#weaponized curiosity

“Calm,” whispered the Voidwalker. “Burn!” roared the Sunsinger. All I could hear was the impassive voices of my teachers, encouraging me (ordering me?) to find my path, find it soon, no matter the risk, because we can never know when it will all be taken away again, when the storm will overtake us. Words, buffeting me like the hail that pelted my face as I pushed through the howling winds, forced my way through to the eye of—

Peace.

The stillness of the hurricane’s eye prickled my skin and brought with it realization. We don’t have to choose between the calm and the storm. In fact, to have either, we must have both.

I like this description because it shows the Guardian essentially panicking. They are pressured by their teachers to find a path, to find a way to fight, because what is the purpose of Guardians except to fight? But the pressure bothers them. It panics them, until they think of the physical storm, the hail, the obstacle that rages now but will eventually have an edge and an end. 

This meditation is very similar to Frank Herbert’s Litany Against Fear in that it helps the user to identify their emotions.* They can see their problem as something finite, passable, and separate from themselves. One can use this sort of visualization in the real world too.

The storm is anything that antagonizes: physical danger, anxious thoughts, a Warlock’s fear of being unable to control their own power.

The calm is the discipline and determination (? sense of self? discuss) that allows one to acknowledge and exist within those thoughts without being controlled by them or suffering too deeply from them. 

She dropped the Cabal behind a pile of stone that had been blasted out of the wall. When she looked up, the rest were gone.

“Ikora, the Speaker is gone.” Even in the other world inside the Dreadnaught, her Ghost had not sounded this panicked.

Ikora stood on the topmost circle, blue fire gusting around her like fog over a lake. Looking at the sky sent Kass scrambling again to her guttering mental link to the Traveler. Ikora reeled her thought in with a quick tug. Although there were meters between them, Kass felt suddenly that she stood face-to-face with Ikora, seeing the warmth in her wide eyes.

With that tug came the Vanguard’s presence in the Light, as fierce and focused as she had been on the comm. Instead of asking questions, she was filled to the brim with answers. She allowed Kass a glimpse into a window behind which there were emergency routes, civilian evacuations, Hidden networks, Eris Morn’s mysterious travels. When it shut again, Kass’ focus remained steadfast.

Ikora let her go to arms’ length. Her regard for her Guardian resided there, not her innermost impressions of Kass but her pride for all six of the Guardians who had fought Oryx. Here lived her regard for the exterior things: Kass as Warlock, Kass as teammate, Kass as thousand-times-born soldier in a war she had not seen begin. She looked at all of this with a peaceful and open quiescence, and then she turned away and let Kass’ Light go.

Ikora Rey took three steps to push into a run and launched herself off the tiled floor just as a Cabal ship, heavy-limbed and coiled with the sharp shapes of gun muzzles, lumbered into the sky.

Kass felt the Light flair again as Ikora shouted. “Red Legion. You will take no more from us, and you will find no mercy in me!”