#DESTCEMBER2020

The Rising Kell had spent nearly a year working to entrench his position of power. He’d taken every measure to protect his fortifications from an attack. An old abandoned factory in the mountains near the EDZ was their home. The Former Baron worked to accrue an army to prepare for an assault on the thieves who stole the Great Machine. Everything was in place. Mechanics have been building walkers and producing advanced weaponry for the conflict.

He sat contentedly on his throne. His plan was actually coming together for his rising to Kell of Kells. With the aid of the House of Dusk, the ‘Guardians’ and their Vanguard would be brought to their knees. The Kell-Rising chuckled to himself before one of his guards entered and walked before his throne, kneeling.

“Celitriks-kel… I have word from our patrol leader. Patrols One, Five, and Six are unaccounted for. They went missing near the western territory, we’ve sent a search party, but I wished to keep you informed.” The Captain chittered lowly, a hint of fear in his voice.

One of Celitriks’s hands reached up to scratch his lower left mandible, “Have we had any reports of Guardians or Legion in the area today?”

“I believe one of our scouts saw a single Human vessel perform a flyby, but it was near the border where we normally see some activity. One Guardian could not disrupt our operations here,” The Captain responded, as his radio flared up with activity.

“Petinak, sir, we are under attack! A Lightbearer-” The chatter cut to static momentarily before returning, “We need reinforcements! We need reinforc-” The loud crack of a bullet cut the transmission off then and there.

Celitriks brushed past the Captain towards the large screen he had to the side of the room with Vandals running diagnostics. He brought up a thermal image of the immediate area surrounding his keep. It was too broad to see individual enemies, but it could spot larger targets, like the ship he saw landed near the border of its view. A single craft just like he’d been told but this ship he recognized. Immediately he turned to face the Captain, who now stood at attention.

“Mobilize all of our forces immediately; I want this thief to die its final death by any means necessary! They could ruin our plans here.” Celitriks roared as he commanded his troops to move out.

“Sir, all of this for one human? I am confused.” The Captain questioned nervously.

“That human is the Young Wolf. And they might be the end of all of us…”

It didn’t take long for the carnage to begin. The Kell sat down in his seat as he watched from the cameras and shanks his House had sent in. Walkers lay wasted on the battlefield, scorched from the Blinding Light of the Great Machine. An army of his people who had raised and rallied behind him covered the battlefield. Their bodies were littered with bullets, burns, and the hint of stasis left on their armor.

Even Celitriks’s most elite soldiers were turned to dust as the monster pressed forward into the complex. Their new, augmented weapons flailed uselessly as the human razed every area they passed. It wasn’t long now until they reached him.

The Kell stood up and drank in whatever Ether he could as he attempted to prepare for the brutal fight ahead of him. His shrapnel launcher was loaded, and he shouted, putting forward every last ounce of energy he could into fighting the Lightbearer. It was now that it dawned on Celitriks, the folly of his attempts had brought him here. The Kell’s efforts paled in comparison to the efforts of the Eliksni at the Battle of the Twilight Gap and the Six Fronts. And those battles were before this new age of monstrosities that the humans had acquired—beasts of unimaginable strength that tore through their ranks without thought.

The Eliksni never stood a chance.

“Well, Zavala wasn’t kidding.”

Artemis stood on Io, a little way away from a Pyramid. A pyramid. On Io. Artemis could hardly believe it herself.

“I doubt he’d joke about something like this,” Virgil said. Then, quieter. “I can’t believe they’re… here. And we’re going straight toward it. And after what happened last time, too…”

Artemis adjusted her grip on her gun and started forward. “I’m sure it’ll go much better than last time. We know what we’re dealing with now. Sort of.”

She knew neither of them believed that. The truth was undeniable.

Even in midst of battle, as soon as he reaches for it, he knows. There will be no coming back from this. Nothing will be the same again. Some changes come all at once. He is cleared to return to his bunk and finds it tossed; the Praxics have taken everything from his workbench, anything that might turn into a gun like that one. Even if the Vanguard has forgiven the use of Darkness in the face of a threat nothing else could stop, he knows what he’s called other places. Traitor rings more loudly in his thoughts than Guardian. There is a cold shadow that lives beneath his Light. He looks at his hands and wonders about the things they’ve made and what they can do now; wonders how quickly everyone else can sense the Stasis on him and how easily it spreads. The whispers that have been with him since he first held Thorn take Pujari’s words and twist them into a taunt. Dead thing. All you will do is kill kill kill. Dead thing dead thing dead thing. He closes the blinds so he doesn’t have to face the Traveler and lays down. For the first time, it’s hard to get up again. Some changes come slowly. There is a peppermint plant that lives on his windowsill, a gift from someone who thought it would do him good. It needs the light, and so he opens the blinds again and notices day by day that it reaches for the sun. He doesn’t know how to keep it alive, mind full of too much reading in the VanNet archive. He waters it, it rewards him with fresh growth and new leaves.

Sometimes Azra dreams her own dreams.  They are fairly normal as dreams go: common ones like driving a Sparrow whose breaks won’t work properly, getting into a Crucible match to realize she’s forgotten all of her guns, bits of memories smashed together in colorful jumbles.  She has nightmares, too, drowning in Darkness and torture and death.  She doesn’t remember much, even when she does stay in her own head.

But most of the time she does not.  She will one day learn this is a very stereotypical Arcstrider trait.  They are wanderers by nature, constantly moving, and this includes their sleeping hours.  So more often than not she is somewhere else.  She walks the plain with the dark tower and the sunset-fractals on the ground. She passes through scenes she does not belong in, noting familiar faces, experiencing odd sensations of worlds not perceived by her own brain.  She remembers these even less than her own dreams.

But she also intimately knows the Void.  So sometimes when death weighs heavy on her, on days that are worse for whatever reason, she goes even farther, in places not reality but certainly not dreams.

ACCESS: RESTRICTED

DECRYPTION KEY: 53754e7349f$IKO-006

REP #: 201-CITY-PRA

AGENT(S): TAR-115

SUBJ: Status of the Sunsinger Order

The Praxic Order has observed several fascinating trends in the Warlocks throughout the past few years.

Since the Red War, there has been a significant downward trend in the number of Guardians who have the ability to harness the full capabilities of the Sunsinger art.

Even Warlocks that were previously capable of utilizing the complete skillset of the Sunsingers have lost the ability to do so. Even with the rise in the Dawnblade technique, there is no known cause for this bizarre phenomenon. 

In collaboration with the Gensym Scribes, the Praxic order has begun extensive testing for the cause. 

We believe there to be several potential causes and have laid out the hypotheses here.

Guardians have lost some of their paracausality. This hypothesis is a dire scenario but should be considered if the future proves this to be true. We’ve based this theory off of the fact that the Sunsinger’s ability to overcome even darkness zones for resurrection proved more than once to break through many predestined encounters. A loss in the paracausal abilities could explain this.

The Traveler has weakened in overall power. As the Sunsinger technique was so commonly used by the most pervasive and powerful warlocks in the field, the loss in their ability could pertain to a general loss of strength by the Traveler. With the recent restoration of the Traveler, this theory has been highly contested among scholars.

Due to the Light’s fluid nature, the Sunsinger art is slowly becoming an impossible shape for a Warlock’s Light. Our final theory is the most mundane and potentially the most likely. The Light has never been fully understood, and many of our powers’ strength has changed over time. This may be just another case of the same occurrence on a larger scale.

It was one of those rare nights where Wyvern had the apartment to himself. Usually he spent the time alone reading, painting, or some other activity that would occupy his mind, but tonight his thoughts were racing too quickly for him to focus on anything. He found himself thinking about his days in the Dark age. One specific conversation, to be precise:

Wyvern was staying at a small town for a few days to rest before moving on. He’d been careful to keep the fact that he was a risen a secret, but he wasn’t sure how well he was keeping it. He was sure a few people suspected, but he’d successfully dodged their questions (Which probably made him look even more suspicious, but there wasn’t anything he could do about that.)

One night, as he stood on the outskirts of the village and watched the sun set, one of the townsfolk came to join him. 

“What’re you doing out here?” she asked as she sat down next to him. “You know you don’t have to stand guard anymore, right? The risen are here for that.” (Wyvern couldn’t remember much about her, just that she must have been around his age when he died. So, not that old.)

“Just watching the sunset,” he replied, nodding to the now dark sky. “Why? Did you need me for something?”

The woman stared at him. “Well, no. It’s just that I’ve known everyone in this village for so long, the only interesting people to talk to are the travelers.”

Wyvern smiled. “Well, too bad I’m leaving tomorrow then, huh?”

“Yeah,” she said, disappointed.

They continued to talk like that for a little while longer, in hushed tones. Somehow, they managed to get on the topic of the risen.

“I’ve seen one of them die before, you know,” she said in a whisper, as if she would get in trouble for even mentioning them. “In a battle against those Fallen. I wasn’t supposed to be outside, but I wanted to see how the risen fought. Instead, I saw how they died.”

Her voice quivered not with fear, but with something more akin to awe. “One of the risen was stabbed to death. Before I could scream, though, a drone- they call them ghosts, I think- shined its light over him, and he came back to life.”

Wyvern raised an eyebrow, interest piqued. “What did it look like to you? I always imagine it being sort of like waking up from a nap.”

The woman shook her head. “It’s more… dramatic than that.” Her gaze flitted over to his, lingering a second too long.

Sometime in the Dark Ages

There was much rejoicing.  It was nice, Tevis thought, to see a little merriment.  Though the air had a chill, people gathered outside, wrapped in blankets or huddled around fires.  People sang and danced.  There was music.  Pots of tea and coffee and mulled wine sat warming by the coals.  Some of the larger fires had spits roasting flanks of meat.  The fat dripped and sizzled, filling the entire village with an intoxicating scent.

It was amazing to see the place come alive.  Just a few days ago it had felt almost desolate.  The streets had been mostly empty.  There was a plague in the region; The Warlords, Risen like Tevis who did not get sick, mostly ignored it.  The people suffered.  The rickety church here had been converted into a field hospital, though there was not much anyone could do besides keep the dying comfortable.  As if the plague were not enough, the last year had been a hard one and most people were going hungry.

He’d arrived to find a dying town.  Most stayed inside, huddling by meager fires and praying that the sickness would pass them over.  Those that went out were filled with grim, weathered determination or shuffled between the buildings with a blankness in their eyes.

All it had taken was some nabbed food stores and a Golden-Age robotic nurse and the town had reborn itself.  They had no flags but they waved threadbare ribbons and beat on handmade drums.  Tevis had been delighted to find a guitar among the supplies he’d stolen and plucked out a few tunes to the awe of the children.  It was nice to find a little cheer in such a hard time.

He knew the consequences would catch up to him, he just wasn’t expecting it so soon.

Lord Citan’s arrival was announced by a sudden silence.  People let conversation die in their throats and hid their faces.  The Risen strode through the village like a glacier: inexorable, crushing anything left in his path.

Tevis put aside the guitar and stood to meet him.  The Warlord came to a stop a dozen feet away.  People scrambled to vacate the area, but they didn’t go farther than the nearest cover.  Wide eyes peeked out from windows and doorframes.

Lord Citan crossed his arms.  “You dare interfere with the lives of my people?”

Tevis supposed he should be groveling.  He didn’t.  “I just brought some food and medicine,” he reasoned.

“Without my permission.”  Citan took another step forward and Tevis had to force himself to not take one back.  “I provide my people with what they need.  You challenge my authority over them.”

Tevis would be incredulous if he hadn’t seen the state the village had been in two days ago.  “I didn’t even steal from you.  Lady Jenka was distracted.  I took her stuff.”  Tevis doubted she’d miss most of what he’d taken.  What good was medical technology to someone Risen, whose Ghost could cure any sickness and mend any wound?  What could guitars and sacks of rice and beans do sitting in abandoned store-sheds?  No skin off of Citan’s back, right?  

Wrong.  Citan took another step, anger growing.  “Worse, then, you circumvented my taxes and invited Jenka’s anger.  Your disregard for my law and my authority over the people will be punished.”

“Your food will rot in your warehouses while your people starve,” Tevis said.  “Are they even yours?”

“Are you challenging me?” Citan growled.  The Warlord cracked his knuckles in anticipation.

Tevis was not the ruling type.  But maybe, if everyone was here, if they could see the shackles Citan had put on them, they might just stand with him.  He thought maybe he’d found somewhere worth staying.  But when he looked to the people huddled behind him, he saw no determination, no anger.  Just fear.  It was always fear.

It was too late to back down now, though.  Citan let Arc crackle up his arms.  Tevis reached for his gun.

He quickly learned how Lord Citan had claimed and held such large territory.  A glancing blow to Tevis’s chin sent his ears ringing.  Another punch knocked his wind out and sent him stumbling backwards.  A third sent him sprawling. 

There was a weight on his chest and Tevis felt the crack and the sharp bloom of pain that meant a broken rib.  Citan had a knee on his abdomen.  Tevis struggled to breathe, struggled to move. 

“This is Corsair Trinn with a message to any Guardian. Please renew your efforts in the Dreaming City. It is not yet lost, but without your aid, it may be. W-we don’t know if we’ll be able to keep going at this rate without you…” The Awoken spoke with unease in her voice, cycle after cycle, her message had only become more dire.

With Guardian’s frequenting the City less, the Awoken inside the Dreaming City lost every battle, and their morale was at an all-time low. Trinn was one of the few that had it the worst. Every cycle now, she knew she was destined to watch as her fellow sisters in arms lost their lives. Something had to give way. It was either going to be the curse of that damned witch or the will of the Awoken people.

Trinn waited in her spot atop the hill, waiting for a Guardian to respond, but after an hour or so, she recognized no one was coming. The Awoken gripped her rifle tightly and tried to calm down; her emotions began bubbling up uncontrollably. In a flurry of anger, the woman smashed her weapon into the ground. She belted out her grief in a cry of absolute agony. Trinn couldn’t keep up this life of immense pain; her mind scrambled to find any way out, out of the cycle, out of the City, out of the misery.

The Corsair heard her team’s distant calls as if on cue as they were attacked by the Hive. Her eyes darted over the hilltop around her, searching and settling on the weapon she’d discarded. Trinn ran by, picking it up in a fluid motion as she moved to help her team.

A contingent of Hive Knights was slowly working their way from cover to cover, pinning and blasting the team of Corsairs. Trinn approached from behind the Knights. The hulking beasts were just barely too slow to make her before she managed to kill them. The solar rounds of her rifle dug deep into the Hive’s chitin and seared them inside out, leaving nothing but their husks. Trinn ran past the disintegrating bodies towards what remained of her team. One, Erilani, was down, teetering on the edge of death; the scorching arc burns from the Knight’s boomer were undoubtedly fatal.

The woman kneeled beside her dying friend. Tears rushed down her face. The deaths were coming quicker and quicker than ever before, the curse was soon to break them, and Savathun would win. The Corsair couldn’t stand it. She wanted it all to end. A distant roar from an approaching Ogre interrupted their mourning. The other Corsairs readied their weapons and prepared for the worst; Trinn was sure the Ogre was too much for them now. It was all over.

The Corsair closed her eyes tight and waited for the cascade of void energy to wash over them. Her ears perked up as she heard the distinct flair of solar energy that she recognized, then the shot, a destructive beam of power radiating out from the barrel of a hand cannon incinerating the Ogre that threatened the group. Trinn opened her eyes and looked up to a cliff overlooking the area to see a Guardian standing there atop the hill. Just in time to save them.

Her radio static cut in, and a soft assuring voice chimed in, “This is Guardian Crow. I’m sorry, I’m late. It won’t happen again.”

It’s a rare and unique thing when a Guardian creates their own weapon. We are given or obtain them all the time, but I mean really make one. It takes a lot of work and a lot of practice, but it is always worth it. There are, of course, practical reasons for creating a personal weapon. As the wielder and creator, a Guardian can build it exactly to their liking. Some Guardians like fast-firing weapons, some prefer slow, some prefer close range, and some long. And making a weapon to fit your preferences can help optimize any loadout.

The first weapon I designed was a personalized sniper rifle. I’ll always take an enemy out from a distance if given a chance. It’s easier that way. First, you’ve got to have a plan. I wanted a sniper that could knock the helm off of a Captain at 2000 yards. A much farther range compared to most snipers of today. Few base frames have that capability. Omolon’s plasma frames are beneficial but mainly for damage boosts, I’ve found. Hakke is stable, Suros handling, Veist is well… it exists. Unfortunately, Daito doesn’t tend to deal in much in hand armaments; they prioritize ship weaponry.

So, I settled on Tex Mechanica. I know one of the mechanics that work over in their foundries, and he helped me out with creating the firing mechanism and getting the barrel rifling just right. After some time thinking, I decided to infuse it with solar shells to burn its targets. 

After some initial tests, I was less than impressed. Modern frames don’t provide the power needed for that range, so I had to get creative. I did some digging, and it took some time, but we found a solution. A Psion’s sniper has an extraordinary range capability for being a projectile weapon. But no ordinary psion’s sniper would do. After collecting about a dozen or so of the snipers, I was able to get all the parts I needed to finish the sniper.

It’s called ‘The Torch.’ And trust me, she’s a real beauty; it’s been put through its paces, and now I can reliably eliminate a target from over a kilometer away. 

Artemis ran onto the deck of the Immortal, stopping dead in her tracks when she saw the caged Traveler. She had just destroyed the shield generators and was waiting for Amanda to pick her up, but now it was clear that she wasn’t going to come.

“How do we come back from this?” Virgil’s voice shook as he spoke.

“You don’t.”

Artemis whirled around as someone else spoke. A Cabal warrior stepped out onto the deck. He wore all white armor. A gun hung at his side, and a mask covered half his face.

Ghaul.

He gestured toward the caged Traveler. “Welcome to a world without light.”

The cage lit up, sending orange ripples across the surface of the Traveler. Artemis stumbled, suddenly feeling weak.

“Artemis, something’s wrong,” Virgil said weakly. He dropped to the ground like a rock.

Artemis glared up at Ghaul for a second before she was kicked to the ground. Still reeling from… whatever happened to her Light, the most she could do was grab Virgil and protect him as much as she could.

“Do not look at me, creature!” Ghaul towered over her. “You are weak. Undisciplined. Cowering behind walls. You’re not brave. You’ve merely forgotten the fear of death. Allow me to reacquaint you.”

Before she could do anything, Ghaul kicked her again, causing her to lose her grip on Virgil. To her dismay, he fell over the edge of the ship before she could grab him again.

She turned back to Ghaul, furious. She hated how she was too dizzy to get to her feet. She hated how she was on her knees, forced to look up at Ghaul. Though she couldn’t deny the hopelessness she felt when Ghaul stepped forward.

“Your kind never deserved the power you were given,” Ghaul snarled. “I am Ghaul,” he looked down at Artemis, and she felt her stomach drop with something she hadn’t felt in a long time- fear.

For prompt 26: “Loner”.

I have not fallen off of the bandwagon. I was kidnapped by the plot bunnies. Anyways, here’s like 4,500 words of a self-indulgent alternate timeline in which Azra was raised ten years earlier.

There was a time where our people yearned for the bitter release of the void. Our Ether stores waned, our servitors lie in ruin, all the while we watched our former dead rise up and fight for a cause they didn’t understand. That monster, Fikrul, he ruined us. He ruined everything we’d set out to create. He tempted us with a tainted, poisonous concoction of his own creation. If not for him and his Scorn, we could have been the Empire to rise on Europa, but instead, the Kings hide as a broken remnant of the old ways.

Did we rely on Craask so much that we are nothing but a den of Wolves without him? I say no! We can be so much more than a broken House; we can be Kings and Queens once more! We will bow to no one! And with our own power, we will stake a place for us to call home. We have taken our identities from other’s strength, the Pyramids, or the Great Machine for so long. But before all of that, we had our own skills. We were engineers, machinists, warriors, and so much more! So rise up my brothers and sisters, drink your Ether, and join me against those who dare oppose us!

We live through the scariest era in our people’s history and face enemies on all sides. But we can not turn on one another! I care not for your origins, void-born, Riis-born, or Sol-born. You are Eliksni, you are one of us, and my Ether stores are open to you.

“Once you get to as old as I am kid, you learn to check out of the regular day to day around here. Promise me. You’ll get there too; if you survive long enough, that is.” The Warlock, Elicio, sipped his drink and relaxed into the booth the two Guardians sat in.

“If I survive long enough?” The New Light asked with a worried tone in his voice.

“Guardian survivability has gone down pretty substantially in the last couple of years. As our Light has gotten brighter, the Darkness has gotten darker. Threats like the House of Salvation, the Hidden Swarm, and Oryx would have been decades apart instead of just a year or two,” Elicio frowned as the Hunter gulped nervously. “I bet the Vanguard didn’t tell you that during debrief, did they?”

“N-no, they didn’t. It sounds like this job is a death sentence…” The young Guardian gulped and took a swig of their drink.

“It is if you don’t play things smart. For instance, I’ve never been part of a raid class operation. Mostly from my own will, there were probably a dozen or so attempts before every successful raid. The Vault? Kabr’s team. We lost an entire army of Guardians to Crota. Strikes are normally pretty safe, patrols even more so. Even so, there is still danger in them.”

“How so? Patrols rarely go into a darkness zone, right?” The Hunter perked up out of curiosity.

“Our enemies love to lay traps now for us. The Vex are probably the most common to do this nowadays. Getting trapped in a simulation, staying in an open position, or not backing down when reinforcements are bearing down on you. Honestly, the number one killer of Guardians is the hero complex. Don’t get full of yourself, watch your back, and know when to retreat. If you can pull off those things, you’ll do just fine.” Elicio tried to cheer the New Light up.

“I- Thank you, sir. I’ll do my best to take your advice to heart.” The Hunter smiled.

“You know, you never told me about your vision from the Traveler.”

Artemis glanced away from her sniper and over at Wyvern, whose white armor made him almost invisible against the snowy landscape of Europa. 

Artemis thought for a moment. “What vision?”

“The one that helped you find the shard of the Traveler, remember?” Wyvern set his own sniper down and turned to her.

“Oh, that one.” she sat back. “What’s there to tell? The Traveler sent me that vision right after I lost my Light.”

“And then you immediately got it back,” he muttered. Did he sound… bitter?

Artemis frowned. “Are you angry?”

“No!” Wyvern said quickly, before adding, “Maybe a little. You were the only guardian to get their Light from the shard. Everyone else that tried never came back. What made the Traveler choose you, specifically?”

Artemis looked away, trying not to feel hurt. She knew Wyvern often asked questions without thinking first, though he meant well. His bluntness may have been a result of being rezzed in the dark age, so she couldn’t really blame him for it.

She was just glad he couldn’t see her expression under her helmet.

Artemis looked back up at Wyvern. “I wish I could answer that, but it hardly matters anymore, does it?”

Speculation and attempted study of the new force in the system have yielded almost no positive results. Aside from Guardian’s permitted inside the Tetrahedral ships, we have no confirmation on material composition, combat capabilities, or inhabitants. From video evidence of Guardians aboard the vessels and Ghost footage from inside the Black Garden and Deep Stone Crypt, we can be sure that these ships have something to do with the statues we’ve documented.

Having searched the entire Cryptarch, Ishtar Collective, and accessible Bray archives, this researcher can only conclude that this is the real physical representation of a previously unknown species. This species we know as The Darkness—treating the Darkness as a species rather than a singular entity opposite the Traveler line up with pre-collapse accounts. The most notable would be the apparent concurrent attacks during the Collapse on Earth, Titan, and deep space with the Exodus ships.

Using other study methods, we have attempted to glean additional information about their presence in the system before this incursion. During the Deep Stone Crypt raid, a singular Guardian successfully gathered stone and metal samples from the area immediately surrounding the statue. Using carbon dating methods, I’ve determined this structure was likely first put into place several years before the date we believe to be the Collapse. 

This and intelligence from our Hidden and recovered voice logs from Bray systems indicate a brief period in which Clovis Bray worked partially with this Darkness species. Though to what extent we cannot be sure. The presence of the statue could indicate worship. However, observations of Clovis from that era give me the impression he merely used the figure as a means to an end.

I suggest securely locking away any additional substances or materials from the Darkness until it can be suitably tested and investigated by any qualified Cryptarch.