Go For A Hike
Wolf's first breath into the world was filled with smoke and flame. Naturally, her first response was to try and hack up her lungs for fresh air, to no avail.
At some prodding from Ghost, she realizes that there's a slab of plasteel crushing her. When pushing it off isn't enough, she drags forth her Void and talkes as much of her calm as possible to use it, then blinks right above where she is. She ignores the burning around her to crawl, because oh, her leg's broken, great- and get out of the smoke. It takes another minute for her to rip off her broken helmet, because it did so much to help her in the crash, and cough up dark, ash soaked blobs of mucus and maybe a bit of blood.
"That... could have gone better." Ghost says, flashing once more and healing whatever damage was dealt to her leg and lungs. "At least I was right; you didn't need to survive."
Wolf spits out whatever is left in her mouth, rolling over from her hands and knees onto her back. Ghost helpfully transmats a spare helmet onto her head. "What the hell happened, bud?"
"Ship first, then we can take stock."
The fire was easy enough, with enough smoke bombs any amount of fire is no problem to a bit of voidsmoke. After the regular, thicker smog wafts away with a light breeze, she set out to work through what survived the crash. There were a decent amount of items left outside of Ghost, just incase they experienced another vault lockout like what happened in the Red War. Unfortunately, most of their food and medical supplies were either burned or crushed to unusefullness. Wolf took what she could, while Ghost bussied himself deconstructing whatever salvageable bits of plasteel the wasted jumpship has to offer.
Wasn't like it was going to fly, anyhow.
The drive core is a wreck, too. Realizing that really hammered home how screwed she is. Unless the people of the Luvial Crux left a FTL drive lying around, she's...
Focus. Taking in a breath from her new helmet's filtration system, she packs up everything she can and takes a good look at her surroundings.
It really, really creeps her out, how much this place looks like Earth. The grass is still green, although its luster appears to be fading. That's explained by the trees (which look like some weird blend between sycamore and maple, with smatterings of dogwood and something else) which are well on their way to loosing their leaves. Minus being able to see some sort of ruin within eyeshot, the hunter feels like she never left Earth, perhaps even traveling back in time.
If it wasn't for the fact that she most definitely flew far, far from Earth, she would've blamed the Vex for crashing. Even if it was kind of her fault for blowing the core. Easy thing, that: blaming the Vex for everything.
Ghost declares enough of the ship has been salvaged, floating back her way. "So, what do you want to hear first? The good news, the bad news, or the worse news?"
Wolf thinks for a moment, then clicks her tongue. "I'm feeling optimistic. What's the good news, bud?"
"The air is even better than Earth's, so you don't have to waste your filters." He quickly interfaces with her helmet, turning off said filtration. Cool, crisp, clean air fills her lungs, further suggesting the season probably being sometime in the late autumn.
Wolf pauses. "That's... really weak for good news." Another thing that seems to finally sink in for the Hunter is how late it is in the day. Well, not day, it's more night, now. She really didn't realize it because of the local moon Lupi d has. It's... closer, maybe? And a lot brighter than Luna. Or maybe that's the Hive, doing something to it to make Earth's moon less reflective. If only she was as inquisitive as a Warlock.
Nah. She wouldn't be caught dead in a dress.
"Well, that and we're alive, but hey." He shifts his shell around. "The news only get weirder from here, unfortunately. So, remember our stragglers?"
A small pit of dread forms in her. "Are they-"
"No clue; I didn't see any of their remains in the wreckage. I was keeping an eye on them the whole trip, but ever since that warp down to the surface..." Ghost twists around, looking at their surroundings. "Which is a nice segway into the worst problem. All of my sensors are being... smothered."
"Something's giving you interference? If it's traceable, we can try and track it down."
"Not with this. It's like there's this thick fog, all around us. I can barely get this entire clearing in without boosting the signal."
"Then why not do it?" The Hunter takes the last bit that survived the wreck, a tasteless meal bar, and shoves it in one of her many pouches and pockets. "Wouldn't it be a good thing to be found? It'd be nice to clear up the whole 'shooting us down' thing."
"Well that's the thing. Would you rather chance it with whoever might be down here with us, or risk having Rasputin's estranged submind find us first?"
Ah. The worse news. Wolf lets out a sigh. "Never mind. So. Uh." She looks around one more time. "Now what?"
"Well, now we have to go find a couple of missing Ghosts," He mutters a barely audible 'unfortunately' before continuing. "And hopefully pick up on some signals on this laughably short range I have."
"Yeah, I'll probably spot something first, before that."
And so the Young Wolf walked.
"I don't think I'll get over how many trees there are." She says, about an hour into her march. Not so much as a 'march', per se, but she tries to be both swift and quiet. Which is difficult, seeing how the Hunter keeps getting distracted. "Everything is just so... lush."
At first, Wolf didn't understand why her surroundings seemed a bit... off. She thought it might've been the stress of crashing the Manus, but she's honestly been in worse situations and not felt like this. Then she thought it might've been the wildlife.
While she was stalking around, Ghost picked up on some movement. A quick investigation showed a small mammal that looked like some sort of badger. It must have caught her scent, because it twisted it head to look at her, a snake in its maw. It scurried away, after staring her down for a minute. Probably to snack on said snake.
She's the more dangerous hunter, here. Obviously. She sneaks onwards, keeping an eye out for anything more dangerous than a critter.
After another hour of moving on, and a ration bar down the hatch, Wolf makes camp. She doesn't trust the forest, as that feeling still hasn't gone away, but she rather be in top shape and be caught surprised than dead on her feet in a blind slog.
Still, the young lightbearer doesn't light a fire, curls up in a sleeping bag shaded the same color as her surroundings, and falls asleep with her Thin Line in her strong hand and one eye open. The night is quiet. Not silent, for she hears birds waking up with the coming dawn, and other animals and insects beginning to buzz about. Peaceful.
The Guardian realizes that she hasn't seen a single ruin. Not even an overgrown road, collapsed building, wrecked transport, or even a natural landmark marred by either Human or alien warfare.
The forest is too clean.
She soon finds a lake. Or, what she thought was a lake.
It certainly was big enough to be one. She broke a treeline to find a rocky shore, leading to a wide expanse of clear water. The water gently lapped at the rocks in tiny waves. The scene was nothing like the reservoir in the EDZ; for one, there wasn't a single building in sight, nor any debris from ancient civilization collapsed in said body of water. It's perfect, downright breathtaking.
Too clean. That uneasy feeling gets worse.
"Is the water safe, bud?" Wolf holds out a hand, and Ghost materializes in it. She follows after her other half, scanning the treeline she just left from. When the two of them get close enough for Ghost to take a scan, her attention turns to the seemingly innocent clear blue. She remembered a hunter she used to run with a lot, back when she was still a kinderguardian. Stories of her going off to Old Chicago in hopes of getting something nice to help out the city - or a cool gun. It was mostly for the cool guns - and getting attacked by a huge reptile twice her size. An alligator, she called it.
If there are any here, she is most certainly going to shoot first.
After a moment, Ghost flies back and reenters transmat, speaking to her. "Well, this is probably the cleanest water you'll find, without going into a mountain. Almost like a water spring."
"Well, won't say no to fresh water." Keeping her eyes on the waters' surface, the hunter dips down, takes out a scorched - but intact - canteen and fills it up. After taking as much as the container can hold, she quickly unlatches her helmet, and uses her hands to take a long, slow drink.
Ghost was right: it tastes fresh.
"So," Wolf starts, putting her helmet back on. "Was it going upriver, or downriver?"
"What?"
"To find civilization."
"Who's to say there is any?"
"Well, if there's fresh water, it's less effort for a people to get said fresh water, right? Can I get a rifle real quick, too?" Holding her arms in the right spot, her Khvostov materialized right into position. Adjusting the sight for more magnification, she scans the opposite shore.
"Unless they have some really good purification tech, not really. Water isn't that hard to clean. And it's downriver. If there are any trails to speak of."
"Who knows, maybe they turned this planet into a little getaway. Nice little vacation spot where they never bothered to check back in at home. If they did, then I'm about to give them a-"
Her sight, zoomed in with the aid of her rifle, almost wrote off a bit of black as a strange shadow. Almost. She clicks her jaws shut, looking back over the spot. Now that she saw it, there's more odd shapes of black deforming the horizon slightly.
The uneasy feeling starts crawling down her spine.
"What is it?"
"I don't know," She puts the rifle down, a grim frown pulling her face. "But I'm about to find out."
The Guardian abandons most pretenses of stealth, going off at a run. The Hunter reenters the foliage, hoping that it would do something to cover their approach. It takes them a few minutes shy of an hour to get close to the weird shadows.
Turns out stealth wasn't even needed. It - thankfully - wasn't some sort of malformed creature; and they didn't pick up on any Dark, so it wasn't some sort of demented trap. Small assurance, that.
It was a village. Not, like, a city district being called a village. It was more like something that the Hunter found, while doing the odd job for Vanguard Ops. They heard stories of small places outside the Last City, back during the Dark Ages, where Humanity hunkered down and just tried to get by. From what they remember, almost all of them are either abandoned, or burned to the ground.
This is of the latter ones. At first it was the surrounding plant life, reduced to ash covering the ground and pillars of deadwood. Every step they took, despite her best efforts, sent little clouds of gray into the air. It was at this point, after a few minutes of stalking forwards with their auto raised, that the Guardian sees what's left of the settlement.
Both Guardian and Ghost are quiet at the destruction. It's not necessarily new to them, to see the skeleton of a dead home. But it is to see it so far from Sol.
The buildings, which were archaic looking, have long been abandoned to the rigors of time. Looking at it now, the lumber used to construct them have left only the most resilient of walls and foundations.
While walking through the dirt-and-ash streets, Ghost breaks the silence. "Hold on; get me closer to the buildings. I want to see if there's anything left for me to tell what happened."
They nod, not saying a word. Checking their surrounding one more time, the Guardian stops in front of one of the more intact buildings. Ghost rematerializes, flying up to the old home. Before he begins scanning, however, he turns back to them.
"You okay?"
They look a bit off to the side, clutching the weapon in their hands a bit tighter.
His voice becomes softer, drifting a bit closer. "It's okay, you don't have to say anything. Think you can assure me in some other way?"
Their grip loosens and, after a few quiet seconds, shrugs, then lets go of their weapons' handle to give Ghost a thumbs up.
Ghost does one of his mechanical chirps. "That's good enough for me! Thank you. Now, if you'll excuse me..." He proceeds to fly back into the building.
The Guardian feels their heart drop a bit. Of course they couldn't speak to the one she cared about the most. Their Solar has been acting up, again. There was a saying, that they remember hearing a while back: 'You are your own worst critic.' It seems fitting, really. Their Solar has to pull from passion, whether it be rage, love, or something of its equal.
Quickly, with another look around, they pull out a small flask. Twisting it open, a luminous sort of vapor escapes the opening. Undoing the helmet enough for their mouth to be freed, they take a quick gulp of its contents. They can feel the cold-but-warming sensation crawl down their throat, stirring in their gut and playing at their Solar. One breath of cool autumn air in, and one breath of cool ether out-
And her Solar is both calmed and stoked. Perhaps with a bit more flamboyance than is needed, she screws the cap back on, spins it like a handcannon, then 'holsters' it.
There. Better.
Suddenly, Wolf hears Ghost call out to her. Pulling up her Khvostov, she bolts into the building, scanning the rooms. The first room, a sort of den with a series of ruined, torched furniture placed about: empty. She dashes into a hallway, and lets out a breath she's been holding. Ghost looks to be unharmed, but he seems worries as he directs her into a doorway further down the hall. As she walks, she can't help but notice how... Human, the construction looks. The ceiling looks made for the average human height, unlike the vast ceilings most alien places build. Well, except maybe either Hive or Eliksni. Wolf had do some serious crawling back in the Hellmouth, to circumvent some more dangerous rooms.
When she enters the room, yet again, it looks very human in make. There's the remains of a bed frame, collapsed from either the fire or time, and the pile of ashes below it might've been some sort of mattress. There's a toppled-over nightstand, also turned to cinders, what looks like an oil lantern that has the same scorched look as her canteen-
And a pair of corpses in the corner. At first, she thought they must've been human; right size, same humanoid shape, looks exactly like an old, charred body should. But then she really looks at them, and she almost jumps because she was about to get closer to... whatever the hell these things were.
"They're not human." The Hunter says, barely above a whisper. Her eyes can't tear themselves away from the beast-like skulls, animal-like legs, and tails these two have. "What are they?"
"I don't know. Their bodies are too desiccated for me to get a good read on them, but..."
"Non-humans. Where humans were supposed to be."
"Yeah. That."
Looking at them now, there's not much she can do to help, other than get out of what's essentially their final grave. But- how? What could have possibly happened in less than a thousand years to make all of this happen? The more Wolf walks this planet, the more she can't understand how- why- what-
Wolf takes in a deep breath, then slowly pushes it out. She leaves the room, then does a once-over in the other rooms. Right when she was about to ask if Ghost got everything he needed from this building, one of her boots kicks something out of a pile of ash. Looking down, the hunter spots a piece of sown cloth. Slowly, she bends down and pulls the object out of it's tomb of cinders. Once again, she feels her insides fall out from inside her.
It's burned, just like everything else in this place, but surprisingly intact. Five limp appendages; four limbs, one tail. One button-eye on the left side of it's head, and a hole burned into the other, filled with grey from the pile she fished it out from.
"This..." She hears Ghost hover over her shoulder and suddenly stop, while she continues. "This was a home."
She didn't want to deal with this. She specifically left Earth so that she can get her bearings, and then this...
"How long ago did this happen?" Wolf asks Ghost, her voice small. She starts brushing some of the dust off of the small doll.
"Carbon dating of all this places it around more than seven years ago, but less than a decade. I can't get an exact match."
"And nobody came back to rebuild?"
"Maybe the locals think it's haunted. They're not humans, after all. Wasn't above older Humanity, either."
She grits her teeth. "I'm doing it again."
Ghost gives her a look. "What?"
She tucks away the doll, putting her hand back on the handle. She stays quiet on purpose, moving out of the home.
They moved out of the building, Wolf escorting Ghost around to scan more of the burned town. They found more of those scorched non-humans, and she tried her best to ignore them besides making sure she doesn't step on them. After a while of searching, Ghost comes up with what might've happened: a raid. Most buildings that weren't burned down completely were shown having signs of forced entry. Either a broken door here, a smashed wall there, a missing window over yonder. Explains why there's no valuables to speak of, if these things even had any.
The longer the search goes on, the more she starts noticing the differences. The ground has the occasional tracks of game, but when she notices the larger ones, one that might've belonged to a larger animal. It might've not been a larger animal, if that's the case. One street that had burned down market stalls with overgrown cobblestone roads. It's all so primitive.
"Hey..." Wolf ask Ghost, after scanning the fifth building; what might've been a sort of tavern/inn. It's second floor collapsed at some point, however, so most of what might've been is lost. Not very surprising. "Have we found any remnants of tech? Even an old radio?"
"...hm." He looks to the side in thought. "No. Not even getting any pings on any form of electricity around here. These people are worse off than most places, back during the Warlord Era."
"So we're on a planet that has a small warsat network, brought here by scientists from the Golden Age, and none of the people on it have access to a lightbulb."
"Well, we can't say that the natives rebelled, because this was an ocean world at some point. Where did they come from?"
"If we have to cover this whole planet to find an answer to that..." Wolf slowly stops. "Ghost."
Ghost turns around, doing his best 'raising a brow' look with his fins. "What are you thinking?" He said, a slight trepidation coming on.
"We're on a planet no guardian has ever been to-"
"That we know of."
She continues, unfaltering. "-which is full of weird beast people, a missing Golden Age expedition crew, and an entirely uncharted world by any vanguard scout."
"Yes, thank you for stating the obvious."
Wolf grins. "This place is a Hunter's holy grail. It's perfect."
"...you're crazy, Wolf."
"You love the crazy, admit it."
"I do, but I also like to complain."
"-I mean really, if it was Him driving, we wouldn't be in this mess. Who thought it was a good idea to let some kinderguardian drive a modified jumpship like that? They have to be on some new level of stupid to do something like that."
He doesn't have the heart to tell her that it was most likely His decision to let the Young Wolf pilot.
"And now here we are, stuck on a rock with our systems suppressed by whatever in Traveler's name this interference is-"
That is annoying, he has to give his friend. He tried sending out signals in frequencies that he knows He will notice, but whatever the strange energy reading he got off that flash of light must've displaced them much farther than he thought. Currently, they're flying slowly south-southeast, while in the middle of light snowfall. The trees they lazily dodge past is some type of evergreen, a kind he doesn't have on record.
Mysterious.
"-I swear if I get within transmatting distance of that Lightmonger, I'm going to rip out their-"
He knows that she knows that their transmat permissions have been slightly altered, so that's not going to be entirely possible. He knows that she has to vent all of this out, though. Still, the shots they took was mostly out of the Hunter's control. He doesn't blame her.
And still, his friend finds a new conversation to yell about. And still, they fly through the forested tundra they found themselves in. And still, he tries to decipher the strange energy that is surrounding them. It's working on some sort of frequency that is entirely unique, not even close to what could possibly be achieved by normal means. So, the energy is paracausal in nature, flowing around them like some sort of vapor. He theorizes that flying high enough might help him out.
He also guesses that the warsats will find him first, if he tries to experiment with that theory.
Another way is to find a way to interact with it, but it appears to... avoid them. Both him and his friend. At first, he thought their light was acting as some sort of barrier, to protect them. But that wasn't the case; it's more like their Light is just too dense to be penetrated, from the ambient energy.
Except this one strand. Like a fishing line with a hook on one end, something has a very, very persistent grasp on trying to pull them in a certain direction. At first, he brushed it off; it was ridiculously easy to do so to the point that his friend didn't even notice it. But every now and then, it would come back, beckoning them in a direction.
Seeing how they really didn't have any other way to go, he directed them in said direction. He avoided the 'hooks' from the reading, deigning to just follow the breadcrumbs left behind from the source of whatever it was-
-and then it pulls back. Suddenly, the line-and-hooks are whisked away by some invisible hand, as if an errant dog was pulled by their leash. He can still guess the heading, and seeing how his friend is getting more lost in her conversation, he decides to make a note of what her direction is bringing her, then follows after the anomalous strings. He flies through the air, sending out signals to try and keep track of where they went.
After a minute of this, he catches something out of the corner of his eye. A quick flash of blue, a shade not unlike that of his friend's flickering optic, but brighter. He curves to fly in said direction, flying up higher to shake off the attention of his silent observer. He can't help but stare, for a second, at what they appear to be.
A cloaked figure, hood up and body fully covered, almost gets passed off as an errant bush. But the signal he's been tracking leads directly to it, so it's pointless. As he gets closer, he notices that the anomaly appears to suffuse the figure, a small object at their side, and a small, blue flame peeking out the side of the tree it's hiding behind.
He gets closer to the blue ball of fire. It's... odd. Well, other than being a floating ball of fire, that is. From the way its being is looking around, it's almost like watching a Ghost with a strange holo-effect on. If it wasn't for the fact that it doesn't contain as much Light as one, he would've believed it was a Ghost.
So, with that in mind, and it's reclusive nature noted, he goes up to it. "Hello."
It turns around, two lighter blue 'eyes' wide in either surprise or its natural state. Strangely enough, both the fire and the figure scream in synchronization.
He hopes his friend won't waste too much time berating him for this.
Mm. Wonder who that is? Probably nothing important.
What is important is needing more reading material while I write another chapter. So, for another recommendation for something to sink your teeth into, is written by 'Adamant39'.
The story is one for the Elder Scrolls: Skyrim fans out there, called 'Four Walking Disasters'. I love it, it respects your time, and I busted my gut laughing at its humor. Best part is that it's one of the few stories that downloaded the mod that lets you skip the default intro, because we've all seen it a few too many times.
It's good, I swear.