Chapter 5
"Why would they leave with that traitor?" Ryan asked Shannon for the millionth time since the portal had closed. Shannon sighed and shook her head at Ryan. "What?" Ryan demanded.
"You know as much about it as I do. They could have been working together from the start or this all could have just been an elaborate prank." Shannon snapped at Ryan.
"Hey Shannon, Blaze, what they hell happened here?" Cayde demanded as he stormed out of the hallway leading to the vanguard's rooms.
"The Warlock in the Dungeons escaped and summoned a ton of Taken. We fought them off with a few other Guardians." Shannon answered.
"We killed all the Taken and then the Warlock showed up and convinced the other 4 Guardians to go with him, including 2 of your 'favorites', Ana and Edward." Ryan said.
The three of them jumped when they heard a scream of rage from the hallway leading to Eris's room. Cautiously, Cayde, Shannon, and Ryan walked down the hallway and stopped outside Eris's door, which was thrown wide open. The 3 of them stared in surprise as they saw Eris(clearly freshly showered) standing in the middle of her room. Every secret drawer had been pulled out and emptied, every cabinet was open and empty, and every artifact Eris had collected over the past 2 years was gone, including the Core(which had been in a pocket hidden in Eris's armor.)
"WHERE ARE MY ARTIFACTS?!" Eris screamed at Cayde.
"I don't know, I've been locked in my room." Cayde sputtered quickly, holding his hands up and taking a step back.
"Where is the Hunter that was taking my things?" Eris demanded.
"Uh, she's gone, along with Zeph, Ana, Edward, Jace, and Baris-7." Cayde answered.
"I'm going to KILL THEM!" Eris screamed, "NOW GO AWAY!" Eris slammed the door in Cayde's face, making him jump.
"Watch out, I can calm her down." A Titan said as he walked up behind Cayde.
"Where've you been Gate?" Cayde snapped.
"Locked in my room." Gate answered. Gate pushed past Cayde and knocked on Eris's door.
"I SAID GO AWAY!" Eris screamed from the other side of the door.
"Oh come on, let me in Eris." Gate said. Eris yanked open the door, ready to strike whoever was on the other side, saw Gate, and immediately lost some of her steam. Eris stepped back and let Gate through, turned to give Cayde a homicidal look, then slammed the door. Cayde shook his head and muttered 'Calm her down. Yeah right.' started walking away from Eris's room, motioning for Ryan and Shannon to follow.
"Since you guys are currently the only Guardians off duty, you will be cleaning up the mess in the center hall." Cayde informed them. Ryan and Shannon groaned as they entered the main hall(it's not really a hall, it's a large open space where the cryptarch and vaults are) and saw the destruction that had been caused. Ryan and Shannon sighed and began to clean up the disaster that was left from the fight.
….
"What do you mean, why would I ally myself with her? She's the best one for the job." Zeph said confused at the surprised looks from the group.
"Well I don't like her." Ana growled.
"What have I done to you?" The Stranger snapped back.
"Remember that one hunter you deemed 'Unworthy'? The one you LEFT BEHIND IN A HIVE CESSPOOL?! DO YOU REMEMBER?!" Ana screamed, enraged.
"Yes, I remember." The Stranger said, slumping down into her chair. "There was nothing I could do for you."
"SO INSTEAD OF AT LEAST TRYING," Ana screamed, "YOU LEFT ME DOWN THERE TO DIE! I WAS STUCK IN THAT CESSPOOL FOR TWO WEEKS BEFORE ERIS FOUND ME AND DRAGGED ME OUT!"
"I'm sorry I left you, If I'd gone done to try and save you, I'd be dead." The stranger sighed. Ana growled and turned her back to the Stranger.
"Now," The Stranger said, "Why do you still have that filth on your armor?" Before they could respond, The Stranger threw a strange glowing golden powder onto their armor. Zeph watched in surprise as the Taken energy vanished from the Guardian's armor, and then realized his armor was still covered in the Taken energy.
"What about me?" Zeph asked.
"I got you with the powder as well, but your armor just absorbed it. You were directly taken by Oryx, only killing him will remove it." The Stranger said. "By the way, my name is…"
….
Three days later, Ana, Edward, Baris-7, and Jace landed the Fallen Ship they had stolen in the Tower Hanger and prepared to depart the ship. The four of them stepped off the ship, Ana with a bag over her shoulder, and stopped as they were surrounded by other Guardians. Eris pushed her way through and walked up to them, stopping mere inches from Edward.
"I shall ask you once, and your answer will determine whether you live." Eris snarled, "Where. Are. My. Hive. Artifacts."
"Right here." Ana said holding out the bag. "Zeph had 'helped' the thieving Hunter steal the artifacts and then replicated them and gave her the replicas." Eris snatched the bag and started going through the bag, inspecting the artifacts. Finally, Eris sighed and slung the bag over her shoulder.
"Thank you. I feel that Cayde and Ikora will want to see you." Eris said before gliding away. Eris stopped by a Titan and spoke to him for a second before she handed him the bag and they began moving towards her room. The four Guardians, escorted by 20 others, made their way to the Vanguard's war room.
"MY HUNTER'S ARE NOT TRAITORS." The four Guardians jumped when they heard Cayde shouting, sounding very pissed.
"They left with a Thief and a Criminal. How are they not Traitors?" Zavala sighed as the four of them walked into the room.
"To start off with," Ana began, "A few of your Titans would be dead right now if it weren't for us, we recovered all Eris's artifacts and have returned them to her, and we just showed up with a Ship full of fallen info. Specifically, a Devil Ketch,." Zavala, Ikora, and Cayde stared at Ana for a few seconds before Ikora spoke.
"She doesn't seem like a Traitor to me. Just seems like herself. I vote to let them go." Ikora chuckled.
"Where is the traitor they left with?" Zavala growled. Ikora made a low growling noise in the back of her throat.
"Zeph is a Warlock like me, not a traitor. He is trying to bring down Oryx." Jace snapped.
"He said he already killed Oryx." Zavala snapped.
"AND HE LIED!" Ikora shouted. "He wanted to get these Guardians into his circle. He is considerably paranoid so he goes through weird processes like this." Zavala huffed and slumped back in his chair, clearly giving up.
"What's up? Is there a Mission to…do..." Ryan stopped talking and walking at the same time as he saw the four Guardians standing by Cayde. Shannon walked in behind Ryan and shrugged as she saw the four of them.
"Alright, now that everyone is here, let's get to your first Mission." Cayde announced.
"We're sending you six to an unexplored planet, recently discovered by Eris. One of her Artifacts, when powered with Void energy it opens a portal to an unknown Planet. You have 3 days to prepare yourselves and I want you back here at 6am on the fourth. Dismissed." The six Guardians scattered to their rooms and began packing everything they thought they would need. They wanted to get everything ready ahead of time so that if they needed anything they would have time to find it. For the first 2 days Ana stayed locked up in her dorm and refused to open the door, even for Edward, which was mildly irritating but he could deal with it. Although, several times throughout those 2 days Edward would see Ana running from her dorm to the hangar or Eris's room and come back with an armful of random junk and lock herself back up in her room. In the afternoon of the second day Edward got bored and went to bug Eris. Edward found Eris sitting on a crate in her usual spot in the vanguard's hall with a collection of random Hive artifacts around her messing with her tablet. Edward reached out and picked up the nearest artifact to him, a small oddly shaped battery like device about the size of a tennis ball that seemed to pulsate in his hand.
"What's this do?" Edward asked as he turned the object over in his hands, trying to figure out what it did.
"It's a power core used to power a hive sniper. It should be dead." Eris replied without looking up from her tablet.
"Supposed to be dead? Then why is it pulsing? The longer I hold it the harder it pulses." Edward inquired as he concentrated on the gradually increasing pulse, silently commanding it to stop. Edward nearly dropped the artifact when it responded to his command and stopped pulsing. Edward looked at Eris and saw that she was staring him down, clearly studying him.
"Is it listening to you?" Eris asked calmly, "Did the pulsing stop when you wanted it to?"
"Y..yes." Edward said, feeling intimidated by Eris's unblinking stare.
"Then keep it." Eris snapped, "It wouldn't respond for me so It clearly wants you."
"What do I do with it?" Edward asked, taking a step back.
"What do you think? Are you as dimwitted as some of the other's here? It's a weapon core, make a weapon with it." Eris growled. Edward nodded and quickly moved away before he really pissed off Eris. Edward went down to the hangar and found Amanda Holliday. Without a word exchanged between the two Amanda knew what Edward wanted and went in search of parts and pieces for him. Amanda came back with a large box of parts and held it out to Edward. Edward nodded his head in thanks and quickly transferred some glimmer to Amanda before taking the box and heading back to his room. As Ana had done, Edward locked himself in his room and began building himself a new weapon. Edward stayed up through the night of the second day and through most of the third day till he heard a knock on his door. Edward quickly had his ghost dematerialize his half-finished weapon and went to answer his door. Edward opened his door and would have fallen over in surprise if hadn't been holding onto the door. Standing outside his door was Ana, but not the way she normally was. Ana was wearing a knee length red dress that hugged all of her curves and sparkled as she moved. It took Edward a second to tear his eyes away from her chest and the low v-neck of her dress to notice that she was wearing heels and had a small band around her ankle. After a few seconds Edward looked up at Ana's face and was extremely surprised to catch a flicker of doubt pass through her eyes.
"Hot damn." Edward breathed, "Am I to be blessed with the presence of such a beautiful creature in my home?" Edward stepped back and allowed Ana to enter. Ana smiled and seemed to glide her way into Edward's room, her hips swaying back and forth as she moved. Edward closed the door and moved to stand behind Ana. Edward put his hands on Ana's waist and she leaned back into him.
"I'm scared." Ana admitted.
"You? Scared? Of what?" Edward asked jokingly.
"I'm not in the mood for your jokes, Edward." Ana growled. Edward sat on the couch and pulled Ana down into his lap.
"You have nothing to fear, I will never let anything hurt you. I swear it on my life." Edward whispered.
"I love you Edward. You know I can't dedicate my whole heart to you but I'll give you as much as I can." Ana admitted, "I am scared of losing you on our mission. I couldn't keep going without you."
"Sure you could, you just don't want to. I get it, I don't want to lose you either, and I know I won't." Edward responded truthfully, "I know that you are strong enough to take down the strongest of Titans, fast enough to outrun almost every other Hunter, and smart enough to outwit the smartest of Warlocks."
"Almost every other Hunter? Who do you think is faster than me?" Ana growled playfully.
"I'm faster than you, and I have a higher kill count." Edward chuckled as he began running his hands up and down Ana's sides, causing her to shiver.
"I need a shower." Ana mumbled. Edward stood up, lifting Ana up as he went, drawing a squeak of surprise from Ana. Edward carried Ana into the bathroom and set her down on her feet. Ana reached behind herself and tried to unzip her dress but could not reach, so Edward turned her around and unzipped the back of the dress for her. Ana wiggled out of the dress, leaving her in only her underwear and leaned over the tub to turn on the water. Ana straightened up and turned around to face Edward and began undressing him. Edward waved her back and finished disrobing and stuck a foot into the now full tub of steaming water. Slowly Edward eased into the tub and sighed as he leaned back. Ana shed her underwear and climbed into the tub, seating herself atop Edward and leaned down to whisper in his ear.
"I will make you beg for mercy when I'm done with you."
….
Cayde looked at his watch, which read 6:30am, and then looked up at the 5 guardians standing in front of him and voiced everyone's question.
"Where's Ana?" Cayde asked.
"Probably getting a bunch of random equipment." Edward stated. They waited another 5 minutes and sighed as they heard Ana walking back into the room grumbling about something. The 5 Guardians turned to look at Ana and were surprised to see her wearing a personally modified set of Armor. Most of the modifications were to her Heliopause Mask and Khepri's sting Gauntlets. Edward knew what the modifications did, she had pulled off the large air purifier over the mouth and had installed a much smaller one that was hardly noticeable. The less visible modification was the one she'd made to the lens. She had removed the previous lenses and installed newer ones that act as highly advanced scanners and could allow her to see in pitch black and see Hive, no matter how they were hiding. Her gloves had been modified with a strange bunch of wires and odd discs with wires leading up to the end of the scarabs pincers. Edward knew exactly what they did, but by the look from the other's they did not.
"Like it?" Ana asked waving her right arm, the one with all the modifications on it.
"What does it do?" Ryan asked, actually curious.
"It allows me to channel my Arc and Void abilities as a Hunter more effectively. If I swap out this disk," Ana paused to release the clasp on the small disk on the scarab and pulled another from her pocket, inserting it and re clasping it where the other was, "With this, it allows me to channel my abilities as a Warlock. I haven't figured out how to make one that allows me to use my abilities as a Titan. And for some obscure reason it doesn't work on my solar abilities at all. It does switch out much easier, theres a mechanism that does it I just hadn't loaded it yet."
"That sounds, uh, useful. I guess" Ryan stuttered.
"Sounds badass actually. Blaze over there is just being dense." Cayde said. "Are you ready to go now?"
"Yes." The six of them said in unison. Cayde reached over and picked up a small perfectly round orb. It was solid black except for 3 green spots on the top like a hive's Eyes.
"I'm going to toss this up in the air, when I do, hit it with your shadowshot, Edward." Cayde instructed. Edward nodded and Cayde tossed the orb, Edward put as much energy as could into his shadowshot and hit the orb. At first the orb did nothing and fell to the ground, but then it began to glow and shake before it levitated up to about chest height. "Step back." Cayde warned as the orb began to glow brighter and make a low humming noise.
The six of them stepped back and watched in awe and fear as the humming stopped and the orb seemed to draw all the light it had emitted and the light around it in. With a loud BANG a black substance shot out of the orb and formed into a round doorway like shape. The six of them stared at the portal, unsure of what to do, when the substance began to change color. It went from black, to red, to blue, finally settling on a hive like green.
"There, portal is stable. You can go through now, but let me warn you. This is a one way portal, once you cross over, you can't come back till you contact us. Anyone want to quit now?" Cayde asked. The six of them shook there heads and began going through the portal. Edward first, then Jace, Baris-7, Ryan, and Shannon. Ana stopped before she crossed through and l took second to compose herself.
Ana swallowed and stepped into the portal. Ana had experienced nothing like it before. It was like being pulled apart into millions of pieces and being dragged across concrete. To Ana, the travel lasted a long time, but it really only took a few seconds for the portal to spit her out and shut again. Ana landed on her stomach in a large circular chamber, which was shrouded in absolute darkness except for the small circle of light surrounding the guardians from a large opening way up in the ceiling, probably hundreds of feet up. Ana got up onto her hands and knees and looked up into the barrel of a gun that was pointed at her head. Ana looked up at the person holding the gun and stared straight into Ryan's eyes.
"I don't know how you convinced them you weren't a traitor but you don't have me convinced." Ryan spat. Ana looked past Ryan and saw Shannon using her Ward of Dawn to somehow keep the others contained. Slowly, Ana stood up and stared down Ryan, who began to shake a little in fear.
"This isn't the place for this." Ana's ghost whispered in her ear. "Look around. We're in a Hive cavern, and my sensors indicate that we are surrounded by thousands of them."
"Ryan, could we do this later?" Ana asked as she flipped on the Hive scanners. Immediately after turning on the Scanner, a mixture of dread and absolute terror filled Ana as she completely forgot about Ryan and stared at the hundreds, no thousands of hive surrounding them, laying just out of sight. "Shannon? Would you mind expanding your Ward? I'd tell you why but that would probably end in our deaths." Shannon looked at Ryan and he shrugged. Shannon began expanding the Ward, and Ana ran inside the orb and hugged Edward. Ryan and Shannon walked into the Ward curious to see what Ana would say.
"What's wrong Ana?" Edward asked, worried about her.
"They're everywhere. So many of them. We're going to die. Oh god, I don't wanna die." Ana spluttered. Ana's ghost materialized and made a sort of sighing noise.
"Alright, listen up," Ana's Ghost began, "We are currently at the bottom of a Hive pit, like the Hellmouth but not quite as deep. According to my sensors, we are currently surrounded by more than 50,000 sleeping Hive and I know there are probably Hundreds more hidden from my sensors. The platform we are standing is an elevator like structure, but it's not currently working. On my own, I cannot fix it, but I think if all six Ghosts present helped, It may only take us 10 minutes or so. There are lamp like structures around that we will have to activate to work on the platform. The second the lights come on, all the Hive around us will wake and attack. So be ready. Edward there is a vial of liquid in a pocket hidden on the inside of Ana's left thigh. The liquid it contains will banish most of the fear from Ana and make her able to fight. Put it in the slot on her air purifier and it will be turned to vapor and she'll inhale it. Tell us when you're ready." As Ana's Ghost finished her speech, the other 5 guardians Ghosts materialized and floated next to Ana's. Edward ran his hand along the inside of Ana's thigh until he felt the small vial about midway down. Edward reached into the small pocket and removed the vial. It was about the size of a fingernail, and had a strange mark scratched onto it. Edward reached up and unsealed her air purifier, releasing a hiss and causing her to begin to gasp for air. Quickly, Edward inserted the vial and sealed her air purifier, bringing a massive gasp from Ana. After a few seconds, Ana stopped quivering and relaxed and stood.
"Everyone ready to fight for your lives?" Edward asked jokingly. Everyone smiled grimly at his joking tone and nodded.
"Prepárate a morir." Ana whispered. Drawing odd locks from everyone except Edward.
"She said, Prepare to Die." Ana's Ghost said. "For some reason, while the anti-fear drug is in her system, she only speaks her native language."
"Initiating repair, be ready." Edward's Ghost stated. The ghosts began their work, turning on ALL the lights in the cavern and brightening the entire place. The Guardians finally got to see where they were. They were standing in the middle of a massive stone chamber with hundreds of Markings, scratches, and carvings everywhere. None of them noticed, but if they'd look hard enough, they would have seen that all the markings and carvings were clearly Human in nature. The thing that drew the attention of the Guardians the most were the hundreds of thousands of Hive everywhere, waking up and getting up. In unison, all 6 Guardians tossed their grenades out into the crowd, causing massive chaos and drawing the attention of all the hive in the room. The six Guardians positioned themselves in a circle on the platform, and began firing into the crowd of Hive as the Hive charged. Every Bullet fired dropped a Hive, but for every thrall that went down, there were 5 more to fill it's place. The Thrall were slowly gaining ground, trying to get into any openings. The Thrall's opening came soon, when Ana's auto rifle clicked empty and she found she was out of clips. Quickly, Ana snapped out her void edge and impaled the nearest thrall. Ana flexed her wrist, hitting the button on the scarab, and flipped the disk to Warlock. Ana threw the lightning grenade into the thrall, and activated her version of stormtrance, which sacrificed some power for longevity and chaining abilities. Ana heard the telltale sound of the others using their own supers after the click of their weapons on empty. Their Supers lasted a single minute, and when they ran out, Ana, Edward, and Ryan began using their Void edge, Shannon began using her Raze-Lighter, Jace pulled out his Arc Edge, and Baris-7, swordless as he was, just prepared to punch the hell out of anything that came his way with his Titan Strength. The six of them punched and slashed, Hive blood splattering everywhere, grunts of effort from the Guardians trying to survive, and the faint sound of the Ghosts messing with the machinery.
"Only 5 more Minutes." Baris-7's ghost said. Ana heard a grunt from next to her and turned slightly to see a Thrall had knocked Baris-7 over and was clawing at his face. Ana swung her blade and beheaded the Thrall, knocking it off Baris-7. Baris-7 went to jump back up but a Thrall grabbed hold of his left ankle and pulled. Ana tried to reach for Baris-7 but was beat there by Jace. The Thrall dragged Baris-7 into the hoard and was quickly followed by an enraged Jace. Jace got a foot into the hoard before Ana reached out and dragged him back. Jace turned to yell at Ana but a shake of her head stopped him. Ana saw Baris-7 standing again, fighting off the hoard surging at him, but was being slowly engulfed. Baris-7 made eye contact with Jace and signaled to him that there was nothing Jace could do, then Baris-7 used his super and shouted as loud as he could, Drawing the attention of the Hive away from The rest of the group.
"We're done." The Ghosts said. Baris-7's Ghost turned and located Baris-7 in the hoard, then transmatted him onto the elevator, confusing the Hive for a few seconds which was just long enough for Ana to hit the activation switch and send the elevator rocketing up. As they ascended on the elevator, the Guardians tried to ignore the grinding and groaning of the elevator while they retrieved their extra clips from their ghosts and began loading and reloading their weapons. As the elevator neared the top of its ascent the grinding and groaning grew louder, now accompanied with a loud screech of protest as the brakes kicked in. The elevator slowly ground to a halt at the surface before letting out a hiss of steam and going silent. The six guardians stood where they were for a seconds, looking out at the terrain of this new planet, until they felt the platform underneath them move. A loud screeching sound from the elevator platform caused the guardians to jump, and then bolt for land as the platform began to slowly fall back in. Jace, Ana, Edward, Ryan, and Shannon made it off the platform began to fall, but Baris-7 had been slower to react and wasn't all the way there. In a last ditch effort to make it, Baris-7 pushed off the platform and leaped towards solid ground, but didn't make it all the way. Baris-7 slammed into the side of the hole and began to slide backwards into it, and had his fall halted as Edward and Ana sprung forward and grabbed on to his arms and dragged him back up. The 3 of them fell onto the ground, Baris-7 all the way on land now, and tried to calm their racing hearts.
"Can we never do that again?" Baris-7 groaned.
"Gladly." Edward chuckled. Ana started to laugh and even though no one knew what she was laughing about her laughter was infectious and had everyone laughing after a few seconds.
"We should probably get as far from here as we can and set up camp." Ana said, trying to stifle her laughter. After a few more minutes, the six Guardians regained their composure and began to take stock of their surroundings. They were standing in the middle of a massive canyon, surrounded by solid black mountains on all sides with strange purple grass covering the ground. There were odd blue and red trees spread out around the canyon. Ana gasped, drawing the attention of the others and looked up to see what Ana was staring at. The six guardians as the sky above them began slowly shifting from the normal blue to a glowing green color and back again. The six of them looked at each other and set out jogging across the canyon, in the direction of the smallest mountain. Roughly 2 hours later, they had left the pit far behind and had covered about an eighth of the distance to the mountain, and they knew they had covered at least 24 miles, when they decided to set up camp as the sky darkened, clearly heading for night.
"Hey Ryan?" Ana began, after camp was set up and they had somehow got a fire going. All the others had gone to sleep except for Ryan and Ana.
"What?" Ryan yawned, staring up at the pitch black night sky.
"Why does Cayde keep calling you Blaze?" Ana asked, yawning as well.
"Oh that. When I was resurrected I took down a couple fallen and chucked a grenade into the engine of their ship. It sorta exploded. I guess a Fallen named Riksis was on the ship. Still have no clue who he is but I don't like him." Ryan explained. "In short, I made things explode and set a considerable amount of things on fire in the process." Ryan looked over and saw Ana struggling not to fall over due to how tired she was. "Go lay down. I'll keep first watch." Ana crawled over to where Edward was sleeping and wormed her way into his sleeping bag, snuggling up against him. Ana drifted off to sleep and began to drift towards an area in her mind she had shut out a long time ago, her past.
And that's where I'm ending this chapter. I don't think I'm very good at cliffhangers so I'm not going to try to force one. Sorry for taking so long with this chapter, I kept deleting what I'd written because I didn't like it. So here you go, I'm happy with the way this has gone and I'm going to start working on Chapter 5 part 2 as soon as I can. This will be a 3 part chapter. Part 2 will be about Ana's past and her fear of the Hive.
