"And who are We
Those that should be alone?
Without songs or stories;
A Hearth of our own?
The Unum's Chosen
A Many from a Few
A Clade without Kinsmen
With the Plains for a View…"
excerpt from Ostron Poem, source unknown
In a utility depot near the Northern Landing Pad, Parson-Luk's hands worked quickly.
He was not a technologically advanced man, but understood the necessity of field repairs. A weakness in the snare could let slip even the smallest prey. For all the primitive trappings of the hunter, Parson-Luk possessed a keen mind that belied his outward savagery. The welder in his hands sealed the largest of the gouges in the Grineer's war rig. The workmanship was amateur, but tidy.
His needlework was better; careful stitches holding shut the more angry lacerations in the Grineer's weeping side.
This was not unexpected.
He had been a Fisherman, before he was a Hunter.
Brakarr was gene-kin. His mortal enemy. They had met on the Plains. Had damned near killed each other, at first. Parson-Luk had been a young hunter then. Proud, full of piss and fire, as all young hunters are. The Grineer threatened his home. They threatened Cetus, and the Unum that watched over them all.
Killing them was more than sport. It was an obsession. Brakarr's unit had been yet another advance recon force, striking out in the days long before the Grineer established a foothold right on the Ostron's very doorstep. They were in an unfamiliar land, then; undocumented.
His territory, not theirs. The Ostron had stalked them one by one; his looted Grinlok rifle puncturing armoured shells and finding the soft clone-flesh beneath. Until there were only two of them left: the giant and the hunter.
The duel had lasted fully a full day and night. Brakarr his munitions exhausted, Parson-Luk, scared out of his wits by the relentless giant that simply would not die. Eventually the tracker's knowledge of the terrain had won out: the Grineer found itself tangled in a charc-snare at the base of a pit; beset on all sides by wild kubrow, hellbent on defending their nest. Frenzied with pain, the Grineer bawled in anguished fury as they pounced.
Parson-Luk had watched from afar as the giant smash the feral hounds down one by one. For all his rage, they had numbers; and could sense death. They chased it with open jaws.
Parson-Luk watched the Grineer fight to the last; a buzzing knife in its hands; all but blinded by the shimmering charge of the fizzling charc-snare. As the fight drew on and on, a curious feeling took over. Pity, tinged with begrudging admiration. The Grinlock sounded three times.
The first shot took the Kubrow alpha in the throat. The second and third felled the other in quick succession. The rest of the pack fled; yelping. They knew the sound of Parson-Luk's rifle all too well. The Grineer had scrambled to its feet, finally freed of that damned net. It rounded about in confusion. It spied Parson-Luk downwind on the hill, the rifle in his hands.
The Grineer was caught dead to rights in the open; a sitting Condroc.
The Ostron had tapped his brow in salute, turned and left.
The Grineer walked him through the repairs. Pointing at this feed tube or leaking pipe. His breath was laboured, but stable. Parson-Luk shushed the Grineer as he fussed over yet another stitch.
Their paths crossed again a month later. A hunt had gone wrong.
It was a silly thing; a moment of absentmindedness that should have cost the Ostron his life.
There was no moon in the sky, back then. But that evening the Void light was beautiful and shimmering. It twisted on the horizon; glinting off the lake beside him; distracting him. The hunter's right ankle went straight down into a Kuaka burrow; twisting badly. He hissed in pain; trapped. He cursed his clumsy stupidity.
The pool of water beside him began to shimmer and bubble. Arcane tendrils of light rose into the air above, twisting fragments of starlight from the ancient past. Terror gripped him like a vice.
An Eidolon; a shambling husk of Sentient debris. Dull and witless; so easily avoided. So capable of immense destruction. Parson-Luk tried to pull his leg free, with ever-mounting panic. It was firmly wedged.
He began to frantically dig; clawing at the earth with chipped fingernails.
An immense pair of mechanical hands gripped him by the shoulders. Parson-Luk yelped in surprise.
The giant Grineer hauled him free with a single mighty tug. It threw him over one shoulder, and began sprinting in the opposite direction of the lumbering shape that arose from the boiling water.
They broke bread that night in a cave overlooking the Eidolon that raged and meandered across the plains, its plaintive wails splitting the night's air, haunting them as it shook the ground with each ponderous step. The meal was entirely provided by Parson-Luk's own rations.
Parson-Luk had little choice in the matter; his ankle was a swollen wreck.
Trapped as he was, through narrowed eyes and thinly veiled suspicion, the hunter established a rudimentary level of understanding. A dialogue began. The Grineer watching him with those rheumy eyes; orange like hot coals.
Slowly, Parson-Luk learned the Grineer's story. It had gone feral. It had no weapon, and was proving a miserable hunter. It was starving; had been living off what slow witted creatures it could hastily blunder upon in a moment of weakness.
Parson Luk's ankle healed quickly; enough that he could hobble about; demonstrating the basics of quiet movement. It looked ridiculous, to see the lumbering beast mimick his own movements. Yet the Grineer seemed sincere in his desire to learn.
He learned its name was Brakarr. That it was something called a Bombard.
At first Parson-Luk told himself that his tutelage was out of necessity. Keep the beast happy, or get his head caved in. Different rationalisations took shape. It was a priceless opportunity to observe his enemy; to see how they quickly they learned, how swiftly they could adapt in adverse circumstances. And yet there was something more. A kind of respect, from one survivor to another.
The teachings provided Parson-Luk with a satisfaction he had not expected; his lessons became more technical in their instruction.
Parson-Luk would learn later that Brakarr was a defect. An Aberrant, to borrow the Grineer's insistent use of the term. There were other Aberrant; some intellectually stunted, others still entirely pacifist. Most were exterminated as soon as they were detected, by decree of the Queens that ruled their Empire with an iron fist. But Brakarr was intelligent; knew how to toe the Empire's line.
He was Grineer, Bombard class; blessed with enormous physical strength; but precious few skills beyond brute power and an eagerness to use it. He served because it was expected of him. He fought because that is simply what Grineer did.
This was an opportunity to become something more. Brakarr seized it.
The Ostron taught the Grineer basics of field craft, of stalking and camouflage. Partly so the brute could feed them, and partly to hide him from the Grineer patrols that routinely swept these hills. Days passed, the Grineer returning to their meagre shelter with a poorly speared fish, or a half starved Kuaka.
As time progressed, the Grineer's yield steadily improved. He would appear back at the cave, a brace of fish dangling on the simple lines the hunter had prepared. Parson-Luk would then teach him how to dress the fish, or the most effective means of flaying the small rodents and game the Grineer managed to wrangle in its solitary adventures.
By the fourth day, Parson-Luk was mobile enough to return to Cetus. He smiled at the Grineer, shaking his head. The Grineer had fashioned himself a cloak of Condroc feathers, that did little to hide the scabbed armour plating beneath. He looked ridiculous, but the hunter felt proud of him despite himself.
The Hunter bade the Bombard farewell, clapping him on the shoulder; setting off for Cetus with a long stick for support. He returned to his home, where his daughter awaited him. His wife had been lost seasons past, and he was needed by the fires of the hearth. He often thought of his unlikely friend, as he listened to the elders by the fire preach of the importance of friendship; of the ties that bound.
It was with a tinge of disappointment that Parson-Luk returned to the cave, some three weeks later, to find it abandoned. The fire had been put out, as if in a tremendous hurry. The bones had been piled neatly in a corner. Stacked in a heap, for use in a broth later. Just as he instructed.
The Ostron shook his head, bemused but surprised at how saddened he felt. He had hoped to see the shambling lummox again.
The Karak rifle clacked behind him, startlingly loud in the confines of the cave. The Tusk Lancer barked something harsh and unintelligible through its filtered mask. Two more of its comrades emerged from deeper in the cave; weapons trained. They were dressed in camouflaged livery; had used the soot from the fire to dull the edges of their armour, masking its shine.
An ambush then, Parson-Luk was livid with himself.
Of course the Grineer had betrayed him. A Hyekka didn't stop being dangerous just because you fed it once in a while. He cursed himself for his naivety.
Brakarr emerged from the shadows with a rock in his hands. The only sound made was the crunch of Grineer battle-plate as he stove in the skull of one of the Grineer troopers. Then the rifle was in Brakarr's hands. Brakarr unloaded on fully automatic as he charged with a bellowing roar. The Grineer scout team panicked, diving in all directions; hard rounds whickering and spanking off their armour as he closed the gap.
Then the brute was upon them. These were field troopers; rangy scouts. There was no physical contest. Armour dented. Bones splintered.
"Parson-Lurk!" Brakarr beamed up at the stricken Ostron hunter, caked in gore. The cave was littered with fallen Grineer. "Brakarr lurk too!"
Parson-Luk smiled at the memory, as he finished the last seal on the Grineer's battered chassis. That had been over a decade ago. Since then his daughter had taken ill, as her mother before her. Medicine was required. Expensive medicine. That meant contract work. That meant off world.
Brakarr had stubbornly followed him every step of the way since.
The Ostron made a pact with himself, as he worked on the next stitch. His hands were caked in gore and spilled coolant.
They would see this hunt through, together.
They would see the Plains again.