Aunor Mahal strode down the hallway of her rehab facility, deep beneath the wall of the Last City. She wore her Praxic Order warlock robes, yellow and black in severe, harsh angles. Above it, her honey-colored skin and braided hair would have been attractive, but for the grim expression on her face.

Another warlock emerged from an office and fell in beside her. Aunor didn't break stride. "Well?"

"It's a whole fireteam, ma'am," said her assistant. "All three of them have Darkness readings off the charts. Our Ghosts can hardly stand to be in the same room with them."

"Physical condition?" Aunor said. "Signs of wasting away? Mental illness?"

"That's just it, ma'am," said her assistant, lowering his voice. "They appear as sane and healthy as you and me. The Shadows of Yor rant and rave, but these three … it's creepy. They're so normal."

"I'll handle their initial interrogation myself," said Aunor, pulling out her tablet and entering the information. "The Darkness has likely changed them in subtle ways. They are liars, as it is. After spending three months on Europa, I expect none of them have any soul left whatsoever. Do they still have Light?"

"Yes ma'am," said the assistant. "All three still register the same Light levels they did before departure. Maybe a little higher, actually."

"Strange." Aunor halted outside a heavy steel door. She pulled up the examination report and read it carefully. High Darkness readings, but also high Light readings? No outward signs of deterioration? No mental illness? Her examiners must have been mistaken. No Guardian who communed with Darkness could keep their sanity and their Light. Their Ghosts, at least, would show signs of stress and sickness. She inserted her key and opened the door.

Inside was a concrete room, the walls, floor and ceiling each six feet thick. Three reinforced steel chairs sat in a row in the middle of the floor. Chained to these chairs were the three Guardians in question.

First was Grant-4, an Exo Titan. Stripped of his armor, he was still more than six feet tall. His orange eyes scrutinized Aunor, alert and wary. His mechanical hands gripped the arms of the chair, but he didn't stir. His history with Gambit was a black mark on his record, but he had many campaigns elsewhere with commendations. Interesting.

Second was Nell Anderson, human Hunter. Also a Gambit player, with a note attached that the Praxic Order was watching her closely. She barely topped five feet, with fair skin and jet black hair that framed her heart-shape face. She looked up at Aunor with nervousness and defiance. "What have you done with Hadrian?"

"Your Ghosts are being interrogated," Aunor replied. "They will not be harmed as long as they cooperate."

Nell exchanged glances with Grant and shifted in her restraints, chains clanking. "How long will you keep us here?"

"Until the Praxic Order is certain that you are no threat to the City and the Vanguard," Aunor said. She reached out with her senses, trying to determine how heavily the Darkness gripped this girl. But she sensed nothing. Strange, that. Aunor could always feel the Darkness on other patients.

Last in line was a human warlock, Jayesh Khatri. His skin was darker than Aunor's, but a spark of blue Light danced in his eyes like a reflection with no source. He sat stiff and straight in his chair, watching her and his friends.

"So," Aunor said, facing him. "I always expected to see those two here again, but you? You ought to be ashamed of yourself, Khatri. Think of your wife and kids."

"I am," he said in a low voice. "That's why I convinced my team to turn ourselves in."

"Yeah, and look what they've done to us," Nell snapped. "Chains? Really?"

Aunor turned to her, one hand poised over her tablet. "With Darkness ratings as high as yours? You're fortunate I haven't ordered you sedated." She returned her attention to the warlock. "So. You are the team lead. I want a full report about everything you did on Europa."

"My Ghost has my report," Jayesh said mildly. "He would give it to you, if you asked."

"I have his report," Aunor said, glancing at her tablet. "And it's nonsense. I want to hear it from you. All three of you face immediate exile, do you understand? The Vanguard cannot allow these powers within the City walls."

The fireteam exchanged terrified looks.

"So." Aunor gestured to Jayesh. "You, first. Start at the beginning. Name, class, assignment. Everything you say will be recorded."

Her Ghost appeared at her shoulder, ready to capture video and audio.

"My name is Jayesh Khatri," he said. "I'm a warlock, Sunsinger. My specialty is healing. Three months ago, just after the Dawning, my team was assigned to Europa. The Darkness had utterly wiped out two planets and two moons, and had seemed to encamp around Jupiter. We were sent because we have an excellent track record. And … Ikora believed that my connection with the Light would protect me from the Darkness."

"And did it?" Aunor said.

Jayesh frowned. "Maybe. In the end … well, I have to tell it in order."

At the end of the row, the Exo made a sound as if clearing his throat. "If I might contribute?"

Aunor stepped in front of him. "Name, class, assignment."

"I am Grant-4, Striker Titan," the Exo said in a deep, cultured voice. "Have you been to Europa, Ms. Mahal?"

"Yes," Aunor said.

Grant nodded. "Then you understand what it is like. I have been in many desolate places around our solar system, but I have never seen anything like Europa. It is a place of relentless cold, and ice, and wind that attempts to sear the flesh from bone. All three of us died of cold several times before we learned what to wear to stay somewhat warm. This was at the landing site. We died a few feet from our ships."

"It was embarrassing," Nell burst out. "Nell Anderson, Nightstalker Hunter. It was so cold, it made the Tangled Shore look like a tropical beach."

Grant nodded and lifted a chained hand. "We were unprepared. We set out into the wastes in search of the Darkness ships, as we had been assigned. We landed not far from a great pylon, floating like a black diamond above the white snow. We touched it. Spoke to it. Climbed up on it. Nell threw snowballs at it. But it was silent."

Aunor raised a skeptical eyebrow.

"The Darkness had spoken to Ikora," Jayesh said. "It told her to seek them out on Europa the day Mercury and Mars disappeared. But when we arrived … nothing."

"Are you saying the Darkness called you, but said nothing once you arrived?" Aunor said, scanning each face for lying tells.

All three of them nodded. No tells.

Aunor raised her tablet. "This is the report from Jayesh's Ghost, Phoenix. 'We have been on Europa for three days, and have learned nothing except how to survive in the cold. The Darkness is heavy and stifling, oppressing the spirit. At times, my very spark seems choked out. But it never speaks, never reaches out. We might as well be insects for all the notice it takes. All my life, I've feared the Darkness might notice me. I never thought it might ignore me, instead.'"

All three Guardians nodded in agreement.

Nell slapped the arm of her chair, jangling her chains. "We were there almost a month before anything happened. A whole. Damn. Month. I've never been so cold and miserable in my life. Then we started getting closer to Riis-Reborn, and Hadrian started getting the shakes. You know about my Ghost, right? How the Fallen rebuilt him with Servitor parts before he found me?"

"I have his record, yes," Aunor said.

Nell went on, "He doesn't do well around the Fallen. Anyway, they have this huge city inside a giant metal capsule out there in the ice. Like an arcology. They call it Riis-Reborn after their original planet that got Darknessified. Anyway, there we were, slogging through the ice and snow. It's glaciers upon glaciers, so there's huge blue cliffs, and landslides, and canyons, but it's all ice. And Jupiter takes up most of the sky, when it's clear. Blizzards whip out out of nowhere and I hate them. I never live through them. My body mass is too low."

"Stay on topic, Firefly," Grant said.

"This is the topic," Nell said. "So a blizzard was coming in. We'd detected a cave in the ice and were trying to get there, when all of a sudden we picked up a radio transmission. Do you know who Variks is?"

Aunor nodded. "Yes. The Eliksni who was loyal to Queen Mara Sov. We believe he is responsible for the riot at the Prison of Elders that lead to the death of Cayde-6."

"Good," said Nell, "because I didn't know who he was. I resurrected after the Red War. I'm going, 'Hey guys, there's some Eliksni calling for help,' and Jayesh is all, 'That's Variks!' and I'm all, 'Do we even care?'"

Jayesh sighed. "Yes, we cared. Or I did. I remember Variks from the Vestian Outpost. I met him, once."

Aunor gestured. "Go on."

Jayesh said, "We changed directions, which wasn't easy to do, because the wind kept trying to flip our sparrows. As we went, this huge Fallen ketch flies over, barely clearing the tops of the cliffs. Whatever was happening was close by."

Grant spoke up. "My sparrow is heavier than either of my teammates's. We had taken to roping ourselves together during blizzards. I threw them the rope, and I towed their sparrows through the rising wind to the source of the transmission."

"And what did you find?"

"A bunch of Fallen getting ready to off Variks," Nell burst out. "He was frozen to the ground, and they were going after him with spears. Jayesh managed to snipe a guy, then the rest came after us. They had this giant walker machine called a brig that was a royal pain in the neck, and the ass, and the elbow, and everywhere."

"A brig, yes," Aunor said. She tapped her tablet and loaded a series of screen captures from Ghost footage. It showed a two-legged machine with a rounded, heavy body, its arms and shoulders composed of missile racks and machine guns. The House of Devil's mark was painted on the chest. "Your story bears out so far."

"So then the Fallen backed off," Nell said. "Variks went inside the little building there to warm up. His teeth kept chattering as he talked to us."

"That's how he talks, Firefly," said Grant. "He chitters his jaw for emphasis."

"No, it was because he was cold!" Nell exclaimed, obviously continuing an earlier argument. "You never hear other Fallen talk like that."

"Have you ever spoken to one?" Aunor said.

"No," Nell said. "But I've heard them cussing us in the field and none of them make that sound."

Aunor sighed. "Please stay on track. What happened, then?"

"Another storm started to come up," Nell said. "Variks begged us to activate the radio arrays before the storm hit. He wanted to talk to his buddies or something. So Jayesh went out to turn stuff on."

Nell fell silent and exchanged glances with Grant. Jayesh gazed at the floor, as if his thoughts had wandered far away.

"And?" Aunor prompted.

"And … he didn't come back," Grant concluded. "So … Nell and I went out to hunt Eramis. She was preparing to give a demonstration of Darkness powers-"

"Who is Eramis?" Aunor interrupted.

"The head of the House of Salvation," Grant said, speaking slowly and carefully. "She was a desperately angry Kell who had learned to channel Darkness. She could create and control ice. She called it Stasis."

Aunor turned to Jayesh. "And you?"

He met her gaze, but said nothing.

Aunor stepped closer. "What did you do out there?" she asked in a low voice.

Jayesh turned his head and gazed at the wall.

Nell squirmed in her chair, as if witnessing her friend's reticince pained her. "He came back," she blurted. "Later. He taught us about stasis. You know. Darkness ice powers."

Aunor's gaze turned to Nell for a moment, then returned to the silent warlock. "What are you hiding, Khatri? If you refuse to answer my questions, I may have to resort to more drastic measures."

"I need a room," Jayesh said suddenly. "Alone. I'll tell you everything, but it has to be kept secret."

Aunor arched one eyebrow. Then she shrugged and walked out. A moment later, two huge Warlocks walked in, both wearing the yellow and black of the Praxic Order. They looked like they could have been Titans, burly men with huge arms. They unsnapped Jayesh's chains from the chair, leaving the shackles on his wrists. Then they led him out. Nell and Grant watched him go, anxious.

As soon as the door closed, Nell said, "What will happen to him?"

"He'll be interrogated," Aunor said. "If he complies, then he will be treated."

"He's not sick," Nell said. "Why would you treat him?"

"The Darkness is an insidious poison," Aunor replied. "No matter how much control someone has gained, or think they have, the Darkness will devour them. As it will to you."

"No, it won't," Nell said, leaning forward and glaring. "We're Guardians. And we use Darkness. We're humanity's salvation."

Aunor regarded her for a long moment through narrowed eyes. "Then you'd better be convincing."