Chapter 37: The Dust Palace
Shiro-4 stared at his sensor readouts. Rockets fired over Phobos as more Cabal transports roared down to the surface of Mars below, but they weren't standard Harvesters this time. He'd never seen these personally, but he'd read about them from century-old Vanguard reports, and they were unmistakable. He started typing a new message to Cayde. He had many pre-recorded messages ready to send, but not even he had anticipated this possibility.
…
"Fireteam Axis and Fireteam… DX7? A default Vanguard designation, really? Whatever. This is Cayde-6 and I've got a job for you. You may or may not have noticed, but things are a little hot right now. We need to take the Cabal's attention off Earth and back to Mars. That's where you come in. The Dust Place is lost to us again. Back in Cabal hands. Word is they've let the Psion Flayers out of their cages to dig around in the Central AI's Cortex. Which means they really want what's buried in there. If Rasputin was protecting it, it's valuable. We've got to flush those Flayers out."
Ash-2 stared at her comms gear incredulously, then Reed-7's calm voice rumbled on the line. "This is Reed. Didn't we just lose two fireteams there?"
"Well, yeah. But the land tank has pulled out and won't be coming back. Another fireteam is paying them a little visit."
"That's suicide," said Ash-2 flatly.
"Maybe," responded Cayde gamely, "but Fireteam Guardian has a pretty good track record."
"Never heard of 'em."
"Huh," Reed said thoughtfully. "I have. They were on that the strike on Luna, took down that Hive ritual. Good people."
"So were a lot of people," retorted Ash.
Reed wasn't interested in arguing. "Fireteam Axis is in."
Ash rolled her eyes. "Fine, we're in too."
"Awesome," said Cayde.
…
The two Fireteams dropped off their sparrows near the ground entrance to the Dust Palace. Ash-2 looked up at it skeptically. The building had certainly seen better days. One entire wing had collapsed, and there were fresh scars from explosives and divots from bullet impacts all over the place.
Index materialized at her side. "According to Vanguard reports from Cayde, the Psion Flayers are already at the top of the Dust Palace. We'd better move."
…
Vistrek's jumpship rumbled as Fireteam Guardian split up to be harder targets for any Cabal anti-aircraft batteries they missed. Now they could only hope it was enough to break through even the Cabal's stubbornness.
He glanced at his coordinates as the kilometers stretched and no more fire came at him, and he remembered the conversation he'd overheard in the City.
…
Stella panted heavily as she reloaded her hand cannon. Ash was right – fighting in the wilds wasn't at all like fighting in the Crucible. It wasn't as fast or open – the Cabal liked cover a little more than guardians worried about looking timid on camera. And there were many, many more people on the other team.
Plus, the Cabal were tough. She worked her shoulder in its socket and glanced down at the dead centurion at her feet. She'd emptied her hand canon and tried to stab him with her knife to finish him off, just like in the Crucible. But unlike a warlock's robe, her blade had skipped off his heavy armor with a spark and he'd grabbed her gun arm, nearly wrenching it off. If she hadn't been ready with a solar grenade in her other hand…
I really need to learn to use the Light left-handed.
"Fireteams, rally up."
Stella clicked the cylinder closed and rejoined the other guardians gathered near a heavy bulkhead door.
Ash's ghost bounced up and down in the air. "The Cabal have locked us out! I'll have to decrypt their security overrides. Something is interfering with security protocols—this is going to take a while."
…
Vistrek bashed open the door at the coordinates shared by the hunter, pointed his auto rifle, but nothing moved. He nodded to himself, shut the door behind him, and started looking. The place was yet another ruined Golden Age structure, though a small one. Some sort of storage shed, maybe? Empty storage barrels and containers were strewn about, long since picked over and emptied. He rummaged around in a chest with a lid that had been pried off with a crowbar. Could there really be something here? Or was the hunter just messing with his friends? Could he have known Vistrek was listening?
"You're not going to run away too, are you?"
Vistrek's weapon was raised and ready, the Light quivering in his fingertips, but no targets emerged from the back of the shed.
"Well, you've got more guts than the last guy, at least. Though that's not saying much."
Vistrek moved forward cautiously, keeping one hand on his auto rifle and using the other to push aside barrels as he moved towards the voice in the back corner of the room.
"Getting warmer…"
There, all the way at the back. He pulled away a piece of ancient plywood to reveal a cunningly hidden cache. Inside a narrow gap in the wall was a sleek black machine gun painted red with white accents. He set down his auto rifle and examined the weapon cautiously, eyes widening. This wasn't just a gun. Those were circuits for a powerful computer, and that—well, he had no idea what that part did. But that one looked suspiciously like some sort of micro transmat.
But who had spoken?
"Well, you found me. Joy."
Vistrek frowned. That couldn't be…
A light blinked on the gun. "Wonderful. Not too bright, are you?"
"But you're a gun. Or an AI in the gun?"
"Ding, ding ding, we have a winner. Given your apparent mental acuity, I think I'll be leaving the safety on. And taking a nap. Wake me up when someone interesting shows up." The light blinked off.
Vistrek stared at it. I was just insulted by a gun. He shook his head and picked up the machine gun, slinging it over his shoulder. No sense leaving it here. It wasn't dangerous… probably.
…
"Alright, we're through!"
Stella took down a heavily armored Psion operative and fell back to the others as they charged through the newly opened doorway. They emerged into an enormous open room that spiraled upwards for at least a half-dozen floors. It made for an impressive view as dust swirled in a storm outside. But more pressingly, entrenched Cabal on multiple levels immediately poured fire into the narrow opening as the guardians moved. Amelia and Reed-7 immediately went down, but they absorbed most of the fire and the others broke through and got in among the Cabal, splitting their focus.
Stella joined in, hurling a fistful of Light at the invaders and leveling her hand cannon.
"Look out!" someone shouted over comms, "Vex incoming!"
The already hectic battlefield turned to total chaos. Okay, now it reminded her of the Crucible.
When the smoke cleared, Stella couldn't remember if she'd died three times or four, and it was bugging her. Focus, Stella. No Kill/Death ratios out here.
Reed-7 gestured to his fellow exo fireteam leader. "The Flayers just penetrated the Cortex above. We're running out of time."
Ash-2 nodded. "We'll have to make a run for it."
"Agreed. Guardians," he said, addressing them all. "Move out, double time. Punch through and don't stop."
The warriors of the Light acknowledged and followed in Reed-7's wake as he charged forwards and up the stairs into another battle between the Vex and Cabal. The running firefight was just as frenetic as the last, blasting through Legionaries in a hallway, then Vex Harpies in a research lab.
They regrouped to break into another room, with white paint on a red background labeled as the main engineering lab. The moment the door opened, the Cabal sprung an ambush. A Colossus swept the doorway, taking down three guardians, and pinpoint fire drove the others back. These weren't normal Cabal – she peaked around the corner and nearly had her head taken off, and cursed under her breath. They wore the green armor of the Skyburners Legion.
Reed-7 erupted in arc energy and leaped forward, drawing fire to himself. Stella watched with something like awe as Aisha calmly stepped into the gap, wreathing solar fire around her hand cannon, and fired raw golden light one, two, three times, each disintegrating a Cabal Centurion and blasting a hole in their defenses and waved at Stella. "Follow me, blueberry!"
…
In the end, the Cabal were outmatched by six guardians, though it was a closer call than Stella cared to think about. Instead, she looked around the room. It was a big space, high enough in the building that she could see several Cabal Harvesters flying at eye-level towards the building.
Reed-7 was busy at the central computer speaking with his ghost. He nodded to the ghost who turned to address the team. "The Flayers are inside the Cortex itself," he said, bouncing to gesture at a massive, armored core, "but I think I can force them out. Then they're all yours."
The first Psion Flayer transmatted out of the Cortex and Stella got a look at him. He was bigger than she expected, maybe half again as tall as a normal Psion, and wore a stylized helmet that wrapped in a circle around his head. He wasted no time, immediately laying out a psionic attack at twice the regular distance that launched Shayura halfway across the room. Stella's first shot sizzled off an arc shield.
The first Harvester arrived, dumping off troops, before Reed's rocket launcher connected and blew half of them off the walkway. Then it was on.
…
Primus Ta'aun glared at the reporting Val, but reigned in his temper. "So, Valus Ta'aurc is dead, his Skyburner bodyguards defeated, and the Flayers and their Skyburner bodyguards killed, the Dust Palace lost once more." He waived the Val off and turned to consider the master display of Cabal forces. They burned bright and powerful on Phobos, encircled by the entirety of Second Fleet, but on the surface the losses were clear.
The Land Tank was damaged enough to be out of action for days, and without its support, he would be hearing shortly from the Sand Eater Valuses asking for assistance to stabilize the lines given the Vex counterattack.
And now he had firsthand information of how effective these smallmen were against his own troops, not some Sand Eater flunkies. He burned to launch the might of his fleet against these whelps for their temerity to attack the Cabal, but he forced himself to be patient. He had become Primus by knowing when to attack, and just as importantly, when not to attack, something many Cabal struggled to grasp. And he thought about just how far they were from home and resupply.
He made the call.
"The Second Fleet will wait," he said through clenched teeth. Get me the Strategic Intelligence Maniple from the auxiliaries of Fifth Cohort. We must understand these smallmen and their power before we commit the entirety of Second Fleet to battle. Send the signal to return to station-keeping orbit around Phobos."
The Cabal grumbled, but they obeyed. Ta'aun, for his part, looked up through the narrow viewing slit of transparent, hardened ceramic to the distant ball of blue and green. "You win this time, humans. But in the end, the Cabal never lose."
…
Cayde-6 leaned back in his favorite chair, enjoying the cool evening autumn air with boots up on the Vanguard's enormous table, feigning nonchalance when Reed-7 reported in mission success. Better yet, Shiro was reporting the Cabal fleet returning to orbit around Phobos. He let out a surreptitious sigh of relief and congratulated the guardians on their success before cutting the line and staring at the ceiling thoughtfully. If those Psions were targeting Rasputin, they were way more powerful than he realized. He had better keep an eye on what their minds could do.
Ikora stepped into the room from whatever sneaky talk she had going on with her Hidden and looked up at the display. "Well, that's a relief."
"Yeah, no kidding." He glanced at his fellow Vanguard member. "Say, Ikora, I know Rasputin is important. But really, what are we looking for? What are we really after? If I left my post and got my ship and just went out there tomorrow, real heroic of course, and I found Rasputin, what would happen?"
She raised an eyebrow at his question. "Good question. As you know, Rasputin effectively controlled everything in the last days of the Golden Age, particularly the military systems. He had access to every classified project, had a hand in every weapon development program. He was the most effective resistance to the Darkness."
"Right, but he lost. It was the Traveler that saved us."
She nodded. "True, but the Traveler is silent now, and Rasputin still lives." She looked out the window and up at the sky. "He is out there right now, reaching out, rebuilding, growing."
Cayde jumped to his feet. "Well, that's it, then. I'll go find it. I'll go tell Rasputin we need its help."
Ikora glanced at Cayde with fond exasperation. "Cayde, the problem isn't that we can't find Rasputin. The problem is that it's not clear if Rasputin wants to be found."
…
Whisper turned her jumpship towards Earth with a sigh. She was deeply relieved that it looked like they had somehow pulled it off, but in the background lurked the Black Garden. But she would have to wait, at least for a few days. It was simply too hot on Mars at the moment, too many variables to launch a blind assault against a completely unknown foe in the middle of a war zone. A few days, just a few days.
…
Stella put her hands on her hips in front of Lord Shaxx and tried to mimic Aisha's confidence. "Lord Shaxx, you told me the Crucible would get me ready to fight the Darkness. Well, I went out there, and it was nothing like the Crucible."
The ancient warlord cocked his helmeted head to the side and considered the young hunter before him, giving Stella the distinct impression that he was measuring her somehow, sifting her potential. She stood her ground.
With a voice quieter than his usual exuberance he answered calmly. "There's a direct correlation between success in the Crucible and victories against the Darkness."
"Correlation? Not causation? If it doesn't get us ready to fight the Darkness, then why did I spend most of my new life in there practicing?"
Shaxx crossed his arms. "Child, a holstered weapon is useless. Fighting in the Crucible teaches you the fundamentals of combat, but combat basics are not what prepares you to fight the Darkness. What you'll get out of the Crucible will come from what you put into it. There's no secret to success - build a Fireteam you can trust. That is what prepares you to fight the Darkness. You either learn to work with other guardians, or you perish. Twilight Gap taught me that."
The hunter considered this and spoke thoughtfully. "So, the Crucible is a glorified team-building exercise?"
Shaxx snorted. "Exercise? The Crucible isn't just training and spectacle. We use live rounds. Winning a match is winning a battle in the truest sense. And make no mistake – it can be easier out there than it is here with the Crucible veterans. And" he added gravely, "with me."
Stella swallowed at the thought of facing Lord Shaxx.
Then the Crucible Master burst out in his trademark laughter and patted her on the back so hard she nearly dropped to her knees. "But I applaud your courage, young one. Now, what are you waiting for? Get back in there and distinguish yourself! Show your competitors what you learned in the field fighting Cabal! Win a few matches and teach your fellow guardians your new tricks! Remember, I like to reward those who encourage their team by example!"
A/N: It's been a while, sorry for the delays. As ever, great thanks to my beta reader, DragonGU. The help and encouragement have really helped keep this story moving along. Thank you!
Referenced Lore:
D1 Grimoire:
Dust Palace
Skyburners
Ghost Fragment: Cabal 4
Ghost Fragment: Rasputin
Bounties:
Primal Scream
Live Fire Exercise
Kill and Be Killed
Diligent
Crucible Master
As a Team
Another Notch
Making an Impact
Individual Achievement
Exemplary
