*Legend 14*

The Dark Below

...

The mid-morning scene in The Tower's plaza was sleepy and relatively tranquil. Very few people milled about this early, save for a few night owl Guardians just returning home from overnight missions, or other Guardians just now mobilizing for the day. Things seemed pretty much at ease here...

Which made Bake's mad tear through said tranquility all the more jarring.

She ran flat out at a speed that was rather considerable, given her Hunter reflexes and Faunus agility. In her path suddenly were two service drones carrying a large crate of ammunition between them. Blake didn't break stride as approached. Just when it looked like a head-on collision (and possible explosion) was immanent, did she jump;double jump over the obstacle. She landed with a neat tuck and roll and continued her run.

She tore into the Vanguard Hall at top speed and, spying her partner Lie Ren already at attention at Pyrrha's side, did she fall in beside him; her hands clasped behind her back, as though she had been there the whole time.

Pyrrha, who's face was currently buried in her scroll, knew full well that Blake had only just now had the courtesy to join them. She turned slowly, a rather humorously sardonic grin on her face. "You're late." She said simply.

"I apologize ma'am," Blake said with a bow. "I was retrieving gear from my room, and I became distracted and lost track of time-"

Pyrrha held up a hand; a signal for silence. "First offense," She said. "I'll let you off with a warning." She turned to retrieve her scroll from the table and in doing so she asked, "But do tell, Blake. Were you distracted before or after Yang left your room?"

Blake's cat ears stood strait up on her head as her face flushed redder than Pyrrha's hair. "I-I-" Blake's mouth moved in a series of panicked and soundless gyrations. Ren chuckled lightly next to her.

"As I thought," said Pyrrha said with a smile. However, her mood quickly sobered, given their task at hand. "Team Nikos, we have a job to do. And I intend to finish it before sundown."

And she took the lead through the hall as her teammates fell in step behind her. It was relatively easy going through the plaza and the hangar bay as there wasn't much activity this early in the morning. As they walked their way through the service corridor, Blake's scroll vibrated in her pocket; an alert to recently received data. She withdrew the device and stared at it's screen. She had received three picture messages. She tapped the screen to open said pictures, and felt her heart leap into her throat.

It was a message from Yang. It was a selfie she had taken in the reflection of a mirror. She was blowing a kiss at the camera; at Blake. She scrolled over to the next photo where Yang had adopted a very sultry and adorable pose; her hand behind her head with her chest poked out a bit, and a wink in Blake's direction. Blake scrolled to the next photo...

And stopped absolutely dead in her tracks.

So sudden was her stop that Ren, who was walking behind her, plowed strait into her. As it was, the last photo Blake was now staring at was quite... um...it was...well...

Let's just say it was udderly captivating ;)

"What is the matter?" Ren said from behind her.

"Nothing," was Blake's lightning-fast response. She tucked the device away as they arrived at the hanger bay.

Given that there was no line at this time of morning, the three Guardians were transmatted into their respective ships quite quickly; Pyrrha into the Ticktock Inquisitor; Ren into the Sidereal Rumba; and Blake into The Fangs of Nyx. And without any ado, they blasted off into the atmosphere.

As the team traveled through hyper space, Pyrrha came through the coms with the mission's summery. "Alright Fireteam Nikos, listen up. Our objective today is two-fold. Firstly we are to find this machine and obtain a detailed scan of its inner workings. After which, we blow it into The Void."

"Should be simple enough," Ren's voice said back. "We know the location, and we know that Blake and Yang already cleared most, if not all of the proximate threats."

"Well the hook this time is we'll be doing this in broad daylight," Pyrrha said back. "We don't want to scare any civilians that may be nearby. We're going to have to do our best to remain discreet, although most have been alerted to a Guardian operation coming through already."

Blake couldn't suppress her smile as she said, "So we're to create a massive explosion, and remain discreet at the same time. Got it."

"Very funny, Belladonna," Pyrrha said rather humorlessly.

Further conversation was halted by the group's arrival at their Lunar destination. The three ships flew in an expertly guided formation over the gray mounds of Moon plains, flying right over the orbital accelerator that was the pride of The Moon's people. "I've got the LZ," said Pyrrha. "Let's bring 'em down." The three ships hovered as low to the surface as they could safely get, and their occupants were deposited onto the ground. Pyrrha did a slow look around. "I was wrong about the daylight; we're on the dark side." She thought for a moment. "This is good. We'll have the cover of night under which to stalk our enemies."

"The irony being our enemies will have the same cover under which to stalk us," was Lie Ren's response.

Pyrrha smiled. "Touche, Void Walker." She walked a few meters out as to better gauge the terrain around them.

Ren was set to join her when Bake suddenly grabbed his arm. Ren turned to her in question. Blake wore a look on her face then that smacked of sudden epiphany; eyes wide, locked on the distance and seeing nothing; mouth slightly agape. She turned to Ren. "I know what to call it now..." Ren knew the 'it' to be her new and yet un-named Semblance. Ren waited for her answer. "...Nightstalker..." she breathed with reverence.

Ren nodded. "So it shall be," he said. "Are you going to use it?"

Blake frowned academically. "Given the unpredictable circumstances of our current mission, I don't think it advisable to rely on an untested strategy."

Ren, at that point had taken to readying his weaponry for the mission; his trusty Silvered Hushwind-D auto rifle, and the Painted Artemisia machine gun (Arc affinity). He flicked the action his Sidearm, Anton's Rule (Solar affinity). "Don't include it unless you intend to use it." He said this with the sagely impatience of a teacher eager to see the fruits of his student's learning.

Pyrrha called from up ahead, "Let's mobilize Team Nikos!" And from there did three Sparrow engines whine to life to motivate them to their mission site. Blake remembered this trip in great detail as her chaperone mission with Yang took them along this exact same route. Blake's stomach did a little flip as her thoughts wandered to that of the beautiful Titan girl. 'Hey, stay focused. We have a job to do, remember?" Adam said inside of her head.

"Sorry," Blake said to him.

Just a few minutes from there did Pyrrha, from the front of the formation, give the signal to halt. They applied the brakes and glided to a stop. Pyrrha dismounted, her scout rifle already primed in her hands. Her team fell in step behind her as they approached the location where they knew the machine to be.

Or at least, where it used to be.

"No way..." Blake breathed. The three of them ran up the ridge to all meet the same sight. Previously, where there had been a strange alien machine, there was only a massive hole. It looked to be more than fifty yards across and Traveler only knew how deep. "This can't be..." Blake was in total disbelief. "It was here. It was right here!"

"Do we have the right location?" Ren said. Blake shot him a very 'Don't be stupid, of course we have the right location' kind of look.

"No, the location matches perfectly with the supplied coordinates," Pyrrha said as she checked the data on her scroll. "We're in the right place, but something definitely happened to the machine."

"Maybe someone sunk it; seismic charges or something," Ren said.

"No, look at the sides," Pyrrha countered. "They're completely smooth. This hole was dug by hand."

"Or by machine..." Blake said dubiously.

There was a short silence between them. "What do you suggest, ma'am?" Ren asked at length.

"We follow the trail; see where it leads."

"That deviates from the original mission parameters," Blake said.

"Then I'm making a new mission," Pyrrha said firmly. "Fireteam Nikos, we are going down this hole."

At that moment, Ren called to his Ghost. "Lotus!" And he appeared by his head. Lotus, much like the flower of his name sake, sported a creamy-white colored shell. "Give us an idea of how deep this hole goes," was Ren's command.

Lotus then took to flying a slow circuit around the perimeter of the gaping hole as the three Guardians watched his progress. After completing his lap, Lotus's analysis was complete. "Well, there's good news and bad news about this. Bad news is that it's deep; I mean kilometers deep. Good news is that its not a trip strait down; it levels out near the bottom and runs horizontal to the surface."

Pyrrha nodded. "Alright then, there's nothing else for it. We go down." Team Nikos steeled themselves as they peered over the lip of the enormous hole.

Into the silence Ren said, "Uhh...ladies first?" The two women of the ensemble turned to glare at him. He sighed. "Very well..."

And he jumped into the abyss with no hesitation. Pyrrha and Blake quickly followed. As it turned out, the walls of the hole were not totally smooth, there were indeed small rough patches and cracks left where chunks of Moon rock had fallen away that served as hand and footholds to aid their descent. However, when free fall could not be avoided, their respective Guardian movement abilities came into play. Blake would plummet, only to double jump at the very last moment onto a ledge beneath her; Ren could be seen gliding from hand hold to hand hold; in Pyrrha's case however, her Titan ability was only good for propelling her upwards, so she had a slightly rougher time with it.

After about twenty minutes of careful falling, the trio hit solid ground. "We're in it now," Ren said. It was then that a thought hit him. "Lotus, can you reach our ships from this depth?"

"Yes I can. We're deep, but not deep enough to disrupt my signal. We can get out of here in a pinch if need be."

"Well that takes care of our first problem," Pyrrha said. "I can't see a Traveler-damned thing down here..."

"Lotus, give us some light."

"No," was Pyrrha's quick command. "This has basically turned into a stealth op. The enemy doesn't know we're here and I'd rather keep it that way; a headlight will only telegraph our position." Lotus quickly transmatted back into Ren's head. "Blake, take point."

"Yes ma'am." Blake readied her Black Suros SWB-42 pulse rifle and lead the team through the tunnel. The near total darkness of this place was no problem at all for the Faunus to navigate, if anything, Blake's vision was better in the dark.

They trekked for some number of minutes in this single file formation down the corridor of Moon rock. Then Lotus came in over the coms. "This tunnel opens out into a cavern. If my scans are correct, it should be pretty big."

As Blake was at the front of the formation, she was the first to see the opening into said cavern. And upon seeing it, did she stop dead in her tracks. Ren and Pyrrha behind her shared nervous glances and then joined their teammate at the opening. It was here that they simultaneously learned that Lotus's previous assessment of this cavern being "pretty big", didn't even begin to cover it.

The space was enormous, and even that description didn't do it justice. Despite the presence of these creatures being very new to The Moon, it looks as though they had made incredible progress in that very short span of time. The three Guardians were looking at the scene from the top of a staircase that had been hewn out of the Moon rock here. In fact, the entire cavern had a somewhat freshly sculpted look about it as there were still some structures that looked as though they were incomplete; pillars and pylons and staircases, and who knows what else these things were building down here. And stalking amongst all of this was a legion of the alien creatures responsible for the creation of this place. Blake recognized quite a few of them as she and Yang had met them in combat on her previous mission. But some were still quite new to her eyes.

The first of which looked to be somewhat larger than the smallest of the lot. They wore rotting cloth sashes and carried what looked like strange twisted firearms. The last were the largest yet, they looked to have three glowing eyes set into roughly horned heads and carried massive and jaggedly crafted swords.

As the Guardians looked upon the scene, Pyrrha said, "Betelgeuse, are you getting this?"

"Every second," was the Ghost's response, his recording going in overdrive.

Amid the extra terrestrial details of this place did Ren spot their itinerary. "Look there," he said. It what could best be estimated as the center of this place, was the machine. It looked as though several of the creatures surrounding it were on guard duty of some sort, as they paced around the thing in measured and precise circuits.

"That's our machine alright..." Pyrrha mused. "But that's alot of space between us and it." She turned to Blake. "Belladonna, you're on reconnaissance." The Faunus bit her lower lip as she judged the distance and hence the effort said operation would take. "You can do it," Pyrrha said with a nod.

Blake nodded back as she prepared herself. And right then did she crouch down on the spot. She then channeled a very mild current of Arc energy through her body; just enough to refract the air molecules immediately surrounding her being; to bend them in such a way that they reflected all incoming light.

She had just become "Invisible".

And she took off across the space. She moved in a sort of crouched sprint, a posture that afforded her equal parts speed and stealth. She stepped with a light precision that didn't so much as disrupt the loose Moon dust under her booted feet. She came to a stop and huddled in the shadow of a standing pillar as a small flock of the strange creatures made their way passed them. "We're about fifty yards out," Was Adam's assessment of the distance spoken inside her head.

Blake whipped out from behind her cover as she continued her journey across the room. After much artful weaving and winding, did she finally approach the machine. The opening closest to her was guarded by two of the larger creatures, both of them brandishing crudely-edged swords. Without hesitation, Blake walked right up the incline that the machine rested on, and slipped right between them. The inside of this thing was even stranger than the outside. There didn't seem to be anything to it, it just seemed kind of...empty. And there was some sort of green fog billowing out of the thing. Blake looked around for an access point of some sort, but soon realized that she wouldn't know one when she saw one on this alien device. "Over there," was Adam's whisper. Blake took the cue and settled herself in front of the designated spot.

Adam left Blake's body then as he set about his work. But, having been subject to the same flow of Arc energy that Blake was, he was completely hidden from sight. "My, this is certainly more complex than the last scan I had to do," Adam said.

"Just make it quick," was Blake's strained whisper. "I don't know how much longer I can hold this camo..." She was already beginning to feel the effects of the demanding strain on her Light layer that holding her invisibility for such a long period would have.

After several more tense minutes of in-depth scanning, did Adam have what he needed. "I got it. Let's get out of here."

"Gladly," Blake said. She turned in the direction of the exit...and stopped cold. One of the large creatures that was guarding the opening was now walking about the space, right in the path of Blake's escape. The creature's gait was not that of a routine patrol, no, it seemed to be actively searching for something...something that it could not see...

Blake made herself as small as she could in a corner of the machine. She had been in predicaments like this before; she had faith in her camouflage, the problem however, was that she wasn't sure how much longer she could hold onto it. Her muscles began to quiver as her head swam from dizziness.

"It's almost through, just hold on a little longer!" Adam said inside her head.

Blake took another look at the creature's progress. She had no idea as to it's anatomy or biology, but if she wasn't mistaken, the thing was currently taking deep, rather irregular breaths through whatever it called a nose...

It was smelling for her.

Bake grit her teeth together, which was rather painful considering how many incisors she had. Said pain paled in comparison to the near unbearable strain on her body. "I can't...hold...it..."

And just as suddenly as Blake re-appeared, did the creature turn in her direction. It let out a roar and struck down with it's blade. The blow would have cleaved Blake in two, if she had not rolled out of the way. Her Suros MKB-51 shotgun was primed in her hands before her roll was even complete. Then, right there from her crouching position, did she leap across the space and unload her shotgun right into the creature's head. CLOW! It crumpled into nothingness. "Blake! Behind!" Adam shouted in warning. Without even turning to see the threat, did Blake quickly duck, the sword of the towering creature whizzing right over her head. She then spun on the spot and a second shotgun blast saw the creature dispatched.

Meanwhile, at the entrance to this place, did Ren and Pyrrha suddenly hear the commotion of gunfire and alien screams. "She's been spotted!" Pyrrha shouted. She could see Blake fighting her way out of the machine amid a hoard of the swarming creatures. "Cover fire!" The sound of scout and auto rifle ballistics filled the air as the two Guardians felled those immediately in Blake's path.

The three of them rendezvoused in the center of the space. They put their backs to one another as to cover their blindsides. "Did you get what we needed?" was Pyrrha's question to Blake.

"We got the scan, yes. But things got hairy from there." Blake answered.

Masses more of the aliens were now pouring out of the woodwork (or Moonwork maybe...) intent on stopping the three of them from escaping.

Pyrrha gave the order. "Fireteam Nikos, weapons free!" And the trio loosed coordinated fire into the crowd, scooting their way to exit tunnel the whole time.

Their enemies soon realized that meeting these three in direct arms combat was proving costly; seeing their ranks fall so quickly. They soon began to take more strategic positions and fired from behind cover. "I'll flush them out," Ren said. With a flicked of his left hand did he cast his grenade at the enemies' cover. The creature in question saw this and dived out of the way...but the Void projectile followed it's every move. It was an Axiom Seeker. The creature was blown into dust as the grenade rounded a corner and collided head on with it.

And then suddenly there came a flood of the smallest aliens, their claws primed for combat. "Allow me," Blake said. Her fourteen inch, jet-black hunting knife was in her hand in a flash. She then activated her Arc Blade. Cloaked in a veil of pure electricity, did she launch herself at the horde, cutting them into electric ashes.

Ren and Pyrrha were still fighting back to back, cutting a path to the exit. They were soon accosted by two more of the alien sword fighters. "These two are mine!" Pyrrha shouted. She tucked away her overheated fusion rifle and charged her does directly. It was here that Pyrrha enacted one of the many traits that indeed made her special; much different from other Defender Titans. As she ran flat out, a disc of Void energy formed in front of her, as to quell any full frontal attacks from her enemies. This was normally a Striker innovation, but Pyrrha was so much the fighter that she strove to perfect her own version of the technique.

The creature in her sight aimed a sinister swipe of it's sword at the Titan, but her Void shield deflected the blow with ease. Pyrrha then put her full momentum into a mighty strait-armed punch that collided with it's torso. "Disintegrate!" And there, it's body consumed by the Void, did the creature drift away into nothingness. The layer of Void light inside Pyrrha's body flared to life as she began to glow with it's telltale purple flare; her Force Barrier.

The second of the sword wielders charged Pyrrha outright, enraged at he fall of it's comrade. It cried ferociously and struck down with a blow that could have split a boulder in two. But the creature got the shock of it's life when it's blade snapped in half; positively shattered over Pyrrha's head. The woman didn't even flinch. "Oh I'm sorry, was that supposed to hurt me?" She sneered. She then focused the Void energy from her barrier into her right fist and delivered a titanic Void-infused punch to the creature. It faded into oblivion as Pyrrha moved to engage her next opponents.

Ren's reaction to this was somewhat comical. He perched his had on his hips as he shook his head. "Girls, you're going to make me look bad," he chuckled. He then turned at the sound of a rush of new creatures coming in his direction. He prepared himself by turning his body completely sideways and spreading his arms in something of an 'L' shape' his right arm curling above his head, and his left pointed strait at his adversaries, palm upwards.

The creatures charged him with reckless abandon, but Ren was calm; almost bored. He easily side-stepped a clumsy blow from the first of them and then stuck back. A flare of Void energy was loosed from his palm and smacked the creature square in the back. It faded from sight as Ren clenched the same fist he used to strike; activating a recombination effect from the energy created by the creature's death. His eyes came alive with Void Light. "Energy Drain activated!" He was then a blur of Void-powered melee strikes that made short and easy work of the rabble.

All immediate threats clear, the three Guardians met up once again. "Excellent work," Pyrrha said to her team. "And now for our final task." She looked to the alien machine in the center of the space, and then to Ren. "How's your super?"

Ren flexed his fingers, Purple energy flaring from the tips. "More than ready," he said.

"Then if you be so kind," Pyrrha said with a pleasant gesture to the machine.

Ren took up position as he focused his Void Light into his palms. His energy peaked as he unleashed his Nova Bomb. "Azarath-Metrion-Zinthos!"Ren intoned the occult tongues of ancient Voidwalkers as the huge Void bolt was fired from his being. It sailed across the cavern, and upon colliding with its target did Ren shout, "Annihilate!" The already massive explosion created by the Nova Bomb was rendered even more so at this word. The tremendous force of the blast kicked up all manner of dust and debris, and whipped the hair of the three Guardians standing here. And once the dust and noise settled, they all saw that the machine was reduced to nothing more than smoking scraps and purple flames.

"Beautiful work," Pyrrha said. "Now let's get the hell out of here."

The group then retraced their way back to the original entrance tunnel, weapons still in hand as they were mindful of another surprise attack from their enemies. But no such attack came. And a short time from there, they were back on the surface .As Ren and Blake sighed in relief from the end of a strenuous mission, Pyrrha was still not relaxed. "One more thing..." she said. "Betelgeuse." Her Ghost appeared by her head. "Call in The Inquisitor, bombing run."

"Ma'am?" Was Blake's question.

Pyrrha grinned rather wickedly. "I'm going to make sure none of those freaks ever crawl out of that hole again," she said.

And then her ship soared in from orbit. Not with the leisurely approach of a planned Guardian pickup.

This thing was coming in with bad intentions.

"Fire!" And the ship launched a volley of sidewinder missiles at Pyrrha's command. They slammed into the mouth of the hole and all around it's perimeter. Under the assault, the hole completely collapsed in on itself. In the end really, all Pyrrha had done was create a larger and much more jagged crater, but the end result was still the same. Nothing would be getting into or out of this hole ever again. She then turned to her team. "Fireteam Nikos, I declare this mission a success."

Ren celebrated by enacting the Travelist prayer; turning his face upwards and spreading his arms into the sky so that his body looked like it was forming a 'Y'. "Praise the Light!" He said.

"The Light sustains us," was the automatic response of his fellow Travelist, Blake."

Pyrrha smiled, "You two definitely earned yourselves a rank up," she said. "I'll see what I can do about getting you some level purple gear."

That was one of the decided benefits of having a Vanguard Captain as a team leader; instant recognition for good performance. "Let's head back home now," Pyrrha said. "I've got alot to tell The Speaker."

...

*End of Legend 14*

...

AN:

Oh my goodness. Don't tell me how long it's been because I already know. I feel like I'm doing the followers of this story a disservice by updating so damn slowly. But alas, real life is a thing, and needs constant attention. As it is, I would like to thank any and everyone who gave this story a read. I shall return again somewhere down the line...

-B. D. Skunkworks