Chapter 6
The First meeting and two bullets
The First meeting and two bullets
Array Station, Cosmodrome
The Exo was looking at the rust covered array from the railing, his cloak flowing with the wing and his face showed peace. The Hunter took some air and after a second or two, exhaled “It is good to be on the field again, don’t you think?” Cayde-6 spoke to the walking figure, not moving at all as the railing received more pressure from the person.
“That is true; I missed the grass and soil.” Kristina responded as her boot scrapped some of the dirt on the floor “But what do you think of this? And of our guests?” she gestured to the coming skiff on the horizon. The Vanguard sighed and took out his hand cannon, the black and white weapon with a spade on its grip had a shine despite its scratches here and there “I have my hopes things go well, but you know how life is, we might also have a hunting spree in a matter of minutes.” He twirled the gun on his hand and holstered it.
The Exo Hunter looked at his apprentice “You owe me a few stories by the way, I need some gossip from the deep space, probably can be used as bargaining chips and bets.” He smirked at the chuckle coming from the human “Oh come on, you surely have some awesome adventures while living with the House of Rain.” His smirk grew at the shocked face of hers.
“You got to remember why I am the Vanguard, not only from my looks.” Cayde joked, but that soon would vanish as another Exo spoke “You are forced to be in the base, the Tower needs some relief from time to time.” Erina-2 spoke while cleaning her helmet with a piece of cloth “Auron got confirmation from the skiff’s pilot; they will be here in 10 minutes.”
Cayde looked at the horizon again, hand in the holster of his second gun “This better be good, I don’t want unnecessary Ether in my filters.”
Devil’s Skiff, Cosmodrome
The Baroness was relaxed on her seat, enjoying the rumble of the ship’s flying, she didn’t have many chances to go outside, mostly because of her duties inside the Lair, but also because she was a big target in the constant fight. So this trip, whether it was for the good or the bad, was a welcoming gift for the veteran Eliksni.
Movement got her attention as she stared at the Vandal ordered to be her bodyguard, the shock blades strapped on her hips and two pistols on the abdominal holsters, and of course there was her Wire Rifle constantly being checked, as if it could be more worked on.
“You have to calm down, young one, we aren’t going to a battle, or at least that’s the plan.” Renuk’s voice was calm as Drexia stopped working on her gun, she knew that the Vandal was being cautious, and with good reasoning, they were going to a possible trap of the Guardians, but she had a hunch that this was a good action.
“I apologize, but I can’t ignore the fact that the Hive or the Kings could appear and give us a surprise attack.” Drexia responded, the baroness noticed she didn’t mention the Guardians, but let it go “That is why we got squads on safe zones in the case we need back up, but enough of worrying around.” She got up and walked to the front of the skiff.
The terminal showed the slowly closer array station, an impressive building that survived the test of time, and still functional for what she had gathered, although the Kings and Hive were lurking on the lower sections of the place. “In the end, this might be the first step of a good path, and maybe, we will be the ones to see the glory of such work.” The baroness took her Scorch Cannon and made sure it was fully charged
“Or maybe, it will be another field of flames.”
Back on the station..
Auron had given the signal for the skiff to land, he was the only guardian on the area as the first Dreg appeared, shock pistols aimed at him, but he could see it was just a precaution “Welcome, I am Guardian Auron, your pilot should have the message of the current situation.” He greeted him.
The Dreg, lowered his pistols and nodded “That is true, I am Leksis, bodyguard of our Baroness.” While it didn’t show, Auron was surprised that a Dreg was assigned as one of the bodyguards for such a high ranking Fallen, but this one seemed different than his brothers and sisters, that was something that the Warlock could feel.
Jumping down from the Skiff, Baroness Renuk looked at her surroundings, an unconscious tactic to understand the area, then she spotted both Leksis and the Awoken. “At ease, brother Leksis, we come in peace for this meeting.” She then faced the Guardian “I shall greet you, Guardian, let’s hope this meeting is productive” she gave him a gentle nod, which was reciprocated “I also wish this works, baroness, our Vanguard is waiting for you.” He walked inside towards Cayde’s location.
Said Hunter was working on a notebook, making notes of the area, his scribbling stopped as he heard various steps “Looks like our guests are here, you two better check your dresses.” He received a glare from both Guardians, much to his mirth, but then he got back on the situation, he could see a Dreg, a Vandal, a Captain and the Baroness herself, he could sense her power and lethality, also there was the fact that she had a Scorch cannon on her back as if it was nothing.
“Greetings, Baroness, I am Vanguard Cay-“ he was interrupted by Renuk “Cayde-6, legendary Hunter, scout of the Vanguard and perfect shooter with a pistol, yes, I know who you are.” She spoke with a cold tone “But I also can respect your abilities as a mediator within your people, looks like the Guardians made a good choice.”
The tension wasn’t that thick as both parties expected, and the Hunter knew he needed to play his cards carefully “Very well, then let’s cut to the chase, we are both here to see something big that our mutual ally” he gestured to Kristina “Thinks that is too important to be said through terminals.”
The Fallen Hunter nodded as her Ghost appeared and showed the solar system “Right now we got Earth, Venus, Mars and the Moon in a relatively ok situation, the Vex, Hive and Cabal are also in a somewhat neutral state.” She spoke as said planets were highlighted “As for Saturn being still in constant fight with both the Hive and Cabal, Mercury being in Vex’s control, and the Taken appearing in every place they can, we can say that the situation with our system is in a relatively calm time.”
Then, the map expanded as the solar system became smaller, and the map moved to the closest star, Alpha Centauri “This is where the House of Rain was residing with their stations, sending Ketchs to other stars, one of them being the recon ship that found me in the moon of Uranus, Titania. They were coming to warn us of the Taken armada.”
Renuk nodded at her words “We had heard of the Taken from different sources, and we thank the Reef inhabitants for their sacrifice, yet there is something far bigger that you haven’t told us, isn’t it.?” She asked the Human, who responded “That is true, the House of Rain have been hidden because of a powerful threat being the Vex Axis Minds, their leadership spans between times and follow Oryx’s sword logic.” She started explaining “If the Hive already follow their King as a god, the Vex live as crusaders just because it is the most effective think for them.”
The Awoken warlock nodded “From what we have understood of the Vex, they would take anything and everything that would work for their purposes, being religious, scientific, magic, you name it. They will use it as an asset for their goals.” He looked at everyone, his frown showing the seriousness of the situation. “We haven’t been invaded by them because of our resources and defenses, if they can send troops out of other timelines, then we would all have been defeated.”
“It is the Great Machine” Rundas sighed “Even for the centuries that it lived with our civilization, we never understood its full potential, and now here with the Guardians, even in a dormant state, is protecting the planet, but as we saw within the walls of this Cosmodrome, they found a crack on the Great Machine’s dome of protection.”
Kristina focused the map on a single Ketch within the vicinity of the Alpha Centauri star, this vessel having the House of Rain’s symbol, her Ghost changed the scenery into what looked like files until reaching a single Eliksni, if the elder Fallen of the different Houses looked old, this one was ancient in comparison “The now passed Kell had managed to live through the rise and fall of the Eliksni homeworld against the Whirlwind, his visions had barely saved as much of his species, and when I met him, he already knew of the threat of the Vex, contacting the Nine so they could check on the preparation of surviving their onslaught, or the needs to take the Traveler to a safe zone in the dark zones of deep space”.
This wasn’t getting any better as the human’s scowl deepened “Then there is the Cabal, the Empire, we all know the strength of their soldiers, easily conquering most of Mars and their ships heavily armed, but the problem is this. They are the scouting fleet.”
The Titan Exo voiced her concerns “We know that the Cabal have uncountable numbers of soldiers and ships, hell, I commanded the strike against the shield brothers in the Dreaghnout.” Erina interjected “I was with the squad covering the fireteam as they infiltrated the ship, we got a signal coming straight from deep space, but our long range radars weren’t able to reach its location.”
Kris focused the map again, the Alpha Centauri star getting as small as a dot, followed by a line that moved so far, that no one knew how far it went, until it reached what looked like a nebula “This is why I needed to talk with both the Eliksni and the Guardians, the Cabal are coming, not as a scouting group, but they are bringing everything.” The map zoomed into the nebula, which then showed thousands of lights, getting closer, they could all see a swarm of ships, and the Dreadnought of the Taken would be something simple in comparison by how many ships were flying.
A chuckle escaped the Hunter Vanguard “So we got time traveling robots that are at our doorstep on one side, and then we got an armada that destroys planets that are just on their path.” The looks he received didn’t deter his speech “We got two giant problems that can easily overcome our forces, then you add the Hive, while they are now disorganized, they still thrive in numbers.” The Exo pointed out, he took his hand cannon and took all 12 of its bullets, placing them on the table.
“Let’s see, we got us the Guardians.” He placed the bullet on one side “Then the House of Devils.” Another bullet next to the first one “Followed by the House of Rain” he received a nod as the third one got with the first two “The House of Winter, and Exile are still on their own.” Two bullets placed on another part of the table. “The House of Kings is pretty much destroyed, needs checking.” He placed the sixth bullet horizontally. “The Reef is still recovering from the Taken fight.” Another horizontal bullet placed. “I do not want to even get in touch with Osiris or the Nine, they are too weird.” Two bullets were on the table, making a cross. “The Hive would prefer death rather than doing talks, or yells…” the tenth bullet was on top of the cross of the other two. “And we got our big baddies ready to destroy us.” Two bullets were facing the ones representing the Vanguard, the Devils, and Rain.
Cayde placed his Ace of Spades on the table “We got a powerful gambit though, but it will be a high bet if the stubborn thing wants to help us, or in his case, use us for his own survival.”
Erina understood what he said “You mean Rasputin, isn’t it?” she received a nod from the Hunter, and by the looks of the Devils of the meeting, she explained “During the Golden age, we had preparations for possible wars, it was inevitable, and one of those preparation was the War-mind Rasputin, like many others on Earth and close planets on the system, he worked to protect us, and it is the only surviving one, although he is far more advanced that what most people think.”
Drexia remembered an assault to a human data center, where a prototype Shank was used, but it was ultimately destroyed by the Guardians, what happened next was what showed the AI’s abilities, be it sudden satellite drops with pinpoint accuracy, EMPs close to the Lair, even the startup and overloading of an abandoned factory's core, that was luckily stopped before a meltdown could occur. That was when the Devils decided to not attack the War-mind again.
Renuk looked at the notes she had made during the meeting, this was something grave, and it was good that both factions were, for what she hoped, making a truce or even a future alliance “We can contact the Exiles and Winter, their pride might be high, but with the oncoming threat, they will understand.” The Baroness sighed “As for the Kings.. we have sent scouts into their territory, but either they have managed to hide underground, or they have finally lost everything.”
The Exo Titan was the next to speak “I can talk with Variks on the Reef and he can help us with meetings on with their hierarchy. The Warmind will be something we need to be extremely careful, the last time we tried to get help from him, he made us make patrols and searches all around the system. He did give us the schematics of a powerful Fusion Rifle though.
”Well then, guess most of the stuff has been checked.” Cayde was loading the bullets on his hand cannon, a smirk on his face “I would have loved to have a firefight here and there, but this little trip was also good, baroness Renuk.” The vanguard faced said Eliksni “Hopefully we can have another meeting in the recent future, I can see good things coming on this alliance.” He offered a hand to shake it with hers.
While it was one of the possibilities that she envisioned, Renuk was honestly surprised that it could be done that easily, she took his hand with her clawed one and shook it “The House of Devils will be pleased to know they will have a good ally, we still got things to revise with our Kell, but I know he will-“ her voice stopped at a red dot, it was so faint that she could barely see it, instincts kicked in as she kicked Cayde on the chest, the look of surprise on his face was blurred by the solar energy shot.
In an instant, the whole place went on full alert, the telltale sounds of electricity clacking around and clouds forming around the array station surrounded the area. Both Guardians and Eliksni had their weapons ready as the screeching sound of a Minotaur resonating around the rusted walls.
Surprisingly, the first voice was of one of sarcasm “Really Cayde? You had to jinx our luck.” It was Auron glaring at the Exo, who actually gave him a look of shameless mirth “I swear, you Hunters are magnets of bad luck.”
“Enough of bickering, we got Vex inbound.” Rundas took his shrapnel launcher and fired at the Minotaur that didn’t have a chance to survive the super heated shot. “Leksis, call our defenses, we got Vex in the area.” he ordered, the Dreg saluted and started running, towards a group of Goblins, and to the surprise of those who just met the smaller Fallen, he had both shock pistols firing as he evaded the attacks. It was as if the bodyguard was toying with the robotic fiends, firing the burst weapons while jumping and ducking, even riding on their heads to use their own weapons against each other.
As the Dreg managed to get to the skiff and call for their lookouts, Cayde was already shooting at the cores inside the hobgoblins that took nest on the gates “Dancing with the enemy, must be good at parties.” He turned to shoot the leg of a Minotaur that then got crushed by Renuk’s scorch cannon, being hit with it as a club. “What he lacks in strength, Leksis compensates on agility and wits.” She fired more to the mobs of Vex.
Erina was using her Fusion Rifle, the void shots, erasing the mid ranged enemies from existence, and those ill lucked to be close to the Titan felt the electricity charged fist of the Exo.
On the other side, Auron was focusing on clearing the path to the nearest terminal “We got Vex in the station, repeat, Vex on the station, we need to protect the Vanguard and the Baroness.”
Back in the Tower, Zavala had a map of the Array station, with green dots for both the Guardians and Fallen, being surrounded by dozens of red dots. “Sniper squads, focus your bullets on the hobgoblins, they are your priority.”
Ikora was tracking the communications on the battle, already having contacted a Vandal that was giving feedback from their own soldiers. “You will get Guardian reinforcements on the outer surroundings.”
Back on the station, Kristina destroyed a goblin with her Wire Rifle, followed by Drexia’s shot that got the ones behind the first. They were working in sync with the charge time of their guns, as for the Minotaurs, Rundas and Auron were staggering them enough so either Cayde or Renuk would give the last shots, Erina was on a mad spree of destruction with her Fusion Rifle, but the Vex kept coming.
Sniper shots could be heard on the distance as the hobgoblins on the outer area were decimated, same with mobs being rained with grenades or Shock Rifles. Leksis was still firing his way back to the main group and felt the hairs of his head burn as a solar shot barely passed over him. “My Baroness, we need to get you out of here.” He hoped she would understand, but the stubborn Renuk shook her head “We must keep fighting, brother, we can still fight.” She was already out of ammunition, but her blades sliced through her enemies.
A bigger cloud was forming as the numbers of Vex thinned, whatever was coming, it was big, and it didn’t disappoint as the form of a Gatekeeper appeared. “The hell is that thing doing here!?” Cayde exclaimed, evading the Void heavy shots of the enormous Minotaur. Everyone was hiding from its powerful attacks.
Erina was feeling her Light at its peak and faced her partners, noticing they were also fully charged, a grin formed on her face “Let’s unload on it, ready?” she asked while charging her fist, the telltale form of a javelin materializing, raw arc energy hissing with power. Auron was feeling the void focusing inside him, his body tingling with the dark energy until he channeled it on his palm. Kristina felt the burn inside her soul, the solar power engulfing her in flames as a hand cannon materializing, she aimed at the gate lord and fired, followed by Auron’s Nova Bomb, and being super charged by Erina’s Javelin.
The combined supers exploded when they hit the Vex Minotaur, destroying its outer plating, even showing its core. “That’s it, now we got a chance” Renuk ran towards the gate lord, being covered from the fire Drexia and Rundas, she used the higher platforms to jump and stab both of her blades into the core, the actual screeching of pain resonated from the massive Vex. “Renuk, catch!” Cyade threw a gun at her, she managed to pick up the shock pistol with her lower arms and fired until the weapon was out of ammunition, but it was enough, the white essence of the gate lord lost its strength and the Baroness barely managed to jump away as the Minotaur exploded.
They were all silent for a moment, letting their breaths recover their energy, the Guardians were drained from using their Supers and the Eliksni sat on the floor, but the silence was interrupted by one Exo “YEAH! That is what I call a trip!” he even fisted the air in victory. Cayde-6, despite the ambush and near death situation, took this trip as a good one.
Renuk looked at the shock pistol, then at her soldiers, they all had their side-arms, so this gun must have been from the Vanguard, even more curious was that it looked battered and had familiar markings “Interesting.. from where did you get this pistol?” she asked the Exo. The Hunter joy calmed down when he responded “Eh, it’s an old pistol I had for a while.”
But then, Erina had an idea. “Cayde, isn’t that gun you got in the moon?” her face showed confusion at the way the veteran Guardian looked with raised eyebrows “Yeah, you got it while.. fighting with.. a baroness..” her words died down as the usually casual Hunter froze.
The baroness smirked behind her mask “Oh, now I remember.” She chuckled, even more with Cayde’s look of horror.
“Uh.. Remember that story I told you a while ago?” the Vanguard just knew that Ikora would make his ears malfunction and Zavala would become purple with rage.
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