Chapter 2: Subterranean Homesick Alien
I woke up on the couch with a stiff back, it wasn't too bad to sleep on, but it still wasn't the best either. Nevertheless, I stood up and stretched. I smelled something being cooked from the kitchen, so I walked in and saw Chilli making breakfast. She must've heard me come in because she turned around and looked at me with weary eyes, as if she was still unsure of me being in the house.
"Good morning." I said as I walked closer to her, but not close enough to invade her personal space. "Whatcha making?"
"Morning to you too Shaun, I'm just making some French toast."
"Well, it smells good! Do you want some help?"
Chilli shook her head. "No, I got covered here, but I do have a question for you."
"Sure, what's up?"
"I guess since you'll be here for a while. I want to know more about you."
"If I'm gonna talk about me, then Bandit should know too. Where is he by the way?"
"He's upstairs in his study, I'm almost done so why don't you get him for me?"
"Can do."
I left the kitchen and was about to head upstairs until I heard and saw the front door open.
"Hey mum and dad, me and Bingo are home, we had a… good… time…"
In front of me were two dogs, both having the same fur colors as their parents, but they looked younger, probably in their teens. Both of them stared at me with their eyes wide and mouths open.
"Mum! Dad!"
The blue dog shouted, and her parents quickly ran into the living room, Bandit almost fell down the stairs going too fast.
"What is it Bluey? Are you… Oh. Looks like you met Shaun."
Bluey looked at her father, "What? You know this thing in our house?"
"I'm a 'thing'? I think that's worse than being called an alien."
Bluey then looked at me. "Oh great, it talks."
This whole time, the other red dog standing next to her sister, named Bluey, was still looking at me with her mouth open until suddenly it looked like her whole face beamed up with light and stars in her eyes as she came up close to me and eyed me up and down with a big grin on her face.
"So, are you actually an alien? For real life?!" She asked me, basically jumping with excitement.
"Yep, I was actually about to tell your parents about where I came from."
Chilli stepped forward, "Yeah, after you get cleaned up, that stuff you're wearing looks filthy."
I looked at myself, she was definitely right, "So, where's the shower?"
"Just head upstairs and at the end of the hall in the master bedroom, you can't miss it." Said Bandit.
I thanked him and headed towards the stairs, but I stopped and turned around. "Hey, Bandit, you wouldn't happen to have any clothes I could borrow, do you?"
Bandit shook his head, "No, sorry mate. We only wear clothes on special occasions, but I think what I have would be too big for you.
"I might have something you can wear!" Bingo added.
I look at the smaller red dog. "You sure? I could just clean my armor."
"Yeah it's no problem, I really wanna hear about where you came from."
"Well, thank you…"
"I'm Bingo, and this is my older sister Bluey." She said, gesturing to her blue-colored sister.
"Thank you, Bingo, nice to meet you, and you too Bluey.
Bingo followed me upstairs and grabbed some of her clothes before showing me where the shower was. I thanked her again and she walked back into the living room to join her family.
"I still can't believe we have an alien in our house!" She exclaimed with glee.
"Me either, but I wanna know how he even got here in our house." Bluey said.
"Big Blue here found him in his office, going through his stuff." Chilli said.
"Wha- Dad! He was robbing us and now you are letting him stay?"
"He wasn't robbing us Bluey, and he's staying with us because his spaceship he got here with crashed."
Bluey rolled her eyes, "We'll I hope he doesn't stay long."
Everyone stood around in silence, not knowing what to say, until Bingo spotted something sitting on the small table next to the couch, it looked like a small ball sitting inside three different sized rings.
"Hey, what's this?"
"That? I don't know. Shaun had it with him, but he didn't say what it was." Bandit explained
Bingo walked closer to the table and reached out a hand.
"Hey Bingo, I don't think you should touch that, Shaun might not like it being messed with."
"Yeah, I have to agree with Mum here, what if it's dangerous?"
"Relax, it'll be fine, and I'll put it right back." Bingo picked up the object and inspected it with it in the palm of her hand. It looked gray and had a small black circle on it which seemed like a screen with dirt on it. She rubbed the dirt off with her other index finger and received a small shock. She got scared by it and quickly set the object down.
"Bingo are you okay?"
"Yeah, I'm fine dad, it shocked me!" She said, sucking on her finger to ease the slight numbness.
The thing on the table started to shake and hovered in the air. The rings that were sitting on the table also began floating and spun around the ball in different directions. A blue diamond flickered to light on its screen.
"Ugh, that didn't feel pleasant, Shaun? How long was I out-"
The ball finally got a grip on its surroundings, and all the dogs were staring at it wide-eyed.
"What."
I decided to take a quick shower, to not keep the dogs waiting, I turned the water on way too hot when I turned the shower on, but I figured it out soon enough. When I was finished, I grabbed a towel that was hanging on the wall and dried myself off, it seemed very heavy and bulked, maybe because they needed such large towels to dry off all their fur. After I was all nice and dry, I picked up the clothes Bingo let me borrow, just some shorts and a band shirt of a dog facing front with white fur and eyeliner and eyeshadow. I slipped them on, and they were kinda big on me, but it was better than being completely naked. I placed the used towel in a basket and headed downstairs.
"Shaun, there you are!" Amy hovered close to me and whispered in my ear. "Mind telling me what the hell is going on?"
We all sat at a table and ate breakfast while I explained everything to happened to Amy while she was out.
"This… is gonna take some getting used to."
"Yeah, no doubt." I replied taking a bite of French toast.
"All right already, come on Shaun tell us where you came from!" Bingo said with a mouth full of food.
"Bingo, manners!"
"Oops, sorry mum."
"Do tell us, I am interested in hearing this." Bandit spoke.
I swallowed the last of my food and sighed. "Okay, I might as well start at the beginning."
(A long, long, time ago.)
I wasn't born when it showed up, but I heard the stories. We call it the Traveler.
And when it showed up, everything changed. My race, called Humans, or Homo sapiens if you want to sound fancy, started exploring the stars. We built great cities on Mars and Venus, Mercury became a beautiful garden world, and our life span tripled. We looked out into the galaxy and knew it was our purpose to walk in the light of the other stars—but the Traveler had an enemy. A Darkness, which had been hunting it for eons across the vastness of space. It found us and that was the end of everything, but it was also the start of something new. For its final act for us, the traveler sacrificed itself and got rid of the darkness in our solar system, and when it died, it created ghosts.
"That's what I am!" Amy said proudly, I chuckled and continued.
Ghosts are imprints of the Traveler whose purpose is to find deceased humans and resurrect them into guardians, like me. Granting them the light and powers to defend Humanity in its absence. A Ghost hovers through a highway passing through rusted and long deprecated cars, scanning them, searching for its human to bring back as a Guardian. The sounds of Fallen ships flying overhead in the sky, the ghost began to worry.
I look at Amy and ask her to also help me in explaining. She nodded in agreement.
"C'mon, where is he." The Ghost said in a female voice as she made her way through more cars looking for its human.
She made her way to a car wrapped around a tree and a body that looked like it was flung through the front windshield. She sighed in relief. "There you are, let's bring you back, shall we?" She spoke as the three rings that surrounded her core started to spin faster and a blue light emanated from her.
I woke up on the dead grass, my vision blurry as I lifted myself up and looked at my surroundings and the Ghost in front of me.
"Try not to freak out but… I'm a Ghost, actually, now I'm your Ghost, and you… you've been dead for a long time." She said to me as a large ship flew overhead. She started to get worried again.
"What was that?" I said watching the ship fly away and disappear in the distance.
"A Fallen ship, they are Scavengers picking at humanity's remains." She said to me as she disappeared, leaving a few sparks in the air. I looked around for her until I opened the palm of my hand, and she appeared, hovering a few inches above it.
"We can't be out in the open like this for too long. The armor you have only gives you slight protection. We need to find you a weapon."
I looked at myself and saw that I was wearing armor that I didn't notice until she said I was. It had plain-looking white colors, and I also had a hooded-cape that was gray. After I finished looking at myself, I looked around for any signs of a building where I could take shelter. I saw a building far off away and I decided that would be my best bet as I started my walk towards it. As I approached it, I saw it was a gas station, one that looked like it had been destroyed for a long time, half of it was just fallen rubble. I opened the front door and looked around for anything I could use. I made my way into the back storage room and saw something that made me sick. The skeleton of a person lying with their back against the wall and a gun in their hand. I walked up to it and carefully removed the pistol from its hand. The gun wasn't in the best of shape, with several scratches on it but it still had an almost fully loaded mag in it so it was better than nothing. I also found a flip knife that had a broken spring on the body of another skeleton, so I took that as well.
"That's dark." Chilli said with a slight disgust of the skeletons.
Back in the front of the store I jumped over the counter and grabbed a map off the wall and swept the dust and pebbles off the counter and laid the map across it.
"Hey Ghost, where exactly am I going? You've never told me why you brought me back."
My Ghost appeared in front of me. "Sorry about that, well you are a Hunter, one of the three other types of Guardians, which is what you are. The others are Warlocks and Titans. As for where were are going, we are headed to the Last City, humanity's only safe place here. There have been other smaller settlements over the years, but none that had lasted."
She looked at the map and scanned it. "there's an abandoned city not to far from here, I say that would be our best bet at finding a ship to get us to the City."
I agreed with her and left the gas station in the direction my Ghost gave to me in my helmet's navigation system.
"Hey Ghost? I have a question."
"Yeah? What do you need?"
"It feels weird calling you 'Ghost'. I think you should have a name."
"Hmm, I never thought about a giving myself a name, I've just been focused on finding you. Did you have something in mind?"
"Yeah, I do, what do you think of 'Amy'?"
"Amy huh? I like the sound of it, thank you."
"You're welcome, Amy." I replied with a smile, even though she couldn't see it through my helmet.
Eventually, Amy and I made it to the city, it was full of depreciated buildings overgrown with nature taking it back over. Amy flew around some buildings, scanning for a ship, when we came across a large hole in the ground where a parking garage used to be. I stood near the edge and looked down.
"It looks like it goes down for miles!"
"It does, and I'm picking up a faint signal that a ship is down there."
"There is? But how do we get down there?" I asked Amy when I looked to my left and saw a ladder that looked like it had been placed there recently. With that as our only lead, I descended it, reaching the bottom with the ladder stopping a few feet off the ground. I looked for a spot where I could land around the rubble and jumped onto the ground. Nearby I saw a tunnel and followed where I went until I stood in front of a large metal door, I struggled to push it open as it loudly creaked and scrapped across the ground. When I opened it enough to squeeze through, I made eye contact with several Fallen looting the secret base. Without hesitation, I emptied the only magazine of the gun I had onto the two Fallen who had guns. When the third one charged at me with its spear, I dodged it and sunk my knife into its back, killing it instantly.
"Sick." Bandit and Bingo said at the same time.
"Uh oh bad news, I'm getting fallen comms saying several more fallen are on their way." Amy said as she played back the audio through my helmet.
"We better find that ship then." I said as ran into another room I saw on the wall across from me.
In the other room was a ship. Amy flew over to it and scanned it while I walked over to some controls and pushed a big shiny red button.
"It's not in the best of shape but it should be enough to get us to—DID YOU JUST PUSH A BIG RED BUTTON?!"
"Yeah, why?"
"Did you not learn anything from movies back before you died?! NEVER. PUSH. THE RED ONES!"
"Ahh, I've forgotten about that, you still never learned." Amy said in a slightly angry tone.
"Relax Amy! It'll be fine." As soon as I said that the ground began to shake as a large door opened loudly above the ship."
"Well if they didn't know where we were they definitely do now, good going."
"Hey I helped! We have a way to fly out of here now!" Suddenly several Fallen busted into the room, all loaded with guns pointed right at me."
"Okay! Time to go!" Amy said as she transmitted me onto the ship and flew us straight up out of the ground and jumped in an instant, leaving the Fallen behind.
"That was too close! You really need think more!" Amy scolded me.
"What? We got out in time didn't we?"
"Yeah barely!"
"Don't get your gears in jam or whatever that makes you run."
"I'm made of Light I don't have gears!"
"Whatever you say, Little Light haha."
"...Don't call me that."
"Okay sorry just trying to lighten the mood. I take we are headed to the last city?"
"Yep, when we get there, first thing to do is meet with The Vanguard."
"What's The Vanguard?"
"The Vanguard consists of three commanders. Zavala is the commander of the Titans and the Leader of The Vanguard, Ikora is the commander of the Warlocks, and Cayde-6 is the commander of the Hunters. I think you'll like him." Amy explained to me.
"Oh yeah? Why's that?"
"Because you both do things without thinking about them first!" Amy rolled her eye. "Look, we are approaching the Last City now."
I looked outside the ship and at the large city and the tower that stood tallest.
"What's that?"
"Vanguard Headquarters and the Courtyard outside, it is where most of the other Guardians hang out and get equipped for going out and off-planet."
"I can't wait to see it!"
"Well, we are here, get in the captain's chair while we pull into the landing bay."
I took my seat as Amy landed the ship and I looked around at the other ships and people.
"Man, I am so excited!" I said as the exit platform lowered and I stepped off my ship.
"Andddd that's where I'm ending it for now."
"Please can you tell us more?" Bingo pleaded.
"Nope, maybe I'll tell you all more another time, my throat kinda hurts." I say rubbing it.
"Yeah, I agree with Shaun, but it was nice learning more about you. Thank you for telling us.
"Yeah, thanks, mate.
"Thank you."
"Many thanks."
Everyone seemed to enjoy my story, and I rubbed the back of my head in embarrassment, maybe getting stuck here wasn't the worst thing to happen to me. Amy hovered near me.
"So, what happens now?"
"Well, that would be getting my ship up and running, but I don't even know how that's gonna happen. It's way too advanced to fix with anything here. Hmm, maybe I could scrap what's left of it and try to make something I could use…"
While Amy and I pondered on what I could do, Bandit came up to me with a look that meant bad news.
"Hey Shaun? I have to show you something."
He led me into his study and turned on the laptop sitting on the desk, and showed me something that made my blood boil. There were several news articles about a destroyed ship found outside the city, the pictures that were taken of it were of no doubt MY ship and now it was most likely being taken to some secret government facility to be dismantled and studied. All of the articles said that if any dog spotted a strange creature to report it to the authorities.
"Great, how the hell am I supposed to get home now?"
"I'm sure you'll think of something, you got Amy and all of us to help out."
"You just want to help so I'll be out of your ha- or fur."
"Well, you haven't killed us in our sleep, so I don't think you're all that bad."
"Gee Bandit, thanks, that makes me feel better."
"Sorry mate, let's go back downstairs and figure out what to do next with everyone."
I sigh, knowing I won't be getting back where I belonged anything soon. "Yeah, Alright."