"What do you mean 'another version' of us?" Drifter said as he stared incredulously at the Emissary, she floated above him and the female Warlock standing next to him. The latter two were in the middle of an argument when the former just...appeared.
"The Nine discovered this just recently. There is another universe similar to yours," the Emissary blinked silently and emotionlessly at the two as she paused. "And in that universe lies several powerful stones. Stones that are powerful enough to shape reality itself as we know it."
The warlock was silent for a moment before her ghost spoke up, causing her to be cut off. "Stones? How did the Nine discover them, and why tell us?" Her ghost seemed curious, if a little accusatory. Emissary replied, emotionless as ever, "Because the Nine are not in a position to retrieve them. Their other agents in that universe are also not in a position to retrieve them as well...or have the capability to wield them."
"And you think we do?" Drifter snorted and cocked an eyebrow up, arms crossed defensively over his chest, "Last I checked, your crazy bosses told me to keep Gambit goin', but with the both of us going after these stupid rocks that comes to a stop."
"The game can wait."
"Wait? We don't have time to wait!" He sounded desperate. Afraid, actually.
"Yes. We do," the warlock finally opened her mouth, turning to Drifter and the Emissary with a determined look on her face, "If the Nine want us there instead of here, then either those stones are more important, or your Gambit has served its purpose." Her ghost tried to speak up, but she sent a look to it, which immediately silenced it.
The Emissary remained unmoving in her floating stance above the pair. "The stones are a result of the formation of their universe, and can change the very fabric of it. Do we need to expressly tell you why they are necessary for the coming storm, Dredgen?" The man recoiled and furrowed his brow, anger flashing across his features.
"I TOLD you, it's Drifter now!" He shot an angry glare at the woman, finger pointing to her as well. "And besides, as you said, those stupid rocks are all the way in another universe. How are we supposed to get there in any reasonable amount of time?"
"The Nine will take you there. We will give the both of you two days to prepare." And like that she was gone as fast as she'd appeared, leaving two bewildered light-wielders alone.
Amy, the warlock, sat across from Drifter and lazily tossed down a card with a scowl on her face. She sighed. "You're still just gonna sit here and have you and your ship transported to some universe...and then do nothing?" She was angry, arms crossed over her chest. Drifter avoided eye contact with her as a sigh escaped his lips as well.
"That's the idea, yeah. Why should I bother worrying about this universe when I can be living it up in another and get away from everything that's coming for us here?" He frowned, finally looking up at the woman across from him as he also tossed a card down onto the table.
"Because I know for damn sure that you're committed to the survival of humanity as much as I am, albeit with your own...morally grey operations as opposed to my own upfront actions…" She trailed off, a flash of anger flashing over her features once more as her mind drifted back to her actions on the Tangled Shore and the Dreaming City...Amy even heard the occasional voice of Riven in the back of her head, oddly enough. Those Ahamkara never really stayed dead, did they?
"...What if I was just in it for myself? Using Gambit for my own personal gain to get a leg up on what's comin' for us…" he trailed off again with his thumb idly rubbing the jade coin in his hand, but he was surprised to suddenly see a hand cannon pointed right at his head. Lumina, to be exact. It was the only one of its kind. The original Thorn was turned into a Weapon of Hope from its wretched form as a Weapon of Sorrow. He scowled, "What? You gonna shoot me? Go ahead, do it. Maybe you can get your ol' pal Cayde to go off to this other universe with you!" The bullet zipped by his head, nicking his bandana and causing the man to flinch.
"If you were just in it for yourself, and I believe that to be at least partially." Amy lowered Lumina, "I know that, in some twisted way, you're doing Gambit to benefit humanity as a whole, even if it isn't the way of the Light and Traveler."
The warlock brought Lumina back up to Drifter's chest with fury in her silver eyes. "And don't mention Cayde ever again.
Drifter sighed and held his hands up defensively. "Don't shoot, alright? I'm sorry I mentioned him in that way," he slowly put his hands down when the hand cannon moved to the small of Amy's back, "I'm just...we've both been under quite a bit of stress lately, haven't we?" He snorted with a smirk.
"Calus is...quite demanding for a Cabal."
"Of course he is! He's emperor after all."
Silence fell between the two after their game unceremoniously concluded with their little argument, and they wouldn't say another word to each other until the warlock moved to stand, stretch, and bid him goodbye, "I'm heading back to the Tower," she put a hand on her hip, "I'll be loading an extra jump ship into your hangar, as well as a fair bit of my own arsenal and enough ammo for the both of us to wage a small war," she smirked.
"Alright...just make sure they're small enough to fit 'cause I got my own, sister," he stood as well and held out a hand. "We're really gonna do this, huh?" He gave a toothy grin as the warlock shook his hand.
"Damn right we are. If these...rocks are able to keep the Witch Queen and Darkness from fully encroaching on us, then we have to take this chance." And with that, Amy departed, transmatting back into the Tower.
The next two days consisted of practically nothing but Amy moving her supplies up into the rogue Light-bearer's ship, which included two of her jump ships, and one of her sparrows. There was, of course, the multitude of weapons and ammo being loaded into the cargo hold of the man's large vessel. There was, indeed, enough weapons to wage a small war. Amy frowned as she slapped Recluse, a submachine gun she earned as an award for Glory in the Crucible and Outbreak Perfected, a SIVA-nanite-infused pulse rifle, onto her back before taking stock of the rest of her ghost's internal storage. The warlock was nervous, unsure of what to expect. What if she didn't have her connection to the Traveler in this other universe? What if she died? Such things mulled over in her head.
Amy turned to Drifter after everything was loaded while her ghost, Omicron, was sending an encoded message to both Zavala and Ikora, letting them know what was happening and that she may not return. "Are we ready?" She asked softly. He nodded.
"Yeah. I think so. You sure we got enough guns? Looks like you moved most of your vault up here," he rubbed the stubble of hair on his chin.
"Just the important ones. Ones that'll make a difference in a prolonged fight," she said as she adjusted the belt of her robes and formed her helmet over her face just as the Emissary appeared once more and floated above them.
"Are you ready?" Her voice was emotionless, and spoke as though there were others joined with her own.
" 'Bout as ready as we'll ever be, sister," Drifter gave a crooked grin, arms crossed over his chest once more. "What place are we exactly going to, anyway? For all we know your friends could just teleport us into the middle of a star and that'd be the end of your quest." Amy looked at him with a raised eyebrow. He had a point, she supposed.
"We will be depositing you somewhere...familiar. It shocked us as much as it will you." Was that humor on the edge of her voice? Amy cocked an eyebrow and frowned, a bit more worried now all of a sudden.
"Familiar? What do you mean?" She asked with curiosity in her voice. "You don't mean to tell us that there's another Last City on another Earth in this new universe, do you?"
The Emissary stayed silent and merely raised a hand, and soon the two guardians' world turned bright white. Amy and Drifter brought up their hands to project their vision just as the brightness started burning into their minds. This pain was something new, something different to both of them. It was as if their minds, their bodies, and their very souls were being twisted, torn, bent, and broken into millions of little pieces and being reassembled all at once every millisecond. Amy wanted to scream, but found that nothing came out of her mouth. Then, as soon as it started, it ended, which caused both of them to collapse and curl up to clutch their bodies in pain.
It took what seemed like hours for Drifter and the warlock to finally stand on their own two feet, but when they did, the Emissary was gone. There was no one else in the cargo bay except the duo of light-wielders. The man immediately ran to the bridge of his vessel as fast as he could so they could get a bearing on where they were.
Amy couldn't believe it. In front of her eyes, right out the view-ports...was another Earth! Her silver eyes shot to Drifter, who was currently tapping furiously away on the console in front of him. "Yeah I thought my eyes were playing tricks on me too, but either that Emissary didn't actually transport us, or that's actually a different Earth," the man muttered to the warlock.
"I'm detecting cities, towns, billions of people down there…" Drifter couldn't believe that he was looking at a Pre-Collapse, and heck, even Pre-Golden Age Earth. There was a distinct lack of any signatures that indicate the Traveler was in the system, or that any of their known enemies were here either. Odd. Definitely seems that wherever this Earth was it hadn't had any influence from the Darkness, the Traveler, Vex, or even Fallen and Hive. Amy gave the man an incredulous look before the console Drifter was working on lit up and began beeping after the sensor scan was completed.
"Scanner is pickin' up a massive amount of spatial energy coming from the North American continent. Looks like some sort of portal is open and letting a lot of critters come from wherever the other side of it is." He tapped away at the controls to move the ship into a stable orbit while Amy began making her way towards the hangar bay. She paused and looked back at him, "Vex?"
"Nah, not detecting any of 'em, but it does seem to emit something similar to their portal technology, even if something else is comin' out of it."
"An invasion then," her voice sounded grim, angry, and prepared while her voice soon transitioned to the comm system between the two.
"Certainly possible. What do you wanna do?" Drifter turned to look at the woman as she was just about to step into the hangar while an unsure look formed on his face.
"We help them. I thought that's what we do," Amy looked back at him with a frown and a hand on her hip.
"Yeah but, what about what the Emissary said?"
"Oh, now you care about the mission? What if that portal is being powered by one of those stones? If we shut the portal off, we'd most likely have one already in our possession."
The Drifter was silent for a moment before a sigh escaped his lips and he pinched the bridge of his nose, "Damn. You have a point there. Fine, we'll head down there, get the glowing magic space rock, and maaaaaybe save some people." The man put a few more commands into the main console then turned to follow the warlock to their waiting ships.
"Good, and NO Primevals!" she shot a glare to the man, which caused him to hold his hands up in defense.
"Hey sister, why the sudden hostility? Those primevals come in handy in certain situations," he protested and frowned.
"Because if that city is populated, which it most likely is, you're going to terrify those poor people down there even more than they already are if that portal is an invasion of sorts. Just use your Light and weapons just this once, alright?" She let out a small sigh while giving the man a pleading look, which, after a moment, seemed to cause him to relent as he waved his hand off.
"Alright alright alright, fine. Let's just get going." And with that the two light-users moved to their respective vessels and departed the Haul with a destination set for the large city in North America.
Tony Stark blasted another Chitauri chariot out of existence before landing in front of Cap, Natasha, and Barton. His faceplate flipped up as he let out a tired sigh. "Glad to see you guys are alright. That looked like a pretty rough landing there."
"Ah, you know, Clint's magnificent piloting skills made sure we didn't die in a horrible, fiery crash. What's the situation upstairs?" Natasha asked as she looked up at the sky with that massive blue portal letting in all the Chitauri.
"Messy, and what's worse is that we have two more bogeys coming in from a high orbit. It looks like they're making a beeline right for the tower."
"Reinforcements? I would've thought they'd come through the portal instead," Cap looked up and tightened the grip on his shield.
"Doesn't look like it, at least to me. JARVIS said their ship configuration doesn't match what we're up against."
"Perhaps they are allies," Thor said as he landed with a thud, hammer in hand, and a rather irritated look on his features. "Which we desperately need right now."
Tony thought about that for a moment before nodding and closing his faceplate once more, "Maybe. How's about you and I go up there and check 'em out when they land? They're heading for the tower."
"Very well. I shall meet you up there, metal man." Thor spun his hammer around and launched himself into the air with the top of Stark Tower as his destination. Tony rolled his eyes in his suit before blasting off himself to meet the new arrivals with, hopefully, peaceful intentions.