Chapter 10: Gearing Up

There has always been aSpeaker, an anonymous high priest with a mysterious and powerful connection totheTraveler and its ghosts. In allthecenturies oftheCity's history,theSpeaker's great work has never changed - to guide new Guardians, healtheTraveler, and raise our crippled protector from its slumber.

The Speaker's office was crowded with all three members of the Vanguard and the Speaker himself. Whisper had given her report, and the tension in the room was palpable.

The Speaker struggled to keep his tone even. "The Hive, now awoken. We must learn their purpose, their plan. I have studied the records you transmitted from within the dead ghost. They reference a place discovered during the Battle of Mare Imbrium, the Hellmouth. There is a place inside it called the World's Grave, a great library of Hive knowledge, guarded by an ancient Hive knight. Seek it out. We must find the truth."

Whisper crossed her arms stubbornly. "I'm not going anywhere until I get some answers!"

The Speaker hesitated, surprised at her response, and Cayde cut in smoothly. "This is a hunter thing, Speaker. Whisper, can I talk to you for a second? Outside?"

Whisper stared at him flatly, then shrugged and stalked out of the office, followed by Cayde, who fist pumped the moment the door was closed. "Yes, I love it when hunters save the day. Did you see the look on Zavala's face?"

The young guardian stared at her supposed mentor, nonplussed. Cayde sighed, calming his energy, and spoke more quietly. "Look, Whisper, I get it. Information is everything around here, and it's easy for us on the Vanguard to forget what it's like to be out on the pointy end of the stick when nobody tells you what you need to know. Believe me, I get that. So tell me, what do you want to know?"

"Everything! What are Fallen doing on the moon? Why is their symbol nearly identical to a Hive symbol? Why do I have strange dreams about a tower? If I have no memories, what do I see when I die?"

Cayde whistled. "You have a lot of built-up pressure in there, don't you? Look, I'll answer your questions now, but then I'm asking you to take a break. The Hive can wait. Probably. Take a day. Shoot someone up in the Crucible. You've been going hot and heavy pretty much since you woke up, and you've got a lot of promise, so I don't want you burning out in the first century on me, alright?"

He looked at her expectantly, and his silly charm threatened to brighten her mood in spite of herself. "Fine."

"Good! Good. Right, where were we? Oh, Fallen on the moon. They live among the Hive, so of course they're crazy. Best we can tell, they're not a real house at all, they're just a collection of castoffs and malcontents that call themselves the House of Exile. They're mostly dregs, though they have some captains and a baron or two that didn't feel like they had a chance to advance in their original house. Or were thrown out. Doesn't really matter – they're not a threat. What was the next one?"

"Their symbol?"

"Right. That one we don't know. Our best guess is it's a status thing – they may be castoffs, but they have the balls to survive in the shadow of the Hive. Or the glands. Whatever. And their sigil is a riff on Crota's sign."

"Crota?"

Cayde shrugged, and for a moment his breezy attitude failed. "A nasty piece of work, and extremely powerful Hive Prince. He killed a lot of guardians when we tried to take the moon."

Whisper could feel her temper calming down as Cayde shared answers to her questions. "How do you know any of this? And why didn't anyone mention it before? And how can you say they're not a threat?"

"Okay, okay, I'll tell the story about that one Fallen and me when we teamed up. It didn't happen like that. We didn't, you know, do anything actively—no handshake, no icy stare of grudging mutual respect. I don't even know which hand you would shake. Do they shake hands? It must be complicated. Anyway, it was like this. I was on the moon. I cracked a Hive structure near Mare Imbrium, not unlike yourself, and they just—swarmed. Ranks and ranks and ranks of thrall, pouring out between the columns, but the columns were knights, and all the shadows behind them rose up hissing sorcery. I drew my gun and—"

Whisper rolled her eyes.

"— and I ran. Don't look at me like that. I had a line of egress and while yes, it was full of thrall, I had a backup, too. I went upslope. Took cover in the shadow of a crashed Phaeton. Emptied my machine gun, ducked down to reload, and saw her at the other end of the hull, killing thrall: a Fallen in Exile colors, bannered in the marks of a Baron, though the flags were claw-torn and stained with Hive ash. She was alone. I think she must have lost her crew. I didn't really have time to shoot her and she didn't really have time to shoot me, so we just went back to killing Hive. Knights pushed me out into the open and back up the range to a high stone saddle in the shadow of an old interferometry array. It was good ground so she came up there, too."

"For a while we just killed things, which is hard to make interesting in a story, so I'll pass over it. At the end the wizards came. I climbed the array to get an angle on them and she fell back to the base of the antennae where she broke her swords off in a knight. I saw that happen and I don't know if I can tell you how I felt. She was another living thing with a mind I could understand and she hadn't howled at me or tried to eat my ghost. I cheered when the knight went down. When I came down, empty on all guns, she was slumped against a bulkhead staring at me with all her tiny black eyes. Ether leaking out of her like smoke. The knight hadn't died easily. Downslope the last wizard moved like fire behind another line of thrall."

Cayde stared off far into the distance, remembering. "I looked at her and wondered how many innocent human lives she'd ended on those broken blades. She did the strangest thing, then. She took the last shock pistol from her bandolier and threw it between us, as if to offer it. When I went to pick it up she tried to knife me, but she was slow, and when I broke her arms and opened her throat she didn't seem surprised. To this day I wonder if she hated me, or wanted to make me kill her, or just felt she should spare me the choice. I did kill a few thrall with that pistol."

Whisper kept up her run of questions now that she was actually getting answers. "You said that we lose our memories when we become guardians, but I had a strange dream about a tower that seemed more than a dream. What is happening there?"

Cayde sighed and his face turned grim. "You ask hard questions. You want the truth so bad, then fine. The tower, that's an exo thing. Some of us, and by some of us, I mean all of us, have dreams about that tower. For some people it's a peaceful little walk. For others, it's a bloody battlefield. You can ask others about Deep Stone and they'll tell you about the army. They might confess one truth, which is this: we have to kill the army to get to the tower. Usually this starts bare-handed, and somewhere along the way you take a weapon. Ask again and if they're buzzed they might also admit that most of us don't make it to the Tower, except once or twice. None of them will tell you that the army is made of everyone we meet. The people we work with and the people we see in the street and the people we tell about our dreams. We kill them all. I think because we were made to kill and this is the part of us that thinks about nothing else. Often I kill people I don't know, but like most of us I think I knew them once, in the time before one reset or another, when my mind was younger and less terribly scarred. All we know is that it has something to do with the Deep Stone Crypt, the place where exos were born. We don't know where it is, and we don't know how it worked. That really is all we know."

"So the dreams are… normal?"

Cayde's expression lightened. "Kid, you're a guardian; none of us are normal. But yeah, we all have the dream. But there is still something… different about you. Look, I may not have been entirely straight with you last time we spoke, but I'm being all reputable now, so here it goes. The number after our name is the number of times we've been reset, but the number always starts at one. I've never seen someone without any resets before. So there's another mystery for you to chase."

Whisper mulled over this new information for a moment before looking back up at the Vanguard member. "This would have been very helpful to know when I first got here. You have a massive library of information in the City – why isn't this recorded somewhere?"

"It is recorded somewhere—right here." He tapped his head. "You need to know something, you can always ask someone who's been there. And, you know, if we had to write down all our stories it would be a lot harder to tell them properly over drinks at a bar later."

Whisper stared at him blankly. "Okay, okay, and we would have to worry about the Factions hacking into our systems and doing something stupid, or ignoring the Vanguard completely and starting another Faction War."

"How have we accomplished anything at all?" asked Whisper in exasperation.

Cayde's mask slipped again. "We haven't, you know," he said quietly. "I used to be out there in the wilds, Whisper, the wind at my back and a good crew beside me. Out there, it puts a face on how much we've lost. If you squint, you can see all we were, and all we could be again. For a long time, I thought the Vanguard were doing nothing but holding us back, afraid, fractured. But then I got stuck with the job, and it looks so different from up here. We only have one City left, no room for error. For every person fighting to retake our worlds, another wants to let it go and a third wants to abandon the system altogether."

He looked her in the eye. "Look, you have a lot of promise. You're smart, competent, and confident, so I'll give it to you straight. There are a lot of guardians older than me, but I've been around for a long time now, and I can tell you we're treading water. Under siege for a hundred years, we're still unbroken, but out there our bones are being picked clean. But these missions we're giving you—you have the chance to make a difference. You're young enough the factions haven't gotten their claws into you, smart enough that even Ikora listens to you, and dependable enough that Zavala takes you seriously. You have no idea how rare that is. I've kept my hands off, trying not to screw up a good thing, and maybe that was a mistake. So I'm going to work more closely with you, sharing what I know. You're out there, Whisper—you can make a difference. So work with me here. Pretty please?" He clasped his hands in front of him, doing his best to look like a puppy. "And if we save the City I can hold it over Zavala's head for decades."

The moment of seriousness hadn't lasted long before Cayde's trademark flippancy returned, but the little window he'd given her was chilling. Cayde was one of the most powerful people in the City, and he felt helpless and trapped while the years dragged by and nothing changed.

"I … think I remember feeling like that, once. When I was on the Moon the Hive killed me, and before my ghost revived me, I was somewhere else. Still alive, I think. Not an exo."

Cayde nodded. "It happens, sometimes, especially to exos. There are some crazier than usual warlocks called Thanatonauts that kill themselves to see more. Waste of time if you ask me - a thousand thanatonauts on a thousand journeys have come up with only the tiniest amount of useful information."

Whisper shuddered at the thought. "So… if I were to go to this Hellmouth, how would you help?"

Cayde permitted himself a small fist pump. "Yes! Okay, we'll get you some better armor, and I'll scrounge up a weapon from one of my staches for you."

Whisper sighed. She was definitely going to regret this.

"Alright, let's get back in there." Cayde led the way back inside, where he gave the Speaker a thumbs up and Zavala a wink, who ignored it. "We're good, Speaker. Carry on."

"There is little else to say. This may be the first Hive offensive against us since the Battle of Burning Lake. We must know their plans as soon as possible."

"We got it covered," assured Cayde with more confidence than Whisper felt. "And, break!" Cayde quickly hustled her off to his own office, which was a small room with every available surface covered in junk. Bits of broken technology, half-assembled weapons, and, oddly, playing cards pinned to a cork board with bits of red string linked them in a complex, tangled web.

"Right, let's see. I've got it somewhere…" Cayde started shoveling odd bits of rock to the side and uncovered a chest. "Ah, here it is." He opened it and pulled out the pieces of a full set of armor. "You're going to need something a little more durable than the light scout armor you've got. This armor is called Jackknife—named it myself. Normally I sell this to hunters, but we'll just say you owe me one."

"You sell equipment to your own soldiers?" asked Whisper incredulously.

"Shhhhhh!" hushed Cayde dramatically. "Don't say things like that. The last time we had lightbearers calling themselves 'soldiers' we were up to our ears in Warlords. But yes, we totally sell stuff to guardians. It's not like you're paying tribute—sorry, taxes—to the Vanguard, are you? We can't post bounties to get guardians out there doing stuff without income, after all, especially not with Shaxx dragging everyone to the crucible with his own bounties. Though I will say that arrangement looked a lot better on the other side of it."

Whisper sighed yet again. Like so many things she'd seen, this was yet another way the City was barely functional. The guardians really were independent, able to do more or less whatever they wanted. Still… these weren't just normal people, these were immensely powerful immortals. These were the people you didn't want to burn out or get crushed by PTSD. Maybe they needed that much autonomy to function. Or… maybe the system was just as broken as everything else.

"Uh, hello? Whisper?"

Right, the armor. She examined it closely while she pulled up the specifications from the Vanguard Network. It was well made and much nicer than her own, heavier too, and painted with a gray and mottled white color scheme, with the inverted double-triangle symbol of the Vanguard painted in orange and white on the chest. The black sleeves of the base jumpsuit were padded and lined with micro-collectors to absorb ambient moisture. They were topped with thick metal-plated combat gloves. Thick pant legs were tucked into knee-high black boots with gray trim boasting programmable soles to mimic the tracks of local wildlife. The helmet was close-fitting and shaped like a skull with yellow sensors on the eyes and a built-in respirator and oxygen supply.

"A respirator? Moisture gatherers?"

Cayde shrugged. "Yeah, yeah, we're exos and don't need it, I know. But you're a hunter, you're going to customize the hell out of this, anyway. If you want more specialized stuff, and if you can afford it, look at the Neuroghast armor, it's made special for exos. And besides, we still breathe out of habit, we still eat and drink, because it keeps us from going crazy. And on the moon, there will be plenty that makes you uncomfortable, so take it from me—you'll be glad you can breathe easy."

Whisper nodded, more than a little apprehensive at his words.

"Oh, I almost forgot the good stuff!" He jumped over to a cabinet and forced it open, shoving aside a stack of reports that looked untouched. Inside were a number of carefully organized and stacked weapons that gleamed from polish. Cayde spoke as he examined each one thoughtfully. "The Hive like winding tunnels and getting in your face, so your sniper rifle won't be of much use to you. So… this one." He pulled out a normal-looking black shotgun with the Vanguard's symbol on the barrel. "The SG-Scattercast, thoroughly tested and completely reliable. And rocket launchers aren't recommended in tight confines—take my word for it on that one. I've had good luck with one of these bad boys. Say hello to The Swarm." With some effort, Cayde lifted a heavy machine gun. It certainly looked lethal with a drum magazine on the bottom and targeting laser beneath iron sights. It was made of nice material, too, by far the nicest weapon she had seen. She accepted the squad automatic weapon, which guardians apparently used like a heavy rifle, getting used to the weight and feeling the hum of Solar Light infused within it.

Cayde examined her with an experienced eye. "Hmm, something's still missing. Got it! When you fight the Hive, and anything else, to be honest, you need to expect the unexpected. Always keep a backup weapon handy, and I recommend this." He pulled out a revolver, or hand cannon as Banshee said, that looked remarkably like Cayde's own, though it bore the Vanguard's symbol rather than the custom paint job Cayde used.

"This," he said dramatically, "is the Devil You Know. It draws fast, packs a punch, and only needs one hand to use."

"Do you tell all hunters to use these?"

Cayde winked. "Only the smart ones. There's no law sayin' others can't use 'em, but a cannon is a Hunter's weapon. It speaks straight, speaks loud, with precision, with intent. Just like us. Good luck out there, Whisper. You can leave your extra armor and weapons in your quarters if you need to."

"My… quarters?"

Cayde facepalmed. "Did I really not tell you about your room? Wow, I must be slipping. Where have you been sleeping? Actually, don't answer that. I'm sending you the room number for your room a few floors down in the Tower. And, uh, no need to mention to anyone you're just getting it, alright?"

Whisper nodded again, unsure how to respond, and left, following the instructions from Cayde to find her room. As the Vanguard member had said, four floors down from the top of the Tower were numerous, tight-packed apartments. She kept walking down the corridor until she found number 279. Ghost signed in for her and the door slipped open to reveal a small, cramped, heavily utilitarian room. There was a bed that at least looked clean, a battered table and chairs, a small kitchen, and a bathroom. By far the most prominent feature was a large, solid gun locker that lined one entire wall.

She set down the package of armor on the bed and set about trying it on, adjusting each piece until it fit snugly and rode comfortably. It was significantly heavier than her old armor, which would slow her down a little. She spent hours working on it, transplanting the micro-tools from the Komarov armor, and fiddling with it until each piece sat comfortably.

Once her armor was ready, she had Ghost pull out all of her weapons for her to consider. Ghost couldn't carry an unlimited number, but he should have space for at least one of each weapon type, which would give her maximum flexibility.

For an auto rifle, she still had the reliable Khvostov 76-02. That was a keeper. The Sorrow MG2 SMG from Banshee had already proven its worth multiple times over. For shotguns she had two, the lightweight solar Graviton ESm from banshee, and the full-sized, harder hitting SG-Scattercast from Cayde. She went back and forth on that, but decided to go with the SG-Scattercast in the end - those tunnels might be cramped, but if she was going to meet an enormous Hive knight at the end, she wanted all the punch she could get.

The hand cannon The Devil You Know she decided to keep at her side rather than transmitting it away, and Ghost used some of their small glimmer supply to fashion a quick-release holster for it on her right thigh. She wanted the nicest weapon she had ready at hand, firmly in place across from the long blade from Banshee on her left side. Her other best weapon was The Swarm, which she was absolutely taking with her.

For fusion rifles, she still had the Helios FR4, and while the sniper rifle probably wasn't going to be very useful, she had no intention of leaving the Calcutta LR2 behind. And finally, of course, the Baron RS/1 rocket launcher had already saved her more than once and would be coming along for the ride.

Once she felt ready, she put away her old, now partially deconstructed armor in the small closet, the Graviton ESm in the huge gunner locker, and headed out to see Banshee and borrow his firing range for a bit. And then… then it was time to head back to Luna.

And, she decided quietly, if nobody else was going to do it, she'd write her own guide of the basics for guardians.

Referenced Lore

Grimoire:

The Speaker

House of Exile

Ghost Fragment: Fallen

Ghost Fragment: Legends

Bounty Tracker

Armor:

Bond of Veils

Jackknife 2.1 (arms)

Jackknife 1.3 (legs)

Jackknife 3.2 (head)

Neuroghast 1.0 (arms)

Bounty Description:

Ballistic Trauma Expert