"So I will prepare a book, which is a map to a weapon. And my vanquisher will read that book, seeking the weapon, and they will come to understand me, where I have been and where I was going. And then they will take up my weapon, and they will use it, they will use that weapon, which is all that I am." - Verse 5:9 - I'll Make Sure

Harley dreamt that he was wrapped in icy chains. Oryx was in front of him, offering to free him through the powers of the Darkness and every time he refused, the chains tightened. Oryx made his offer again, but the chains had become so tight that Harley couldn't say or do anything to refuse. Oryx laughed and summoned the dreadful orb of Darkness. "Your efforts are wasted, Child of Light. All falls to the Deep in the end."

Harley shot awake only to find that he still couldn't move. The chains were like a vice, locking him in place so the Darkness could overtake him once more. He looked down and breathed a sigh of relief. Apparently, whilst dreaming, he'd managed to become entangled in his sheets so thoroughly that they'd formed a cocoon around him. He struggled free of his bedding and shivered. Why was it so cold?

His gaze settled on the window across the room. He'd cracked it open the night before, obviously forgetting to close it before going to bed. He felt somewhat calmer, knowing that there was a rational explanation for the icy chains from his dream. But what he couldn't explain was why the dream had occurred in the first place. Oryx was dead with no way back. He shouldn't be having these dreams anymore!

"Agh!" he yelled in aggression, kicking the closest thing to him - one of his boots. The garment flew across the room and impacted the closet door with a loud thunk.

Prism's eye lit up. "Harley? What's going on?"

Harley rubbed his face. "Nothing, Prism. I'm fine." He sighed. "What time is it?"

"5:22."

"Wonderful." At least I got closer to a normal hour this time. "I'm gonna get dressed."

"Are you sure you don't want to try and get more sleep?" His Ghost sounded concerned.

"I don't need more sleep. Obviously, I'm not tired anymore or I wouldn't be getting up yet."

"Your attitude would suggest otherwise," Prism muttered.

Harley pretended not to hear her, opting to find something to wear. He ultimately decided to go for comfort, grabbing a pair of black sweatpants and a heather grey V-neck from Fyr that read 'What Happens on Venus Stays on Venus.' He put on his sneakers and made his way out.

"I don't understand why you've been up so early lately," Prism remarked, "You always slept in before."

Harley shrugged. "Maybe I'm turning over a new leaf."

His Ghost scoffed lightly. "Sure... I know that's not it, though."

"Look, would you please just drop it? Please? It really doesn't matter."

Prism sighed. "Whatever you say."

"Thank you… Now, do you know if Rae and the others are coming back today?"

Prism's shell mimicked a shrug. "According to Kaedro, they should be if their mission was successful."

"Awesome. It'll be nice to see them again."

"I'm sure it will... Not to mention they'll be back just in time for a certain special day."

Harley was confused. "What do you mean?"

"You can't seriously- Ok. You know what? Nevermind. If you don't know, I think I'll keep it a surprise."

"Ok..."

He grabbed a cup of coffee and headed back out of the mess hall to the plaza. A sheet of fog sat over the City, masking it in a sea of white. Harley leaned on the Tower railing and stared out at the lightening sky. Thin rays of sun peeked over the horizon, causing the fog over the City to shimmer. The sight was one Harley felt privileged to see, as he hadn't been one to get up early prior to Phobos.

As the day slowly began and more vendors and staff got up and about, Harley didn't have to wait long before he was joined by Kaedro and Jade. "Hey, Ace," said Kaedro.

"Hey, guys… Did either of you hear from the others?"

Both Guardians shook their heads. "Nothing," said Jade, "But who knows? They might be on their way right now."

Harley sighed. "Yeah. Assuming their mission didn't fail."

"It's no use dwelling on that," said Prism, "It won't make you feel better."

Kaedro nodded. "She's right, Ace. Let's talk about something else."

"Like what?" asked Harley.

"Well for starters, you've been up a lot earlier these past few days. What's up with that?"

Harley groaned. "You sound like Prism. Why does it have to be something more than just not being tired?"

"Not saying it does. Just trying to make conversation."

"Hm."

The Guardians fell silent, staring out at the City and watching the fog gradually clear up. In certain cases, words weren't necessary. Harley found himself enjoying the peace and quiet.

Suddenly, Prism spoke up, shattering the silence. "I was just alerted by Amanda," she said, "She told me we should go to the Hangar."

Harley sucked in a breath. There was only one reason the Shipwright would call them to the Hangar. "Let's go." Jade and Kaedro nodded in agreement.

The three of them set off for the Hangar. Harley had to hold himself back from sprinting down the hallway and jumping the railing. They entered the space just in time to see four Guardian ships docking.

"They're here!" yelled Kaedro.

Harley watched with bated breath as four figures transmatted out of the ships. "Let's go," said Kaedro. They hurried down to the Hangar floor.

"Guys!" said Harley.

Rae was the first to spot them. "Ace!" She hurried over, pulling him into a tight hug. Then she punched him in the shoulder.

"Ow! Why?"

"For being an idiot and worrying us to death. Duh."

"She's correct," said Bazzle, "It was...incredibly difficult to focus on the mission at hand."

"Hey guys!" exclaimed Fyr, "Look at this!" He held up a sword, grinning proudly. Harley noticed the weapon bore the insignia of a tree at the base of its blade, and that it glowed as though it was in the process of being forged.

"Yeah, I'm letting him carry it," said Rae, "You're looking at the newest Iron Lord."

"What?" said Kaedro.

"Yup," said Rogue, "Saladin made Rae an Iron Lord. It was crazy."

"We have so much to talk about," said Jade.

"Let's go to the mess hall," Kaedro suggested, "Then we can all sit down."

"More importantly: food," said Fyr.

"Sure. That too."

"Amanda!" called Rae, "We good to go?"

"Yep!" the Shipwright hollered back, "Welcome back!"

The newly reunited Chasers left the Hangar and walked to the mess hall, where the away group grabbed a bunch of food before sitting down. "Ok," said Kaedro, "Who's going first?" The others exchanged a few looks.

"You guys," said Rae, "We know more about what you were doing than you knew about us."

"Alright." Kaedro looked from Jade to Harley. "Should…? Yeah, I'll start. So the day after you guys left, Ace and I flew out to Phobos to investigate that Cabal signal. We found out they were under attack from the Taken, which are other lifeforms that Oryx corrupted with the Darkness... I found info in the base that Oryx's ship was what had taken out the entire Awoken fleet. It's called the Dreadnaught and it's parked in Saturn's rings. But before all that, Ace fell through one of the rifts that were all over the place. Actually, now that I'm thinking about it, you never told us what happened after you went through the rift."

Harley shifted uncomfortably, crossing his arms. "You know what happened."

"No, Kaedro's right," said Jade, "We only know what the end result was. Only you know the rest."

Harley stared at the table. "Harley, I can't explain this for you," said Prism, "I wish I could, but I wasn't there."

Harley sighed. "Fine… I fell through the rift and wound up on the Dreadnaught. I wasn't there very long before the Hive started attacking me. They just kept coming... Soon, I was cut off from the rift I'd gone through, but I knew I couldn't let Prism fall into their hands, so I threw her back through. Instead of killing me, the Hive took me prisoner. They put me in a cell… I don't know how long, but long enough that my Light was almost completely drained. Then these two Knights came and brought me to Oryx and… well, you know the rest."

The others nodded, solemn looks on their faces. Kaedro cleared his throat. "Anyway… Cayde convinced me that the only way I could help Ace was by getting onto the Dreadnaught and shutting down its weapon. He sent me to the Cosmodrome to pick up a stealth drive so I could get on board. I brought it back and Amanda installed it in Eris' ship. While that was happening, Cayde asked me to track down Tevis - a Nightstalker - who'd gone missing on Venus... It turns out he'd ended up in the Black Garden without his Ghost."

Harley looked at Kaedro in surprise. He hadn't known about that. I wonder if it's different now that the Heart is gone.

"I got into the Garden but the Vex had already killed him. But I was able to retrieve his bow and harness the Void."

"Shit man," said Rogue, "You're a Nightstalker now?" He shook his head. "Going up against those guys in the Crucible sucks."

"Yeah… After that, Jade and I used Eris' ship to get onto the Dreadnaught. We disabled its weapon and set up a transmat zone. This other fireteam, Fireteam Calypso flew in and helped us take down a Cabal tank. Then we went looking for Ace but only found traces of a dead comm signal. We regrouped back at the Tower and went on a recon mission the next day to get info from a Skyburner ship the Cabal crashed into the Dreadnaught." He looked at Jade. "You wanna take it from there?"

The Warlock nodded. "By using the information, we learned that Oryx was in the center of the Dreadnaught and the only way to get there was by using a Hive rupture. We conducted some scans and figured out that only Ascendant beings could use ruptures. Then a nearby rupture opened and that... that was the first time we saw Harley since Phobos."

Harley felt her eyes on him and glanced over. She looked away. "Um, anyway, Kaedro and I went back to the Chamber of Night to steal a piece of Crota's crystal so we'd pass as Ascendant."

"Cool!" said Fyr.

"We ran into Harley again, but Kaedro was able to knock him out and get him back to the Tower. Then we found out that the crystal was empty, so Cayde sent Fireteam Calypso to steal cloaking technology from Rasputin so that Kaedro and Liv, the leader of Fireteam Calypso, could use the crystal to steal Crota's soul."

"You stole a Hive God's soul?" said Rae incredulously.

"Yep," said Kaedro, "Liv and I went back into the Hellmouth and snuck into Crota's fortress to infiltrate his funeral. We pulled it off, but our invisibility gave out and the Taken started attacking. Luckily, Eris was able to teleport us out. Then, Liv, Jade, and I used Crota's soul to open the rupture and get us to Oryx. We fought him and nearly killed him, but he used the Darkness to Take himself."

"Damn," said Rae.

"So he peaced out to his Throneworld?" asked Fyr.

"Yeah." Kaedro sounded surprised that Fyr remembered how Hive God deaths worked. "We knew we had to take him down for good, but we wanted Ace healed first. A Warlock named Asher Mir was able to work out a way to bring him back, so we spent a few weeks healing him and then he was in a coma for a month before he woke up."

Harley nodded. "Yeah. Then I was stuck in the med bay for a few more days. When I was released, the Vanguard didn't want me going on a mission right away, so we took a trip into the City."

"That's good to hear," said Bazzle, "Did you enjoy yourselves?"

"I bet there was a bar fight," said Rogue.

Kaedro shook his head. "There wasn't a fight and it was definitely better than the last trip we took, but we can't seem to go anywhere without running into some kinda trouble."

Rogue nodded. "Say no more."

"Anyway," continued Harley, "We left for the Dreadnaught a few days later, fought our way through the Ascendant Realm, and here we are." The others nodded.

"Nice, nice," said Rae.

"I wish I could've been there," complained Fyr, "That sounded sick."

"Enough about us," said Harley, "What were you guys up to over at Felwinter Peak?"

"Ok," began Rae, "Basically the House of Devils dug up this thing called SIVA. SIVA is self-replicating nanotech that can make almost anything. It was invented during the Golden Age, but the Iron Lords rediscovered it during the City Age. Only it turned against them, killing nearly all of them, and had to be sealed away. More recently, the Devils uncovered it and started augmenting themselves with it. A group of them captured the Peak, so we went up and found Sepiks Prime trying to break into the Iron Temple. We stopped them, but Sepiks teleported away and the Fallen started taking down the sensor grid. Salad figured they knew where SIVA was, so we went to the Cosmodrome to stop them. We couldn't fix the sensor grid, but we pulled the logs and found out that the Fallen started producing SIVA."

"So what'd you do then?" asked Kaedro.

"We regrouped back at the Iron Temple, where Lord Saladin and Shiro established a base," said Bazzle.

"Yeah and it's totally sweet!" said Fyr, "There's cool fire pits and Saladin has pet wolves and-"

"Anyway," said Rae, "Later we went to take out the Fallen's artillery in a military bunker in the Plaguelands. We took down the shield generators and destroyed the guns. Shiro brought in backup to secure the area while we returned to the Temple. Sometime after that, we flew out to Mars near Clovis Bray where we found undisturbed SIVA prototypes that Shiro and a Cryptarch named Tyra Karn used to find a weakness in the Fallen's hold on SIVA. Pretty sure that happened while you were fighting Oryx the first time."

Kaedro nodded. "That sounds about right."

"Yeah, well, later we used what we found to take down SIVA long enough to enter the replication chamber. When we got inside, SIVA puppeted the dead Iron Lords against us, but we were able to use Felwinter's Battle Axe to kill them. Then I set the complex to self-destruct and we got out of there as fast as we could."

"So you ended SIVA just like that?" asked Harley.

"Yep."

"But… that only accounts for some of the time you were gone. What about the rest?"

Rae shrugged. "We hunted down Sepiks and ended him. They'd also brought Tanniks back to life, so we killed him again, too. Then Shiro put us on the trail of some crazy Splicer priest who'd been controlling SIVA."

Bazzle nodded. "Yes. Aksis, Archon Prime. Lord Saladin worried that we alone were not enough to take him, so he and Shiro accompanied us to Aksis' Perfection Complex. It was difficult, but we defeated him in the end."

"So why did Saladin only make Rae an Iron Lord?" asked Kaedro, "You were all there. You all fought SIVA."

Rogue shook his head. "He offered it to all of us," the Exo explained, "Well, except Fyr. Old Salad said he'd consider it once the kid's got some more training and maybe a decade or two under his belt."

"Which is incredibly unfair!" Fyr piped up.

"As for me and Baz, we could've joined up back in the Dark Age. We got offers back then too. Turned 'em down then, turned 'em down now."

"Why?" asked Jade.

"Well, Baz feels like he's needed more here than on the Peak. And I just think it's a waste of time." But the Titan grinned, indicating that he wasn't serious. "Rae wasn't around until later, so she kinda missed her chance back then."

"Does that mean you'll be spending all your time on Felwinter Peak?" Kaedro asked the Awoken.

Rae rolled her eyes. "You'd just love that, wouldn't you? Sorry, but you're not getting rid of me that easily. Saladin might call me in sometimes if he needs help with stuff, but apart from that, nothing's gonna change."

"So do we have to start calling you 'Lady Rae?'" the Exo Hunter teased.

Rae glared at him. "Just you try it."

"Sounds like you guys had a lot to deal with over there," said Harley.

"All of us have been through a lot," replied Bazzle, "It will do us all some good to take a break from missions for a few days."

"Speaking of which," said Rae, "We still gotta report to the bosses. C'mon, guys."

Fyr groaned as he stood up. "Whyyyyy?"

"The Vanguard must be updated on the situation," said Bazzle.

"But whyyyyy?" The Titan sighed and walked off.

"We'll see you guys later," said Rae.

"Later," said Kaedro.

"Bye, Rae," said Harley.

Kaedro sighed. "Man, that was a lot of talking… You guys wanna go watch a movie or something?"

"That sounds good," said Jade.

"Sure," said Harley, "Your quarters?"

"Yup."

And with that, the three remaining Guardians rose from the table and walked out of the mess hall.

A/N: Not a whole lot going on in this chapter. The teams had to bring each other up to speed and everyone got to decompress a bit. Final chapter will be out soon, then we'll start moving into Destiny 2 territory ;D

Keep your eyes up, Guardians!

- TheWolfParadox