It hasn't been years, he discovers, since he died.
It's only been three months.
Three months where all the Guardian has been thinking about is sweet, sweet revenge and carnage and payback. That's she's still going strong without stopping is a wonder in and off itself, because for all his knowledge of Guardians and the shit they can deal with as Light-augmented undead beings, barely stopping for a rest over the course of three months are sure to hit at least some form of limit that she can't break.
Although that hasn't happened yet. 'Yet' being the operative keyword here, he's sure of it.
Cayde is finding it all ridiculously surreal.
"We aren't safe out here."
Her reasoning is sound but since there's this teeny, tiny thing with him apparently being dead and all, Cayde ain't all that happy to waltz out of wherever the fuck they're at right now. The Tangled Shore is a haven to outlaws and the general scum of the system for a reason after all, and him parading 'round the block when the Scorned Barons are out and about sounds… not so fun. Not so fun at all.
"Don't want to burst your bubble there, sweetheart," he drawls and yanks out the knife embedded in his shoulder. He hands it over with a flourish that has her stare at his hands for a full ten seconds before she reacts, "but 'safe' went flying out beyond the Kuiper belt somewhere around the time where you landed here."
"I know."
The scary thing that's most certainly going to keep him up at night for the foreseeable future is that she's not lying.
She really does know. Or at least he's desperately hoping that she does.
"Come on, this way," is all she says before wrapping a hand around his gauntlet and hauling him up on his feet, immediately heading for the sparrow that's parked not far away. "I'll get us somewhere safe."
"Uh…"
She chuckles, a bitter, stinging sound that would have him wincing if he wasn't trying to keep her from exploding like a rigged grenade.
"Well, as safe as anywhere in this shithole can get," she comments and looks at him. "Petra had it set up by the time I got here."
"PV's here?"
She's nodding while her Ghost draws closer to the two of them. Sundance is still snug in her own little dimension and Cayde sure as fucking Hell ain't gonna bring her out until there's at least several thick inches of steel between them and the rest of the world. He watches as a large piece of pink… something is transmatted into the Guardian's hands and raises a brow.
Hell no.
By the Speaker's frilly boxer briefs, Hell fucking no!
"I'm not wearing that."
"You most certainly are if you want to go outside," she says tersely enough that for a moment it's like seeing Zavala glare at him.
Zavala's not nearly as cute as the Guardian is, though.
The cloak however is an absolute eyesore with its bright magenta-pink color and it's absolutely going to clash horribly with his already-fabulous getup.
"Pink is so not my color."
"You can throw it away for all I care when we're out of the open."
"This is going to clash horribly with my color scheme, you absolute fiend. I hate you for making me wear this."
"No he doesn't," Sundance quips and for a moment there, Cayde's as tense as a Fallen going on an ether hunger strike, but she doesn't materialize. She's only tapped into the Guardian's Ghost's and he can breathe easy once more, "He's being a drama queen."
"Sundance!"
If a Ghost could smile and jump around in utter joy, this would be what they'd look like, Cayde decides, because never in his years as a Hunter has he ever seen a Ghost spin around like it's flat out drunk and chirp like that.
It's adorable.
He catches it out of the corner of his eye, but the Guardian tenses when she hears his little buddy. Guess there's some stuff he still needs to wheedle out of her, but that's not now when both of them might as well have a big, fat target painted on their backs. Later, preferably with a stiff drink or two to loosen up the joints—kid might still have some of the good stuff from Amanda's storage stashed away somewhere, he knew that he'd left a cache or two onboard her ship not long after the Red Legion had been kicked out of the City.
Nonetheless he shucks out of Andal's cape and carefully folds it before taking that hideous thing masquerading as a Hunter Cloak—of course not before he's looked it over with the proper amount of disdain that such a wretched creation deserves—and fastening it beneath his scarf. The Guardian is silent the entire time, eyes flickering back to him every few seconds when she's probably sure that he ain't looking at her. She freezes whenever she figures out that she's caught by him and her eyes are straight ahead once more.
Still adorable
As soon as he's finished tangling with the monstrosity, she's fishing out a small comm with one hand, the other having returned around his lower arm. Her fingers are curling around his wrist and he shuffles a bit until she lets go of him. He only laces their fingers together in return and cracks a smile at her.
"Petra," the Guardian is speaking quietly into the comm while keeping a close eye on Cayde, her Ghost and their surroundings. Nothing appears to escape her notice as they're slowly beginning to make their way to wherever it is that this so-called 'safe place' is hidden away at.
PV's apparent answer has the Guardian scowl, but she doesn't slow down in her herding.
"I don't care if you've run out of fuel for your jumpship and you're trapped on the fucking Dreadnought. Get to the Lair, there's something you have to see." She's looking only at him now, eyes gleaming in the sickly light that the Shore's illuminated with. "Trust me," she says. "It's something you'd have to see to believe."
Petra's answer is apparently less than satisfying if the Guardian's scowl is anything to go by.
Cayde can't help but crack a smile before he's stepping closer, ignores the way that the Guardian is tensing up, and wrangles the comm out of her hands. The shit-eating grin he's wearing only stretches further as he waggles his eyebrows. "And here I thought you cared, PV. Shows what I know 'bout our supposed friendship, huh?"
There's silence on the other end, the Guardian is staring at him like she's not completely sure if she should deck him or just yank him down and kiss him silly. Frankly, he's a fan of the latter. He can still feel the ringing from when she hit him earlier.
Then the comm explodes in what he can only describe as 'frothing Awoken screaming'.
He daintily hands over the comm once more to his Guardian and leans back against the wall as a cackle escapes him. The Guardian is looking at him with a hesitant smile peeking out from the corner of her mouth, and that adorable dimple she has in her left cheek is peeking out at him.
Score one for Cayde-6!
He better keep that one to himself, though.
oOo
Apparently, what constitutes as 'safe' in the Guardian's eyes is the safehouse of the one and only Spider of the Tangled Shore.
Honestly, at this point Cayde really ought to stop being surprised anymore—it's no good for his health.
The fact that there's Fallen all around him, glaring at him with their creepy beady eyes and clenching at their spears and guns like they'd like nothing more than to put some holes in him that Sundance can't fix again is nothing short of eerie. He's just counting his lucky stars that the Guardian's with him.
She is being avoided like the plague by the little fuckers, as if they're more than aware of what she's done so far and what she's planning for the future.
The sickly feel of her Light covers her from head to toe as she's striding straight into the maw of this dragon's lair. It's oily and unnatural and apparently a wonderful Fallen-repellant.
Huh, who knew?
Doesn't make the nausea go away, though
If Spider's confused when she shows up with him in tow, he sure doesn't show it. The Fallen is looking down at the two of them, playing with an empty Ghost shell in one hand and looking very much like he's half a deal short of asking all sorts of—no doubt—invasive, incredibly convoluted questions.
Cayde's just beginning to feel the stress of the day.
"Well, in all my years I never thought I'd see the day where a Guardian managed to resurrect one of their own who'd met their Final Death," Spider's still talking—why is that overgrown gnat still talking, can they just please get out of here, it smells and it's weird and he wants to go home—but the Guardian doesn't exactly seem inclined to give the bastard any answers without a fight.
"How he's here is none of your business, Spider. The only reason I'm bothering you about this right now is to let you know that there will be a second Guardian in the complex, nothing else."
"How… magnanimous of you, my dear," Spider's cackling is grating on Cayde's auditory sensors and his body tenses from the way that he's being looked over as if he's nothing more than a piece of meat. "But what about your little revenge quest now, dear Guardian? Giving up on hunting down Uldren and his Scorned Barons?"
Spider mentioning the Barons makes it feel like the hives have broken out and all of a sudden Exos are no longer immune to the fucking thing. That the Guardian has been going toe to toe with these crazy bastards is a can of worms he'd really rather not think about right now when he's still reeling from trying to understand everything that's happened so far.
They'll talk about this later.
"Not on your life," she hisses and for a moment Cayde is choking because the Darkness around her just swelled up as if it's choking her. "That bastard has to pay for what he did, nothing will ever change that. Not even Cayde being here."
"And Cayde can hear you perfectly well since he's standing right here beside you," he can't help but say. It turns their attention straight at him. "Just, y'know, wanted to say something—I'm feeling quite lonesome all by myself over here, Guardian."
The Darkness crawls back from wherever it came from. He's writing that down as another win.
The roaring laughter that erupts from Spider is something he hasn't taken into account. The Fallen smuggler-crime lord-whatever-the-Hell-he's-playing-at-now is clutching his belly as he just keeps on laughing. The Fallen guards beside Spider are chittering nervously as they glance between him and their boss. In their situation Cayde would probably have done the same because Traveler above, that laughter must have scared a few good years off their lives.
"I see his infamous quips have survived him being shot by the little Sov princeling too," Spider cackles from where he's sitting, and excuse him but ow. "Although, I don't seem to remember him being that pink on the wanted posters passed around out here."
Wow, low blow. Asshole.
"Decided to change it up a little, gotta make sure they wouldn't recognize me straight away. It takes time to get this handsome every morning, you know."
He's ignoring the way that the Guardian is desperately wanting him to shut the Hell up, and he's having way too much fun right now to use his own filter.
Sorry, sweetheart
"Whatever keeps you feeling alive, I suppose," Spider examines the Ghost shell in his hand a bit more closely while answering them.
Talking about his death despite it never having happened for him is scary, not that he'd ever admit that to anyone currently in the same room as him, and even though it hasn't happened there's a brief moment where Cayde feels the hole that Spider's talking about in his chest. He's feeling around at his sternum before he can stop himself, letting the entirety of his hand spread out and just stay there. Nausea is coiling around the edges of his mind, as if he's been busy drinking the days away with hydrazine-spiked booze.
Thankfully the Guardian appears to still be able to take a bloody hint because it doesn't take long for her to finish up whatever business she needs to get done with Spider, and ain't that a whole can of worms that he doesn't look forward to try and open up later on.
Spider's gleaming eyes follow the two of them as Cayde and the Guardian disappear down a conjoining hallway and it's not until that they're far enough out of view and hearing that he steps closer to the Guardian, grabs her hand and holds onto it for dear, fucking life.
The meeting with that disgusting pile of Fallen crimelord makes him feel as if he's been dipped in sludge and left to dry somewhere on Mercury for at least a few centuries.
Ew
"Hell of a character, ain't he?" Cayde mutters and cracks a smile in what feels like an eternity when he hears the choked snort from the woman beside him. His fingers loosen around her hand and instead move to tangle with her own, lacing together like they were meant for nothing else.
"You are such a sap," Sundance is chittering through their private connection, but Cayde is the bigger person so he's ignoring her right now.
Yep.
Bigger person.
That's him.
"All in all it went… well," the Guardian notes. She's looking down at their laced-together hands like she still can't believe he's here. "I think?"
Every moment that passes is making Cayde want to just grab his gun, his Ghost and his darling, little protégé here before running for the hills.
"You phrased that as a question, why'd you do that? Questions are bad, especially when you're stuck out here."
"Hasn't killed me yet," is the only answer he gets out of her before she's stopping in front of a circular, locked door.
"Spider gave you your own room? What is this, Fallen Summer Scout Camp?"
Better watch his mouth or he'll end up somewhere bad out here. His question has her laughing though, so at least this one he can count as a win.
One more to write down
Cayde looks at her from underneath the pink travesty someone's dared to call a cloak and finally begins to unbuckle the clasps in the front while she's unlocking the door and ushering him inside like a right proper mother hen.
Colonel would be proud to see her right now, no doubt there.
The room is sparse, only containing a bunk barely big enough to hold maybe two people, a small light and a closed off space, probably for toiletries. The only signs that shows it being lived in is the fact that the bunk is a mess of blankets, pillows and whatnot else a bed might be expected to entail and a standard Tower-issued backpack resting against the headboard.
"You didn't correct him when he said that stuff 'bout me being resurrected."
His optics are making the room glow a soft blue and he finds that he can't take his eyes off her. Not now when she's standing there, bathed in soft light and looking way too innocent for all the shit she's gotten herself involved in.
"I don't want him knowing every single fucking detail about what I do," is all she answers as soon as the door is closed and the two of them are alone, really alone, at last. She doesn't look at him.
"Hey, look at me," Cayde sighs and steps closer to her. His hands come up to cup both of her cheeks, metal thumbs caressing her skin softly. "I'm here. I'm alive, y'hear."
"I know," she whispers and looks straight up at him. "Traveler's Light, I know, Cayde, but this… it…"
She breaks away from him and turns around to look at the bed, at the floor, anywhere but him.
"What?"
"It feels… too easy."
"How?"
"How? Cayde, you die, I go on the hunt for your killers and then, all of a sudden, you're back? Just like that?"
"It is quite convenient…" her Ghost agrees from where it's floating just above her shoulder. "How did you even get here, Cayde?"
Now it's his turn to find the floor or the walls or that very nice ceiling much more interesting than it probably ought to be.
"Oh, y'know… I have my ways."
"Cayde, honestly, I'm too fucking tired to deal with this kind of bullshit right now."
Wow, she's gotten blunt all of a sudden. What the Hell happened to the clingy, sobbing Guardian he'd seen not even two hours ago?
"Well…"
"Oh, don't tell me," Ghost sighs as it floats closer towards him, "You got into trouble, didn't you?"
"Well, not exactly."
"Traveler above, what did you do, Cayde?"
"I…" he's stalling, so fucking sue him, "I, uh… might have been poking at something that I shouldn't."
He swears, the fucking Ghost is narrowing its' eye at him right now.
"What 'something'?"
"Uh… Vex?" he's asking it like a question and he's an idiot and why hasn't the floor swallowed him up yet? The groan that sounds from both Guardian and Ghost certainly makes him wish for it to happen sooner rather than later. "I swear, I had everything under control!"
"You don't just go around poking Vex technology, Cayde!
"Funny, that's what the you I spoke to earlier said too."
"Gee, I wonder why!"
Since when did her Ghost learn to be such a snarky little fucker? He can't get it from her, there's just no way.
"Traveler, this is how you're here? You… you…" she starts laughing then and it takes a moment for Cayde to catch up before he's doubling over, laughing his ass off as if this is the funniest shit he's ever gotten away with.
Honestly, it's kind of hilarious and it's kind of tragical at the same time, that a member of the Vanguard has ended up in this situation, out of all possible people.
"What matters now is that you're here," she says and smiles at him. Before her Ghost can even protest, she's pressing her lips to his mouthplates, her smile like the Sun, "You're here."
The Ghost is making disgusted noises in the background. Cayde flips his middle finger at the little guy before burying both hands in her hair.
Cayde couldn't give less of a fuck right now.
She's here—he's here, she's willing—he's willing, and he needs it, Hell, they both do!
He needs the comfort of touch, of the recognizable and the safe. The—no, his Guardian probably needs the same, she just isn't as vocal about it. Cayde's willing to bet a lot that he can make that change.
"Urgh, get a room, you two."
With a dignified huff, the Ghost disappears from view when he begins sneaking his hands underneath his Guardian's shirt.
oOo
They end up on the small bed, legs and arms all tangled up and this is how he learns that it's only been three months.
"We went, just the two of us, to the Prison of Elders?"
"Everything was chaos out in the Reef. From what you told me, Petra contacted you personally and you were off before Zavala even knew what was going on."
"And… I ended up dead out there."
She's silent for a moment before nodding, the only hint that she's moving being the fact that her hair moves slightly against his jaw.
"Yeah…"
"What about Big Blue and Ikora? My guess is that all of this happening got them pretty rattled up." The scoff that leaves the Guardian has him straighten up sharply. "What?"
Her arms are crossed and a dark expression is making her look absolutely thunderous. She moves around and he lets go before she drags both of them over the edge of the bunk. When she stands up he stays exactly where he is.
"They did nothing."
It's ringing in Cayde's ears.
"No, no, that's—no, that's not possible. They're my fireteam, they had to have—"
"Oh, Ikora was shocked that you were gone, the Commander, too," she interrupts him. Her voice is strangely neutral, as if she's trying to distance herself from the fact that all of this had actually happened. "At the vigil we held for you, she raved about all of this was on Uldren's head and how she would personally take the Titans, Hunters and Warlocks on the hunt for his head, but in the end… it was all talk. Zavala just opened his mouth and said that we were no army and that there was no way he'd sanction any revenge against the Reef. Duty to the City and the Traveler came first. Both of them are still at the reconstructed Tower."
All of this is too much, too fast.
Cayde swallows, rests the back of his hand against his forehead while scratching at his horn. His mouth opens and closes again and again, because he wants to say something but he can't.
This revelation… it hurts. It hurt like a motherfucker, and the feeling is so eerily strange
"Clearly you didn't listen to any of that."
As far as comebacks goes, he could have done better. Could be worse, though, too.
"I watched you die right in front of me, tried to keep you alive through whatever means I had on me, and them telling me that there would be no repercussions? They're lucky it's only me and not the others as well out here."
"Yeah, 'bout that, where's the rest of your fireteam?"
"Somewhere on Io last I heard from them. Asher Mir's been running them ragged trying to "cleanse Io of the Vex plague", or something like that."
"I take it they weren't all that descriptive."
"Oh they were. Tora in particular sent a rather… colorful message to me a few days ago, actually. It was very educational."
"Tora's the… uh…"
"He's the Warlock, Cayde. You know this, you lost a bet on him around the last Crimson Days event."
"I did?"
"Sharpshooting while racing a sparrow across the courtyard ringing any bells?"
"Oh, him! Speaker's ankle socks, craziest bastard I've ever met; are we sure he's a Warlock?"
"His love for books and studying in the Light tend to be a dead ringer."
Cayde scoffs.
"Ikora won't miss him much, she has so many other little protégés to keep track of, don't she?"
"Beats me, I don't keep tabs on her."
Cayde hums and stretches out an arm. Without another word she grabs his hand and lets him drag her down into his arms.
This feels… nice, for lack of a better word.
"It feels like a dream—that you're here is… it's almost too good to be true."
"I better be the products of your wildest dreams or not at all," Cayde smiles, recounts the words he spoke so long ago, back when losing the Light, Cabal and regaining the City was the worst of their problems. Not her trying to deal with her grief through shooting criminals with extreme prejudice.
Her raspy laughter brings him out of his musings, draws his attention to her face which once more is dominated by tear-streaked cheeks and a quivering lip. He bends down, kisses her like it's the last time he'll ever do so, even though it's not. It'll never be, if he has anything to say.
He'll deal with her and the Barons later.
She just got him back—they can wait a little before returning to the real world.