Hello Lovelies! Did you miss me? Well I missed you guys and this story. A two-month break isn't quite my longest, but it sure felt that way. Anyways, enjoy!

Chapter 6 – Gratitude

The female's weight became heavier in his grasp; it must not have been holding itself up anymore.

Lykrosis pulled out and lowered the female to the ground handling it more gently than he ever thought he would. He wasn't sure why, but he didn't want to just let it collapse against the ground like he had seen happen multiple times with the sdee'al.

After he released it, it simply lie there for a few moments respiring heavily. Eventually, it pushed itself upright and then as was customary after it had recuperated, returned to the pools to clean itself. He had taken that as his cue, quickly refastening his bio-suit and reattaching his cloak. He intended to clean himself in private after returning to the burrow.

Lykrosis should have left, but he hesitated. Lingering was not something he was accustomed to, leisure even less so, but… he wanted to remain, at least a few more moments. It was unusual but he was content to simply watch the creature.

It was smiling again; it had been since they had finished, and didn't seem inclined to stop in the near moments. It did not hurry nor were its movements purposeful and efficient. It was calm and sluggish, seemingly enjoying the feel of the water. A few times it looked back at him and its contentedness increased, the smiling taking over its features.

The reaction made Lykrosis feel strange and he found this behavior puzzling. In fact, much of what the nuur'az had said of the past few moments was returning to him and it was all puzzling. He wanted to consider it all now that he was no longer distracted, but a distinct whoosh of air denoted the nuur'az return.

It had floated back down the path from wherever it had gone, pausing to hover between them as it said, "So… how was it?"

Lykrosis was trying to figure out what to say when an abrupt noise from the female cut off his thoughts.

"You laughed!" the nuur'az shouted as it zipped toward the creature as though it had not just addressed him. "But you've never laughed out loud before! How…" It didn't even finish the sentence, choosing instead to scan the female with beams of nuur as it did when sampling other materials. "I… I don't believe it. There is a change in brain wave activity. I have no idea what it means, but I can see it!"

The female was still smiling and for the first time, its mouth parted and Lykrosis caught a glimpse of what he thought were teeth. The reaction put him on edge; smiling indicated contentedness, he knew, but baring one's teeth meant aggression in every other creature he had come upon.

This whole scene was confusing. Was the female content or enraged? Why was the nuur'az behaving so erratically? His relaxed state further declined when the nuur'az in question came rushing at him. It stopped just short, enough so that he did not feel the need to react yet, but he did not like this.

"You! You did this. You made her laugh," and as he watched, it gently dropped downward and bumped itself against his right, upper claw. Lykrosis was so taken aback; he still didn't know how to react. "Thank you," it finally said as it returned to eye level.

It expressed gratitude? Why? Lykrosis was truly confused now. He had done nothing other than mate the creature as he had before and he even knew that he had not made it finish. "I do not understand," he finally admitted, "The female did not finish."

The nuur'az laughed. "Of course, you would focus on that. That is not important right now at all. The female told me before that being near you, touching you made her feel better. I didn't believe her, but it's true; I just saw it in my scans, the injury to her mind has changed minutely. You are helping her."

A flurry of movement distracted him. The female had teleported out of the pool directly in front of him and promptly covered itself with its garments. The movements were hurried; something he had never witnessed from the creature before.

"Uh, the female says we must go, she must do something." The nuur'az switched to their own language for a moment, before speaking to him again, "She also wishes to express gratitude. We offer you a favor; if you ever want or need anything from us, you may ask and we will do our best to give it to you."

And with that said, they disappeared.

"Are you going to tell me what just happened?" asked the ghost after they had returned to the ship. It had watched the female teleport herself onto the sofa with enough force that it actually creaked as it smashed into the bulkhead.

No answer.

It had been so thrilled with the female's change and now it was just worried again. The way she had communicated with it in the hollow had a dire sense of urgency. It was not normal for her to rush in such a manner or feel so disconcerted. Something was definitely going on, although, it didn't seem like it was going to get an answer.

The ghost prompted her again, but she gave no response so it gave up and made its way to the console. There was always more work to do.

Not ten minutes later, it heard its name urgently yelled through its mind.

Ghost! Ghost come.

"What?!" it said rushing over. It almost started scanning her worried the thing eating away at her had somehow worsened.

Record.

"Record what?"

Record. The female closed her eyes and appeared to be concentrating very hard on something.

It was thoroughly confused at this point, but waited at the ready nonetheless. After a few more minutes, it was finally flooded with information. The words came pouring out of her without pause like she was rushing to get them all out and it did its best to capture everything.

Ghost. It, no, he. Name. All name. Guardian. Me, we. Darkness. Stasis. Venus. Pain. Taken, corrupted. Punished. Orb. Fallen. Where. Time. There. Here. Stealth. Guardians. Earth. Event, past. Pain. Darkness. Want. Name. Me. Surrender. Loop. Frigate.

And if that jumble of incoherent thoughts and words wasn't enough, next it got intense emotions. She cycled through almost everything it could imagine: happiness, anger, confusion, mirth, misery, solemnity, pain, and the list kept going. The initial shifts were jarring, each one felt honestly as if they were the ghost's own feelings, before they finally became muddled together and abruptly cut out.

The female's eyes slowly opened, the feeling of urgency gone.

"Well that was certainly interesting, but why did you want me to record all of that? I couldn't make sense of any of it."

…

And there it was, the blank stare.

The ghost knew that look, she had forgotten everything. "You don't remember, do you? You listed off a bunch of words and sent emotions to me; you wanted me to record it all." The ghost played it back for her and although there was interest, there was no recognition. "I think it's important. I think you asked me to record it because you want to remember it, to be reminded of it." Its words sparked even more interest within her and it felt a request to repeat the list again. "I'm going to put them up on this monitor so you can review them whenever you want."

The female lifted herself off the couch and surveyed the monitor it had transferred the words to. The ghost wasn't sure if it was the list or its own words that caught her attention, but she moved close to the monitor and although there wasn't any indication, it knew she was studying them.

It checked on her periodically, brought her her drink, and eventually something to sit on, but her concentration never wavered. It seemed they were going to be in for a long night.

Destiny 2 is coming. Woo! I'm so ready. Alas, that also means more lore, which I absolutely love and hate at the same time since it is just more opportunity for Bungie to inadvertently crush this story's realism. I hate being AU or OOC unintentionally.