The machine felt its systems begin to reactivate. It began scanning its surroundings, detecting a temperature of 37.7 Celsius and hilly surroundings that resembled the few remaining sand dunes within the Sahara. Its reflective shell rose slowly from the rough sands that had entombed it for what seemed like years. The machine spun as it took in its surroundings, confirming its scanners still worked as they matched the data.
A scan of its internal hardware began, showing green across the board. It noticed a concerning detail, new parts and hardware that were unfamiliar. Nor was it aware of what the Traveler did. A sense of uneasiness fell over it as it finally noticed something sticking out of the sand. The protrusion was a skeletal hand sticking out of the desert, bleached by the harsh glaring sun. Once more for the fourth billion, five hundred thirty-two million, four hundred fifty-two thousand, two hundred thirty first time it scanned.
For the first time in the sea of countless scans, a surge of hope appeared within the machine. It was compatible. This lone, forgotten, bleached skeleton under the scorching sun and buried beneath the sand was compatible with it. It had finally found its Guardian. After what seemed like several lifetimes it would no longer be alone and it could do its duty. It would finally protect humanity from the Darkness and any other threat that may assail it. The machine finally had true purpose. Its search had ended, after all this time. Desperately it began to dig out the skeleton with its shell. It took hours but slowly but surely it was brought out of the sand into the sun.
It looked on somberly at the skeleton, knowing its Guardian suffered a traumatizing demise. The skeleton was damaged, signs of lacerations to the arms and torso likely from a curved sword. A scimitar perhaps? Carbon scans showed it to be 335 years old. Older then the last city itself. Skeletal structure indicates they are male, around the age eighteen, with a short height of 1.52 meters. Covering parts of the skeleton were remains of a poorly made white tunic and pants made of linen, alongside a hooded cloak. A violent death for one so young and in such a miserable place, seemingly a tragic trend for Humanity.
It was time for them to return. Its shell began to separate into pieces and floated around its Light Core. A soft bright light flowed onto the skeleton and slowly seeped into its marrow. The skeleton started to levitate off the ground as bone began to regrow from where it was chipped and lost. Bleached tan bones turned to a healthy white. Pink red muscle and budding viscera flowed over it like a stream of water. While tanned skin sprouted from the muscles like a charnel field of grass. Once the skin and muscle grew back, the body started to spasm in excruciating pain as the brain began to feel the regeneration process. On the top of their head black hair pushed its way out down to their shoulder blades. Purple eyes formed in their sockets, bringing focus to their soft face.
The soft light slowly rescinded from the body and the shell of the Ghost reassembled into one piece. The now living Guardian fell to the desert sands with a thud, unconscious from the brutal experience. Their body spasmed, letting out heavy breathing from the aftershock of the pain running through their fresh body. They were visibly sweating, the pain making their body go into panic mode. The rebirth of the Guardian was grotesque in nature, but necessary. It would take them a few hours for them to awaken from their revival because of the large amount of Light energy it consumed.
Its radar suddenly received a ping, revealing something small 34 meters away from their position. Their sole eye snapped to it, seeing a small creature half the length of an old American football. It looked like a Desert Horned Lizard in its profile yet not. Its skin was a pitch black with white bone like carapace for horns, spikes, and armor across its body. Alongside that, its eyes were a deep red. It emanated an aura of abnormality and when it looked upon the creature with thermal imaging it showed to produce no heat at all.
When it realized it was noticed, the small lizard hissed before tunneling into the sand, seeming to run away. Whether to go gather more of its kind or simply out of fear, it did not know. The Ghost seemed to almost slack within the air, knowing that it was going to be a long few hours.