Scorch yawned as she and Dawn entered the Hall of Guardians. In her hand was a cup of coffee she'd picked up from a store near her apartment. Cayde turned at the sound of her footsteps approaching, and welcomed her. "Hey, great to see you! There's a lot we need to go over, so I'm glad you came somewhat early."

She glanced around the otherwise empty room. "Where are the others?" He gestured at where Zavala and Ikora usually stood. "You mean them? They're out doing something, I think investigating some kind of landing accident in the hangar. Doesn't matter. I'm here because we need to go over a game plan here."

She walked over, taking a sip from her cup as she did so. Dawn stood nearby, looking around the room curiously, waiting to be addressed should the need arise. Cayde pointed at the coffee cup in Scorch's hand. "Can I see that for a second?" She handed it over to him with a quizzical look on her face. The Hunter held the cup up to his mouth, and began to sip from it. A moment later, he handed the cup back to Scorch who stood silent in disbelief. "Thanks for that, that's the good stuff. Coffee around the tower just never seems to taste as good."

With that out of the way, Cayde looked back at the table and brought out a map of some landscape that Scorch was unfamiliar with. "I've talked with Amanda Holliday, the Shipwright here. Due to the nature of the mission, she's more than happy to lend you and your…" He searched for a proper word. "…companions, ships. One for each of you, and they're pretty fast. She's also providing a good stock of sparrows for your use since you'll be covering a lot of ground." Scorch faced him with an eyebrow raised. "We will?"

Cayde nodded. He jabbed his finger at the map lying on the table. "This is a chart of the Ishtar Region. The transmission came from somewhere within the mantle of Venus, underground. But we managed to triangulate its position to somewhere in this vicinity. Your job," he said pointing at her, "is to get down there, and start investigating. Whatever they were doing, the Heroes were definitely involved with something dangerous. Find some clues, narrow down possibilities, and see where this takes you."

Scorch just stared at him. "That's almost nothing to go on! How do you expect me to track down a group of people without knowing anything?" He shrugged. "That's why we've had such difficulties in the past, there's no info to go on. All of our trails ended up running cold. The only thing we ever managed to find was a large collection of Vex bodies that were apparently killed by them at some point before they disappeared." Scorch gestured at the map. "And where was that?" "Right…" Cayde indicated a spot on the map labeled 'Waking Ruins', "here. If you find something else there, hats off to you, but we combed through that area many times before. We couldn't pick up any sign of the Heroes' presence."

Scorch sighed. "Alright, thanks." Cayde looked over to the side and called, "Dawn! Could you come over here please?" She walked over, questioning. "What do you need?"

He leaned against his arm on the table, giving off an air of being somewhat impatient. "Is there anything you can tell us that might point in a certain direction for you guys to take? Anything at all?" Dawn looked over at the map. "What is this area here?" She indicated a spot that appeared to lay inland of the coast. "That? That's where the Ishtar Academy used to be. Some of the greatest minds of the Golden Age worked there." Dawn began to nod vigorously. "I'm not sure what, but something about that place is involved."

Cayde clapped his hands in an official sort of way. "Good enough for me. Scorch, you'd better go pick up your gear from Master Rahool. He's a nice guy, but can be a bit… vague. If for some reason, you find yourself with something you didn't ask for, call him out on it."

With that odd bit of advice, Cayde looked back to the maps, and began to mark areas of interest. With nothing else to do, Scorch walked out of the chamber, Dawn acting as her shadow.

-X-

"No, no. That rune means 'sun', so then this one has to either be a synonym or a relative term. 'Star', perhaps?" The Cryptarch mumbled to himself as he struggled to understand what a certain set of scrolls meant, and how they should be deciphered. He was often given puzzles and tasks from the Guardians that had grown fond of him, and he enjoyed challenges that could potentially help the war effort.

"Hello?" Turning around, the Cryptarch found himself looking at a young woman who stood outside his stand in the tower plaza. He looked her over, noticing that instead of a Guardian's armor, she wore slightly worn out jeans with a hooded jacket, and fingerless gloves. Probably someone who didn't really care about what others thought of her appearance. He straightened up, and greeted her. "Good morning. How may I be of assistance?"

Scorch held out the card that Cayde had given her yesterday. "This is from Cayde-6. He says I need some gear for a mission I'm taking on." The Cryptarch looked at the card, and sighed. "I'm not really fond of these exchanges, but they usually are necessary ones for dire circumstances. I'm more than willing to help the Vanguard when I am called upon. What class?"

She looked blank for a second, then her face lit up with enlightenment of his question. "Oh, I'm a Hunter." Turning around, he looked through a storage container and brought out an odd looking object, a dodecahedron. It was purple in color, and glowed softly. She raised an eyebrow and looked at the Cryptarch.

"What is this?" He cocked his head. "It's an engram. Do you not know about engrams?" She shook her head, and he sighed. "Ah well, I suppose living in the city can't expose you to everything. Well, it's quite simple to explain. Engrams are a fourth state of matter, one that items and objects, no matter the mass, can be converted into given the right hand in Cryptarchy." Placing his fingers upon the purple dodecahedron, he began to move them slightly, running his hands along several edges, and generally being very careful.

Suddenly, it flashed and began to take a shape. Resting in the palm of his hand was now a helmet, a very fine looking one at that. Scorch's eyes widened at the spectacle in front of her. "Well that's… new."

"Not really," said a voice from behind her. She and Dawn turned around to see Eager slowly walking the last few steps until he stood next to them. "What are you doing here? I figured you'd be out doing, you know, task force stuff." He shook his head. "Now that I'm apart of your team thanks to your extremely rash and quick decision, I was immediately reassigned to helping you. I was just looking through informational archives we have on Venus. Figured that we might as well be prepared." He nodded his head towards the helmet resting in the Cryptarch's hand. "The whole cryptarchy stuff is pretty common, by the way. Damn useful though. We find anything that we need info about or need to decode, he's our guy."

The Cryptarch nodded. "That's right, I will be your guide when it comes to comprehending the hidden secrets that engrams and encoded documents hold. Here's the helmet." Scorch grabbed the helmet from his outstretched hand, and analyzed it. "That model is Sanction Six, one of the finer looking helmets if I do say so myself. And here-" He reached behind him and brought forward the small box of engrams that he'd been looking through earlier, "-is the rest of the set. Just allow me to decode them for you."

Roughly five minutes and a large amount of decrypting later, Scorch was the proud owner of a set of gold and white colored amor. "Its color scheme is 'bloodpact', but you can change it later if you wish." Scorch raised her eyebrow, a common expression for her these days. "Change it later?" The Cryptarch nodded. "Just speak to the Guardian outfitter, and she can repaint your armor from a selection of color schemes."

Scorch shook her head, and faced Eager. "Seven years ago, we were on the brink of extinction. But now that we're in a comfortable position, Guardians apparently care about fashion more than fighting. Do you understand now why I had very little respect for you all?" She walked away as the Warlock searched in his mind for something to say in retaliation, but could not as he was completely flabbergasted at her odd question.

"Anyway," he began, attempting to change the subject, "You should probably go talk to Cayde. I was just there, and he told me he forgot to give you something." Scorch retreating back sighed in exasperation. Dawn shrugged. "It might be important. Go ahead and see what he wants, I'm going to grab my own gear." Eager looked at her. "And how do you know what class you are?" She glared at him with a condescending expression, and responded with a sarcastic tone, "Maybe because I'm pretty much a copy of another person? I'm probably going to have some similarities. Titan appears to run in the soul."

Eager looked slightly sheepish, and turned away. Scorch left them both to discuss whatever, and began to make her way towards somewhere she could change.

-X-

The Hunter Vanguard glanced upward after he detected the shadow approaching him. His gaze found Scorch looking at him expectantly. "Ah, I see you got your armor. How's it feeling?" She looked over herself, having taken the time to get fully geared up. "Well, it's more comfortable than I expected it to be. It's fine." Cayde nodded. "That's good, usually there's not much room for any consideration other than efficiency on the battlefield. Come over here, I wanted to talk to you about something." He motioned for her to follow him, and he walked over to the wall next to the opening of the Hall.

Built into the wall was a glass case of sorts. Inside was a shelf that held three glass pedestals, each of them in turn holding a different weapon. To the right of the window was a large blue computer screen, one that Cayde began typing something into. Scorch looked at the guns more carefully and noticed several details about them. All three were hand cannons, and each had their own unique characteristics. The one on the right was black in color, dark and wicked looking. It had sharp ridges running along its sides and top. She felt uneasy looking at it, as though it were a poisonous object to gaze upon.

The one on the left was of a more intricate craft. Most of the gun was a dark grey color, but the slide and most of the top was a brilliant timberwolf-white color. Engraved at the front end was a feather design pattern, giving character to the gun. Two sights were made to curve upward in a wing-like fashion, and there was a wicked hook on the butt of the handle. It looked like a beautiful weapon, and even Scorch had to appreciate the artistry involved with creating such a firearm.

The last was positioned in the middle. The bottom of the barrel was black, but the top of the slide was gold. The handle itself was a glossy brown and almost appeared to be made of wood, though Scorch suspected this was just an aesthetic characteristic. It looked similar to some of the Golden Age relics that people had managed to find every couple of years or so, almost as though the gun were made to give off a classic feel. It definitely looked powerful, that was for sure.

"As you might have guessed, these guns are kinda important. Y'know, the glass case and all." With an audible beep, the screen accepted whatever Cayde had typed in, and the pane of glass began to slide into the side, revealing the guns up close. He pointed at the sharp looking on first.

"That there, is the Thorn. It was the Messenger's weapon that he used against us, though it's not the first time we've encountered it. It was the same weapon that Dredgen Yor created from his original gun, the Rose. But after he became corrupted and began taking influence from the Hive's darkest powers, he twisted the Rose as well, and it became the Thorn. He murdered several Guardians with it until he was taken out by Shin Malphur using the Last Word. We'll get to that in a second. Anyway, I suppose that the Messenger managed to find it somewhere after Malphur hid it. Shin had said that nobody should ever become capable of wielding it again, but obviously whatever hiding place he picked wasn't good enough."

This time, Cayde reached in and pulled out the feather-design hand cannon. "Now this one here is something special. See, Matt, one of the Heroes, was a Hunter. And he had a reliable hand cannon, yeah, but he thought that perhaps he needed a weapon that more suited himself. So he begins forging this baby here, and though it took him forever, he actually managed to make a working prototype which turned into this, the Hawkmoon." He sighed contentedly. "Never has he made me prouder than when he showed this work of art off to me. A true Hunter's weapon."

He put the Hawkmoon in a holster at his side, and reached in to take out the final gun, the golden one. "Finally, we've got the Last Word. You heard me talk about Shin Malphur killing Dredgen Yor with it. Jaren Ward was the original owner, however. You see, he was a ruthless though very noble Guardian. This was his gun, his constant companion. He used to be friends with the man that Dredgen Yor used to be, and even tried to save Yor once the latter had become corrupted. But, things didn't pan out so well, and they parted ways as enemies. A few years later, he adopted Shin Malphur. Shin was an orphan living in the settlement of Palamon, and Ward became fond of him. Shin accompanied him for the rest of his travels until things went south."

Cayde shook his head sadly. "It's not truly known, but it's the most likely possibility that while Ward was away from one of their camps searching in the woods for something, Yor came back and killed him. All Malphur found was his gun, the Last Word. Swearing vengeance upon Jaren's killer, he ended up hunting down Yor and taking him out. He came to us, told us of Ward's story, and gave us the Last Word." He patted the hand cannon in admiration. "He said that it was too painful of a reminder for him, but someone worthier may come along and have need of it."

Scorch looked up from the gun into Cayde's face, and was startled to find that he was now staring directly at her. "That's where my need to talk to you comes into play. Firstly, I need a favor. Matt left the Hawkmoon in Banshee-44's care, he's the gunsmith here. The gun had become jammed with some kind of mechanical issue, and he didn't have time to fix it before he left on their mission. He said he'd grab it when he got back, but obviously that hasn't been the case. So it's sat here for five long years, collecting dust and reminding us all of the loss we suffered."

He pulled the Hawkmoon back out of the holster, and handed it to her. "If you don't mind, I'd love for you to return it to him when you find him. Call me a romantic, but I think it's been missing its owner for far too long." She looked it over, and nodded her agreement. Who was she to deny this to Cayde? It wouldn't hurt her in the slightest. "Spectre?" The Ghost appeared, and dematerialized the Hawkmoon, storing it for later. Cayde shook his head. "Still don't get your Ghost, but whatever. This is the second bit."

Now, he held the Last Word gingerly towards her, and Scorch ran her eyes over it hesitantly. "Malphur left this in our care for the next Guardian who was worthy of it. I think that's you. If you really are the child of light that's gonna bring about the Balance, it can't hurt to be well armed. Treat it with care." Scorch extended her hand towards it, and paused for a moment. Was she ready for this? Was she ready to follow her fate as the child of light?

Her guiding feeling came back to her, telling her that, yes, she was ready. It was time for her to find her place in the world, and accept who she was. Reaching forward the rest of the way, she gripped the Last Word by the handle, and lifted it upwards. It was well balanced, and felt light in her hands. Something about it in her possession seemed… right, somehow.

"Hey, where's your cloak?" Cayde looked around her in an attempt to find the fabric that should have been adorning her back and head. "My cloak?" "All Hunters wear cloaks, it's one of our trademarks. Almost a pride thing." She frowned. "That seems as though that'd be awfully inefficient in battle. You'd get tangled up all the time, and it'd blow around in whatever wind you came across." Cayde raised a finger. "Yes, but then you'd look freaking badass as it did." She just looked at him in disbelief. He waved his hand in dismissal.

"Well then, cloak-less Hunter, I think that about sums it up." Cayde gestured at the door. "Amanda will be waiting in the hangar with your ships, and your sparrows are all stowed away. I wish I could come with, but I've got other duties here. So, instead I wish you happy hunting." He saluted her, and walked back to the table. For the second time that day, Scorch left the Hall of Guardians, but this time she left it feeling confident, feeling as though she were finally coming to terms with this new life she'd been given.

She walked up the steps that led into the tower plaza, and spied Dawn, now fully dressed in her gear, conversing with Eager in the center. Dawn stopped talking as she spotted Scorch, and waved for her to join them. Complying, she walked over and greeted them. "What's up?"

Eager shrugged. "Nothing much, just discussing some of the info I picked up from the Archives. How about you? What did Cayde want?" She reached into the holster at her side, and pulled out the Last Word. If the Exo's eyes could possibly widen, they sure as hell were doing that. "Wait, he- he gave you the Last Word!? That's quite the honor, I have to say." He stopped, and said in a more serious tone, "I hope you know that, and uphold that honor." Scorch nodded, out of witty things to say. It was true, this wasn't something she could go off and flaunt around, it was a hero's weapon, and she planned on keeping it that way.

"What's the plan Scorch?" Dawn looked curiously at her, waiting for a response. Scorch thought for a moment. "Well, I'm gonna be blatantly honest, I've never been on Venus. I would recommend that we head there and scout out a bit before anything else. Get a lay of the land, you know what I mean." Dawn nodded. "That sounds logical. Lead the way." Scorch remembered what Cayde had said about their ships, and she knew where they were heading next.

-X-

Amanda Holliday retracted her hand from the Frame she was performing maintenance on. It came away greasy, but she had the corroded copper wire that needed replacing. Smiling to herself at the success, she set it down on the workbench next to her, and grabbed the wire she'd set aside as a substitute. Before she could begin work on the next phase however, she heard the sound of boots walking up the stairs to her workshop. She spun around to face her guests, and began hastily wiping black grease onto the metal-working apron she wore.

It was a young woman, a Hunter by the looks of the armor, followed by two Exo companions. One was a Warlock, and the other wore the signature armor of a Titan. She looked very familiar, though she couldn't place her finger on it-

Amanda gasped. "A- Ash? How- how are you here?" The Exo held up her hand to calm Amanda. "No, I'm not Ash. I'm just a part of the mission to go rescue her, as well as the other two."

The Shipwright looked over all three of them. "That's the secret mission you three are supposed to be taking on? Tracking down the Heroes?" The woman in front nodded. "That's right. I'm Scorch, a child of light that was prophesied to bring about the cataclysmic event known as the Balance, and it's my destiny to find the missing Heroes, along with these two." She nodded at the Exo. "That's Dawn, pretty much a copy of Ash and the Warrior's persona that has been sent by them through some unknown method to guide us to them. And this is Eager, the guy who shot my sparrow."

The Warlock glared at the woman for a second, and then smiled as he turned to Amanda. "How do you do?"

The mechanic sat down on her desk. "This is a lot to take in, you understand. I'll probably need a minute here." She just sat there for a few seconds before looking back up at Scorch. "They're alive? Ash, Matt, Aria, they're all alive?" Scorch paused, and then nodded slowly. "We believe so, though nothing is confirmed." Amanda pointed her thumb at the hangar bay below them. "Your ships are ready to go, feel free to leave whenever. I'm just gonna ponder this for a while." Scorch nodded in gratitude, then turned back around and descended the steps, leaving the Shipwright to contemplate the information she'd been told.

Walking onto the hangar floor, Scorch saw the three ships that Amanda had pointed out near the large opening of the hangar itself. They appeared to be smaller than the multi-person ships, but also sleeker and probably faster. "Those are good ships alright, Cayde wasn't kidding." Eager commented on the ships statuses, and accompanied his remark with a whistle. "Whose is which though?"

Dawn shook her head. "I don't think it matters. I'll take the one on the right." She set off at a brisk pace for the rightmost ship, and a second later came Eager's reply, "Alright then, guess I'm on the left. That leaves the middle for you, fearless leader." He too took off toward his respective ship, and Scorch began to walk slowly in the direction of the last remaining vessel. Spectre appeared, and Scorch talked as she moved. "I can't fly a ship, I've never had any experience." He sized up the ship himself. "Well luckily from the records I've looked at, Ash was a great pilot which means that Dawn will more than likely show that same trait. Eager's on the task force, he's trained for it. And you've got me. Believe it or not, I'm still a Ghost, and I still have knowledge about these things."

She nodded, and increased her speed due to the slight boost in confidence. "You'll see, it'll be just as easy as driving a sparrow. I'll teach you on the way." The front cockpit was open, and a ladder stood against the side, leading into the seat. A Frame stood next to it, waiting for her arrival. "Welcome, please enter." She complied, and began to ascend the ladder. Once she'd clambered inside, the ladder was taken away by the Frame, and the cockpit's plexiglass window began to slide over her. She sat in the black pilot's seat, one that was very comfortable and allowed her easy access to the console of buttons, levers, and switches. Spectre dematerialized into the ship, and a moment later his voice came over the comms. "Ready when you are."

She noticed a radio, and spoke into it with its settings on "broadcast" rather than an actual channel. "Are we good to go you two?" A holographic display appeared in front of her on the viewport courtesy of Spectre, and it showed the statuses of Dawn and Eager. Dawn spoke over the comms, "All clear and ready." A dot next to her name on the display winked green. "On your mark." Eager's light winked green.

Scorch exhaled deeply, trying to ignore the feeling of butterflies in her stomach. "Alright then… Fireteam-" She stopped. "What's wrong?" asked Spectre. Scorch frowned. "We don't have a name, a fireteam name." "Is that really high on your priority list right now?" She pointed at the display, analogously pointing to Spectre. "You know just as well as I do that one of the most important things in racing is a proper name. That's why 'Scorch' works so well." The Ghost sighed. "Fine. Hurry up though, I can't imagine that the Heroes are going to be in need of any more delays."

She furrowed her brow for a moment, then her face lit up. She spoke into the comms again, "Fireteam Seeker, let's go." The ship began to rise quickly, Spectre at the controls. Dawn and Eager's each began to rise as well, and in another few seconds, they all blasted out of the hangar, and arced upward into the sky.

-X-

"Alright, so you understand the pitch and roll now?" Scorch nodded, though it felt slightly awkward with her helmet now on. "It's just a bit difficult without any sense of orientation in space." "Well, it seems like you're learning quickly enough. Just apply that knowledge to practical use, and you'll be solid." The comms suddenly crackled to life, and Eager's voice came over the channel. "Alright, I have to ask a question. How the hell do you have a Ghost, and such an anti-Vanguard Ghost too?" Scorch chuckled lightly. "You alright if I tell this story, Spectre?" "Doesn't matter to me."

She replied back into the comms; "While I was still living on the streets, I ran into Spectre as he was returning to the tower. Ghosts without a Guardian are, as you know, placed on supply duty. They collect materials wherever they can, usually on the borders of the city. He was coming back from such a supply run when he came across me shivering in the cold, living in a cardboard box. He asked me why I was out there, and I told him. At first, he wanted to take me to the tower, but I explained how I'd already been turned away more than once, and he became infuriated. Outraged at the way that the Vanguard were treating victims of the battle, he decided to stick with me and become my protector." She smiled. "He's been a pretty damn good one too."

Silence followed on Eager's end, until he finally spoke seriously, "I'm sorry, Scorch. I- I really am. I don't think anyone intended that, but it doesn't excuse what happened." Scorch thought this over, and though she was still a bit apprehensive about the shaky relationship with the Vanguard, she was willing to accept his reconciliation. "Don't worry about it Eager, you didn't have anything to do with it. No point in crying over spilt milk." Silence followed, and she figured he was likely mulling over her dismissal of his apology.

"Just letting you all know, we're approaching Venus in thirty seconds. Prepare for landing." Scorch sat back in her seat, and allowed Spectre to pilot the rest of the way. The blue effects of Warp space began to dissipate, and the black of normal space began to appear instead. Venus seemed to jump into her field of view, greenish-yellow and different in size than she'd pictured it, slightly smaller than Earth.

"Beginning our entrance into Venus' atmosphere…" Spectre's voice sounded as though he were concentrating, and Scorch watched silently in an attempt to avoid disrupting him. As they penetrated through layers of the atmosphere, red heat began to surround the ship. The heat shield sheltered them from the effects of quick entry through the air and gaseous layers that enveloped the planet. Soon enough, the heat disappeared, and they made it to cloud height. Half a minute later, they'd passed even that, and the planet itself came into view. The landscape was luscious and green, full of life like a jungle. Several identifiable human structures could be seen in various parts of the region, and there was a coastline that led into a red-colored expanse of water, probably an ocean created from terraforming.

Spectre began to fly towards a spot in a rocky terrain, one that had a clear path that would be traversable by either sparrow or foot. The ship slowed to a halt, and lowered itself until it was about twenty feet above the ground. "Get ready for a transmat." Scorch barely had any time to register Spectre's words before blue light surrounded her and the next thing she knew, she was falling flat on her ass in the dirt. Eager and Dawn appeared as well, and casually landed upright on the gravelly ground. Dawn walked over, and extended a hand to Scorch. She took it, and allowed the Titan to help her up.

"So," asked Eager, "where to first?" She looked around at the surrounding landscape, and pointed towards a cluster of buildings not too far away. "Is that the Ishtar region?" Spectre twisted around to her. "Technically, we're already in the Ishtar region, but that is where most of the Ishtar population lived, yes. It includes the Ishtar Academy and a few research outposts every few miles or so." Scorch gave a single nod, and began issuing orders. "Then that's where we'll start. The Heroes saved my life once, and it's about time I return the favor. Let's go."