"ASH!" Scorch heard Matt's tortured yell off to the side, but could not do anything; she was frozen in shock at what the Knight had just done.

Ash's hands rushed to the wound in her chest, scrabbling futilely to remove the object impaling her. Bright blue liquid began to gush out of the opening, the equivalent of blood for an Exo. Slowly, Ash's movements began to desist until her hands fell limply to her sides. The Knight sloppily scraped her body off the blade where it fell onto the table like a rag doll.

With a cry of unparalleled fury, Matt charged the Knight, his bladedancer's trance rejuvenated in his emotional pain. Scorch looked down slightly to notice that she'd managed to unpin herself from Eager, and hurriedly scrambled up to where Ash was on the table, still bleeding out.

"H-hold on Ash, j-just hang in there…" she stammered. The hole in her chest was more destructive than Scorch had previously thought; with the blue gel-like blood now pouring all over the table and no longer obscuring view of the torso cavity, she could see that there were several mechanisms out of commission. A heart-like pump was trying ever so hard to keep the liquid circulating throughout her system, but failing as artery and vein-like tubes had been severed. Two bags of some artificial material were trying to inflate and deflate, although they weren't filling up properly due to one of them having been torn open.

All the while, Whip was zooming around and emitting small blue beams of light every so often, trying to repair what he could whether it was working or not. It was nauseating to see her body like this; people tended to think of Exos as just robots with souls, but they were so much more complex than that. Ash mumbled something incoherently, her eyes fluttering open and shut intermittently.

Meanwhile, the Knight had obviously messed with the wrong Guardian; Matt had taken little time in killing it by speedily jumping around and cutting its limbs off to incapacitate it. Once the Knight had fallen to the floor, he drove his blade into its face with one final thrust, and the creature breathed no more.

Immediately, his trance ended, and he left the knife in the Knight's head as he ran over to attend to Ash. "Whip, what's going on?!" he asked hysterically. "Why haven't you healed her yet?"

"There's some kind of dark essence from that blade; my light isn't nearly as effective as it should be right now! Her wound just won't heal properly, she needs to be physically repaired!" Matt nodded, all too aware of treating wounded people quickly before any other harm could come to them.

"She needs a medic! She needs help!" he yelled.

Cayde responded by pointing toward the exit; "Get her to the infirmary, I'll send a healer Warlock after you!" Matt nodded, and with one quick motion scooped Ash into his arms. He then tried to jog at a healthy balance between carefulness and speed towards the staircase, Aria running after them. She stopped to help Shaxx up to his feet, and let him lean on her as she helped escort the Titan up the stairs as well.

Cayde held his interface up to his mouth; "This is Cayde to all local Guardians, I need three healer Warlocks in the infirmary ASAP, we've got an Exo in dire need of surgery; some kind of substance is keeping her from being healed by light, and I'd rather her not die." He waited a moment until a green light winked on the interface, signaling that someone had accepted the order.

Silence filled the room once they'd left, save for the slow sound of dripping that came from Ash's blood spilling off the table and onto the floor. Cayde helped Dawn up to her feet, and gave a long sigh. "This could have gone a lot better. To be fair, it could have been a lot worse as well." He turned towards Eris while Dawn made her way over to Eager, his usual joking demeanor apparently gone for the moment. "Eris, you alright?"

The woman was picking herself off the ground, and clutched the her newly regained orb tightly. "I will be fine." Cayde nodded. "Good. Hopefully, Ash is the worst casualty that we've suffered today, and we don't have to see anything else like that soon." Dawn picked Eager up, and set off to take him to the infirmary while Eris followed behind her, leaving Cayde alone with Scorch. He began to walk off.

"Cayde… is Ash gonna be alright?" He turned to her, and looked troubled as he tried to find the words to answer her query.

"That's a tough one. Is it possible for Ash to turn out fine? Yes, absolutely; I've seen people come back from worse. But is it also possible that she dies? Certainly. Exos aren't just made out of a bunch of circuits that can be easily replaced, we've got much more fragile and complicated systems than that." He shrugged sadly. "So to answer your question, I don't know. I'd say that it's about a sixty/forty chance against her making it, but don't take that as a fact. Just keep a bit of hope alive for her."

Scorch felt a lump in her throat. "How does anyone… how do you deal with this so easily?"

The Hunter Vanguard gave another long sigh. "You learn to hide your emotions when you've been around as long as me. Sure, you can feel… but you can't let anyone else see, or else everyone would lose their calm. So I have to set an example, regardless of how much I care." He looked over at where Matt had disappeared.

"There are a few problem Matt has, but there's one big one that's truly detrimental; and it's that he cares too much." Scorch was shocked to hear him say that about his favorite apprentice. "Too much about his teammates, about his friends, about the mission… and sometimes those priorities contradict one another." He looked over at her. "I'm sure you've noticed how close he is with Ash?"

Scorch looked down at her feet. "I've always had my suspicions, though he's never outright told me, or any of us for that matter."

Cayde nodded. "Good choice on his part."

At this Scorch looked back at him in surprise. "What?"

"I've been in this city a long time. The kind of friendship they have…" He shook his head. "It's just not going to be healthy in the long run."

Scorch scrunched her eyebrows up in confusion. "How can you say that?"

"Because I've been where he is before." He chuckled. "What, never thought ol' Cayde had someone? Well, I mean, not anymore at least." He looked down, and pulled something from his belt. It was a playing card. "I had this whole system to keep track of things, like weapons. Spades for Hakke, that kind of thing. But hearts…" He showed her the card in his hand, a Queen of Hearts. "Well, hearts were for this girl I knew. I still keep one around, useless as it may be…"

Scorch asked tentatively, "What happened?"

He met her gaze with an unusually cool one. She'd never had a conversation with him for this long without him cracking a joke of some kind. "Reality happened, and gave me a big wake-up call. The life of a Guardian… there just isn't any room for attachments. Emotions can be toyed with, and regardless of your views about it, having loved ones can end up being a weakness should your enemies realize it." He gestured at the table where Ash's blood had collected. "Like what happened there. Not to mention that they aren't even the same… species? I mean, what do we Exos qualify as? 'Homo roboticus?' Sounds weird."

Scorch shook her head to try and clear his ramblings from her mind. "Hold on, how come it's a problem for them to be different from one another?" She knew of her own beliefs on the issue already, ever present in the back of her mind. If anything, she simply wanted to challenge them and see if they could be invalidated.

"Like I said, I've been there. You ever see anyone like them down in the city? Anybody to fit that picture except for them?" She let her mind run through all the memories of when she was younger, seeing if any stood out in likeness to what Cayde had suggested. She found none.

"A relationship like theirs is practically unheard of. Sure, every now and again you get the odd Awoken and human pairing, but at least they're both 'organic', right?" He gave a small huff of annoyance as he said the word, and Scorch thought that perhaps Cayde had more experience with this topic than he'd let on. "Now a human and an Exo… people don't think that it's possible for love to occur there."

Scorch felt he was speeding ahead. "Love? I mean, they're best friends, yeah, but..." Cayde looked over at her with an expression of Really? on his face. She sighed.

"Okay, yeah. Pretty much everyone but them can see that there's... something there." He snorted.

"Something... yeah, that's a heck of a something alright. I'll bet you didn't see many popular Exos down in the city during your… unfortunate childhood, right?" With a start, she realized he was right; almost everyone that she'd known had been either a human or Awoken. She'd see the occasional Exo roaming about, but almost always alone.

"What about it?"

"Well," he explained, "outside of the tower here… Exos aren't really liked. People see them more as products of humanity, property rather than equal beings. They don't trust 'machines' that can think on their own, and they certainly don't believe that they feel true emotion; they're of the opinion that everything is simply a expression of programming," he finished bitterly. "That's why we have so many Exos as Guardians here; it's just about the only work that they can get, you need every hand available when you're fighting for the survival of humanity."

He waved at the exit to the hall once more. "So yes, their relationship is unhealthy. Not only is it a potential point of vulnerability should the other face danger, but they'll likely face ridicule and discrimination where they go as a result."

Scorch fell silent, taking in all of this information. Finally, she settled on, "Are you going to do anything about it?"

He pointed at himself. "Me? Hell no. I'm probably one of the very few around here who sees what they truly are; not even Ikora or Zavala have a clue. The fact that they're so close is going to help hide that detail for a while. And it certainly isn't my place to judge or interfere." Again, he looked at the Queen of Hearts before he grunted and shoved it back into a pouch.

"Anyway… that's enough social commentary for right now. I'm going to go assess the damage of the attack; you should look into the conditions of Ash and Eager." With that, he strode out of the room leaving her alone with her thoughts.

She felt anger, a lot of it; anger for the situation, anger at the Hive, anger for the bigotry against Matt and Ash, and anger at Matt himself; she absolutely knew that he had to be in horrible pain right now, but she couldn't help but think that it was partially his fault. Had he not ordered the Heroes to interfere, Ash wouldn't be in this condition; that was on him, not her. But she also knew that the situation would be worse if he hadn't showed up. She was thankful for his help, but angry at how he'd handled it, trying to take over the situation rather than simply assisting.

Deciding that the best thing to do right now was to comfort her friend and stow any thoughts of scolding him, she set off for the infirmary, intent on helping any way she could.

-X-

"Alright, spinmetal!"

"Here you go."

"Ghost, start the process."

Scorch heard the voices of several healers in a room to her left, assumedly operating on Ash. There were a few specially designed rooms for more intrusive and imperative surgeries, but the vast majority of Guardians were treated out here in the main lobby; a large complex that almost appeared to be more of a well-kept and sanitary warehouse than a hospital. She stuck her hands into the pockets of her jacket, having taken the opportunity to change out of her armor into something more casual. Wearing it around just made her feel like she was waiting for another disaster to happen, and she didn't want to jinx anything.

It was a massive room with beds filling the center of it. Many injuries could simply be fixed with a bit of Radiance therapy and some bandages; anything superficial like that was dealt with here. Others like Ash were contained in the operating rooms that Scorch had walked by. She made the choice to look for Eager instead, as Ash's room was likely a bit hectic right now; she would check in later. Many beds in the main room were occupied as well, several healers darting around to attend to the Guardians who'd suffered things like broken fingers or a stray bolt in defending the courtyard.

Keeping her eyes peeled, she found Eager sitting on a bed near the nearest corner of the room, Dawn at his side. She strode over to them, alerting them to her presence with her footsteps. "Hey, you two alright?"

Eager nodded. "Yeah, I'm good. Must've knocked a wire or something loose when they chucked you and me into the Vanguard's table. Came to in here pretty much unscathed. Chest hurts a bit, but they'll take care of that soon."

Dawn watched him as he spoke until he turned to her, awaiting her response on the matter as well. "Yeah, I'm fine. I was more worried about you two and Ash."

Eager winced, and faced Scorch again. "Yeah, Dawn told me about that. Is she gonna be alright?" Scorch opened her mouth to reply, but hesitated. What was she supposed to say, that Ash might end up dying because she tried to protect them?

He noticed her pause, and his eyes turned downcast. "That bad, huh?" Scorch realized her mistake, and grimaced.

"Well… the odds are against her, but not by much. Cayde seems to think that she's got a fair chance of pulling through as long as the healers do their job right." Eager nodded again, taking any kind of hope they had and building around it.

Dawn's gaze shifted to her. "What happened exactly? Why couldn't Whip just heal her like one normally would?"

Scorch furrowed her eyebrows. "I'm not sure exactly, but from what I heard it seems that the Knight's blade was coated with something that kept light from affecting her; I'm not sure what that means if it comes down to her dying and whether or not she can be revived." She hadn't meant to freak either of them out, but the she could tell from the looks on their faces that they were troubled by this information.

"Jeez… I mean, I haven't seen or heard about anything like that since the Thorn…" muttered Eager. "Then again, Dredgen Yor did become corrupted from becoming too close to the Hive; maybe he learned it from them and infused it into his gun."

Dawn crossed her arms. "If that's the case, we need to keep that in mind when we go up against these Hive int he future; they seem different, more militarized than other encounters. Probably the result of being Crota's personal army."

Scorch picked up on something in Dawn's voice; she was putting up a facade of toughness, but there was a slight waver. She motioned to her; "Hey, Dawn; I gotta talk to you for a moment. Eager, we'll be right back alright?" The Exo nodded again, and placed his hand back on his abdomen where the pain originated.

Scorch pulled Dawn aways a bit, into an spot of the room where nobody could hear them; everybody else was focusing on getting treated.

"Hey, are you alright?"

Dawn looked like she wanted to confirm it, but couldn't without Scorch knowing she was lying. Scorch raised her eyebrows, still waiting for an answer. Dawn relented and a worried expression came over her features.

"I guess, it's just… Ash is like a sister to me. We may not be identical in the slightest but there's still that connection." She shuffled her feet. "I know you and Eager are good friends with her, but it's just a little bit more close to home for me. Sorry if that sounds odd."

Scorch didn't think that sounded odd in any way at all. Dawn was constantly trying to act different from her twin; Ash was emotional, Dawn was tough. Ash let things get to her at times, and Dawn let everything roll off of her. It may have had something to do with the fact that Ash was a different persona whereas Dawn's personality matched that of the Warrior's- but Scorch knew it was likely because Ash was the original of the two. And Dawn never wanted to seem like she was just a copy of someone else, in the same way that Ash was so drastically different from her original; the Warrior.

She placed a hand on Dawn's shoulder. "Believe me, I'd be more worried if you weren't a bit depressed by this. You put up so many walls to look tough to everyone… it's alright to let them down every once in a while. I already know that you're probably the toughest person I know." She flashed a smile.

The Exo's blue eyes shone back at her, finding sincerity in Scorch's words. Unexpectedly, she pulled Scorch into a hug, and the Hunter had no choice but to reciprocate, patting the Titan's back ever so softly.

"Thanks." said Dawn simply. Nothing else was needed, both friends understood the other fine.

They pulled apart to the sound of approaching footsteps. Looking toward the source, they found Aria walking up to them with a grim expression on her face.

"How are you two doing?" she asked briskly. Scorch noticed that he usually optimistic and enthusiastic attitude was missing, without a doubt the result of how close she was to Ash and what she was going through.

"We're fine," answered Scorch carefully. "Is Ash alright?"

The Awoken exhaled deeply in stress. "Why don't you two come see?"

-X-

Aria entered the room first, followed by Dawn and then Scorch. There was more then enough space in the room so long as people didn't crowd around the bed in the middle of it.

Matt was sitting in a chair at the bed's side, watching its occupant intently. Apparently, he'd had the same idea as Scorch, and had dressed into a different change of clothes while the healers had operated; he had on his usual off-duty attire of black jeans and a jacket. He turned toward the sound of people entering the room, appeared to approve of Aria coming in, and then promptly widened his eyes at the entrance of Dawn and Scorch. They narrowed a moment a later, but he did not comment on it; instead, he turned back to watching Ash. Scorch looked her over as well, assessing the Exo.

Ash's chest still had a large hole in it, but all the machinery inside had been replaced and repaired to the best of Whip and the healers' abilities. The heart-like pump that she'd earlier was now pulsing stably, if not a bit slow. The torn air-bag had been completely replaced; while the untouched one was a black color, this one was silver, though otherwise identical in appearance and function. The blue gel-blood was no longer spilling out thankfully, but dried remnants still stained the edges of the gap in her chest, a small reminder of what the Exo had survived.

"She's not awake yet, her body nearly shut down to preserve life-functions," explained Aria shakily, "but she should come back around in a while." Dawn looked over at her twin with something akin to a mixture of both relief and sadness in her eyes; sadness at how bad a state she'd been in, but relief that she was going to pull through.

"It was touch and go for a while," continued the Warlock. "Whip had to physically operate and replace all the broken bits of her while the healers kept her stable and alive." She looked over at her friend on the bed. "That dark essence sure didn't help, though the healers estimated it would wear off in a few days. Scary thought. But hopefully she'll be back up and fighting soon." At this note, Aria's voice sounded just a bit more like her usual self, and Scorch could tell she was happy with the prospect.

Matt said nothing all the while, just staring intently at Ash's face, waiting for him to wake up.

"Matt?"

He turned to look over at Scorch who was tentatively testing the waters. She tried to think of something to ask, but all her questions sounded dumb. 'Are you alright?' No, of course he wasn't alright, his best friend had nearly died a few minutes ago.

He seemed to understand that she couldn't think of something proper to say, and rather than filling in the blanks, he ignored her. Instead, he turned to Aria and said, "I need to go see Eris. Can you watch her for a bit?"

Aria nodded without a moment's pause. "Absolutely."

He grunted in acknowledgement, and stood up. "She's gonna need to see you too Scorch." That was the only direct statement he issued to her before he walked out, not bothering to wait. Scorch weighed her options, and quickly decided to follow Matt.

She jogged to catch up to him leaving the infirmary, and now walking across the courtyard. "Hey, uh, what are seeing Eris for?" He didn't answer her, and just continued on down the stairs to the Hall of Guardians as Scorch tried to keep pace.

Scorch was getting bit tired of the silent treatment here, and just wanted him to do something; whether it was talking or yelling at her, she didn't care. She just wanted a sign that he acknowledged her.

Matt approached the table where the Vanguards and Eris stood near, discussing the aftermath of the attack. "So we've got no fatalities, just a few injuries and then Ash." Cayde confirmed Ikora's question with a quick nod.

"It seems that way. We managed to come out luckier than we should have-" He stopped when he noticed that Matt had entered the room. "Hey. How're you holding up?"

Matt shrugged. "I'm fine; she pulled through. I'm just here to do my job." He walked over to Eris who stood at a distance from the table, observing the Vanguards. "I believe you asked for this before we left."

He procured a shard of something; Scorch remembered Eris asking him to bring her proof that the soul-crystal had been destroyed. She guessed that this was it.

Eris took it gratefully, and looked at him. "Excellent. This will bring us one step closer to destroying Crota." She gestured toward the various battle damages and marks around the room they were in. "And I saw firsthand that Omnigul has been destroyed. I have you to thank for that as well." She didn't say anything, but Scorch could've sworn that she detected the bite of a subtly hidden jab at Scorch and her fireteam.

"What's the next step?" he asked. Scorch was amazed; after all that had happened, he was still rearing about to finish the mission? Maybe Cayde had been right; his priorities were getting messed up, and he was using work as a way to cope with his grief. That wasn't safe.

Fortunately, Cayde seemed to sense the same thing, and walked over. "Well, Eris; I mean, they got done what you needed immediately, there's no rush is there? Especially with one of their members in such a critical condition?" Eris looked like she wanted to argue at first, but realized what he was getting at. "Of course. A respite would be beneficial for everyone; tend to your wounded, Guardian. I will notify you when we have need of you."

Matt opened his mouth, probably to say something stupid like 'I'm fine', but closed it without a sound. He just bowed slightly, and and turned around to leave. Cayde gave Scorch a knowing look, and motioned for her to follow him. She knew what he wanted her to do, and she agreed. She followed after Matt hurriedly.

He was already at the top of the stairs when she caught up to him. "Matt, it's nothing personal. They just think that you need a break." He said nothing, ignoring her again.

She clenched her teeth. "Matt? Hello?" He continued on without acknowledging her.

She'd finally had enough, and stopped in the middle of the courtyard. "Look, this isn't helping anyone. If you're pissed at me, come out and say it; but don't walk around ignoring me like I'm beneath you or some-"

He spun around so quickly that she was surprised he didn't fall over. "Oh, I'm pissed. And I'm only keeping silent so that I don't start saying things that I might regret later, despite how much you may deserve them right now."

She crossed her arms, refusing to let this slide. "Alright then, hit me with it. Let it out."

Matt debated with himself for a moment, but quickly took her up on her offer. "Where do I start? How about with the fact that my best friend almost died today? Huh? Do we want to get that little tidbit out of the way?"

Scorch uncrossed her arms, and held them out toward him in a submissive manner. "Look, I feel horrible for what happened to Ash; but I don't see how you can come around and blame me of that."

He scoffed. "How about the part where she was injured because she was trying to protect you? Trying to protect you from a situation that I'm sure you'll say you had 'under control', am I right?" His voiced was now escalating in volume, not quite at the point of yelling, but he'd be there soon.

Other Guardians were starting to look at them, watching the spectacle unfold. She shook her head. "The situation got out of hand, absolutely; but that wasn't on us. We were tricked, Omnigul tricked us. She was never meant to come here, nobody was prepared for that."

He laughed mirthlessly. "See, that's your problem Scorch. 'Nobody was prepared for that'. You don't consider all the possibilities, all the ramifications of your actions; you go charging into things without thinking about the consequences, and then you deal with them later."

"That's not fair," she argued, "it's not like you don't do the same thing." He froze.

"What?"

"When you guys were just starting out as a team, I know you did the same things I've done! The Black Garden, meeting the Stranger, it's all the same thing! You just managed to have better luck with it, at least until you challenged the Vault." He glared at her, but let her speak. "And this, just now? You came expecting to swoop in and fix everything on the spot, but guess what? Things didn't pan out, and Ash almost died!"

"How dare you imply-"

"Oh, I do imply," she continued boldly. "I don't think either of us are at fault; people get hurt. But if I am somehow considered to be at fault here, then you can be guaranteed that you share some of that blame with me for ordering your team to interfere!"

"Interfere?!" he yelped, taken aback. "What the hell did you think we were trying to do, uh- uh- steal your thunder?" He pointed accusingly at her. "Did you think that we were there just because we wanted to show off? We got a message from Zavala while we were flying back here, and came as soon as we could! It wasn't a matter of credit!" Now he was shouting, obviously furious with her in disbelief that she'd seemingly accuse him of something so petty.

Both of their Ghosts materialized, and hovered to a few feet away. "You two both need to just take a deep breath, and-" began Seraph, but Matt cut her off.

"Not yet, she wanted this, now she's gonna get it." Spectre said nothing, allowing Scorch to fend for herself here.

"I agree, it's not a matter of credit; it's a matter of the fact that regardless of your intent, people got hurt!" She pointed back towards the infirmary door behind Matt. "Eager got hurt, Ash got hurt, and it probably could have been even worse! My point is that you need to come to terms with that, and stop trying to protect everyone!"

He was still fuming at her, but his eyes narrowed a bit in confusion. "What?"

"You have this habit, this flaw of thinking that you can save everyone!" Now she was on the same volume as he was, shocking the onlookers with the ferocity of their dispute. "Trying to take on the Black Garden alone, sacrificing yourself in the final battle for the Traveler, we're not helpless!"

Seraph looked over at Scorch nervously, "Scorch, maybe you should tone it down before you say something-"

Scorch knew that the Ghost was right, but she couldn't keep the words from tumbling out of her mouth. "You keep saying that I need to learn how to think of the consequences; well, you need to learn that you aren't the line between life and death!" She took a deep breath, trying to will herself to stop but her mouth wasn't cooperating;

"Stop comparing every person that you know to Sara! I get that she died, I get that you felt helpless to stop it! But people die everyday; that's a part of living, and you need to get over it! Not everyone you know is going to die like she did!"

Her hands flew to her mouth to cover it in realization of what she'd just said, but the damage was done. Scorch instantly knew that she'd gone too far as Matt's eyes widened, and his face lost all expression in shock. All were silent, and no one, not she, he, nor any of the circle of Guardians around them said anything.

Seraph and Spectre just looked at her. "Scorch…" She could here the disbelief in Seraph's voice, and the hurt that Scorch had used that private information against Matt.

She reached forward a tiny bit. "Oh my God, I- I… Matt, I didn't mean that-"

Nothing could have prepared her for the fist that smacked into her jaw, sending her reeling backwards. She could hear the collective grasp of the crowd around them, at a loss for words at the act of aggression.

Regaining her footing, she reached a hand up to her mouth and felt her lip; her hand came away bloody. She looked up in time to see Matt throwing another punch, and she quickly ducked to the side. She grabbed the base of his arm, and pulled him towards her, sending a knee into his abdomen once he was close enough. Having stunned him, she threw him back.

It was his turn to stumble backwards, hand clutching his side to apply pressure and hopefully make the pain disappear faster. Scorch decided that the best move was to strike while he was distracted; otherwise, there was no way she was going to best him in a physical fight, he was just too experienced.

She jumped forward and kicked at him, but he'd already sidestepped and grabbed her leg. Using her forward momentum, he simply added it to his own and threw her behind him, where she landed on the ground and skidded a few feet.

"Stop! Please, Matt!" Seraph's cries for reason went unnoticed as the Hunter simply walked past his Ghost, refusing to address her. Scorch had never seen him like this before; it was like he'd snapped, and suddenly was no longer in control of his actions. She was in a dangerous position indeed.

He bent down and let a hand stretch toward her throat. She used her arms to grip his hand for support, and then swung her legs over it until she had her feet against his head. Now, she began to push away, causing tension to strain in his shoulder socket.

Grunting, he began to lift her up into the air. She looked around wildly, shocked at how much adrenaline must be pumping through his system to allow him to do this. Then, he let her weight and his added force fall once more, and slammed her into the ground.

She immediately relinquished her grip on him, her eyes seeing stars. She focused her eyes back on Matt, seeing him livid with fury and, scarily enough, with his blade drawn. She inhaled sharply, pitting hope against hope that he wouldn't dare use that here.

Before it was seen exactly what he would do with it, a voice rang out; "STOP!"

Matt ceased what he was doing, and he, Scorch, and the rest of the audience around them turned toward the source. Cayde was standing there, a deadly expression on his face. He appeared unarmed, but unpin closer inspection, she saw his hand inching very close to where his concealed hand cannon was. Behind him stood Aria and Eager, all three of them looking at the scene before them like one would analyze a bomb; carefully, and ever aware of how dangerous the situation was. This was a level of chaos that Scorch was completely unfamiliar with; how had everything fallen apart so fast?

Her friend's chest was heaving with exertion and the hyperactive state his body had just been in. Matt looked at Cayde with something like confusion in his eyes.

"Put it away, Matt." Cayde gestured toward the object in Matt's hands, and he finally looked down. He saw the knife as though for the first time, and his eyes widened with surprise. He quickly let it drop to the floor, as though afraid of what he'd almost been about to do with it.

"I- I…" he stammered, and Scorch realized that just like her, he'd never meant for things to progress this far. He looked at Scorch with a frightened look in his eyes, reflecting the same one that she was giving him. There was a silent agreement that they'd both come to and knew that the other had realized it as well; Matt could have easily killed her if Cayde hadn't stepped in. He'd overpowered her without too much difficulty, and had very nearly lost complete control of his proper judgement. Neither of them was sure if he would've stopped himself, and both were grateful for the outside intervention.

Cayde let his hand fall away from his gun, and sighed with the depressing feeling that came from nearly having to go up against one of his closest friends. "Ash is asking for you, Matt. I told her you'd come as soon as you could."

Reason was beginning to make its way back into the mind of the Hunter standing above her. She could see his eyes blinking as he made sense of both the situation and what Cayde was telling him. Slowly, he began to walk away from the scene, towards the infirmary. Without warning, he stopped, and turned back towards her.

The look he was giving her was conflicted; she saw both emotions of anger and fear flitting across his face, both directed at her but in different ways. Matt gave her a quick nod; one that said, This isn't over.

Then he set off again in the direction of Ash.

The crowd began to disperse until nobody was left but Scorch, Cayde, Aria, and Eager. The other three looked at her with blank expressions, they were unsure of what to think.

"What happened?" asked Eager softly. Scorch shook her head, unsure of what to say but just knowing that she wanted to put it off until later.

"No, you haven't earned the right to silence." That came from Aria, her arms crossed over her chest. "We come out here to see what all the noise was about, and you two were just about to kill each other."

Seraph appeared at Aria's shoulder. "I… I talked with her a few days ago, and told her about why Matt is so overprotective of everyone. I explained about what happened to Sara…"

The Awoken girl's eyebrows shot up to match the widening of her eyes. "No!"

Seraph's gaze drifted towards the grunt. "And she brought her up, threw her death in his face. Told him that he shouldn't keep trying to protect everyone because of what happened to her."

The Warlock turned towards Scorch, still laying on the ground. "In that case, I almost don't blame him. I mean, did you have a death wish? To talk about something so personal to him in the disgusting way you did… it's enough to make anyone snap. If I remember correctly, my advice to you as a kid was to 'be brave', not 'be a reckless asshole'."

Scorch felt her eyes moistening, and she blinked rapidly. "I-I messed up. I went too f-far…" For this, none of them had a response. Scorch had always been the most resilient of them, having learned to never show anyone how she was feeling; years of living on the streets had done that to her. To see that shell breaking was a shock for them all.

"I n-never meant to h-hurt him like that. I shouldn't have said w-what I said," she muttered sniffling.

Aria snorted. "You think? Look, I don't blame you for Omnigul's attack, or for what happened to Ash. She was injured doing her job, same as what could have happened to anyone." She jabbed a finger at Scorch. "But it goes without saying that what you just did is… well, I can't say unforgivable with certainty, maybe Matt has a softer side than I do. But if I know him as well as I think I do, then I wouldn't count on it. When you're ready to act like a real Guardian, like his friend… then you can talk to him again. Until then, leave him alone." With that, Aria headed back the same way Matt had.

Cayde took a second to get his bearings, and then left without saying anything; somehow, his silence said more about his thoughts than any speech of his ever could.

Eager just walked over and placed a hand on her shoulder comfortingly. "You alright?"

She didn't answer. Instead, she stared at the ground, thinking of how she may have just lost one of the few true friendships she had, and wondering if she had any hope of ever getting it back.

A/N: Alright, so BIG conflict here. Whose side are you on? Do you all think Scorch or Matt is in the right? Feel free to let me know in the reviews below, I seem to be suffering a drought of them at the moment. Seriously, FEED ME YOUR THOUGHTS...

A joke of course, but they do motivate me to get the next chapters out faster; plus I don't know how you guys are feeling unless you let me know. So...

Anyway, the next few chapters should calm down just a bit; they're going to focus on recovery and how Scorch and Matt are dealing with their fallout. So be prepared for that!