Chapter 15

The Enemy Within

I woke up to white again, but this time it was a light inside a fixture overhead. I blinked the blurriness from my vision, or at least tried to, before sitting up. As I did, my arm resisted moving and nearly caused me to lose my balance. Looking at my arm, I saw I was hooked up to several machines monitoring my vitals. The room was a sterile white and gave me an odd sense of unease and comfort. It was the infirmary. How'd I get here?

As if in response, I remembered Mr. Yang pushing the button, a flash of purple, white, and then black. Suros, the device...Charli…

Feeling a surge of distress, I plucked the cords out of my arms to my own discomfort and tried to slide out of the bed. It was then that I noticed I was still wearing my pants, but my robe and chest armor were nowhere to be seen. I felt bare, but then I remembered that also I needed to get a new helmet. I needed to be more careful with my equipment, but at least it's done its job. Now, I had to complete mine. I quickly stood up and dashed over to the window, throwing open the curtains.

It was either morning or evening, I couldn't tell. Clouds of a dispelled or gathering storm painted blood reds and fiery oranges across a multi-colored sky. As my eyes wandered around the cityscape that unfolded in front of me. I didn't see any smoke indicative of the bomb, but I wasn't about to cough that up as an illusion. That had been real, it had to be.

I didn't move from the window for several minutes. I needed to get moving, but there was one thing holding me in place: fear. What had only been a suspicion was now my reality, and I was scared. There were Fallen in the City, in one of the primary foundries that it had, and what evidence did I have that they weren't in the others or walking among us or even in the Tower itself? None.

We needed answers, and Yang would be able to give them to us whether he wanted to or not. Suddenly, two warm arms wrapped themselves around my neck. "Morning sleepyhead," a familiar voice said behind me. I pushed the arms aside and turned around to see an Awoken with brown hair and glowing green eyes.

"Arla!" I exclaimed, returning the embrace. "You're alright."

"For now yes," she said with a smile. "Honestly, you gave us quite the fright the last couple days."

Was I out that long? "Couple days?" I asked.

"Yeah. They found you, Charli, and that guy right where that explosion went off…"

I interrupted, wasting no time. "Where is he?"

"Yang? He's in a holding cell. Starco was adamant that he was Fallen, but we've been unable to get anything out of him, even when Ikora went in. Zavala was a little more successful, but he was barely in there for five minutes."

"Have you tried torture?" I wasn't a fan of it, but it was admittedly useful in the past.

Arla seemed shocked at the notion, falling deathly silent for several seconds. I regretted saying the words almost immediately. "No, Maximus," she said glumly. "We have not tortured him nor will we. Just because this is war does not mean we need to stoop to the enemy's level. We're not heathens."

I wish we hadn't gotten on this subject so quickly. "How do you suppose we're going to talk to someone who won't?"

Arla grinned. "For that, my dear Max, we have ways. Follow me." She turned around and waved off the doctors trying to make their way over to me, telling them I was just fine. As far as I could tell and remember, I hadn't sustained any injury beyond that fall off the building, something that was still a miracle. So, I was a little sore, but I would be able to function just fine.

Starco spawned in my robe and I slipped it over my bare chest. It felt like a void surrounded me as I put it on without my armor. After the initial wave of doctors, nobody bothered us as we exited the infirmary. She pushed the button on the lift and entered when it opened. I followed suit and readjusted my robe so it fit better on my shoulders. The doors shut, and it accelerated down in a sudden jolt. Arla leaned against the back wall of the elevator and closed her eyes.

There was something different about her demeanor. It was harder, colder. I couldn't tell if it was her new set of circumstances or what I said, perhaps both. Honestly though, I didn't like it, and to change that, we needed to clear the air at least somewhat. "Is everything alright? You seem...tense." It was rather direct, but I figured it'd get to the point in the short ride we'd have on the elevator, given she opened up.

She opened her eyes and looked at me. "I'm sorry Max," she said. Looks like she was opening up. "It's nothing you did. I'm just trying to cope with all…" she threw her arms out and above her head. "...this." Her voice sounded tired. "I'm mortal for the first time since trying to escape the Reef. It's...weird."

"What do you mean?"

She straightened her posture. "The next time I die in the field or anywhere that's it. Every moment could be my last. I can feel a void in myself, a hole where Stargazer had been, and I didn't even know it. I wish there was an easier way to explain it. I just…It's hard to fathom that I've entered the last phase of my life."

She trailed off, leaving us quiet for several seconds as I chose how to respond. I couldn't imagine the inner turmoil that she was feeling. I looked into her eyes and saw stifled tears gathering behind their. Arla hadn't hardened herself because she wanted to be; she did so because the one moment she went soft was the moment she would take a fatal shot. "I'm not going to pretend to understand your predicament, but it's the way we respond to these trials that define who we are as people."

Her confidence seemed to regenerate steadily. "And that's why I'm gonna keep fighting as long as I still have some life left in these bones. Those scum are going to regret the day they were born."

The lift door opened. "Speaking of scum…" I said, gesturing towards the door.

"Thank you," she said with a grin. We exited the lift with the doors clanging shut behind us. The corridor we were in was dimly lit and silent. Heavy metal doors lined the hallways with panels next to each one's frame. A green light shone on all of them save for one at the end of the hall. This must've been where they kept the interrogation rooms. It looked generally unused, perhaps due to Guardians' tendencies to kill more than they captured. Despite that, there was a singular frame at the end of the hall with a broom sweeping the floor. "Don't make eye contact," Arla warned. I was not about to question why. There was something eerie about the hallway as we walked through. Invisible eyes seemed to stare into my back as I walked.

Moments later we stood in front of the door with the red light. The panel was close to eye level for Arla and just an inch or two under mine. She held her eye to the scanner, and the door slid open almost immediately. Inside was a room that was surprisingly darker than the hallway. The walls looked like limitless voids whose expanse was broken only by a dim light reflecting off the floor or the large window that saw into the next room. Sitting in a metal chair was a haggard Mr. Yang. He was currently asleep on the gray table in front of him and not moving a muscle. He almost looked like a corpse, but the gentle rises and falls of his chest said otherwise.

"The man's crazy," Arla stated, folding her arms across her chest in front of the glass. "Keeps talking about how their day will come and we'll be powerless to stop him."

"He's smart though," I countered. "He knows how to get under your skin and trap you." This must have been the reason they were so eager for Charli to come. They likely assumed Arla and I would come along to watch, and in one fell swoop, they could get rid of practically any opposition. The only problem was I had no idea if this was a puppet or the puppet master. That was a question I was hoping Variks would be able to answer when we sat down and talked. Hopefully he had some insight. "That...thing handed Charli a bomb and held her hostage without her even knowing."

"Yeah he's gloated about that a time or two. To me, this guy sounds like something out of a bad show."

"True, but I don't think most Illusion are going to be like him. We could be lucky and got the oddball." I folded my arms and kept watching Yang as he slept there. Arla began nimbly twirling her knife in her fingers. "So what ways were you referring to earlier?" I asked, changing the subject slightly.

She stopped twirling the knife and slipped it in its sheath. "Heksis agreed to use his expertise on him."

"I thought he was a cqc specialist. Why not send me?" I wasn't really irritated, but it bothered me a little that I had captured him and now had to sit shotgun while someone else did the job I should be doing.

"It's no offense to you, but we had no idea when you'd wake up. Somehow several chips and circuits in your body fried for some reason. No notable damage to any of your systems, but now you won't have to do maintenance for awhile. Docs and the bots feared the worst though. You'll probably have to go back in a few days just so they can check up on how everything's integrating." Of course they would...never a day that they're not worrying about something. I turned my head to see Arla looking right back at me. Her face had that half-grin that I'd known, the first time I'd seen that since she went down. "In Heksis case though, looks can be deceiving. Not everything is as meets the eye."

"Tell me about it," I said, turning back to Yang. This guy was the classic example, but it was about time we removed his mask; the question was how. For that, I asked Arla. "Have you guys tried to interrupt his disguise at all?"

"Yep, but we haven't been successful, obviously." She sounded a bit annoyed at that fact but continued. "We tried looping tones with varying frequencies to possibly disrupt the disguise…"

"Whoa, whoa, whoa," I interrupted. "Back up. Are you saying that the disguise is machine-based?"

"They scanned him shortly after bringing him in. There are some profound differences between them and standard Fallen." Oh joy…"For one, their muscles are much more stronger and more toned. This, the docs say, could just be their training or the implants."

"Implants? Like augmentations?"

"We don't know their exact nature, but the docs theorize it plays some part in their disguises. Thought a tone high or low enough would be able to disrupt their function. Nothing worked before the systems shorted out."

I rubbed the back of my neck. "Crap. Was the tone maxed out?"

A flicker of confusion shot across her face. "No, and the system we used to make the tones was practically brand new, just hadn't been used in a couple months." I almost asked if it was sabotage, but Arla seemed to read it off my face somehow. "And no, it wasn't sabotaged. We've have this guy in a lead box the entire time. No comms going in or out. They would need agents who knew what was going on to know we had Yang in custody."

"Who knows the full details of Yang and Suros?"

"The Vanguard, us, and Heksis to a lesser extent."

"How's Charli?" I felt terrible for never even asking if she was alright; I'd been so caught up in finding out about Arla and Yang...

"She's been out since the incident as well. Extreme overexertion the docs said. I'm surprised you didn't ask earlier. She was awake yesterday long enough to walk to her room. My guess is that she's been sleeping off that migraine." There was silence for a moment as I thought back to the seconds just before the bomb went off.

Charli threw a grenade at the wall and leapt through the hole. Meanwhile, I punched Yang across his smug face and broke his jaw. While Yang was still shocked by my blow, I brought both of us to the ground and prepared for the heat. My hands burned first, and then there was the wall of purple that turned into white, and then black. Wait a minute...I rewinded my mental footage to the point I tackled Yang. The explosion had not come until just before the white and black, meaning that the hot sensation was caused by something else. I pushed it forward and smashed my fist against Yang's fake jaw, bringing him down right after. Charli's wall of purple energy shielded us, and then came the burning sensation. I focused on my hands rather than Charli's heroic form as she threw out her Ward of Dawn. They were blanketed in a white aura, a bright light, that began extending itself toward Charli as she prepared for the explosion's force. Soon, her hands were covered in the white light as well. The shield went from purple, to a light blue and then to an opaque off-white. It was then that the fire cut out and I was left in darkness.

I reopened my real eyes back in the interrogation room, or rather the room next to it. I felt a new presence in the room with Arla and me. Turning towards the door, I saw a new figure step into the dull lights. While still a proclaimed Warlock, Heksis seemed to be a little bit of everything, or at least that's how he came off to me. The body armor on his legs and torso were blue, largely covered by a dark green robe similar to my own, but seemingly a bit thinner. He had his hood drawn up over his head, and the only part of his helmet that stuck out was a blood red visor. His personality was even more contradictory: quiet to some, loud with others, and Arla even claimed he could be quite the prankster. Looking at the sharp blades at his sides, I didn't ever want to be a part of those pranks. He also had a pair of modified hand cannons placed just behind the blades' hilts. Intimidating to me? No. To others? Yes. Odd? All day every day. The sharpest tool in the shed? In my opinion, no. He came off as awkward to a stranger, but that wore off as you got to know him. That was yet to occur for me, but he was completely comfortable around Arla.

The two had an arm each wrapped around the other as they watched Yang sleep. Arla had him by a couple inches, and maybe a few brain cells, but I wasn't about to stand in the way of their relationship. On the same note however, I was going to let him make the first move. A few seconds later, that came in the form of the pair exiting the room and stepping into the hallway.

/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\

Arla Nublier

Arla and Heksis moved towards a seemingly ordinary piece of wall, leaving Maximus to his thoughts. She searched for a few moments against its smooth, black surface and finally touched one spot just to the right of her shoulder. The cool metal peeled back and revealed a bright, white light that stood absolutely still at the divide between the two rooms. The two were silent as they entered, letting the metal slide shut behind them. Before they took a step further, Arla planted herself in front of Heksis. "Before I let you at him, I need you to promise he'll walk out of that room alive." Her face was deadpan. "NOT in little pieces," she emphasized.

Arla didn't mean for it to sound rude, but she wasn't going to hide the fact that she was a little frustrated by his decision to leave her while in the infirmary. When someone you care about is hurt, common sense, common courtesy, says you should stay by their side, not go who knows where for "urgent business." That's why you have seconds-in-command. This frustration didn't exclude Charli and Maximus and their excursion to Suros , but one, they'd been on a under orders for the Vanguard and thus had to go, and two, they had gotten hurt in the process, making them unable to sit at her bedside. Of course, she'd have to ask Maximus some serious questions as to why he only took Charli on something potentially dangerous.

Words for later though. Right now was all about getting Hek in there and that piece of garbage in a prison cell or the morgue.

"Question. How many of these shape shifting spider pirates did you find? You get a sample of the weaponry? And the devices they use to mimic other beings? I could definitely put that kind of tech in the right hands y'know."

Arla was stunned for a moment. These were not the questions that she had been expecting out of him. She had expected him to at least acknowledge the tension in her voice but to no avail. What he said was behind them. Arla did have to internally applaud him for keeping his mind on the task at hand.

Her mind and mouth back where they were supposed to be, Arla thought for a moment. "I highly doubt it, but I'm not one hundred percent sure. Ikora didn't mention anything recovered from the explosion besides this guy, Charli, and Max. Nothing else to recover. From what I saw on my visit, nothing left but a crater."

Arla and Heksis moved farther down the hall. The entrance to the room wasn't far from here, just one more right. "As for the tech, we still haven't been able to shut it off." Arla looked at Heksis eyes behind the mask. She could've sworn she saw the faint glow behind the blood red visor but couldn't be certain. "Look, let's focus on getting some info outta this piece of garbage. Then we'll focus on what he's made of. Capeesh?"

"Garbage? You haven't even seen them yet." The blue robed warlock mumbled quietly as he followed along, letting out a soft cough as they neared the corner.

"I don't plan on seeing what he's made of. In fact...I'm pretty sure he became decommissioned before I even walked through the door. Your friends certainly did I good job." He muttered, leaning his head to the sides back and forth for a moment as they walked around the corner.

"But...given my experiences I think I would know the fallen pretty well. Tell me...what is the one thing that every fallen wants? That every fallen fights to have?" Heksis asked.

Arla couldn't help but think that it was a trick question. She paused in front of the door, hidden from Yang's side but readily apparent on theirs. "Power? The Traveler? Freedom? I don't know," she said with a shrug.

"To survive," Heksis answered definitively. "The Kells and the Barons may talk about glorious assaults on the city, breaking down those walls and massacring every dirty, filthy flat face they find. But the real fallen? The grunts? They just want food. They just want to stay alive. Now...why a fallen would want to live in the city itself? I don't know. Maybe he just really really liked the pancakes or omelettes perhaps?"

"Well, it's about time he picks up the tab," the huntress concluded. Arla pushed a button on the wall that slid the door open and revealed a conscious Mr. Yang standing in the doorway. An evil grin stretched its way across his smug face. "Glad to see I have company," he mused. Frozen in surprise, Arla suddenly felt herself lifted into the air and began choking on her own neck. She helplessly followed the inhumanly strong hand from her own throat to the arm and shoulder of Mr. Yang.

Heksis jumped back in surprise and instinctively pulled his two swords out of their sheathes, taking a small step back from the figure. Arla tried to reach for her knife when two other arms seized her own, causing her to drop it. She tossed her gaze over to Heksis. Behind the mask she could see the conflict in his glowing eyes: kill or maim?

"SORRY ABOUT THIS!" The warlock shouted, sheathing his swords and throwing a palm forward. An invisible force slammed into Arla and Yang and sent them flying to the opposite side of the room. In mid-air, Yang threw his weight to one side and made it so Arla smashed into the table with her back.

Pain coursed through her back as it bent awkwardly, no snap of bones thankfully, but it was going to be sore for certain. Fueled by adrenaline and rage, Arla struggled to her knees and coughed as she gasped for air. She looked towards the wall she knew was one-way glass, but she couldn't tell if Maximus was even there. Suddenly, a heavy force and sharp pain in her gut threw her onto her side. Heavy footsteps and Yang's increasingly maniacal cackling filled the room. She felt a hot breath drift across her face that smelled like death itself and caused her to shut her eyes. "I'm rather...disappointed the great Arla Nublier doesn't even have the guts to interrogate me herself, let alone fight me." Two things suddenly slipped from her person, one near her waist and the other her torso. Yang moved yet closer to her ear. "First, you don't even go with your friends to Suros to visit me. Then, you try to send that traitorous friend of yours in here." Arla opened her eyes through the pain just as he gestured towards the door. Heksis smashed into it again. The metal had several dents that would no doubt prohibit it from opening. Arla just hoped he knew what he was doing. "You know what that says to me, my dear Huntress? Do you?" Arla didn't respond. "That you're a coward. Afraid to face your past. You haven't had the guts to be honest with your fellow men and women for years." Yang squatted in front of her and laughed. "Oho, I can see it in your eyes. You know who I am, and you know what I'm talking about."

"No…." Arla grunted through gritted teeth. "I don't."

"Ah," Yang chuckled. "Still lying through your teeth. He warned me about this. Told me you were so young and stupid back then, and never really caught onto the details until it was too late. Didn't have the guts to look back on your actions." A murderous smile that crazy couldn't even begin to describe curled onto his face. "Worry not. I did it for you, and you won't need the guts for anything in a minute." His voice grew hushed. "And the best part is: nobody's coming to help you." Yang began to chuckle maniacally. Arla glanced at her knife and pistol being clutched in his hands and then towards the door. The dents were deeper now, making the door much more obvious to the unknowing eye. If Hek was going to do something, now was the time for drastic measures.

The sharp click of a pistol being primed echoed through the room and an unseen object, frigid to her skin, forced itself against her temple. Something equally sharp pressed against her already pain-stricken stomach. "Finally, vengeance for my grandfather."

/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\

Meanwhile, on the other side of the door…

Heksis immediately put his left hand up in front of him, quickly spreading his hand out as his ghost materialized in his hand. The ghost had a standard shell, except the shell looked like it had taken immense amounts of punishment. A spiderweb of cracks ran down from the top, with the largest crack running for right down the center and between the machine's single blue eye.

"Activate Model number 23 from the bruiser section of my ship. Spawn it at my current location." The warlock commanded, with the crackled ghost immediately giving a rapid nod of approval, recognizing the worry in it's Guardian's voice.

"Spawning now Guardian!"

A loud thud thumped behind him as the robot beamed in. The warlock made a gentle turn to face the machine behind him, and it certainly was a sight.

Two wheels, one directly on top of the other, in the middle of the robots cylinder shaped frame. In the front right in the middle of the machine's chassis were five large cameras, all of which were meant to be installed on a frame, rather than a Frankenstein creation such as this.

The truly intimidating factor were the two gigantic metal arms on both sides of the robot, with several machine gun barrels sticking out of tiny holes in the shoulders, the machine was a brute, capable of tearing through the defenses of any enemy it was sent against with ease. The four fingered hands were smaller in comparison to the rest of the arm, but large enough to grab onto a heavy object to throw, and small enough to wrap around a dreg's throat.

He stepped out of the way of the robot, picking up the sword he'd dropped as he did. Once he was out of the way, he brought his left hand up, pointing it at the door.

"Command: Rescue the awoken guardian in the room, capture anyone else, painfully if possible." The warlock commanded, venom in his voice near the end of his command.

"Confirmed. Simplification. RESCUE AWOKEN. BREAK LEGS OF ANYONE ELSE. Beginning now." The robot said in a chirpy, static tone as the rolled forward toward the door, leaning forward slightly as it slammed into the door. After a few smashes, the door was noticeably dented, rendering it unable to open manual now.

Suddenly, a gunshot shattered the air. Heksis cursed himself and shouted, "GET THAT DOOR OPEN NOW!"

/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\

Arla found herself floating in a blank void. Still, she clutched her gut, feeling the pulsating pain, but death did not seem to give her that sweet release. Truthfully, she felt even more panicked than she had been before her gun went off. Her heart still raced rapidly, and her lungs still felt the need to breathe. Was this what final, true death felt like?

Suddenly, an ear-splitting tone forced her to fruitlessly cover her ears and twist her face in pain. It was then that she felt the cold floor beneath her. There was something warm spreading across her waist along with something light and slippery. Arla recoiled at the thought of seeing her innards spread across the floor in front of her and squeezed her eyes tighter, impatiently waiting for death, but another bang jolted her back into reality. Heksis was still fighting, so she was going to as well, bowels or not, until she couldn't fight any longer.

Arla barely peeked through one eye at first, seeing the dark color of blood coating the floor and smelling its rusty odor. She squeezed it shut again immediately and steeled her nerves for the gory sight that was about to lay before her. Once again, she opened only one out-of-focus eye, but as her vision cleared, she opened the other out of pure shock. Yang lay on his face supported by bent knees. Purple-red blood leaked from his mouth and the arm that had once held her knife lay empty-handed and equally lifeless at her thigh, one of her hands was almost touching a one of his, stained with his own blood. Arla quickly snagged her knife off the floor and kicked away from the corpse, holding the knife in its direction as she did so.

At what she presumed was a safe distance, she patted herself, looking for a bullet hole. Finding none, she looked about the room and still came up empty. It was then that she noticed the overhead light's glint seemed to bend unnaturally on some of the dark, yet reflective surfaces. There was one inches from where her head had been, one in the ceiling off to her immediate right, another in the floor closer to the one-way glass, then the opposite wall, and finally the one-way glass where the bullet had buried itself. The embedded projectile was only partially buried in the glass, not passing all the way through but going far enough to cause a few cracks.

Calming herself down, she stood up and wiped her hand clean of Yang's blood. She pulled up her left wrist and activated the small communicator she kept in it. "Maximus, you there?" she asked. THUD! Heksis apparently didn't know what had happened. The impacts had become increasingly frequent since Arla had regained her hearing and probably since the gunshot. She could only imagine the panic going through his mind. Serves him right, Arla thought.

"I'm here," he responded a couple seconds later. "How'd it go?" His voice sounded worried.

THUD! "What d'you mean by 'how'd it go?' You say everything. That butthead attacked me!"

"Wait, slow down. How did Yang do that? He was out cold."

Arla stopped. "Okay, hold up. I'm confused. Where are you right now?"

Maximus grunted as he tried to push or pull something. "I'm doing some maintenance on my ship before we head to the Reef."

"Why'd you leave? More importantly, who opened the door?"

"Zavala came in pretty much as soon as you two went through the door. Told me to prepare my ship to leave in a few hours. Said he'd hold down the fort in the control room." There was silence from both sides. Zavala got on her nerves sometimes. He'd been adamant to the others to let him have another go at the prisoner. "So what happened exactly?" Maximus eventually asked.

"It's all a bit of a blur, but Yang was standing by the door when, I guess, Zavala opened it. He grabbed me by the throat and was about to kill me when Heksis used that palm thing and sent us flying into the interrogation room. I smashed my back into the table while Yang was relatively unharmed it seemed. He kicked me in the stomach and grabbed my knife and gun, holding them to my gut and head. He said something about avenging his grandfather like I had something to do with his death."

"And then Heksis busted in?"

Arla glanced at the door. THUD! She decided it was best to ignore the impacts and focus on what her teammate was saying. "No, he's still trying to get in. At this point, he has to knock it down because there's a massive dent that'll keep it from going up."

"What about Yang?"

"He's...dead. I didn't see, but there was a gunshot, and then I found him keeled over. He didn't shoot himself, but I have no clue how he died. I just know it's disgusting and I want out of here."

"Well crap…" Maximus said, a little discouraged at the news. "When you're done there, meet me at the ship. We're going to pay Variks a little visit. Tell Hek if he wants to come along he's welcome, but we have to take my ship. Variks sent a message and warned that if I did, the meeting was off, and all ships would be treated as hostiles."

This rebellion has all of them on edge. Arla thought. "I'll extend the invitation." She looked over to the door. "I wouldn't keep my hopes up. Perhaps he has more 'urgent business' to attend to."

"Well, we won't know until we ask him. I'll see you at the ship. Don't be too long."

Maximus closed the channel from his end. Arla walked over to the glass and looked at her reflection in it. She internally laughed at the rather strange design of this comparatively older interrogation room. The reflection was oddly out of place against the other black walls, but perhaps that was an intimidation technique. Let the prisoner know people were watching beyond the glass, and let him/her see just how guilty (or psychotic) he/she looks.

A thought suddenly popped into Arla's mind, creating a wry smile on her face. Still grinning, she pulled out her pistol and fired four bullets into several parts of the glass, each one embedding itself into the glass and sending cracks all across its surface. Arla quickly followed it by a swift kick into the glass, shattering it into thousands of pieces and revealing an empty room. She vaulted over the control panel and now-exposed wiring, but paused only for a moment to hear that the pounding now seemed to come in impossibly quick pairs, almost like a heartbeat.

As she approached the door, she pulled out partially-empty magazine, stored it in a pocket, and pushed in a fresh one. She momentarily flicked her gun into its grappling hook mode, just to make sure the hook was still there. and then slid it back into place.

Using her free hand, she pressed the button that peeled back the metal and stepped through. "Hek!" Arla called out above an odd yet familiar metallic whirring that echoed around the corner. As she stepped closer, the whirring grew more intense. Every second or so, a pair of loud bangs bounced down the hall above the noise, quickly followed by a grunt and labored breathing. She changed her approach and crept to the corner silently. Peering around the corner unseen, she found Heksis standing next to one of his robots. She couldn't remember the specific model number, he'd shown her around a couple times in the past, but somewhere in the back of her mind she thought of the numbers 23 and 32, just couldn't remember which was right. It was a brute of a machine, built for pursuing enemies and gunning them down, but Hek had mentioned it could try to force open doors.

Heksis' chest heaved with each breath, but the machine pulled backward unaffected by any sort of fatigue. Arla couldn't see the door, but she could only guess that it wasn't going to hold much longer. "One more time," Heksis muttered. He felt along the wall with his hands and suddenly kicked off of it, flying straight into the door just as his machine shot forward. The two hit almost simultaneously, and the sharp sound of metal against tile rang out as a section of the door came loose and slid against the ground. Drawing his swords, Hek and the robot vanished through the hole, prepared to strike, but then recoiled when he saw that Yang was lying dead on the floor without Arla anywhere to be seen.

Her timing only guesswork, Arla strode over to the door and peeked through a barely four-foot high hole. "Hey Heksis," Arla teased from behind the door.

The warlock looked surprised by her sudden appearance from around the corner, and, in a flash of movement, slid the sword down its sheath and watches her from behind the sights of a hand cannon.

"You were not supposed to kill him Arla," he muttered, aiming slightly above her head. Hek must've suspected it was a trick, something she hadn't considered. Perhaps he thought Yang had actually knocked her out or killed her, and used whatever disguise technology he had to change both of their forms and waltz out of here. Hek was not one to take chances.

"Yang is dead, and I don't believe it for a second. We're now no closer to figuring them out, and what's worse, he could've switched you out. Try to pretend to be you, so he could escape." He slowly pulled the hammer back on his hand cannon with his thumb.

"I shoot above your head. The disguise doesn't change them physically right? So that means if your Yang, shooting right above your head would blow his off. Assuming you're Yang."

Arla holstered her weapon and stepped through the hole with her palms out, the barrel following her all the way through. She kept them up as she straightened her posture. "Look, I didn't kill him, and he certainly didn't kill me." She ventured a step closer, but Heksis re-emphasized his grip on the weapon and the situation, so she stepped back. Her eyes noticed something behind him. "If you don't want to lose a girlfriend, I think you should lower your weapon and turn around."

"Of course, and then when my back is turned you'll kill me." The glow of Heksis' eyes was think behind his mask. Arla knew that look even with his nearly opaque mask obscuring it: the face of a determined killer. He would pull the trigger if he even sensed danger. Arla held her breath as she stared down the barrel for a few seconds more, hoping that he would consider her logic before doing something he'd ultimately regret. The eyes disappeared for a moment. "Fine," he relented. "I believe you." He pushed the hammer forward and shoved the gun into its holster. "These guys don't seem the overt type anyways."

"Well, he's not being covert now." Arla said, gesturing to Yang's dead body on the ground. Keeping a hand near his hand cannon, whether for her or him Arla knew not, they approached it. "Yang" continued to lay in a crumpled, lifeless heap but now, sleek, dark green armor peeked out from the now-ill-fitting suit. His human features now gone, Yang revealed what had replaced him: Fallen.

"Honestly, I have no idea how he died," Arla started. "He had me on the ground with my own weapons turned against me, but then nothing ever came of it. He just...died all of a sudden." Arla began looking over the body as she spoke, looking across the back and then flipping it over and searching the torso. "Heksis looked at her strange, causing her to pause momentarily. "I didn't kill him, I swear. Look." She began showing him multiple sections of Yang's corpse: the back and neck on one side, and his torso, throat, and head on the other. "See? No bullet holes or slash marks. I'm no doctor but to me it looks like he died of something internal." Arla stood up with a small groan, the pain in her abdomen returning. She guessed it could be a fractured rib or two. "Well, let's get this guy down to medical. Get this guy checked out. Would you mind carrying him?"

"Ha!" Heksis yelled. "Why carry him when we can have others do it for us? 23!"

"Activated and ready for tasking," a robotic voice said from behind the door.

"Here. Ask him to get it. I've programmed this one to take commands from you, added your face and voice to the list of authorities. Anything you say, my bots will do. Within reason of course."

Arla felt a sudden sense of pride in being added to his robot's authority database was quite the honor given he wasn't very social and kept only an inner circle of friends. Among which, she could only name herself, Ikora, and possibly Maximus. Any others, Arla was not fully familiar with. Though she was mystified at how quickly the situation had turned. In the last few minutes, he'd gone from pointing a gun in her face to offering her to command his robots. It was then that she realized it must be a test, probably one of the reasons he kept one of his hands so close to one of his hand cannons.

"Unit 23 right?" she asked quietly. Heksis nodded slowly. Her eyes wandered to the hand staying near the hand cannon for a moment but then turned to the hole. "Unit 23!" she called out confidently.

"Arla Nublier confirmed. Ready for tasking," the robotic voice answered.

"Come take this piece of trash to the medbay." Heksis quietly snickered.

"Confirmed. Take trash to medbay." There was a whirring sound followed by a couple clicks. "Error. Error. No trash or trash receptacle detected." Heksis snickered again, and Arla shot him a glare. "What?" he said. "Not all AIs are like Exos." The Huntress rolled her eyes and turned back to the hole. "Unite 23! Please carry this dead Fallen to the Medbay for an autopsy."

"Dead Eliksni detected. Carrying to medical bay." The robot gave the door one last, powerful charge and made the hole large enough for it to come through. Once in, it slung the Illusion scum onto its frame and rolled out of the room towards the exit and lift. Arla and Heksis followed suit. As the doors opened, Unit 23 exited first with Heksis behind it, ensuring the body didn't fall off. Arla, however, hung back a few steps, fished her phone out of a pocket at her hip and called Maximus. He picked up on the second ring.

"What's up Arla?" he greeted.

"Hey Max, we're delivering the body to the medbay now. We'll be at the ship in about five minutes."

"Any odd glances?" he asked jokingly.

"None yet," she responded with a smile. "Just got off the elevator. I'm sure they've had stranger requests."

"Right. Bringing in a minion of the darkness with strange markings and powers is totally the norm around here," Max said sarcastically.

"Like you'd know the norm for the medical bay."

"We've certainly kept them busy the last few months," he chuckled.

"True," Arla returned. "See ya at the ship."

Arla just about clicked off when Maximus' voice came through again. "Hey wait. Is Heksis coming? Starco wants to know if he should prepare a seat."

"I was about to ask. I'll shoot you a text when I know. See you in five." Arla pulled her phone off her ear and slid it back into the pocket. Heksis waited by the entrance, fiddling with something at the rear of the robot. He straightened as Arla approached and pushed the button to open the door.

Arla and, to a lesser extent, Heksis recoiled at the wave of smell that slammed into them. It smelled like sterilizing agents, sweat, and sleep deprivation, a smell that Arla had never gotten used to. For the most part, the waiting room was empty, the only constant inhabitant was a white robot at the front desk staring lifelessly into the distance until they came within a few feet. Once they'd entered its range of interaction, it spoke in a simulated woman's voice. "Hello. How may I help you?"

Arla placed an elbow on the desk. "We're here to see Dr. Miranda."

"One moments please Miss Nublier." The robot typed something into its computer, and within a minute, Dr. Herman Miranda appeared in the door of the waiting room.

Herman was a man of stout stature, but his personality made him seem larger than anyone in the room. For a man so attuned to death, he was remarkably resilient. Arla knew that at one point he'd been a Titan but quit years ago for some reason unknown to her and probably most people who knew him because while he seemed larger than life, something in his eyes was...off. One brown eye seemed frozen in place whilst the other flitted about at twice the speed, as if compensating for its partner's lack. However, both flew open at the sight of a Fallen in a suit. "Uh, we best go into my office," he somehow got out amongst his obvious surprise.

His office was only a hallway away and the third door on the right. Dr. Miranda rushed them into the office and locked the door behind him. It wasn't large by any means but it wasn't quite claustrophobic despite the lack of windows. There was however a door that led to a large room that could've been a morgue or lab. "What in the world are you thinking Arla?!" he shouted through a whisper. "Why did you bring me a Fallen corpse?"

Arla tried to settle him down. "I told you I was going to bring you something you'd never seen before."

"However, you didn't mention it was a FALLEN. There are rules against this!"

"I know the rules, but this is with the vanguard's permission. I promise." Arla knew he'd be uptight on the rules, so she'd prepared a lie on the way up. Had she planned on Yang dying? Yes, but not in the way she'd predicted. She figured Hek would kill him once he ceased to be useful, or she'd kill him herself, perhaps even offer to let Maximus do it if he was awake by that time. Regardless, he dropped dead almost literally, and they needed answers.

His face seemed to smooth, but his brows remained furrowed with conflict. Dr. Miranda sucked in a breath and pushed it out. The brows stated but his voice relaxed this time. "Alright. What happened?"

Arla nodded to Heksis who in turn signaled the robot to transfer the body from his frame to the examining table in the adjacent room. Heksis went through the door but lingered close by, signaling the body he dropped at the nearest table.

"We're not sure. We had him in the interrogation rooms, and he tried to break out when Hek here was going back there. Then, he suddenly dropped dead."

"And you want me to find out?" he asked, pointing to himself.

"Among other things." Herman motioned for more, "This Fallen isn't like normal Fallen. It can cloak itself as another being. We want you to figure out how they do it."

"Look," he said calmly. "I'm a pathologist. I find out how things die for the City in and to a lesser extent the Tower. Dissection like this isn't necessarily my forte." Arla's heart began to sink. She wasn't about to force him to do it. Heksis was a self-proclaimed expert on the Eliksni, so he could slice and dice to see what he could find, but he had no formal training to her knowledge of using a blade in a non-combative way. "But, I'll make an exception," he finally relented. "If the Fallen are advancing, it's our job to stay two steps ahead. I'll need some time though. This kind of thing isn't instant."

"How long do you need?" Arla asked, concerned.

"A few hours at the least. A day at the most." This wasn't the best of news to Arla, but she would have to accept it as she had no other option that wouldn't result in the complete annihilation of their evidence the Illusion were in the City. "It'll have to do," Arla responded. "I'll leave you to it." Heksis alone walked out of the room, Arla assuming that the not had been sent back to his ship via his ghost. With a slight nod towards the door, the pair made their exit from both the office and the medical area.

As they approached the lift, Arla popped the question. "Hey Hek, I was wondering if you wanted to come with Maximus and me to talk to Variks. We could use your expertise."

"In the Reef? I'm not interested in being thrown into his arena ever again. So if that's why you wanna see him, I'm out." The warlock muttered with a tone of distain when she brought up the vandals name.

"We aren't done here anyways...more of these Illusion could be present. We should talk to the vanguard, full lock down of everything within 100 meters, no one leaves until we get this figured out. Say there's been a radiation accident, and that people in the blast radius could be contaminated. Suros will take the fall for it."

The lift doors opened, and the pair stepped inside. Arla leaned back against the wall with her arms crossed and her eyes lowered. Heksis was right, but there hadn't been any lingering radiation from the blast, a miscalculation on their part if they were going for terror. "Locking down the tower will do us no good. We have no evidence they can emulate a guardian to the extent they did Yang. He was flesh and blood. Besides, we have no way of actually determining who's real and who isn't. The best thing we can do for everyone is to find out who they are exactly and find out a way to stop them." The doors opened slowly, revealing a cloudy outside with a slight bit of wind. The sun peeked through in the distance, but the clouds quickly moved to cover it.

"Then how about you just mow everyone down? Then we just revive them and pay them for their troubles. The guilty will die and the innocent will live on," he suggested.

Arla's mouth fell agape, appalled by the suggestion in every cell and atom in her body. That was dishonorable and boneheaded in almost every facet of Arla's imagination. Executing every Guardian would take weeks and reveal little to nothing. Not to mention the uproar it would cause in the Tower and possibly the City if word leaked out. It was insensitive, par for Heksis' course, but almost to the point of inexcusable even for someone of his bluntness and social awkwardness.

It was radical and stupid, but it was also partially partially right. Then a thought came across her mind, one that made her blood boil. "What about people like me?" Arla asked, making her irritation known. "Ones without a ghost to revive them? You plan to just shoot me and all the others without ghosts? Because you sure as heck know I'm not gonna raze everyone." Arla didn't realize that her voice began carrying out of the open elevator and drawing eyes to her. "And the civilians, what about them? Yang, for all intents and purposes, was one Heksis. You can't just kill put a gun in their face and pull the trigger. They can't be revived like you, like Maximus, like almost everybody else!" Arla ran her hands aggressively through her hair. She could feel tears gathering in her eyes. Her voice quieted but became shaky despite its fierceness. "Th-There are two sides to this war." She gestured to the pistol on her hip. "The one we fight with guns…" She then pointed outside to the elevator toward the City. "...and the one we fight with our actions. You can't favor one or the other otherwise you'll lose."

"True words Miss Nublier," a hearty voice interrupted. Arla looked up to see Commander Zavala standing to the left of the lift. "War is a complex thing that nobody will ever fully understand. Much like this situation here." Zavala leaned in towards Heksis and sniffed unpleasantly. "Do I smell a problem here warlock?" There was a bit of sting in his voice.

Before Heksis could respond, Arla put a hand in front of him and blurted, "No. We were just leaving." She turned her head to the side and said, "Meet me at Maximus' ship if you want to come. It's bright green and doesn't have enough room for bad ideas." With that, Arla turned and stomped her way to the hangar, eyes watching each step and then turning back to Heksis who remained cemented to the elevator.

The guardian stood at the elevator for a few seconds more, staring at the huntress as she walked off to the hangar and then back at the Vanguard Titan. Heksis lowered his head and eyes to the Zavala's feet submissively. "I-I'm going to be going with them..." he muttered quietly.

Zavala twisted his face into a sneering scowl. "Then go along..." Zavala pointed a stern finger. "...but remember your place. Because you're not one of us," he spat, turned on his heel, and walked away. " There was a sense of finality in the words. As he walked away, Heksis shot him a hateful look behind his helmet and adjusted his collar.

/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\

Hello again, its the SFR. Just wanted to take a minute of your time to give a HUGE thanks to my good friend PegLegDregsNeedTheirMeds for playing Heksis in this chapter and in chapters to come. If you're familiar with his page and character, I think you might want to check it out again because he's rolling out a brand new story (that yours truly edits from time to time ;) ) for Heksis. If you haven't checked him out, show him some love and tell him I sent ya.

Once again, I can't thank you all enough for your continued support of this story. You are all fantastic, and I'm glad I can (hopefully) make you day just a little better.