Second Strike
"Nearing The Last City, Tower," Ghost announced behind it.
Its Guardian still sat on the cold, metal floor of the cockpit, cradling her partner's heavy head. "Ma'am?" Her head hung over slightly, waiting for Sven's eyes to return to its brilliant red glow. She eyed the crippled Ghost shell next to her knees, the light of its eye flickering softly against the floor. After several minutes of no response, her Ghost continued again.
"The Speaker has called for a gathering of the Guardians back at the Tower. Maybe he'll know what to do..." They neared the Tower, and was dropped off in the central Plaza. Guardians filled the air with loud chatter, some tanned faces filled with worry, a blue face was plastered with fear and darted their eyes back and forth through the crowd. As she sat there unmoving below the steps, slowly she gained the attention of nearby Guardians. A pale faced Warlock ran towards her with bright blonde hair. She stopped suddenly a few feet away from them, taking in the sight of the Exo in her lap as still add a statue. The Warlock's face contorted into that of utter disbelief and fear. She brought her hand to her mouth and drew her eyebrows together. Tears welled at her forest green eyes.
"Oh..." With one word and the sight of the Warlock, a pit opened in the Hunter's stomach. What was going on? Another Warlock, a male Exo this time, ran up beside the female Warlock. He voiced a barely audible curse before turning back to the crowd.
"Oh fuck..." he started off. "Fuck fuck fuck fuck FUCK FUCK FUCK!" He clutched at his camouflage green head and dissolved back into the crowd. The Hunter's Ghost reappeared at her side.
"Wait here, I'll go find The Speaker," it said before seemingly flying off in a haste. The Hunter's attention with the crowd accumulated, as the Guardians formed a circle around her. She scanned their faces, each of them showing an array of anger and anguish. She looked down to get friend's face still in her lap.
"Please wake up, Sven..." she murmured down at him.
"Stand aside," a smooth yet firm voice spoke above the crowd. The Guardians parted to reveal the clad white Speaker walking towards them followed by the Hunter's Ghost. He took a knee as he neared them, then picked up the broken Ghost that sat near his feet. "He's still alive..." he breathed. She drew her white eyebrows together.
"What do you mean?" The Speaker held Sven's Ghost in his grasp, rotating it and scanning every detail.
"What is your name," he looked up above her head. "'IzzyWizzyDizzy,' is it? "
"W-well," she was taken aback slightly, suddenly aware of how stupid her RiVi ID sounded coming out of his mouth. It was a name she got a long time ago from her older cousin. It's not even close to her real name, but after all these years, it just stuck. "Just leave it at Zee," she insisted. He gave her a short nod.
"Very well then." He stood up, and kept the Ghost in his hand. The Speaker turned back to the crowd looking down at then from the Plaza. "Guardians, most if not all of you have received a peculiar letter regarding a supposed new patch that was incorporated into the game," he stated. Zee watched his broad back as he leisurely paced back and forth among them. It disturbed her slightly that The Speaker himself knew he was in a video game.
"For those of you who are unaware, it seems that The Darkness is not your only enemy anymore. This patch known as Virulent has the ability to lock players into their servers and experience pain and even death here as they do in the real world. The Guardian behind me holds proof in her arms." All eyes locked onto Sven in her arms, and she reflexively brought him closer to her, assuming a protective aura.
"W-wait, you mean like we feel the death, but we don't die out of game right? Our avatars just get deleted forever or something, right?" An anonymous voice filled with denial spoke from far back in the crowd. The Speaker held an excruciating silence before taking again.
Finally, with a heavy heart, he confessed that he didn't know.
"You are all welcome to come test the theory," he added, using an open hand to direct Guardians to the edge of the balcony. They shifted onto their feet and looked at one another. No one was brave enough to step up. The Speaker's hand fell back down to his side.
"What we do know," he announced as he held up the broken Ghost in his hand. "Is that your Ghost is now your life." He let the words hang into the air, letting it sink in for all of them. "Your Ghost dies, then you die. Simple as that."
"W-wait, but why?" Zee spoke up from behind him. She struggled to get back up on her feet, but refused to leave her best friend's side. She kept her seat on the ground. "Why our Ghosts?"
"Your Ghosts have healing powers, do they not? They revived you, or rather, your Guardian avatar at the beginning of the story after being dead for years. When a Guardian dies on the field, your Ghost keeps you from falling into that dark void of death, keeping you alive long enough for a friend or teammate to rescue you. Without your Ghost, your lives would have ended a lot earlier," the Speaker talked down to her. She shrunk away from him, intimidated by his authority. "It seems the Virulent patch has reprogrammed The Darkness and its minions to target all Ghosts. Once your Ghost is gone, you are gone."
"What about Sven?" Zee blurted out. Her glowing green yellow eyes scanned the mask of The Speaker. "Is he..." she didn't dare continue. He slowly took a knee nearby her again and placed a heavy yet comforting hand on her shoulder.
"Your friend still lives," he reassured her with a low voice. "His Ghost still fights with what little Light is left in it." He placed the flickering Ghost in her arms before standing back up again. "Wait here Guardian. I will address you later." She stared back at him with furrowed brows, not bothering to give a response.
"Guardians, believe me when I say, protecting your Ghost will not be an easy task. They may hide for a majority of your missions, but remember they must decode doors, deal with a encryptions, hack into information. All of which, I'm sure you all know, require a significant amount of time and leaves them quite vulnerable." Another voice, a woman's this time, spoke from the crowd.
"Wait! Don't they have shields? They can still protect themselves!" The Speaker's shoulders drooped slightly, and with a heavy heart, deflected her words.
"Your Ghosts may have shields but they aren't strong enough to protect against a Hallowed Knight's plasma rocket, or the barrage of bullets from several Shanks. Your shields don't last so long to make you invincible; what makes you think it's the same for your Ghost?" He replied with a heavy lilt in his voice. The words steadily brought forth a depression on Zee. The Speaker may be the all knowing and translator of The Traveler, but he isn't one to mince his words. If it is important information the Guardians must know, he will give it to them. Desperate suggestions and questions were thrown at him, only to be rejected left and right.
"Then we'll stay here! We're safe at the Tower, aren't we?" The Speaker shook his head.
"You may be safe from The Darkness but hundreds of Guardians have already died from being forcefully disconnected by outside sources. There is no safe haven here," he said gravely. A human Titan with abnormally lemon blond hair stepped out from the crowd. He stood with his chest puffed, and had a face of determination.
"Then what do we do? Are we just going to stand here and do nothing? Is there any way for us to get out?" The Titan raised his voice in anger. "Some of us actually have families out there!" Voices started into low chatter, then jumbled talking, and raucous shouting.
"The people outside! They'll get us out, right? We just need to wait!"
"How long do you think that will even take? Hours? Days?"
"Years...?"
"No! I have work tomorrow!"
"We all have shit to do outside genius!"
"I don't wanna die...I can't die...!"
"Mama! Daddy! Get me out of here!"
"Shh buddy, it's okay. You're a big boy of twelve now, right? We...We'll figure something out, okay?"
The voices became a jumbled mess around her, all sense of order was beginning to collapse right in front of her eyes.
"There's no point. We should all just jump now and get it over with."
"Don't talk like that! You can't give up without a fight!"
The Hunter pushed Sven and his Ghost off her lap and carefully placed them on the floor. She whispered a quick apology, and told Sven that she would be gone for just a moment. Zee walked up to the Speaker and grabbed at his shoulder and, rather forcefully, spun him around to face her.
"What do I have to do?" She shouted above the crowd. "Tell me what I have to do!" The crowd's noise faded away as she stared into the blank mask of the Speaker, resolute. "You said he wasn't dead," she finally said after the crowd was deathly silent. "Tell me how to bring him back. Tell me how to take him home!" The Speaker held his wrist behind his back and turned away from the Hunter, his head tilted down in deep thought. He slowly paced across the ground, the eyes of countless Guardians on him, waiting in heavy silence.
"Your Ghosts are now your lifeline," he repeated slowly. "Ghosts are made of and live off of the Light from the Traveler." He turned back to Zee standing behind him with her hands clenched at her sides. "The only way to wake your friend is to collect enough Light to repair his Ghost." He strode towards her and knelt beside Sven on the ground. "Your friend is very lucky. Rarely do Ghosts ever survive being shot without their shields up." She kneeled on the other side of Sven, across the Speaker.
"And where can I get enough Light to wake him up?" She asked, struggling to keep her voice steady. The Speaker stared back at her through his mask.
"You know as well as I do where to get Light, Guardian," he said with a low, husky whisper. Her brows knitted together. Despite asking, she already knew the answer far back in her mind. Strikes. Raids. Dungeons. Her heart sunk into the pit of her stomach.
Her low armor and recovery stats made surviving any Strike nearly impossible. Finding appropriate teammates for a Fireteam was hard enough already, but finding teammates willing to go into a Dungeon now will practically be a miracle. She wasn't one to believe in miracles, but she desperately needed one, despite her belief in them.
The Speaker waved a hand above his head, calling two NPC bots towards them. One of the bots neared her with its regular chipper tone, getting her with the traditional "Hello, Guardian." The other bot, colored dark green with a wide red stripe running vertically down its narrow frame and one eye, slipped its stick like robot arms under Sven's back and legs and lifted him off the ground. A switch flipped on inside Zee, her eyes widening in anger. She made two steps towards the bot, but was jerked back by the Speaker.
"What are they taking him?" She growled fiercely. She promptly called after the bot carrying her best friend. "Put him down!"
"Calm your nerves, Guardian," the Speaker spoke with an uncharacteristically soothing voice. "I've ordered them to take your friend to the Tower North and have him and his Ghost quartered there for now." The other bot, fully painted red and purple, cradled Sven's Ghost in its arms and followed its partner to the Tower North. The Speaker faced the observant crowd once more.
"Any Guardians who have fallen in the field of battle but can still be saved may be taken to the Tower North for safe quartering," he explained. "Until further information can be gained, I suggest you all make yourselves comfortable here at the Tower." And with that, the Speaker ended the hearing and gestured an open hand towards the Tower North, silently prompting Zee to go on. Her eyes were filled with uncertainty, and she waited just a moment too long to act.
The coagulated mass of shouting voices filled the air as the crowd grew unruly, unsatisfied with the Speaker's words. He called forth various NPCs—Vanguards, vendors, and space fillers alike—to make a wall between him and the rioting crowd. The NPCs stood with stone expressions, facing the Guardians who spewed venomous words from their lips.
"You fucking useless shit-head! What makes you think I want to stay here another minute?! Get us out of here!"
"They can't even think! They're just coded to tell us we can't do anything about dying in this hell hole of a game!"
"Fuckers just want us all to die!"
"Goddamn puppets for the asshole who started all of this, I bet!" Zee warily glanced at the Speaker by her side, who still stood rigidly with his wrist held at his back.
"You're not going to do anything?" She asked, worried. The Speaker gave her a sigh in response.
"What for," the response came out monotone. "The Tower is a combat locked zone. They can't hurt me, nor can they actually kill me. They can try to throw me off the balcony—any NPC here, really— but we'll just come back as though nothing happened. We can't die... Besides..." he trailed off as he watched the Guardians failing to break through the wall of NPCs. "...We are necessary to your survival," he said low enough just for the Hunter to hear. He clapped a hand at her shoulder once more, before striding off to the Tower North.
Babbles: Hmm...still a little slow in the beginning so far, but hopefully by the next chapter things will start to pick up. c:
And now I should probably get to working on my Essay Draft for college v_v
Until then
Cheers, my friends.