Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

245 Kilometers from the Last City. 

+9 years, 287 days.

The spacecraft shuddered as another lightning bolt glanced off the wing. It rocked and rolled through another thunderstorm; the third one since they had managed to get airborne outside the ruins of Houston. While the ship's door seals had worn out centuries ago, it was still enough to maintain cabin pressure. The Hunter in the pilot's seat just would not be taking it into orbit any time soon.

The craft rocked again, shaking the flight stick in Nicole's grip. She slammed her fist on top of the instrument panel and swore in Eliksni. The ice and frost that had begun to build up the gauges cracked as she brushed it away. The defroster and cockpit heaters were both kaput, sometimes Golden Age technology was funny that way.

“How much longer do we need to stay in these clouds?” she asked her Ghost.

The small machine that had revived her nine and a half years ago was currently acting navigator. He knew where the 'Last City’ was, and the ship's built in navigation system was shot.

His eye darted across the blurry view beyond the windows. All Nicole could see were angry clouds and patches of light where lightning arced between them. “You can bring us down out of the clouds now. We are getting close to the intercept point for the cities air identification zone... Though it has been a while... And my memory of my time there has some holes.”

 He waved his damaged fin out of the way to show the gouge in his core.

Nicole throttled down and pushed the yoke away, dropping the ship's nose below the horizon. She was not keen about staying in the storm any longer than she needed to. The clouds beneath the main brunt of the storm were not kind, but better than higher up. After just a few moments, her radio cracked with a weak signal. The voice also came over the ships unmanned communications station.

“Unknown ship pinging as Skylanes Sierra-one-zero-two-romeo-charlie. Identify immediately or you will be fired upon.”

Nicole looked over at her Ghost, who nodded once. “Alright... just like how you told me...” She clicked the transmit switch and spoke into her helmet mic. “This is Sierra-one-zero-two-romeo-charlie. I am a new guardian, requesting clearance to land.”

There was silence across the channel for just a few moments. “Acknowledged. Have your Ghost transmit City Ident codes and await further instruction.”

Her Ghost pulsed once and Nicole heard a jumble of sounds over the radio channel. “I hope those are the right codes,” he mumbled.

“Codes verified, and clearance granted. Two escorts have been scrambled to your position; follow them in to City airspace... You’re too big for the Hangar, what is the status of your VTOL thrusters?” The voice on the other end asked.

“They are not functional,” Nicole answered. They had tried to use those to take off back in Newark, but there were just some things her Ghost could not get back into working order.

“Copy that, you will need to land at Runway seven-west. Nav data will be transmitted to your Ghost. Welcome to the Last City, Guardian. And good luck.”

Two ships flew passed Nicole’s cockpit, coming from straight on. They circled around and fell into formation, one on either end of her ship’s wings. They were much sleeker than her old cargo ship. After what she assumed were the pilots performing a visual inspection of her craft, they pulled ahead for her to follow. She followed them into another bank of clouds and over a tall mountain range. The ground dropped away into a wide valley with a massive sphere dominating the sky. The city sprawled out for kilometers beneath it.

“So that’s the Traveler... wow...” Nicole muttered. “That’s much bigger than I thought.”

“Yes, that it is.” Her Ghost said. “That is what made me, and helped bring you back from the dead.”

“It's very impressive.” Nicole had to look away from the Traveler as the escorts banked and started to descend. She could see a long straight line ahead of them; there were a few others crisscrossing across it, but this one was the longest.

“Now, normally we’d let the auto-pilot do the landing for us... but that was one of the things that was shot like the nav system. So good luck?” Her Ghost chirped.

“Well if we crash, you can just bring me back, right?” Nicole looked over at him with a worried smile behind her helmet.

The small machine turned to look at her with the most serious expression a ball could have. “Only if we don’t explode on impact.”

“Oh... No pressure then.” She banked the craft to line up with the runway and slowed, the ship's engines winding down for final approach. The landing gear was deployed and Nicole brought the ship down as gently as she could.

The ship shuddered as the centuries old tires made contact with the asphalt The landing gear suspension snapped and the stiff tires tore themselves apart from the friction; yet miraculously the brace held the landing gear at extension. The cargo shuttle slid down the runway on its rims, sending sparks and bits of asphalt bouncing off the hull. Nicole flipped a switch and lowered the wing flaps to their full extension and fired the reverse thrusters; the ship shook violently but eventually came to a gradual, but rough stop.   

“Well... we made it, good work Nicole.” The Ghost said, vanishing into her armor.

“Thanks...”Nicole unbuckled her restraints. The cockpit was a chorus of alarms and beeping, but she ignored it to make her way off the ship. She pushed her way through the rusted chairs and glowing blue chunks of Gimmer that cluttered the floor; something must have broken free during the landing and flung it all around. The ship’s hold had been full of the stuff all crated up. If the fabricators at the Newark airfield had been working still Nicole would have been flying a fully functional ship, but of course they were not.

The outer door creaked as she pushed it open, an evacuation slide exploded out of a hidden compartment but failed to inflate, the old yellow thing hanging limply out of the doorway. She glanced up at the Traveler in the sky, “It’s less impressive from the ground to be completely honest.”

Nicole popped off her helmet and clipped it to her belt. The air smelled like burned rubber and fire. She spied a cluster of vehicles approaching at speed with flashing lights. They looked like the fire rsponse vehicles she had seen across Mist Territory; the thought suddenly occurred to her that she was standing in a craft that had just experienced a crash landing and could burst into flames at any moment.

She hopped down to the ground and quickly walked away from the smoking rims, while the emergency vehicles pulled up and crews began dousing the ship down with foam. A heavily armored woman climbed off the back of one of the trucks, carrying a shotgun in front of her, but aimed down at the ground. Her armor was extremely bulky, and she had a silver sash hanging from her waist. “Are you the new Guardian, Hunter?”

“Yep, that’s me. Though I wouldn’t exactly say I’m exactly new.” She bowed her head slightly, something she had picked up from her time in the wild. 

She had been called a Hunter, which was how the City classified her abilities that had been granted by the Traveler, it seemed to come with an affinity for knives and agility. Judging by the armor, this new woman was a Titan if Nicole remembered right. “I’m Nia-” She stopped herself, that was not her name with Humans, “My name’s Nicole, pleasure to meet you...?” She offered her hand to shake in that classic human manner.  

The Titan took Nicole's hand and gave it a firm shake. “Matilda, I’m part of the City Defense. They send me over just in case you were actually not human, or some other sort of trick going on.”

“Just you though?” Nicole asked.

Matilda laughed. “No, the rest of my fireteam has me covered across the runway. If you can’t see them, they’re doing their job right.” She turned and waved off to some unseen Guardians. “Though it's a good thing you came out with your helmet off, else we might have had some blue on blue action.

Nicole turned to her side to show the red metal docking caps that her Ghost had grafted onto her back armor plate. “I wouldn’t blame you; this is a genuine Eliksni Vandal armor set... with a few modifications. It was meant to be convincing.

“Just make sure you keep your helmet off while here in the City. I don’t want you to cause a panic. In fact, maybe get a new set of gear all together. I’m sure some of the vendors have deals available,” the Titan said.

“Okay, that’s understood. I’ll look into it.” Nicole actually did not intend to look into it; this armor set has served her well over the last few years. It would take a lot more than one suggestion to get her to replace it.  

“Alright, good. You’ll want to go see the Vanguard in the Tower. They always want to meet the new arrivals as soon as possible. Cayde-6 is the Hunter Vanguard; he’s an Exo, wears a cloak all the time. He will probably notice you first,” Matilda said.

 “How do I get up to the Tower from here?” Nicole glanced up at the structure that stretched tall above the runway. Long cables dangled from the top and anchored not too far away from the base, and a small ship flew out of a large box that must be the hangar. Matilda pointed out towards the base of the tower and laid out the route she would need to follow to get up to the Tower's courtyard. They exchanged goodbyes and Nicole headed in the direction she had been told.

 The doors to the Tower base slid open automatically and she walked inside. A bit of rusty dust fell from the ceiling; it was evident that this area had not been used in a long time. Chairs were stacked up and covered in blankets. Crates were just sitting in the walkway on abandoned pallet jacks. They probably used the area for storage now. Only a few lights were on, leaving the open space dim.

Nicole was not impressed so far.

 At one point, the room looked to have been used as a shopping area, stalls were closed up tight, but their faded signs were still legible. An advertisement for some sort of rifle had been slapped up on one of the pillars not too far from an illuminated bank of elevators. Suros Weapons Foundry: DIS-47 was boldly printed over a sleek white plated rifle. The bird decal on the weapon extended off of the frame and splashed across the paper. It was a very good looking gun. Much more uniform and fancy than her old assault rifle, or the Fallen Wire rifle that hung across her back.

She pressed the elevator call button at the back of the chamber, and then a small display lit up above the door and began to count down. There were a lot of floors. Glancing back the way she came, she spotted a group of Guardians playing cards at a table off in one of the dim corners. Their table was lit up by a couple camping lanterns scattered around their little fort. They had been hidden behind a particularly tall stack of crates blocking her view of them coming in. Nicole noted that they were Hunters like her, judging by their gear. She debated whether or not to go over and introduce herself, but the elevator arrives and dinged open making her mind up for her.

Nicole signed and boarded the lift, pressing the button that was labeled Tower Commons. The elevator zipped upwards at a slight angle to account for the Tower’s superstructure. She reached the top in no time at all. Once the doors opened she was greeted with an absolutely amazing view of the Traveler, or The Great Machine as her Eliksni friends had called it. Nicole walked to a railing and glanced down; the ‘Last City’ stretched out beneath it, rising up to meet the Traveler and went as far as she could see... A few more towers dotted the skyline further in, and the entire place was circled by mountains. “That's some view...”

Her Ghost popped into her helmet through her helmet speakers. “You’ll have plenty of time to enjoy the view later, you should probably go see the Vanguard like that Titan said.”

“Fine... where...” Nicole turned to see if there were any signs giving her directions.

Up the courtyard, there was a staircase leading down into the Tower interior, a helpful sign indicated that this was the path to the Vanguard Operations Center. That was probably where she should start.

Nicole walked down the steps and walked into the interior of the Tower. The signs directed her forward, but she passed one of the largest Humans she had ever seen. He stood tall with his arms on his hips, clad in orange and white armor; definitely a Titan. “THE CRUCIBLE NEEDS GUARDIANS, HUNTER!” he bellowed. “YOU LOOK LIKE YOU HAVE WHAT IT TAKES. GET OUT THERE.”

Nicole nearly jumped out of her boots; she was not expecting him to be so loud all of a sudden after sitting there quietly. She just hurried passed him and through another doorway. Vanguard Operations was displayed above the door, so this had to be the right place.

There were three Guardians there, as far as Nicole could tell, the rest were what looked like regular Humans working at computer stations. The Guardians were standing around a long table, A Titan stood at the end of the table and a Warlock, the third class of Guardian, was at the other end. A Hunter stood opposite of the Warlock, looking at a large map of some region Nicole did not recognize.

“Hey there, Hunter!” The Exo that had to be Cayde-6 pointed at Nicole with both fingers as she walked into the command space. “Nice gear, new girl, right?  Just came in on the ol’ Pterosaur? Great landing by the way, come on over and let’s get you set up.”

Once again, Nicole was taken off guard with how... non-abrasive everyone was being. She came down the steps into the sunken meeting area, and walked over to the Exo before bowing her head in a greeting with a small smile. “Good afternoon.”

When she straightened back up, she noticed the Warlock Vanguard squint at her, then type something rapidly into their tablet.

“Oh-ho-ho, don’t gotta' be so formal there, Guardian.” He leaned his side against the table. “Soo, where do you come from, how long have you been around? Tell me, everything.”

“Ah, well I come from the old Seattle region.” She summoned her Ghost. “He brought me back... what would you say? Nine years ago?”

Her Ghost blinked once. “Nine Years, five months, thirteen days, and... five hours.”

Nicole was going to go on, but the Warlock Vanguard stopped her. “It’s you. The Fallen Guardian. Cayde, this is the one that stopped the Strike going after the Umic Archives.”

“I... uh... Yeah...” Nicole frowned, and felt her heart begin to beat faster. That was the incident that finally encouraged her to go to the Tower.

“What are you talking about, Ikora?” Cayde seemed to be puzzled for a moment, but then it seemed to click. “OH right, the Tank.” He slapped the table, “Man, when that thing came through the wall, your expression was priceless.”

“Cayde, this is serious,” the Warlock stated.

“Oh I know, just... it. Was. Great.” Cayde stood a little straighter. “So what made you leave your four armed buddies and finally come to the Tower?”

“Well that was just it, the Strike. I thought it was about time I made my way here, and maybe I could prevent another one of those happening.” Nicole was honest with them.

“Nothing like being drawn to your duty to protect Humanity or things like that?” he asked. His tone was sort of betraying the seriousness of the question.

“I was... well... you could say that was another part of the decision process.” That was a lie.

From the end of the table, the Titan Vanguard raised his voice and joined the conversation. “The House of Mist is not currently a threat; we can leave it off of the list of targets... for now. But your duty first and foremost should be protecting Humanity, and the Last City. Not some Fallen House in the north. Until we are sure you have those priorities straight, you will be restricted to the Tower.”

“Ooh harsh, but the big man has spoken, Hunter.” Cayde said.

“Furthermore, once we have deemed you fit for duty, you are forbidden from returning or contacting this Fallen House in any way.” the Titan continued, ignoring the Hunter Vanguard’s comment.

“I... understand, sir.” Nicole frowned, but kept the sadness inside her from showing. This had been a mistake to come to the Tower. She should have never let her Ghost talk her into it.

“Can she at least keep the armor? It looks really nice. Love the cloak.” Cayde pointed at her.

The Titan hesitated momentarily. “Yes... she may keep the armor, but not the House colors.”

Another twinge of regret. Not only was she never allowed to return to, or talk to anyone in House Mist, but she was not even allowed to display her colors anymore. “Understood... may I leave now?” Sure this would be a short first meeting with the Vanguard, but everything had just been thrown for a loop right in front of her. At Least they had not hesitated to take Mist off the ‘target’ list.

“Just a few quick things to take care of...” Cayde picked up his tablet from beneath a pile of paper maps. “...alright... I’ve just assigned you quarters in the Guardian flats, and activated your City Ident so you can access services across the tower while you’re under house arrest.”

“I... well thank you.” Nicole managed to mumble, she was not entirely sure how much of her feelings she was keeping off her face at the moment.

“Sent it to your Ghost, so now you’re good to go... good luck.” Cayde gave a half wave as Nicole turned her back and walked back up the stairs midway through what he was saying.

She felt horrible. Everything she had built for nearly ten years was gone from her. Sure... it was entirely possible for her to just cut and run back to Mist, but that would jeopardize the House, and the Humans that relied on it. For the good of the House, and Humanity, she would stay with the Last City. Nicole decided to suck it up and go visit the Shipwright, she had seen the signs for the hangar earlier.

Her Ghost flew around her head when they walked back into the courtyard. “Access to the Tower information network, news on the going-ons of the solar system, this is great,” he paused. “Oh... right... I’m sorry about Mist, but I’m sure they’ll warm up to them eventually.”

“Do you really think that?” Nicole asked. She took a left and walked down a corridor marked for the Hangar. There were a few other Guardians coming the other way, one gave her an acknowledging nod.

The Ghost took a bit longer to respond than it should have. “Yes, I do... Everything will work out find in the end.” Nicole eyed her Ghost briefly, and walked into the hangar.

The hangar was a wide open space; catwalks crisscrossed the flight deck where dozens of small spacecraft say on lifts. There were small vendor stores and offices suspended from the ceiling above the hangar floor. It reminded her a bit of some of the military sites she had visited on her journey to the Tower. Nicole walked up to the stall with the big Shipwright sign above it. Inside the stall, a woman was sitting on a crate in the back, reading something on a tablet. She looked up when Nicole approached.

“Hey Guardian, haven’t seen you around here before. I’m Amanda Holliday, the best Shipwright in this here City.” Her voice had a southern accent to it. Nicole had heard it before while crossing the remains of the North American Empire.

Nicole did her best to put a smile on her face. The result was probably a bit flat. “Nice to meet you, so I just arrived here and-”

The Shipwright cut her off. “That your wreck out on the runway?”

“Yeah-”

“You want me to fix it?” She asked.

“If you can.” Nicole replied.

Holliday hopped off the crate and walked over to a screen; she flipped through a few windows and brought up a camera view of the runway. Her ship was front and center on the screen. The fire retardant foam had been washed away and the craft just sat there, crooked, on what was left of its landing gear. “She’s an ol’ Pterosaur Vi-two-twenty-one... She’d be a beaut’ when all cleaned up... I can do it, so long as you’ve got the Glimmer.”

Nicole straightened up; finally something was going right about today. “Sounds just fine. Just take what you need from the ship's cargo hold. That should be enough.”

“If you say so, then alright, Guardian.” Holliday pushed the screen back up against the wall and pulled her tablet off the container she had been sitting on. “I’ll send down my team to take a look and see what needs fixin’. I just need your CID for contacting you if we’ve got any questions.”

Nicole summoned her Ghost to take care of that part of the transaction; she had not learned her number yet. He spun around and made a chirp. “I’ve transmitted our City Ident code to your device.”

“Alrighty then, I’ll send you a message with an update on your ship when I know something.” she said.

“Thank you, finally something went right today.” Nicole exclaimed.

“Awe, what’s biting you?” Holliday asked.

“Vanguard shit, just leave it at that.”

“I hear you, sister.” She nodded her head. “You just do you.”

“Thanks, I um... I’ll get going now.” Nicole started to backup and then turned and headed back up the steps.

Nicole hurried back up the steps, and took the lift to the lower levels. She would find her assigned flat next. Maybe another thing would go right. The lower level branched out below the open courtyard. Scents wafted through the air from shops and food carts that stuck into the narrow streets. Guardians and civilians stood at kiosks that were selling all sorts of wares.

Her Ghost looked around from his perch on her shoulder. “Sort of reminds you of home, doesn’t it?”

She nodded slowly, wishing that he had not reminded her of that so soon. “Yeah... well... let's find this apartment. Do you have a map?”

“As a matter of fact, I do,” his eye lit up and projected a map of the floor into the air. Normally it would just appear on her helmet, but she had been told not to put it on. A path snaked through corridors and ended up on a corner unit near the far edge.

“I hope it's not too bad...”Nicole sighed and followed her Ghost’s projection.

It took her well over an hour to find an open path to her assigned space. Doors had been walled up, sealed, or locked with some looking as if they had been that way for centuries. One doorway that was labeled as a throughway on the map turned out to be the back door to someone’s ramen shop. Once she had found her room, the sun had begun to set already. It was only midday when her ship had crested the mountain and seen the Traveler for the first time.

“Ghost, how old was that map you downloaded?” Nicole asked, turning to look at the little machine.

“Lemme check- oh- It's dated around two hundred years ago...” He flinched. “Sorry.”

“That's fine,” she grumbled. “Just get one that’s more up to date for the future.” The door was locked, and the control beside it did not have any visible control surfaces. Nicole slapped its surface, nothing happened. She pressed her hand on it. Still nothing. “Got any ideas, buddy?”

“Yeah I’ll take a look.” He floated down off her shoulder and looked around at the pad. A beam of energy shot out of his eye and interfaced with the pad. The door clicked open a moment later.

The flat was not small, but it was not big either. Compared to where she had been living before though, it might as well have been a closet. It had everything she would need, a kitchen, bedroom, and main room. However, much to her happiness, there was a new looking bathroom. Everything looked like it would work when she needed it to. That was almost worth being restricted to the Tower.

She opened one of the cabinets above the counter in the kitchen and found a dozen cups wrapped in plastic neatly stacked up. Taking one and stripping the wrapper off, she checked the fridge; a water dispenser was in the door. With hope, she pressed the cup into the dispenser. A soft hiss came from the fridge as the cup filled with water. She could feel the cold water chill the cup in her hand. “Ooh...” Nicole raised the glass and drank the water; it tasted... well like water, but was almost as refreshing as fresh glacier melt.

It had been months since she had been anywhere close to civilization.

Nicole circled the bed and unclasped the backpack she kept under her cloak. She dumped it out onto the bed, and then stripped out of the armor and scattered it across the floor. Nicole flopped out on the comfortable surface and stretched out with a moan. When she was just starting to feel good about showing up at the tower, she rolled over to look at the contents of her backpack.

She ran her fingers over the leather cover of the sketchbook, tracing the alien glyphs embossed into its surface. Flipping through it slowly, all the regret that had started to fade came flooding back to her.

Leaving was the hardest choice she had ever made, but it had been made a necessity. That Strike had caused so much grief and so many problems. She should have stayed with them, and just worked everything out from there. Getting forbidden from ever returning or even contacting them was going to be tough.

A sudden thud shook the cup sitting on her nightstand.

Nicole scrambled up and threw open the curtains. Face down on her balcony was the body of an Exo; he looked like a Hunter. Bits of metal that had broken off of his frame spun on the floor. After a few breathless moments, their Ghost appeared and revived the Exo; who immediately rushed her railing and went over the side.

“What the fuck?” Nicole ran over and looked over the edge. She was honestly surprised to see that he was still there, holding onto the lip of the balcony.

The Exo looked up at her; his face was white with a black stripe coming down the middle. He smiled; completely contrary to what it looked like was happening. “Oh, hello?”

“Are... are you alright?” She asked, taken off guard by his cheery attitude. Something must be wrong with Exo Guardians.

“Yeah, I’m fine... why?” He asked as if he was completely oblivious to his current predicament.

Nicole waved down at the drop beneath him. “Well you’re just hanging of the ledge!”

“Yeah,” he said. “It’s cool though. I mean, we can’t die.”

Nicole nodded slightly. She had experienced that moment more than a few times. That high that came with resurrection was a strange sensation. “Are you new?” she had to ask. He looked like a fresh Guardian, even if she had never seen one before.

“I might be, why?” The Exo decided not to drop himself over the edge and climbed up into her balcony.

“Because you were just hanging off the side of the Tower!” She waved her hands at the edge wildly again.

“Well I am, I’ve been here for a week. How long have you been here?” He asked.

“Oh, well I got here today, actually.” Nicole replied.

“So you were just revived too?” The Exo said with excitement in his voice.

She shook her head. “No, I just took a long time to get there.”

“Cool, it took me a while to get here too. I was revived in a hospital in Meridian Bay on Mars... I’m pretty sure.” He held out his hand and his Ghost appeared. “Jinx?”

It seemed that he had named his Ghost. Nicole had thought about it, but she had yet to find one that really fit her little buddy.

“What is it, Guardian?” His Ghost asked. It had a feminine voice unlike hers.

“How did you find me?” he asked Jinx.

“You were in a pile of dirt in the Clovis Bray Medical Research Facility... Floor seven, room forty-two. Meridian Bay, Mars.” Jinx then sprouted off a few exact coordinates that meant nothing to Nicole.

Midway through the next line of coordinates, Nicole saw the Exo’s eyes go up and down her body. “You have nice eyes,” he said without warning. His Ghost stopped suddenly and swung around to face the Exo. He broke into laughter at whatever look his Ghost was giving him.

Nicole felt herself blush. “Oh... um... thank you.”

His Ghost vanished and he rolled his arms. “Would you like to continue this conversation over a drink?” He asked. “There isn’t much in the Tower Commons, but a few levels down there is a place with decent food.”

Nicole glanced back at the sketchbook on her new bed, in her new apartment, and then turned back to the Exo. “Sure... I could use a drink.”

“Okay, its four floors down. I’ll meet you there!” The Exo backed up and threw himself over the ledge again without another thought.

“Oh what the fuck.” Nicole sighed and headed back into her bedroom. She grabbed one of the plain tabards she kept in her pack and threw it over her body suit before heading down to where the Exo should be waiting.

Right off the elevator, four floors down, was a good sized bar. The Exo already had a table and waved her over. Spotting the waving robot in a crowded bar was pretty easy. Nicole came over and plopped down into the seat across from him. One of the serving Frames, legitimate robots she had seen around the Tower a few times, came over with a tray of alcoholic drinks for them. Nicole took one and had a sip right away.

“My name is Brutus by the way. I think we should get names out of the way pretty quick,” he said.

“I’m Nicole; it is honestly really good to meet a friendly face.” Brutus offered his glass, and she met his with hers. It was interesting having actual conversation with someone here. It had just been painful business so far. All the other Guardians she ran into seemed to just silently nod when they passed.

“So,” Brutus asked. “You how far I came to get here. What’s your story?”

“Well it’s a long one...” Nicole trailed off and took another sip of her drink. “How much do you want to hear? Short and sweet?”

“We’ve got time.” Brutus nodded. “Tell me everything.”

“Well alright, we’ll need some more drinks.” She finished off the glass and set it off to the side. “So it all started...”

Chapter Text

Five Meters Underground, Pacific Northwest, North America
Day 0 

Chapter Text

Downtown Seattle ruins, Pacific Northwest
House Mist Territory
+5 hours

More Fallen had arrived over the course of the next half hour, filling the throne room. There were quite a few of the taller ones kneeling below the Kell's platform. The one that could speak her language, he had finally introduced himself as Rykis, had told her that they were the Kell's Barons. They controlled the largest of the outposts across the region. Rykis pointed out the one they called an Archon, he was bigger than the Barons, but just short of the Kell. Apparently, next to the Kell, he was the most important Fallen in the House. However Rykis lacked the English words to explain why.

Rykis had been pulled into the debate early on, so Nicole was completely in the dark; though she could diffidently see that things were becoming heated. Two of the Barons had pointed at her and spoke in aggressive tones. Even if the Fallen language seemed very harsh to begin with. They spoke with anger.

She could recognize some bits of honor in the way they acted though. Whenever the Kell spoke, all would be silent until he ceased. The Kell's hands spread as if to calm the Baron's arguments. He said something to her, to which Rykis returned to translate it.

"Guardian, what can you bring to the House, that we do not already have?" Rykis said.

Nicole thought; what did she have? The skills that had been granted by the light were unknown to her, and she was not aware of what the House of Mist had in its arsenal. "Well, what do you think, Ghost?" She asked privately inside her helmet.

The small icon appeared in the upper left corner. "Well, I told you that this was not a good idea," he replied. "You probably want to sell it..." The icon vanished and the Ghost appeared in a flash of light.

The Fallen chittered at the appearance of the small machine, and its lightshow. Her Ghost turned back to her and nudged its intact fins at her, as if to edge her on. "What?" she whispered.

"Sell it." The Ghost came through her speakers, best if they did not want Rykis translating everything they were saying. "You saw how they reacted when you emerged from the tunnel."

Nicole nodded slowly, now understanding what he was saying. "I bring myself; a Guardian, to the service of the House of Mist."

Rykis translated that over to the other fallen, and that set off another fierce round of debating amongst the Barons. However, the Kell just sat back into his chair. Nicole swore she thought she heard a laugh from behind his mask.

"Think we sold it?" She asked the Ghost.

"Well let's hope we did. I don't want to know what they'll do if you're not accepted." He said.

"Hoping for it? I thought you were totally against this?"

"Guardian, you are in a room with so many Fallen, and with a Kell at that. I have met many other Guardians who never have the skills to face one of them," her Ghost replied.

"Oh... Shit." Perhaps she should have insisted on bringing her sidearm in. Not that it would have been much use against this many Fallen. "I see your point."

Again, she sat back against a collapsed pillar and watched the debate continue. A holographic map was projected by the Archon, displaying the area. The ruins of Seattle were overlaid in a grey color, as were some of the surrounding cities. Some spots were red, with an upside down trident like symbol in the middle. Nicole was not sure if they were even discussing her anymore. Perhaps their arguments had spiraled to another set of plans.

She leaned over to Rykis, who was still standing beside her. "What are they talking about?"

Rykis jumped a bit, obviously not expecting her to say something to him at the moment. He turned to answer her question once he had recomposed himself. "They are discussing the idea that we can use you in the fight with the House of Devils. Our Houses do not get along. Archon thinks that you can scare them away."

Nicole nodded slowly. "I see..." Her Ghost was right though, she was not that experienced in fighting these creatures yet.

Finally, after what felt like hours of leaning against the pillar, it seemed like the Fallen had finally come to an agreement. Rykis, who had eventually resorted to sitting on the floor, stood up and gestured Nicole to follow him to the Kell. Nicole complied, slowly. She was not completely trusting anymore, which had been a bad decision in the first place. The alien-ness of the Fallen had finally sunk in. Rykis knelt before the Kell, so Nicole followed his example.

The Kell spoke, and Rykis translated. "Guardian, after much quarrel, I have decided to accept you into the House of Mist. You will take the rate of Dreg until you're allegiance is guaranteed..." They both paused for a second and the Kell looked down at Rykis specifically. "Until you learn our language and ways, Vandal Rykis is expected to be with you at all times. Is this understood?"

Rykis looked up at the Kell, and then back to Nicole. It was impossible to read his face as an alien, and the mask over the bottom half of his face didn't help either.

"I understand," Nicole nodded her head, hoping that this was appropriate behavior.

Rykis was addressed directly by the Kell, so he did not bother translating it for the Guardian. "Vandal Rykis, take the Guardian to the ruined city across the lake. She will be given space in a suitable building. Is that acceptable to you, Baron Acskis?"

The Baron that held control of that area of ruins was one of the now outspoken members of the House who had called for killing the Human female. He was not pleased, but it was not his place to question the Kell. "Yes... I will also send it along with our next patrol near House Devils..."

"After she has some time to settle in and receive some instruction, Baron," the Kell advised. "Give her two days."

"It will be done, my Kell." The Baron nodded and turned to exit the throne room, not with intently giving Rykis a kick as he passed by.

Nicole didn't know what was just said; just that one of the tall Fallen kicked her translator, Rykis. It was a strange scene watching the aliens leaving the throne room; some went as far as to jump out through damaged holes in the walls. Rykis recovered from the kick and bowed once more to the Kell, before guiding her out of the cavernous space.

"Kell has granted you a place to stay for now, Guardian." Rykis said.

"Oh, that's good." Nicole said, passing through the original doorway. She had not expected that, finding somewhere to live had been at the end of her list of things to do.

"Yes, however it is across the lake. It will be a few hours until we arrive on foot." Rykis chittered, fidgeting with his lower arms.

"Okay, give my thanks to the Kell when you see them again," she nodded.

Rykis took her up one of the main roads; the older buildings that flanked the path were over built by newer, more 'futuristic' expansions. However, both styles were equally overgrown by pine trees, ferns and moss; a lot of moss. At ground level, the remained of the city streets were almost unrecognizable below a layer of dirt and debris where plant life had turned them into natural looking forests.

Nicole did not know how she knew was natural forests looked like. The associated memories were without context, no people or animals, just empty mountain sides with trees and ferns as far as she could envision. What did she even look like? What if she looked like the Fallen, she had not seen herself yet; there had not been any decently reflective faces, nor had Nicole been really paying attention to that sort of thing. What did a Human look like?

"Wait-" Nicole called, "There's something I need to see... Ghost, can you take me back to where you revived me?"

Her Ghost appeared in front of her in a flash of blue light. "Yes, I can. Are you talking about right now?"

"Yes, take me there now... please." Nicole looked back to Rykis to see if he was okay with it. He did not seem to protest at all, so she followed her Ghost back down the hillside, towards the market area.

Rykis kept close on her tail, as her Ghost darted quickly around corners and through the various things that were hidden beneath moss and ferns. Any other Fallen in their path swiftly got out of the way of the running duo. They came up across the hole into the metro tunnel she had emerged from earlier in the day.

"Guardian, wait!" Rykis called, however Nicole had already dropped into the dark. The Fallen looked around and took a portable light with him before following her into the tunnels.

The collapsed and flooded tunnels made rapid maneuvering difficult; she slid down the crashed train car and into the maintenance passageway following her previous footsteps. The soft ticking in the distance behind her was Rykis trying to keep up. The internal clock on her helmet ticked away during the journey, almost three hours passing by in the dimly lit corridor.

"Approaching the site, twenty meters ahead," her Ghost finally noted.

She stepped into the ancient metro station, its arched ceiling had collapsed in for than a few places; however only one or two allowed the dimming sunlight to stream inside. Nicole looked over the railing and down to the murky water that hid the lower platform from view. There had to be centuries worth of rainwater and runoff down there. A barely functioning reader board just repeated a single word; Shoreline. The space fed no flashbacks of memory, there was just a disconnected familiarity with everything. "I guess the Ghost was right... no memories are coming back," she thought to herself.

Her Ghost was hovering over an area of disturbed soil and upturned plants. "This is where I found you."

Nicole knelt down and looked upon her grave. Still no memories; she sighed. The flak plate she had taken her badge from earlier in the day had shoved some of the dirt off of another item. She pulled the exposed piece out and found that it was a rifle, covered in moss. Nicole brushed the plant life off of the matte tan plastic, which felt very brittle under her fingers. Once again, it felt familiar, but nothing beyond that.

Suddenly, it vanished from her hands; dissolving into bright blue particles which faded away. "Hey! What the fuck!?" she looked down at her empty gloves, completely dumbfounded.

The Ghost lazily floated in front of her. "Sorry, that was me. Just a moment..." His fins twirled around the core and small sparks of blue leapt from the damaged stabilizer. And then, as soon as it had gone; the weapon reappeared in the air before her. The dirt and rust had been cleaned away. The plastic had been restored and the barrel was polished black. "The wonders of Glimmer," The Ghost said, "It should be just fine now."

She took the weapon from the air and ran her fingers over the small engravings that were now visible on its surface. Umic Industrial was clearly etched into the handguard over the barrel, the same company that was on her security badge. A larger ammo counter appeared over the small one for her sidearm on her Heads Up Display; the weapon had a full magazine, but apparently nothing in reserve.

"Wow... good work," Nicole congratulated her Ghost. "But where do I get more ammo for it?"

"I can generate ammunition for you if you have an ammunition synthesizer, that takes regular Glimmer, or I could use some of the ammunition cartridges that Fallen use." The Ghost turned to Rykis, who had finally caught up with them. "Do you have any spare ammunition for her?"

Firstly, Rykis looked exhausted, but then appeared more surprised that the Ghost would talk to him directly. He nodded slowly and reached into one of the pockets on his belt. He pulled it out and offered it to the Ghost, his lower arms fidgeting slightly. "Yesss... Ghost... But it is for our weapons, not Human."

"It will work, observe;" The Ghost emitted a light from its eye and the ammo cartridge disappeared from the Fallen's hands, causing Rykis to jump. The Ghost turned around and a magazine of bullets appeared in a pouch on Nicole's chest plate. "It's simple as that."

Rykis looked astonished at what he had just witnessed. Nicole laughed a little at the alien leaning over the Ghost with his hands up to his mask. She stood up and walked a few meters to the edge of the upper platform and squeezed the trigger. A single bullet leapt from the barrel and flawlessly struck the water surface, obliterating a lily pad.

"It works right. I think..." Nicole commented.

"I would hope so." Her Ghost replied with a bland monotone voice. "I fixed it."

Rykis approached her and lightly tapped her shoulder. "Guardian... I believe that we should be on our way before your star fully... sets."

"Fine... just give me a few more moments." Nicole nodded and walked across the platform, just taking in the space. She spied a surveillance camera hanging up on the ceiling. It was aiming towards the general direction of where she had died. "Ghost... there isn't any chance you could pull the data from wherever that was recorded, could you? Or has it been too long?"

Her Ghost hovered up to the camera and scanned it with its eye. "There is a chance, I am detecting some power still feeding the network; the server may still be salvageable, but it will not be here. The data would be stored at the offices that ran security for this system."

"I see... that's a mission for later then." Nicole spun around and walked back to Rykis, who had picked up her old ballistic helmet and was examining it in his hands. "I'm ready to go."

The Fallen gently set the helmet back down and stood. "Good... It is a good thing I collected some supplies before we departed..." He shifted his footing and looked like he was about to say something else, but held whatever he wanted to say. Instead the Fallen turned and started to walk towards the metro stations exit.

The stairs to the surface were covered in grasses and other plant life; everything had layers of grime and moss glowing on it. Rykis looked around and then pulled a device from one of his pockets. "That way," he pointed towards the mountains that were just barely visible in the twilight. "Our destination is on the other side of the large lake in this area."

"Then off we go..." Nicole pushed passed the taller alien and stated their trek across the valley.

Six hours later, the only good light they had to go off of was a lamp that Rykis had kept in his bag, and Nicole's Ghost. His eye thankfully doubled as a high powered flashlight; he stuck close to her shoulder. The low lying ruins were heavily overgrown, and the land had sunk back into marshland over the last few hundred years. Nicole wanted to explore these ruins, to see what is left of the civilization she lived in; unfortunately it was just unrelenting walking at the moment.

Nicole could see the outline of a city in the moonlight. There appeared to be some kind of artificial light sources in the buildings as well. That gave her hope, but it was probably more of the LED lightbulbs that burn forever. She glanced over at Rykis, who was holding a small sphere; a map of the area was displayed there were several pulsing dots behind them. It was hard to read his emotions, but his eyes seemed to convey worry. "Is something wrong?" She asked.

"There should be a patrol sent to meet us," Rykis replied. "But they are not here yet."

"How do you know that?" Nicole questioned.

"We prepare for House Devils, lined the area with sensors, we tripped a few." He waved his lower hands across the holographic screen.

"Ah... okay, will they know it is us?"

"Probably not- They are expecting us to come from the bridges." Rykis shrugged. "But patrols do not shoot on sight; too many Humans have wandered through here."

Nicole found that last bit quite interesting, so perhaps she would run into another Human after all. They walked on and passed through a dimly lit intersection. The yellow light was blinking endlessly at its lowest setting. The air smelled off, a bit like ozone; she wasn't sure how she knew what that smelled like. Rykis stopped suddenly and knelt down, picking something out of a puddle Nicole turned and watched him turn the strange pistol over and aim towards a wall.

"This is one of our shock pistols, at a high charge... Something happened here." A faint clicking noise drew his attention to the distance. Immediately he ducked down and waved her towards a position behind a crumbling wall. "Devils, they are still here."

She slid into cover with the Fallen, and peeked out to the street beyond. "They likely saw us," Rykis continued. "Be ready." He pulled a rifle off of his back and readied it, the tip lit up with blue electricity with a subtle whine.

Nicole nodded and checked her weapon's magazine, even though her helmet displayed an accurate count; muscle memory from memories she no longer had. "Alright, good to go."

Her Ghost's icon appeared on screen. "I haven't got the resources to synthesize you a grenade, but if I do during this fight it will appear on your belt, on your left side."

"Got it... Anything on the tracker?" She asked.

"Nothing yet... wait-" The Ghost paused and a sliver of red appeared on the edge of the tracker. "Movement, just outside my range."

Rykis looked over his cover. "That was one of the Devils." He stood up and opened fire at some target Nicole couldn't see. "Kill them, before they kill us."

She called upon some knowledge deep in her mind and leaded out around cover, brought the rifle to her shoulder and squeezed the trigger. The rifle kicked and sent a burst of bullets towards a small fallen, missing its lower arms. Her Ghost tagged it as a Dreg, and the taller ones as Vandals. The wording seemed random but it was not the first thing on her mind. The Dregs fought strangely, one hand held a pistol and some kind of electrified blade in the other; they just charged head-on into the gunfire, leaping over cover and running right to their position. They were fanatical.

Slipping back into cover to reload, she saw that Rykis was marked as a Vandal as well on her Tactical system. Vandals were fighting smarter, using cover and only popping out to fire, yet they still seemed a bit amateur to her mind.

The Dregs went down easily enough; she was feeling the thrill in her chest, heart beating faster. She was getting cocky; they just ran straight into her bullets. It was exhilarating. Nicole stood from cover and started to fire randomly in the direction of the attacking Fallen; laughing maniacally.

However, in a building across the intersection, a Fallen Vandal charged his Wire rifle for the shot. All she saw next was a flash of light, felt a jab of pain, and then there was nothing.

It was not exactly nothing. She felt something, like a floaty feeling; but nothing around her, just mindless blackness. Then suddenly there was a shock to her system. Feeling returned to her consciousness and she sucked in a deep breath of air. Nicole opened her eyes to see Rykis and her Ghost looking down at her.

She sat up and rubbed her face, her helmet was missing. "Wh...What happened?" Nicole muttered.

Rykis answered first. "You dieded."

"What?" She died, how was she still here?

Her Ghost 'blinked' and twisted its fins. "Well to be more precise, you were shot by a Wire rifle and your head exploded."

"But... how am I still here?" Nicole stuttered.

"Oh... did... did I forget to tell you I could do that?" the Ghost said. "Yes, I can bring you back from the dead, as long as there is enough ambient Light around. I just waited for Rykis and the others to finish off the Devils before I felt it was safe to bring you back."

"Well, that's great and I'm glad you can. I fucked up." Nicole sat up against a section of dilapidated wall. "Wait, others?"

Rykis waved one of his arms towards another group of Fallen sifting through the Devils' bodies. "Some of the patrol survived; waited to ambush House Devils but they found us instead." He shook his head. "You must exercise some restraint while fighting Guardian."

"Yeah, yeah, yeah, I will... This was just the first time in this life." Nicole finally pulled herself back to her feet. "Are we going then?"

"Yes, they will stay behind, but we can continue to the town." Rykis pushed passed one of the Patrol members and set them back on track to the city in the distance.

Their eventual arrival wasn't anything spectacular. It was the dead of night and hardly anything was happening. They passed the odd patrol, at which they only gave Rykis a nod before continuing on. It was quite obvious what additions the Fallen made to the old downtown sector, circular metal pods were sticking out of human structures and emanated light from a few window like openings. Nicole spied a few wood additions that definitely weren't original construction, so not everything the Fallen built was metal.

There was a large dome in the middle of what probably use to be a park. The forest that had regrown around it had been cut away a long time ago, but some of the stumps remained. The structure itself was painted white and black, and banners of the same color hung on poles and rungs. She had seen some of those while in Seattle too, it must be ceremonial or something. Rykis was taking her to that building.

"This is where Baron Acskis resides." Rykis said. "He will assign you a housing unit for your stay here."

"Didn't you say he was the one that didn't like me?" She asked.

"That is correct. However most likely he will assign you a place in one of the empty towers," Rykis said. "He would dare not oppose the Kell."

"If you say so, Rykis," Nicole shook her head. She grabbed the helmet from the clip on her hip and placed it back over her head.

Rykis walked her up to the entrance to the dome; it was sort of like the Kell's throne room, only the guard did not ask her to surrender her weapon. He and the other Vandal talked for a few moments, when another Fallen came from inside to collect them.

Her helmet labeled this Fallen as a Captain; however they were not wearing armor, instead they wore just their mask and a shirt that looked more like a piece of cloth draped across the body. They were slimmer than some of the other fallen of that size that she had seen earlier in the day, wider hips too. If Nicole had to guess... she was face to face, well face to about midsection, with a female of the Fallen species. The female spoke to Rykis, but he did not bother to translate.

They were led to a room somewhere along the edge of the dome, where they found the Baron sitting at a table with a large fish before him. His mask was off, hanging off to the side of his face. Another first, but Fallen faces were inherently strange to her, the two mandibles over an actual mouth. She did not know what her own face looked like, but it was not like that.

The Baron pulled the mask back over his face and clipped it on. He took a breath before speaking, to which Rykis translated for her. "So the Guardian made it. Perhaps you will be a valuable addition." He grumbled. "I have given you quarters in tower twenty seven. Your translator will be the only other occupant, understand?"

Nicole nodded; again Rykis handled the meat of the conversation.

"Good, I expect you to be out with a patrol by midday." He said. "Show me that you can be trusted with this House."

She nodded again, "I will... sir." Rykis probably made that sound much more regal for this setting.

Rykis once again translated the Barons words, seeming to remove the hostility from his tone of voice. "Then do that and leave my dwelling." Rykis looked back towards the way they came, "That means we should go now."

"Yes, I can sense that." Nicole followed him out they met another Fallen outside the dome.

"This is Vandal Jasix, she will show us to tower twenty seven." Rykis said. "I have worked with her before, she knows some of your language."

"Oh, that's good." Nicole said, looking up at Jasix.

"Yes, hello Guardian," Jasix said. Her tone was much more accepting than the Baron's. "Our Baron wishes that you be up early yes? Let us go quickly."

"By all means." Nicole motioned for her to lead the way.

Rykis stayed at Nicole's side while Jasix took them through the forested streets of this ruined city. It was not far, but there was more than a few blocks between the Baron's dome structure and the building that he had chosen to house her in. The building itself was small compared to the structures that made up the city's downtown core; it only appeared to be eight stories tall. The lower levels seemed unsuitable for her to live in, the trees and ivy coursing through the building; however, the upper four seemed fine to an extent.

"This is where you are to stay," Jasix said. "You are allowed any space in the building to call your own."

"Okay..." Nicole nodded, "I'll see what I can find in there..."

"Good luck, Guardian." Jasix returned Nicole's nod. "If you require..." She stopped and asked something to Rykis.

"Water." he replied in English, answering the question Jasix must have asked.

"If you require... water... then there is a vat for use at the resource depot. Buckets are available for your dwelling when it is needed."

"Oh, thank you." Nicole waved to the Vandal and walked over to the entrance to the building. It looked like it had been some sort of hotel at one time. The overgrowth only extended so far into the lobby, but there was not really anything of interest there. Her Ghost appeared and provided light for her as she passed through the arched doorway and up an old escalator. The second level looked to be mostly massive rooms filled with rotten furniture. The outer spaces were filled with plants and rubble, but the core of the building was mostly intact.

The third floor was obviously not for the guests, a large Employees Only sign was mounted on the door. The floor contained a massive kitchen and service corridor. There were trays and dishes that sat untouched on carts for centuries, but still nowhere for her to call home.

Nicole skipped the fourth floor and went straight into the fifth. The rooms were along the edge of the a balcony that looked down to the fourth floor; a pool that now looked more like an indoor swamp sat slightly overfilled in the center. She walked to a corner room and kicked open the door. The room was large, but everything was heavily water damaged. Nicole figured that all the rooms would be something close to this.

"Hmm... roomy; could use a bit of work though," her Ghost wondered aloud.

"Well it'll do... for now." Nicole poked the small ball.

Rykis knocked once on the door from the hallway. "If this is what Guardian wants... I will set up on the floor below."

"Okay that works. I'll uh be here until morning." She said.

He nodded once, and turned to leave. "Farewell."

Nicole shut the door behind him and then flopped against it, sliding to the floor. She took off her helmet and looked up to the Ghost, cracking a nervous smile. "So how'd I do?"

"Well I think you're going to do just fine." He replied.

"Oh Ghost... am I even going to be able to do this?" She asked. "Like live here and survive this world?"

"Of course you will. You're a Guardian, and Guardians can do anything."

Chapter Text

North Medina, Pacific Northwest
House Mist Territory
+1 Day

Nicole awoke in the old hotel room to her Ghost tapping her visor. She had slept in her armor since there was no way she would sleep on this mattress until she had cleaned it. Taking a glance at her mission clock, she noted that she had only slept five hours; not much but enough she hoped.

“Wake up, Guardian. It’s almost midday, and that Fallen is waiting outside the door.” Her Ghost nudged her visor again.

“Alright, I’m up,” Nicole yawned and sat up. The armor was not the most comfortable thing to sleep in; she lifted her arms into the air and stretched with a yawn. Popping off her helmet, she ran her fingers through her hair and rubbed her forehead. Her eyes were covered suddenly with dark brown almost black hair; Nicole brushed them out of the way and then glanced down at her helmet. The visor reflected her face back at her. “Oh... so that’s what a Human looks like.” She blinked, and her green eyes blinked back.

“Well... yes.” Her Ghost blinked. “You okay?”

“Yeah, I’m fine...” She placed her helmet back on and grabbed her rifle from the wall. “Let’s get out there then.”

Nicole pulled open the door and walked out to the corridor beyond the room. Rykis was sitting on the ledge with what looked like a notebook; he was sketching something in the atrium. There was something familiar feeling about his act of sketching; perhaps she had done some in her past life.

He must have heard her open the door; he packed up his sketchpad and stood up from the ledge. “Good morning Guardian. The patrol is assembling on the old highway; a runner came by less than an hour ago.” Rykis nodded towards the stairwell. “We should be going.”

“Yep, that’s why I’m up; lead the way.” Nicole started down the stairs.

“Of course, Human,” Rykis nodded and followed her down. Once they reached the roadway the Vandal took the lead, drawing her through the overgrown streets once again.

The ruins were different during the day; the faded color of the building behind the green moss was a beautiful combination. The old asphalt was buried beneath layers of soil, and then covered in a thick layer of ferns, and grass where the sun shone commonly. There were ruts in the dirt, like something was still using the roads. It was a surreal feeling, like this was all wrong, but she knew no other image of the world around her.

Further into the city, she saw smaller Fallen playing in the streets, with others watching from the windows in the buildings; women and children she guessed. Rykis took her away from the occupied areas, opting for the less busy alleys and roads.

They came to a wide open area, sunken beneath the rest of the land around it. Large portions of grey concrete were still exposed, peeking through the grass and plants. This was a highway, or use to be one. Rykis stopped and pointed down at an onramp that passed through a tunnel. “That way is where we’re meeting them.”

“Well alright,” Nicole hopped down over the side of a crumbling embankment, taking the lead again. The asphalt here was long buried, and a small stream flowed down the gulley. A flock of birds took off from inside the old tunnel’s supports. She walked through the tunnel at the end, but before she could reach the exit, a coughing, puttering sound wafted from down the tunnel, before a sharp, whistling whine sounded alongside it, spooling up. As she neared the exit, a deep rumble echoed down the passage, and vibrated in her chest. She recognized that it was not a natural rumble, but nothing was coming to mind.

She quickened her pace out of curiosity and was met with an unexpected sight. It was a large, rather boxy tracked vehicle, with a large, thick barreled cannon spouting from an angled metal box. The word popped into her head; Tank. It rumbled and roared with a whistling whine as a burst of black exhaust emerged from back end. Its tracks began to turn and it moved forward ahead of another trio of smaller vehicles. They hovered and matched the Fallen design she had seen during her time so far in this place. But that Tank... it was undeniably Human.

Plates of tan metal were welded to the side, adding additional armor or maybe patching holes. She glanced back “What... is that?”

Rykis walked up beside her and nodded to the vehicle “Ah, that. It is one of your kind’s ancient vehicles of war... the engineering group fixed...” He looked down at his hands, counting out on all four of them, and then holding up all but one finger. “...Eleven before I was born.”

“You got those to run?” Nicole asked again. “Does the gun work?”

“Yes, however the ammunition is scarce, we use them mainly at sentry posts... this must be because of the ambush last night,” Rykis said. “Baron Acskis must feel that this patrol needs the boost... hmmm, not a good sign.”

The tank came to a stop and a Vandal carried a large belt fed gun up to the top, attaching it to the roof. Smaller Fallen emerged from inside the vehicle and collected large cannon shells as long as her leg, and attached a hose from a barrel to a port on the tank.

“I still can’t get past the fact that they managed to fix this up.” Nicole avoided stepping across the hose, and went around the barrel. “I have no memory of these things but I’m impressed.”

Her Ghost appeared between her and Rykis. “As am I, it looks in good repair, despite its age.”

“I would not know.” Rykis replied. “That is done by Baroness Tansis’ crew, in the south.”

“They must be skilled.” The Ghost said.

“Indeed, they are responsible for most of the maintenance and new machinery here. But enough of that... they are almost finished fueling and our Captain has arrived.” Rykis pointed to one of the tall Fallen approaching from up the road. “He will be in our Skiff support.”

The larger Fallen walked over to the assembled patrol group. The other Fallen stopped what they were doing when he made a grunt. The Captain pointed to the crew on the tank and said something before moving his attention to the riders of smaller bike like vehicles.

She really liked the look of them for some reason, they looked sleek and cool. Maybe she would try to get one someday.

Nicole shook her head and looked to Rykis, who was happy to fill her in with what the Captain was saying. “He is telling them what route to take, ‘follow this four-oh-five and then onto road ninety.’ We’re apparently heading into the mountains for an overnight patrol.”

Glancing up at a faded highway sign, Nicole noted that the road names corresponded to the way they had been numbered in the past. “So you’re going off the old names for them?” She asked.

“It is convenient. All those signs your people placed make navigation simple.” Rykis waved his upper right arm at the very sign Nicole was referencing earlier.

“Hmmm... makes sense I guess,” she responded as the Captain continued to issue orders for the bike riders.

Rykis explained that the bikes, which they called ‘Pikes’, were to scout ahead of the tank, to warn of any Devil ambushes. The leader of the Pikes chittered back to the Captain in affirmative, before turning to its own. With a few words that Rykis didn’t bother to translate, the riders mounted their vehicles Rykis nodded to the Tank, as a Vandal wheeled away the bundle of empty fuel barrels that had been emptied into the tank, and the heavy vehicle’s crew buttoned up hatches and got into position. With another grunt from the Vandal on top of the Tank, the others of the patrol climbed aboard, mostly atop its turret, as they settled in for the long ride to the mountains.

He climbed up the Tank’s rear, and held out one of his gloved hands to Nicole. “We ride,” he explained, as she took his hand and climbed onto the massive metal vehicle. The tank’s huge motor rumbled loudly beneath them, roaring and whistling sharply as it lurched and the heavy tracks clanking as they set off on the patrol.

The engine was too loud to speak to Rykis about anything while the Tank made its steady progress. They had only been on the road for a couple minutes when they came across the interchange with Highway 90. Many of the bridges for the junction were damaged and crumbling, but there was a ramp down to the other road that was intact.

The tank rumbled down the ruined highway, all around them were the rusting bodies of vehicles. Most were facing the same direction, as if they were fleeing some disaster happening in the cities. By all means, they probably had been; something wiped out humanity oh so long ago. Nicole glanced at the Fallen that surrounded her; this species seemed completely incapable of being the cause of that scale of destruction. It had to have been something else instead, something that was no longer around.

This portion of highway jutted east, directly away from the cities and water. It was not long before they had left the urban decay and ended up deep in the miles of rotting suburban neighborhoods. Though the only hint Nicole could see that there had been anything there was the occasional house sticking out from the trees. Nature had almost completely reclaimed the land.

However, there were only so many trees she could watch, the Fallen around her had been talking in their native tongue the entire trip. The hard metal was not kind to her rear either. She shifted her seating and got on to her knees. The armor her Ghost had created had come with knee pads built in, to which she was thankful for. “So Rykis...” Nicole thought for a second, she hoped she had pronounced his name right.

He looked up from some sort of book he was looking through and closed it. “Yes, Guardian?”

“Well first of all, call me Nicole please. I don’t really associate with Guardian yet.” She shrugged; it was true however, at least Nicole seemed right to be her actual name.

“Very well, Neh-cole.” Rykis nodded and smiled under his mask, at least she thought he did. His cheek bones moved in a fashion her human mind interpreted as one.

“So what kind of patrol just goes in a straight line?” she asked.

“Ah not really, the Pikes are quite a bit faster than the Tank. They are the one patrolling in a grid pattern around our position, traveling well beyond our sight range. We are just their support in case they make contact with the Devils,” he replied.

Nicole glanced back to him, “If they’re so much faster, what happens if the patrol gets hit far away?”

“The Skiff holds a small first response group. They will go while we make our way there for immediate support.”

“Oh,” Nicole nodded. “That’s a really good system.”

“Yes, we’re not a stupid people.” Rykis laughed, though it sounded like a low key chittering.

“That’s not what I meant by that,” Nicole clarified. The last thing she wanted to do was offend the one Alien that spoke her language.  

Rykis laughed again, “Yes, I know.”

Nicole just smirked. “Okay, another question then; how come you can speak my language so well?”

“Oh that one is simple,” Rykis said. “I am an interpreter at the trading post, someone with an in depth knowledge of your language is needed nearby, though it has been quite a while since I have seen humans personally.”

“Ah, so how’d you learn?” Thankfully this worked to speed up the passage of time marginally, but a little was better than not at all.

“I was taught by the Archon, though I am not sure where he learned English though...” Rykis scratched his head. He looked like he was going to continue, but then he set his hands back down to his lap.

“Well... that’s... cool,” That draw off was a bit awkward, Nicole was not sure why Rykis did that, but she decided to drop the conversation. “That’s all for now, I guess, got to get to know the person I’m going to be spending the most time with.”

“Indeed,” Rykis agreed. He went quiet again for a bit, and then began a conversation with another Vandal across the tank. She shrugged and went back to watching the scenery pass.

As the mountains rose around them, the air quickly cooled and snow covered the world. It muted everything; even the rumbling engine beneath her seemed to be quieter. The view evoked another flash of disconnected scenes in her head; mighty mountains and frozen rivers, snow and ice with miles of white trees all around them. It was sort of like where she was now, just a little different. She knew snow was supposed to be peaceful for some reason, no clue why.

The sun was disappearing beyond the distant horizon when Rykis poked her shoulder. “Is it true that the risen do not have any memories of their past?”

“Ah... yes that appears to be true...” Nicole said.

“So asking questions about yours is useless, right?” Rykis replied.

“That’s right; I’m a mystery even to myself. I’m still learning my tastes.” That last word kicked up a feeling in her stomach, it growled rather loudly; however it was still quieter than the tank. “Speaking of tastes... do you have any food? I haven’t eaten in... Well, ever I guess,” she laughed.

Rykis nodded and looked into one of his pouches. “Yes, I brought some along for patrol. I was not sure if you Guardians had to eat but I brought extra for you.” He pulled out a small package and handed it over to her. “Fish... and I have some dipping if you would like.”

Nicole took the package and unwrapped it ravenously. The fish inside was pink, with a bit of darkened grill marks across the top. She held it up to her mouth and took a bite. The taste triggered images again, flashes of water and sand and the very definition of the term fishy. “Huh... it’s Salmon.” She muttered, the wording coming to her.

The Eliksni looked over to her and nodded. “That’s right... I thought you said you do not have any memories?”

“That’s true, though certain things cause flashes of memory, though they’re usually devoid of any identifying features or human life. They seem to be just basic images of what things are... like forests and water, things like that.” Nicole elaborated. “It’s like just barely knowing what someone’s talking about when they say ocean... I think... I’m guessing since I don’t know how society works but then again I do know... does. Does that make sense?”

He nodded, the helmet on his head shifting slightly. “Yes, I think it does.” Rykis settled back into the tank’s netting as they continued the route into the mountains.

The highway took them into a steep valley, so much so that the Pikes had grouped back together and continued ahead on the only road that was out here. The route split around a gorge, in the dim evening light Nicole could see a frozen waterfall down below. A sudden flick of movement on the cliff side caught her eye; it climbed up the vertical rock face and disappeared into the forest. Whatever it had been was too far to properly identify, and she dismissed it as some sort of wild animal.

The trip had been rather calm, apart from the constant rumbling from the tank; however even that became a sort of background noise. Nicole glanced up at the craft flying overhead, Rykis had called it a Skiff and it blended in fairly well with the dull grey sky.

Nicole closed her eyes and flicked open the air vents on her helmet to let in some of the crisp cold air. But all of a sudden an explosion echoed off the rock, followed by rapid gunfire. She shot upwards and grabbed her rifle, but there was nothing coming towards the tank; the fighting was further up the highway... where the Pikes were.

Shouting came from the crew on the tank and the entire vehicle lurched forward as it began to gain speed. The engine whined and the tracks tore through the snow and ice, scoring the ancient pavement below.

As they roared around the corner of the gorge, Nicole saw that up ahead all lanes of the old interstate were blocked. The surviving Pike pilots were behind an overturned van, there were not many left. Their vehicles were flaming wrecks across the snow. The roadblock was occupied by the Devils; she could recognize their colors in the dark.  

The electricity based weapons zipped around, glowing brightly through the night. The Vandal on the Tank’s mounted gun opened fire, while the Fallen on the Tank rolled off the side; she followed their lead. They stacked up behind the vehicle for cover and it slowly began to roll towards the blockade.

Almost at once, Rykis and the other Vandals dashed out from cover and made for the trees along the side of the road, leaving her alone behind the vehicle. She glanced around and lost sight of them in the dark; then she spotted on of the other Vandals with his hands covering the sides of his head. “What the-”

The Tank suddenly lurched back, letting loose a deafening boom. Something attached to the back slammed into her helmet, knocking her to the ground. An explosion lit up the valley from the checkpoint, and a small fraction of incoming fire ceased.

Nicole was still recovering from the blast, and shook head in a pointless effort to clear the ringing. It took a few seconds, but she picked herself off the ground, and the ringing began to fade. Over the rumble from the Tank, she could hear her Ghost coming through her helmet speakers. “Guardian? ...guardian? Can you hear me?”

“Ye-Yeah I can.” She replied, stumbling out and moving towards the snow covered guard rail. She fell and flopped over the side, hoping that this was going to provide adequate cover. “Fuck that hurt...” The swear came from the deep end of her mind, completely naturally.

“You will survive,” the Ghost replied. “I’m sorry; I apparently forgot to put in proper sound dampening when I created your helmet.”

“Good going there,” She muttered.

“I will rectify this issue when you secure more glimmer for parts and repairs.” The Ghost said. “For now, I’d recommend that you move further away from this vehicle. There’s not enough space on this side of the road for you.”

“Got it, just give me a minute,” she rolled out of the snow and back over the guardrail. Stumbling through the gunfire, she finally shook her head clear and made it into the trees.

There was a flash of light from the blockade and some machine walked over the barrier. It was metallic, and had multiple lights across its bulbous head. On its back was a large cannon, which twitched and shifted to aim at House Mist’s tank. On its chin, a rotary gun spun up and opened fire at the Pike survivors. Its main gun fired, though it was much quieter than the old Human tank.

The shot flew across the roadway and smacked into the side of the turret, detonating. The Tank rocked, but once the explosion cleared there was only a gouge in the side of the armor, no penetration.

Mist’s tank fired back with his main gun, letting out another deafening boom. The shell tore through the armor of the strange walking tank and detonated in its core. The alien tank blew apart in a massive fireball and stumbled towards the cliff. It almost looked like it was alive. One of the walker’s legs caught the guardrail and it careened over the side of the mountain.

The Mist Vandals in the trees began to open fire now that the largest threat had been dealt with. Nicole moved up the hillside, and found a clearing above the Devil’s position. She opened fire from her position, taking out one of the Devil’s Dregs. She could see that the gunfire from the blockade was focusing solely on the Tank. Nothing was even looking up at her.

“Guardian, I have movement right behind you. Something big!” The Ghost alerted her.

She twisted around and glanced up the cliff face behind her. “How could there be anything there.” She thought.

In the dim light given off by her helmet light, she could see the snow rising and falling off of something emerging from the ice. The red lights of another one of the spider tanks stared at her through the falling snow.

“Oh shit!”

The walker’s chin gun spun up and opened fire on her; the bullets launching all kinds of material into the air as they struck the ground. Nicole dove out of the way and rolled behind an outcropping of rocks, just in time.  The rock cracked and chips rained down upon her; she did not have any heavy weapons to deal with this thing.

“Ghost, do you have communications with any of the Fallen that are on our side?” she asked.

“No, I don’t... I can try though.” Her Ghost replied. “...I think these are Mist codes...”

After a few fleeting moments, her helmet radio was suddenly lit up with a discord of Fallen voices. She was not sure what they were saying. Hopefully her Ghost did actually connect to the right one. “Uh, Rykis, They’ve got me pinned down with another one of those walking tanks on the mountainside.”

There were a few seconds of continued coordination she did not understand before Rykis came across the radio in her language. “I see it, will have Tank target it.”

Nicole glanced back down at the Tank on the road. It was barely visible outside the spotlights the Devils had set up. There was no way that the Tank could aim this far up. She could see a hint of movement on top, but what it was, she was not sure. But then light flashed from the top. Bullets zinged above her head, peppering the Devil’s Walker across its head. The Walker shuddered as holes began to appear, something inside was giving off a bright red light.

“Neh-cole, we are leaving. Captain is dead, but the Pike riders have been rescued. Tank needs to save ammo and Archon is calling us back,” Rykis called out over the radio. “Return, fast.”

Nicole peeked over the rock again; the Walker was still maneuvering in the snow, though its attention was directed down the slope. The main gun on its back charged and fired, but it seemed to miss. The gunfire continued to pepper the Walker’s hull.

“Okay, I understand.” Nicole replied to Rykis. She dove out from behind the now pummeled rock and made a mad dash for the tree line. The Walker’s turret swiveled to her and fired its coaxial weapon, some sort of slow moving electrical bolts. They followed her through the trees, tracking her down.

“What the fuck!?” One of the bolts struck a tree, and exploded. The tree was blown to splinters, which thankfully triggered the other two. Now that she was in the clear from the Walker, she made a beeline for the Mist Tank. When she emerged from the forest she could see that Rykis and the other Vandals were falling back around the bend, probably over a hundred meters away. Nicole had dropped out where the Pikes had been taken out.

Her exact position was behind an ancient landslide, so she was not under fire from the barricade. However, there was an intact Pike not too far from her position. “Can you tell if that thing is still working, Ghost?” she asked.

“I’ll check.” The Ghost flew out from behind her and dodged the smaller pieces of wreckage. The blue scanning light from his eye flashed across the Pike’s surface. One of the Devils on the wall must have noticed because a volley of gunfire came down range. Thankfully, the Ghost puttered back over to her position. “Yes, it’s in working order.”

“Great, that’s our way out of here.”  Nicole reloaded her rifle, and inched closer to the edge of the landslide.

There was movement nearby, the indicator on her HUD showed four hostiles coming closer. They were probably coming down to check the area for any survivors. She shook her head and charged out around the corner. The Devils where far closer that she had realized, Nicole had nearly walked right into a Vandal. She quickly head-butted the Vandal, knocking it back a few steps and she followed up with a burst into its chest. Nicole reached down instinctively for a new magazine, but found something else instead; a knife. Twisting it around in her hand, Nicole brought the blade through the neck of a Dreg. A burst of wet gas sprayed from the wound and coated her helmet.

She kicked the Dreg into another and managed to grab an actual magazine from her belt. Nicole turned and ran for the Pike, picking it back up and climbing aboard. Thankfully, it was still running; she gripped one of the handlebars and the Pike shot forward. Gunfire shot past her as she attempted to ride back down the mountain pass. She looked back and fired at the Fallen with her rifle, just to force them off her trail.

For some reason, she found that driving the Pike just seemed to come naturally. The balance and steering was only slightly different to whatever mental skills she was using. Nicole understood that she would probably never know why it was this way, or why she was instantly competent with a weapon. But she was glad she did.  

The Devils appeared not to pursue her any further; she left them behind in the cold snow. Nicole tried to wipe the black droplets from her visor, but they just further smeared across and made it even harder to see. She opted to just remove the helmet all together, clipping it back onto her belt with a free hand. The crisp air and flecks of snow were directed away from her face by the Pikes small windshield, but the wind blew through her hair. It was a good feeling, a relaxing feeling. It triggered another vague memory, trees and blurry shapes flying past as her point of view swung over a road that wound along the edge of a gorge. There was not anything recognizable of it; just the feelings. The worry and fear of combat melted away into the sound of rushing wind.

She was safe again, free. This had to be something from her past life, a happy place. Her happy place.

Nicole rode on, finally coming across her allies from the House of Mist. The Tank was damaged, a bit of darker smoke belched from its exhaust and there were more than a few missing armor panels. Rykis stood from the back and waved to her, calling her closer to the vehicle as it lumbered down the roadway.

“You made it out! Good!” Rykis shouted to her.

Nicole brought the Pike a bit closer so that she could properly respond. “Yeah, but what was that? Those Devils have you boxed in here?”

Rykis shook his head. “Do not know, this is the first time we came across them there.” He looked around at the others. “Kell will have others check other passes. Has been years since a full sweep was done.”

“You doing okay?” She asked. If her interpreter died, she would be... as the word popped back into her head... fucked.

“Yes, I am fine. Are you going to remain on that Pike?”

Nicole nodded and gave its engine a bit more power. “Yeah, I do think I will. This is... calming.”

Rykis’ attention was drawn away to a wounded Vandal on the back of the Tank that had reached up to him. “Very well, keep close.”

She pulled away from the Tank and dodged a line of snow covered vehicles. It was like that all the way back down the highway; the Pike was fast, but the tank was not. Nicole was constantly shooting ahead and then slowing down for them to catch up. Driving the Pike became more and more like second nature the longer she rode, tapping into that forgotten memory. Not long after they left the snow, a Mist Skiff arrived to pick the wounded up and take them somewhere for treatment. The trip back to the old city was as uneventful as the trip up, just far darker.

Nicole followed the Tanks approach into the sunken portion of the highway and back to where they launched. A Vandal waved her over to a different area under the overpass with what looked to be a light stick. There were other Pikes parked with tarps draped over them all over; however there was more than a few open spots. The Vandal had her park in an open spot, she dismounted. He waved to her and said something she did not understand when she started to walk away.

Backing away, Nicole put up her hands. “Sorry, I don’t know what you’re saying.”

The Vandal growled and spoke in a rough accent. “Turn off.”

“Well I don’t know how to do that either,” she replied.

He grumbled again and reached over the handlebars and pressed a switch on the console. The Pike’s engine cycled to a stop. It lowered down and settled on some small studs that might have been some kind of landing gear. “Now know.”

Rykis came around the concrete pillar and called her over. “Baron Acskis wants to know what happened, we have been summoned.”

“Well okay then... you’ll have to lead the way; I still don’t know where places are here.” She replied.

Her Ghost appeared and spun around her head before facing Rykis. “I have footage from this Guardian’s helmet. It should help.”

“That might get us on Acskis’ good side,” Rykis replied. “He was not happy to be woken at this... hour...” With that, Rykis started off back up to the city with Nicole close behind.

Chapter Text

South Bellevue Ruins, Pacific Northwest
House Mist Territory
+2 Days

Nicole hurried across Bellevue with Rykis and the other Fallen that had survived the ambush. The Baron's den was completely across town from where they had stowed the vehicles. It was the final hour before dawn, and a few flurries of snow had blown in while they were gone.

There were not many other Fallen out and about like there had been that morning, aside from the occasional sentry on patrol. Their glowing eyes made spotting them fairly easy inside windows or on rooftops. Nicole's Ghost flew around her head and glanced out at the buildings.

"I still find it highly unusual that this House is active during the day... and not at night like many of the other Houses," he said quietly, blinking along with their walk.

Rykis looked over at the small machine and simply waved across the buildings. "While our night vision is very good, there are things to do here that can only be done when the sun is out," he nodded enthusiastically.

"Interesting." The Ghost flew around and orbited Rykis once before returning to Nicole's side. "I still do not entirely approve of this, Guardian. We should be on our way to the Last City."

"I don't think so, Ghost. I don't know if you've noticed... but I suck," Nicole said. "I think we should stay here as long as these Fallen will have me. At least until I have more experience."

The Ghost's fins angled down, seemingly to mimic an angry frown. "Fine, you make a good point."

The group of Fallen, plus one Guardian, walked across the city, towards the Baron's dome. When they arrived, the Baron's guards ushered them inside. Nicole followed along, but Rykis was not translating anything at the moment. She passed through the dining room she had met the Baron in before, and into a large chamber with a variety of screens.

The Baron himself was sitting in a large chair in the back of the room. "This guy probably has a throne in every room here," she whispered to her Ghost. Even if what she said was transmitted beyond her helmet, only Rykis would understand.

"He does seem the type," her Ghost replied.

The Fallen proceed to reiterate what happened upon the mountain, at least which is what Nicole thought they were doing; none of it was being translated for her. Up in his chair, the Baron looked distressed and sounded extremely frustrated whenever he spoke.

It was a full hour of testimony before Rykis nudged her. She had sort of zoned out again, watching a series of screens displaying maps of the area. There was not much of a purpose to listening to a bunch of gibberish she could not understand.

"Guardian, have your ghost display his recording." Rykis gestured to the main screen facing the Baron.

"Got it; Ghost, if you may?" Nicole held out her hand, summoning her companion.

The small machine appeared in her palm and glanced towards the slightly curved screen. "I will see if I can make a solid connection. I've never interfaced with a Fallen screen before." A small beam of energy shot from the Ghost's eye and connected to the screen.

It took a moment, but the screen flashed and the group was treated to a video of her sitting on the tank. It was taken over her shoulder, and she assumed it was taken by her Ghost's eye, however the past version of herself took the Ghost out, yet the camera remained in the same position.

"This is a bit early; I will jump to the point in question. I will also be able to rotate the view to focus on anything that happened around us," the Ghost said; Rykis translated that for the Baron, who simply waved a hand in acknowledgement.

The video jumped forward to the moments before the fighting started earlier that night. The Baron watched the combat through completely before instructing the Ghost to rewind and rectangle different shots. He halted the recording on a good shot of the blockade and ruined Pikes. The frozen image also held a downed Skiff; she had not noticed its burning wreckage when she was up there, but it explains why there was no aerial cover like she had been told.

Nicole leaned over to her while the Fallen continued to discuss amongst themselves. "So... how exactly did you manage to get this angle?" she whispered.

The Ghost dipped one wing and turned to look at her. "Space Magic."

"Rea-" She started and then was immediately interrupted.

"Yes. Really."

"Well that just seems like a cop-out, to be honest," Nicole replied, reaching out and giving the Ghost a light push with her finger.

"Some sort of nano-camera system along your helmet and armor." Her Ghost imitated a shrug with his fins. "Some just call it space magic, so I do to."

"Isn't it nice to explain things though?"

"Absolutely... not." His damaged fin sparked slightly.

Nicole shook her head and sighed. "You are no help."

Meanwhile it appeared that the Baron had finished deliberating with the other Fallen. Nicole noticed him nod and gesture for the others to leave, except for Rykis who stayed behind. The Baron waved a hand at Nicole and spoke.

Rykis resumed his second job, being her translator. "By all means this was a failure, but you are lucky I cannot place the blame on you. You survived, where my fellows did not; a feat I am not sure how I feel about... Unfortunately I am aware you are unable to die, but that is also fortunate for me..." Rykis glanced back at the Baron, seemingly stopping mid-sentence. The Baron barked, and nodded for Rykis to finish. "...that I can kill you without consequence."

"Wait, hold on-" Nicole raised her left arm while her right felt for the grip of her pistol. However she stopped mid pull. There was no way she could kill this creature with a peashooter like that. Plus, even trying would ruin her chances here. Instead she looked on, and flashed five fingers at her Ghost.

"Five minutes? Got it," the Ghost replied with what seemed like the quietest response over the radio she had ever heard.

The Baron's lower arms appeared with a handgun, and fired once. The bullet flashed through her helmet and through her forehead, once again banishing her to the darkness.

Time passed in the void and eventually she was brought back to the land of the living. She had been dumped in the snow outside the Baron's compound, so upon awakening she was quite cold. Rykis offered a hand to help her up as soon as he saw movement. "Apologies, Guardian... the Baron is not pleased with the events that have transpired."

"No shit." Nicole took Rykis' hand and he pulled her up. "At least that plan worked..."

She took off her helmet and checked the front. Where the bullet had passed through there was an obvious paint chip and dent, the Ghost had patched it fairly well. She rubbed her thumb across the spot, barely feeling anything through her gloves, and then plopped it back onto her head. "What next?"

"There is nothing more tonight," Rykis said. "We should return to your tower."

"Oh, well that's fine." Nicole turned and looked over the skyline. "Which direction is that?"

"It is on the other side of the city," Rykis nodded. "I will take you, but pay attention this time."

Across the snow dusted city the old hotel stood out among the smaller structures on the peninsula; it was the only one over three floors. The hotel itself appeared to be in better repair than the rest of the buildings. It might be an acceptable place after all.

Nicole walked up the stairs and found her room. She flopped back down onto the old be and decided to go back to sleep for a good bit, she was more tired than she thought.

The next few days went on and Nicole found herself slotting into a daily routine. Rykis was spending the morning hours teaching her their language, which was not easy in any aspect. Afterwards she would collect food and water from the depot in the city, and return for more language class. It was just as hard for him to teach her as it was for her to actually pronounce many of the needed vernacular; however she was slowly starting to get the basics down after a week.

Her ventures into the city became more than just water runs after the first week. There was so much out there that the Fallen had not yet claimed, or they did not use. By the second week, there had been an increase in patrols going out; none of which she was part of. There was a lot of force build up down by the old highway. Rykis had said he was not sure what it was for, it was just in response to the patrol she had been on.

Between the day's language lessons, Nicole sat in the corner of the room reading a semi-water damaged book she had found in one of the empty Hotel rooms. It was a tour guide for hikes out in the mountains; though of course all the trails would be long overgrown by now, it was more for her to understand what the area was like. A sudden gust of wind blew in through the window and disturbed the flaking paint. Chunks fluttered to the floor around her discarded armor plates, and she stopped reading to look around the dilapidated room. As the cogs of thought turned in her head, she set the book down and summoned her Ghost. "You know... I think I can fix this place up a bit."

"Finally! We're actually going to do something." He popped off her hand and flew around the room, his eye producing a blue light and he scanned the space. "The structural integrity is still stable, so it's all going to be cosmetic work."

"Good." Nicole tapped her chin with a finger. "So we need paint and some materials to fix the walls... and I could kill for something more comfortable than the cloth I've been sleeping on. Let's see if we can find some out there."

She pulled on her chest plate and clamped the pieces all together. Nicole pulled the plate away slightly from beneath. "Oof... It didn't feel this tight yesterday. It really... compresses... stuff, you know?"

Her Ghost turned around and blinked at her. "I apologize, the measurements may be wrong; they were the default set by the provider. Time without the plate has allowed your body to expand to your natural form. We should find materials to make some adjustments while we are out there."

Nicole clicked all the small miscellaneous armored plates into place, but then tapped the plate over her hip with a knuckle. "Okay, this stuff feels thin."

"I did not have much material to make the gear, it provides life support but that is pretty much it," her Ghost said. "You can get better gear in time, with materials I can rework and break down existing armor to help upgrade what you have, or restore older sets you find... if that's what you like."

"Another reason to get going." Nicole headed out the door of her room and dropped off the side of the balcony to the floor below. Rykis' room was across the floor, but he was not in the room. A written note, in english, was up on the door. Apparently Rykis had been called away by the House's Archon. He would not be around for an undetermined amount of time. "Oh that's just great, I don't have an interpreter."

"Are you still going out then?" the Ghost asked.

"Of course, I don't feel like being cooped up in here." She spun around and walked down the stairs

"Good," the Ghost quipped. "When I was searching for you, I passed a great deal of warehouses south of here. There might be untapped resources left there we could check out."

Nicole ducked to get out through the old lobby doors and into the cloudy weather. "Okay that's where we're headed. How far is that?"

"It is about twenty five kilometers." The Ghost projected a map of the area onto her helmet HUD with a path from her current location to somewhere south of them. "It's a six hour slow walk, two at a jogging pace, if you're up for it."

"Are we sticking to a clear path?" She asked, heading up the nearby onramp that led onto one of the many ancient highways. The concrete roads remained relatively passable with all the old rusted cars pushed to the sides, grass and other shrubbery had long penetrated through cracks though.

"Best route keeps us following this old highway." He replied. "They're not overgrown as much as the surface streets."

"Alright, just keep the route up for me." Nicole took off down the road, staying in the middle of all the ruins. They had built the highways here with high walls on either side to keep the sound down for the homes and businesses that had once lined either side; however, it now just made it look like she was running down a dry river channel.

They traveled south at a quick pace, staying on the path the Ghost had set. Snow had fallen again while she slept; hopefully the winter season would end soon, her armor was not the best insulator. Nicole used the run to practice her language lessons, her Ghost would say a phrase in english and then she would repeat it back to him in the language of the Fallen. It was hopefully helpful, though she had no way of knowing if she was actually pronouncing it correctly. The scenery was a lot of rust, greens and greys, not much at all to look at; she needed something to keep her busy to pass the time.

Eventually the highway evened out and lost its concrete walls, switching to something slightly elevated above the land around it. The land here was flatter, losing the hills and steep valleys she had been running through for the last two hours. It was a welcomed change. These were wide valleys, she could see the other side but it was a good distance away. Though she could see why the Ghost had brought her all this way, this valley was filled with massive flat buildings. Warehouses, by the hundreds. She came to a stop outside the first warehouse. "Alright, one last phrase, lay it out for me."

"How about you translate what I say?" her Ghost said. "Here it goes, Hiss hiss, chitter chitter, growl growl."

"Rude." Nicole frowned and summoned her Ghost to her hand. He appeared, with his fins formed into what her mind interpreted as a snide smirk. She pulled her hand away from beneath the Ghost and gently slapped the little ball.

"Okay fine, fine." The Ghost twitched its fins and flew around Nicole's helmet. "Shall we find out if there is anything of use here?"

"Yeah, okay." Nicole hopped over a rusted container truck partially buried in the eroded soil. There were a lot of scenes like that across the area she had explored; piles of earth and vegetation had gathered along walls or anything else that got in the way of the wind and rain. An entrance to this monolithic concrete structure was thankfully shielded by the container; one of the loading dock doors had rusted and fallen away. She walked inside and glanced around the massive open space, columns were evenly placed in the open space, supporting the ceiling far above her. Rows and rows of metal racks were filled with crates and the remains of ancient cardboard boxes... Their contents rotted and growing moss.

"Well, I don't see anything here that looks like it can be salvaged," the Ghost said, flying around and through the shelves. "There are a large amount of computer screen mounts, not that we need any of those right now."

Nicole shook her head, "No, nothing valuable for us... though, if we did need it, could you do what you did to my gun? Clean it up and make it work again?"

"Possibly, but I was only able to do that because I had some glimmer, that is programmable matter, to reconfigure into the missing parts," he replied. "My reserves are running very low right now."

"Where do we get you more? I'm sure there there's bound to be some stored in one of these warehouses." Nicole walked further into the structure and passed a rusted forklift, some yellow paint flakes were still barely holding onto the frame.

"Glimmer could be found anywhere really; Bits of Golden Age technology house components made from the stuff, but there does not appear to be any here anymore." The Ghost spun around the old forklift, his eye scanning over its surface. He mumbled afterwards, she could barely hear him. "Oh my, this thing was ancient during the Golden Age..."

She hopped over an area where the floor had given way to the basement below, though she spied a promising sign not too far ahead. Vault Storage. Nicole stopped before a set of massive doors, and waved the Ghost over. "Can you get these open? They look like they haven't been touched yet, and vaults always hold something good, right?"

The little machine sailed over and shot a beam of light at the control panel that she assumed belonged to the door. "Just a little repair work to bring this back online... as long as the cables to the motors are still intact."

As soon as he finished, there was a loud rumble as dust and rust broke free of the doors. They slid with a loud screeching that echoed across the cavernous space. Daylight streamed in from inside the doors, a bad sign to the integrity of the room beyond. Nicole raised her hand to block the sun, and then frowned at what she saw inside. The space was dominated by dozens of large wooden crates. Moss was plentiful, along with grass and ferns that grew on top of the old crates. The boxes themselves were taller than she was, but otherwise unimpressive. Stenciled across the front of one crate nearest to her were the words 'Vault N042'.

"Who the hell calls a wooden crate, a Vault?" She muttered, walking over to one over on its own and yanking the panel marked 'Door' free from its rusted clamps. The inside was equally as disappointing as the rest of the room. Crushed boxes and rotting furniture; some long dead person's belongings. Nothing that looked like it would be of any help to Nicole in her search for intact furnishings for her home. Everything here reeked of rot and mold. "Well this is all shit. I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that everything here is old furniture."

Giving the entire area a once over with his scanner, her Ghost nodded in place. "It does appear so; I am only detecting small quantities of Glimmer, and nothing that can help with the hole in the ceiling back in your tower." He passed over the area one time more, "And the Glimmer is too far buried to be worth the retrieval attempt. However there does appear to be a pre-Golden Age car stored up behind the first row."

"How exactly is that useful to me?" She asked, slightly confused.

"Not at all, just an interesting bit that I noticed." He returned to her and vanished into thin air. His voice now coming from her internal helmet speakers. "There are a lot more Warehouses to check, however. We should get moving before dark."

Nicole used the hole in the wall to exit the warehouse. "I am not going to search each and every one of these buildings..."

"I will do my best to indicate which buildings might be better to search, however building materials aren't exactly something that my scanners are made for."

"Got it, there has got to be something useful out here." Nicole walked on to check the next warehouse, hoping she would have better luck as the day went on.

AN
Apologies about the time between chapters. I am in the middle of moving right now so this hasn't exactly been my top priority. If it looks a little weird here at the end, its because I chopped the chapter in half instead of making you all wait even longer. Sorry.

Chapter Text

Abandoned Industrial Sector, Pacific Northwest
House Mist Territory

+24 Days

Unfortunately, Nicole’s hunt for viable building materials and decor had turned up nothing that she could actually use. They had found more than one warehouse full of old building materials, however the issue changed into how they were going to transport the resources they found. The Ghost mentioned that if she located some sort of Jump Ship, he would be able to store items there, but she had no idea where to find something like that. Her Ghost however, had some ideas.

Nicole hoisted a plate of sheet metal and tied it to her back with a pair of salvaged straps. There were a lot of those around the area. If she was only going to be able to take one piece, it would have been the one made of the lightest material.

“Alright, which way now?” She glanced down to her helmet's internal clock. They probably had five or six hours of sunlight left.

“If my memory serves, I once saw a ship that had collided with a building across those tracks just south of us,” her Ghost chimed.

Nicole turned and started off in that direction. She could see the berm that the railroad tracks rested on top of in the distance less than a kilometer away; however she did not see any sign of a ship. “What makes you think that it still works?”

The Ghost chirped in her ear. “Well... we Ghosts are actually very good at bringing the dead back to life.”

“I would think that a ship is much more complicated than a person”

“Not entirely, in the past I’ve peeked into the inner workings of that crashed ship, and it looked far simpler than you were.”  

“If you say so, Ghost.” Nicole rolled her eyes. She crossed the tracks and saw the tail of the craft sitting in the wall of a nearby building. Old, torn tarps fluttered in the wind and were secured to the fuselage as some sort of makeshift camp; the former residents were long gone, judging by how ruined the camp was. Walking closer, her Ghost emerged from her back and flew towards the old aircraft. She stepped around a pile of bones that were buried in the dirt. The Ghost stopped momentarily near another pile of bones. “So why didn't you bring any of these back, not that I’m not grateful for the second chance.”

“Well, they didn’t have the spark that you had,” he replied. “Some were close, but I was confident that I would find the right one.”

“Hmm...” Nicole carefully stepped over a single rib cage. It was grim, but they had been dead for a very long time. “Any idea who they use to be?”

“They were soldiers, that’s all I was able to figure out; but let’s let the dead rest, and see about getting this ship running.”

One of the ship’s wings had broken off at one point, and come to rest against a toppled train car. Nicole pointed over to it. “Well isn’t that something we’re going to need? I don’t think that you can fix that.”

“Oh nonsense,” The Ghost flew into the craft’s troop bay and vanished from sight. His voice now came from her helmet again. “With all that glimmer we found, I could just make a new wing.”

Nicole shook her head, and took a cautious step back as a shimmer of light pulsed across the hull of the spacecraft. The vessel began to shake and the engine whined to some stage of life. Bits and pieces of building crumbled and bounced across the hull. “Okay, I'm really impressed.” She said

An engine activated and the vessel lifted, leveling out in the ruins. “It’s working!” The Ghost shouted. Despite the lack of a wing on the right side, the ship appeared to be functioning just fine. At Least that was what Nicole thought.

“Wait... what are those... oh... OH... oh no.” The engine burped and the entire thing shook. Her Ghost appeared out of the bay and rocketed passed her shoulder, appearing just as a blur to Nicole.

“What’s wro-” The ship dropped, falling nearly a meter back into the crash site. She did not get a chance to see it actually land before there was just a white light and a sudden bone shattering pain that engulfed her entire body. It was over in an instant.

The flames burned for hours.

Once the fires had died down enough to traverse the crater, the small Ghost ventured forth. There were bits of... well everything scattered everywhere. Hopefully he would find a large enough piece to restore his Guardian from. If not, he would just use his internal reserves, though that was supposed to be more time consuming. The craft had been fully armed when it had been shot down during the Collapse; the rigging that held the munitions to the craft had degraded over the centuries and his attempts to restore the craft only furthered the failure.

The Ghost’s eye found what it was looking for; her upper torso had been shielded by the piece of metal she had been carrying around. The light swirled forth from the machine, restoring the Guardian’s body from nothing.

Nicole took a sharp breath and looked around at the burning world around her. It had been mere seconds as far as she could tell, but everything had changed. The sun was gone, long passed beyond the curve of the Earth, and everything was ablaze. Her Ghost looked down at her, shining into her eyes with his light. She looked up at him, and blocked the light with her hand. “What the hell happened?”

He twitched slightly and turned off his light. “Well... I sort of blew you up.”

She pulled herself up off the ground and found her assault rifle still attached to her back. “What do you mean, you blew me up?”

“There were bombs... and they were volatile... and they exploded.” He chirped in an uneasy tone, “I would have warned you, but you need me to rez you.”

Nicole stuck her head and shook her helmet enough to scratch an itch on her head. “At least you can do that right...”

“Oh what-ever, you’re alive Guardian.” The Ghost swooped in and bonked her on the helmet.

Nicole laughed a bit. He was right there, she was alive and the ship was not. She climbed out of the crater and back to street level. The building and tracks she had been near were now completely gone; bits of metal rail were sticking out of a building face like arrows not too far behind her. It had been one hell of an explosion. “Well my metal plate is gone now, what do we do, just head back home empty handed?”

“Sorry, looks like we will,” he replied.

“Damn...” Nicole stretched and pushed at her chest armor which seemed to be back to its original tightness. “This stuff sucks.”  She sighed and started back towards the highway. “It seems really weak too.”

“Well it was made out of the barebones materials I had on me.” He replied.

“Any of that metal that we found good for armor?” Nicole asked.

“It did not seem like it, that was all light decorative metal. It doesn't have the strength for armor.” He orbited her head like he usually does when trying to work out a solution. “I also do not have the necessary engrams, or blueprints, for a better armor set.... though I might be able to restore and edit some of that old armor by the...ship... never mind.”

Nicole glanced back at the crater. “Yeeeaaahhh... no... Nothing survived that.”

Something dropped down from a roof not too far ahead of her and skittered across the street. Nicole caught a glimpse of what looked like a Fallen running on all six appendages, or at least four. The figure stopped in an alley shrouded in darkness. Four glowing blue eyes blinked at her.

Nicole raised her left hand, and gave a little wave at the eyes, while her right moved to the grip of her sidearm. She was a bit unsure whether or not they were friendly. “Hello?” She called out in Fallen. It was one of the first words Rykis had made sure she got right.

The Fallen emerged from the shadows, and Nicole actually recognized them. Well, recognized the armor, she hardly ever saw any without their masks. It was Jasix, the other Fallen that met with Rykis regularly. She could speak english well as far as Nicole could tell. “Guardian, Guardian, Guardian, what kind of mess have you created here?” Jasix looked towards the burning buildings behind Nicole.

Nicole coughed and pointed over at her Ghost, floating just beside her. “He did it.”

“I was just trying to restore an old ship for my Guardian here.” the Ghost said, blinking at her.

Jasix shook her head and rubbed her forehead with one of her hands. “Why, we have a very.... skilled...” She seemed to work through her words slowly, making sure she was using the right ones correctly. With what little Fallen Nicole knew, she did the same. “Skilled mechanic here at Mist. Should have gone there. She could help with your armor issue too!”

“How long have you been listening in?” Nicole was curious.

“Turned up after the explosion, Rykis was wondering where you went.” Jasix replied. “There should be transport passing soon if you want to go to Tansis tonight?”

“Transport... Tansis?” the word sounded familiar, but Nicole was just not sure.

Jasix nodded and waved for Nicole to follow. “There is a... train, I think, passing here. And Tansis is Mechanic and armorer.”

“Ah...” Nicole went to follow the Vandal, as she led her towards another set of tracks she had passed earlier in the day. “Sure, take me there.”  

“Yes, yes, this way.” Jasix found a spot nearby the tracks and pulled something off her back. It was a small tripod with a flashing light. She placed it down and aimed the light up north. She then climbed up the side of a building and perched on the roof with her rifle out.

Stepping back, Nicole was not expecting Jasix’s sudden movement. “Uh, is everything okay?” She called.

Jasix scanned the area around them. “Yes, yes, though others may have been alerted by the boom.”

“Do we really need to worry about the Devils this far west?” Nicole asked.

“Likely, no. But never know; they came all the way from the other landmass to bother us, it seems like a very small jump to come a bit farther west,” Jasix replied.

“True, I hope they’re not going to respond though, I don’t have anything to really help against that.” Nicole glanced down at the rifle in her hands. It had served her well in her first and only real engagement, but it seemed to lack power.

Jasix looked down as well. “Maybe we’ll get you something better there too.”

Nicole nodded and smiled under her helmet. That would make her feel better about being out in the middle of nowhere; maybe she could go out even further on her own in the future. Over the sound of the raging fires, she could hear a deep rumbling sound coming from the metal tracks near the platform.

She glanced down the rail and into the darkness. Other than the occasional streetlight or other intact lighting system, there was nothing she could see approaching their position.

Nicole glanced up at Jasix and the Fallen held up a set of binoculars to her four glowing eyes. “Here they come.” She looked down at Nicole with a nod.

“I don't see anything though.”

But that was when she spotted a dull red cluster of lights, further down the track. The rumble grew louder and louder; sounding deeper, but very similar to the tank from weeks ago. It was still barely discernible from the darkness when the sound suddenly changed in tone, winding down rapidly. The machine slowly glided across the rails into view.

She had seen plenty of rusted out trains while walking outside the ruins of Bellevue, but this one was not a normal train. The base of it had been one at some point in time, but the Fallen had attached the front end of one of their Spider tanks over the original engine compartment. Armored plates covered the train's cab, and a multitude of sensors had been affixed to the rooftop. It was pulling flatbed cars, too many for her to count in the dark. There was one box car directly behind the engine.

The train came to a stop just passed the light Jasix had placed, the door to the boxcar slid open and a group of Vandals spilled out in a loose formation. They swept the area, making sure it was a safe place to stop. Jasix jumped down from her rooftop and approached one of the Vandals; they spoke quickly and quietly, Jasix gestured to Nicole and the Vandal nodded.

“Come aboard, human.” The Vandal said, waving to Nicole. “We must be on our way.”

It surprised Nicole that the Vandal spoke better english that Jasix, but she hopped aboard anyway. The boxcar had seats attached all around the walls, but only a few of them were occupied. Nicole took an open seat next to Jasix as the train lurched back into motion. It rapidly began to pick up speed and head further south.

Nicole’s Ghost appeared at her side and blinked at the surroundings. “I have to say, these Fallen have done wonders getting old human technology working again.”

“Right? I think this will save me a lot of time getting around the area in the future.”

“You should ask about how far it goes,” he said.

Jasix leaned over and poked the Ghost, turning him towards her with a single finger. “I can answer that, Little Machine. Rail runs all through Mist land, we have some that is starting to head further south, but it still being restored.”

“Hmm, interesting... Can you answer a few more questions?” He asked, sort of hovering towards Jasix. “How did you combine the spider walker and the engine?”

Nicole watched her Ghost and Jasix float away towards the forward door and out of the car, leaving her with seven other Fallen sitting on the wall. On one hand, Nicole was glad her Ghost was talking to the Fallen on his own, but on the other, he just floated away without saying anything. She frowned but remained seated.

The train rumbled south for nearly half an hour. They did not make any more stops after she had come aboard. Jasix and her Ghost had been gone the entire time; Nicole was starting to think that maybe they had left her on the train; in a joking manner of course.

Nicole suddenly felt the tug of deceleration as Jasix and her Ghost returned from the engine and she took her seat. “Enjoy your time alone?” She asked the little machine as it came to her side.

“Only now that I have you to come back to, Guardian, yes.” He replied. That made her smile a bit, and she opened her palm for her Ghost to land. He settled down and vanished into a flash of particles, going somewhere in her armor. “Looks like we are arriving, let’s see what Tansis has to offer.”

As the train came to a stop, one of the Vandals opened the sliding door and Nicole hopped out of the train car. Jasix lead the way off the platform and towards a group of buildings that were outlined by a cluster of flickering lights. A Fallen Captain stepped out from a doorway, ducking on their way out. He walked over to Nicole and Jasix, greeting them in the Fallen language. Nicole’s rough understanding of the language let her pick up some of the conversation. 

“What can we help you with, Vandal Jasix?” the Captain asked. 

Jasix bowed her head, “We are here to see Baroness Tansis to provide armor for the Guardian.” 

“Hmm, that would be a problem right now. Tansis is asleep, she and her crew have been hard at work bringing our reserve vehicles online,” the Captain motioned for them to follow him. “I will let her know you visited in the morning. We can provide accommodations, follow.”

Nicole glanced across the runway; the formerly uninterrupted concrete apron was broken up by centuries of cracks and plant growth. Large clumps of grass dotted the area, only dimly illuminated by the flickering light poles that dotted the area. She could see the outlines of aircraft resting at odd angles; surely they were long gone in terms of operational status.

The Fallen lead her into a short structure with small windows. The old lettering over the doorway denoted the building as one of the bases barracks buildings. There were the spotted tarps that the Fallen liked to use scattered all over the building, covering holes and broken windows. This seemed to be one of the only non-hangar buildings in the area that was still relatively intact.

She walked in and could hear the chattering of unseen Fallen elsewhere in the building. There were strange rounded chairs around the first room with similarly styled platforms that she interpreted as beds nearby.

Their escort spoke and Jasix translated for Nicole. “There is an open room for you just down this hall. He says that you can pick any bed, the room is not in use right now.”

“Oh, thank you,” Nicole replied, using her limited understanding of their language.

“You speak Eliksni?” He asked, cocking his head to the side.

“Just a little,” she shook her head and returned to English for Jasix to translate. “Not enough to hold a good conversation yet.”

“Ah, I understand,” he replied and said something else that she did not know the words for.

“He says that the kitchen has a working... war... um... Ah, water pump and food in the store room. It’s upstairs.” Jasix nodded in an affirming motion.

The Vandal gave a small sudden nod and left the two of them in the hallway.

“I will be going as well, Guardian. The day is just beginning for me.” Jasix adjusted the strap of her rifle and drew a hood over the top of her head. “Tansis knows your language better than I; just let her know what you need.”

“How will I tell who she is?”

“She stands out from others here. Just ask for her. Have a good rest, and may the Great Machine bless you.” And she just jumped out of an open window, disappearing into the night.

“Well that was an interesting exit,” her Ghost piped up from her helmet speakers.

“There was a door, just down the hall.”

“Fallen, what can you do, huh?”

Nicole walked to the end of the hall and into the open room and glanced around. There were plenty of the Fallen styled beds with folded fabric sitting on them. She removed her helmet and took in the air, and found it surprising that the smell of mildew that she had become accustomed to in her tower was absent. Picking a blanket off a bed, she brought it to her face and smelled it. It was fresh, clean; there was some sweet scent there that Nicole could not place.

Her Ghost appeared in the air around her and took a look around the room. He flew through a door in the back, and she could see the light of his eye flashing about in there. “It looks like their shower room should work. You should take one while you’re here.”

Nicole nodded; she had never taken a shower or heard the word used before, yet she understood what it was. It had been a few weeks since she had been brought back, so it was probably a good idea.

She unclasped her thin armored chest plate and stripped down out of the padded bodysuit. There was not a smell, which was something she was surprised by. Though it made sense, her Ghost had rezzed her less than twelve hours ago. That probably refreshed her. Nicole would still take the shower; this was probably her only chance with working water.

The floor was cold, but clean; it looked like it had been cleaned recently. She turned a pair of knobs and there was a groaning sound from the walls. After a few moments, water sputtered from an overhead nozzle. Nicole stepped beneath the flow and let the hot water rain down upon her. It was really a great feeling, like sitting on the tank in the snow. She was calm and relaxed again.

Her Ghost flew into the shower room. “Don’t forget to use soap.”

“What soap?”

“I think that might be some.” The Ghost flew towards a canister on a shelf.

Nicole grabbed the canister and twisted the lid off, and then took a scoop of the paste. It was gritty and slick, almost like it had tiny bits of stone. It was all she had, so she used the soap. Once she was finished, she turned off the water and glanced around the room.  “So... what do I use to dry off?”

“Oh... I don’t know.”  Her Ghost scanned the space. “That appears to be an issue.”

It seemed that there were no towels in the shower room or in her view back out in the bunk room. She resorted to just shaking the water off of her skin and stealing a blanket from one of the empty beds. The blanket was rough, but acted well enough as a substitute towel. “Next time, we make sure I have one before.” 

“Sure thing, I’ll mark that down for later.” the Ghost blinked. 

Nicole rolled her eyes and sat down into her chosen bed; it was much more comfortable than her old flat mattress in her tower, perhaps she could get one in the future. That was something to talk to Rykis about when she got back.

It felt weird to be out of her armor, nothing except for the blanket to protect her. She felt vulnerable, and of course, naked. She had slept in that armored bodysuit for the last three weeks, it was all she knew. But the comfort she felt and the warmth of an actual blanket; that far outweighed any concern she had.

Nicole slept so well, she did not hear the rustling in the room that morning.

Chapter Text

Ruins of Joint Base Steilacoom, Pacific Northwest.
House Mist Territory

+25 days

The next morning came slowly. For once, she seemed to rest comfortably, even feeling the way she did. Though as she opened her eyes, she became aware of something around her. Nicole slowly opened her eyes to the sight of dozens of glowing blue eyes.

Nicole blinked the sleep out of her eyes and silently glanced around. There were probably almost twenty Fallen bunched around her bed, just watching her. “What... are you all doing?” She mumbled.

The group exchanged glances and one poked her in the cheek with a finger. They probably did not understand her language at all. She sat up and pushed the prying fingers away from her face. Nicole spoke out in the best Fallen she could muster in her sleepy state. “Stop that... get out of here.”

The sound of their own language coming from her lips caused them to burst into conversation, but it was too rapid and busy to catch it all; it was a lot of surprise. It just seemed to encourage them more and they began to sift through her things. Her protests were ignored and there were too many surrounding her to get up. Was she being robbed?

They did not scatter until a commanding voice barked from the doorway. Nicole turned to see a large Fallen duck through the door and walk in; although she remained hunched over beneath the room’s ceiling. The smaller Fallen fled at her appearance, flowing out through the door around her.

“Ah young ones, they’re so curious. Are they not?” The tall Fallen shook her head and glanced back at the tailing few. Her armor was covered in bags and pockets, with various tools sticking out of them. The helmet was smaller, and rounded off instead of the points and wings that others had; there was what appeared to be a series of magnifying lenses attached to her helmet.  

Nicole looked up at the new arrival and then to the door. “Those were children?” She was surprised; they did not look that small. She was also thankful that this Fallen was speaking English.

“No, not really,” she replied. “They are still young, but mechanics in training, they just arrived a few weeks ago.”

“I take it, that you are Baroness Tansis?” Nicole could not find her bodysuit, or armor. It was not where she had left it the night before. That was worrying.

‘Yes, yes, apologies. I forgot to introduce myself,” Tansis nodded. “This is my repair yard.... Jasix mentioned that you needed armoring? I can take you to our workshop.”

Nicole did another lookover of the room, but still no sign of her gear except for her rifle leaning against the wall where she left it. “Well hold on, it looks like some of those mechanics stole my armor.”

Tansis sighed and looked back at the doorway. “I will have one of my aides check with the group that just left.” She walked over to a cabinet and opened one of the drawers; she took out a folded cloth and handed it to Nicole. “This is one of our tabards; it’s for a tanker, so it should fit you well enough.”

Tansis left the room and Nicole slipped the garment over her head and slipped out of her bed. There had been a belt with the shirt, and she strung that around her waist, pulling it tight. Tansis had been right, it did fit well. The House of Mist insignia was stenciled across the front in white, while the fabric was a worn black with more white accents. It was nowhere near as protective as her armor, but maybe she would not need to wear her gear all the time. Nicole wrapped her bare feet in strips of cloth that she had found in another cabinet, much like she had seen some of the other Fallen doing while she was out in Old Bellevue. It would not be as effective as her boots, but it was all she had at the moment.

She joined the Baroness in the hallway and Tansis looked her up and down. “Mist colors look good on you, Guardian.”

Nicole nodded, “Well thanks, I agree... You’ll be supplying me with Mist armor?”

“Ah, yes. That is what I said. Follow me.” Tansis turned and walked back down the corridor, with her arms behind her back.

The ground beyond the bunk room was freezing cold beneath Nicole’s wrapped feet; she wished she had her boots back. Outside in the morning sunlight, Nicole could see the old airfield much better than before. The various aircraft across the apron were just shells of their former selves. Everything except for their hull was stripped and pulled. The hangars around the runway had their doors partially open, and she could see dozens of Fallen aircraft stationed inside. Some were covered in tarps or netting of some kind.

Tansis caught her gaze and waved one hand towards the group of hangars. “Ah, I see you have noticed the Jackwings, close air support fighters, we use them to scare off House Devil incursions. It has been a difficulty keeping them in working order. Parts are so scarce.”

“Could I go take a look at them?” Nicole asked. Their forward swept wings and bulbous nose gave them a predatory look.

Tansis shook her head, “Not now, I am somewhat busy today and am helping you right now as a favor for Jasix. Though perhaps in the future, I hear that Guardians are natural pilots. But for now, the arsenal is just over here.”

The building the baroness led her into was another, more squat structure. Crates were placed all over the space. Script was painted on the side, she guessed they were for sizes or something of the like; if this was armor that is. However before she let the door shut behind her, she heard a voice calling out in English.

“Guardian!? Guardiaaaan!?”

Nicole turned and looked out; she spied a small ball flying through the air. It was her Ghost. It was not until now that she realized he had been absent along with her armor for the last half hour.  She stuck her arm out the doorway and waved to him. “Over here, Ghost!”

“Oh finally! I've been looking for you everywhere. I came out of your pack while it was being carried off to another bunk room by a group of Fallen,” he said.

“I’m so sorry; I completely forgot that you live there while I’m asleep... sorry.” Nicole waved the Ghost into the Arsenal building. “But Tansis is going to set me up with some new armor.”

“Please just remember that I live in your backpack.” The Machine zoomed in and passed her head. “And thank the Traveler, hopefully something that will resist more than a few shots.”

“Mm, it should,” Tansis interjected. She was pulling pieces of armor out of the crates, setting them on tables according to size. “Though the one issue I am running into is that I do not believe we have a Vandal set that would fit you well, and the Tanker set is just not armored enough for use in normal situations.”

“Oh I can handle that!” Her Ghost asserted, butting around Tansis and looking over one of the Vandal armor sets. “I have the ability to make some adjustments with enough of the right material, and if something is too big, that's perfect... I’ll just need a bit of Guardian tech to help.”

“Are you talking about my armor? Where is it?” Nicole asked. “Tansis can send someone to collect it.”

“No, no need. I can just transmat it over here.” The Ghost chirped, “Just give me a moment...”

“Transmat? What’s that?” Nicole questioned; another term she had never heard until now.

There was a flash of light and the helmet and chest plate from her old armor materialized out of nothing, it clunked down onto the table beside the Vandal set. “Teleporting or storing materials. It also helps with your revive. But that is beside the point... if you’d excuse me...” The Ghost opened up and then both armor sets vanished, seemingly deconstructed to some glowing blue material before dissolving to nothing.

Nicole looked over at Tansis who was watching the Ghost with plenty of curiosity. She paced around the table, looking at the armor that had been rejected while her Ghost worked. The Ghost was not really doing much visually, his fins rotated around the round core with a blue energy, but that was it.

“Yes, Transmat. Mm we have a similar technology, but it is exceedingly rare for storage use...” Tansis placed a palm down where the armor had been moments before and eyed the Ghost. “How long will this take?”  

His singular eye blinked momentarily. “Just a few moments... For small adjustments... But this is a big alteration... Standby Guardian.”

There were a few moments more that passed, with the bits of the Ghost shell orbiting around. The fins retracted back in to the core. There was a tingling sensation and the bodysuit from the Fallen armor set materialized beneath the tabard she had been wearing.

Nicole untied the tabard and slipped it over her head before the armor plates began to appear across her body. The bodysuit fit well now that the Ghost had the excess materials to make adjustments for her proper proportions. It had additional soft padding across her belly and hips, and seemed to be made up of many different layers of material. Though she did not have much time to inspect the bare bodysuit, all the Fallen armor plates rapidly appeared across her body, except for the helmet which came back into existence on the table. Looking in a dirty mirror that hung on the wall; from her neck down she looked indistinguishable from the Vandals she had met on the train or in the city, except for the missing lower arms and the smaller stature.

Tansis leaned across the table and ran her fingers across the armor, giving some bits a tug. “Very, very good work, Ghost. Would it be possible to borrow you for some material fabrication later?”

“Maybe, if my Guardian would allow it,” he blinked and swung between the two in the room.

She looked back from mirror and grabbed the helmet off the table. “I don't see a problem with coming back to help here.” The helmet looked similar to the one Rykis had, but with a faceplate between the top and the facemask that all Fallen wore. “This looks very nice.”

Nicole placed the helmet on her head and it sealed with a hiss. Its heads-up-display flashed on, appearing more of a hybrid of her old one and whatever computer system that the Fallen armor had possessed; the HUD was now orange tinted with some Fallen symbols scattered across the corners. However she suddenly found it hard to breathe, like there was not enough air in her helmet. Her hands searched across the armor, she had seen a hose dangling off somewhere. “Some help, here?” she gasped.

Tansis reached over from behind, and guided a hose to her hand. “It attaches to your right cheek port, Human, just under the jaw.

“There... We go...” With the hose firmly grasped, Nicole pressed its nozzle into the port with a click. Crisp, freezing air hissed into the helmet, but it was not entirely what she thought it was. Breathing caused her to cough and gasp at the gas coming into the helmet, she grabbed the table for support but the issue seemed to clear up in a matter of moments. The air seemed to be fine now, though still a bit cold. Slowly, she stood away from the table and took a few steps around the room. “Okay... I’m alright, everything is good now.”

Her Ghost hovered nearby, looking her up and down. “This armor looks leagues stronger than your old set.”

She jumped twice, feeling the weight bounce and shift. Getting a good understanding of how her balance was with the new armor. “Feels better too,” Nicole smiled behind her visor.

“Great!” Tansis clapped her upper hands together. “I am glad that you appreciate our armorers. Here is a belt with pouches for you. But I cannot give you a cloak or house mark, which is something that the Kell will grant you once he has decided that you are a member of the House.”

Nicole took the belt and slipped around her hips, clipping it into place. “Well this is more than enough, thank you Tansis.”

There was a loud bang from outside and series of bleeps began to blare from a pocket on Tansis’ waist belt. She retrieved an electronic pad from the pouch and sighed heavily at whatever was on screen. Tansis muttered something in her native language and looked up at Nicole. “I have some pressing matters to attend to. The train should be arriving soon to take you back north. They blow the whistle during the day when getting close, but feel free to wait around the base until it arrives. Just say away from the hangars for the time being.”

“Oh wait, before you go... is there a place where I can get materials to fix the building I live in?” Nicole asked. “There are a lot of holes in the wall.”

Tansis quickly packed away the extra armor sets, just shoving them inside without folding them, and closed the crates. “Well, the train should take you north to the Seattle ruins. It will stop outside the resource market where they sell building materials. Check there.” She ushered Nicole and her Ghost out of the door and locked the arsenal building up. “But I must hurry; I will see you again soon, hopefully. And you as well.” She waved a hand towards the Ghost and then quickly walked off to one of the large aircraft hangars.

A fresh cloud of smoke faintly rose from the furthest hangar.

Nicole shook her head and turned to go the opposite direction. It had been dark when she had arrived the night before, and she was no longer near the bunk house. Finding the station was her first priority. It did not take long though, there were a set of long overgrown tracks just behind the arsenal building which linked up with a line that looked recently used. Following the tracks, Nicole came across the spot she had gotten off the train.

It was obvious that it had not been a passenger station in the past, the rising old cargo cranes and various shipping crates that were scattered across the space was a clear indication of its true purpose. Nearby, a few Vandals pulled a tarp off of a crane of Fallen design and maneuvered it into position near the tracks. They were preparing to load cargo so the train should be arriving pretty soon.

Across from the cargo platform, there was a field littered with the rusting hulls of various vehicles in the tall wild grass and bushes. Most were of old human make, but the most interesting vehicles were a handful of Fallen Spider tanks. Yellow circles were painted on their hull, where the armor had been punched clean through by something else. It was not some battle scene from the Collapse; they were neatly lined up at different ranges. The closest she could see appeared to have been stripped of anything remotely useful; its gun turret and forward weapons were missing. It's insectoid like head was pushed forward just enough that she could see its engine compartment was completely empty. This was a target range for something, and judging by the damage to the old walkers, Nicole would have to guess this was where they trained on the restored Human tanks.

Sure enough, at the far end of the field Nicole saw and heard one of the tanks rumble up to position behind a crumbling bunker. It was manned by a group of the smaller Fallen, the ones that Tansis had called Tankers. Standing beside the Tank, a Vandal in some kind of heavy armor seemed to lecture the tank crew about the range.

“You know, I might just watch this for a bit.” Nicole said to her Ghost. She climbed up onto a sunken shipping crate and let her legs dangle over the side. “Do you think we’re a safe distance away?”

Her Ghost turned to scan over the field visually. “I think so, unless they plan to use you specifically as target practice. We are perpendicular to their range.”

“Hmm, good.” The ground shook and a tremendous bang rocked her helmet. A flash of light leapt from the tank barrel and slammed into the furthest Spider tank. A shower of sparks and bits of shrapnel fell from the hole and smoldered in the grass.

After watching a few practice rounds, her stomach growled. How long had it been since she had eaten anything? Nicole unclasped her helmet and set it onto the crate beside her. There was a slight hiss from the helmet, but that quickly silenced itself. She brought her pack around to her front, but frowned when she remembered that it was not her old pack with her food in it. That was still with the Fallen troublemakers that stole her gear. Her stomach growled again.

“When you were looking for me, did you happen to see where they kept the food?” Nicole asked, not really expecting him to.

He blinked and turned to look back at the base. “I think Jasix told you that there was food in the bunkhouse store room.”

Nicole clipped her helmet to her belt and hopped off the container, starting off at a quick pace for the barracks. “That's right, thanks for reminding me.”

“That is what I am here for.” He replied, coming up alongside her head.

Finding the barracks building from this different approach was quite simple, it was one of the only buildings that had its holes and craters patched. She was not sure it was the exact same building she had slept in, but Nicole did not think that they would mind if she looted a little bit of their abundant food to get through the day.

The storeroom was large; it appeared that it occupied one of the old bunk rooms. Most of the crates were refrigerated, and there was a lot of smoked fish so that is what she took. She ate her fill of the chilled meat, and stuffed a few wrapped packages into her bag. There were other ingredients in crates, but nothing seemed to appeal to her for breakfast; though she did snag some of the greens so she could add some variety to her diet later in the day.

She glanced out one of the remaining windows as a whistle blew somewhere in the distance; the same one from the night before. Nicole quickly wrapped up the leftovers from her breakfast and turned to walk out the door. There was a single Fallen there with an apron over their clothes. The Fallen held a pot on one hand and just sort of stared at Nicole ransacking the store room.   

Just giving a wave, she brushed by the Fallen and headed out into catch the train out of there. From what she could tell, there was a lot here to explore; hell there was so much out there in Mist territory alone that Nicole doubted that she would ever see all of it.  The train rolled into the base with an earth shaking rumble, though it was likely just localized to the concrete platform.

Once the train came to a complete stop, the team of Vandals began to load crates and other equipment onto the flatbed cars behind the passenger compartment. Nicole could not remember what the smaller Fallen in Mist were called; their counterparts that she had fought against in the Devils faction were called Dregs, and had their lower arms cut off. However these still had their arms and were respected among the others, more so than her.

The passenger car's side slid open and a few Vandals exited; one of which Nicole recognized. Rykis perked up when he saw her waiting on the platform “Neh-cole!” he exclaimed, and looked up and down at her new armor. “You look good.”

“Thanks to Baroness Tansis, and Jasix. They offered to help upgrade my gear” Nicole nodded. Her Ghost appeared at her side and spun his fins around. “Oh and thanks to him, he did the work on making it fit me.”

“They all did excellent job. But what happened before, why did you not leave a note telling me where you’ve gone. I was worried, making sure you are safe was my charge as granted by the Kell.” Rykis questioned.

“I wasn’t expecting to be out this long, just another sort exploration... except I spent a few hours dead and then Jasix found me out there.”

“What? How were you down for so long?”

“My Ghost blew me up.”

“He doesn’t like you that much?!” Rykis exclaimed.

“No, no, no,” her Ghost popped in. “There were some very volatile explosives in a ship I was trying to fix for her... it failed and fell.”

Rykis shook one of his hands at her Ghost. “Do not try that around other Fallen. We cannot come back like her.”

Her Ghost blinked, “Oh I know that, I will not be attempting to restore a warship so quickly in the future.”

“Plus, we were out in the middle of nowhere. I had not seen anyone all day.” Nicole added.

“Still, if Baron Acskis finds out about that, he would have a better excuse for recommending your exile.”

“Well...can I be exiled if I am not technically part of the House of Mist yet?” She asked.

Rykis crossed both pairs of arms. “Banished from our Territory, how does that explanation fit?”  

Nicole put her hands up in the air. “Fine, fine... I understood that just as well. Don’t want that to happen.”

“That is right.” He replied and shook his head. “Now if you are finished here, we should board the train and head back to the city.”

She brushed passed Rykis and walked into the passenger car. “I was already on my way back when you showed up.” Rykis huffed and followed her back on.

The passenger car attached to this train was not the same as the one she had rode on the night before. This one was more... elegant... to say the least. In its past it had been an actual passenger car, but the interior had been stripped at some point and replaced with benches for the Eliksni that rode them; as most were larger than what Nicole assumed was the average human. There were only a few intact windows, the rest were covered in wood and cloth. Nicole picked a spot on a bench against the wall and leaned against it.

Rykis took the seat next to her while the teams of Fallen loaded the flatbed cars with cargo. Nicole heard the sound of a Skiff engine above them, so she took a look out one of the intact windows. There was a different craft; it looked more bulbous, sort of like a utility variant of the Fallen dropship that she had seen all over the Mist territory. It was lowering one of the Spider tanks onto an open spot on the flatbed car. The tank appeared to be partially disassembled for easier transport, with its legs and turret tucked under the main body.

“Where are we headed?” Nicole asked. She had been told that this train was going to go to the Seattle ruins, where the raw material market for Mist was supposed to be. However that information was only valid as of last night, something might have changed.     

“Mmm, this train in going to take us to the ruins near one of the markets. We should be able to walk across the bridge you humans called five-hundred-and-twenty to get back to your tower.”

The train started off with a rough momentum shift, reversing back up the rails. Nicole gripped the bench until the speed increase settled. “Ah, alright... Well Tansis told me there was a market where I could get building materials.”

Rykis looked over at her. “What do you need that for?”

“I don’t know if you noticed, Rykis, but the tower has a lot of holes in it and this weather is too cold to be comfortable.” Nicole shook her head.

He tapped his mask with a finger. “You are right... but construction materials are valuable. You need something to trade.”

Nicole laughed, “Well that seems like how a market should work....” Rykis gave her response a glare. “How much glimmer do we have Ghost?”

“Five hundred units, not much,” he piped up.

Rykis nodded slowly, “that is a good item to trade, but that much would be enough for maybe some wood sheets.”

“Perfect, that’s all I need to stop the wind and rain in my room.”

Her Ghost made an orbit around her head. “Well, have you thought about moving to a different room?”

Nicole started to respond, but stopped. She had not actually thought about moving to one of the other rooms in the old hotel tower, there were probably many more intact rooms to choose from. Still, a stop to get wood was not the worst idea. “I’ll look into it, but still want to stop at the market.”

“Then we will, delivery of the wood should only take a day or so,” Rykis nodded.

The train fell back into silence, at least as quiet as was possible with the rumbling engine. Her new armor was much better at regulating temperature than her old set, especially with the wind blowing in from the cloth covered windows. Traveling across the region during the day, she could see a lot more of what was left; it was mostly trees, and moss covered ruins. There was not much resemblance of what she had seen around Bellevue or Seattle. Everything was much more overgrown this far out.

At one point they did pass through another city, but it was nearly completely overgrown. It did not look like Mist had any official presence in those ruins or any of the others she had seen so far. The train rattled through an old port area, but the water had left the piers and wharfs behind long ago; trees and ferns grew between them and the new shoreline. However, her view did not last as the train disappeared back into the forests that had grown up around the tracks.

Eventually the train reentered the industrial sector from the night before, but following a different set of tracks. They would not be going back the way she had come; instead they hugged the western edge of the valley. Nicole watched as a tall wall appeared, crossing both ends of her line of sight. The wall just cut through buildings and roads with little regard to what had been there before. It was crumbling and looking much worse than the buildings around it, a sign that it had been hastily constructed. Signs around its base indicated that most of the wall had been built on top of what use to be the southern portion of Interstate Four-o-five, the freeway she had followed south yesterday. Around the tunnel the train had to pass through, Nicole spied more tanks stationed around the entrance. They were old and rusted, and looked like they had not moved for centuries. More victims of The Collapse.  

The inside of the wall was less overgrown than other, things looked a little more intact. Glancing back at the wall as she rode away from it, she spied Fallen stationed at the top. A Spider tank maneuvered an old burnt out bus over the tunnel entrance after the train passed through.

This must be inside the Seattle perimeter that the House of Mist had established.  

Nicole sighed and swung around to continue watching their approach, when a light flashed on her helmet HUD. A steady beeping began to sound from somewhere on her armors, but she did not know where. “Um, what’s going on?” She asked to her Ghost. He might have some idea on how this armor worked.

The Ghost flew over and scanned over her armor with his light, but before he could answer; Rykis unscrewed a canister on her back and replaced it with another from his pack.

“You ran out of...” He held up the bottle he had removed from her back and gestured to it, and then to the hoses that hooked up to her helmet. “I do not know what to call it in English...” He named it in his language, but she had nothing to connect that too.

As soon as he had replaced the tank, Nicole tasted that chill again and coughed once. “What if it goes off again?” It undoubtedly would.

“Ether,” He used their word for it again, but continued in English. “Is lightly rationed here in Mist, you can pick up your weekly allotment from the community depot. Usually two canisters last a day.”

“Is it required?” She asked.

“I think so.” Rykis just shrugged to her.

The lack of information was a bit worrying to her, but who else would she ask. Jasix was probably not better than Rykis, though she would probably get the best answer from Baroness Tansis when she went back.

Once the train disappeared beneath a maze of elevated highway columns and platforms supporting tall buildings it began to slow. It hugged the very edge of the road deck, remaining in its shadow the entire way. It finally came to a complete stop near a cluster of burnt out and rusting train cars that Mist had left to rot away. Scattered amongst them, however, were other flatbed cars loaded down with recent looking cargo. Not all was as lost as it seemed.

She hopped up as the train’s crew opened up the passenger car’s doors, but she let Rykis lead the way. As far as she knew, Rykis had grown up here in Fallen occupied Seattle and knew his way around. Well, as far as she knew, she too grew up in this city... but that was in a time that was locked away from her.

“To the material exchange, yes?” He asked.

“Yes, please.”

Rykis gestured for her to follow as he quickly hurried up the stairs, heading back to street level. To their left was an old building. It was far older than any of the others around it. The building’s stone and brick exterior had a certain artistic flair to it that was lost on the newer utilitarian structures around it. UNO STON was hanging from the wall in large brass letters. There were a few open spots for missing letters, and her mind filled in the blanks, it had likely said Union Station at some point.

The building’s doors were propped open and Rykis stopped and waved for her to enter first. Nicole obliged and walked in. The interior of the building was really only one room, a grand hall which occupied its core. While the walls were dark and dirty, Nicole could definitely see that the chamber used to be a very beautiful space. The only light were small work lamps set up around small tables and racks with sheets of wood other construction material. There were small stacks of any kind of material thinkable with Fallen all over bartering with the shop owners.

Nicole glanced around the space, taking in the ancient architecture that was far better than anything else she had seen in the Human ruins. Smashed through the wall behind her, was a Fallen Skiff. It dangled through the wall, and its headlights had been wired to provide more light to open space from far above.

Rykis began to speak with one of the stand owners that had sheets of wood stacked up against the old marble walls. “She is interested in buying wood panels from you,” he informed the Fallen.

"What does the Human have to offer?” The Vandal replied. “Is it much?”

Rykis waved for Nicole to show her Glimmer to the Vandal, so she too waved to her Ghost. In less than a blink, a small pile of glowing blue cubes had formed on the table. They owned up to their name; the cubes glimmering on the table. They seemed to make their own light in the gloomy room, bits of particles danced across their surface and the table itself.

The Vandal eyed the pile of glimmer on their table. They picked up one of the cubes and brought it close to one of their eyes. “Yes, useful... hmmm but there is not much. Most I can give her is two sheets and some fasteners for this.”

“Very good, that is all we need.” Rykis replied. “It should be delivered to tower twenty-seven in Baron Acskis’ sector.”

The Vandal nodded, “Very well, we have a delivery caravan going that direction tomorrow. Though we only deliver it to the depot for pick up later.”

“That works, for such a price,” Rykis replied. The two Fallen exchanged another saying that Nicole had yet to learn and then he gestured for the door. He kept in their language and talked to her as they left. “How much of that did you understand?”

Nicole took a second to work through the proper responses for him. Listening was fine, but it took longer to reply. “Plenty.” She switched back to English, just to make it easier on herself. “But I’m not all the way there. I can understand more than I can speak.”

“Then I will stay in my language,” Rykis replied, the bits of his cheek bones above his mask shifting into what she took as a smirk. She returned the smile, but then remembered that her helmet had a full face mask with a new mirrored visor. “We’ll see how this helps. Then we can begin our written language when we get back to your tower.”

That interested Nicole, if she knew how to write and read it then understanding the words on her helmet’s HUD would be so much simpler. No more random flashing lights and alarms where she could not understand them. She had only had the helmet for less than two hours, and that one alarm had been enough. “That sounds good.”

And with that, Nicole and Rykis walked back out into the ruined city. For the entire walk to the Bellevue ruins, Rykis quizzed her on the Fallen language. It was much more effective than the method she had started out with the day before.

Chapter Text

>>This chapter has a violence warning for combat scenes<<

Evergreen Point, Pacific Northwest.
House Mist Territory

+33 days

It had been a week since Nicole had covered all the holes in the walls and ceiling with the wooden sheets Rykis had helped her purchase. They worked wonderfully in conjunction with a heater Jasix had brought her not too long after Nicole had returned. Together, the weather sealed room and heater kept her warm even while it snowed outside. The heat that wafted through the hole in the floor that led to Rykis’ space told her that he had a similar setup. 

While meeting down there for her daily language lessons, she saw that he had blocked off his windows with a massive street sign. When she finally questioned him about how he got one all by himself, he showed off a small spherical machine, not too much larger than her Ghost. “We have storage devices, break down objects into information, like you Guardians’ Ghosts do.”

“Couldn’t you have just used that on the wood for me?” She blabbed out in confusion.

“Only works on non-living... inorganic stuff. Like metal, though nothing too complicated or volatile. Though they are quite rare in Eliksni society. I have one because I use to work at one of the markets regularly.”

Nicole nodded and followed along. They were conversing entirely in the Fallen language now. It seemed strange to her that she was learning so quickly; but she had been alive for just over a month now, and had been dead for God knows how long. Who was she to judge how long it took a space magic powered zombie to learn how to speak another language.

However, it had occurred to Nicole that her Ghost was not learning any of the language like she was. He was the only one Nicole had to speak English with but it put him at a disadvantage with the others. “Do you think I could get one?” 

“I do not think so, unless there is a broken one your Ghost could see about fixing.” Rykis rubbed the bottom of his facemask. “I could see about asking the Archon the next time I am at the Center...”

“Okay, we-” Nicole stopped talking when she heard something.

A voice called out from somewhere outside the room. From the sound of it, they were in the old buildings atrium a few floors below their rooms. “Hello?! Is there anyone here? Messenger service!” 

"I wonder what this is about?" Rykis asked aloud as he got up from his bed. Unlike Nicole, he had one of those beds she had seen at the old military base. She had asked about getting one, but Rykis said it would take some time to locate one for her. He opened the door to the atrium and stuck his head out. "What is it? I am on the fifth floor."

The messenger was of the House of Mist’s not-Dregs; the Fallen that were smaller than the Vandals, but had both pairs of arms still. The messenger walked up the stairs and came to Rykis’ door. “Vandal Rykis... Guardian. The Kell is calling a briefing of all ready fighters. The meeting is at noon, at Baron Acskis’ dwelling. Message understood?” 

Rykis nodded, “Yes... we will be there, thank you.” The not-Dreg messenger returned Rykis’ nod and headed back out. Rykis turned to Nicole and sighed. “...I fear that the time has come for our move on the Devils.”

“Well if that's true, then it’s about time,” Nicole said. “How long has it been since you said Humans crossed the mountain pass?”

“Years, not sure. Sometimes they routed around the pass on Ninety, but they’ve not come for a long time,” he replied. Rykis walked over to his window and pulled away one of the road signs to peer at the sky. “It is an hour and a half to noon... probably. We should get going.”

Nicole hopped off the bed and stretched her back. “Alright, I’ll get my armor-” She called to her Ghost in English. “Ghost? Armor me up, looks like the Kell is rallying the troops.”

The Ghost flew down into Rykis’ room, through the hole in the ceiling. “What’s going on?” The armor still flashed across her body suit, fitting much better than her old set.

“Messenger said that they’re calling a meeting. Rykis thinks that we’ll be going after that roadblock camp up in the mountains.”

“It’s about time we do something Guardian like.”  Her Ghost grumbled and vanished into her armor, anticipating her to start on her way.

She glanced over at Rykis, who had been strapping the individual armor plates back across his undersuit. He had left his painter’s sash and bag off against the wall, and had begun to check his rifle over. “I never asked this before, but are you a soldier?” 

“Well not exactly... I work at the market as a translator, and as the only real skilled artistic person... I paint signs. However that is beside the point, I am trained, as is every Eliksni in the House Mist, in the event that I am needed.”

“So you're... a militia member?” Nicole asked as they walked down the stairs and out of the building.

“I suppose that is a good way of saying it, but the only reason I’m in any fighting right now is because the Kell assigned me to follow you, and he definitely wants you at that meeting.” Rykis replied.

Nicole frowned, she did not want to be responsible for him getting hurt. He had been really nice to her ever since she had met him; though he was also the only one could speak to her. But, he seemed to genuinely accept her. “You... don’t have to follow me into this, I can understand your language well enough now.”

“Oh?” Rykis’ eye ridge raised slightly in an inquisitive look. “What does this mean?” He then proceeded to speak something in the Fallen language, and Nicole had absolutely no clue what he was saying. Her silent confusion behind her faceplate caused Rykis to break out a laugh. “That settles it then, I am staying with you.”

Nicole sighed and conceded with a nod. “Fine... you’re right, I just don’t want you getting killed because of me.”

“I have been taking care of myself just fine,” Rykis said. “It will be fine, Nicole. Though I am glad to hear that you care about me.” 

The journey across the ruined occupied city was rough with snow. It came up to her knees in the middle of the road, and snow drifts were climbing the sides of long abandoned vehicles. None of the Eliksni children were out in the streets that day. Everyone seemed to be inside during the storm.

Nicole walked warily away from the skyscrapers; thousands of broken windows held massive icicles that would most definitely cause impact damage without actually damaging her armor.  The constant falling snow and wind made seeing the Baron’s dome nearly impossible until they were a few hundred meters away. The guards standing outside the main entrance were more ornate than the Baron’s usual guard complement; their armor was cleaner and had more decorative details across their armor surface. They wore layers of animal pelts over their armor to probably brace themselves against the cold.

The two glanced at her, their exhale plainly visible in the freezing air. Their rifles raised slightly as they inspected the pair approaching them. When they got closer, one of the guards opened the door and the other waved Nicole and Rykis through. “Quickly, in the back. They are going to begin shortly,” one said. 

“That was quite expedient...” Rykis led the way to the briefing space.

The room was filled with quite a bit more Eliksni, they were mostly Captains with a handful of Vandals. Baron Acskis was not in his mini-throne, that seat was occupied by the largest Fallen Nicole had ever seen; it was the House of Mist’s Kell.

She had seen the Kell only once before when she was only a few hours old; Nicole had been very intimidated back when she had no idea what was going on here. The Kell had moved the throne closer to the display table, and the tactical map that Nicole’s Ghost had made was being displayed.

As soon as Nicole and Rykis entered the room the Kell stood from the throne. “Good, the Guardian has arrived. Baron, let us begin.” Nicole began to translate what was said for her Ghost to understand. He was very thankful that she had remembered to do that for him.

Baron Acskis glared at Nicole in the back of the room, and then stepped up to the projection. “We will be assaulting what we believe to be the main House of Devils camp tonight. Using the storm for cover, Captain Balkasis will take the armor divisions and Captain Verasis’ three Pike groups up the valley-” He made motions and the map transferred to the region, with lines dictating the directions people were to take. “-and attack the Devils roadblock headon and crush it. Meanwhile, Captain Takas will lead twelve Skiffs to flank around and set down on the frozen lakebed and the surrounding ridgeline.”

The Kell took over briefly for the Baron and pointed back at Nicole while clearing his throat. “Guardian, that is what you’re going to be following. Senior Captain Takas and her forces will assault the main encampment. Skiff flyovers indicated that their main camp is directly north from the lakebed. I have utmost confidence in you all, and I expect you to utilize the assets at your disposal to their full potential.”

Nicole noted that the Kell seemed to glare down at the Baron during that last bit. Acskis gave a passing glance towards her again. A knot formed in her stomach; this was not going to be a quick one-and-done operation like the scouting run she had gone out. This was also going to be the first time she had gone into combat since then, and the third time since she had awakened. Nicole glanced over at Rykis, who was looking at the deployment map with some intense concentration.

He turned toward her slightly and noticed her look; he sighed and waved towards the projection. It was still difficult to gauge his facial expression, because the mask, and being a different species than whatever predispositions she woke up with often teamed up together. “I hope you really do have those advantages you mentioned back at your hearing. Your presence has encouraged us to be more aggressive than we have ever been in years.”

Nicole just nodded her head, she was wondering the same thing. Other than her Ghost being able to revive her, she did not seem to be any better than any of the Fallen here. In fact, they were probably better than her in all other aspects regarding combat. The briefing went on; explaining retreat and evacuation routes, where medical stations would be established, and the Kell emphasized that any House Mist fighters should stay out of both the Tanks and the Guardian's way when in the field of combat. Nicole wondered what the Kell thought she was able to do that made it a danger to be near her.

The Kell stood from their seat and waved to the groups of Fallen. “We will be moving out as soon as we are ready. Go to your groups and await the order.” 

She looked over at Rykis again. A Captain had walked over and was talking with him. The Captain was tall and slender, their armor on the other hand was bulky and covered in pouches. They nodded their head to Nicole and introduced themselves. “Guardian... I am Senior Captain Takas. I’ll be leading the Skiff deployment. You’ll be going in with us tonight.”

Nicole returned the nod, but honestly did not know how else to respond other than her name. “It is a pleasure to meet you. I am Guardian Nicole.”

“Mmm... Neh-cole, I see.” Captain Takas waved to the door. “Come, Rykis and Neh-cole. The Skiffs are waiting down in the staging area.” Takas walked them out of the Baron’s home and down the hillside towards the old freeway.

Nicole had seen the staging area before a few weeks ago, but now it was something completely different. There were about half a dozen of the old Human tanks huddled out of the snow beneath the overpass; as well as a few other old vehicles of Human make. They had Spider Tanks too, but they were folded up on trailers, like what Nicole had seen back on the train. The activity in the area was beginning to pick up now that the Captains had returned from the briefing.

Captain Takas lead them beyond the highway and over to an open field that may have been a parking lot at one point in the past. The twelve dropships the Baron had mentioned waited near the ground, gently rocking in the wind and snow. A few held Spider tanks latched into their cargo area, and Groups of Fallen were climbing aboard at the order of other lower Captains. Takas stopped beside the lead Skiff and gestured towards one of the access doors. “This is the one you’ll be riding in. As soon as we hit the ground, you’ll dismount from one of those drop bays.” She pointed over to one of the holes in the bottom of the ship. “When you’re out, clear the zone as quickly as possible. Vandal Rykis here will be right behind you.”

“Got it, Captain.” Nicole said, grabbing hold of one of the hand grips beside the hatch.

“You’ll be the first out. Clear the way for my troops.” Captain Takas’ voice held a tone of seriousness that Nicole had not heard since the Baron had shot her through the head. Nicole gulped and hoisted herself in; which was not as easy since she lacked the additional two arms the Eliksni had. 

The inside of the Skiff was cramped with the others already inside the craft, though they moved out of the way for her as soon as she boarded. No one wanted to touch her apparently. Other than that... it was still a small claustrophobic space. Machinery and pipes lined the bulkheads with computer screens and gauges squeezed between them.  The lack of space did not seem to bother the others though.

The drop bays were located in the tail of the Skiff and the only way to get there was down a low tube she would have to crouch down to get through; seeing as that was the only place where the others were not gathering, Nicole knelt down and crawled to the back of the bay. The bays were wide open and cold air mixed with a few loose snowflakes wisped up around her. Rykis crawled up beside her and sat across from the hole into the world beyond.

“The Kell has ordered the Tanks out, it will take them some time to reach the pass, so we will be waiting here until they are close enough...” Rykis paused. “Also, the storm is getting worse. The weather station near the mountains is reporting that it is even stronger there.”

“Do you think the Tanks will be fine in this weather?” Nicole asked.

“Yes, we’ve tested them in previous winters. They will just be slow.” Rykis shrugged and shifted his position in the bay. He pulled a bag off of the wall and stuffed it under his side for some cushion.

Nicole pulled one off and did the same, he had a good idea. “Ugh, why did they call us in now if it's going to take hours for the Tanks to get there?” 

“Wouldn’t you want to do only one briefing instead of two?” Rykis offered. “Besides, it is not like we can’t just continue what we were doing in the tower here... which was what?”

“Um, you were telling me about that storage ball you got, but that was pretty much over with.” Nicole pointed at the pouch that held it on his belt. “What other kinds of tech would I be able to get once I’m part of the House?” The alarms sounded in her helmet, she needed to switch out the Ether canister. She slipped a fresh one out of a thigh pouch and switched the two out. A cold crisp puff of air blew into her face, it smelled pleasant. Though she did not need to wear her helmet right at the moment, so she cut the air supply and took it off.

Rykis told her about the data-pads and weapons that would be available to her once the Kell had granted her official status in the House. Though there was not much beyond that. He said that she could request a Pike for personal use, or send a vehicle to Tansis to see if it could be repaired, but Nicole really liked the idea of having a Pike. She thought back to when she rode the Pike back down the mountain pass, how freeing it had felt. That would definitely be something she would look into later. 

When the call to take off finally came, Nicole had dozed off on top of the bag. She was quickly awakened by the sudden high pitched whine of the Skiff’s engines lifting the craft out of its low hover. More snow blew in through the hatch as the Skiff flew higher into the storm. It was dusk outside, the orange glow of the setting sun tinted the storm clouds more the higher they climbed. Nicole threw her helmet back on and it hissed back to pressurization.

She summoned her Ghost to the palm of her hand. “Alright, quiet guy, did you get the attack plan for review?”

Her Ghost replied. “Finally, something I can understand. I must say, you learning a language I don’t know is very infuriating. But if you have to ask, yes I did.” His eye lit up and a small projection of the Kell’s plan was floating in the air between Nicole and Rykis’ sleeping form. She reviewed it, at least three times. The Skiffs were to drop them off in the lakebed, and then shoot up to the ridge line to deposit a few of the Spider tanks on top. Covering fire would be provided, but that was all she was able to understand from the map. She huffed and leaned back against the bulkhead. 

Nicole glanced down through the hatch as the Skiff dropped down beneath the cloud later. They were very close to the mountain slopes, way too close. The pass road, old Interstate Ninety, was probably only fifty meters beneath them, and passing by fast. She could just barely see the tank column crawling through the snow just below. The trucks were nowhere to be seen, neither were the walkers.

The tanks were mere moments away from rounding the final corner before they were in sight of the Devil roadblock. The lights in the Skiffs snapped off, as they broke off from the others and flew over the ridge line.

“Here it begins... when the lights come back to full that is when we go.” Rykis sat up from the bag he was sleeping against. Behind them, the other Eliksni in the craft queued up for the drop bays.

An explosion echoed through the mountain valley, coming in over the sound of the Skiff engines. Then another, and another. Rapid gunfire followed. The Tank column had engaged the roadblock.

With the battle beginning, the Skiffs dropped like rocks and swept down low across a frozen lakebed. They flew meters off the ground for just a few moments before stopping suddenly. The lights inside the dropbay snapped back on, and an alarm chirped repeatedly.

Nicole dropped down into the snow. The downforce from the engines was kicking up all the snow from the ground and swirling it randomly across her face. She charged forward and scanned the area that she could see. It was not much in the heavy snowfall, but she had ran into a cluster of tents.

Fallen wearing House Devils colors were emerging from snow-covered tents to investigate the fighting that had begun at the ridge line. Either they were not paying attention, or the snow was too thick, but they seemed to head away from Nicole without seeing her. She squeezed the trigger and her rifle kicked against her shoulder.

Her bullets tore through the nearest group and the under armored Dregs crumpled to the ground. A quick glance around showed that was all she could see here were Dregs, the higher ranks must have another place in camp. Hearing the sound of gunfire from behind them, the other Devils spun around in Nicole’s direction. Electrically charged bolts sizzled passed her and she slid into cover behind a nearby crate. It’s not that she probably could not handle a few shots, it's just that there were a lot of Dregs out there.

An object sailed through the air and landed in the snow nearby Nicole’s leg. Arcs of electricity linked it to the ground and the crate’s surface, and it began to hiss loudly. “Move!” Her Ghost shouded into her ear.

Not to react slowly, Nicole immediately dove out and away from the crate just moments before the space behind her erupted in a thundering explosion and bolts of lightning. She shook her head and pushed out of the snow. The Dreg and a few of their allies that presumably threw the grenade were charging through the burning tents that littered the area around where the crate had been moments before. Nicole brought her rifle up to take them out first, but a volley of fire from her left got them first.

Rykis ran over to her and pulled her to her feet. He slapped her back. “You’re good. Keep moving, we’re clearing as a wave.”

Sure enough, the other squads from the Skiffs were just charging into the tents, and taking on any Dregs that were caught off guard. Most of them seemed to have fled further north, where the others were likely camped. She saw that some Mist Vandals had shoved Dregs into the snow and somehow restrained their arms to their backs. They were taking prisoners. Everything here was moving very quickly, as what Eliksni combat seemed to be.

Nicole moved with Rykis, taking the lead. Her weapon chattering away at the unfortunate Fallen that chose to stay in her way. The three Skiffs behind them took off and fired down into the tent city ahead of the advancing Mist forces before flying back to the relative safety of the ridgeline. The Explosions had ceased on the other side of the camp. Either the Tanks had broken through, or something had gone wrong; all she could hear was the sound of small arms fire from further ahead to the east.

Things were going well enough until Nicole encountered a House Devils Vandal weilding a Shrapnel Launcher. The weapon launched razor sharp projectiles smothered in a burning oily substance. They cut through her shields in one shot, but none impacted her armor with enough force to puncture. She had been in the middle of a reload, and she instinctively reached down to her belt for something. Her hand came back clutching the grip of a simple knife that had materialized out of thin air. Without putting much thought into it, she flipped the knife around to holding from the blade and threw it at the Vandal. As soon as the knife left her fingers it burst into flames, lit by some unknown source. When it struck the dreg the flames immediately spread across the creature almost like they were liquid.

If it had not been killed by the blade sticking into its face, then the crackling fire did the trick.

A series of bright flashes went off up the ridge, followed by a tremendous explosion north of her position. The shockwave blew the snow out of the sky, and for a brief moment Nicole could see what was left of the small town to her north. Pieces belonging to what looked like Pikes and Spider tanks began to fall from the fireball. The leg of a House Devils walker slammed into the snow beside Nicole, still twitching.

Briefly, Nicole could see the ridge above the Devil camp and it was lined with the six Mist Spider tanks she had noticed were missing from the tank column earlier. They had flanked around the mountain and climbed up the backside. Judging by the debris that were raining down, they had just taken out the camp’s vehicle area.

The snow returned and brough the visibility back down to only a few meters. A few ground based flashes streaked upwards towards the ridge. Not all of the Devils’ armor had been destroyed it seemed. 

Nicole rolled to the side and fired a burst into the chest of a Vandal. Higher ranks were starting to filter south to meet the invading attackers. She moved virtually on her own, however keeping an eye on Rykis who was always nearby. One of her bursts struck the Vandal’s unarmored face, and its head just exploded. A white gas sprayed from the neck, and took the rough form of the Vandal before blowing away in the wind.

She was just dumbfounded at that sight, and she looked back at Rykis for a brief moment. What the hell was that? It did not make any sense to her. That would be a question for after the fight.

To her left, the silhouette of a Devil Captain loomed over the shattered remains of a tent. Its shockblades crackled and hissed as it sliced through the protective armor of a Mist Vandal. The electricity arced from the blade to the Vandal, causing it to convulse rapidly as it fell into the snow.

Nicole turned her rife to the Captain and opened fire with a sustained burst. The bullets plinked off the Captain’s shields, the shield indicator on her HUD hardly moved. She had been right not to try and take on the Fallen earlier in the month when all she had was a pistol, this rife was barely getting the job done as it was. But now it seemed completely useless against the Captain.

“Uhh... any ideas, Ghost?” She was able to hear the panic in her own voice as she instinctively switched back to her native language.

Her Ghost’s voice cracked from her helmet speakers and an indicator started to flash across her visor, highlighting various fallen weapons that had been dropped by the dead. “I’m working on it... give me a second.

She continued to plink away at the shields, constantly moving to stay out of the Captain’s range.A highlight flashed across her HUD; it was displaying an overlay above a discarded Wire rifle sticking out of the snow.

“That should do the trick!” Her Ghost announced.

Nicole threw her rifle onto her back and slid through to snow to grab the weapon, dodging underneath a swing from the Captain’s shock blades. She had seen it used more than a few times on the only two engagements she had been on previously. Pulling the trigger, the weapon charged up and fired.

The energy bolt slammed into the Devil’s shields. They burst in a flash of blue crackling energy, and the Captain stumbled from the force of it.

Nicole’s shoulder hurt too, there was not that much padding on the rifle’s shoulder stock. However, it was in her interest to make it worse for the Captain; she fired again. This bolt had no shields to stop it, but the heavy armor over the Eliksni’s body provided ample protection. A good sized dent on the breastplate knocked the Captain back, but he stood back up and moved to charge for her chucking as he went, and then vanished.

She blinked the confusion. It took her less than a second to recall that Tansis had told her that the Eliksni could teleport; but it was a second too long. The Captain reappeared right in front of her and brought one of his electrified blades across her chest. It glanced off her armor, but sliced through her soft padded belly. She winced and lept back out of the Captain’s reach, then pulled the trigger once more.

The recoil kicked her shoulder, and the reverberations caused more pain to shoot from her stomach. The Captain would not be a problem anymore; it’s headless corpse sat half a meter away in the snow.

With one hand, Nicole pressed against her wound and it came back red. More pain pulsed from within. “Not... again...” she muttered. Cautiously, she peeled the bodysuit apart at the tear, unsure if this would be a wound would have to be healed right away.

Evidently the bodysuit had been keeping her insides.. inside. Bits of her internals fell down into the snow and blood turned it red. She dropped down to her knees as the pain tripled. That just caused more to flow from the gaping hole in her body.

With the Captain dead, there did not seem to be any other Devil’s around. Her Ghost appeared beside her and flew down to her belly. “Ooh that’s bad... let's fix that right up shall we?”

Nicole tried to tell him to shut it and just fix her, but she could not make herself say the words. She had never been really wounded . Except for when the Baron shot her when he was frustrated, she had just been instant killed every time and had been spared the pain. Her Ghost’s eye emitted a bright light and she felt it’s warmth pass over the pulsing spot. All at once, the pain ceased and was replaced in a warm sensation. Nicole watched as the bodysuit was stitched back together by her Ghost. It looked good as new, and she felt good as new.

“There you go, all patched-” The sound of crackling electricity sailed through the air and struck the snow not too far from Nicole. An Eliksni Grenade blinked once and detonated in a flurry of snow and arcing bolts of energy. Nicole rolled into her side and was thrown a few meters by the blast. Her Ghost, however, was propelled head on into a crumbling wall nearby.  

The smoke rose from singed points on her armor where the bolts had arced between her and the grenade, she rolled over and crawled towards the crumbling wall. Her body tinged from the shock, but she pushed beyond it and jabbed her hand into the hole in the wall. Nicole pulled out her Ghost; he was intact, but was not responding to her. He blinked and his fins twitched, however her Ghost did not float off of her hand. 

“No no no... Ghost!” She brushed the soot from his shell and eye. “Wake up buddy...” The Ghost just blinked again with no other response. If he was out of commission, even temporarily, what would happen to her if she died? Would she just be down for a bit of time, or would she be dead for good; she had no clue.

The ground rumbled as another barrage from the Mist tanks on the ridge fell  closer to where she sat in the snow. It brought her back into the moment at hand and the battle still going on around her. A House Devils Vandal lept over the other end of the shattered house and raised its shrapnel launcher. Nicole stuffed her Ghost into one of her belt pouches and dove for the Wire rifle nearby. Before she could shoulder it, the Vandal took a rapid fire burst to its side and dropped.

Rykis lowered his rifle and grabbed Nicole's shoulder. He lifted her to her feet and handed her a spare automatic rifle from his back. “Are you okay, Neh-cole?”

“My Ghost is stunned and out of commission. I think I'm mortal for now,” she replied with a cough, answering in the best Eliksni she could muster at that moment. “How are you holding up?”

Rykis’ face flashed with concern behind his mask, but he nodded. “I am... Doing fine. But you need to avoid getting into these situations. Use more cover.”

“Yeah, okay.” Nicole shouldered the rifle and glanced around, “We need to move north.” The fight in their immediate vicinity had seemed to come to an end, with the sound of battle heating up further up the valley. She moved at a half couch through the snow. It was slow moving, but kept her form out of sight among all the impact craters across the field.

The area beyond the first Devil camp was barren snowfields much like the lake bed where they had landed. The occasional tree gave the Mist fighters some cover besides the snowstorm. The radar on her visor blooped as a group of red contacts advanced toward them. She was not sure what the range was now that she was on her own for now. Dropping down on to her belly she groaned internally as her bruised ribs protested the strain. Rykis dropped behind her and crawled through the snow beside her.

“What is it?” He asked.

“Sensor is showing that there are some Devil’s up ahead, four of them coming towards us.” Nicole moved forward, slowly and continued to talk. “Going to stay low so they don't spot us first”

“Remember, stay safe.” Rykis still sounded concerned. Nicole sent back a look at the Vandal but kept pushing on. He remained just a few instances behind her.

She checked the sensor after a few meters to see that the four icons had stopped moving towards them. They were just beyond her field of view in the storm so she aimed the automatic rifle in their direction. However, before she fired, the indicators vanished from the readout. Confused, Nicole stood up on one knee.

Suddenly, a bucket full of snow belched from a small depression beside her and the rumble of machinery shook around her. The snow fell away as one of the Fallen Spider Tanks rose out from its snow covered pit and knocked Nicole effortlessly out of the way. Rolling back upright, Nicole brought her rifle around. It looked like a different model than the kind she had seen so far. Sitting on the back, right behind the main gun turret was a Devil captain seated on an auxiliary turret and a myriad of other weaponry hanging down right beneath the Walker’s head; Its two front legs were angled differently as it began to walk towards the ridge line.

She opened fire with the auto rifle and the energy charged shots pittered harmlessly against the hull. Lowering the gun slightly she sighed. “Okay I didn’t think that would really work.... Rykis, we have a problem!”

The Captain on the auxiliary turret spotted her and swung the weapon around to face her down. Kicking up snow, Nicole dashed in a roll as the spot where she had been exploded. She fired back, letting the bullets rake across the Captain’s shields. The indicator that appeared above him flashed down, this gun appearing to be more effective against shields than her old Assault rifle. She kept on him, moving behind the Walker to the other side. The Captain’s shield burst and he fell from the turret spasming. But unfortunately the Walker became aware of the fight going on behind it, and it turned in place; one of the legs stomping down on the dying Captain attempting to get back on his feet. 

“Rykis!?” Nicole shouted, looking around her. “Where the hell are you?”

The Walker spun around enough for its chin mounted machine gun spun up and began to lace the area around Nicole with fire. She dove out of the way, coming back up on her feet and moving around the back side of the machine to keep it turning.

Coming in behind her, Rykis tore something off of his belt and pulled the lid off. A brilliant red flame sprung from the flare as he dashed passed the Guardian. Nicole looked on in confusion as Rykis ran straight towards the spider walker and slapped the flare to the side, some unseen adhesive holding it to the hull. He sprinted back at her, and picked her up. “I have just called it into our tanks!” he shouted.

The machine gun on the tank spun up and spat bullets in their direction as the gravity of what Rykis had done dropped into her mind. On the ridge above the valley, the Mist Spider tanks honed in on the flash of light on their sensors, and fired. Nine high explosive shells  were launched through the air and slammed into the Devil’s Walker. The first two shells detonated against the armor, doing little besides denting the armor plating, but seven more blasted against the vulnerable joints; ripping the machine and its crew apart. 

Rykis thankfully had put enough ground between them and the tank for them to be spared death from the concussive force alone. He had dropped them into a tree well to take cover when the tank ceased to be. The blast knocked the snow from the branches, partially burying them in the pit.

Nicoled looked up at Rykis, sitting in the air pocket he had created when he dropped in above her. The only light at the moment was from his four glowing eyes.

“Are you okay?” He asked as one of his arms knocked open a small hole for air, although neither of them needed it.

The snow from the hold collapsed, landing on her helmet’s visor. She couldn’t move her arms under the snow, but she nodded. “Yeah, I’m fine...” She stifled a laugh. “Rykis that was the craziest thing I have ever seen... granted I only remember about a month... but still.”

Rykis shrugged, knocking more snow down onto her. “You are Ghostless, and I care...” With that, he stood and helped Nicole out from the snow. “Besides, neither of us were armed for such a fight.” 

“Well, thanks...” Nicole smiled behind her helmet. “Are you okay? That machine gun was getting pretty close to hitting you.”

He looked down and gave himself a patdown of his front and back, coming back clean. “All seems to be well.” Rykis looked like he was going to continue, but paused and listened to a voice speaking in his helmet. 

It then occurred to her that she had not been hearing any of Mist’s radio traffic since her Ghost had gone offline. She did not even know how to manually change her signal.

He looked down at her once he had heard enough and noted the way her helmet was tilted; he relayed whatever information he was given to her. “Baron Acskis has announced that the fight is winding down, and our tanks have rolled through the Devil leadership camp and secured a site for transport. It seems that they’re calling for those of us from the first wave to group with the tanks and let the fresh reinforcements finish clearing the camp for any pockets of Devils.”  

Nicole glanced around where she stood in the snowstorm, the area was illuminated by the burning remains of the tank and the trees that remained around it; noticing almost at once that the fight had seemed to piddle into the occasional bursts of gunfire off in the distance. Her mind went back to the attack plan. This camp spanned nearly nine square kilometers according to her Ghost’s count, and the eastern part of the camp, across the old highway, had held the Devil’s air pads. Apparently during the fight they had found that their leadership was to the north, where the tanks now waited.

The two walked through the snow, on edge the entire way. Bodies and ruined equipment belonging to the House of Devils was scattered in groups, most not too far from what looked like the remains of cabins they had probably been using as shelter. They had managed to catch the Devils’ by surprise, and won out.

The tanks were sitting in snow up to their side panels, and a few had plows fastened to their front plates. Nicole spied more than a handful of fresh dents and ruined armor panels. All recent battle damage. There were only three of the tanks here too.

“Will we be getting Skiff pickups once we are out of the battle site?” One of the House Mist Not-Dregs asked, climbing aboard the back of one of the tank turrets. 

The Not-Dreg standing out of the tank’s cupola, a Tanker as Tansis had informed her, shook their head. “No, you will either march back, or ride on the turret. Skiffs are ferrying critically injured to where Baroness Kisakas has set up medical treatment.” The first Not-Dreg grumbled and threw a pack onto the back of the turret and sat down on it. leaving it at that.

Rykis waved for Nicole to climb on first, and she obliged; taking a seat on the cold metal on the front of the turret, where she could lean against the main cannon for support. Ideally, they would not need to move the gun on their way back to the staging area. Rykis dropped heavily against the turret beside her. The fatigue that she began to feel in her body was probably hitting him just as hard.

One of the tanks, fully loaded with House Mist fighters, lurched and began to pull out of formation. Dozens of others were walking beside it, having arrived too late to secure a spot on the first run out of there but opting not to wait for one of the other tanks to leave. Almost as soon as the tank had left the grouping point, a sheet of metal that had been up against a ruined building exploded outwards, bouncing off a nearby hulk of a truck.

Nicole found herself staring straight down the blowing barrel of a rocket launcher held by a House Devil Dreg. In the split-second before the Dreg launched the rocket, Nicole’s head raced. She just had to jump off the tank, but Rykis probably would not react as fast... and he was only there because of her and she cared for him too. She gave him a shove off of the turret, and only afterwards did she recall that her Ghost was still not working and in her pocket.  

The rocket slammed into the turret’s armored plate where she had been leaning just moments before. Her shields managed to soak up the blast and kept her alive, but the wind had been thoroughly knocked from her lungs. She was launched sideways into a snowbank that had formed against a shipping container. Pain shot through her leg as it violently impacted something buried beneath the surface. She felt a snap in her leg as snow buried her underneath the container. Her head was spinning, but she was alive; however that pain in her leg was just growing worse by the second

Outside the snowbank, the Vandal atop the third tank swung the machine gun turret around and lit up the doorway, The armor-piercing tipped bullets punched fist sized holes in everything and the Vandal did not stop firing until he was sure no others were hiding inside the building.

Rykis stumbled up from where he landed and looked from the tank, where he had been sitting, and to the missing chunk of building that the rocket had been fired from. Where was Neh-Cole? He spun around and scanned the snow, all four of his eyes searching for the Guardian. They had been getting close, as friends at the very least. It was strange as well, being the one to teach her how to speak his language or being her purposed guardian... he was a guardian for Guardian. Rykis would have laughed if the situation was better. He spotted her arm swinging around in a snow pile trying to dig herself out.

Leaning down, he used the butt of his rifle to dig snow out from around her. As he got close, the snow began to turn red and it took a second for his  mind to make the connection that Human blood was red. Moving with more haste, Rykis grabbed Neh-Cole’s arm and pulled her out. The blood was coming from a large gash in her leg, but it was impossible to tell how bad beneath the bodysuit; there was a jagged piece of metal visible in the melted red snow that looked to belong to the remains of a vehicle from long ago. She groaned when he rightened her. 

“Thanks...” she mumbled and attempted to take a step away from him now that she was free. Unfortunately when Nicole went to step on her injured leg, the pain overwhelmed her again and she dropped back to the ground. “Fuck.”

Rykis quickly scooped her up and held her in his four arms. “It is alright, Neh-Cole. I do not mind.” He offered to carry her down the mountain.

She gasped as her injured leg swung down and bent at a weird angle, the pain flashing through her again. Rykis’ lower arms shifted in order to provide support and ease the pain. “Okay... Thanks... Be gentle I think its broken?”

Nicole took her Ghost out of her pocket to see if he would wake up and heal her, but he did not, Choosing to flash wildly like a strobe light instead. She placed him back into her pocket with a resigned sigh, hopefully they would be able to find a fix for him before too long.

What Rykis meant by carrying her down the mountain was actually just holding her in his arms and walking over to the tank. He climbed aboard and set her atop a pile of tarps with her leg stabilized. Nicole’s helmet was off and she was leaning against his side when the tank rolled off down the highway, making its way back to the Bellevue ruins four hours away.

Rolling though where the road block had been the day before, Nicole could see the remains of one of Mist’s Human tanks smoldering from its opened hatches. A neat hole was punched in the side of its turret. Directly across the highway from the old human vehicle was one of the strange Devil walkers, with its entire crew compartment blown open. It appeared that it had been the one responsible for the killing blow. Further down the road, another Mist tank sat disabled, its track was blown to bits, but otherwise completely intact. The night had been hard fought, but they had won.

A Vandal climbed over top the turret from the other side and looked across the handful passengers riding on the front. “Medic here. Is anyone hurt?”

Nicole did not say anything since she was sure that the medic would not have anything for a Human. However, Rykis waved them over. “Here, the Guardian’s Ghost is damaged, and her leg is wounded.”

“The Human?” the medic asked, crawling over to Nicole’s leg.

“Yes, I’m Human. Can you do anything to help?” Nicole spoke up now that the medic was here already.

The medic unlatched Nicole’s thigh armor and peeled open the body suit to examine the damage. “Mm, bone broken just above your knee... this will take a while to heal normally.” The Vandal must have read Nicole’s inquisitive expression for they continued. “Leg anatomy is very similar to us. Plus cross training was more useful years ago... I think I may still have some Human safe medicines in my kit...” The medic dug into their pack for a few moments and pulled out a cluster of faded glass vials the remains of english letters barely visible.

Nicole frowned and looked from the medic’s face to the vials, and then back at them. “Are those still viable?” 

“They were when I last worked on a Human... probably seven years ago. Old age creation, they say they never expire.” The Vandal pulled out what looked like an injection needle mixed with a gun.

The words UMIC were embossed on the side in worn out chrome. She recognized the name from her ancient security badge. Maybe the medic got the device from where she had worked.

After squinting at the faded text on the side of the vial, the medic loaded it into the needle gun and jabbed around the wound three times. The machine hissed with each injection and then the medic stowed the device in their bag. “This should be a pain reliever, I will wrap and brace the leg until you can get to better facilities.” Nicole nodded as they continued to do just what they said they would.

The pain began to fade until it was nice and dull. Still there, but much more manageable. She began to feel drowsy, either the exhaustion from battle was finally seeping into her system or it was the painkillers were doing it. “Can I see the bottle?” She asked.

“Sure,” The medic pulled the bottle from the injection gun and handed it to Nicole.

She brought the small vial up to her face and tried to read what little was legible on its wrapper. It was definitely a painkiller, and a small bit of surviving subtext said that it would cause extreme drowsiness if dosed properly. “Thanks, this’ll make me sleep.” Nicole handed it back to the Vandal and sighed, deciding not to fight against the medicine  and get some rest.

Nicole repositioned her head onto a bundle of Rykis’ cloak, so that it was not his armor plates, and let the rumbling tank send her off to sleep.

xxx

Something was wrong. Nicole felt off, she could not see. Vertigo flashed across her mind and orange light with a thunderous bang erupted around her. Ice ran across her body and she managed to tear her eyes open. The tank was burning, and she had been thrown carelessly into the snow. Her armor was gone, instead she was her original bodysuit she had been resurrected in. 

She rolled onto her stomach and scrambled away from the wreck. Nothing was making sense and concentrating on anything was proving impossible. The ground around the tank splintered and broke away, falling into whatever lay below.

The ground beneath her shook, and she turned over to see a Kell sized Devil Captain walking in her direction. Nicole tried to scramble away, but seemed to be going nowhere no matter how hard she struggled. 

Rykis appeared just up the road, firing at the Captain with his rifle, a flare in one of his lower hands brightly flashing red. “Neh-cole, Hold on!” he shouted.

The Devil Captain waved, and instead of a barrage of fire coming to strike the Captain and save her, the glowing shots fell atop Rykis... obliterating her friend. A gaseous silhouette of him rose out from the fireball and dissipated in the air.

She rolled back onto her back and scrambled for the sidearm on her hip, but it was completely useless against the Captain. The bullets just pinged harmlessly off of the armor. There was nothing she could do.

He reached down and picked her Ghost from her pocket, not even flinching at each bullet impact. Nicole dropped her pistol in defeat. Her head spinning even faster. The Captain closed his fist over the Ghost, crushing the first thing she knew into a fine white powder and letting it blow away in the wind. The Devil Captain stood tall, seeming to grow even larger before her very eyes. He raised his foot, now the size of an old city bus, and brought it down on her. 

xxx

Nicole shot up from the bed, throwing the blanket off of her and tweaking her broken leg in the process. She was drenched in sweat, even with her bodysuit folded down to her waist. It was a dream... just a dream. Controlling her breathing, she glanced around the room she was in; she was back in her tower. This was Rykis’ bed. Had that medication really kept her asleep for the entire drive, and walk back home? It evidently had. 

Light flashed on through the hole that led up into her room, and Rykis climbed down to check up on her. “Neh-cole, are you okay?”

She nodded in the dim light, “Yes... now I am... That stuff really did a number on me didn’t it?” 

“I carried you back after the Kell dismissed us from the staging area. You slept through all of it,” Rykis said.  

“I see...” She was still tired, and still scared of going back to sleep. But having Rykis here with her was making her feel better. “I was having a rough nightmare just a few moments ago...”

He nodded thoughtfully. “I am also having issues sleeping. That was a terrifying situation we went through tonight.”

“I think it's trivial to be scared if I could just be revived later. But I feel really bad that you had to go through that because of me.” Nicole put forward her thoughts.

“To be honest, I could have decided not to go, but like I mentioned before I left, I am here to help you...” Rykis looked down at her and twiddled his thumbs, “But I would be lying if I say that I am glad I did.”

“I get that, I’d rather not go and fight either; but that's apparently what Guardians are supposed to do,” Nicole sighed. “I don’t want to think about it... just wanna go back to sleep.” Rykis nodded and started back towards the ladder that led up to her room, but Nicole called back to him. “Wait... Rykis.” She hesitated. “Do you think you could stay here with me?”

Rykis stopped, and turned back around. His head cocked at an angle. “Are...are you sure?”

Nicole moved over, so that there was more space in the bed, she separated the blankets in two so they would each have one. “Just be sure that you don’t hit my leg.” He nodded slowly and came over. The bed was big enough for them to use and not touch. But she felt that just having him nearby would help her sleep. 

“That is... doable,” Rykis replied, crawling in beside her. “We’ll look into getting your Ghost fixed in the morning,”

“Sounds.. like... a... plan...” Nicole yawned out loud. She was grateful for the other presence with her. Even if he carefully stayed clear of her leg. He was a welcomed friend, and maybe more. Though that would be something to look into later; some feelings were still new to her, and would need time to develop.

They slept well, even into the next morning.

Chapter Text

Evergreen Point, Pacific Northwest
House Mist Territory

+157 Days

Nicole yawned and stretched out beneath the blanket; swinging her legs over the side of the bed, she stood up and pulled her undersuit back over her shoulders. The Eliksni lying beside her in the bed rolled over and flipped the blanket over the hole she had left behind. Things had been going well enough over the last four months since the two had begun sharing a bed together; those first few days after the battle had been both emotionally jarring and traumatic. They had bonded that night more than they had ever before, even if they had been practically living together at the time. She was not entirely sure how relationships went with the Fallen, but they were managing. Even if she did not understand where they stood to him, to her, they were very close.

Remaining cocooned in the warm blankets, Rykis rolled to face her. "What's the plan for today?" He asked in his native language.

She had hardly uttered a word of english ever since the battle in the pass. Her Ghost was the only one that refused to use the Eliksni language; it had become clear that he actually did know the language, just preferred not to talk in it. Her language lessons from Rykis had gradually stopped after the second month and now she was just learning by exposure nowadays.

"I think we're going after another camp," Nicole answered. "Scouts found another further north on another abandoned mountain pass."

The large House of Devils outpost they had cleared off of the old Interstate-90 mountain pass had not been the only one in the area. The Devils had evidently created small dens and chokepoints all over the mountain range and foothills to harass House Mist and the reported Human settlers in the region. Thankfully the first camp they had cleared out months ago seemed to be the largest thus far. Nicole had been going on missions almost weekly to remove them. Every time had been a success, but it was never long before another made itself known.

Most of the locations had actually been given up by House of Devils defectors. Jasix had told Nicole one evening that Dregs and some Vandals had been coming down the mountains bannerless ever since the local leadership had been decimated at the mountain pass. They brought plenty of intelligence in exchange for a place in a friendlier House. Nicole was a bit miffed about that, the Dregs were welcomed into the house much faster, and she was not. She had already done more for Mist than she had thought she would have to, and she was still waiting on approval. It was out of her control, she would just have to be patient.

"Another camp," Rykis shook his head. "How many more of them are there?"

"Not a clue, but there are fewer and fewer of them every time; eventually we'll be done," Nicole replied.

"Yeah… eventually." Rykis sighed.

"Alright, come on. We have to be at the highway by eight AM, and you know how long that walk is." Nicole finished strapping her boots on and stood up. "We don't want to keep Baron Asckis waiting." She pronounced the Baron's name as Ass-kiss just to spite him; she never used it in public, only in the comfort of her own home.

With another sigh, Rykis threw the blanket off of himself and pulled his armor closer. "Your Human timekeeping throws me off," he commented. "Why break up the day into twenty four bits, why not twelve like us?"

"Rykis, I can't answer for Human history, my clock was pre-set to it anyway. It's just what I'm use to. Besides, can you tell me why you use twelve?" She glanced back at him with a playful smirk.

"Well its... um well... no I cannot," he paused. "Its just how its always been."

Nicole laughed and stuck her tongue out, a decidedly human gesture that lurked in the depths of her subconscious. It had turned out that the Eliksni of Mist had a similar expression, but one that required the use of their mandibles, and of course a maskless face; mandibles that she did not possess. "Same for me, Rykis. All history."

"History neither of us know," Rykis shook his head.

Nicole mirrored the gesture and then looked up to her old room. "Ghost, Come down here!"

He hovered down from one of the few holes in the ceiling. His shell was still blackened in some places where he had taken the strike from an Eliksni arc grenade four months ago. She had tried to clean it off, but some areas had proven persistent. The arc zap had knocked him out for nearly five days, and Nicole had been extremely worried that he may never recover.

She brought it up to Baroness Tansis one night, and she came up with a potential solution; she would hit the Ghost with another shock, and hopefully that would reset the little machine's system. Tansis had brought over an old medical device, she likened it to what humans had apparently called a defibrillator. Nicole had not known what one was, but it had been explained to be a device that delivered a regulated electrical shock to someone to restart or restore their heart beat. Tansis charged the paddles and pressed them against the small machine's core. One quick jolt later, and Nicole's Ghost shot off the table and did a lap around the room.

Afterwards, he had been very adamant about who had held him while he was out. He apparently found the thought of being held by an Eliksni disturbing , something Nicole did not agree with at all. She had told him that her hands were the only ones that touched his shell, but that was only mostly truthful.

The Ghost came to a stop just in front of her, giving Rykis behind her a glare. "Yes Guardian, what is it? Oh!" He seemed to light up as he realized they were getting ready to go. "Are we headed out to another rough and tumble with the Devils?"

"Yes, headed out soon. Can you summon my gear the easy way, gotta beat slowpoke back there."

She flicked her thumb back at Rykis who was pulling his straps taunt with one pair of arms and wrapping his others with cloth at the same time. More than once she had wondered what it would be like to have a second pair of arms, so much more she could do... like carrying four guns instead of two.

"Got it," he Ghost replied.

"Laugh all you want Neh-cole, for I am just about..." Before he could finish his sentence, Nicole's armor vanished from the table and materialized on her body in a flash.

"Done," She finished for him.

Rykis just sighed and chuckled. "Okay fine, you win. Again."

Nicole unclipped her helmet from her belt where it had appeared and slipped it over her head. She reached out and gave her Ghost a pat on his shell. "Thank you Ghost. Come on Rykis, lets go." She pushed out into the corridor and found that the weather was pretty bad. Water dripped through cracks in the atrium skylight, Nicole's patch job up there was doing good enough.

The main stairwell had probably been the most intact part of the building when she arrived. She had swept up all the dirt and cleaned the remaining light fixtures recently, and wondered why there was so much dirt inside a seemingly closed space. This rain storm gave her the answer; the runoff had transformed the stairwell into a roaring waterfall, splashing down the steps and over the side of the landings.

"Guess the stairs are out of the question." She sighed in annoyance, they would need to be cleaned again. After the weather passed. She turned around and hopped over the railing overlooking the central atrium, and splashed into the marsh a floor below. Only in a few areas she could tell that this used to be the hotel's pool; a ceramic tile here and there, and the diving board poking out from a cluster of ferns and moss.

Rykis dropped beside her and grumbled, she had waterproof boots and all he had were woven wrappings. "Remind me to retrieve my proper footwear if we ever return to Seattle together."

"Why didn't you get them last time you went over yourself?" Nicole asked, trudging through the water towards the door out to the terrace. At some point long ago, a landslide had back flowed up and over the outside wall and created an easy slope down to ground level.

"I forget easily and you might remember where I do not." Rykis shrugged and followed her out into the rain storm, then they stomped down the fern covered muddy hillside.

Around the front of the building, Nicole noticed that there was an old Human truck parked under the overhang. It had not been there before; she had walked under that overhang countless times right where it was parked. She then noticed that it was rumbling quietly, and Nicole changed directions to investigate. Pinned to the back of the truck was a banner bearing the House of Mist sigil, denoting an official vehicle. She figured that was interesting. It looked a lot like the various rusted hulls that littered the roadways across Mist territory, only it was now obviously functional.

She got around to the front, and there was one of the small Not-Dregs that Mist had in the driver's seat. They looked out at her and then back to the lobby entrance, then honked the horn twice. Another Not-Dreg popped out of the doorway and bounded across the parking lot.

"Guardian!" the other Not-Dreg called. "Your presence has been requested by the Kell at the earliest of moments."

Nicole looked over to Rykis who just shrugged. "Him too?" she asked. There was no reason to refuse, a meeting with the Kell was important. Maybe it was finally her time.

"Yes, Guardian." The Not-Dreg said. "Please get in the back of the rig, we will take you there immediately."

"Its best not keep the Kell waiting." Rykis pushed passed her and climbed into the back of the truck, getting out of the drenching rain. Nodding in agreement, she hopped in behind him and the Not-Dreg closed the cloth flap behind her.

The truck pulled out from in front of the old hotel and splashed down the road. The rain was really coming down as they drove over one of the floating bridges that spanned the lake. Nicole was surprised that it was still so intact after so long had passed. She had only been back to the old Seattle ruins once since the day she had been resurrected, and that was only to visit the material market. A real reason never presented itself, so she was looking forward to that as well.

The heavily armed checkpoint on the other side did not stop them, they had already moved one of the tanks out of the way of the tunnel passage. They were just waved through and the truck continued onto the next road. The entire journey only took close to ten minutes before it came to a full stop along side the old theater hall the Kell used as a throne room. Normally, it would take her three hours on foot.

The rear flap swung aside and a Vandal in clean fancy armor waved her and Rykis out. He had netting draped across his chest, like many of the other House Mist Eliksni. The fishing gear look seemed to be something they all appreciated, except for Rykis. The area was protected from the rain by a large canvas of Eliksni design that ran over the street between buildings. Nicole and Rykis were ushered through a doorway and into a room that looked like it had been a back stage dressing room centuries ago.

More fancy armored Vandals were waiting with towels and brushes. They began to brush away the mud and dirt from their armor, making sure that they were presentable it seemed. "So what's going on?" Nicole asked.

One of the Vandals scrubbing the white plated areas on her chest plate chittered. "Our Kell has called you for a formal meeting. If we had given you more warning, I would assume you would have cleaned yourself. Either way, we will have you ready in just a few moments."

She looked back to Rykis and directed her next question to him. "Think this is good news?"

Rykis nodded once, "There was no way that the Kell would call you into a meeting to dismiss you. He must have decided to accept you into the House."

"I can only hope so." Nicole giggled, a bit giddy at the thought.

When the cleaning crew was finished, one final Vandal came in through a door and collected the two now clean and polished visitors. "Follow behind please. Stay three paces behind me, Guardian. Vandal Rykis, three paces behind the Guardian."

The Vandal guard retrieved an electrified spear from the wall, the blade cracked with energy, but it did not seem that its purpose was for combat anymore; the spear was decorated very similarly to their armor. Nicole complied and followed the Vandal out into the main hall had once seen orchestras and plays, but now served as the place of leadership of an Eliksni house.

Now that Nicole was more familiar with the Eliksni, she could take in the area more; although that did not mean that she was not nervous about whatever ceremony that was about to happen. There was still the slight chance that this was all going to be an elaborate refusal of her request to join the House. Even with all her time that she had spent with the House so far, that spur of the moment decision to request to join had been a horrible idea. She was still new to being alive and did not have all the cards in front of her, and had been to bullheaded. Now they were going to see what it was all about.

The theater hall had been cleared of its seats at some point, though there were still some at the edges of the room. They were occupied by none other than fellow Humans. Nicole was surprised; she had not seen a single human until this moment. They were dressed in what had the appearance of casual clothing, but wore tabards with the House of Mist sigil over them. The humans looked happy to see her, giving her a small wave as she entered the hall. She waved back to them, intending to meet with them after whatever this was had concluded. It made her feel better knowing that they were so happy to see her there, even if she did not know them.

She took notice of all of the Mist Barons that were standing at the base of the old stage. Nicole recognized Baroness Tansis and Baron Asckis talking with one another. Asckis scowled back at her, though his expression did not look as aggressive as the previous times she had met with him. She had gotten pretty good at reading the emotions off of the Eliksni faces, especially with only half the face showing most of the time. There were not many of the lower ranks though, Nicole could only count maybe six Captains and a handful of Vandals.

She was escorted down the center of the hall, and stopped at a raised platform a few meters from the stage. Flanked by more of the Kell's guard, the Kell himself emerged from the back of the stage. Everyone knelt down, and Nicole followed suit. The Kell lowered himself into his throne chair and addressed the assorted members of House Mist before him.

"Barons of House Mist, I have called you here so that you would all bear witness to my final decision on the matter of the Guardian." He looked down at Nicole. "The Guardian has already proved that they are willing to fight for us under the Mist banner, and they have followed every request we made of them. Baron Asckis, as you were the only one to oppose her initial request, what say you now?"

Asckis glanced back at Nicole on the platform and shook his head. "As much as I hate to admit it, but the Guardian has proved to be a useful tool in dislodging the House of Devils from our mountains. I still do not trust them to be completely loyal to us."

"I understand that complete loyalty will be something we will likely never see, the Guardian is ultimately loyal to the Great Machine." The Kell nodded to Asckis. "However, she has met the requirements that I placed on her privately for House Membership, and the Guardian has surpassed the normal milestones we place on other inductees to the House. Are you still advocating for refusal, Baron?"

"No, my Kell, I... withdraw my refusal." Baron Asckis said, looking down at the ground.

The Kell clapped his upper arms together. "Excellent, does anyone else have anything else to say regarding the Guardian?"

Baroness Tansis spoke up from where she stood. "Not regarding House membership, but I would appreciate it if she, and mainly her Ghost, could spend some time with me at the Vehicle yard."

Nodding in agreement, the Kell offered a hand in Tansis' direction. "I am sure that she would gladly assist you."

Another Baroness, one that Nicole had never met before rose from where she had been sitting. "I would like to see the Guardian make her presence known in the north. We are fairly isolated from our main den, and contact with Humans is exceedingly rare. It would be good for my boat crews to meet with a member of the risen before going out on the summer runs."

"That is another excellent idea, however with House membership, comes her right to movement in Mist territory, unless ordered she is free to visit on her own accord." The Kell said. "Anyone else? No? Very well then, with that I view this petition approved. Guardian Neh-cole, I welcome you to the Great House Mist."

Nicole smiled behind her facemask before removing the helmet from her head. A great worry left her chest, they were not going to kick her out to make it on her own, they were welcoming her in. She had been mentally prepared if they had chosen the other, but this was so much better. She knelt down on the platform, Rykis had told her a few weeks ago that it was what she should do, and she hoped he was right.

The Kell continued. "Every Eliksni carries their House Banner with them, and we are honored to have you carry ours with you." One of the fancy armored Vandals stepped over from the side of the platform with a folded sheet of cloth that could only be a small House Banner that the Kell was referring to.

"Even should you eventually depart on a quest to the Great Machine, you will retain your House status and will always be welcome to return."

Nicole stood up and accepted the folded banner. It was small enough to fit into one of her belt pouches, so she quickly placed it into the one closest to her side. "Thank you my Kell," She replied, kneeling once more.

"If you do eventually travel to commune with The Great Machine, please let it know that we have treated its new chosen with respect and have assisted them where we can to get through their whirlwind. I hope that the Great Machine will welcome us once again."

She nodded to that thought. As of yet, she had not actually seen anything that the House of Mist had done for other Humans; in fact no Humans had been seen anywhere in the Mist territory that Nicole had visited yet. They had treated her well, and Rykis had told her about working with other Humans, but still, there had not been any personal experiences yet to judge the statement against. Finally, she replied with a mild assurance that she would do what she could.

All of a sudden from stage left, a large Eliksni wearing similar armor to the Kell, but appearing to be older than anyone else's in the chamber marched across the stage platform. A large circular machine the size of a Vandal floated in behind them; it was a Servitor, one of the machines the Fallen used to make Ether. Nicole had seen one or two in the other outings she had done against the Devils.

The intruder fumed not anger but what appeared to be annoyance. "Sirakas I cannot believe you went through with this so quickly. I told you not to accept her into the House until I had a chance to speak with her." He jabbed a finger at the Kell in the throne chair. "Welcoming a chosen of The Great Machine is an important event and not something for a simple summons."

"Archon Marakis I would like to apologize for the assumed haste, but the wait for our Guardian sister has been longer than any other." The Kell chided.

The Archon seemed to calm, even though he kept the energy in his voice. "Fair enough, my Kell. I just wish to take the Guardian and speak with her at my complex; to help her understand the House that she had requested to become a part of."

"I see no problem with that, will you go with the Archon, Guardian?" The Kell asked her directly, the tone in his voice seeming to encourage her to leave with him as soon as possible.

Nicole looked to the Archon. "Of course, I would enjoy an opportunity to learn about Mist." Rykis had told her some, but if this high ranking Eliksni would like to sit her down and talk, who was she to say no.

"Excellent, you should come with me right away, my Skiff is waiting." The Archon motioned towards the door that he had come from.

She nodded and hurried up to the staircase leading up to the stage. The other Humans would have to wait until later, and they did not seem bothered by her quick exit. Rykis seemed to not know whether to follow or stay, and elected not to leave with them. The Archon led her out to the street through what had been an emergency exit door at one time. The ship waiting was a large Skiff, large enough to easily hold the much larger Fallen. It was hovering in the street, wobbling slightly in the heavy rain and wind.

"Please join me on board." The Archon said, climbing through an open hatchway.

Nicole felt really small sitting in the passenger compartment across from the Archon. Everything inside was sized for him or the Barons. She felt like a child, even though she could not remember ever being one, the feelings were still there.

The Archon sat and glance out one of the viewing ports as they roared over the ruins of Seattle. "This must have been quite a wonderful city before your Collapse." he commented.

She nodded and looked out at the overgrown roads and buildings. Some areas boasting trees that looked like they belonged in an old growth forest. "I do agree, but do not remember ever seeing it any other way than it is now."

Archon Marakis guestured a motion Eliksni often used as understanding. "So then it is true that the Great Machine's Risen do not remember the lives before, interesting." He grew silent again for the rest of the quick trip.

The view west, beyond the city that she had seen on the ground, was of old docks. Like the other ruins Nicole had seen while on the train, the port facilities and piers were high and dry. Trees sprouted at the bases of tall pilings that lead into a sort of valley. From this height, she could still see that water entered the old bay, but it was probably a good kilometer way from its historical location.

Nestled between the skyscrapers was a strange tower that stood over a low built park area. It was an old human design, red and rusty but some specks of white still were visible in areas; it was also leaning slightly towards the coast.

The large dropship came down for a landing at a cluster of buildings near the towers' base. More strange old human construction jutted out from a pond; probably some kind of art that was barely standing after all the years. The Archon got out and took her through a set of garage bay doors into a room filled with Eliksni styled furniture and machines.

"Come sit." He pointed to a small her sized seat across from one of his size. Nicole took the invitation and sat across from the Archon. "So Guardian, what would you like to know about our great House of Mist?"

Nicole looked around the space, and at the Eliksni infront of her. She summoned her Ghost and looked at him, thinking on what he had said about the Fallen when they had first encountered them. "Well, what makes you all so different from the others? Why are you so friendly?"

"Well, my Guardian friend, we can start there." The Archon chuckled. "I suppose it comes from what we were back on our homeworld, before the Whirlwind. I don't know too much about pre-Whirlwind Mist, but we were sea workers. We manned the ships, worked the docks, we were the laborers that maintained the supplies for our society. Mist had a Kell, and all the normal organization Houses had, but we were not at the same level as the others."

The Archon shifted slightly. "We close to the bottom rung of the social ladder of sorts. It made us close knit and more accepting. When we left our world in pursuit of the Great Machine we operated the cargo vessels which carried all our supplies. Then when the infighting began, and the old Houses started to splinter, Mist was split between the victors. We were allowed to exist as long as we maintained our posts and shed our house banners. Our original Kell fell to to Kings, and the leadership followed." The Archon paused. "When the Eliksni fleets arrived here, in this system, those of us that were still loyal to Mist mutinied and re-established our sigil. We recaptured a handful of carriers and cargo vessels, and managed to steal a ketch from the House of Winter."

"House of Winter?" Nicole asked. "How many Houses are there?" There was a lot of history the Archon was skipping over. Like how they managed to take that many ships. Though then when she thought about it, she had met a lot of House Mist members and the Archon had said they only captured a handful of ships. Nicole mentally shrugged; it worked out.

"There are many, though mostly four large Houses. The Devils, Winter, Kings, and the Wolves. Others that I am aware that survived were the House of Storm and Saints... well the Saints are gone now as much as I am aware."

"Wow, if they're larger than Mist, then there must be a lot of Eliksni here." Nicole said.

"Yes, I was not part of the original push, but it had been explained to me that we Eliksni took all we had for this mission after the Great Machine."

"That's a risky push..." Nicole shook her head, then decided to bring the Archon back to his original story. "The mutiny, is that how you ended up here?"

"No, no, after we took the ships we fled to one of the moons around the ringed planet where you Humans had constructed arcology structures. The ships were hidden under the ocean, and moved onto one of the structures. It was not my first choice, but it turned out to work well enough."

"So then how did our ketch end up crashed outside this city if you originally set up out there in the system?" Nicole asked.

"Well, that is simple, Guardian. We, as you Humans would say, 'pissed off' the House of Devils."

Chapter Text

Chapter Text

Central Seattle Ruins, Pacific Northwest
House Mist Territory
+157 days

Nicole and Rykis walked down the path that had been worn through the tall grass. The old road surface was clearly visible here under the dirt. It was cracked and crumbled, resembling gravel more than the flat concrete it had once been. The other trees, not the evergreens, were starting to get their leaves again, and were bringing brighter shades of green to the pale urban ruins. This was her first spring, and it was wonderful, everything was so full of life.

Her meeting with Fort Discovery had gone well; so well in fact that she was absolutely convinced that working with the House of Mist had been the right decision. She and Rykis had spent the remainder of the day walking around the small settlement named after the original park it was built on. There had been a fort there before at some point in ancient history, but its name had been lost to time.

She met many Humans in the fort; over half of them had ties to the region that went back to before the Collapse. Those that had migrated over to Fort Discovery from elsewhere had interesting stories of the world outside the region as well. She had made it a point that return trips would be common for her. The children that her Ghost was entertaining followed him the whole time, trying to play tag with the mechanical ball.

Pedro and Athena had ideas for expansion that Nicole could help with. They had been in radio contact with a group of people due east that were worried about a band of Fallen lurking around their town. The town had been cautious about Mist, but stories of the friendly Fallen out west had apparently made the journey to them. They were willing to move into Mist territory but had no way to do it without drawing the attention of the local Fallen crew. Pedro had planned to bring it to the Kell's attention soon, but the campaign against the House of Devils had kept the Kell busy. Now that things were calming down, he would bring it up and suggest that Nicole help convince the others that Mist was extra safe.

When Nicole finally left Fort Discovery, she found the Archon taking a video call with an Eliksni Vandal who wore a banner she did not know. Though there was a lot she did not know already. It was hard to tell the color of the armor with the screen glare from the angle they were at, but it looked green. Marakis had ended the call and turned to face the two who had approached. He briefly mentioned that he was speaking with the House of Exile, before asking about their tour. Later Rykis told her that the House of Exile was an Eliksni collective that lived up on the moon. Mist apparently had a trade deal with them regarding Ether.

On the flight back to the Archons compound, they all talked briefly, Marakis was interested in how she and Rykis were getting along. He seemed really excited with a Guardian and Eliksni living together and seemed to read the subtext of what was really going on quite well. Sparing them the embarrassment of just saying it.

The day was nearly over by then with the sunset lighting the sky in a bright gold. Their walk back towards downtown kept them in the shade already. Her Ghost spent his time orbiting around the two and occasionally flying off to scan something dangling in the old windows. The ruins were mostly empty, Mist Eliksni lived in the newer buildings that were further downtown. Those buildings were still old pre-Collapse construction, but they were in much better shape than the stone and steel skyscrapers that made up ninety percent of the city. Over the centuries after the collapse, those buildings had remained free of overgrowth and were still somewhat waterproof, unlike her hotel across the lake.

"So, are we headed back to the Kell to catch that truck back, or are we walking home on our own?" Nicole asked.

"No, the Kell gave you the choice of living elsewhere now. You're not restricted to Baron Acskis' outpost." He replied.

"So... where are we headed then?" He did not really answer her question.

"We're headed to where I lived before. I think that you might like it." She could see the edges of his face move behind his mask in what she recognized as an Eliksni smile, then he shrugged. "If you do not, then we can go to your hotel tomorrow, or maybe somewhere else."

"Oh, alright. It's been a while hasn't it?"

"Mm, not as long as you think, I visit it whenever you're busy around Bellevue."

Nicole nodded. "Well that's good; I'd hate to keep you from home."

There was a bleep from her helmet that was clipped to her belt. She looked down and saw something flashing on her visor. "Oh hey, give me a second." Her helmet slipped over her head, but she did not activate the seal.

The blinking icon opened into a list that took up half of the view screen. The word Quests was in bold at the top, with little icons and what she guessed were the quests themselves listed on it. There were only a few entries. The currently highlighted 'quest' had a graphic of one of the metro trains she had seen in the tunnel over a banner for Umic. Memory Troubles was the name with the description "Locate Metro Security Records."

The chirp of her Ghost sounded from the helmet's internal speaker. "Hey! You finally checked out the Quest tab!"

"What is this?" She asked.

"Well, you seemed to be getting a lot of things to do, so I decided to put together some of my own quests for you. Usually these come from the Vanguard at the Last City but given how we're not planning on going there any time soon, I'll do it for you for now."

"Okay... why did it just pop up now?" she stopped Rykis. "Hold on for a second."

"Well follow the marker and find out!" the Ghost replied, at the same moment a diamond shaped marker appeared. He sounded excited which was very unlike himself.

Nicole nodded in the direction the marker showed and started to go. "Sorry Rykis. My Ghost found something he wants me to see. We gotta' detour."

"Then lead on, Neh-cole."

The marker led back and over one block, to the front doorway of a tall office tower. The building's stone facade was crumbling in places, leaving piles of rubble underneath the trees. Once at the door, the icon appeared again further inside. It stopped at a stairwell leading down into the dark. "Alright, we're here. What did you find?"

Her Ghost appeared from inside the doorway and played his flashlight over the remains of a sign hanging on the wall. The letters had faded but most were still legible. -Metro Transit Authority. Regional Security Office.

"I found the place!" He did a spin inside his shell.

At first, she was not sure what he meant, but the name of the 'quest' connected the dots. The camera down in the subway tunnel had been looking right at where her body had been. It was still working and sending the data back somewhere and something was still giving it the command to record. Robust systems were still working somewhere. But if she wanted to find out what had happened to her, all she needed to do was go down and find the network hub.

It was not a priority; she had actually forgotten about it up until now. The discovery of her cause of death was more of a hopeful curiosity than an actual objective. However, there it was... at the bottom of the staircase were some answers about her previous life. Under the helmet she bit her lip and gave it a good two seconds of thought. The answer was obvious.

Down she went. Quickly at first, but immediately slowing for caution; the stairs were slick and covered in moss. That was something she was used to seeing out there. Buildings, trees, rocks, and even growing on the side of Eliksni crates that had been sitting just a little too long; moss was everywhere. The bottom step was submerged beneath a few centimeters of water and somewhere deeper in the basement she could hear flowing water.

At the far end of the large open space, Nicole could see dozens of blinking green lights hidden behind a window. The working systems were a good sign that this was the right place. She stepped into the ankle-deep water and apologized to Rykis. He was not wearing any sort of water-resistant footwear, but he followed her anyway without complaining. Sloshing through the water, Nicole noticed that people had died down here fairly quickly. A few had died at their workstations, leaving their skeletons collapsed over keyboards and left computers in stand-by mode.

The sign on the side of the door said that it was the data-storage room. It was exactly what they were looking for. The blinking lights were the status lights for over a dozen large computer racks. The hum in the room was loud, and the air was warm. The doorway was raised higher than the water, someone had some forethought when they built the place in the basement, so there was no water inside. Once inside with the door closed behind them, Nicole could not hear the water flow anymore.

Nicole had no idea how to search all this for what they wanted, so she waved to the machines. "Okay Ghost, do your thing."

He chirped and flew over to one of the stacks. "This might take a while. These cameras have been recording for centuries..." The Ghost flew from stack to stack, an optical beam connecting with each tower. "Just have to find the feed from your station and trace where it goes. It was Olympic... I think?"

"Well take your time, Ghost. It's not like Rykis and I can do anything."

After a few minutes scanning through the various racks, he had found the data. "I got it!" he exclaimed with all his fins expanding out from his core. "Well, are you sure you want to watch this, last chance."

Rykis looked at the Ghost, and then to Nicole. "What did he find, what are we looking for?"

"Well he found the recording of how I died. The first time." Nicole grimly smiled. "I'm hoping it'll give me something to work with. So yes, Ghost, start it up."

He floated over to a dormant computer station and interfaced with the monitor. The screen flickered and flashed to life. The multiple camera feeds from across the station appeared. There was even sound.

Olympic Park Station
-28 minutes

Umic Security Officer Nicole Walker rushed down the escalator leading into the chaotic subway station. Her heavy plasteel ballistic vest almost knocked her off balance in the shifting sea of Seattle citizens. Thirteen hours ago, she had thought that the vest had been overkill; her regular uniform had woven strands of sapphire wire which was good enough to stop mid-caliber ammunition. But as the day progressed, she no longer felt that way, and was grateful for the vest.

Gunfire at the top of the stairs brought her around with her rifle, aiming the carbine towards the odd colored daylight streaming in at the top of the shaft. The citizens and refugees parted and dropped to either side, clearing a firing lane to the doors. At the top of the stairs her partner, USO. Keane, fired out the door and onto the street. An explosion rocked the shaft and people fell, more pushed deeper into the station.

"I'm gonna' close the doors!" Keane shouted. "Get in here now."

He fired again, Nicole tried to get back up the escalator, but the parted sea had closed and everyone that was up near the top was making their way down whether she was in the way or not.

A cluster of blue energy shots peppered the wall above Keane. A large group of people finally made it through the doors, and he slammed his fist into the switch on the wall. The station's storm shutters dropped from the ceiling and bounced once off their rubber seals.

They were locked in, and the bad stuff was locked out.

Another explosion from outside shook the ground again, more gunfire erupted nearby, it was all muffled by the storm shutters. "Everyone downstairs." Nicole ordered. People that had remained on the stairs, even after the crowds fled, slowly got to their feet, and moved down to the station.

The trains were still running, "Thank the Traveler..." Nicole muttered. There were casualties and moving the injured on foot down kilometers of tunnel was just not going to work.

"Please form a line! Cue up at the marked positions!" A Transit cop in a high-visibility vest was directing the panicked people to where they could board the next subway car. "We'll get you all out of here as fast as we can. The trains are running double-time and filling up at previous stations!"

Nicole walked over to one of the small coffee shops along the wall that had its lights still on. The windows were smashed, but two of the original employees were busy passing out water and snacks to anyone who came for them. She grabbed two bottles of water and a small bag of sugar cookies. Downing her bottle in one go, she headed back into the space between lines where Keane was wiping the sweat from underneath his helmet.

"You alright?" She offered him the other water.

Taking the water, he also drained it. "Yeah... uh... just glad those doors are doing the job." He nodded over to a group of Seattle Police Officers talking on the other side of the next line. "They got working radios. Military's been trying to get up here for hours apparently. Something is bogging down the roads, and the weather is just insane."

She nodded. "We could really use the help. A bunch of street cops and some deputized, heavily armed, and highly skilled, security guards ain't going to help everyone." Nicole smirked; trying to add some humor into the situation.

Keane returned the look with a thin smile. "Yeah, doesn't mean we can't try."

The ceiling chimed. "Train approaching... train approaching."

At the front of the lines, the Transit cop checked his wrist pad. "Alright people, this train is only two-thirds full! Stay in line and wait your turn. We'll all make it out, just don't push."

The sleek subway train slid into the station and squeaked to a stop. The cars were packed, but apparently only part full. Once the doors opened, no one got off, and the lines began to squeeze in wherever they could. With a blow of their whistle, the crowds stepped back and allowed the Transit cops to get the doors sealed and sent the train on its way.

"Next train arrives in... five minutes," chimed the ceiling.

Two more trains came and went, but the population count in the station did not seem to be decreasing. People were just spreading out now that there was more room.

Nicole noticed a lone kid standing in the middle of the station clutching a stuffed animal. It was covered in dirt, but she thought it might have been an Orca. The little girl could not have been older than five, but she did not look scared or sad. Nicole walked over and took a knee beside her. "Hey there kid, where are your parents at?"

The girl looked at her and shook her head. "I dunno, mommy went to get daddy. She said to wait here."

"Well which way did she go?" Nicole asked. Hopefully it was not far.

The little girl pointed the stuffed Orca up the stairs. "She went up there."

Nicole looked up that direction and frowned. That was not good.

"Train approaching... Train approaching."

Unknown to Nicole, the station security system picked up a conversation going on down one of the maintenance corridors, coming towards the station.

"Holy shit Sam, where did you get those?" Voice one spoke out, in audible surprise.

"From nowhere. I ain't telling." Voice two was gruff, and noticeably angry. "Here, take it, it's loaded."

Voice one huffed and had to hurry to follow "What the hell are we going to do with them?!"

"We're getting on that next train. I'm getting us out of this place." A sharp click-clack sound was registered with the system. It was identified as the racking of a shotgun pump by algorithmic analysis.

It would have alerted the authorities if there was anyone left to pick-up. There was not.

Back in the station proper, the next train was slowly gliding into the station. It was only one fourth full. Plenty of room for evacuees. The door in the backside of the station burst open and out rushed two men. One had an assault rifle, and the other in the front was carrying a large gauge semi-automatic shotgun. He fired it into the ceiling once.

"Everyone fucking back off. We're getting on that train, you hear me?" the man bellowed. Chunks of plaster fell to the ground around them.

People froze in place, some dropped to the ground. The traffic cops had their hands on their sidearms, but nobody drew their weapons; not with a threat like that in a crowd of civilians.

"Hey now, there's plenty of space for everyone. Just put the guns down." One of the cops motioned slowly.

"Nah, we're going. Now. Get everyone out of the way." The guy in front swept the gun across the station. "Stay the fuck back."

Nicole eyed the gunmen, both the shotgun and the rifle had large drum magazines, however the guy with the rifle seemed put off by what was going on. That did not change the fact that he was still waving the gun around the crowd.

One of the cops that had been back near the coffee shop came around slowly and half crouched. He looked like he was going to try and tackle the shotgun wielder. If shots started flying, things would go bad very quick.

Nicole threw herself in front of the kid who was just out in the open, well in the line of fire. Too many potential targets had been behind the kid.

The man with the gun reacted to Nicole's sudden movements and fired at her. Under normal conditions, if that shotgun had been loaded with buckshot or some other kind of regular shotgun ammunition, it would have just caused a few dents in her plate vest. However, that gun had been loaded with high-velocity solid slugs.

At the range they were at, there was nothing that could be done. The slug smashed into the center of her plasteel plate, causing it to deform beyond its threshold. Her chest cavity was crushed. The plate had stopped the bullet, but not in any manner that would have saved her life.

Central Seattle Ruins
+157 days.

Nicole watched her original self crumple to the floor and die. The others, who she did not know or recognize, took down the men with the guns. They tried to revive her, but it was no use, she was already gone. Her fellow security guard was visibly distressed and started to kick the guy who had shot her while he was detained. However, the officer in the bright yellow vest pulled him off and shoved him away. The girl was loaded onto the train with the Umic guard and sent away almost immediately.

The people that remained in the station pulled her body far out of the way, moving it to its final resting place on top of the mezzanine above the tracks. One of the people that helped carry her body placed her arms on her chest and draped a tablecloth from the store over her. He seemed to say a prayer and leave, but there was nobody else up there to witness it.

"Well there you have it." Her Ghost blinked. "There is more to the recording near the end, but that's how you died." The video sped up and the station eventually emptied, leaving her body sitting alone on the platform. Nobody else entered the station after the last train zipped down the track.

"Huh..." She had expected some firefight with the cause of the collapse, not getting shot by fellow Humans. It did not change anything though, she had hoped that when she found the video of her death it would unlock the memories of that past life, but nothing came from them. No insight into who she was, or any of the people they had known. It felt almost like a wasted trip; the question of how she died was answered, but there was no extra reward.

"I can tell you're disappointed. If you thought that it would help your memories, I could have told you that it wouldn't." The Ghost replied to the look on her face. "This bit at the end though might cheer you up a little.

Nicole sighed as the video clicked and moved on. With no movement it switched to an 'extended event monitoring' mode. There were only subtle indications on how fast time was passing in the station; a steady drip became a flood of water down the tunnels, drowning the track. Dirt piles slowly grew across the floor from the corners, eventually enough for plants to grow and sprout under the steady station lights. Her body rapidly deteriorated on screen, becoming food for moss and other things that made the station their home.

The video would briefly slow when the occasional animal triggered the cameras, or some big event like part of the roof caved in. The system timestamp degraded into error symbols before the first lightbulb went out.

When the station was looking similar to how it was when she was revived, the camera slowed down back to real time. Movement appeared from the other side of the platform and an Eliksni scurried in looking around the space. They were small and about the size of one of the Not-Dregs.

Rykis made a sound behind her, like a squeak almost, but she continued to watch.

The Eliksni on screen cautiously poked around the ruined metro station, digging through the shelves and boxes left in the cafe. They crossed out to the station mezzanine and came across the moss-covered remains of Nicole's former life. The Eliksni knelt and picked up the old ballistic helmet, the skull still secured by the chinstrap. However now that it was disturbed the skull slipped free and fell to the ground with a loud thunk. A dull ache spontaneously formed on the back of Nicole's head and then faded.

Setting the helmet upside down, the Eliksni carefully returned the skull to its place on the remains. Then they pulled a backpack out from under the moss and ferns that laid beside her body. Digging through it, they pulled out a tablet and what looked like a small stack of notebooks. They put the notebooks back into the pack and threw it over their shoulder but put the tablet into another bag.

The image froze in her head as the video went on. She had seen that bag before. It was so familiar, still covered in paint brushes and other small tools. Her eyes slid over to Rykis watching from beside her. The same bag was slung over his shoulder, looking a bit smaller after all the years. If an Eliksni could look any more guilty, she doubted it.

"Rykis is that you?" Nicole asked him. "Did you take my backpack?" She would not say he stole it; she was dead at the time after all.

Slowly, Rykis nodded. "Yes. that was me. Years ago." His fingers tapped together nervously, and he seemed to think he needed to say more. "I still have your stuff; I was going to give it back when we got to my place."

Nicole raised her eyebrow. "Oh, really now? How'd you know it was mine before we saw this recording?"

He nodded towards the screen showing the current status of the old station. "When we went down there on your third day. You stopped over where your body had sat for so long. I recognized it right away. Yours were the only bones in the station, and the only bones I had seen down there that day."

"Well we just saw why. I hope that guy made it somewhere safe. We'll never know though." Nicole sighed and waved her hand in the air. "Alright, we found what we were looking for. It didn't help me, but let's get out of this flooded basement. Rykis, lead on to your place."

"Yes yes." he chittered. "Follow me."

They headed back up to the surface and into the early hours of night. The occasional streetlights continued burning brightly through the trees that grew around them. Some lights were still on in the various buildings, making the skyline an odd patchwork of light and dark. The walk only lasted a few blocks, not long at all. It was actually directly behind the Kell's hall. Rykis had probably gone home after her last meeting there. She was mainly mentally exhausted, there was a lot that had happened today.

The building Rykis called home turned out to be the old Art Museum. She smiled at that, of course the local artist would choose to set up shop in an art museum. The windows had all been patched over with metal scrap, just like he had done over in her building, and the door was sturdy and weather-proof. He held it open for her to go in.

"Anyone else live here?" She walked in and found herself inside a small tunnel made of hanging tarps. The light was provided by the warm Eliksni tube lights that stuck up from the floor every few meters. Her question was nearly answered by voices from behind some of the curtains that broke off from the tunnel.

"Yes actually. Many of Mist's more artsy Eliksni live in the building. But there is more than enough space that I can have this for my own," Rykis replied. He closed the door behind him and latched it shut.

Taking the lead again, he took her up the stairs and through a set of double doors, to a half sphere structure in the middle of a room. Tarps and string lights spread out from the structure which was attached to the walls and ceiling of the big room they were in. Nicole could see faded and water damaged paintings hanging from the walls which had to be old Human art. The dome structure was obviously Eliksni construction with heat and light pouring out into the cold building from behind the curtain.

"Come in, this is my... uh... home." He pulled the curtain open and gestured her inside.

"It looks very cozy." Nicole followed him through the curtain and into the space. He had probably left it to warm up while he went to meet her.

There was a mix of Eliksni and Human furniture inside. In the center of the space was a table covered in small jars and brushes; she could see a few unfinished canvasses sitting around it. It appeared that Rykis was quite good at traditional painting.

Rykis had walked over to a locker leaning up against the wall. "Take a seat, let me see if I can find it..." He motioned for her to sit at the table with his lower arms.

Nicole sat where he pointed and watched Rykis dig through the locker. From there she was able to get at a better look at the canvases he had leaning against the bench.

She recognized the scene in the painting. The looming Spiderwalker in the snowstorm. Nicole had been standing a meter to the right when this had happened. It was the battle at the Pass, when Rykis had charged the tank with a flare to alert the artillery on the ridge.

One of the other paintings was of the interior of her hotel tower, after she had done some cleanup of the swamp, and made it more like a pond. The light was captured perfectly, and the colors were wonderful. Her art viewing time was cut short as Rykis brought her attention back to him when he placed a hard-backed case on the table. It looked just like the one from the video, just a bit cleaner.

"So, this was mine? From before?" Nicole picked it up and looked it over. The case was made from a slick stretchy material, and the edges cracked when she bent it too much. The straps had rotted away at some point and their remains dangled haplessly at the side.

"Yes, it should be everything." Rykis nodded, sitting across from her. "I was young and looking for salvage back then, I had tried to trade your tablet, but it didn't work and wasn't worth anything. I did like looking through your sketchbooks though."

"Sketchbooks?" Nicole pulled open the bag and heard the rubber seal peel apart, still holding strong over the centuries. Carefully, she emptied the bag and found an old data-pad, and a few notebooks.

"Yes, there were some really old, stylized drawings that I think you did. Just take a look."

"Well if you say so." Nicole opened one of the old notebooks and slowly paged through them. The pages were remarkably well preserved; they were filled with drawings of places and things, as well as some random animals and creatures she did not recognize. They were not as good as Rykis' drawings, but they were fairly good. If these belonged to her, Nicole wondered if she had retained those skills as well as her warfighting abilities.

While carefully flipping through the pages, a small rectangle fell out from between them.

The piece of plastic material was a photograph; it was not even faded at all. Five people were standing in a semicircle, and they were posing with bright yellow guns which looked really strange. She saw herself near the middle of the group in a Umic hat and leaning up against a man wearing a vest with Mars Tactical stitched onto the chest. On the other end of the group was the other Security guard from the recording.

She flipped the picture over and found that it was not actually a piece of paper, it was something more advanced. The back flickered and began to form words across its surface. "11th Quinquennial Intersystem Defense Technologies Convention. SimFire Combat 3rd place team. Hosted by Clovis Bray"

"Huh," Nicole muttered. "Check out me back in the day." She passed the photo to Rykis and put the sketchbooks back into the bag.

The data-pad looked to be in okay shape, but when she tried the power switch nothing happened. At the moment, it was not really worth her time. She figured she could get her Ghost to fix it, but she should probably save it for later. A lot had happened today, and her head was a little fried.

Setting the data-pad back onto the table, Nicole ran her fingers through her hair and let out a sigh. "Well... This has sure been a day. Wanna take me to bed and call it a night with the newest member of Mist?"

Rykis let out more of a purr than a chitter. "Mmm... Yes Guardian."

He dropped the photo on the table and came over to pick her up. By the time they reached the bed on the other side of the room, her armor and her Ghost had made themselves scarce. Hopefully the neighbors did not mind the noise.

Chapter Text

Central Seattle Ruins. Pacific Northwest
House Mist Territory
+158 Days

Nicole walked the short distance between the old art museum and the nearest market. Despite the heavy rainfall that drenched everything, Nicole headed down the overgrown street with a pep in her step. Her brand-new House Banner was proudly wrapped around her belt, showing where she had pledged allegiance, and Rykis had painted the House sigil onto her breastplate that morning. Also, the night before had been nice, there were no complaints from the neighbors in the morning. It was not the first time they had been together, nor would it be their last.

As she approached the market, she saw that the House of Mist had strung up massive tarps, creating a shelter from the torrents of rain that came down over the old city. Nicole could tell the area it was in had been historical back before The Collapse; the brick buildings around her appeared far older than the steel and glass towers that surrounded the low open air market. Mist had been maintaining the area; the vegetation that had taken back almost every inch of the rest of the city had been cleared away, and the road visible enough that one could tell that this street had been paved with brick.

In the middle of the market street, House Mist had erected barricades around the hole in the road she had emerged from five months prior; but they did little to hamper the creek that flowed down the center line and into the old metro tunnels. Flanking the road on both sides, the market stalls were mostly all situated beneath the building's overhang. The architectural term that described the structure had randomly appeared in her memory after giving it a curious glance... It was an arcade, a covered walkway with a bunch of stalls.

The distinct lack of any real memory, but still being able to remember what things are, had consistently been disorienting. However, since the discovery of her cause of death had yielded no answers, there was nothing that could be done. It might even just be her Ghost beaming definitions and words directly into her mind without telling her. Maybe it was the Great Machine itself providing guidance on a whim.

Nicole walked through the market for the first time, and with the intent to actually buy something as well. Her Ghost had been stockpiling Glimmer on almost every outing they had been on; the strange glowing chunks seemed to just fall out of the pockets of the House Devils’ Eliksni whenever they went down. It was supposedly valuable stuff.

There were plenty of stalls selling old Human technology, but she was interested in some home-grown Eliksni gear. As she stood, without a ship, her Ghost was just about out of storage space in the weird digital realm that existed in her so-called 'backpack'. She needed one of those spheres that Rykis had.

Nicole window shopped for a bit, glancing through the various stalls, and still not finding anything she was looking for. Eventually, she approached an Eliksni sitting at a table near a pillar towards the outside of the market. A sign on the table said Information in English and scrawled beneath it were the words: I speak Human.

"Excuse me." She addressed the Eliksni in their own language. "Is there somewhere where I can buy some of your equipment? All that I see here is old Human salvage."

The Vandal glanced up at her. Their gaze going up and down over her armor. "Mm, you're that Guardian Viraks was talking about, aren't you? You speak well. If you are looking for our things, there are shops down below. Just follow the signs."

She looked back and could not spot the difference between a sign naming a shop to one giving directions. Bringing her attention back to the Vandal, "I don't yet have a good grasp on reading your language yet."

"Oh, well that sign there." They pointed off towards a sign with a few small arrows pointing every which way. "The bottom entry leads to a shop that might help. It's down the stairs."

"Okay, thanks for the help." She grabbed a small cube of Glimmer from a belt pouch and set it on the table. She was not sure if that was what she was supposed to do, but the Eliksni took the cube and pocketed it with a nod.

She headed down the stairs, going deeper into the old structure, and the building got stranger the further she went. The layout was almost organic with twisted side passages and walls. Old, abandoned shops occupied small nooks and crannies; most were truly original installations with their contents looted and shelves long emptied in the past. She guessed that not much down there was actually used by the Eliksni in the present day. Once Nicole passed through another doorway, she found an area that was much better lit. Big open windows lined the passage, looking west through an active shop and overlooking the former bay and crashed Ketch that sat in its salty water.

The shop she found was large, occupying three of the original suites on the west side of the floor. There were tables upon tables of Eliksni goods and technology. And she was not the only one there to shop. A group of young Eliksni were browsing the selection with bags of scrap, likely to trade with.

There were a few of the flying machines they called Shanks hovering around near the ceiling. They seemed to be keeping watch over everything.

Nicole walked into the shop and scanned across the tables. Her earpiece crackled slightly as her Ghost spoke into her ear. "Hey, need another eye?"  

Glancing across the many tables and variety of pieces before her, she nodded. "Yeah, you'd know best what's compatible with my backpack thing."

Without a reply, her Ghost appeared with a flash of his trademark light. The Eliksni younglings seemed surprised at her Ghosts' existence. They chittered to one another in hushed voices Nicole could not understand. Ghost went right to work at scanning over every bit of machinery on the table, while Nicole broke off to wander the shelves.

She was finding that not being able to read the language was quite the hindrance lately. Many of the parts were labeled and she had no idea what they were. There were plenty of portable lights around shelves she was at, but those were the only things she recognized.

Getting reading and writing lessons from Rykis would be her next priority.

Across the shop, her Ghost let out an excited beep. "Found one!"

She turned around and headed back towards his position. Sitting on the shelf behind a few pieces of armor was a cluster of spheres in a variety of sizes. The largest was about twice the size of her fist. Nicole plucked one of the machines off the shelf, it fit nicely into her palm. "Will this one work for what we need it for?"

His eye gave a nod. "Yes, Nicole. We should be able to store pretty much anything besides a vehicle for the time being."

"Great, now... just to find the one who runs the shop." She headed up to the front of the shop and looked around for an Eliksni in charge. There were plenty of others here, but none seemed to fit.

One of the Shanks descended from the ceiling and approached her. This model was unarmed and where the gun would usually be was a container. A speaker on it snapped on and it spoke. "Ah the Niakin. Looking to trade for that now?" The voice sounded old and gravelly. Then the lid on the container opened “What have you got?"

She looked the Shank up and down. “Do I just put it in the box?”

“Let me get a look at it first.” The Shank tilted down to get a look at whatever Nicole was planning to give him.

Reaching into one of her belt pouches, she retrieved a solid chunk of Glimmer about the size of her hand and showed it to the drone’s camera. “Five of these?” If her math was right, compared to what she spent on that wood sheet a few months ago, this was an exceptionally large sum. Close to thirteen thousand units of the stuff. The rest was stored in her Ghost.

The Shank sat there for a moment, and its camera sensors blinked. She could hear the small servos inside whine and adjust for a moment. “Mmm that is fair. Not much for haggling are you Niakin?” They trailed off into a laugh. “Just deposit your Glimmer into the box, and I’ll process the trade.” Nicole nodded, getting curious as to what Niakin actually meant, and placed all the Glimmer she had into the box beneath the Shank. Her Ghost floated over and spawned some more to match the amount agreed upon. With the box filled, the Shank flew off and disappeared into a vent embedded high on the wall.

Another Shank with a different object where its gun should be descended from the ceiling. The shopkeeper's voice extended from the new Shank, and a small actuator extended a sticky slip of paper with a few small Eliksni glyphs on it, “Take this and place it on the sphere. It shows that you legally purchased it from my shop. None of the security of the market will bother you if they see it.”

She took the sticker and applied it across the side of the machine in plain view. "Thank you, I'll be back here in the future for sure."

"Sure thing, Niakin. Good trading with you." The Shank zipped back up to the ceiling, leaving her just as confused as to the meaning of the name with no time to ask about it.

Nicole glanced up at the cluster of Shanks and shook her head. Whoever ran this shop was strange. But she had what she was looking for and she placed it into the pouch that had once contained the glimmer. Heading out of the shop, she headed back towards the stairs. "So how long do you think that it'll take for you to integrate the device?" Nicole asked her Ghost, who had remained in her orbit.

"Not long, do you want me to work on it now?" He blinked his eye and flew closer to her hip.

"Mm, maybe later. Once we're out of the market for sure."

The stairs up to street level were different from the set that she used to get down into the lower market. She was now on the other end of the street from where she went in, on the other side of the hole she had emerged from when she was rezzed.

There was a group of Humans bartering with Some Eliksni at a cart across from the market. From the look of it, it was the Humans that were the people doing the selling. She approached when the Eliksni group had finished up their trades and left the cart. Colorful fruits and vegetables were piled high in wooden crates, all of which she knew of only in the vague shadow memories of words, and none of which she had seen since she had been resurrected.

“Hey, good morning Guardian!” The man at the cart gave her a wave. “Looking for some fresh produce?”

Nicole looked over all the crates with all the greens, yellows, oranges, and even purples. “I don’t know, where did this come from?”

“Oh, those ancient greenhouses up by the old university have really held up through all the shit.” He picked up one of the oranges. “My family has been tending to the site since The Collapse wiped out most of the local farms.”

“I see... how much for... do you have a box with some of everything in it? I’ve not had any before and I want to give it a try.”

He gave her a nod. “Yeah sure. I can have Sam whip up an assorted crate for you. What do you have to trade for it?”

“I have some Glimmer, name a price.” Nicole returned the nod.

The guy looked back at the other person behind the cart, Sam probably, and exchanged a few words. He picked up a crate they had been working on and set it before Nicole. “Ah, probably a hundred units.”

Since her pockets were empty, she looked up at her Ghost and gave him a small nod. He flew over and spawned a large chunk of Glimmer on the table they had extending from their cart. “That should be a hundred.” Nicole leaned down and picked up the crate.

“Sounds good,” he picked up the Glimmer and placed it in a machine. He was satisfied with whatever the machine displayed and smiled. “We’re headed up to Fort Discovery later. Been there yet?”

“Yes actually, I was just there yesterday.” Nicole readjusted the grip she had on the crate. It was not that heavy, just a bit awkward to carry. Her mind wandered ahead, plotting the best route back to the museum.

“Ah alright, I figure I’ll hear all about it from Athena when we get up there." He shrugged. "If you need more produce, we set up here almost every other day."

"I'll try a bunch and see what I like. Then we will go from there." Nicole gave a goodbye nod and headed off back to the museum.

Leaving the market, she left the safety of the tarps and stepped back out into the downpour. The path south was dark and grey, and the sunlight that made it through the clouds was diffused and dim. It was also still morning, so it was mostly blocked by the ancient skyscrapers.

Nicole left her hood down despite the rain drenching her hair and face. It felt good, it made her feel alive. Surrounded by bright green ferns and trees that stood out even in the dim rainy morning.

With a shove of her shoulder, Nicole pushed through the museum's double doors and raced up the stairs to Rykis' space. She dropped the crate just inside the work area and took a look around. Rykis had gone back inside his home pod and was asleep on his bed. They had been up late the night before, and the morning had started early.

She placed the sphere machine she had purchased outside on the worktable for her ghost to work on and headed back into the pod.

Unclipping her armor's straps, Nicole stripped down to her underclothes and slipped into the cocoon of warm blankets that surrounded Rykis. She wrapped an arm around him and nuzzled his shoulder. She was happy, things were looking up compared to the last five months under Acskis' scrutiny.

Maybe now she should go see other parts of Mist's territory, like that one Baron asked.

Chapter Text

The Last City
Lower Tower Commons
Present +9 years, 287 days

“You slept with a Fallen?!” Brutus blurted out as Nicole paused her story to get a sip of whatever they were drinking. 

“We did more than just sleep together...” Nicole gave a coy smirk but then looked down at her now empty glass with a sigh. “Really... If things had worked out differently, he and I would have started a family... adopted obviously.” 

Nicole frowned and just stared into the glass, thinking about how that was all behind her now that she was actually at the Tower. She missed Rykis, but knew that she was doing this for him and the rest of Mist. When she looked back up at Brutus and his semi-clueless face she noticed the disgusted glances from the table next to them.

 “ Shit...” she muttered.

Swiping her eyes across the bar, Nicole became acutely aware that others had been listening to her story and were not amused. The entire bar from the look of it. The other Guardians were talking in hushed tones, not sparing her any accusatory looks. Even the music that had been loudly playing when they had entered was now at a much lower volume. 

“I thought bug huggers were crazy... but this one takes the cake.” A warlock at another table said just loud enough that they intended for Nicole to hear. 

Nicole frowned and rubbed her eyes. These other Guardians were quite an uptight group, from what she had seen with the Vanguard and what happened back in Seattle... maybe coming to the Last City had been a mistake. If she wanted to fit in, a lot of who she was would have to be tucked away, right now she was drawing too much attention; so much for flying under the radar. “Brutus, I need another drink.” 

Brutus nodded and headed over to the bar across the room. 

“Don’t worry about all of ‘em,” A Hunter at another table said to her while gesturing to the rest of the bar. “Bugs do sometimes seem to be the least evil out of all the stuff that we face out there. Don’t doubt there are some good out there too.” 

“You've obviously never seen the bone piles around Old Russia,” the Warlock interjected. “Or heard about what they did to London.” 

Nicole put up a hand, “I personally never saw any piles of bones other than the dead from the Collapse. Then they also had a whole deal with Discovery Point and eventually old Portland, so I think Mist was fine.” 

The Warlock flicked the hair out of their face, and took a sip of their drink. “I’d have to see for myself to be sure.” 

Brutus returned to the table and placed a much larger glass of some alcoholic beverage into Nicole’s hands. “Much appreciated,” she raised the drink and took a long sip. “Do you want me to continue here, or have you heard enough?

Before Brutus could reply the Warlock pointed a finger at her. “We’re invested at this point regardless. Let's hear the rest.” 

“Alright well, there’s still a lot more... we haven’t even gotten through the first year yet.” Nicole took another sip and started again.

Central Seattle Ruins. Pacific Northwest 
House Mist Territory
+225 Days

As good as he was at giving her speaking lessons, Rykis was a terrible teacher for the written language. For that, Nicole had to attend something like a class. It was not anything official like a school from the pre-Collapse, not that she remembered anything like that, it was more of a co-op between parents for the young Eliksni. Nicole sat cross legged in the back of a group of tiny hatchlings, all nearly a fifth of her size. It made her feel slightly awkward, but once she was done she should be able to read their signage around the city. She wanted to learn this skill herself, even though her Ghost could read and translate any sign for her. 

For lunch, she had packed one of the Greenhouse Oranges and dried fish to eat while the younglings ate what their parents or family brought for them. Nicole’s first interaction with an orange had been amusing to everyone but herself. She had bit right through the rind and chewed like an apple, which she had eaten before. It was bitter, and then sweet. Not the best combination and the expression on her face had made both Rykis and her Ghost burst into laughs. The two of them had let her walk right into that on her own. Much to her embarrassment, she did it again with the banana. Those bastards. 

She headed outside of the space they used as a classroom, back in ancient history it had been a coffee shop overlooking a small park. At some point, that park had overflowed its banks, and flooded across the avenue it sat on. Parks and green space like it had probably been the start of all the nature that took the city back after the Collapse. 

Nicole tossed the rind into an old rusted trash can where the sidewalk used to be and chewed on the orange slices. She almost swallowed a seed when a voice whispered practically in her ear.

“Hey Neh-cole.” 

She turned around, but there was no one there. A tap on her shoulder from the other direction sent her back around.

“Or is it Niakin? That's what everyone else seems to be calling you out there.” 

Nicole looked back and forth for the voice. Nothing at all. “I don't even know what Niakin means.” She replied, still searching for an origin. The voice was familiar, feminine and speaking english with an accent. It looked like her Ghost did not feel like helping either, he stayed quiet. 

Another shoulder tap, followed by a sigh. “Look up.” 

Immediately, she did and saw a slightly distorted patch of air around the metal beams that had supported an awning at some point. There was a crackle of arc energy that spread across the form and the distortion faded to reveal an Eliksni laying across the beam. 

“Wait... Jasix? Is that you?”

The Vandal Scout laughed and gently lowered herself to the street. “That’s right. How have you been doing Niakin?” 

Nicole laughed too, now that she realized it was just her friend messing around. It had been nearly two months since she had seen her last. “I’ve been fine, you missed my induction into the House.” She gave the Vandal a playful nudge. 

“Truly sorry about that, but I was out on a run and didn’t exactly have time to return.” Jasix took off her hood and scratched the top of her head with one of her arms. 

“Yeah... he did sort of spring it on me too.” Nicole said. “Anyway.. What the fuck does Niakin mean? I’ve heard it a few times here and an old shop keeper kept calling me that. Rykis has no idea.” 

The look of exasperation on her face made Jasix suppress a chittering giggle. “Ah it is old name from Riis... home. Old guard say you're one of us now, you get a proper name.”

“Oh, I see,” Nicole smiled. “It sounds nice…. Now that I know what it is.” 

Jasix let out a loud chittering laugh. “Yes, its goooood.” 

“So what brings you around, other than to check in on your newest sister?” Nicole gave her another nudge. 

Jasix switched back to speaking normally in her native Eliksni language. “Well the Kell is finally sending an expedition across the mountains at the request of Pedro from the fort. It's obvious that you are valuable for such a mission.” 

“Hmm, that's right, Pedro did mention wanting to head out there when I first met with him, glad it’s happening.” Nicole nodded. “And that I’m going with them, you too I take it?” 

“Yes, I will be going too but as lead scout.  I’ve been out that way many times, not in recent years though.” She said, “For obvious reasons that you cleared up.” 

“Was it really that bad out there?” Nicole asked, but then shook her head. “Nevermind...” She recalled that on her first night she and Rykis had run into a Devil raid just outside the ruins of Bellevue. “It's not like... I did that much at the pass though.” 

Jasix shrugged. “You were the push that got the Kell to okay the strike, that was enough. Plus on all those other excursions, you drew the Devils’ fire.” 

Nicole laughed a bit at that. “True, I make a good walking target at the very least. When do we leave?”  

“Right away,” Jasix said. “Transports are waiting at the upper market.” 

“Do I have time to let Rykis know?” She got up and started up the road towards the old convention center. They would be passing by the art museum where she and Rykis lived now.

Jasix hopped along behind her, keeping pace. “Rykis is waiting by the vehicles, Kell doesn’t want him going though.” 

“Damn... I haven’t been able to spend much time with him lately.”

“Don’t worry, Rykis will be waiting for you to get back,” Jasix chittered a laugh. The two walked a few blocks north and passed the ancient brick and mortar district into the more modern canyons of rotting steel and glass. 

The Eliksni of the House of Mist preferred to set up in the shorter, stout, likely historical buildings that wove between two different styles of structure that made up Seattle's old downtown. There were collapsing ruins all over the city, and then tall visually distinct towers that reached far into the clouds further east. The latter towers were in very good condition... almost strangely so. Other than moss and foliage growing in centuries of dirt buildup all over the exterior, they looked pristine.

As far as Nicole knew there was no one living in the towers yet, but it made sense; the density of Eliksni spread out over the region was low enough that there were simply more buildings than residents at the time.

Though she had heard rumors from the locals that lived near the skyscraping towers felt that something was wrong with the towers, and that they should not be occupied, or disturbed. Nicole planned to spend as little time as possible near those buildings for now, but She thought that the old UMIC headquarters was there somewhere, which was something she needed to check out eventually.

They had to divert around a closed off block where the House was starting to disassemble and demolish a small section of exceptionally hazardous buildings. This was going to be their first time doing that sort of work, the last few months after the Devils were beaten back have been a boon for improvement work to the region. There was a crew put together to shore up or tear down old failing buildings, and there were a lot of them across the city;  her Ghost had estimated they would be at it for the better part of a decade. 

The sound of activity ahead signaled their arrival to the upper market. While the lower market focused mainly on local trade, the upper market was the hub for regional sales. Vendors from all over the House of Mist’s territory traveled to the collection of buildings and covered walkways to sell their scrap, salvage, and food. Rykis told her that he did most of his work here back when Human traders from across the mountains came in. However, that all stopped when the Devils showed up. 

The market occupied the old convention center complex that spanned over the highway. Its massive open halls made good spaces for the regional traders to set up their shops and store their wares. The vast space below the buildings was where the highway passed through, as well as various covered garage spaces and service areas that the House of Mist used to store most of its vehicle fleet.

“Neh-cole!” Rykis called and waved from over by the stairs that led down to the highway. 

She smiled and gave him a hug, briefly enjoying the limited time they got together. “Good to see you Rykis.”

The embrace lasted only a few moments, all four of his arms holding her close, and then they parted. “Good luck on this mission, I hope it goes smoothly.”

“As do I...” Nicole sighed. “Hopefully it's just an in-and-out formal visit.”

“Good to see, Jasix.” Rykis gave her a friendly wave as she joined the two by the stairs. “I would say keep Neh-cole safe... but the opposite is true,” He laughed. 

“That's right, our undying friend here needs to protect me. ” She joined in his laugh. 

Nicole shook her head with a smirk and put her hands on her hips. “Yeah okay I’ll do that.” 

Though the sudden thought of the mortality of her friends struck her, and made her realize that Rykis not going on these missions was a good thing. She had thought about this before, but it had been what felt like forever since there had been a real combat mission performed and she had started to become too comfortable about leaving the city. 

She would come back, the others could not. 

With a slight frown, she gave Rykis another hug and started down the stairs towards the trucks that waited below. It was a pair of large trucks similar to the one that had picked her and Rykis up from the hotel outside Bellevue the night she was officially welcomed into the House. Their large blocky cab and covered cargo bed were ideal for the mixed sizes of the Eliksni ground forces. A single tank sat ahead of the trucks and was draped in cargo nets stuffed with plants and tree branches; spring camouflage to keep it hidden among the overgrown ruins. 

Nicole nodded up to the cluster of Skiffs backed into a cargo dock near the top of the cavernous space. “Why don’t we fly out there? It would be a hell of a lot quicker.” 

“Captain Takas does not want the Skiffs beyond the mountains until a ground recon is done, and before you ask, Pikes might get us shot at by the Human locals.” Jasix replied.

“I’ve been really wanting to get some time on a Pike... those look fun.” She frowned, trying to bring her mind around to less depressing things.

“Well there are not many left in this region, Baroness Tansis is working on fixing the few we have in the south. Maybe if you ask nicely...” 

“No, it's fine.” Nicole waved the thought away and folded into the circle of Vandals and Dregs near one of the trucks. At the center of the circle was a new Captain she had never met before. Granted, that list of those that she knew was still very small. 

“Ah, good, Niakin and Jasix have arrived.” The Captain said as soon as he saw them. He also used that new name that's going around, Nicole was not sure about it yet, but she might not have any control over it. “I am Captain Tyvos, the leader of this mission. It should be an easy crossing, we will have Jackwing support throughout the expedition, but they will stay at high altitude unless needed.”

Nicole looked over at Jasix with a surprised expression; they weren’t going to use Skiffs, but the Kell was letting them get a Jackwing support flight? Jackwings were the even more rare fighter class that the House had. She had only ever seen them when she visited the old military base, supposedly they used them to keep most of the Devil skiffs from fleeing the pass, but she had missed that part. 

“Jackwing recon of the area is unreliable, due to the altitude restriction, so we will be going in to check up on the Humans in a town called George. We have also been unable to reach any of our outposts in the region, so we will be checking in on them as well- however power is still flowing from the network, so I expect that just their communications relay to be down. Clear?”

A general sound of agreement from the Eliksni, and Nicole nodded. Captain Tyvos had them mount up on the vehicles, while he and his small crew moved to the tank. He was too large to fit inside, but he found a seat on the back. He sat cross-legged in an armored nest of metal and sandbags. 

Nicole hopped in the back of one of the trucks and settled into a pile of netting for cushion. There were a ton of crates stacked up near the cab, so she figured this was the supply truck. Jasix climbed in and moved one of the crates over to the rear and used it to sit with a leg hanging over the tailgate.  

The truck rumbled to life beneath her and the convoy rolled out and onto the highway. The day was warm out on the road; back in the city under all the trees and in the shadows of the ruins it had been cool and comfortable. Nicole was under cover but with her helmet off she could feel it in every breath she took. 

After the first hour they were cruising up the mountain pass and approaching the battle site at the lakebed. The air up in the mountains was definitely cooler than down below, the altitude and wind providing all the relief Nicole needed. She and Jasix had pulled down the canvas cover for the truck to just let the air flow. As they drove across the highway, she looked out over the lakebed, there was not much left of the old House of Devil’s camp; any left over supplies or ruined vehicles had been stripped by House Mist scrappers and the spring growth hid anything else beneath the tall grass. 

They drove on, passed the ruined dam and started down hill. This was now the furthest east she had been relatively... figuratively. Maybe she had run anti-Devil operations beyond this, but never on the east side of the mountain range. As they passed through a strange short tunnel, this was it, on to new lands and more people... she hoped.