Hey man, everywhere you roam
Your demons gonna go
But at least you're not alone, yeah
Hey man, you're hanging by a thread
You're standing at the edge
It's one more chance to take my hand
Remedy – 30 Seconds to Mars
October 22, 2958, 12:02 (Tower Time); Echo Mesa, Io
TYPE: LIVE COMBAT FEED
PARTIES: Three [3]. Two [2] Guardian-types, Class Hunter, designates Cayde-6 [c6], Azra Jax [aj]; One [1] Ghost-type, designate Spark [s]
ASSOCIATIONS: Cayde-6; Infinite Forest; Jax, Azra; Osiris; Sagira; Panoptes; Praxic [Warlocks]; Pyramidion; Rey, Ikora; Vex
/AUDIO UNAVAILABLE/
/TRANSCRIPT FOLLOWS.../
[c6: 01]: Thank the Traveler.
[aj: 01]: Cayde?
[c6: 02]: No, no no. What the hell is going on?
[aj: 02]: Uh-
[c6: 03]: You tell me you're on some secret mission, next thing I know Ikora's freaking out at me about another Vex threat and your Ghost being screwed up-
[aj: 03]: Ikora's freaking out?
[c6: 04]: Well, you know, freaking out for Ikora. What unholy mess have you gotten yourself into?
[aj: 04]: You cannot blame me for this one. This was all her plan.
[c6: 05]: Was it Ikora's plan for you to get someone else's Ghost shoved inside yours? Can Sagira even rez you?
[aj: 05]: Never got the chance to find out.
[s: 01]: I'm back, for the record.
[c6: 06]: Then where is Sagira?
[aj: 06]: Panoptes has her.
[c6: 07]: What!?
[aj: 07]: Listen, Cayde, I don't have time.
[c6: 08]: Oh, no. You're not getting away that easy.
[aj: 08]: It's not an excuse. I legitimately do not have time. Panoptes has Sagira. I have to get there before-
[c6: 09]: No, you're waiting for backup. The Praxics are scrambling a team. The Vanguard's assembling a raid force, too.
[aj: 09]: I can't wait for strike forces.
[c6: 10]: Ikora herself is heading out for Mercury.
[aj: 10]: And how long is she gonna take?
[c6: 11]: Two hours. Hour and a half.
[aj: 11]: Nope.
[c6: 12]: You give me lectures about going off to Nessus by myself, but you pull shit like this?
[aj: 12]: I'd wait. You know I'd wait. But if I delay for backup, we'll lose Sagira and our only current plan for finding Panoptes. It'll rip her apart, Cayde.
[c6: 13]: Screw Zavala, I'll head out myself. Half an hour.
[aj: 13]: This could all be over by then.
[c6: 14]: You can't fight the Infinite Forest alone!
[aj: 14]: I'll grab Osiris, then.
[c6: 15]: You think he's going to listen to you after you lost his Ghost?
[aj: 15]: I'll make him listen.
[c6: 16]: That man could out-stubborn a rock. Wait for backup. Please.
[aj: 16]: I can't. I'm sorry.
[c6: 17]: We can't open the Infinite Forest without you. I can't send anyone in after you if you go now.
[aj: 17]: Then I'll have do this on my own.
[c6: 18]: God dammit.
[aj: 18]: I'm sorry.
[c6: 19]: If you die, I'll never forgive you.
October 22, 2958; Infinite Forest, Mercury
Azra Jax thundered into the simulation with all of the subtlety of a Cabal War Party. Apparently she had no intentions of sneaking up on him this time.
"You've returned," Osiris commented mildly. He turned from his shore-watching. He'd done every preparation he could think of by himself. It was time to do business.
But something was wrong. Azra stalked towards him, every movement filled with anger and urgency. There was a storm in her eyes. The air crackled and snapped around her. That was not the look of someone back victorious from a mission.
"What happened?" Osiris asked. His fingers drifted towards the Hand Cannon concealed beneath his robes. He looked at her- fury barely contained, haste chasing every step- and her Ghost, who…
"Sagira would want me to lie," Azra said. Osiris did not like the implication of the conditional tense. He did not like how close the Ghost floated to her, half-hiding behind her shoulder. It wasn't familiar. It wasn't Sagira.
"I don't lie," the Hunter continued. The way she said it sounded like an oath. Osiris glanced back at her and saw conviction- if tempered by guilt. Azra grimaced.
Osiris opened his mouth to ask a question, but the Hunter held up a hand. "No. We don't have time for arguing. I'm going to talk, and you're going to listen." She put the hand back down and shifted her rifle into a more ready position: a clear threat. She stared straight into Osiris's eyes. "Thirty seconds."
He did not trust a single thing about this situation, but he didn't know what had happened. Even if her information was false, he could discern something from the shadows her explanation cast. He shut his mouth and nodded.
Azra spoke succinctly and without passion, like a scout reading off a report. "We got into the Pyramidion. We simulated the Infinite Forest just fine- but you and Sagira have been introducing too many unpredictable variables into the equation. The simulation is flat-out wrong. It said Panoptes was in a part of the Forest that doesn't exist in our timeline. We were trying to figure out what to do about that when Panoptes crashed our party and took her."
Osiris couldn't help it. He interrupted. "Took her?"
"Ripped her out of my Ghost," the Hunter growled. "It was like the last time she remembered, in that simulation of the Vault, but there was nowhere for her to run." She paused to shudder a bit and shook her head. "I don't know how it found us. The Pyramidion shares almost no information with the Forest. Maybe there was something in the seed we stole…" she let out an aggrieved sigh and wrenched her train of thought back on the tracks.
"It doesn't matter," she insisted, looking back up to make eye contact again. "Panoptes has Sagira; I can find her, at least, which means I can find Panoptes. And I'm going to, right now. There isn't time to waste."
She couldn't be serious. His first, barest measure of trust- collaborating on her with this plan- had been immediately met with a betrayal. Sagira was dead, and if she was not dead, captured, or hidden somewhere he could not find her. "If you think I am coming with you-" Osiris started.
"I don't," Azra interrupted. Osiris had to quickly backtrack on his own assumptions- if she wasn't here to bargain for support, why was she here at all? "You're never going to trust me, I know that," the Hunter explained. "You never were going to trust me. From the first second you had a reason to be suspicious of me, I was a scapegoat. You didn't make that assumption using sane logic, I don't expect to be able to convince you out of it."
She took a deep breath, steeling herself. "But I promised Sagira I was coming for her. So. Here are your three options."
She slung the gun behind her back and rolled her shoulders. The Arc Staff sprang into existence in her hands in a very deliberate way. Her face was set in a hard expression. Osiris couldn't tell if she was bluffing or not, but she spun the Staff in her hands and snapped it to a ready position with force.
"One:" the Hunter started, "You come with me, we kill Panoptes, and you put your Ghost back in her shell." She paused for a second. "Know you won't pick it, but it's on the table. Two: you give me her shell. I go kill Panoptes. And I do whatever I can to get Sagira back."
"You wouldn't know how," Osiris said in reproach.
"At least I'll have fucking tried," Azra retorted. "Third option:" She gripped the Staff and the crackling intensified. Its heart glowed white with barely-tamed power. "You don't give me her shell and I beat you up and take it." She cocked her head. "Or four, I guess: you cause me enough troubles that I have to kill you. And I'll hope your body will still be here when I get back."
"You think you can beat me?" Osiris asked.
"You think I can't?" Azra answered. "You're an old man with no Ghost. And you have no idea the kinds of things I've been getting up to out there. The Vault was just the start."
Osiris considered the paths forward. There were other options she hadn't listed. If he could manage to kill her first… but no, her Ghost would raise her again. He'd have to kill both of them, and the Ghost was already demonstrating a wise sense of skittishness. It would take a lot of time to force its hand.
He could run, but she'd demonstrated that she could find him quite easily. He could seek Panoptes himself, alerting it to his intentions… but the Hunter would just follow him or go fight Panoptes herself. She was only here for Sagira's shell.
Osiris removed the shell from his sleeve carefully. "Tell me why," he bargained. "Why are you doing this? Why do you care so much?" That was the major thing here that didn't make sense.
Azra paused for a telling second. "I could tell you that I care about her now. I do. She was in my head. I couldn't help but become a little attached. And I promised her I'd come for her. But… that's not the whole of it." She shifted her feet in the gravel self-consciously but did not break eye contact. "…She needs help. That's reason enough for me. Wouldn't it be for you?"
Osiris was reminded of a story Saint had told him once. It had been after the battle of Six Fronts, in those heady days of victory and rejoicing. Saint had some… unique beliefs regarding time travel. If you asked him, he would tell you that a Guardian from the future had saved his life on Mercury and had shown him a path to a better future. After Six Fronts, he began insisting that he'd been visited again. Most people seemed to assume his instance on a 'Guardian savior' was just a humble way to deflect praise for his great deeds. In public he never gave details. But in private, he told stories.
It had been after dinner. They sat alone in Saint's apartment, nursing glasses of tea. "Her eyes were like a storm about to break," Saint had said, awe ringing in his voice. "And her Light- I can hardly describe it, Osiris. It was like when she moved, the entire universe moved with her. One moment, I am alone, outnumbered. I think, maybe I will not make it out of this. Then, boom! Crrch, szzt!" his voicebox crackled in a replication of an Arc Staff. "She takes out two Captains in two hits! And before it was a hold, a desperate one. Now it is a rout!" He slammed a fist down on the table, rattling their empty plates.
"We smash the Fallen party. There is a Spider-tank, and she takes it apart, piece by piece, as I stand and watch. Nothing can even touch her!" He seemed to calm down, the buzz of victory lapsing into something more thoughtful. "We fight our way back to the rest of the unit. She turns to go. I stop her. I need to know how this has happened. Why it has happened. Why did she come to save me? And she looks at me-" Saint settles his own features into an expression of friendly confusion. "You know what she says to me? She says, 'You needed help.' Just like that." Saint leaned back in his chair, voice now quiet but full of resolve. "That is the kind of person I want to be," Saint said. "One who does not need a reason to help. One that just does."
The crackling electricity from Azra's staff brought Osiris back to the present. She was scowling at him now, looking as if she very much intended to take her third option and be done with their conversation.
Osiris paused to think but a moment longer. Saint had always been prone to flights of fancy, but his message had rung as true from him as it now did from the Hunter. And, frankly, of the options available to them right now…
Osiris put Sagira's shell back into his sleeve. "I'm coming with you," he announced.
The Hunter frowned. Osiris crossed his arms stubbornly. "My Ghost is in danger," he said, "and coming with you is the only way I can find her before something terrible happens."
"I'm not taking you into a fight just to have you stab me in the back," she protested. "Not against a Vex Mind."
"I do not trust these circumstances," Osiris said. "There are too many factors at play, too many unknowns. But…" he sighed. "I trust you. For now." He really didn't have much choice.
The Arc Staff vanished with a flash. Azra placed her hands on her hips instead, chewing on her bottom lip. She didn't look entirely convinced.
"Take it," her Ghost urged from behind her shoulder. "We don't have time."
The Hunter shook her head but relented, stepping closer to Osiris and gesturing to her Ghost. "Fine, fine. Let's get moving."
"There is no time to waste," Osiris agreed.
TYPE: LIVE COMBAT FEED
PARTIES: Three [3]. One [1] Guardian-type, Class Warlock, designate Osiris [o]; One [1] Ghost-type, designate Spark [s]; One [1] Guardian-type, Class Hunter, designate Azra Jax [aj]
ASSOCIATIONS: Infinite Forest; Jax, Azra; Osiris; Panoptes; Sagira; Saint-14; Vex
/AUDIO UNAVAILABLE/
/TRANSCRIPT FOLLOWS.../
[o: 01]: How difficult would it be to find Saint-14, now that you have the correct Ghost?
[s: 01]: Difficult. Not impossible, but it may be time-consuming.
[aj: 01]: You're very shiny. He's not. And I'd be working second-hand from Spark anyway-
[o: 02]: Then we will search for him afterwards.
[s: 02]: I guess the most important order of business is getting Sagira back. We can regroup and make another plan if we really need to.
[aj: 02]: I'll distract Panoptes while you… do whatever it is you're going to be doing.
[o: 03]: The process is quite simple in theory, though it has not been applied in practice to my knowledge. At least not beyond our current circumstance.
[aj: 03]: Nobody's dumb enough to try dislocating their Ghost out of their shell, huh?
[o: 04]: Quite. Though the theoretical groundwork has been laid very firmly. Ghosts, as beings of Light-
[s: 03]: Not to be rude, but now's not the best time for academic debate.
[aj: 04]: I am going to need some quiet if I'm going to find Sagira.
[silence]
[aj: 05]: There.
[s: 04]: Got it.
[aj: 06]: Ready?
[o: 05]: Yes.
[s: 05]: It's just another Vex Mind. We can do this.
[aj: 07]: Doesn't mean I'm not terrified.
[o: 06]: Let's make haste.