Once the part was complete, we returned to the plains, once again on the trail of this...warden, I suppose. Wearing the mask once more, we headed off toward Gara-Toht Lake, hoping to find the strange sight we had seen before. This time, though, we encountered something unexpected. At first, I was unsure what we were seeing. It looked like a warframe, but ne I had never seen before. It took me a moment to realize that we were staring a some kind of Specter, albeit one of a warframe I had never seen before. I guess my repository of knowledge had truly dried up, something that I had been thinking all the way back when I had seen Umbra, and learned that the Lotus was missing. It seemed that now, I was on my own once more - no fore-knowledge to help me. Form here on out, I was in unknown territory.

Oh well. All good things must come to an end. Besides, it would be good for me to have to work without foresight as to what would happen in the future - if I didn't I might forever be shackled to that knowledge, and find myself unable to function if I was deprived of it.

Following the frame, we once more came upon a glowing light - complete with glowing hand. Etran examined it, and once again Nakak got a vision. This one claimed that the warden had struck down the eidolon every time its tendrils rose out of the ground...until one day, where he hesitated, if only for a moment.

Somehow, I already knew how this was going to end.

Anyway, Nakak told us to build another piece of this warframe and try to unravel this further. One bounty and way over a hundred dead grineer later, and the part was under construction. That was going to take another twelve hours, as like it or not, I hadn't figured out how to rush the process without ticking off the technocyte flesh used to make it, which was impairing my already failing attempts to figure out how to control the frames.

What was I doing wrong? This monstrosities were likely victims of Orokin cruelty, but surely they had found a way to control them.

Ugh, you guys probably have no idea what I am talking about, do you?

Well, here's what happened.

XXXXXXX

Once I'd acquired the schematics for the Excalibur frame, I had set about building it as soon as possible, so that I could begin fielding warframes in my army ASAP. Space Ninja wizards are awesome, okay?

The problem was, once I had finished building the frame, it refused to do anything. I had merely asked it to walk a certain distance, but I had received no reponse. I had tried to get it to take a step, to no avail. Then I tried to make it shake its hand. No response.

Okay, maybe it couldn't take digital commands?

Assuming that was the issue, I'd instead attempt the same set of command using psionics. I'd hoped that those would provoke some reaction from the flesh-puppet, even if it was a rebuttal. If it gave me a rebuttal, maybe I could figure out why it refused to act.

Yet nothing happened. The suit didn't even acknowledge that I had sent the order. It felt like I was sending imperatives to a wall, or a person who was completely unwilling to admit they were wrong in spite of the truth being obvious.

And I better leave those memories behind - too many bad feelings there.

Annoyed, I'd finally just tried putting it in a room full of food and leisure items just to see if I could get a reaction out of the creature.

Unsurprisingly, it did nothing.

That was when I lost it. Annoyance now out of control, I tried forcing my mind into the infested puppet, if for no other reason than to get it to react.

I really ended up regretting that.

I did manage to breach into the frame's mind...and was then immediately forced out by feelings of pain, sorrow, and rage.

What the hell? What was this?

Confused and scared, I curl up into a ball, idly noting I was in the fetal position, while my mid tried to process just what had happened. Meanwhile, the frame had collapsed onto its knees, though otherwise it gave no reaction.

Okay, okay, DO NOT MESS WITH THAT! NOT NOW!

XXXXXXX

Back in the present, I was still waiting for the Revenant part to finish building, so I set about trying to examine the artifacts once more, again using the mask.

Once again, a vision came to me. This time, though, it was not of the war against the sentients. Instead, it depicted a group of commanders building…..something. Beside them were a literal army of fabbers, all working on assembling the object. Nearby were several of the organic creatures that had been made by the Xziphid, busy carving…..something into the ground. Strange circles and symbols that looked almost like magic circles of some sort. Their purpose eluded me, but part of that was because I didn't want to know what they did.

Eventually, the project was completed. As construction finished, so too did the Xziphid creatures finish their work. With the symbols finished, they circled around them and made some strange, heavily repeated phrases.

It took me a moment to realize that they were chanting.

They did this for some time, which somehow caused the circles to start glowing with light. Soon, tendrils of all colors emerged from the various symbols, which wrapped themselves around the finished project, causing new symbols to appear on it. Eventually, they and the chanting faded, as did the light. Whatever had been done was done, though, as the device was soon attached to a transport and sent away.

With that, the vision faded away, leaving me alone to ponder what I had seen.

…Did this mean that the Progenitors had magic?

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AN: Read and Review! This is Flameal15k, signing off!