her left hand to her temple she began rubbing the bare skin beneath her finger in an effort to combat her growing headache. Her attempts, sadly, yielded no success. Looking around the cabin she had decided to take refuge in, she took in her surroundings, a habit she had begun to develop after having been ambushed twice now.
Her surroundings were so bare and plain that the only indication that she was in a different cabin from her last trip was the lack of dents on the roof from when she had practiced leaping with her light. Her legs still ached from the memory of nearly shattering them against the metal frame of the train car. As usual, the walls beginning to peel away and reveal their rusted surface from years of oxidization. And of course, there was no furniture to speak of, well, aside from the new addition of the... forge? It hardly looked anything like the ones she had seen in books she'd been reading. Then again, a lot of them had been generally fantasy novels which she knew couldn't be trusted in the slightest, not to mention the rather important fact that it was also technically an alien artifact.
Saito was also out of her head and could be seen orbiting the alien forge occasionally zapping it with a blue beam from his eye. Wherever his beam hit began to glow with a grid-like pattern on its surface. Evidently, he was scanning the materials or something... Louise still wasn't entirely sure how his 'scanning' or 'hacking' worked. She'd found a few books that covered the topics, but their concepts had been entirely beyond her grasp. Computers and code? It was all gibberish to her, and she often found herself ignoring it in favor of more medieval and fantasy-type topics. Saito warned her it may be a good topic to pick up, especially considering how the Vex, her primary, and previously her only enemy up until recently, were basically machines. It was a little more complicated than that, but they still operated in largely the same manner.
Seeing as Saito still hadn't noticed her and seemed to be perfectly content to keep his focus on... whatever it was he was doing now. Perhaps trying to 'hack' the forge to life. She instead let her gaze wander some more, eventually landing on the main doors of the train car. Des[ite feeling the now familiar rumble of the train however along its tracks half of her brain was screaming at her that the doors were going to burst open any second. Through them, a swarm of Vex and Fallen were going to come streaming in guns blazing and their swords drawn. She waited, counting the seconds as they passed... nothing happened.
"I'm not growing paranoid am I...?" Louise muttered to herself with a sigh as she realized what she had been doing.
"Hm? Oh! You're awake, good!" Saito suddenly perked up when he heard Louise's voice. "How are you feeling? Anything abnormal? Unusual?"
"Just a headache." And the fact that she just spent the last four minutes and twenty-three seconds staring at a metal door.
"Alright, here let me take a quick look." Saito shot a beam of blue light into Louise's forehead, and as it remained Louise could feel the dull ache in her head slowly fade. It was like a cool breeze washing away the blazing heat of the summer's sun. Louise felt the tension in her shoulders fade and her body relax once more, her paranoia slowly growing less intense. Still... she just wanted to be sure. "Hmm, that's odd. Your vitals seemed a little weaker than they should be... must be a side effect of using so much light all at once. Try to be more careful in the future allright?"
"Mmhmm... Do you mind if I open the door?" Louise asked, only half-listening to Saito, her gaze fixated on the door. "Just... maybe to get some fresh air?"
"Uuuh..." Saito's front shell whirled and clicked opening and closing a few times his gaze bouncing between her and the door. "Well, we are moving at some pretty high speeds but... it should be alright. I'm not picking up anything on the local comms, and there doesn't appear to be any Vex activity too close by. Sure, knock yourself out."
"Awesome," Louise said standing up and pushing herself away from the wall, actively trying to ignore the part where her ghost subtly mentioned some Vex were currently in the area. Rolling her shoulders and neck she shook some of the discomfort from her frame. Sleeping against the wall was rather uncomfortable, but for one reason or another she refused to sleep on the floor, something about seemed so... indignified. 'Not like sleeping against the wall is any better I suppose.' She thought to herself as she made her way over to the door.
Once she was in front of the large door she grabbed the large red handle and rotated it 90 degrees counterclockwise. The metal innards of the door making an audible clunk as they released their locks allowing for Louise to slide the door open. With a small amount of effort, Louise slid the door to its side, the old rusted metal screeched in protest as she did so. The old rusted wheels and deformed tracks proving to be no match for her light-enhanced strength.
As the door split away from the wall Louise felt the surge of warm wind slam against her through the open gap. Her helmetless head allowing her hair to flow freely in the wind behind her head. Even despite the nighttime conditions, the air felt as if it was boiling and the wind blew with the ferocity of a typhoon Although the wind may be attributed to the fact that they were actively moving at speeds of over five hundred meters per second.
Raising her head Louise admired the starry night sky, without any light pollution from large cities or civilization, the stars shone brightly and clearly in the night sky. Louise felt a soft smile form on her face as she gazed upon the sight. Feeling as though the wind carried away her problems away with it. Holding onto the side of the train with her left hand she used her free hand to reach an open palm out to the starry sky. It was so far away, and yet despite the distance, she felt as though if she just reached a little further she could reach out and grab them.
"Do you think we'll ever get the chance to see the other planets in this system?" Louise asked absent-mindedly.
"Maybe... Maybe one day." Saito said in a hopeful tone over her shoulder. "I mean... someone's gotta come visit sometime right? And who knows? Maybe one of the shipyards we end up visiting will have a capable ship for us. Then we'd be leaving this planet with a ship and a train to our name."
Louise's smile turned sad... "Yeah... maybe someday."
"Then again... we can't exactly bring the train off-planet... and considering how active the fallen are out here..." Saito began mumbling to himself.
As reality began to set in Louise suddenly didn't feel like staring at the stars anymore, she didn't want to delude herself with false hope. Survival was what mattered to her now, the Vex had taught her that. And now with another race gunning for her ghost, her already bleak chances of that had just plummeted even further.
Pulling herself back into the cabin she grabbed the door with her right arm and slid it shut in front of her. Cutting off her view of the night sky, she had more important things to focus on right now.
"Right then, did you get anything on this... forge?" Louise asked Saito as she gestured vaguely with her arm.
"Well, not much, but I have a few hypothesizes on its maximum temperature before we start melting the poor thing." Saito remarked. "And since we only have one of these things, and unless you suddenly want to start plundering Fallen camps for another one I suggest you don't break it. Considering how lucky we got after the last time I don't fancy our chances going after another one."
"I think we did pretty alright," Louise said cracking her knuckles in front of her. "Now enough about the fallen, how do I use this thing?"
"As I said before, we don't have a stable supply of Arc or Ether. Without those, we're gonna need to do things manually." Saito informed her. "I could try to teach you how to use your Arclight, buuuuuut without a proper understanding of how to control it the flow of energy, you might just end up blowing a circuit, or simply end up destroying the whole thing."
"Soooo?"
"So I'm going to try and teach you how to use your Sol light abilities," Saito said confidently but suddenly deflated, recalling how Louise's first lessons went with her Void subclass. 'With how you use these classes they are as much of a threat to our enemies as they are to us!' "Right... so, to begin let's just start with a simple flame, and learn how to control that first." Saito began. "Don't worry too much about lighting yourself on fire, your light should protect you long enough that you can extinguish your flame before it actually becomes a problem. Hopefully..."
"Real confidence booster..." Louise sarcastically noted.
"Eh, it's not like you need to worry too much about dying, after all, you still have me!" Saito said cheerfully bobbing.
Louise groaned and shut her eyes in order to better focus. She tried channeling her light into her arms, picturing a small flame dancing within the palms of her hands. She felt her light flowing like a gentle rive down her arms and into her cupped hands. Then with a slight prodding, and a gentle shove she felt it leave her hands bundling itself into a ball, floating gently above the palms of her hands. Carefully she made certain to trap the energy within a small sphere of her power and...
Louise frowned, 'I imagined fire would be hotter than this... Is it just that hot here on Mercury?' She thought to herself.
Opening her eyes however revealed why she felt no heat, for instead of a flickering orange glow, she saw a gentle violet glow. She had summoned a small, concentrated ball of void energy within the palms of her hands.
She sighed as she cut off her flow of light that kept the little ball sustained. She watched as the deep violet gradually faded to a lighter tone, before vanishing entirely. Gritting her teeth she bit back against the sting of her failure. 'It was only my first try, it doesn't mean anything about what's to come.'
Closing her eyes once more she tried again to visualize the energy traveling from her core, the gently flowing river, the humble thrum of its energy. She imagined gathering all this energy into a single concentrated point, then she pushed it from the palms of her hands into the space above it. Feeling the power in her hands, this time more powerful than the last Louise eagerly opened her eyes... only to find an even bigger ball of void energy than before.
"Tch..." Louise clicked her tongue and dismissed the energy letting it fizzle into nothingness once more.
"Well... third times the charm right?" Saito chimed in over Louise's shoulder. She had forgotten that he was there.
Louise didn't answer, she closed her eyes and tried again. This time she forced the energy out, commanding it to obey. Her light was her power! How dare it not respond to her call! This time she did not cup her hands, she curled her fingers as though she was holding a globe in her hands. She forced her light into a ball in front of her, confining it within the prison of her fingers. She felt her brow crease as she grit her teeth in focus, she would not fail, she is. not. a. ZERO!
"LOUISE!" Saito's panicked cry broke her focus and she opened her eyes. In her hands was a growing ball of void energy, rapidly increasing, in its current state it held the power of a small nova bomb! If it went off now it would destroy the train!
"RAAARGH!" Louise let out a war cry as she crushed the nova bomb within her hands drawing in as much of its discharged energy as she could. But even with her best efforts, a large amount slipped past her guard. The free energy detonating outwards and rebounding off the cabin walls. Louise felt the train car wobble and shake from side to side threatening to tip and derail the entire train. Stranding her out in the desert filled with fallen and Vex. She shut her eyes as she waited for the cars to flip and the crashing and banging that would ensue.
But it never came.
Louise opened her eyes to see that the train car was still in one piece. Gravity was still pulling her to the floor of the car, and there was no loud crashing and banging. She looked around to see if any damage had been done, behind her the Fallen forge had been knocked onto its side, but otherwise undamaged. The walls were a little singed and a few were sporting a bump or two, but otherwise, they were mostly intact.
"Well, that was a little too close..." Saito chimed in from behind her. "Maybe we ought to take a real quick break from the dangerous activities no?"
Louise let go of the tension that was keeping her shoulders up letting her arms fall limp at her sides. She was about to reply when she felt something was... off.
Leaning to her side she placed her right hand against the floor and waited. After about thirty seconds her suspicions were confirmed. There was no gentle rumble, no occasional bump from a weathered track, nothing. The floor was still.
They were still.
The train had stopped.
"Um, Saito?" Louise started, trying to keep the anxiety out of her voice. "Why isn't the train moving?"
"I had to use the emergency brake to stop the train, just in case we... you know... derailed," Saito said. "I'll need a minute or ten, it depends on the damage done."
Louise bit her lip. At the very least she hadn't destroyed the train... she just hoped the damage wasn't too bad.
"I'm... I'm going to get some fresh air..." Louise said making her way to the door. "It's... it's safe right?"
"Should be... I'm not picking up any Vex activity, and the Fallen don't typically set up camp in the middle of the desert. They'd be better off pillaging an abandoned town." Saito informed her.
Louise nodded, pulling on the latch built into the door she heaved the heavy metal door open to the night sky once more. Only this time, there was no wind to rustle up her hair, no force to knock about her loose robes. Just her and the starry sky above her.
She dropped off the ledge of the train car, feeling her boots sink lightly into the sand. Talking a few steps she enjoyed the feeling of walking under the night sky. Without a moon the desert was quite dark, only lit by the emergency lights from the train. Sitting down Louise lay back massaging her fingers deeper into the sand as she did. Seeing the abundant darkness surrounding her she began to feel overwhelmed. For what purpose did she fight? She was bur a small speck of light suffocated by darkness at every side.
"Hey Louise, I got an Idea." Louise jumped at the sound of Saito's voice coming from over her shoulder. "Just, bear with me for a sec here."
In front of her, Saito dumped a small pile of wood from various trinkets and collectibles that Louise had insisted they keep, and then immediately forgotten all about. Before she could inquire as to what her Ghost was getting at she noticed a small glow at the center of the pile. The small glow slowly grew brighter and brighter until it burst into a little flame.
"Before you yell at me, no, nothing memorable or irreplaceable is in there, and no, I am not doing this to rub it in your face." Saito quickly said.
"Then why?" Louise curtly asked.
"I figured you could do with some inspiration," Saito offered.
"Inspiration." Louise repeated flatly.
"Just... watch it for a minute or two. Fire is... it's not like Void energy, it's... different, the way it moves differently, it acts differently. It... well, just watch it over for a little bit, watch how it moves, how it flows, how it burns." Saito explained.
Louise hugged her knees close to her chest, resting her chin on their surface. Bored she watched the flames as they burned.
"Look, I need to get back to fixing the train but here," Saito dumped a small pile of other wooden artifacts, including a broken-up desk. Louise had hoped Saito could work some magic on it to fix it up, but sadly it was impossible without a glimmer. "Use this for fuel if the fire gets low, and don't let it go out!"
Louise was about to protest but Saito had already flown back to the train to resume his repairs. She let out an exasperated sigh and turned back to the fire. Noticing how it was starting to grow dim, she haphazardly grabbed a small piece of wood from next to her and tossed it onto the burning pile.
She watched as the fire flared for a moment, spitting embers and smoke into the night sky. She watched them float higher and higher until eventually, they disappeared altogether. The sight brought her some joy, so she did it again, enjoying the feeling of watching the embers spiral into the night sky. A small smile graced her features, the sting of her earlier failures fading slightly.
Curious she picked up the burning leg of a wooden desk from the pile. The top of its frame was currently alight and burning slowly. As she removed it from the pile its fire began to dim slowly flickering before reducing to embers. Not wanting the flame to die she cautiously blew on the ember feeding them oxygen as she did so and as she did, glowed a small bit brighter.
Feeling ambitious she drew the end close holding out her free hand in a cradled position beneath the flame. Once more she tried to call upon her Sol light to harness the flame. But as she did so the fire at the torches tip began to dim even quicker. Not wanting the flame to go out she blew on the embers some more to reignite the flame. As she did she suddenly came to an epiphany. Something that should have been so obvious she couldn't believe she hadn't thought about it before.
She had been treating the flame-like void energy, when in fact she needed to be doing the exact opposite. Void
Louise looked down to the end of her makeshift torch once more, during her revelation it had grown dim and faded to dimming embers. Instead of blowing on them again, this time she held her free hand close to the tip and focused. It needed fuel, oxygen, and carbon. Her light was paracausal, it could take on any form she commanded it to, a simple act of combustion should be easy.
She focused on her light, this time taking care to restrain her void light, channeling it like she did when creating healing or empowering rifts. Pushing it through her hand she began to feel a warmth building in her palm. Quickly spread up her arm almost reaching her shoulder. Opening her eyes she came to see... in her palm, no her whole right arm... was very much on fire!
"GAAAH!" Louise screamed in a panic quickly waving her arm in an effort to extinguish the flames that had now engulfed her arm. Thankfully as her focus broke so did her flow of light, and the fire's fuel source. With the fire extinguished Louise let out a relieved breath.
"Bwahahahaha!" Beside her she was greeted by the sound of hysterical laughter from her Ghost.
"Don't you have a train to fix?" Louise ground out bitterly.
"Oh, yeah I fixed that thing before I started your fire. I was just waiting to see my idea would work." Saito said between chuckles.
"What!? Why you little... C'mere!" Louise sprung from her spot in the sand trying to grab Saito's shell but finding no success.
After approximately twenty minutes of relentless chasing, Louise gave up on trying to grab Saito.
"Alright! Fine. You win! Now can we just leave already?" Louise called out to Saito's blue glow, as he hovered in place tauntingly. "This place gives me the creeps."
"Alright alright, I'll fire up the trai-Ghrk!" Saito was cut off as a mechanical claw shot out from the darkness gripping him tightly.
"SAITO!" Louise felt dread build up within her stomach. Vex! But, she hadn't seen any phase in! Their method of transport would have set off Saito's scanners immediately. Not to mention how obvious the big white light appearing out of nowhere is in the middle of the desert.
"GAAAH!" The noise of Saito screams and the grating sound of metal scraping against his shell as the vex unit slowly crushed Saito within his shell echoed in Louise's ears. She knew she would never forget the noise as long as she lived. Without thinking her free hand shot forward, the only clear thought in her mind was to kill the Vex standing before her. A projectile, a bullet, anything, it needed to die!
Much to her surprise, a single small firework shot from her palm corkscrewing towards the Vex unit with impressive speed. Slamming into the goblin it incinerated its entire frame the flames practically devouring its limbs like void energy. A scant second after the unit was struck it became little more than ashes in the sand. Thankfully the flames did not seem to affect Saito in the slightest, his shell was, scratched, but still functional.
Still, Louise's heart did not stop racing until he was safe in her grasp.
"Are you allright!?" She desperately asked, fear leaking into her voice.
"OOOOOOOOOOOOWWWWW" Saito suddenly yelled. "Let go! Lemme GO!"
Louise quickly let go of Saito's shell letting him pulse his shell outwards a few times experimentally.
"Sorry... sorry, I know you meant well, but my head's a little... bruised?" Saito explained.
"Sorry! I just... wait aren't you made of metal? How does that bruise?" Louise realized confused. Then again, if Saito was entirely metal, how did he feel pain in the first place?
"Its not exactly like a bruise, its just... the memory of the pain still lingers... if that makes any... sense..." Saito trailed off as something caught his eye behind Louise.
Tentatively Louise checked over her shoulder... and immediately regretted it. Behind her, she saw a dozen glowing red circles illuminating the frames of Vex Goblins behind her. And before her eyes she watched as more and more eyes suddenly glowed to life as the inactive frames were activated by her presence.
Without a moon for the sun to reflect off of, there was no visible light beyond the Vex's eyes staring at her ominously. Louise gulped audibly as she stared down the few dozen units, she could not see their full faces, and anything below their shoulders was shrouded in darkness. They hadn't made any aggressive action just yet, most seemed to be shifting their joints, rotating their shoulders. 'They need to calibrate! These units must have been abandoned, and are only now being reactivated, that buys me some ti-'
Louise noticed the attention of every unit present shift, their single eye moving as one to look at her... no just over her shoulder at... SAITO! Noticing their intent and their weapons slowly being raised Louise needed to act fast.
Without hesitation, her left arm shot out to grab Saito's shell once more. The sudden movement however set off the powder keg just waiting to go off. As soon as she moved all hell broke loose. The vex immediately opened fire, the Sol energy from their weapons lighting up the desert floor. Thankfully the old units still had some kinks to work out and most of their fire was widely off-target, some of their shots even slamming into their own units. If Louise wasn't in such mortal peril she may have found the scene amusing. Sadly, comedy was the last thing on her mind as one lucky shot slammed into the back of her hand, the hand currently covering Saito.
The feeling of the burning beam striking her shielded hand stung, but her light held strong. With Saito in hand Louise turned to run, setting her sights on the train she focused her attention solely on her destination. Then she pulled apart the fabric of reality to... something was wrong.
She couldn't blink.
Not blink as in close and open your eyes blink! She couldn't cross the void! It... it wasn't responding!
Her light, it, it felt different. It wasn't the vast emptiness, the devouring hunger that she had become accustomed to. No, it had been replaced by something else... something... Something! Urgh! She couldn't describe it... whatever it was it was stopping her from blinking.
'Fine, if I can't get both of us to safety... then in that case...' "Get the train started, and if I don't make it... don't come back for me without backup," Louise said aloud.
"What?" Saito asked concern laden in his voice. "Wait Lousie don't-!" As he spoke he felt Louise wind back with her arm, and he didn't need to read her thoughts to put two and two together. Before he could react he was already hurling through the air at high speed towards the train.
With Saito clear of the line of fire, Louise could finally focus on the enemy before her. She thrust her palm forwards again, recalling the beautiful flame that had sprung forth from her palm last time. Imagining it devouring the unit before her, the gluttonous flame burning the vex frame to satiate its hunger. She grinned as she felt the heat rush to the surface, and felt her facade shatter as a pathetic collection of sparks was spat from her hand.
"What?" Confused she examined her hand, desperately trying to see what could have gone wrong. The Vex took advantage of her distracted state quickly closing the distance between them. Louise gasped as she saw a Vex foot plant itself in her field of vision. Quickly looking up she was greeted by the open palm of a rusting goblin unit standing before her.
"SHI-" Louise did not finish her curse as she was flung head over heels backward by a Vex melee slamming into her. Her shields held, barely. With a quick burst of her light, Louise was able to reorientate herself... mostly. She had some experience with hovering and a little more with flying. Frustrated she immediately retaliates with a strike of her own, but much to her own surprise there was no elemental boost to accompany it. No purple swirl, or even some puff of smoke, just a pure semi-transparent ring of light.
Thankfully the rusted and old Vex unit's body still crumpled under the force, scattering to pieces under the shock. But were one unit fell, four more closed in to fill the gap, each firing their weapons with varying degrees of poor accuracy. Not one to count her blessings Louise turned to run, she needed to get to the train before the-
"GAH!" Louise screamed as two bolts of Sol energy pierced her shields and melted through her left ear and right calf. Disorientating her and dropping her to the ground. Catching herself just before she fell face-first into the sand she bit her tongue and fought back a scream. With her ear damaged her head was swimming, her balance was a mess and her leg now left her crippled.
Behind her the marching feet of the Vex closed in... her heart began to beat rapidly as her breaths grew rapid and desperate. Their presence seemed almost physically manifest the presence of the darkness itself. She could feel it on her back, its hostile tendrils pulling at her fragile frame, tempting her to give in. She couldn't though, she wouldn't she refused...
Behind her she could hear the footsteps drawing closer again, she thought she heard a cackle, then another... and another. Growing louder by the second she could hear adolescent voices all laughing with wicked contempt at her sorry state. She was a failure, plain and simple. She was never anything more than a disappointment.
"Shut up..." Louise muttered. The Laughing grew louder, more intense.
"Shut up..." She said again her fear beginning to morph into rage.
"Shut up!" She began to yell, then a voice whispered into her ear.
"You will always be a zero" The laughing reached a peak and Louise's growing anger boiled into rage.
"SHUT! UP!" Louise roared forcing down her pain she spun on her heel with her good leg, and let loose a streaming torrent of fire from her palms. "RAAAAAAAAARRRRRGH!" The full heat of the sun melting any Vex that dared to get too close to her. For four continuous seconds, she kept up the flames shooting forth from her arms like the breath of a furious dragon. The flames consuming anything that they came in contact with. The night desert suddenly awash with light as the flames fought back against the forces of darkness, driving them from her train, from her home.
As her flames began to die and fade Louise let her arms fall limp by her sides, a wicked grin plastered on her face. "Heh... Not a Zero." She chuckled darkly.
Straightening her back she rolled her shoulders and turned back to her train. Feeling quite satisfied with herself. But her victory was short-lived. As soon as she turned her back a dozen balls of light accompanied by grid-like patterns suddenly lit up the space behind her. Louise didn't bother turning around and instead opted to move as quickly as she could towards her train. Using her light she was able to float at a slower speed than a sprint but it was still much faster than a limp.
The whining behind her reached its peak and Vex units began to drop onto the desert below. She had a few seconds at best before they began shooting at her, she needed to hurry. In a desperate gambit, Louise dropped to the ground below, landing on her left leg she launched herself forwards using her light to offer a strong burst of momentum towards her train. Behind her, the Vex had begun firing bolts of Sol energy at her with stormtrooper levels of accuracy.
Counting her lucky stars Louise sailed into the open doorway of the train car; her momentum carrying her across the room slamming her body against the opposite side.
"I'M IN! PUNCH IT!" Louise yelled, certain that Saito was listening in for her signal.
Saito needed no further instruction as the train lurched into motion. As it did Louise cast a healing rift at her feet to patch herself back up to full, but they weren't out of the woods yet. Seeing their quarry was beginning to escape the Vex opened fire once more. A few minotaurs beginning to sprint in order to catch up, firing weapons with little regard for accuracy. Their only goal was stopping the train, no matter the cost.
Seeing them gaining ground Louise leaned out of the open door, ignoring the Sol and void beams pelting against its exterior. They needed more time, not a lot, something small would do, a broken leg would be enough. Unfortunately, her rifle was currently in storage, so that was off the table. A void grenade would work, but... she couldn't feel her connection to the void anymore... something else had taken its place. Sol energy.
"Okay, no time to think... uh Sol grenade go!" She collected a great deal of Sol energy into her hand and underhandedly tossed it at the Minotaur's feet. However, the small ball of fire simply popped and fizzled harmlessly like a firecracker. "Dammit!"
The minotaur retaliated firing a heavy bolt of void energy that slammed against the train car knocking Louise away from the door.
"Ow... okay, I guess it's not as simple as just gathering energy and spitting it out anymore," Louise mumbled as she tried to come up with a new plan. Her Sol energy burned with the heat of the sun... if she could just call upon it... wait the sun! The sun was basically a giant fusion reaction and if she recalled correctly it was the exact opposite of fission, which was what void energy typically relied on to explode. So if she could just envision the same process, but reversed... "I hope this works..."
Having seen the sun right up close she had a good idea of how it looked, beyond just being a big ball of light in the sky. Picturing that same ball of molten light in her hand was difficult, she was concerned if she pictured the full thing it would explode with the same force as her first void grenade and destroy the back of the train.
Another bolt slammed against the side, they were getting closer! "Argh, screw it!"
Throwing caution to the wind Louise imagined the bright sun in the palm of her hand. Its unrivaled heat burning with the force of a thousand burning buildings. A minotaur was closing in.
She could feel the heat building in her palm. Another bolt slammed into the cabin.
"Louise! If you are going to do anything now is the time!" Saito called over their radio.
The heat was building, the reaction just waiting to take place... it was ready.
A minotaur was now reaching with its free hand, it was mere centimeters from grabbing the caboose of the train. Just a little more, and... suddenly its primary ocular unit was met with nothing but sand. Confused the hive mind ran a systems check to reveal that its lower body had... melted away? Its systems check got no further as the rest of the unit was melted down to slag by the heat of the fusion reaction occurring just behind its head.
Back on the train, Louise grinned devilishly as the train began to rapidly pick up speed, leaving the vex units far in the dust. Her Fusion grenade had arrived just in the nick of time, its heat destroying the minotaurs that were so close to catching their train. Had only one of them managed to climb aboard, the Vex would have had an anchor to the train allowing them to drop as many units as they liked on the train. They would have been overwhelmed in seconds, checkmate.
Despite escaping Louise still didn't feel safe, sucking air through her teeth she tried to ease her paranoia, convincing herself that no units had managed to sneak aboard. Thankfully she wouldn't need to.
"I ran a scan, none of them got aboard. And if any of them had, we would have known by now, trust me." Saito said from over Louise's shoulder.
"...Good." Was all Louise said as she slid the door shut.
Making her way back over to the forge that had been all but forgotten until now, she picked it up off its side. Tilting it back into its upright position, she made sure to dust off some of the sand that had clung to it.
"Now then..." Louise said, holding out a free hand she let a flame dance between her digits. "Where were we?"
The train had reached its top speed some time ago, more than long enough for them to have lost the Vex, for now...
There was use getting his shell in a twist over it, they had both made it back safe, if only barely. If Saito had a pulse, or anything equivalent it would be racing right now. That was the last time they made any stops in the desert on the dark side of mercury.
Looking over at Louise Saito felt his concern growing as he looked at her. He'd seen her 'confident' smile earlier, a terrible farce really. Her entire body had been shivering like a child out in the cold. The experience had been terrifying for her, but for now at least, she had something to cover it up with.
Saito watched with rapt interest as Louise pushed her flames into the belly of the Fallen forge. Heating the bucket of steel scrap and powdered carbon that Saito had separated from various sources. If Louise could heat the metal enough to melt it they would only need a mold to cast the weapon in, as opposed to the tedious process of hammering it into shape. They watched as the metal grew hotter, and hotter an-
"LOUISE STOP! QUICK!" Saito suddenly yelled.
Reacting immediately Louise snuffed out the flame she was currently spewing into the furnace. She turned to stare at Saito with a questioning look in her gaze. Saito didn't immediately reply, however, instead opting to run a quick scan on the forge, specifically the parts that had begun to near their melting points. Watching them carefully he waited and watched as their temperatures slowly crept back down, the metal alloy slowly losing its glow.
"Phew... that was too close." Saito eventually said. "Sorry to startle you but... well, it seems the forge is not as capable as I'd hoped it be."
"How so?" Louise asked with concern.
"Well, unfortunately, it seems this one might be a little damaged." Saito continued. "It's not unusable, but if we try to heat the metal to its melting point, well, some pieces of the forge will melt too. Rendering it useless to us."
Louise sat down, falling back against the door of the train car in defeat. "Great... so now what?" She said throwing her arms up. "It's not like some store is just going to have stell ingots lying around!? Now how am I supposed to make weapons with this thing!?"
She started kicking the forge in frustration. "Whoah! Hey watch it!" Saito shouted in concern. "We've only got one of these things and I don't think either of us wants to sneak into another fallen camp to try and nab another one! We barely got out the last time! And the majority of the campers weren't even there!"
Louise groaned and stopped assaulting the forge with her foot, she simply opted to fold her arms and glared at it instead.
"Didn't you read those smithing books?" Saito asked.
"Yes, I've read each of them front to back, we need an ingot... oh right." Louise suddenly felt silly, ore didn't simply come out of the ground in neat perfect chunks of carefully cut metal. No! It came out as a chunky mess broken-up mess! Not to mention there had also been many smiths that had used metal from various old metal trinkets and vehicles as scrap metal for their projects.
"Alright, so what kind of technique should we use?" Louise asked as she stood up from her place against the wall.
"Well, considering our bucket of various scraps I reckon we go with a canister weld." Saito said proudly.
"Okay, but how do you expect me to put together a proper canister?" Louise asked.
"Well, since it's our first time trying this, and we don't really have a lot of scrap metal unless we start cannibalizing the train. I think we can cheat a little bit and just use some glimmer for the canister this time." Saito said bobbing his shell in a nod. A moment later he shot a blue beam from his eye, it struck the table they had set up in front of the furnace and slowly grew upwards leaving a square toped canister that was about 30cm tall and 7cm wide. "Here we can put the metal and carbon powder in here, and then use this." Saito dropped a thin piece of metal in Louise's hands. "To seal it. Just use your Sol energy to tack weld the cap in place."
Louise nodded in affirmation but paused for a moment. "I'm going to need some tools for this."
"I'm glad you asked!" Saito said cheerfully before suddenly dumping a large heavy toolbox and a small anvil in the center of the table they were using. "Tah dah! I took the liberty of collecting some of these items while we were exploring the old town with the library. One of them had a classic smithy shop with some old tools leftover, it's actually what gave me the original idea for all of this!"
"I see." Louise said surprised by all the equipment in front of her. "How... how long have you been wanting to get me to try this?"
"A couple of years now. We've just never had a forge to do it!" Saito said giddily.
"oh-kay then..." Louise said a little put off by Saito's excitement. With her questions answered Louise set to work on her new project.
Line break
"Okay, please for the love of the light, don't crack..." Louise and Saito both tensed dramatically as she quickly sank her nearly finished blade into the metal drum of oil Saito had provided her. (She really needed to ask him when he'd snuck off and found all these things.)
"When you were too absorbed in a book to notice the outside world... so pretty much the entire time we were crashing in the town." Saito suddenly said.
"You aren't even in my head! How the heck did you know what I was thinking!?" Louise exclaimed in surprise.
"Studying your thought patterns and scavenging for parts has been my only pass time for the past three years; I don't need to be in your head to know what you're thinking." Saito said in an obvious tone. "never mind that now though, the blade's done!"
Dropping the subject Louise lifted the now steaming heat-treated blade from the hot oil to examine it. Holding up straight she checked to see if the blade had warped or was beginning to do so. Thankfully None were visible but she placed it on the anvil with a weight over it just in case. As the blade cooled Louise took a seat against the wall, amazingly, despite all the various items Saito had picked up, he had somehow neglected to grab a chair for her to sit in.
Once the blade had finished cooling Louise picked it up to inspect her handiwork. The blade itself was certainly nothing unique, just a simple, generic, shortsword. It probably wouldn't last long in the field, but... it at least proved she had potential. She smiled at the piece, admiring her hard work.
Saito ran a quick scan over the weapon she was holding. "Well, the good news is this one will at least operate as a weapon. It certainly won't be slicing up any Vex, but it might work against Fallen, although it won't be very effective against anything stronger than a vandal. We'll need to give it an edge, some kind of guard and maybe a handle, although for something like this I'd recommend we don't waste any glimmer for these pieces."
Louise frowned at Saito's appraisal of the weapon. All that work and it couldn't even scratch a Fallen captain? She sighed, so much for having a dramatic pirate duel with one of them... then again, maybe if she stole one of their cutlass's she could get a better idea of what she needed to make her own.
An evil grin crossed her face as she came up with an idea, now all she needed was a fallen party to raid. Surely there were bound to be some around?
"For once I don't actually know what you are thinking... and quite frankly, I don't think I want to know either." Saito said with concern.
"Oh, no need to worry my dear familiar. Tell me, does there happen to be any Fallen raiding parties nearby that we may be able to... relieve of their weapons?" Louise spoke in a honeyed tone with sing-song words laced with acid, that sent shivers up Saito's shell.
"oh boy..."
"Louise...? Hey Louise!"
Louise shook her head as she noticed a large hand waving in front of her face. She realized now she had been spaced out for some time. Turning to face the owner of the hand she saw Atlas's towering form looking at her with... mild concern? She was still terrible at reading people's expressions but for a moment she thought his eyes seemed... worried. Sadly whatever emotion might have been there vanished in an instant replaced by his usual no-nonsense Iron Lord Face.
"Are you well?" He asked in a neutral tone while folding his arms. "You've been staring into space for the past twenty minutes. For a moment you seemed..." That flicker of concern flashed across his eyes for a moment again. "...distraught."
"I-I'm fine now." Louise said smoothly waving her left arm in a placating motion. 'How the hell did he know that without seeing my face!? I'm wearing a helmet still.' "Just reminiscing on the past... How... how, much longer until our reinforcements arrive."
Atlas regarded her for a moment before looking away. "According to what I've been told they have been requisitioned ships and will be arriving in a few hours. How long exactly will be based upon whether or not they are shot down or crash on their way here."
"You don't sound too confident." Louise deadpanned.
This time Atlas's expression clearly took on a queasy look. "Some of my late brothers and sisters... did not excel at staying in the air for too long. If at all..." He finished with a bitter chuckle as sadness and pain danced in his eyes, and Louise cringed as she realized what he was thinking about.
"Ah, well, I'm sure our reinforcements won't have any issues right?... I mean, you got us here without issue." Louise offered to try and steer his mind away from the late Iron Lords. She remembered how hard it had been for her to wrestle her metal bull under control, she couldn't begin to imagine how hard an enormous metal drake would be. Atlas sighed. "May the traveler guide them." He muttered in prayer, but Louise couldn't tell if it was for their reinforcements or Lost brothers and Sisters.
On that heavy note, they fell into silence once more. Louise idly looked around the war room that they were staying in for some form of distraction. Her eyes fell on an interesting-looking throwing axe lodged into the west wall. She could also see a rather crude drawing of a vandal was nailed to its surface. Her curiosity piqued she strolled over and removed it from the wall with without much issue.
Examining it carefully she admired the craftsmanship of the weapon, noticing some slight imperfections revealing hammer strikes on its surface. Despite being concealed behind sanding and polish Louise could feel where the hammer struck the metal.
"Was this handmade I wonder?" She thought aloud.
"Yeah, we have a blacksmith in town who makes the majority of our melee and throwing weapons for us." The commander suddenly said from behind Louise. She had been watching the interaction between Louise and Atlas silently. "Granted he won't be around for much longer... word on the street is he's packing up shop to leave with you guys." She added with a distasteful snort. Evidently unhappy with the prospect of losing such a valuable asset to their settlement.
Louise nodded in acknowledgment. Atlas had mentioned their reinforcements won't be arriving still for a good few hours of time, maybe she could pay him a visit before they left? Of course, he may be traveling with them, but chances are she would not get the opportunity to speak with him while they traveled.
"I'm going to get some fresh air." Louise announced before heading for the nearest exit.
"Don't get lost." Was all the commander offered before she returned to her map table.
Louise turned to Atlas to see if he had anything to add, but the large Titan simply nodded to acknowledge that he'd heard her and made no motion to stop her. However, as she passed him he spoke up. "Have Saito hover over your shoulder. The people need to see that you trust them."
Lousie halted mid-step, she did not like the idea of Saito being out in the open around anything that moved of its own accord. Not after what had happened on mercury, not after he had been so close to... "Sorry, but I don't think I will. It's not that I don't trust the people of this settlement, but I don't feel comfortable putting my light on the line for a stroll."
"That wasn't a suggestion." Atlas said firmly, leaving no room for argument. Then with a sigh, he added. "Louise we are not warlords, we are Guardians. You remember how they greeted us at the doors, I won't make you remove your helmet but you must have Saito out."
Lousie clenched her fist in frustration. She had a million and one reasons why she was not comfortable with showing her Ghost. But if she was going to get any chance at meeting someone with a talent for the craft she had taken up, then... "Fine. Saito,"
Saito appeared over her shoulder nervously glancing between Louise and Atlas. "I will be back later, notify me when our reinforcements arrive." Louise stated before leaving the war room, not bothering to wait for any confirmation this time.
A/N
And that is a wrap people! Phew, 8.3K words, I'm pretty sure that's gotta be a record for me. Hopefully makes up for the extra week delay. Again terribly sorry about that, my old job ended pulling a fast one on me dragging me in for some extra shifts at the last minute creating a whole fiasco for me to deal with.
But with that shitshow behind me I can finally focus on my writing again! Until uni starts in two weeks, whoop dee-doo.
Eh, I'll manage.
Anyhow, onto reviews! Going to be trying something new now, let me know what you think!
hellion117 :
All I can say is them receiving fallen Lord ships is gonna cause some problems… good chapter tho
Well... yeah you got a point there. I don't think ol' Atlas is going to be too pleased to see them on the horizon. Or maybe he will but just be disappointed by what follows? Who knows? I do! But you don't! Don't worry you'll find out in the next chapter!
Thanks for the review and I hope to see you in the next one!
Zekken182 :
tnx for the chap! good to be back
Hoo boy! It is good to be back! Man, the lack of updates has been keeping me up at night for some time now, glad to finally be over that ridiculous writer's block episode.
Thanks for your review and I hope to see you in the next one!
Raven :
Glad you're back...(are you really though?) you've been gone a month, but alas, that's just life grabbing you by the neck and never letting you go. Louise's old personality is a sight to behold, you love to see it. Seriously, her arrogance is something to be seen, it's beautiful! New characters also, wonder what they're up too. Eh, It's kinda 50/50 right now, writers block hit me pretty hard over the summer. Either way, its going to be a lot of fun to explore Louise wrestling with her old self. Her time on mercury has left her pretty scarred, as seen above, so I am excited to reveal more of how she will be developing in future chapters! The new characters all have arc and backstories plotted out in advance so they won't be dragging the story anymore too! (their development ended up being my primary source of writer's block.)
Thanks for your consistent reviews and I hope to see you sticking around for more!
Jbest4781 (Dayum, lotta reviews, one for each chapter! Really appreciate that! :
Now since the majority of your kind reviews the chapters were compliments, to those I shall simply say: Thank you very much for all your praise of the story so far, and I hope to see you continue to follow me in the future to come!
As for some questions such as 'Doing well so far and wonder why campaign missions Louise will take part in before she returns home' My simple answer is : A LOT! She's gonna see some sh*t before she gets home.
And 'Great chapter here and can't wait to see Louise take part of the Destiny events and shift things around' To which I reply : With a curveball factor-like Louise thrown into the mix we can always anticipate a pretty major ripple effect to follow.
And Lastly 'Doing well so far and gonna wonder how Louise will get off Mercury. Also gonna wonder how her Sol training will go before she perhaps elevates it to Dawnblade. Not to mention her exploring more stuff on the other Void classes from the other Guardians' Well, we've seen how she escaped Mercury, and as for her Sol, training, the beggings just made their exposition above! I hope you enjoyed it. Now as for the void... well, she is a void mage after all. She is bound to come up with some... creative new spells to cast.
Alright! Thanks for your reviews and I hope to see you in the future chapters to come!
Okay now one last thing before I go, the next chapter may be delayed again as I will be going back to Polish/Re-write the old chapters. Nothing major, I will still be keeping the old story and the direction I am taking it, but I'm just going to clean it up. My writing has come a long way from where it started, but for new people just picking up this story, they will be stuck with my old rather janky long-winded nonsense that I started out with. So I want to go back and just tweak them enough that they are easier to read, and more appealing to new visitors.
Alright now with that said and done I hope you all enjoyed it and I'll see you all in three weeks!
(Fingers crossed for two!)