Chapter 3: Discovery III
Their departure was unceremonious. All the Warlock did was tell a select few not to expect him back anytime soon. Most of those were in the Reef or otherwise within easy comms reach. He sent two messages via the VanNet to Ikora and Jaxson. Writing them felt unnecessarily final. It made him nervous for some obscene reason.
The Warlock climbed into the modified Galliot and breathed out deeply. "This is it."
"Not many leave the system," his Ghost stated, "and for good reason. You're going to be disappointed."
"In all likelihood, sure. But if there's even the slightest chance... we have to try and do something. This is our heritage. At the very least I have to get a look at it."
"If there's Hive?"
"We leave. Straight away."
"Glad we agree on something." The Ghost spun her shell around. "Well, I'm excited. Or terrified. One or the other."
"Perhaps both?"
"I don't know about that. I'll figure it out soon."
"Tell me when you do."
The warp to Kepler-186 took many hours. The Galliot surfed on waves of sheer nothing, slipping between the folds in space. Colour dimmed during, and it cast over him a muted calm. The Warlock meditated. The Ghost tried to read. It beat sleeping the centuries away in a SMILE pod in every way.
They arrived with a flash of sensation. The Warlock gazed out the viewport and marveled at the foreign star system. Kepler-186 was smaller and slightly cooler than the sun he left behind, but that was to its own advantage. A slow-burning flame consumed less fuel. Nothing immediately jumped out as noteworthy. Still, it was a breathtaking moment. He had traveled beyond Sol. He had ventured to an entirely foreign star.
He was ecstatic.
"Wow," the Ghost obsereves. "No Hive. I think."
The Warlock frowned, glancing at his hands. "I... can still feel the Light, barely. It's distant and yet clear. I don't like this feeling... It's... off."
"Yeah. Weird. We're far enough now that... Yup. We really hit on a jackpot. I'm not seeing any Cabal signatures. Not enough Darkness, so the Hive haven't reached this place yet. And... wait."
The Warlock perked up. "What is it?"
The Ghost scrunched her shell up and narrowed her eye. "I'm getting something... The fifth planet, Kepler-186f, there's... We need to get closer."
One short jump later and they were above the planet in question. It was even more impressive than the sun.
There were continents of tan and green scattered around the sphere, surrounded by huge bodies of blue.
"It's... alive," the Warlock gasped. "I... what's wrong?"
His Ghost was frozen in place, staring off into the planet's horizon. "Warsats."
"What?!"
"Those are Warsats. The Exodus Prime brought Warsats. And they're in operation. You bastard, you were right! There are humans down-"
The Galliot's radar flashed red. The Warlock had a split-second to jerk the flight stick to the side and dive under the burst of concentrated plasma beams. He directed his bird to dodge as smoothly as she could, but it was a struggle. The Warsats didn't let up even a smidgen.
"I'm setting a jump-lock." The Guardian's free hand moved over the console before him. "In three... two... on-"
A beam kissed the Galliot's wing and sliced right through, sending the jumpship careening. Shockwaves reverberated throughout the cockpit and hull. The satellites keep their barrage up, hitting the ship again and again and again.
The Warlock cursed in seven different languages - three of them not human - and pulled helplessly on the flight stick. "I've lost control!"
His Ghost played around with the ship's terminal for a few moments, then turned back to him. "Get into the mesosphere, if gravity can catch us we can get out of range and-"
Another hit rocked the Galliot. The Warlock gritted his teeth and waited until the nose pointed towards the planet, then gunned the thrusters. Red lights flashed all around him, damage reports with some system failures mixed in for good measure. He could feel the Galliot coming apart beneath his hands, each piece beginning to burn up as they dropped towards the planet. The Warsats didn't relent, cutting away at the jumpship until they knew it wouldn't survive. When the carrier rails fell silent, the Warlock sighed in relief.
"Jokes on them," the Ghost chuckled humourlessly. "You don't need to survive."
"What was that for?" The Guardian snapped. "Rasputin?"
"No. I don't think so, anyways. I'm trying to figure it out. Their defense system has sturdy firewalls. There's... something in there. I'm trying to draw it out... Dammit, it's locking me out! Argh..."
"Get anything?"
"Not much. I... hold on. I found this."
The Ghost projected the message onto the glass canopy.
:AI-COM/SCPO: ASSETS/WARWATCH/IMPERATIVE
CONTINGENT ACTION ORDER
IMPERATIVE: CONTAIN TEMPORAL ANOMALY
This is a SUBTLE ASSETS IMPERATIVE (NO HUMAN REVIEW) (NO AI-COM REVIEW)
KEPLAR-186F secure. Restoring activation protocols. Activating SCRY OVERSIGHT. Target [310M] lifeforms. Event mode set to SILENT VELES.:
"Oh crap."
The Warlock gritted his teeth and felt his way around his Light. It felt oddly weak, as far as he was from the Traveler. Thin. Not enough there to do much just yet. That was an issue. He had a skill with Arc, a prowess with controlling the uncontrollable storm, but here it was beyond his grasp.
So, instead, he turned to the infinites between spaces, the nothingness beyond, the expansive and empty Void. He had walked those nullscapes, summoned forth its paracausal venom and fiery reduction of matter. Before he was a Stormbringer, he had been a Voidwalker.
"Back to the old days indeed," he muttered. Void Light was always more than plentiful, and even in the Darkest of places it could be exploited. And there, without his patron, he did just that.
Purple tendrils reached out from emptiness to grasp what remained of his falling ship and held it together, mercilessly extinguishing the surrounding superheated shroud of incandescent plasma. Void was an all-oppressing force none could resist. And it was his to command.
"We're not slowing down," his Ghost warned. The Warlock didn't answer her. It was taking a lot to keep himself in this trance, this lack of emotion, and some feats were beyond him.
They still plummeted, and fast.
"Hey, look. Clouds," the Ghost observed. Not a second later: "Bye clouds."
A stab of irritation slammed into him, weakening his grip. "You're not helping."
"And we're still falling, so..."
"I'm am attempting to rectify that."
"Rectify faster."
The Warlock bit back the retort and forcibly cleansed his mind of her nagging. They were getting close, now. He could feel it. He held on tighter, pulling back, slowing down the Galliot down...
A stray thought swept across.
Drifter knew about those defense systems.
The brief spill of anger ruined all his efforts and the Galliot dropped like a rock.
000
Old Belhorrolt Erdsson had done well for himself, many said. Doramb was not a well-off place, but each and every man and woman did their part. And, considering their recent misfortunes, life was harder than ever now. Even so, Belhorrolt had worked himself to the bone to build a house, raise livestock and care for crops, all in the interest of providing for his family. His wife was dead, had been for nearly a decade now, but his son and his family yet remained to support him in return. Together, they worked and lived to their utmost all hours of the day.
The evenings were his favourite time of the day. Belhorrolt and his son would sit outside on their home's porch and smoke the treasured tobacco and cardus weeds that the annual traders brought in. Together, they watched the stars in companionable silence.
A child's cry pierced the air.
Alosk smiled apologetically, passed the pipe to his father and left to comfort his own little one. Belhorrolt exhaled deeply. He was happy, there was no denying it. He had led a hard life, but he was content with it, proud of it. He had weathered the many hardships his farm had faced, built up on the tiny inheritance his own father left, and raised his only surviving son as best he could.
Something stirred above. The old man paused to watch. This night was near cloudless and it provided a breath-taking view of the heavens. Something was different. Brief flashes darted up, like twinkling stars beginning and dying within moments of one another. A strange sight indeed.
The spectacle ended as quickly as it began, but another phenomenon burst to life. A falling star tore across the sky, an odd purple glow trailing behind it. Old Belhorrolt stared as the the star fell closer and closer, then disappeared past the thick forests beyond Doramb. He waited for another few minutes, waiting for the next peculiar occurrence, but none presented themselves.
He glanced down to his pipe and solemnly swore to cut back on his habits.
000
The Warlock returned to life to a world engulfed in fire. A burning sheet of plasteel lay over him. It took considerable effort to throw it off.
His Ghost materialized above and looked at him expectantly. The Warlock sighed. "Yeah, yeah."
A wave of his hand extinguished the spreading flames, plunging the crater and shattered trees into near-total darkness.
"That could have gone better," she muttered. "I thought they didn't bring weapons?"
"The Exodus Prime? There was no mention of that. We acted on what little intel we had available. However, I will admit, this is... surprising."
"We going to skip over the fact that there are maybe three-hundred-and-ten-million humans present?"
"Sure. I'll admit, I'm more intrigued by the temporal anomaly right now. And the reasoning the Warmind has to keep it contained." He shook the recent death from his limbs.
His Ghost scoffed. "Warminds are crazy. There's understanding why they do anything."
"Not immediately, no, but if we delve into-"
"What, we politely ask this guy for a why and hope he doesn't vaporize us? I'm not so keen on that idea."
The Warlock paused. "Perhaps not the wisest tactic."
"Exactly."
"But a Warmind won't stop the Hive."
"You think so? There were a lot of Warsats up there. There could be other WMDs we have no idea about... What else?"
"Hm?"
"What else are we going to do? The Galliot's scrap metal, so-"
"We will salvage what we can and carry on. If there truly is a human populace, we will investigate. I want to know... I want to know everything."
They worked for the rest of the night. The fuel tanks of the Galliot had burst, which had contributed to the initial wildfire, but what remained was collected. If nothing else, they could weaponize it. The plasteel plating was equally valuable as a resource and the Warlock cut away sizable portions to be transmatted into the Ghost's digital vault. The food, water and medicinal supplies (Ghaul had taught them a valuable lesson) were, for the most part, ruined in the crash. What little survived was packed away, but the Warlock knew it wouldn't last him forever. And starving to death was not a pleasant experience. He would need to find an alternative food source.
"Air's breathable," the Ghost reported. "Everything looks good. Just like Earth..."
"The colonists must have brought frozen embryos of Earthen flora and fauna to replicate the environment of home. At the very least, we know they arrived without any trouble. Whatever happened occurred after the initial colonization efforts."
"Good for them. And us, I suppose. Can we go now?"
The Warlock found a game trail and followed it for a couple of hours, right up until they found the mountain stream. It was difficult to ascertain any noteworthy landmarks in this thick woodland of fir, oak and pine trees. The water was clean enough for consumption, so the Warlock sipped from a freshly filled flask and stocked up. Across the stream, a doe and its fawn eyed him warily as they approached the water's edge. He stared back, keeping dead still. As soon as they had their fill, they bounded away, no doubt intent on telling the rest of the herd about the strange man they encountered.
The Warlock smiled softly and moved on. He followed the water downstream, if only because settlements could usually be found near freshwater. He didn't know if this held true if the residents utilized self-contained habitats, but it was as good a direction as any. At the very least, if it connected with an ocean-bound river, then it would lead him out of the dense forest.
He saw the smoke before the village came within sight. He had been fortunate to find an underused dirt road after only a day of travel. Now he was second-guessing that luck. The Warlock drew his cannon and jogged forward.
"Stay hidden," he told his Ghost. She didn't need to be told twice.
The cause of the smoke was a simple raid. The Warlock was old by many standards. He had lived through the days where nothing could be trusted but the steel in your hand and the Ghost at your side. He had seen many raids before. Mostly Fallen were the perpetrators, but sometimes fellow humans would surprise him.
And yet the creature standing before the burning building, holding an axe in one hand and a screaming child in the other, did not look human. Nor did its fellows, holding equally primitive weaponry and donning nothing more than ragged cloth and old leather as vests, leggings and boots. Their most notable features were the curling horns on their heads and the larger stature than the cowering villagers they had at their mercy. A nervous mob had formed, armed with nothing better than pitchforks and hatchets. Not even a single rusty shotgun between them.
One shouted as soon as it saw the Warlock, but it was too late. The Guardian's cannon fired, and the bullet snapped the spotter's head back with a crack. Five subsequent shots dropped just as many creatures, before the rest began to panic. The Warlock didn't relent in the slightest. It was a one-sided slaughter. When the cannon's chamber was emptied, only the creature holding the hostage remained. It barked something in its own tongue, but the Guardian didn't heed the unfamiliar words. The axe pressed closer to the child - who couldn't have been any older than six - and gave the man pause. He holstered his cannon and drew his knife of Hunter design.
The Warlock grasped the Void in his offhand and tore himself through space in a Blink, slicing the atom-sharp blade through the horned creature's arm and then tearing out its throat, catching the child and kicking away the dying beast.
He was met with no other sound than the crackling of raid-sparked flames, turning around to face his terrified and dumbstruck audience.