The massive chamber they now stood in was symmetrical, with two diverging paths; one to the left, and one to the right. Everywhere they looked, Vex bodies lay strewn about and broken, rusting in their exposed state. In the center was a platform, isolated like an island. Farther ahead was where the two sides of the room came together again, to form a massive stage-like structure with a set of stairs to some area above. The most incredible thing, however, was the scenery.
Behind the far centric stage was an array of dazzling shattered glass, hovering about in the air like some art display. Broken pieces littered the area in the back of the room, forming a massive throne-like image above the stage staircase. It would have been almost beautiful, if Scorch hadn't been thinking about where they came from, which was from the lair of the Vex's ultimate conflux.
"Look," Dawn whispered to Scorch, and pointed at either side of the room. There were pillars with rings around them, much like the ones they'd used to get in the Vault in the first place. "Okay, so those obviously do something. But I wonder what…?" Her voice trailed off as she noticed the two Vex time-gates that were standing vertically in Vex-stone a few feet in front of each ring. She began to get an idea of what was going to happen.
"So we activate the time-gates, and then what? Just go through them?" Eager's question sounded as though he were frustrated, and Scorch didn't blame him. This whole mission had been one puzzle after another, and here they were at the heart of it all with yet another complication.
But once again, the guidance came over Scorch. There was a strong urge she had, one of the most overwhelming feelings as of yet, to head over to the pillar on the right, and stand inside its radius. She had already begun taking the first step when a sudden blue light began to emanate on the stage-like platform in the very back of the room. It glowed brightly, and Scorch felt a weight in her stomach, not unlike one where she'd swallowed a large rock. Within a few seconds, some massive being appeared, and Eager muttered, "Well, shit."
Standing where the light had been was a large Vex warrior. It looked as though its torso made up almost the entirety of its mass, with a somewhat upside-down triangular shape for a body, and a larger version of the signature white core that all Vex had in the lower regions of their abdomens. It had two large spike-like protrusions emitting from the back of its head, like the ears of a jackal. In the center of its head was a singular whitish-blue eye which immediately focused on them, and narrowed menacingly.
"I don't think it likes us very much," said Eager, and the new threat roared in confirmation. Vex soldiers began to pour in from all sides of the arena in response to its call.
"Everyone, to the right!" yelled Scorch, and she took off sprinting for the pillar she'd been attracted to earlier. Dawn and Eager followed behind her, trying to avoid several bombardments of void projectiles that the large Vex had begun to fire from a cannon on its arm. Sliding into cover behind a raised block of Vex-stone, Scorch took a moment to catch her breath while red lasers from the other Vex danced around in the air. Dawn slid right next to her, and bumped shoulders. Eager fell into place next to her.
"Alright, what's the plan here?" she asked. Panting, Scorch racked her brains. They'd been trying so hard to get here, and now that they were finally where they needed to be, she was coming up blank. Taking a few deep breaths, she steadied herself and thought of a strategy. Scorch pointed at the pillar, and then the time-gate.
"Those pillars have got to activate the time-gates like we thought. My… that feeling I get, the guidance? It's telling me to get in there. I need you two keeping this gate open no matter what while I get inside."
Dawn nodded enthusiastically. "No problem! C'mon, Eager. Let's do this!" Pushing herself upright, she grabbed Eager's hand and helped him up as well, then proceeded to step into the pillar's radius. Immediately, the white cubic lights began to appear, pixelating into existence to form a circular wall rising from the ring on the ground. A wavy sort of effect began to take shape in the center of the time gate, like a ripple in space. Suddenly, a portal opened where the effect had been, and stretched itself to the boundaries of the gate.
The Hunter looked at her Ghost. "Spectre, I need you to stay here in case they run into trouble. Whatever happens, they cannot be allowed to fail!"
He bobbed in the air. "You can count on me, Scorch."
Scorch gave a quick nod to her companions. "Stay here, keep that gate open no matter what!" Dawn saluted her in confirmation, and then continued to fire upon a Harpy that had come a little too close for comfort.
Eager waved her forward. "Just go, we've got this!" Heeding his advice, Scorch pulled the Last Word from her holster, clambered up the block of Vex-stone, and charged through the portal.
Eager looked over at the waves of Vex enemies approaching them, intent on stopping them from keeping the portal open. He sighed as he reloaded his weapon. "Today sucks."
-X-
Scorch felt herself fall onto the ground. Pushing herself up, she turned to see that she'd fallen out of the portal onto a large platform composed of Vex-stone. So she was still in the core of Venus? But then-
Looking up, she was surprised to see the sky. The implications of this suddenly made themselves abundantly clear in her mind as she looked around to see nothing but Vex structures all over the surface of the planet. This was a Venus that had been taken over completely by the Vex. Did that mean she was in the future, or what? Shaking her head to clear the unpleasant thoughts, she began to walk forward on the platform.
The sound of something metal clanking against the stone drew her attention. It appeared to have come from above a staircase in front of , she began to ascend the steps with her hand cannon drawn and ready to fire should anything jump at her.
When she reached the top of the staircase, she saw a long stretch of Vex-stone with nothing else in sight, save for a scrap of metal that looked to have belonged to a Vex body laying on the ground suspiciously. She walked over to it, and knelt down. She pondered on where it had come from before she heard a footstep and began to turn-
A fist came from behind her as she turned, and slammed into the side of her helmet, near her jaw. The shock of the impact forced her to relinquish her grip on the Last Word, and it fell away skidding across the ground. She leaned backward, and rolled over with her momentum to reach a standing position. Her assailant moved too fast for her to get a good look at them, and began to assault her again. She held her forearm up to stop a knife-wielding hand of the attacker, and used her free arm to smack them square in the solar plexus. Wheezing, they hunched over to gain their breath back, giving Scorch a chance to raise her leg up, and kick them in the abdomen, sending them reeling backwards.
"You're good, I'll give you that," said the attacker with a tone of respect in his voice. "But you've caught me on a bad day." It was a person wearing black Hunter armor with white highlights, though they had no cloak. Scorch's first thought was that they had scavenged the armor off of someone else.
Scorch raised her arms to show she meant no harm. "I don't want to fight you. I'm a Guardian of the city, and I'm-"
He waved her claims aside before she'd even finished speaking. "There are no Guardians here. Believe me, we've checked. This is a future of Venus, and there's nothing but Vex here. So who the hell are you?"
The voice sounded familiar, and suddenly the 'we've' pronoun he used clicked in Scorch's brain, and she threw caution to the wind on a hunch.
"You used to have white and blue armor, didn't you?"
The attacker froze up for a second. "How- how would you know…?"
Two others came up behind the stranger, one wearing black and maroon Titan armor, and the other wearing similarly colored white and rose-highlighted Warlock garments to the ones that Scorch had seen all those years ago. "When you said you heard something, I didn't think you'd find this," said the Titan, gesturing at Scorch.
The Warlock gave her a quizzical cock of the head and asked, "Who are you?"
Scorch shakily pulled the hood of her cloak back, and raised her hands up to grasp the sides of her helmet, pulling it away from the seal around her neck, and revealing her tousled brown hair and amber eyes.
"Matt… Ash… Aria!" She said their names with genuine joy in her voice, and they all seemed to be very taken aback by her enthusiasm.
"Yes, those are our names. What about it?" asked Matt. Scorch took a deep breath, and began to explain.
"I've been searching for you for a while now, my entire team has… it's so great to see you all again!" Matt's head tilted slightly. "Again? Have we met before?"
Scorch jerked a bit. "Oh, right! I don't know if you'd remember, but my name is Scorch."
Aria shrugged in confusion. "What kind of a name is Scorch…?" She stopped short as Scorch pointed to the long scar on her cheek.
Stunned, Matt began to take off his helmet as well for likely the first time in a while. Ash and Aria followed their leader's example, and removed the obstacles obscuring their faces. For the very first time, Scorch actually could see what they looked like. Matt, had short brown hair, green eyes, and basically looked like a normal human, whereas Aria had lavender colored hair tossed behind her and to the side in a sort of teenager style along with blue skin as an Awoken. Ash was surprisingly similar to Dawn; she was white with silver accents, and had bright electric blue eyes. There were a few differences, but by and large, she could have been Dawn's twin. The only real difference was that Dawn had more black accents on her as well.
"Oh my…" Aria beckoned to the Hunter. "Matt, it's… it's her! The one we saved in the battle for the Traveler!" He seemed to be in awe of the situation, and walked forward a few feet.
"How-? How is this possible?"
Scorch smiled. "Well, it's a long story as to how I got here, but basically-"
"Not that," he dismissed, "I mean your age. Last time we saw you, you were a thirteen year old girl, and that was two years ago. So why do you look like you're twenty?" Scorch's mouth quickly made an 'o' shape. She hadn't prepared for this, not yet anyway. She didn't know how else to tell them the truth other than launching into it, and getting it over with.
"Alright, well… this isn't the easiest to explain…" She scratched her head to procrastinate, much to the consternation of the Heroes.
"What isn't easy to explain?" growled Ash. Scorch exhaled slightly.
"You've been missing for five years, so it's technically been seven years since I last saw you."
Ash made a sound like she was choking, Aria gasped, and Matt simply stood there silent for a moment. "F-five years?" he stammered. Scorch nodded. "But that's impossible, we've only been here for… how long has it been, Seraph?"
A Ghost popped up on his shoulder and looked at him. "It's been two weeks, three days, and eleven hours."
Matt gestured at Seraph to Scorch. "See? So, how the hell have we been missing for five years?"
Seraph piped up once more. "Actually, it isn't too difficult to imagine. Considering that this is a potential future of Venus, and the time-gates are the only things linking this future to the past, once that connection is severed it would be nearly impossible to align those realities again. We're lucky that it managed to link up so close to our original time-line."
Scorch raised her hand for a question. "About that… how did you guys end up stranded here in the first place?"
Matt sighed. "It's a long story." Scorch continued to stare at him expectantly, showing she had nothing but time right now. He conceded.
"Well, we came here by suggestion of the Stranger. She mentioned how the Darkness was about to use another one of its many plans to end the reign of light, and well… it's kind of our job to stop that from happening." He gave a slight chuckle. "I'll admit, we were a bit arrogant. After we got our info from the Hall of Whispers in the Ishtar Archive, we realized we were a bit out of our league."
"How did you get around the mind-core?" asked Scorch.
Matt seemed surprised. "You found it too? Honestly, it wasn't that difficult. Seraph ran an algorithm and found that they were able to imitate every likely action of ours, but also unlikely ones. She studied them and found one solution to run through the computer, and found that all the copies were forced to follow the action, but I couldn't."
Scorch raised an eyebrow. "And what action was that?"
"She ran a simulation of the three of us holding guns to one another- attacking one another. And we just… we could never do that. Nothing except for a computer could do that." Both of the other two nodded approvingly, and Scorch remarked on how much a family they were.
"How did you even get to the point where you started tracking us?" Scorch looked over at Aria's face which seemed curious. Scorch exhaled slightly.
"Well, to understand that, I've got to explain my side of the story." Aria nodded in agreement, and waved for her to continue.
Scorch took a deep breath. "Well, when you rescued me all those years ago, my first line of thought was to become a Guardian like you three." She motioned to the Warlock. "You inspired me the most, telling me how we shouldn't let fear rule us, but use it to our advantage with bravery." The Awoken girl smiled happily that she had encouraged the now-Hunter.
"But things didn't pan out that way. I lost my home, my family, and ended up living on the streets for a bit. Once Spectre, my Ghost, began taking care of me, I got into illegal Sparrow-racing to make ends meet for him and I. But I was called in by the Vanguards to help them solve a puzzle; a mystery transmission arrived at the Tower, originating from Venus. It contained two components; a corrupted message, and a soul."
"A soul?" asked Ash questioningly. Scorch nodded.
"The soul was from you. You jettisoned a fragment of your old persona, the Warrior, either as a way to help and guide me, or simply to show that you all were alive. Maybe both?" But Ash shook her head. "I haven't done anything of the sort! We've sent all kinds of transmissions, but they didn't get responses; we couldn't send anything back to our own time without the portal open. And even then, that's a time-gate. It could end up anywhere in that network of realities."
Scorch was confused for a moment before the answer hit her. "Of course, because it hasn't happened yet! But now, the portal is open! You can send it now!"
Ash appeared doubtful. "I don't know, I'm not sure that time works that way…"
Scorch shook her head to reject Ash's thoughts. "Of course it does, or at least it will; because it's already happened. You can't rewrite the past! Or, at least not yet, anyway."
The Titan sighed. "Alright, I'll try." Facing the portal down below, Ash screwed her face up in concentration, and her blue eyes began to wink on and off quite rapidly. After a few moments, the odd behavior stopped, and she nearly fell over. Matt leaned over and held her upright.
"You okay?" he asked. She nodded in his arms.
"I think- I think it worked. You said that the personality is one of your team members?"
Scorch nodded. "Yeah, we're the Seekers. Figured that we might as well have a cool name while we looked for you. In any case, once Dawn and Eager joined me, we set out to find you based on the messages's contents."
"I don't know why we'd need to send a message now of all times, considering you're already here," said Matt, and Scorch had to admit he had a point. Why would they send the other distress message when she'd just saved them? She shook her head, and decided to work out that mystery later.
"Anyway, you never finished your story. What happened after you proved you were real?" Matt nodded, and picked up where they'd left off.
"After we proved we were real, the mind-core killed all of our copies, and summoned quite a few Vex to stop us. Lost my cloak in the escape, but I think we came away pretty decently. Fast forwarding a bit down the road, we ended up inside the Vault, evaded the Templar and Gorgons, and finally made it to Atheon's arena."
Scorch held her palm up to stop him. "Hold on, who's Atheon?"
Matt frowned. "Atheon is a large Vex leader, their conflux of time. With him still alive, the Vex hold a scary amount of power over time itself."
Scorch snapped her fingers. "So that's who the conflux is, that's probably the giant Vex that I saw a few minutes ago." Matt nodded.
"Yeah. In any case, we knew to look for the other Aegis's, the last gift of Kabr. He created them as he died, for others to hopefully combat Atheon and the Templar. We opened a time-gate, and I went inside with Ash to find this one's Aegis, but the forces outside overwhelmed Aria, and she was forced to retreat into the portal. With no one outside keeping it open… we were trapped here, unable to do anything." He gestured around at the surrounding landscape, full of Vex-stone buildings and mossy growth. "We've been living off stored rations our Ghosts kept with them, but we expected to run out in about a month. If you hadn't found us…" He didn't finish the thought.
Scorch cleared her throat. "So, is Atheon the threat you were all hoping to destroy?" To her utter shock, Matt shook his head.
"No. Atheon's control over time is worrisome to be sure, but… there is something, someone far more dangerous. See, Atheon only operates within limitations of his power, of the Vex's ability to travel through time. But there's someone who entered the Vault long ago, and literally became one with the conflux that lives within Atheon in order to find a way to change time itself. The only way to kill him is to destroy Atheon."
"Who is it?" asked Scorch. She remembered the voice in her hallucination; Join me, and together we can halt this, undo what fate has set in motion. As Matt said it, the name finally clicked in Scorch's mind, and Matt's answer confirmed her fears.
"Kaine, the Consumed."
"The Consumed…" A shiver crawled up Scorch's spine. Matt nodded. "We need to stop him, or he'll eventually take control of Atheon's abilities, and wipe out everything we've worked to build; all in the name of defying destiny."
Well, so far it has worked. The voice which Scorch now knew belonged to Kaine, came from nowhere, and yet, seemingly everywhere at once. The Heroes immediately entered a combat position, and trained their aim on various areas in their line of sight. Scorch meanwhile, stood dumbfounded.
Scorch, you know that I'm right. I showed you what the Balance will do. All you need to do is leave them here, and it will never become a reality. Startled, the Heroes turned to face Scorch with expressions of fear in their eyes. Scorch had originally thought that finding the Heroes was her destiny. But if her destiny involved bringing about the Balance and all that destruction, was it so wrong to turn away from it and save who she could?
Scorch… Kaine's voice sounded like the audio of temptation itself, and she made up her mind. No matter what, the Heroes were her priority, and she was getting them out alive.
"I'd suggest you put our helmets on, and get ready to kick some Vex ass." The Heroes smiled, and complied. As Matt fastened his own helmet on, Scorch suddenly held something out to him, and he turned to see what it was.
Sitting in her hand was the Hawkmoon. "Cayde said that I should return this to you when I found you… looks like I can finally do that." He picked it up with absolute care in his touch, his face full of awe.
Locking gazes with her, he gave a quick nod of appreciation. "Thank you, truly. I've been missing this for a bit."
Scorch nodded in response, and began to reach back to her cloak. "Now that I think about it, I believe this belongs to you too…" He shook his head.
"Nah, you keep that. You took a vow, and followed it through. That cloak is yours now, just a tradition of us Hunters. Take care of it." Pulling her hand away from the hood, she nodded again in gratefulness.
Matt grabbed a cartridge of ammo from his belt, and loaded the Hawkmoon. Scorch picked up the Last Word from the ground, and checked to make sure that it too was loaded. Ash and Aria appeared to be ready to leave, and waited at their leader's word. He turned to his Ghost which was zipping happily above his head.
"Seraph? I need the Aegis." A blue light began to appear in the air, and suddenly another Aegis like the one Scorch had used materialized in the air, landing neatly in Matt's arms. He turned to Scorch.
"These Aegis's are the only things that can damage Atheon; as a conflux of time itself, he can't be harmed by normal weaponry, only distracted. This one will help, but the other one needs to be found as well, the one in the other portal. Are you ready?" Scorch accepted this all without question, and gave a thumbs up without hesitation. He turned back to the portal.
"Alright… Heroes! And Seeker," he added, "let's do this!" Sprinting down the steps, all four Guardians ran up to the time-gate's portal, and charged through to the other side.
Scorch felt a rubber-band like feeling, as though she were being pulled back, and then snapped forward across time, skipping like a stone through reality. With a jolt, she landed on the other side of the portal, and looked around to see Eager and Dawn still in the ring, holding off waves of enemies. Eager noticed her.
"Where the hell have you-?" His question died in his throat as he saw who was with her. "Holy shit…"
Dawn too, looked up to see Scorch and the Heroes standing there. "You did it Scorch! You found them!"
Scorch and the Heroes ran down the greet them. "Close the portal," she ordered, and both of her companions complied happily, stepping out of the ring immediately. The portal ceased to exist, and the time-gate stood empty once more. The waves of enemies that had come in response to the open portal had disappeared now that there was nothing to defend.
Ash walked over to Dawn and looked her over. Dawn did the same, and both had the same expression of mild discomfort on their faces. "This is…" began Ash.
"Awkward?" Dawn supplied.
Ash nodded. "Yeah, that's the word. I mean, are you like a sister, or a daughter, or…?" Dawn shook her head emphatically.
"Let's go with twin, or sister alright? But definitely not daughter. Ick."
Ash nodded. "Alright. Just so I know since you're a copy of me, you don't have any interest in taking my place, do you?"
Dawn shook her head. "No thank you, I may be a clone of you, but I'm my own person too." She looked over at Eager, nodding at him in reference to the understanding they'd come to earlier. "I've got no interest in taking anything from you whatsoever."
Ash's voice sounded like she'd just grinned. "Alright then, we're good. Pleasure to meet you."
Eager waved both arms to get everyone's attention. "Hey, did we forget about the whole reason for us being here?" Everyone stared in bewilderment until they heard Atheon roar again from behind them.
"Yep, kinda forgot about the big guy!" yelled Matt as he raised the Aegis on his left arm, and held up the Hawkmoon with his right. "C'mon, let's get to that other portal!"
Jolted into action by Matt's call, they began to sprint to the other side of the arena towards the left pillar. They went to work, standing inside the pillar's radius and preparing themselves for the onslaught of enemies. Matt turned to Scorch.
"Alright, you're up kid."
She jerked abruptly. "Wait, me?" He nodded.
"Yeah, you! We got this Aegis down, it's only fitting that you get the next one! Plus, with five people out here, we'll have a much better chance of keeping the portal open and not marooning you in time," he joked. She felt her knees get slightly shaky, but nodded her agreement all the same.
The time-gate opened right as Vex Goblins and Harpies appeared on cue. All of the other Guardians opened fire to prevent them from reaching the ring. "Go, now!" ordered Matt. Letting out a small breath, Scorch charged into the time-gate.
Once again, she didn't watch her footing and fell upon the ground on the other side. But this environment was much different than the potential future of Venus; this place was hot, rocky, and everywhere she looked there was nothing but chunks of rock, bits of Vex-stone, and grayish dirt. The air had a slight red tinge to it, making her first think she was on Mars; but then she realized that if the portal on the right had been the future of Venus, then this must be its past, before it had been terraformed by humans.
She walked cautiously. Like the other reality, there was a staircase here too. She walked up it just like she had the other one, and roughly twenty feet in front of her was the Aegis, hovering above the ground. She quickly ran to it, and grabbed it happily. It had been much easier than she'd expected.
Fool. Kaine's voice appeared once again from nowhere, and she raised the Last Word to the air threateningly.
"Leave me alone! You can't escape fate forever!"
Is that so?! His voice reverberated with unbound fury, and Scorch wondered whether she'd finally crossed the line. In a moment of complete surprise, a shadowy figure began to take shape behind her, blocking her way back to the portal. She furrowed her brows in frustration.
The shadow was obviously of a male figure, but it was pitch black like a void, and black-colored flames licked its body all around. You've overstepped your boundaries young one. I offered you a chance to make a real difference, and you spat in my face. Now, you shall suffer the consequences, and see what a true master of time and destiny can do!
His arms spread apart, and as they did so, a white aura began to glow around him. Just as Scorch wondered what the hell he was doing, the portal back to Atheon's arena disappeared in a flash of light, deactivated by Kaine.
"Wha…? NO!" she screamed. A deep raspy chuckle came from him, like the sound of a thousand snakes slithering over sandy ground. Now, let us talk.
There was a flash of light, and in an instant, neither shadow nor Guardian occupied the landscape and it was empty once more.
-X-
The other Guardians continued to fight the endless waves of enemies with determination in their minds and movements. The Heroes fought to repay Scorch's deed, and the remaining Seekers fought to keep their friend alive.
Suddenly, the time-gate switched off. All present stared at it in shock, not processing what had just happened.
"SCORCH!" Spectre cried, his synthetic voice full of pain and loss.
"What- is she gone?" asked Eager, his own pitch in tone unnaturally high.
Dawn hesitated for a moment, then shook her head furiously. "No, I don't believe it! We hold this position, and remain here until that portal opens back up!"
Under Dawn's courage and rallying order, the Guardians were reinvigorated to fight, and the chamber continued to be filled with the sound of warfare.
-X-
Scorch opened her eyes, and saw that she was lying on the ground, head against a familiar looking terrain of sand. Standing up, she looked around to confirm her suspicions.
She was back in the destroyed landscape that Kaine had shown her before when he first spoke about the Balance. Everything down to the last crumbling rocky formation was identical, except now a shadow stood with her as well. The only thing that had come with her was the Aegis on her arm.
Need I remind you about this? What your fate will bring to those you care about?
She shook her head to ward his persuasion away. "I already know, and I made up my mind. This can't be the whole answer. For all I know, this is the just what you want for the city, for Earth!"
Kaine shook his shadowy head. You mistake me for some sort of genocidal maniac. My only goal has been to escape my predestination. Now, if something happens to be in my way… well, it must be dealt with accordingly.
Scorch jabbed a thumb at herself. "Well, guess what asshole? Now it's me that's in your way."
So it is. He sounded resigned to this outcome. Are you certain you'd like to continue along this path?
Scorch held up her fists, one of which was holding her Hunter's dagger. "Not a doubt in my mind."
Kaine ground his teeth with the sound of scraping metal. Very well.
With a speed that far outclassed her own, Kaine closed the distance between them and backhanded her. She went flying backwards through the air, and landed in a heap upon the dark grayish-black sand. She tried to stand back up, but found that her enemy had other ideas.
The Consumed had already made his way over to her, and proceeded to pick her up by the back of the neck with shadowy flaming arms. She could feel his touch burning the skin of her neck, and she cried out in pain. He simply laughed in the face of her torture, and threw her towards a cluster of the rocky protrusions coming from the ground.
She hit it back-first, and not only felt, but heard something crack. She reached down to her lower left side of her abdomen to find that one of her ribs had cracked. She would have asked Spectre to begin healing her, but realized with a dry feeling in her mouth that Spectre was still with the other Guardians. She was alone with…
Looking up, she saw him looming over her. He pulled one large fist back, intent on finishing her. Thinking quickly, she used one last option and held up the Aegis to protect herself. By her will, it fired a beam of energy like the ones they'd used against the Templar, and it hit Kaine in the center of his mass. The beam burnt a hole right through him, and sent him staggering backwards. Groaning, he looked down to see the gap in his chest. Scorch realized that something so dark as Kaine could never withstand the light of something so pure like Kabr's Aegis, created literally from his selfless dying mind as a way to help others.
I-impossible… he grunted, straining to keep himself upright. He looked up in time to see Scorch barreling toward him, Aegis in hand. Spinning artistically like a ballerina, she twirled and used her centrifugal force to drive even more power into the impact of the Aegis slamming into him. The blow caused him to completely lose his footing on the ground, and he flew backwards several meters onto the dunes of sand.
Ugh… He tried to push himself back onto his feet, but the sight of Scorch standing there with the Aegis stopped him. He glared at her, and she knew she had his attention.
"You forget that the very thing you have been attempting to destroy all your life gives me an advantage," she spat, her voice full of anger and determination. "My destiny gives me an advantage, an understanding that I will beat you, and I will save the Heroes." Kaine took deep breaths, struggling to regain his composure.
You… may have defeated this… ethereal projection of myself… he said each word slowly and with a malicious tone. You may even destroy the conflux which lives within Atheon, and banish me from this realm forever… but this so-called advantage you think your fate gives you… it will turn on you quickly. You will not be able to escape it as I did for so long before it becomes your undoing. And in your final moments, as you perish under the culminant weight of all your sins against me… I will be there, watching, and reveling in your sorrow.
Scorch shrugged. "Get in line." And with that, she held the Aegis out, and let off one more bight beam of energy which engulfed the Consumed. He screamed in agony, until there was nothing left to scream, and his particles were systematically broken down and dispersed throughout the air. After she looked to see that he had truly gone, she sank to her knees in despair.
"What do I do now?" she asked aloud. She herself had no clue who she was talking to, but found it easier to imagine that she was directing the question at her guidance. It had influenced her so well before, but now… there was nothing. Had she fulfilled her destiny? Was it her fate to live out the rest of her life in this barren wasteland?
She thought about sending a transmission out, but remembered what Ash had said before; We've sent all kinds of transmissions, but they didn't get responses; we couldn't send anything back to our own time without the portal open. Even if she did try to contact someone, there's no way she could manage to reach them. With nothing else to do, she found herself reflecting back on the message.
Who had tried to send it? And better yet, for what purpose? It had sounded like someone had been trying to be rescued from being trapped, but she'd already saved the Heroes. So who else…?
A thought came to her. There was only one other person that it could have been, unlikely as it was. Although, the more she mulled it over, the probability seemed to increase. For Scorch to have begun her mission in the first place and make her way here to the Vault of Glass, there needed to be a message. So someone needed to send that message, and who was more equipped to do that than her? She was a child of light, she had more powerful connection with the light of the Traveler, and how it flows through the universe. Who's to say that she couldn't force her message through time? It was worth a shot at least.
"This is…" She thought hard for a moment on how to disguise her identity. "…a Guardian, reporting from the Vault of Glass. The lost are here, the lost Heroes are here! But they need someone to rescue them, someone to take on an urgent mission. They found something darker than any of us could have imagined." She debated whether or not to mention Kaine, and decided against it since she'd never known about him while embarking on the mission. She didn't want to rewrite time itself like the Consumed did. "In any case, you need to find Scorch, find Scorch and she will be able to save them."
As she spoke, she realized that the timelines perfectly coincided with one another, and she laughed in her awareness. "So that's why I'm a child of light! My being a child of light, the Balance, it all makes sense now! Or, at least the Balance part will later I'm sure." She shook her head, and focused back on sending the transmission. "Please, she's their last chance for survival. Over and…" Before she cut the connection, she looked around to see if the portal had reappeared, but there was nothing to be seen. "Oh, what's the use. Might as well transmit all I can."
Before she could give up, however, another unlikely thought occurred to her. Kaine, as a former child of light, had managed to completely sever her connection in time to the portal. Perhaps she, as another child of light, could remove the blockage, and allow the portal to reopen. She scrunched up her eyes in absolute concentration, and wished for nothing more than for her to escape this nightmarish place. As she did so, she felt an almost physical weight bearing down on her, as though she were literally lifting away the obstacle with her mind.
"C'mon, Scorch…" she muttered to herself with strain in her voice as the weight of lifting it was now affecting her actual body as well, with massive amounts of pain emanating from the region of her broken rib. With great effort, she mentally lifted it higher… higher, and… away!
Instantly, a white flash began to engulf her. "My God, it's opening!" The landscape around her disappeared, and she found herself back in the past of Venus, the reddish air surrounding her. Looking up, she saw that the time-gate had reactivated upon her arrival back in normal-reality. "We're gonna make it out of here after all!" With that, she severed the transmission connection, realizing that it was no longer needed.
Prehistoric Vex began to materialize into existence around her, with a seemingly universal goal of stopping her from reaching the time-gate. Done with dealing with similar encounters, her only response was to leap into the air, and let loose several Shadowshots. They planted themselves in both the ground and the chests of minotaurs, and latched onto every available Vex they could. Not stopping to stay and find out what would happen, she sprinted forth with every ounce of effort she had, and leapt through the portal.
There was another terrifying sensation of rubber-banding, as well as a free-fall like feeling. With a jolt, she landed on a block of Vex-stone, and looked up. The Heroes and other Seekers were there, still standing inside the ring.
"Close the portal! Quick!" she barked hoarsely. The others did so unquestioningly, and the time-gate ceased to be active.
"Scorch!" called Dawn happily, and she ran forward to hug her friend. Eager followed closely behind and placed his hand on her shoulder as Dawn was taking up most of the space. The Heroes walked over to her with smiles in their voices.
"Glad to see you made it out of there in one piece," said Matt. He cocked his head curiously. "What the hell happened though? First the portal turned off, and then-"
"It's a bit complicated to explain, but we've got bigger problems." Scorch turned and pointed at Atheon, still looking at them with hatred. "He needs to die, NOW, or else Kaine will have won. I've seen what he's capable of, and needs to be stopped."
Matt nodded in understanding, and hefted up the Aegis on his arm. His entire body began to crackle with electricity as he gave his speech; "You heard her people, this thing has lived for five years longer than it should have! We're taking it down TODAY!" Aria produced a ball of void energy in the palm of her hand in response, and Ash summoned a flaming hammer from the air, which engulfed her entire body in flames.
"Well… that's pretty cool," Eager said with an admiring voice, and responded by conjuring up a flaming palm of his own. Dawn's fists began to charge with Arc energy, and Scorch let herself get into it a bit, feeling a powerful aura surround her body, and her hand holding the Last Word ignited in purple fire.
Like a well oiled machine, they charged perfectly in line with one another into the fray. Atheon bellowed in anger, but he didn't have much of a say in it. The other Guardians kept him busy with tactics like a Fist of Havoc or Nova bomb to the chest, lighting him on fire, and in Scorch and Matt's case, firing projectile after projectile of light beams into him. Perhaps at one point the Vex would have appeared to be formidable, but with all six of them fighting him at once, each felt invincible, knowing that if any of them were to fall into trouble, there'd be five other Guardians backing them up immediately.
Atheon's body was smoking now from every joint and servo on his body. "Not much longer now," called Scorch, "just a bit more!" Matt yelled to her from across the arena, "Alright then, let's go for one more effort! Guardians make their own fate!"
Meeting in the center, the duo combined their final beams of light to form one massive blob of energy that blew right through Atheon's chest, and obliterated his insides. As the conflux within him began to die, Atheon wasn't the only one that Scorch heard screaming out in pain. Kaine the Consumed's voice cried to the heavens, though it received no answer as his very soul was banished to whatever hell that death would take him to. After several seconds, his cries of anguish ceased, and there was nothing left but the smoking corpse of Atheon.
All six Guardians stared at it, panting heavily. Eager was the first to speak, his question directed at Scorch; "So, is that it?"
Scorch laughed. "Yes, that's it. We did it!" Everyone cheered, and both the Seekers and the Heroes gathered together in one large group of excitement. Scorch and Dawn hugged again as Aria and Eager high-fived one another. Matt and Ash pulled each other into a tight embrace, and looked at one another, caught up in the moment. After a second or two, they pulled away again sheepishly.
"Uh, guys?" Aria looked over at Matt and Ash who hesitated for a moment before giving the Warlock their attention. "How are we supposed to get home? I highly doubt that the Javelin is still sitting around in orbit any more."
Scorch raised her head to look at the Awoken girl. "Don't worry, we've got ships. We're more than willing to take you on as passengers."
Matt nodded his thanks. "Alright then teams, let's go! I don't want to stay in this place any longer than we have to."
-X-
Scorch flew the ship in silence with Matt taking up the spare seat behind her. Each of the Guardians had buddied up with their respective counterpart on the Seeker's team. She couldn't imagine how awkward that had to be for Ash and Dawn, and it gave her a small chuckle.
"What's so funny?" asked Matt curiously. She got herself back under control.
"Oh, nothing, just a stray thought."
"Alright." Matt allowed her a few more seconds of silence before talking again; "So, five years. That's really how long we've been gone?"
"Yep." Scorch tried not to say too much on the subject in case he was touchy about it.
Apparently however, he was a bit nonchalant. "Well, at least it's not as big as the last time I was pulled out of time."
"The last time?" she questioned with curiosity in her tone. She turned around in her seat to see him nod.
He walked over to her and explained, "I was just a normal guy on Earth when the Traveler first came. But one thing leads to another, and the next thing I know, I'm waking up centuries after my death with this little gal yelling that I'm some sort of Guardian." He playfully pointed to his Ghost, the one he called Seraph. Her blue eye pulsed slightly out of affection. He faced Scorch once more.
"As for you, I believe you said that you only joined the Guardians so that you could help find us?" Scorch nodded.
"Once, I wanted to be a Guardian like you three, but after the way the Vanguard ignored my situation… all desire for that died."
He nodded understandingly. "Okay. And now? Will you stay a Guardian?" She hesitated.
"I think… regardless of what may have happened, I know that I can do a lot of good as a Guardian. And so long as I'm making a good impact and helping others, that makes me happy to be called a Guardian."
She looked at him again to see an approving smile on his face. "Good choice."