Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

I thought I knew myself.

We all like to think we know ourselves.

But we never truly do.

That is unless, if we are ever so lucky enough, someone comes into our lives who becomes our whole world and shows us our true selves. Shows us what really matters to us and gives us the strength and courage to do the impossible.

It may not be expected. It may be gradual. A slow, growing respect and admiration that is returned over the years. A camaraderie that blossoms into a deeper friendship and trust where the lines blur between that and love. It’s not something you can really pinpoint when it happens. It’s just … there. Hovering in the air whenever you’re near each other, comforting and warm. Shared in a kind word or the giddy levity of a joke that hits just right.

I don’t really know what drew us together in the beginning. He’s a Hunter. I’m a Titan. He’s an Exo, I’m an Awoken. He loves to gamble and is a braggart. I’m careful with my glimmer and tend to be on the quiet side.

But opposites attract, right? Least, that’s what he’d say.

There was just something about him. An air. A lightness that belied the responsibilities he shouldered and the seriousness that both his job and what we did as Guardians often required of us. He was kind and funny. Offered up advice from his long time in the Wilds. Was there for all Guardians, not just his Hunters. And while he told the worst jokes, he also told the best stories.

I liked him. A lot. In fact, there wasn’t a single time I can recall when I was around him that he couldn’t make me smile or make me feel better. Hopeful. Safe, even. With all we faced, all the enemies at our gates, all the worries that kept us up at night pacing the Tower hallways and staring up at the Traveler looking for guidance or answers … when I was around him, all that faded away and the world just felt right somehow.

I wasn’t the one to make the first move that changed the dynamic of our relationship from just Vanguard and Guardian to friends. I was never so bold in that regard. Put me up against an army of hissing, gnashing Thrall and I won’t bat an eye. But, at the time, ask me to walk up to him and say: “Hey, do you want to be friends?” No. No way. I’d’ve been too scared. And he didn’t exactly say: “Hey, let’s be friends.”. It was more what he did that changed it all. He’d start listening in on my feeds back to the Tower whenever I was out in the field running a strike or hunting down a target. Every now and again I’d hear him chime in with some advice for me or a joke that would usually be so stupid I couldn’t help but at least smile at how stupid it was. It usually drew exasperated sighs from Zavala or Ikora but I got the sense that they knew it was needed. Especially in my early days on the Moon. Going down into those pits. At the time I was unfamiliar with the Hive and was trailing them down into the darkness. The smells that permeated the breather in my hemet once I was down there … The lingering air of death all around. The sound of brittle, rotted bone crunching under my boots and the echos of screeches and hair-raising chants that scratched at my ears.

I remember thinking: “I can’t do this. I can’t be a Guardian.”. Even knowing if I died my Ghost would bring me back … it wasn’t the actual dying that scared me but the how. The horror of the how that made me freeze in place. The fear of being torn apart.

But he got me though.

That time and all the others.

He always got me though.

I’d just focus on his voice as he told me about his first ventures to the Moon. About running into the Hive. How they came spilling out of all the crevices and cracks in the ground around him like a massive swarm of ants. Scared the hell out of him. I’m not sure Zavala or Ikora approved of him telling me he was scared. I think it was a no-no of sorts. Can’t have a Vanguard admitting fear. Some sort of appearance thing or code. I don’t know. It was something dumb. And I know he didn’t give a damn about it because he’d known exactly what I needed to hear right then to get myself moving and do what needed to be done. He always knew. And it made me feel less alone down in those pits.

That’s how it started.

No matter where I went or what I was facing, he’d be there. Even if he didn’t say anything at all, I’d gotten so used to the sounds on his end of the comms I’d know exactly when he was there. The soft, very subtle hissing sound of his breath through the ridges of his nose. The light clunk of the rim of his coffee cup against his metal lips and the sound of him drinking. Then the clunk again as he set the cup back down on the table. The shuffling of paper and an annoyed sigh that followed or the repetitive clicking of the two small plates on either side of his lips, his equivalent of grinding his figurative teeth because I’d gotten to know how much he hated paperwork. All those subtle sounds that I don’t think anyone else would notice, I did. And I’d focus on them. And I’d know, if I ever needed anything, he’d be right there.

Like myself, I don’t know when things changed for him. When he started feeling something more. Even he’s told me he doesn’t know, himself. It was just that gradual thing. That slow transformation. One day, it was just there.

He became everything. Someone I just couldn’t live without.

My light in the darkness.

But that light … it was almost lost forever.

And that’s where this story begins. In a cold, listing prison, on the far reaches of our system, where a Dark Prince and his Barons stole a Gunslingers Light.

It’s our story, yes. But, more importantly, it’s the story of a man who saved me. Who became my whole world. Who I love endlessly.

It’s the story of the man they call Cayde.

CHAPTER 1
❣️♠️❣️

I am yours and
Everything that
Comes with that.
Your happiness is
Mine, just as your
Pain.
We are connected
In the good and the
Bad.
In the triumphs
And in the suffering.

~JM Storm

Cayde lay motionless before me on the cold, rusted metal floor of Deck Zero.

It felt like all the blood drained from body when I saw him, the cold of the open space around me seeming to seep past my armor to my skin and then right down to my bones. I shivered. Slow clopping of boot heels on metal. I looked up, seeing Uldren strutting across the platform to the hatch that led to the escape pods. The Barons were already standing there, just on the other side of the opening, waiting for him. I couldn’t see their faces against the nausea-inducing magenta light at their backs. I could only see the faint glow of their eyes. Eyes that seemed to be smiling with proudful malice.

A low, amused chuckle emanated from Uldren as he turned to face me, the cruel sound echoing off the metal hull. He lifted the gun in his hand - Cayde’s cannon - giving it a little wave. A taunting gesture. A trophy. “He didn’t feel a thing,” Uldren told me before casting a smug, self-righteous smirk my way. I grit my teeth as anger and tears welled up and raised my gun, about to fire, but was too late. The hatch door closed.

I didn’t care.

In that moment, the only thing that mattered was Cayde.

I ran to his side, skidding down onto my knees beside him, dropping my gun and pulled my helmet off, tossing it aside so he could see my face. I blinked tears away, my eyes adjusting to the dim light, and saw just how bad things were. There was a hole in his chest and a black, oil-like substance was slowly seeping out onto the floor under him.

“No. Nononono,” I uttered under my breath as I pressed my hand over the wound desperately trying to stop the bleeding.

Cayde let out a soft, painful grunt, laying his hand atop mine. I looked him over, seeing even more blood spattered on his arms and down the left side of his body where is armor had been torn, exposing his ribs. His right hip was also gnashed from the fight and appeared to be dislocated as well. And when I looked up at his face, really saw it, my heart broke. The left side had been badly damaged, the teal metal that made up his cheek ripped off and missing, more of the black-colored ichor oozing from the small pours of the structure underneath.

I grit my teeth against the trembling of my bottom lip, my eyes stinging with more tears, my vision blurring.

His Ghost - His Sundance - I knew she was gone. There was no way to fix this. I knew that. But it didn’t stop me from trying to think up a way. Any way. There had to be something. Anything!

“H-how’s my hair?” He suddenly asked as he looked up at me, his voice metallic and echoing against the damage, coughing a little as he tried to chuckle.

“Cayde,” I softly whispered, shaking my head.

“Mmmngh. That bad, huh?” He managed, shifting a little, wincing.

“I’m here,” I whispered, not knowing what else to say at the moment as Ghost appeared beside us, letting out a shocked gasp, his eye darting back and forth at what he was seeing. “Oh no,” he uttered, immediately scanning Cayde as I moved behind him and sat, carefully easing him up, cradling his upper body in my arms against my chest. I gently laid my palm back over the bullet wound, hoping against hope it would help somehow, ignoring the blood that was dripping all over my armor. He winced at the process and coughed some more but, as soon as my arms were around him, his body relaxed and he grabbed them and held onto me with all the strength he had left.

Ghost made a pained burble. He was trying anything and everything he could to make something work to heal Cayde but to no avail. I could feel Cayde against me, under my arms, breathing heavily - struggling to get in what air he could. I could hear and feel the vibration in his throat down into his chest. Air bubbles in the liquid filling his artificial lungs.

He was dying.

“There’s nothing I can - I’m … I’m sorry,” Ghost finally said after scanning Cayde numerous times, confirming what I already knew. It didn’t make it any less painful to hear. There was so much regret and sorrow in Ghost’s voice. I knew he wanted to help Cayde. That he would have in an instant if he’d only had the power to do so.

But he didn’t.

He didn’t.

“Ais-” Cayde finally uttered, and I felt him squeezing at my arm.

He knew.

“It’s okay,” I whispered, nodding. “It’s okay. I’m right here,” I told him, laying my cheek to the side of his horn, my voice a thin, frail shadow of itself. “I’ve got you.”

He nodded a little. “I-I’m sorry.”

“For what?”

“For being me. Going rogue. Getting you into - into this. If I hadn’t - ”

“No. No, shhhh. ‘Kay? Shhhh,” I soothed. “It’s not your fault.”

“This … this is why … you’re bad at poker,” he managed.

I wanted to laugh but I was afraid I’d start crying and never be able to stop.

Cayde coughed again, gasping in air as a low, steady trembling began to take over his body. I closed my eyes, more tears falling, and kissed his temple. “I’ve got you,” I whispered. “I won’t let you go. I promise.”

He shifted his hands, hugging my arms even tighter to himself, his breaths becoming more raspy, like he was drowning. He kept shifting his left leg, moving it a little in clear frustration at the discomfort. I started quietly humming a soft little song to him, giving him something else to focus on. I felt his hands curl even tighter around my arms, trying to hug me as tight as he could while he coughed again, turning his head into me, pressing the side of his face to my chest as if it would shield him. “Ais, I-” He tilted his head back, looking up toward me. The look in his face, it was like he’d wanted to say more, but he just didn’t know how. Like there was an eternity of things he’d wanted to say and he regretted every moment he’d let slip by not saying at least one.

The pain in his eyes from that was searing.

I reached up and carefully held his cheek in my hand. “I know,” I whispered, nodding, tears dripping from my eyes. “I know,” I assured him. “I love you, too. Always.”

His features eased and the plates on his face that could still properly move shifted into a soft, elated smile, almost as if he were wonderfully surprised by my response. Like it had been the one he was hoping for. It belied the pain he was in.

His blue optics suddenly warmed, like new life was sparked back into them.

Then, just as suddenly, he gasped, his eyes widening. “Ais …” He grabbed onto me. And then … slowly, his body began to relax.

My own eyes wide, I gaped as his began to fade. “No. No, Cayde!” I shook him. “Nonono! Don’t go!” His features began to blur as my eyes filled with more tears, watching until his own were dark, his body going slack, slumping into me, lifeless and still. “No. Nonono. Cayde! Cayde! Stay! Please! Please stay!” I pleaded as his head lolled back into my chest. I shook him again. “Cayde!” I screamed, his name bouncing off the metal all around us and then … nothing but a horrible silence. When he didn’t respond, I felt as if all the air had just been ripped from my body, my heart shattering. I pulled him up closer to me, rocking him gently, pressing my face to the side of his as I cradled his head and sobbed. “Please come back,” I whispered. “Please. Please.”

Nothing.

Just his silent lifeless weight against me in reply.

I screamed.

*

I don’t know how long I sat there with him, numb, my body still gently rocking his as I held him. My gloves and armor were soaked though with his blood. I could hear Petra’s voice. It was soft but seemed muffled and far off in the distance. Eventually, I realized she wasn’t far away but crouched down right beside us, the weight of her hand reassuring on my arm, Ghost hovering beside her, his shell downcast. “Aislin …”

I shook my head. “I-I can’t,” I barely managed, holding onto Cayde even tighter, afraid she would take him from me. “I don’t want to move him.” Her single eye was brimming with unshed tears. She was holding them back, her other hand on his shoulder, idly caressing it, as if somehow he’d still be able to feel it and know we were there; that we had him and he was safe. She nodded, understanding, and took in a slow, shuddering breath as her gaze went from me to him.

I tilted my head, looking down at Cayde’s face, feeling my own unconsciously twist in pain. With a shaking hand I slowly, very softly, trailed the backs of my fingers over his jaw. He still felt warm against me. I wanted to hold onto that. To move meant that warmth would quickly fade. To move meant I would never hold him again.

But Petra was right. We couldn’t stay here forever. And Ikora and Zavala … they didn’t know.

I had to take him home.

He would want to go home.

“Bring the ship around,” I finally managed to tell her, my voice broken.

Petra slowly stood and watched me for a few more moments before turning to go. Ghost floated down to my shoulder and settled on it, cuddling in against the side of my neck and jaw, as if trying to hug me in the only way he knew how. I think if Ghost were capable of crying, he would have. Even the usual bright glow of his shell was dimmed in sorrow. I tilted my head toward him, feeling him shudder.

Looking back down at Cayde, if not for the damage to his face, it would almost look as if he’d simply fallen asleep in my arms.

I wish that were what had happened instead.

In fact, I found myself muttering how this all just had to be a bad dream and I was going to wake up any moment to us having fallen asleep together on the couch while watching an old movie.

And then it hit me like a punch to the gut.

There would be no more movie nights. No more kicking back and making fun of silly, pre-Collapse films. No more coming back from a mission to hot bowls of ramen or waiting cups of fresh coffee. No more lazy chats in the Hangar while watching the ships come in. No more regaling of his days in the Wilds with the old gang.

He wouldn’t … be here.

He was gone.

I suddenly felt more alone than I ever had in any dark, endless pit the Hive could’ve carved out. I couldn’t help looking around the open dock, absently searching the shadows as if maybe, somehow, he’d be there. His spirit. His Light. The soft blue glow of his eyes. Anything.

But there was nothing.

Just the low, empty hum of the prison and the occasional creaking of cold, ancient metal.

“Aislin?” Ghost murmured, his voice static-laced and worn.

I shook my head and caressed Cayde’s face once again, staring at it for a few moments, then leaned forward, gently kissing his forehead just beside his horn, letting my lips linger against the smooth, creamy metal. It seemed like a moment to say something to him. To whisper a promise to him - a pledge. But there was nothing I could do but will myself to breathe.

Finally, I found the strength to straighten. I got my arms under him and got my feet under myself, then stood, picking him up, holding him carefully to my chest as if he were the most precious and delicate thing in all existence. He felt so impossibly light in my arms; seemed so small and frail. Not the man he usually was with the broad chest, the confident swagger, that air of pride that bordered on arrogance with an ego to match and warmth that just … radiated.

Now … now it was gone.

He was gone.

I felt my chest tighten again, my throat constricting impossibly tight, making it hard to breathe as I realized I’d never feel that presence again. I nearly collapsed back down onto my knees with him as that sunk in.

Somehow, though, I managed to stay on my feet and I managed to breathe. “I’ve got you,” I whispered to him with a nod, holding him close, then headed for the opening in the wall toward the prison exit, my feet feeling like they were made of lead, dragging on the floor.

❣️♠️❣️

Chapter Text

CHAPTER 2
❣️♠️❣️

People come and go,
But love remains.
Sometimes beautiful
And sometime a
Beautiful ache, but
Love always remains.
~JM Storm

We flew in silence for the first few minutes before Petra asked if she should open up the comms and contact Zavala and Ikora. I didn’t think it was a good idea this far out. I felt like we needed to be there. We needed to be closer, before we told them. It would be cruel to leave them waiting. “Not just yet,” I quietly replied. I didn’t want to have to tell them. It was as if the moment we did - once they knew - then it would be real. And I didn’t want it to be real. I wanted this to be a nightmare. Just a terrible, terrible nightmare that I’d soon wake up from and everything would be as it was before. He’d be back in the Hangar with Colonel, tinkering away at some broken gun he planned to fix up, or have Banshee work on. Or looking over his maps, plotting the next strike point for his Hunters. Maybe helping Amanda with a busted up sparrow while the two of them shot the shit, as Amanda would say. The usual old stuff that, at the time, seemed so routine and familiar I never gave any of it much thought.

My eyes drifted to his face again. I hadn’t let him go. Even though my arm had fallen asleep and gone numb underneath his weight, I didn’t care. I didn’t want to move him or let him go. I just wanted to sit there with him in my lap and keep him safe in my arms.

Despite the damage to his face, he almost looked peaceful. Like he really was just sleeping.

I would’ve given anything for him to just be sleeping.

I wanted to imagine that instead of a movie maybe, instead, we’d had a long day and he’d just settled back and fallen asleep in my arms like he’d done so many times before.

Heh.

Cayde always struck me as a romantic. But a take-charge romantic. Imagine my surprise when I discovered he was actually the one who liked to cuddle up in warm arms and drift off. Not that he’d never offered the same to me. I’d leaned back against that broad chest of his more than a few times, only to feel his arms wrap around me in a warm hug.

I was never going to feel those arms again.

I swallowed as best I could and shifted my cheek against the top of his head, closing my eyes, instead remembering one afternoon not too long ago, coming back to the hangar, exhausted, hungry, a bit cold from where I’d been trekking out in the snowy mountains, trailing Fallen. There Cayde was, at his make-shift workstation, talking with a group of Hunters and a Warlock, handing out some guns and a shiny gold engram - to which he made some elaborately over-the-top gesture of excitement for the lucky one who got it - then looked at them all proudly and told them to bring back some stories as they all departed for their next assignments. When he spotted me, he smiled and I smiled back, and he came over to me, looking me over. “You look like something the cat dragged in. Or a Fallen. You alright?”

“I think the mountain got me more than the Fallen,” I admitted.

“Definitely the mountain,” Ghost chimed in, appearing, shaking himself out like a wet dog, water droplets from melted snow that had gotten stuck in his shell flying every which way.

Cayde held up his hand to divert the spray and chuckled. “Why don’t you two go get cleaned up - ” he pointed at Ghost, “you a lot dry, and then meet me and Sunny up in our usual spot?”

“We’re pretty tired, Cayde,” I sighed.

“Trust me?” He gently offered, smiling again.

I caved. “Okay,” I nodded.

He then shooed us off.

Once cleaned and in a change of clothes, Ghost and I made our way up the stairs and across the catwalk over the hangar to the spot Cayde had quite a while ago made into a little make-shift balcony complete with a couple camping chairs and an old metal stash box for a table. I’d expected to see him leaning back in one of the chairs with his feet propped up on the railing as usual but, instead, there were no chairs. In their place was a heavy blanket laid out on the floor with the old stash box on its side to make a shorter but wider table with a camping lantern on top, softly glowing. Pillows I recognized from around the common areas of the Tower were piled up against the back wall with a few others scattered around, and a separate, smaller blanket lay folded up on the side.

I frowned, looking at Ghost who looked back at me, just as surprised.

“Oh! Hey. Thought I’d beat ya back.”

I turned to see Cayde standing there, holding a tray of two bowls of steaming ramen, Sundance hovering next to him.

“Those for us?” I asked, pointing to the bowls.

“Nah,” Cayde shook his head. “These for the the other two Guardians I set this all up for,” he sassed.

“Ask a stupid question …” I muttered, nodding, rolling my eyes as I smiled.

“Mm hmm,” he nodded, stepping past me to put the tray down.

“He missed you today,” Sundance whispered to me as she floated by. “It was … a day.”

I frowned. “Why? What happened?”

“Now I know you two aren’t chattin’ about me behind my back,” Cayde interrupted.

“We would never,” Sundance replied. “Just telling her how hard you worked on this little set up.”

Cayde arched a skeptical brow at her as he turned around.

“It is really nice,” I told him. “But …” I shook my head, looking around. “You didn’t have to.”

“I wanted to,” he told me. “Or can’t I treat my favorite Guardian to a little something special?” He motioned for me to sit down then promptly tucked me in up to my waist with the blanket and handed me a bowl before sitting down beside me.

“I don’t like the cold,” he quietly stated without looking at me but sensing I was looking at him. “Not sure why. I can’t really feel it like you can. But … Figured this would make you feel better.”

I leaned over, gently bumping his shoulder with mine. “Thank you,” I softly said with a warm, if not tired smile. “It’s perfect.”

He’d smiled back then picked up his own bowl and the two of us ate while our Ghosts settled on our shoulders and we watched the evening ships come in.

After, I’d leaned back in the pillows my eyelids drooping, wanting to sleep but also wanting to stay awake and just enjoy his company.

Next thing I knew, I was being pulled over and settled back against this chest. “Cayde, wha - ”

“Shhhhh. Story time,” he murmured, putting his arms around me. “I ever tell you the one about the time I met my first Archon?”

I shook my head.

“Oooh. Well, there I was, out in the middle-a nowhere, not a soul far as the eye could see, mindin’ my own business an - ”

“You’d just robbed a Fallen encampment,” Sundance chimed in.

“Borrowed. I borrowed from a Fallen encampment. You gonna let me tell this one?”

There was silence for a moment and Cayde continued. “So, like I was sayin’, there I was, out in the middle-a nowhere, not a soul around. Sun was startin’ to set on the horizon. Stars were just peeking through the skylight. Figured I could make it to the next settlement by morning if I didn’t set up camp. Made it a couple miles and I had to, uh …  step off to the side behind a boulder for a little break. Give that ol’ coupling in my leg a rest. And the next thing I know, the ground under me's thumpin’. Like: Thump. Thump! THUMP! I peek my head up over the boulder and what do I see charging up the other side of the trail but this hulking murder machine with all four arms armed with razor sharp blades that were shimmerin’ like fire sticks from the reflecting sun, fur cape flappin’ behind it, and drool dripping from below it’s re-breather as it snarled all the way to me! Apparently he was none too happy I’d borrowed. And that was the moment I learned two valuable lessons. One, if you're gonna take a siesta, do it waaaaay off the trail. And, two, always make sure you’ve reloaded your gun.”

As the memory faded, I smiled.

Looking back on moments like those now, I still don’t know how it never became more than that. More than just sitting together or sharing ramen and telling stories. It was so damned obvious we’d fallen in love. But we never outright said it to each other. We just kept … pushing the boundaries of friendship to something more without really breaking them.

Why did it take … Why didn’t we tell each other sooner?

Maybe … Maybe we were just afraid. Maybe we didn’t know what to do with it. Maybe we loved the way it was so much we just didn’t want to risk ruining it somehow. Losing it.

They were all stupid excuses to have never told each other how we really felt.

I lifted my head, my eyes unconsciously drifting down to the jagged and torn edges of his face. Teal had become my favorite color. And seeing it now, what they’d done … I didn’t want to look at it but I also couldn’t avoid it.

I was going to find them. And Uldren. And I was going to do far more than rip their faces apart and leave them battered, broken, and bloody. I was going to take my time. I was going to let them know the pain they caused him. And then I was going to let them know the pain they caused me. And Ghost.

I touched Cayde’s cheek, laying my hand over it, trying to both hide the damage and soothe it at the same time.

Not seeing it didn’t make it any better.

There was no reaction. No eyelids fluttering open. No bright blue eyes greeting me.

Nothing.

Except …

I blinked and squinted.

At first, I thought I was seeing things. My eyes were tired and strained and I had to blink several more times to clear and focus them but, sure enough, I saw it. Inside Cayde’s hood on the left, there was a very, very faint green glow reflecting off the material. It was so faint, I really thought I was imagining it at first.

But I wasn’t.

I carefully tilted his head and pushed the hood back.

There, just behind his ear, was a tiny green … light. It was hidden inside one of the creases of the metal and only about the size of a pinhead. But, in the darkness of the back of the ship, it gave off a sure glow. The light slowly but steadily pulsed, growing dim, then coming back up again, like an idling light to a waiting terminal.

I had never seen this before. I brushed my thumb over it.

It continued to glow.

“Petra …?”

There must have been something in the tone of my voice because she put the ship on autopilot and came back rather than simply answering me. “What is it?” She asked as she came over to where I was sitting with Cayde.

I took a steadying breath and pointed to the light just as Ghost floated over to see what was happening. He hovered over Cayde’s head, looking at what I was pointing at as Petra leaned over to look more closely as well. “It’s … Is he?” Ghost stuttered, looking up at me then at Petra.

Petra frowned as she touched the spot, sliding her finger over it. The light continued to slowly blink. “I … I don’t know.” She shook her head and looked at me. “You’ve never seen this before?”

“No,” I answered, shaking my head as well. I looked back at the blinking light, then at Cayde’s face before my fingers unconsciously traced the sealed port at the back of his head. I looked down at his body, then back at his face as a realization struck me like a hammer. “His body is broken … but not his mind,” I whispered, as if saying it out loud would somehow shatter any bit of hope I suddenly felt. I looked at Petra. “Exo bodies like Cayde’s aren’t all metal. The older ones are, yes. They’re designed with metal casings over the exterior structures of their bodies but their joints and some other parts, where they need to be able to bend and move freely, are lined with a flexible, muscle-like coating. But later models, like Cayde’s … they’re not all hard metal on the outside. Only the ‘bones’ are. And their heads. The rest is this … I don’t know how to explain it. I saw some sealed up in labs on Mars. They’re like a … a fleshy … silicone … mesh molded to the human figure over a rigid interior structure, holding all the internal working bits together. I didn’t understand before,” I uttered, shaking my head. “I know they were trying to make Exo’s to mimic humans as much as possible for the DER but … Why make the bodies softer and more human-like - more vulnerable - but not their heads?”

“Because … you’d … want to protect their consciousness,” Ghost offered, looking at me.

Petra’s eye widened. “He’s not … dead.”

“He’s still in there,” I nodded. “Petra - ”

She nodded and placed her hand on Cayde’s shoulder, giving it a squeeze. “Hang on, Cayde,” she uttered, then went back to the cockpit and flew us as fast as she could while I had Ghost open up the comms to Zavala and Ikora on a private channel.

❣️

Zavala had the Hangar cleared of everyone, save Holliday. When Petra and I stepped off, I was carrying Cayde, Petra right behind me, Ghost floating along beside us. I heard Amanda softly gasp and shakily utter Cyade’s name while Zavala and Ikora flanked us, hurrying along with us to the infirmary. Both their faces were awash with stoic fear and concern, each of them looking down at Cayde as we navigated the concrete and metal corridors toward the back of the Tower to the Vanguard Infirmary.

Camrin Dumuzi of Owl Sector was waiting for us by the infirmary doors and solemnly nodded, directing me inside and to place Cayde on the exam table where her team was already set up and waiting for him. I hesitated in letting him go once he was laying down. I hadn’t let him go since the Prison. My arms felt moulded to him. A part of him. But Zavala gently put his hands on my shoulders and backed me away so the team could get to work.

It felt like an eternity on repeat as I was backed away. Like I was being ripped from him even though I wasn’t. All I could do was look at his face and wonder if it was the last time.

As soon as we were clear, the team descended on Cayde and Camrin pulled a curtain closed around them, Ikora, Zavala, Petra, Amanda, and I unable to do anything more but wait.

I felt terror briefly grip at me - at my heart - as I began to realized I might never feel him in my arms again.

My stomach tightened. I felt ill. I looked down at my empty arms seeing the blackened blood stains along them and trails that had dried trickling down the front of my chest plate and legs.
I wanted to wash it all off. To rid myself of the sight of it.

But, at the same time … I wanted it to stay. To have that part of him still there.

I couldn’t seem to breathe very well, and I backed into the wall behind me, my armor making a soft thunk and low, hollow scraping sound against the sterile white interior as I slowly slid down it until I was sitting on the floor, just staring at the closed curtain, feeling so much at once that I began to go numb. I watched the shadows behind it moving back and forth in practiced succession, the voices of Camrin’s team sounding echoed and garbled against the pounding of my heart in my ears.

One doctor came out from behind the curtain, carrying Cayde’s damaged chest armor along with his scarf and cloak, leather belt straps dangling, his sheathed Hunter’s knife carefully balanced atop it all. He set them on a nearby table and went back behind the curtain. My eyes became fixed on the pile of armor - the way the tattered cloak’s edges dangled from the table and how strangely lonely the knife appeared sitting atop it all. Ikora came over and crouched down beside me, setting a hand on my knee while Zavala stood to my other side. I noticed Petra stayed in the doorway with Amanda, the two of them silently watching.

A few minutes later, the same doctor came back out to the table, this time carrying the rest of Cayde’s uniform - his boots, pants, chaps, kneepads, and his orange leg warmers - then went back behind the curtain once again. Ikora was saying something to me and rubbing my knee, trying to get my attention but I didn’t hear what it was at first. I finally blinked, pulling myself out of my stupor, and turned my head to look at her. “What?” I managed.

Petra intervened, replying for me. She explained what had happened. That Uldren had escaped while the Barons had destroying Cayde’s Ghost before Uldren landed the final blow. I didn’t fully pay attention. I resumed staring at the curtain and the shadows moving behind it until, a little while later, Camrin finally stepped out and came over to us.

I don’t remember standing, but I was suddenly somehow on my feet.

“Is he - ?” Zavala attempted to ask, hesitant.

Camrin sighed and placed her hands in the pockets of her robe. “He’s in a coma. His brain is alive and intact,” she confirmed with a nod. “And while the side of his face sustained heavy damage, the part that houses his consciousness wasn’t harmed. His body, however … has stopped functioning. He has a massive gunshot wound to his chest, which has caused major functioning parts like his circulatory system to shut down, as well as causing severe injury to what serves as his lungs. They’re flooded with bio-fluid. His body doesn’t require oxygen to survive, however this raises DER issues of his brain rejecting his body without being able to experience that sensation. He also has many superficial injuries but, internally, despite the toughness of Exo skeletal structures, his ribs are broken, as is his right hip, knee, ankle, and his pelvis. Whatever hit him, hit him hard,” she explained as gently as possible. “His body has responded by shutting down, placing him in a coma of sorts until the body can be repaired and healed. The problem with this is his body was created in a time when - if something like this happened - the tech capable of making the repairs or even transferring him to another Exo frame was available. Without it … we’ve never been able to successfully bring Lightless Exos out of something like this,” she quietly told us, her tone and features grim and sympathetic, yet professional. “Not with damage as extensive as Cayde’s.”

I shook my head. “W-what what’re you saying?” I asked. “We can’t save him?” No. No, there had to be something. There had to be!

Camrin’s eyes drifted down and she shook her head. “Without the repairs or a Ghost, his body only has enough back up energy to keep his brain functioning for about seventy-two hours. When it runs out …”

“He dies,” I quietly finished, my voice cracking as I looked to the curtains. I felt the weight of Zavala’s hand on my shoulder. It was trembling. Slightly. But I felt it.

“There’s nothing else you can do?” Ikora asked, he own voice wavering. “Nothing?”

“I’m so sorry,” Camrin replied, her voice low and regretful as she shook her head.

I swallowed around an intense growing tightness in my throat, my stomach so tense it hurt. “Is - Is he in any pain?” I barely managed.

“As far as we know, no,” she shook her head.

I felt some relief at that at least, but also felt incredibly ill and dizzy. The room began to swim, my skin felt like it was on fire and ice cold at the same time. I clenched my fists, shaking my head. We had hope but now, hearing it from Camrin … reality was sinking in even harder than it had in the prison. I leaned forward, balancing myself on my knees, feeling like I was going to vomit. I closed my eyes and tried to steady myself.

Hands were on the backs of my shoulders. Ikora and Zavala.

No. I had to stand up. I couldn’t fall apart. Not now. Not yet.

“Wh-What can we do?” Amanda asked. “Is there anything we can do?”

“Be with him,” Camrin offered. “Let him feel your presence and hear your voices.”

Then, I heard the soft clacking of her shoes as she moved away.

I finally managed to stand up straight again, my eyes focused on the white curtains.

This had to be a terrible dream.

Any minute now, I’d wake up.

Wake up.

Please.

Without thinking, my legs moved on their own, one foot in front of the other as I slowly went over to where Cayde was, feeling like I was outside myself the entire time.

I gripped the curtain and slowly eased it back.

They had him laying comfortably on the bed, his body dressed in a simple white cotton dressing gown that hid the thick gauze covering the gunshot to his chest. His lower half was draped with a sheet and an infirmary blanket, wanting to keep him warm, even if it was possible he may not be able to feel anything.

If he wasn’t so still …

I just wanted him to open his eyes and look over at us.

Just once.

But he didn’t.

Stepping up beside the bed, I pulled my gloves off. My hands were stained gray from all the blood that had seeped into the material. I tried not to think about it and tenderly stroked the ridged mohawk that followed from the base of his horn to the back of his head, just as one would soothingly run their fingers through someone’s hair. Then, I leaned over and kissed his brow. “We’re right here,” I softly whispered to him, choking back tears. I didn’t know if he could hear me, but I hoped he could. “You’re home and we’re all right here.”

I saw the motion of Ikora stepping up to his other side, taking his hand in hers, holding it carefully in her own as her other caressed his arm up to his shoulder and back while gazing down at him. I looked over at her. I couldn’t read much in her expression, other than sadness. But I could see a storm brewing behind her eyes.

Zavala came to stand at the foot of the bed, his eyes fixed on Cayde’s face, stoic and silent but I could tell he wanted to say something.

But he didn’t.

Instead, his lips pressed together in a hard, tight line and he swallowed carefully.

“I hope he knows we’re here,” I hear Amanda whisper somewhere next to me.

“I’m sure he does,” I heard Petra softly say in reply.

“We should have been there,” Ikora then quietly stated, regret lacing her voice, her eyes showing the cracks in her resolve the longer she looked down at Cayde. At her friend. My vision blurred and tears escaped, rolling down my cheeks. “This is not your fault,” she quickly told me, reaching over Cayde, laying her hand on mine. “This … is on the head of Uldren Sov.” And there I saw the brewing storm begin, hardening that resolve. “And if he thinks what he’s done is the end, it’s not. It’s the beginning,” she continued, her voice growing harder - angry and determined. “We’re going to fight him,” she then stated with conviction, seemingly more so to Cayde than anyone else. Then, her attention went to Zavala. “Do you hear me? All of us. Every Titan. Every Warlock. Every Hunter.” Zavala looked at her sadly, saying nothing. “We will take The Reef by storm!” Ikora added. “And then …” She turned back to Cayde. “We will mount the head of that son-of-a-bitch on his precious throne,” she vowed.

There was a brief silence. All of us looking at her then down at Cayde.

“No.”

Zavala’s reply was quiet but cut through the silence like a knife despite being choked and gravely.

All of us looked over at him.

What did he mean, “No”? My fist clenched in frustrated anger and I straightened.

“What did you say?” Ikora asked him before I could, her features twisting in stunned disbelief.

“We are not an army,” Zavala quietly explained. “We are not conquerors. We are Guardians,” he reminded. His pained gaze drifted to me then back to Ikora as he began walking around the bed toward her. “We need to keep our eyes here. On our home. Our people. The Traveler. The Reef was lost the moment it lost its Queen.”

Out the corner of my eye I caught Petra wincing, her one good eye glaring daggers at Zavala, but she managed to hold her tongue nonetheless.

“So if another Sov wants a piece of lifeless rocks …” Zavala continued, his eyes back to Cayde’s face. “Let him have it.”

Petra turned and left the room and I quietly sighed, settling down next to Cayde.

“This is Cayde we’re talking about,” Ikora reminded as if nothing had transpired there. “For us to do nothing is … is …”

“Say it,” Zavala demanded, looking at her once more.

“Cowardice,” Ikora declared.

Zavala held her eyes for a few moments, then looked down at Cayde and very gently, laid his hand just below the wound on his chest. “I refuse to bury any more friends,” he quietly replied, his tone sombre and slightly broken, and I saw the subtle glimmer of unshed tears in his eyes. His words were belying what he was feeling. He wanted to fight, too. He wanted vengeance. He wanted to put Uldren’s head on a pike, just as Ikora did. Just as I did, too. But there was a reason he was holding back. One I just couldn’t see right now. Hell, I didn’t even really want vengeance, myself, right now. All I wanted was to find a way to save Cayde. Whatever it was, whatever it took, I didn’t care. I just wanted to save him.

And I wasn’t going to rest until I tried every possible thing there could be.

There had to be something.

There had to be a way.

Anything.

My mind reeled but anything I could think of was just desperately foolish and would likely cause more harm than good. Likely wouldn’t even work at all. Hell, a Ghost didn’t even really know how Exo’s worked, so how the hell would I know how to fix one?

I closed my eyes and let my forehead rest against Cayde’s shoulder, drowning out the quiet bickering between Ikora and Zavala and wishing there had been something useful I could remember from my time in the Bray facility on Mars.

BrayTech.

But not Mars. If there had been something on Mars, it would’ve been found by now.

But there was, maybe, somewhere else.

I sat up and looked over at Ikora and Zavala who had stopped speaking at this point, both of them with sorrow-filled eyes that conflicted with the hard lines on their faces, their lips pressed tightly together, no doubt to stop themselves from a full out argument over Cyade.

“I have an idea,” I quietly told them, both of them looking at me. “Maybe,” I quickly added. They knew as well as I did, right now, we were just blindly and desperately reaching in the dark and I could tell, for them, false hope was likely worse than no hope.

“But I need Petra’s help.”

❣️

I didn’t want to leave Cayde’s side but I wasn’t sure how this would go and the last thing I wanted - especially if he could hear us - was to be arguing over him. Amanda sat with him, though.

While Ikora went to find Petra, Zavala, Ghost and I waited in one of the conference rooms down the hall from the infirmary. I hadn’t said anything to either of them the entire time we were waiting, I just sat at the table beside Zavala, thinking about every clue that Cayde either knowingly or unknowingly hinted to me in his stories. Ghost settled on my shoulder, a quiet, comforting presence. Zavala said nothing, but I felt his eyes on me.

When Ikora came in with Petra, I stood, and Petra’s demeanor softened some as she focused on me rather than Zavala, waiting for me to speak.

I chose my words carefully.

“Cayde told me he’s been working with the Awoken for quite some time,” I said to her. “Even before being part of the Vanguard or this latest thing with these Scorn. Correct?” Petra gave a nod in confirmation. “He said your people - our people - are very good at keeping secrets. And if there was ever anything important he needed to keep secret that he didn’t trust to write down or record … he’d give it to Paladin Oran.”

Petra’s features immediately changed, like a drastic realization had just come to her. And then, they immediately became defensive. “Aislin … Whatever he may have told you -” she carefully began.

“Where is it?” I evenly demanded, cutting her off, her reaction alone enough to confirm what I’d suspected.

She shook her head. “That’s a very dangerous idea,” she said. “He wouldn’t want you to-”

“He’s dying, Petra!” I snapped at her, slamming my fist against the table top so hard it cracked the surface. Ghost twitched, his shell curling in a wince as I heard Zavala’s chair scrape against the floor. I stared at her, breathing carefully, trying to calm down. “Please?” I begged her, my eyes tearing even though I was trying to stop them. “Please, if there’s a way to save him, that’s going to be it. Where is it?”

“Where’s what?” Ikora asked, looking between us.

There was silence as I stared Petra down until, finally, she sighed. “The Deep Stone Crypt,” Petra uttered, her eye on mine, her features warning. “At least … that’s what he believes it to be. As far as I know he’s never been in it to make any confirmation, though definitely BrayTech. But that’s what he told me he thought it was. Years ago.” She pointed a finger at me. “And if you were anyone else, I wouldn’t have told you.”

“I thought the Deep Stone Crypt was a subroutine,” Ikora stated, frowning.

“The image of a tower is,” I nodded. “Cayde told me he’s seen it in his dreams. Just like many other Exo do. But then he found something he thought might be it. Or, rather, he joked about it. I didn’t understand at the time that he was hinting something to me without openly telling me because to was too risky. But, at some point - I don’t know if it was before or after joining the Vanguard - he remembered something or something was triggered somehow and he went looking for it. And he found it.” My attention then shifted back to Petra. “And he told you, didn’t he?” I said to her, arching an eyebrow. She’d been the one person he knew he could trust outside of his circle. “Just incase something happened, he knew you could be trusted with it. Please, Petra. Where is it?” I asked again.

I could see she was weighing her options. Looking for some out. Another way. Anything so as not to betray Cayde’s trust. And I understood that. I did. But he was going to die if we didn’t try.

If we wanted to save Cayde, it was the best and only one we had.

Her shoulders settled some in defeat and she fixed me with a hard, cautionary look. “Enceladus.”

The room fell into a heavy silence, each of us digesting that word. Enceladus.

Zavala exhaled through his nose and turned toward the far wall, hands clasped behind his back, posture tight as Ikora stepped away from the table, crossing arms, deep in thought. Ghost floated forward, his shell rotating slightly as if scanning an unseen constellation.

“I’ve sent fireteams into that system,” Zavala finally said, his voice low. “Never to that moon. Never deep.” He turned back toward us. “That place is unstable. Tectonic activity, cryovolcanism, buried structures. Anything Bray left behind could be under a mile of frozen hell.”

“Then that’s where we go,” I said. There wasn’t a tremor in my voice. I couldn’t afford to let there be one.

Ikora turned to me, her brow furrowed. “You understand what you’re suggesting, right? We’re talking about ancient Golden Age tech. No support, no intel. That moon’s been dark since before the Collapse.”

“I don’t care,” I said firmly. “If it’s our only shot, we have to try.” I sighed. “And … I think I know just the person to help with long buried BrayTech.”

Zavala’s lips pressed tightly together but I knew he knew it was the best shot we had. “I’ll get hold of her,” he assured me. “And have the hangar team prep your ship.”

“He didn’t happen to leave you with any coordinates, did he?” I asked Petra.

She shook her head. “I’m afraid not.”

“Then we’re flying blind.”

“I’ve run the scans of the moon’s surface,” Ghost said to me. “I have various coordinates to areas that might be the best places to find such a structure.”

I nodded. “Okay,” I sighed, trying to reassure myself this was the best shot we had. That I was making the right choice.

I stood and left the room, heading back to the infirmary, wanting to sit with Cayde as long as I could.

❣️

I could tell Amanda didn’t want to leave his side but, when I told her to stay, she insisted I get time to sit with him alone and gave me her seat. “Don’t worry,” she said. “I’ll stay with him while you’re gone.”

And, with that, she left us alone.

The infirmary felt so empty and cold, even though it was actually warm and comfortable, for what it was.

I eased the chair back and took a seat, then scooted closer to Clyde’s side, taking his hand, holding it as my other softly rubbed his arm and shoulder, hoping he could feel me there.

His hand was still warm in mine.

That should’ve brought me comfort. Should’ve made me feel like he was still here—still tethered to this world. But it didn’t. Not really.

Because warmth without motion… without his laugh, without that damn sarcastic glint in his optics or the way his fingers would squeeze back when I held his hand… it wasn’t the same.

I lowered my forehead to the back of his hand and closed my eyes. For a long time, I just sat like that—letting myself fall into the rhythm of his stillness, wishing it would shift. Wishing there’d be a spark of something. A twitch. A breath.

Something.

“I need you to come back to me,” I whispered.

The words broke out of me before I could catch them. My voice cracked, low and rough. “You’re not done yet, Cayde. You can’t be. You promised me ramen on the rooftop. You promised to show me the weird card trick you swore worked on Shaxx.”

I lifted my head, brushing my thumb along the edge of his hand.

“You said you weren’t going anywhere.”

My throat tightened again. The ache was relentless—like I was cracking in half from the inside out.

“But you’re slipping, aren’t you?” I asked quietly, searching his face. “I can feel it. It’s like you’re halfway gone already. And I… I don’t know what I’ll be if you don’t come back.”

I turned my gaze to the medical monitors—silent, humming steadily, tracing the fading lifelines of power that kept his mind active and his body from collapsing.

“We’re going to try something,” I told him, scooting a little closer. “Something reckless.”

I smiled, but it trembled on my lips.

“We’re going to Enceladus. BrayTech. Something you remembered. Something you found. You were never reckless without a reason. You knew this might happen. You left us a thread. At least … that’s what I’m hoping it was.”

My hand gripped his a little tighter.

“And I’m following it, Cayde. I’ll tear open every frozen vault and buried lab on that godforsaken moon if I have to. I don’t care what’s guarding it. I don’t care what it costs.”

I leaned forward, brushing a soft kiss to the side of his head, just above the damage. “Because I’m not losing you. Not after everything.”

I sat back, letting my fingers tangle loosely with his, feeling how impossibly still he was—like the universe had paused for him, waiting to see what I’d do next.

“I’m going to find it,” I said. “And when I do… Zavala and Ikora, they’ll bring you to me.”

There was no response, of course.

But I imagined, just for a second, that he heard me.

That somewhere inside all that silence, Cayde was holding on too.

Just a little longer.

Behind me, I heard the soft hiss of the door sliding open. I glanced over my shoulder to see Zavala. “Ana is on her way,” he said, his usual deep baritone lowered as he walked over to us.

I nodded, my attention returning to Cayde, just staring at his face. Wanting to memorize it. Just incase I … I never got to see it again.
I swallowed with effort.

“You really love him, don’t you?” Zavala softly inquired.

I looked over my shoulder at him once again a bit surprised to see his features had softened some as he looked at me, waiting.

“Yes,” I finally admitted.

He seemed to be searching my face before nodding, processing. “Do not think I don’t understand love,” he murmured as he slowly walked around Cayde’s bed so he was on the other side of him, facing me. “The thrill and the joys that come with it. The warmth.” There was a long pause. “And the pain that comes with losing it,” he quietly added, resting his hand on Cayde’s shoulder, looking down at his long time friend and colleague. I noticed his demeanor waver some, his physique losing its broad, defiant stature as his shoulders slumped ever so slightly.

“Did they have a name?” I quietly asked.

He turned to face me again, a very faint yet fond smile tugging at his lips, his eyes becoming incredibly soft - the softest I’d ever seen them. “Safiyah. ” He whispered the name as if speaking of a goddess, soft and reverent. “She was my wife.”

“You’re …” I hadn’t expected that. I didn’t know Zavala had been married. “What happened to her?” I carefully asked.

His eyes turned back to Cayde’s face, becoming clouded and dim like a darkening sky of sorrow and loss. “A battle,” he managed in a quiet voice that just barely gave hint of cracking. “And a loss that could not be bared,” he cryptically answered.

He took another breath before looking at me again, this time his eyes were awash with emotion and resolve fighting against one another. “It was … centuries ago. Before Guardians were known as anything more than Warlords and Iron Lords. Before Humanity came together again. Before the City. And yet … ” his eyes drifted downward as he seemed to briefly become lost in the memory. “That pain never ebbs.”

I swallowed, wondering if this was to be a reflection of myself. Centuries from now, if Humanity was still here, if I was still here and if Cayde was … gone. Would I be like Zavala, still mourning that love?

“I wasn’t the Commander then,” Zavala continued, drawing me out of my thoughts. “I am now. And with that title - that position - comes immense responsibilities that go beyond ourselves.” He explained. “But that does not mean Cayde is not my friend. It does not mean I don’t care about him or feel the pain of what’s happened to him. It does not mean I don’t wish to tear apart anything standing between us and Uldren Sov and the Barrons to make them pay for what they’ve done,” he stated, his voice growing hard and as unforgiving as steel as he spoke. “What it does mean is I must put our people and their safety above that personal pain and desire. I said what I said because we cannot afford to wage a war. We’ve lost too many Guardians in our fight with Ghaul. Numbers that have not been replenished. The City is still being rebuilt. We don’t have the resources. We are vulnerable. If we waged a war as we are now, we would lose. And the City - our people - would pay for it. Cayde would not want that.”

Everything he was saying was right.

As much as it hurt to admit, he was right.

About it all.

And about Cayde.

He wouldn’t want us to risk everyone and everything for him. He would hate us for it. Hate that he were here at the cost of so much and so many.

I closed my eyes, feeling the sting of tears as I nodded, understanding now.

“However,” Zavala continued, “investigating a moon does not require an army.”

I looked up at him.

Zavala leaned forward, bracing himself against the edge of the bed as he looked at me. “So the reports will say that I have sanctioned yours and Ana Bray’s exploration of a moon for needed resources for the City. What becomes of that …” He tilted his head, his eyes set, telling me everything without saying a word. “We’ll just have to see, won’t we?”

I managed a bit of a relieved smile and nodded. “Thank you.”

He gave a single nod in reply, his eyes then returning to Cayde’s face. “Hold on,” he whispered.

I took a careful breath, looking at him. “How did you do it, Zavala?” I quietly asked.

He looked at me inquisitively.

“Survive that pain?” I elaborated.

Zavala’s eyes locked with mine. “Who said I did?”

❣️♠️❣️

Chapter Text

CHAPTER THREE
❣️♠️❣️

The pain doesn’t last
Forever, you know?
It might be pitch
Black right now, but
Remember that dawn is
Traveling the Earth
To find you.

~JM Storm

Zavala contacted Ana while Holliday prepped my ship with supplies and had it refueled.

I spent the time waiting alone with Cayde, quietly talking to him while sitting beside his bed, holding his hand, petting it softly while Ghost perched on the pillow beside him. “It’s gonna be okay,” I whispered to him. I was sure I was saying that as much to myself as him. Hoping it sounded convincing. “I don’t want you to worry about anything, alright?” I told him. “You just … you relax and …and think about … about camping out in the Wilds, sitting by the fire … playing that godawful screeching harmonica of yours,” I chuckled. Truthfully, even though it wasn’t a favorite sounding instrument of mine, when Cayde played it, there was a soul to the melodies I didn’t hear whenever anyone else played one. I could actually sit and listen to him play it for hours. “Think about … hanging out with Shiro, playing a few good rounds of poker. Totally beating his ass this time, too.” I smiled. Shiro had won the last hand they’d played and Cayde jokingly rimmed him for cheating, vowing he’d beat him next time. There would be a next time. “Good times at the cantina,” I continued. “Slow, late afternoons sitting at the ramen bar down in the CIty, sharing a bowl of that way too spicy tonkotsu.” The first time he had me try some from a bowl he’d ordered I ended up guzzling three glasses of cold milk after, all while he couldn’t help laughing at my reaction!  I shook my head.  He’d known it was going to be too spicy for me.  Jerk.  I smiled. My fingertips traced the edges of the small metal caps on his knuckles and the plate at the back of his hand. I then followed the barely visible, shimmering lines of metallic teal as they wove themselves through the soft, deep gray synthetic skin of his arm like fine threads of a spider’s web, creating an intricate pattern that weaved its way up and disappeared beneath the sleeve of the medical gown he wore. “Y’know, when you wake up, I think … I think it’d be nice to get out of here for a while. Go out into the Wilds. No missions. No agenda. Nothing. Just go and explore like you used to.” I nodded. “You could show me some places I haven’t been yet. Tell me some more stories. I love your stories.” My eyes suddenly stung and I swallowed carefully around the knot in my throat. I reached up and caressed the undamaged side of his face, hoping he heard me and that the things I was talking about now were all he was thinking about.

I wanted so much to see his eyes. To know that he knew I was right here with him. That he wasn’t alone. That, somehow, everything really would be alright. Even if it might not be. I wanted him to believe it. So he wouldn’t be scared. Not that Cayde struck me as someone who would be but I knew there was a big difference in what he showed and what he hid deep down, even from himself sometimes.

It had to be alright.

I lifted his hand to my lips, kissing the backs of his knuckles, and held it there, closing my eyes for a while as I softly caressed his forearm.

Suddenly, I smiled to myself as a memory flashed by. It wasn’t a smile so much for what happened in the memory, but the memory itself. “You remember the first time I called you Firefly?” I murmured aloud with fondness. “I think that was when some part of me just knew. Knew you meant so much more to me than I ever realized.”

It just came out, right out of the blue. It was about … not quite a year ago. Cayde was sitting with me, talking to me about Andal for the first time and what had happened with Taniks. I guess he figured it was past time I heard the story from him of why the Fallen mercenary was so notorious. Not just the whispered stories. All the Hunters knew it but none so personally as Cayde. And how it haunted him. Littered him with regret and even shame at his own failing to ensure Taniks was dead. How he felt so sick at heart, even to this day, whenever he heard Taniks’s or Andal’s names because he felt like he’d failed not just a friend but someone he’d come to see as his brother. As family.

At first, it had started out as a casual story. Something Cayde was trying to make light of by praising Andal and speaking in awe of him and the man he’d been. But the more he’d ventured down the rabbit hole of what happened that fateful day, the more he’d become lost in the memory - in that moment Andal had died. I’d watched as his fists clenched so tight that the leather of his gloves looked like they were going to come apart at the seems. He was shaking with rage, his eyes glaring murderously off at nothing in the distance. I’d never seen him so angry. Tears started rolling down his cheeks. Sundance had appeared and tried talking him down; tried to soothe him, but he didn’t seem to hear her. I’d risked touching his arm and he’d jumped, looking over at me, at first seeming ready to attack me but then … panicked. He immediately began apologizing profusely for the emotional outburst.

“It’s okay,” I’d assured him, grateful that he’d told me what had happened. He shook his head and made to get up and leave but I’d gently stopped him and tugged him back toward me.

“No. Do-don’t …” His protest was weak and he didn’t fight me as I tentatively put my arms around him.

“It’s okay,” I whispered, nodding.

He’d looked at me, eyes wide at first. And then … he just … caved. Fell against me and let me hold him. He didn’t cry. At least, no more than the tears that had fallen. He didn’t say anything, either. He just … burrowed into me, like he was hiding from the world. Or from Andal.

I held him tighter, resting my chin on top of his head. “It’s okay, Firefly. It’s okay,” I murmured, rocking from side to side.

“Firefly?” He’d eventually murmured with a crackling voice.

I’d smiled and began caressing the back of his head though the cloak hood. “All those stories you tell … about being out in the Wilds. In this chaotic world I’ve found myself in, when you talk about nights out there … the peaceful ones of laying in the cool grass and staring up at the stars, watching the fireflies twinkle and dance among them, living in that moment … It sounds so perfect. Whenever I look at you, I think of fireflies now.”

Silence.

Then … a hesitant shift as his arms slipped around my waist and he returned the embrace. “So, I’m a glow bug?”

I’d smirked. “I won’t call you Firefly anymore if you don’t like it or it’s not appropriate. I just thought - ”

“No.” He’d shook his head. “No. I like it.”

I’d looked up at Sundance, who’d been hovering close to him the whole time, watching. Her shell turned up as if she were smiling at me.

Bootsteps behind me drew me out of the warmth of that memory and back to the present. I looked down at Cayde, then over my shoulder, seeing Ana Bray coming into the infirmary, giving a brief nod as she approached. I nodded back noting the paled expression on her face as she got a good look at Cayde. “Zavala and Ikora told me what happened.” she murmured in disbelief. “Is he …?”

“He’s still in there,” I assured her.

A nod and brief silence. “Zavala … he filled me in on the plan,” she hesitantly said, as if not sure how to broach the subject in such a sensitive moment.

“Then let’s go.” I didn’t want to leave. I wanted to stay with him and talk to him. But if I didn’t go, I knew for sure I’d never be able to talk to him again. This was the only shot he had.

Standing, I leaned over and pressed a soft kiss to Cayde’s cheek, lovingly caressing his brow as I smiled at him and gently placed his hand back under the blankets. “The Wilds,” I whispered to him, my eyes tearing up yet again. “Laying in the grass, watching the fireflies under the stars.” I nodded, swallowing thickly. “That’s where I’ll meet you.” A tear spilled over and dripped down onto the blanket. In case this didn’t work, that was what I hoped he remembered. That was where I’d find him.

❣️

Zavala assured me he, Ikora, and Amanda would stay with Cayde and update us if anything changed while Ana and I went to investigate Enceladus. Meanwhile, Petra told us she’d be of more use tracking down leads to find Uldren and the Barons, but would stay in contact.

When Ana and I came out of the jump, the icy rings of Saturn were shimmering against the light of the distant sun to our backs. The planet itself was a swirl of browns and mustard yellow, with hints of a subtle green glow in the atmosphere. Eerily beautiful in its own right, sending a chill up my spine as I recalled what had happened here years ago.

As we moved in closer, we could see the remaining wreckage of Awoken and Hive ships that spanned the area of the final battle lead by Queen Mara Sov and the Awoken against Oryx and the Dreadnaught. Nothing had moved. Everything was still adrift, tangled within the scattered rocks and dust of the rings; a frozen, silent, unceremonious graveyard. The massive ship itself was long disabled and listed like a now true tomb within the debris, housing whatever remaining Hive managed to survive The Taken War and hadn’t or couldn’t abandon ship to Titan.

“I hadn’t ever come in this close,” Ana whispered, looking out the window. “What was it like on there?” She asked.

Hellish flashes of smoldering green eyes and gnashing teeth and claws jumping out of the darkness strobed through my memory. The eerie, echoing songs of the Wizards and howling screeches of the Thrall assaulted my ears.

I swallowed.

“I had nightmares for weeks after,” I told her, omitting that I still did from time to time. Sometimes even the shadows back in the Tower still gave me pause as I’d wait to see if anything were to come crawling out of them. “Not that I’d never faced the Hive before,” I continued. “It was the feeling that place gave off. Like on Luna. When you go down too deep below the surface. Get too close to their magic. There’s this … sensation it creates. Like a tuning fork at the back of your neck. A low, unsettling vibration you feel all though your body that seeps into your very soul. Makes you cold. Makes you feel hollow and forget what life and Light feels like.”

My own words sounded haunted even to myself.

Ana was quiet for a few moments after that, then asked: “It took out the Queen’s entire fleet. How did you manage to get on board?”

The question made me smile as it brought back memories of the first time Cayde and I had really had a chance to work together in some capacity. “Cayde had an old stealth drive hidden away. I retrieved it and he got Holliday to hook it up to Eris’s ship. Of course, Eris didn’t know,” I explained. “And Zavala didn’t know Cayde was sneaking Ghost and I on board to set up a transmat zone.” I chuckled, shaking my head. “He got in so much trouble,” I fondly recalled before my smile fell a bit. “Eris’s ship got destroyed in the process of me getting on board, though. I tried to take the blame but Cayde wouldn’t have it. Instead, he tried to make it up to Eris as if it were his fault but … she wouldn’t accept. Anyway, Zavala had him buried in reports for a week. And Cayde didn’t complain at all. I think he felt, since Eris wasn’t accepting an apology, he’d accept the punishment and maybe that would, in some way, make up for it.”

“That does sound like Cayde,” Ana fondly confirmed. “The sneaking you on board part without telling Zavala. He always did go by a creed of: As long as nobody gets hurt and it gets the job done, then why not? So, um … when did you two start … dating?”

“We aren’t,” I answered.

“That’s … not what it seemed like back there.”

“It’s complicated.”

I had no idea how to explain it. Friends but something more? Platonic love?

Denial?

Even though he hadn’t had a chance to say the exact words as I had back in the prison, I knew that was what he was feeling. But, until we had a chance to talk about it, really, there was no defining exactly what we were. And I wasn’t going to try to, anyway. We just were. I loved him. And he knew that. And I knew he loved me. That was enough.

I guess Ana figured I wasn’t going to elaborate further so she didn’t continue to ask any more questions.

I was grateful. I honestly didn’t think I could handle thinking about beyond the next sixty-five or so hours.

My eyes lingered on the Dreadnaught for a few more moments before shifting back to the stars as we circled away from that side of the planet, coming around to where Enceladus held orbit.

“Tower, this is City Hawk seven - two - three, we’re in orbit around Saturn. First moon on the horizon. Enceladus. Going in for a closer look.”

“Roger City Hawk,” Zavala replied over the comm. “Keep us posted.”

“What’re you doing?” Ana asked. “I thought this was off the record?”

“What we’re really doing is. But Zavala wants a trail that looks like we’re just out here doing a survey expedition. Just incase something goes wrong. Last thing we need is the Praxic Order poking around. You know how some of them are. If they find out we knew about something like this ahead of time and they weren’t notified … ”

“Right,” Ana nodded. “Good call.”

The moon was a lot smaller than I’d expected it to be. Insignificant, really, next to the giant it drifted with. Several could fit inside Earth’s moon alone. It looked like a tiny ball of ice lined with deep ridges and scattered pockmarks from passing meteors just drifting by. Something no one would think of being anything important, just a random ice bal in Saturn’s orbit.

A perfect hiding place for something just the opposite.

Ghost appeared over my shoulder. He opened the channels to see if we could pick up any signals, checking the radar systems as well, but they were all quiet.

“Nothing, huh?”

“No. Nothing,” he confirmed. “No signals, no signs of life, or any activity at all. It’s reading as dead. And, without knowing if Cayde actually found something here - actually saw it - there’s no telling without getting closer.”

I looked back out the window. It was dark, the shadow of Saturn nearly blocking out all light from the surface. “Then let’s get closer.”

I brought the ship in low, seeing nothing but a sea of grey and black shimmer from the cold surface, many of the ridges revealing themselves to actually be jagged icy swales and jutting mountains, some appearing to be bubbling out a kind of liquid from below the surface that hardened almost immediately, creating the alien formations.

“Still nothing reading on any of the scanners,” Ghost noted.

Then … “WAIT!” He suddenly sputtered, spinning around to look out the window. “There!”

Ana looked out the window, searching for what he saw as I turned the ship in the direction he was looking, bringing it back around. “I don’t see anything,” she said, looking from side to side.

“Right down there,” Ghost said, blinking as he bobbed down a bit to motion where he was looking. “Do you see it?” I tilted the ship to the right as we circled, squinting my eyes.

“I see it!” Ana said. “Right there!” She pointed just below us and I noticed the faint outline of something darker than the rest of the surface. A spire of some kind, made to blend into the jagged icy mountains surrounding it, the squared off top and circular base, however, giving it away once you were close enough. Ghost looked at the displays on the panel. “It says … there’s oxygen?” He told us, sounding bewildered by that.

“It’s a dead moon. There shouldn’t be any atmosphere at all, let alone oxygen,” I shook my head, looking at the readouts. Sure enough, though, the scanners read oxygen. And at safe levels. “What the hell …?”
That was … impossible. There were no signs of terraforming anywhere.

“Tower, this is City Hawk seven - two - three, we’ve spotted some kind of anomaly on the surface. We’re going to set down to investigate.”

Static.

“Tower, this is City Hawk seven - two - three. Do you copy?”

Just more static.

“Something’s blocking our signal,” Jinju said.

I frowned. We didn’t have time to for this.

“I’m going to set us down nearby,” I told them, bringing the ship back around once more, settling us under the cover of an icy glacier drift and safely away from whatever was bubbling up from below. I checked the readouts one more time as I got up from my seat. There was no mistaking them. They read oxygen present. But, even with that, the subzero temperatures were deadly. - 334F. Why would there be a need for oxygen?

I pulled my helmet on and looked over at Ghost. “Is it too cold for either of you out there?”

“No,” Ghost replied. “Others of us have traveled through open space. Jinju and I should be fine.”

I nodded. “Alright. Ana?”

“Ready,” she replied, helmet secured. I pressed the release button to the door, the back hatch of the ship slowly dropping down into a ramp. As I stepped off, I’d expected my boots to counter the lack of gravity but … there was no need. A dead moon but there’s oxygen and gravity. What the hell was this place? I switched the readings to display on the inside of my helmet, checking them again, getting the same as before. “You seeing these readings?” I asked Ana.

She nodded. “Yeah.” Jinju appeared by her side looking around.

Beneath our feet, I could feel tremors and all around us, low, echoing clacks of snapping ice blocks resonated as the bubbling substance of whatever it was seeping up onto the surface like lava melted the ice and changed the formation. It would be very, very easy to get lost here. Everything changed by the hour.

“Ghost? Are you reading the same thing, too?” I asked.

“Yes,” he said and Jinju confirmed with a bobbing nod.

How was any of this possible? Even if the facility was placed here during the Golden Age and they had the tech, it didn’t appear to be a place the Traveler had touched in any way. They would need some kind of bio-dome to contain an atmosphere and regulate it, wouldn’t they? And, again, what was the point? Oxygen and gravity on a dead, frozen, subzero moon?

“Maybe it was for the Exos?” Jinju said. “With what they can withstand, they’d be the only ones out here, really. Maybe the oxygen was to allow them to breathe? So the DER didn’t affect them.”

“That’s a very good point,” I admitted, nodding. “It makes sense. Which means maybe we’re in the right place."

I started walking toward the spire about a hundred yards ahead of us, the formation growing more ominous the closer we got; a knife-like monolith rising up out of the ice like a massive tree stretching toward the sun. It stood on a thick, rounded platform a couple hundred feet across, the surface made of glossy black metal tiles with huge hydraulic arms attached to a doorway that was sealed into the base. Yellow ladders ran up along the sides at various points granting access to what looked like power panels. From those panels, lines ran to the very tip of the spire where beacons and comms arrays were secured, their outlines against the faint remaining light of Saturn all that gave them away. As we got closer, I noticed there were also signal boosters and antennas sticking out in a few places around the platform, as well as what looked like ventilation pipes. “Whatever we’re looking for is under the ice,” I said, looking up at the spire again. “Not inside that.”

“If this is the Crypt - or a crypt - and it’s buried under us … Could that be the Dark Tower?” Ghost asked, looking up. “That image Exo’s see in their dreams?”

“It’s possible,” I nodded, looking up once again at the imposing structure. “If this is Deep Stone - or one of many - then I suppose either arriving here or leaving, this would be what they would see. Something that imprinted. Something striking enough it stayed with them.”I was curious if this really was what Cayde saw in his dreams. His nightmares. It definitely gave off a nightmare vibe.

“Or was programmed into them,” Ghost ominously noted.

“Or that,” I agreed. I looked around. “What about that?” I asked Ana of the slab that was set into the platform, the one attached to hydraulics. “That looks like a doorway, doesn’t it?”

Ana stared at it for a few moments, a subtle orange glow appearing around her irises as she activated her optic enhancement lenses to make out any possible substructure.

Suddenly, she yelped and staggered back, dropping to her knee, holding her helmet in pain. I hurried over to her, crouching down, Junju twitching beside her in worry. “What happened? You alright?”

“Ye-Yeah,” she said, wincing and blinking. I noticed her eyes watering, as if she’d just stared into an intensely bright light. “Something caused feedback. Stopped me from scanning.” She winced again, shaking her head. “Ow.”

I frowned and checked the comms once more. “It says the signals are dead,” I told her, looking at the antennas around the platform. “Unless … whatever this is, it’s still active to some capacity but blocking our scanners from reading it,” I said.

Ana nodded in agreement, getting back to her feet. “Something’s definitely here. We’ll need to be careful.”

We decided to split up to look for a way inside, Ana and Jinju going to the right as Ghost and I went left.

As we walked, Ghost drifted closer to the structure, twitching his shell, then made a tentative attempt at scanning it himself. “Careful,” I warned.

“It’s alright,” he told me. “Whatever stopped Ana isn’t aware of me. I”m not getting anything from it.”

“It stopped Ana … but not you?” I frowned, watching Ghost run his scan along the side of the structure before looking up at it. “Golden Age tech,” I then muttered, suddenly realizing what happened. “It doesn’t recognize you cause you’re not Golden Age.”

“But the bio-tech in Ana’s eyes is,” Ghost acknowledge. He’d already figured that might be the case. “Whatever’s still operating here, it’s checking for anything like that.”

“But not you cause your tech is something completely off whatever was programmed into its radar at the time.”

Ghost bobbed an affirmative.

What the hell was this thing?

I stepped up to the structure and touched one of the tiles. I could feel something. A very low vibration. Like something was running deep below the surface but it was too faint to pick up on any of the instruments. I peered closer at it, looking at seams, following along the edges and down where one structure merged into another at the base, looking for anything that appeared to be a way in. I was tempted to pull a Cayde and just start shooting it to see if it revealed something.

“Aislin. Over here,” Ghost called. I walked around base to see what he’d found, noticing his beam focused on a spot where the ice met the tiles. “Down there,” he told me. “Under the ice. There’s something there. I think it’s a control panel of some kind.”

I crouched down onto one knee and brushed the sand-like snow away. “Centuries since it’s been here. The ice’s built up,” I nodded. “That’s why there was no obvious entry point.”

“Good thing you’ve got me, huh?” Ghost chirped.

I smirked and managed to brush away enough of the snow Ghost’s beam was able to shine though a clear patch in the ice just enough I could see what he was talking about. I laid my gloved hand down onto the spot and focused my Light, flames erupting from my palm, melting the ice down and away from the panel, sizzling and steaming against the subzero air around us. An unmistakable tiny white ‘CB’ symbol began to reveal itself, etched atop the panel. “Clovis Bray,” I uttered with a nod. “Ana. Over here,” I told her though the two-way.

A few beats and Ana came around from where she and Jinju had gone, kneeling down beside me to get a closer look at what Ghost had found. “It’s a security panel.” Jinju said, turning to Ana. Ana brushed away ice droplets that had already re-frozen to the panel. She pulled out her knife, wiggling the tip into a seam and popped the cover off revealing a keypad with a small screen above. Junju scanned it several times before making a frustrated burble. “I can access it,” she told us, “but it’s going to take a few minutes. The security system on this is state-of-the-art.”

“Let me help,” Ghost offered. “The two of us together might be able to access it faster.”

Jinju bobbed and the two of them got to work.

I stood and stepped away, finding myself staring up at the spire once more.

Crunching footsteps brought my gaze to Ana as she came over to me. “You alright?” She asked.

I nodded. “Yeah,” I murmured, my eyes back on the spire. “I just … I keep thinking about him,” I admitted. “Coming here. Not just as he is now but as … maybe his original self - when he was human. If this is even the one he went to. I wonder what he was thinking. What he was feeling the first time he saw what we’re seeing now.”

“If there’s any hint of that person in the man he is now, knowing him, his curiosity was likely driving him more than anything.”

“Yeah,” I nodded. “Yeah, I’d believe that.” I didn’t mention what I knew from Cayde’s journal. Of how it wasn’t really a choice for him to come here. To become an Exo.

“Do you think he was scared?” She then asked. “I can’t imagine Cayde scared but … I think I’d be. Leaving so much behind. Even my body.”

“I don’t know,” I admired with a shake of the head. “I think I’d be, too, though.”

A sudden loud and hollow sounding clang of metal startled us, shelving the conversation. It was followed by a low, echoing groan of grinding stone and concrete against one another as bits of gathered ice that had crusted over part of the door heaved and cracked, the sound piercing as it echoed over the lifeless landscape. I winced at the unpleasant noise. “Got it!” Jinju proudly cheered as if it wasn't obvious.

Beneath my feet, the icy ground began to rattle from the weight of the massive door moving back on the hydraulic arms. I stumbled a bit, balancing myself just an almost deafening hiss from the pressure behind the door burst upward. Dusty, stale air released up into the cold in a white, misty cloud. Ghost and Jinju came over to us and watched as the platform slowly opened. I rested my palm of the hilt of my cannon, not sure if there was anything that might come out at us or not, or if there were any defenses that might’ve been triggered.

When the doorway was fully open, a large platform elevator rose up out of it to the ground level and clicked into place. “Welcome to Clovis Bray facility, E-2. Please, watch your step in navigating the lift.”

Ana and I looked at one another before walking over to it.

“Is it just me or … Did that voice sound like you?” I asked her.

“I’d rather not think about that,” Ana said as she stepped up to the platform. She gave it a good shove with her foot, testing its integrity, then stepped up onto it, myself and our Ghosts in tow. To our left was a simple release leaver with up and down arrows.

“But, yeah,” she added with a nod, then reached over and pulled the handle, the platform lowering us down inside.

*

Dark walls surrounded us, the perimeter softly lit with light tracks inlayed in the corners. They didn’t do much to quell the claustrophobic feeling the angled shaft created. I looked up, watching as the green-tinted night sky got further and further away as we sunk deeper and deeper inside, eventually, the door above us slowly closing.

Just like a tomb.

The hairs on the back of my neck stood on end. There was a very unsettling feeling about this place. Almost … sinister.

I shook myself out of it.

Once we got down what I guessed was around two hundred feet or so, the elevator began to slow and the shaft opened up to reveal a large open room of what looked to be a pristine light gray metal walled area with darker gray grated metal flooring. Lights illuminated the space and built - in benches surrounded the exterior facing a central monitoring arm with three screens projected from the ceiling, giving anyone seated anywhere in the room a screen to view. Behind the benches, window-like screens flickered with playing scenes of open grassy plaines, rolling hills, golden wheat fields, mountain ranges, and the sun setting over the ocean. My eyes focused on one screen in particular.

“This looks like some kind of waiting or reception area,” Ana said. “Not at all what I was expecting.”

“What were you expecting?” I asked.

“I don’t know. Just not this.” She checked her feed. “Says there’s oxygen. Room temperature’s at a steady forty-five.” She took her helmet off and took a breath, puffy white vapor dancing into the air before it disappeared. She nodded to me and I removed my helmet, feeling the cold sting on my cheeks.

“Must’ve been what the vibration you felt was,” Ghost said. “A system running to keep a heat source going. Otherwise, it’d be just as cold down here as above.”

“Golden Age tech. Same thing we’ve seen in other places like this,” I nodded, stepping off the platform. “Enough power to run for hundreds of years, maybe even more if just the basic systems remain online.”

Lights concealed behind wall panels and along the ceiling and under the benches must’ve sensed our movement and began to grew brighter as we walked further into the space. As my eyes adjusted, they became drawn to a long hallway ahead of us. Above it was white stenciled lettering that read: ‘Clovis Bray Exo-Science Labs’.

“At least we don’t have to go searching for it,” Ghost noted.

I checked my tracker. “Not reading anything,” I said, starting down the hall.

“Reminds me Ishtar,” Ghost murmured as he looked around.

“We’ve only just stepped in the door,” I told him. He wasn’t wrong, though. It did have an Ishtar vibe. At least at this point.

On the wall beside us, horizontal black and yellow caution lines directed us around and to the left, and to the eventual end of the hallway, revealing a set of sealed sliding doors. As we approached, the red light above switched to green and slid open with a soft hiss.

I stopped.

Why had the door opened?

“We made ourselves a master key,” Jinju told us. “Plus, it helps that the system recognizes Ana.”

“Nice,” I nodded.

Ana peeked her head into the room beyond the doors. “Looks clear,” she said going inside. I followed.

“I know you’re here with us and a Bray and all but …” I looked around. “I expected more of a security system for a place that’s not supposed to exist.”

“So did I,” Ana admitted.

“We disabled the ceiling turrets,” Jinju remarked. It was part of the bypass Ghost and I hacked to get us in. Not too sure about anything beyond here, though.”

I’d figured it’d been too easy.

The place suddenly shook with a low tremor. A rippling sounding echo of crackling and snapping reverberated all lured us like a spiral moving upward. The movement of the ice around the facility. “As if this place couldn’t get creepier,” I muttered.

“Yeah,” Ana uttered, looking upward toward the ceiling. “Let’s see what we can find,” she then said.

This new room we’d stepped into was different than the waiting area. It was constructed of light gray concrete and the floor appeared to be some kind of deep green marble with large diamond shaped metal plated panels for the ceiling. The space opened up further to a large room with another hallway in front of us on the other side flanked by large rectangular windows that seemed to be security stations.

Judging by this structure, and the one we just came from, I got the sense this whole facility was like some giant honeycomb of hallways, connecting one room or lab to another in a circular pattern.

Ana went over to one of the stations and stepped inside, sitting down at one of the computers and booted it up while Jinju scanned some other equipment. “Let’s see if this can tell us what we’ve got here …” she said.

I stood by, waiting, not knowing what else I could do at the moment. I knew Ana and Jinju were doing all they could as fast as they could. If anyone could get into this system it was them. I just … I hated every second that ticked by.

Rather than pace around and think about it, I decided to head down the hall beyond the security check point, my curiosity getting to me. I looked finding sealed rooms with double pained windows that were almost completely dark, save the faint bit of light from the hallway shining in. I tapped on the glass, the sound more like solid plastic against the hard knuckles of my gloves. “Huh,” I uttered, looking up. “Reinforced polycarbonate. Unbreakable,” I said to Ghost who was looking in the window as well.

“These labs look similar to the ones we found on Mars,” he told me. I holstered my cannon and leaned closer to the window, cupping my hands around my eyes as I pressed in against it and peered in.

He was right. There was some seriously high-tech scientific equipment and machinery inside along with work stations and tables, computers, all that sort of stuff. As I scanned the room, a strange, shadowed shape suddenly appeared in the corner of my eye, startling me. I jumped back for a second then slowly peered back in.

It was a bare foot!

That was when I noticed more bodies hanging form the ceiling! At first I thought they might have been people who had lived or worked here and hung themselves in the sealed up lab during the Collapse. A gruesome and morbid picture, yes, but it wouldn’t be the first time Ghost and I had run into such a thing. Thankfully, they weren’t.

As I got a better look, they appeared to actually be Exos. More specifically, the empty shells just hanging there in a row, like someone had hung suits in a closet. It was the same thing we’d seen on Mars. Unlike Mars, however, and why I’d been so startled, was I noticed, even in the darkened lab, that the bodies didn’t appear as robotic as the others we’d encountered. These ones here were more human in design than any other Exo I’d ever seen. Even more so than the Exo Stranger’s. I wasn’t sure about Cayde, though. What I had seen of him was just his neck, hands, feet, and forearms. Although, the hands on these ones looked very similar with the jointed synthetic silicone of sorts, much like Cayde’s were, save lacking the smooth metal tips of the fingers and the metal plate at the back of his hand. These bodies were also lacking heads.

“Are those … Wow. Those are … Those are anatomically correct, aren’t they?” Ghost asked.

I arched an eyebrow and looked again.

Indeed, they were.

Now that was something we hadn’t seen on the ones on Mars.

“Why would you make war machines with such human qualities?” Ghost mused, pulling me out of my thought. “Even with the DER, this is really going for authentic. Like bordering on … cyborg. These look nothing like the Exos we know.”

“Well … you remember that old movie we watched with the cybrog that goes after that woman and her kid? That one had skin and looked totally human but nothing stopped it except getting completely crushed or dipped in molten metal. Granted, it was a movie but the idea …”

“Mmm,” Ghost burbled with a nod. “I guess I just imagine something … tankier when I think “war machine”.”

I wondered what Cayde had been told about the program back then? What he saw when he’d arrived here. If it was here and if any of this is was here at the time. Actually, the more I thought about it, likely not. This all looked really new. And Cayde had had, what? Five incarnations before the Collapse? He might not’ve even known this was happening.

I backed away from the window and sighed.

It was so quiet.

There was no one in my ear.

No witty comments. No jokes. No casual conversation or reminiscing.

Just silence.

Silence so loud it was becoming deafening.

I suddenly felt so alone in a way I couldn’t find words for.

Leaning up against the wall next me, I slowly slid down to the floor.

“Aislin?” Ghost drifted down to me as I breathed deep, closing my eyes, letting my head drop back against the icy metal wall, taking one slow breath after another.

“What I wouldn’t give to hear his voice over the comm. Just once. Just a casual, cheerful “Y’ello”. Anything to make this nightmare end,” I murmured.

“Me, too,” Ghost admitted. “And Sundance.”

I opened my eyes to see his shell drooping and held my hands out to him, hugging him once he’d settled in my palms.

“This has to work,” I told him. “This has to be the place,” I said with conviction. “It just has to be.” I shook my head. “I don’t … We can’t lose him, too. I can’t,” I uttered with a strained, grating voice. “I don’t know how to be in this world without him.”

I hadn’t realized how true that was until now.

“Yes you do,” Ghost gently replied and wiggled out of my hands so he could float in front of me to look at me. “He taught you how.”

“I don’t think he was expecting anything like this, though,” I shook my head.

“That he might not be here so suddenly? Or that you’d fall in love?”

“Either.”

Ghost seemed to contemplate that. “Well … maybe not the latter. I don’t think anyone can plan on love. But I’m sure he taught you how to be here without him if the worst ever … ever happened. It only makes sense. It’s what he’s known, himself. With Andal. Everything he’s opened up about and shared with you … I’m sure it was a bit different for him; the feeling of losing a bother isn’t exactly what you’re feeling right now. But, still, being faced with losing someone you love and care about deeply. Cayde understood that.”

“I feel like there’s a knife in my chest,” I told him, making the motion of holding a knife’s hilt against myself. “Turning. Slowly.” I clenched my fist tighter, the leather of my glove creaking under the pressure. “Each second a sharp pain just radiates all though me. None of this even feels real.” I leaned forward, resting my forehead on my knees.

“I know,” Ghost soothed. “I know.” He settled down in front of me, tilting his shell against my forehead. I let out a heavy, shaky breath, putting my hands around him, pulling him in close, holding him tight.

We sat in silence for a few moments as I pulled myself back together.

“He’s still with us,” Ghost then told me, his own robotic voice sounding a bit strained. “I know it hurts to think he might not be for long. But that’s exactly why you need to get up. Because he needs you.”

Ghost and I exchanged a silent look and I nodded. He was right. I couldn’t fall apart now. There would be time for that after. Regardless.

“Hey! I think I found what you’re looking for!” Ana called down the hall.

I snapped out of my stupor and got to my feet, Ghost and I hurrying back to the security office. Ana and Jinju had all the monitors running, scanning through everything they could pull up. “What’d you find?” I asked.

Ana pointed at the screen showing a schematic of the underground facility divided into levels, each one a specific function in the Exo program. “Third level down. Looks like a medical wing. Maybe it’ll have what we need to fix Cayde?”

“How do we get to it?” I asked.

“Down the end of the hall should be an elevator,” she said, pointing behind us. “Before you go, though, look at this.”

She pulled up another level on the monitor showing the base levels and what looked like huge piping that went from the bottom of the facility down into the core of the moon. “They were pulling up the raw metals and silicates from the core,” she said. “This moon’s rich with them. That’s what’s boiling up onto the surface. And this moon’s not the only one. There are other places in Sol with them, too. With the same compound. They were mining them and shipping them somewhere. It looks like that’s what Clovis used to build the base body structures of the later Exo’s. Incredibly tough and much stronger than any materials found on Earth or man-made. But also easier to work with and easier to repair if damaged.”

“So there’s a good chance we can fix Cayde,” I said, hopeful.

“I hope so,” Ana nodded. Her expression then took on a bit of a grim appearance. “It also looks like there were other things being used in the process. It’s all been redacted, though.” She showed me a screen where nearly every recorded page of a report was blacked out. “It’s something to do with the actual make up of their function.” She looked over at me. “I can’t find what it is. In anything. And if we don’t know what it is, and it’s not here …”

I thought of the shells we’d seen hanging up. It wouldn’t make sense to have those here and not have what would be needed to make them work. I wouldn’t think, anyway. “It will be,” I said.

I couldn’t afford to think otherwise.

❣️♠️❣️

Chapter Text

CHAPTER FOUR
❣️♠️❣️

I know I’d be ok
Without you, but
I wouldn’t be me.
The me that I’ve
Become just from
Being close to you.
You bring a clarity.
A balance. I don’t
Just see it, but
I feel it.
You make me a
Better me.
~JM Storm

The medical wing was unlike any other I’d ever seen, even the ones at the old Bray facilities on Mars. It was like something straight out of old Earth science fiction. There was strange equipment everywhere. From massive robotic arms that jutted out from compartments in the ceiling, hanging over tables, to scanners, medpods, and tubes with a strange murky liquid inside and detached hoses floating within. There were glass monitors everywhere, too, some built into the floor, free-standing, and others affixed to the walls near tables and pods. Golden Age artifacts that were simultaneously old yet appeared far more advanced than most things we had now, hundreds of years later.

Everything was sterile and white. Not a speck of dust or even a remaining scuff of a footprint on the floor from whoever may have been the last in here.

As I walked further in, I passed through what appeared to be a monitoring station. Large, black, semi-transparent glass screens stood vertically next to each other in a row, outlines of humanoid forms etched into the glass with pathways that formed patterns over every key section.

“Diagnostics,” I whispered as I slowly traced my fingertip over the lines.

“There’s nothing here,” Ghost said with frustration, and I turned my head to see him fluttering from desktop to desktop. “No paperwork laying about, no notes, no functioning data pads. Nothing,” he muttered in a tense voice. “It’s as if this place has never been used.”

“Maybe it was new?” I offered. “Ana said it looked like there was more than one. Maybe this was one that hadn’t been used yet?”

“Possible,” Ghost bobbed then turned, his eye widening. “Aislin, look! Over there.”

He quickly drifted over to what he’d spotted and I followed, seeing a large medical bed - one of four lined up against the far wall. They looked almost like one of the CT scanners back in the Tower infirmary only far more intricate and advanced with a lot more precise and finely tuned instruments attached.

Ghost started scanning the various parts while I gave one of the beds a closer look.

Like the tables, there were robotic arms that dropped down from the ceiling above and individual silver metal arches suspended over the rexine bed at different intervals, each with smaller, more delicate and finely articulated arms for more precise functions. At the head of the bed there was a molded indent and a port hole built in where the patient’s head would rest. Along the side there were ridges that held tracks with small square devices that looked like they could each move independently of each other, back and forth around the curve of a head in the space. More monitors also surrounded the area, some on the walls, some free-standing, each looking like they had a specific arm or part of the bed to control and monitored what was going with that area.

Something suddenly started tugging at my hair, tickling the back of my neck.

I quickly jerked away and spun around to see what it was.

The whole bed had started moving! Monitors and lights were flickering and humming, robotic arms jerking around, aimlessly searching for something to work on. I then saw what had ‘tickled’ me was one of the smaller arms’ needle-like ‘fingers’. Strands of my hair were hanging off them as they twitched, the arm they were attached to hanging from one of the arches that had been above me. I looked over at Ghost and he curled his shell in a bit. “Sorry,” he muttered. “Appears the equipment is functional, though.”

I glared at him as I relaxed. “Ana, is this what we’re looking for?” I asked her over the comm.

“Checking now,” she told me. “Just give me one sec … There’s just so many files in here … Ah! Yeah. That looks like it! Do you see tubes going out the back of it?”

I looked around the bed, spotting some tubes coming out the base hear the top. “Yeah,” I nodded as I crouched down, taking each in my hand to inspect. “One’s gray with a blue line and the other’s white.”

“That’s it, then. Check the monitors to the arms. I’m going to bring them online. Run a test.”

I heard a beeping sound come from each monitor as they went form flickering to fully online, the Clovis Bray symbol slowly forming on the screens as they loaded. “Looks like they’re working,” I told her.

“Okay. Everything looks good on our end, too,” she told me.

“And we’re sure this is meant to repair damage?” I asked, rubbing the back of my head where my hair had been pulled out. “It’s not just some sort of assembly thing?”

“It looks that way. Hang on. … Okay … There should be a lab next to you. To the right of where you came in.”

I looked, seeing the darkened windows along the wall and a set of steps that led up to a small platform and some doors. “Yeah, I see it.”

“Inside, there should be a couple Exo shells. Maybe take one out and damage it then run it though and see if it works?” Ana offered.

“Not a bad idea,” Ghost said and I couldn’t disagree.

The moment I stepped inside the lab I got the same vibe as before. That this place was all set up and ready to go, but hadn’t been used yet.

“Creepy,” Ghost quietly said, looking at the hanging Exo shells.

I nodded and got one down, carrying it out. “Does it not having a head matter?” I asked.

“I don’t think so. We’ll find out,” Ana said.

I walked out to an open area of the floor and set the body down, laying it out, then stepped back and drew my cannon, ready to fire at its chest, wanting to create similar injuries to what Cayde had.

I couldn’t pull the trigger for some reason, though.

“Aislin?” Ghost asked.

I felt my hand shaking as I looked at the body laying there. All I could see was Cayde. All I could remember was the moment I ran onto the dock and saw him laying on the cold metal, bleeding.

“Aislin,” Ghost tried again, coming around in front of my face, getting my attention.

I snapped myself out of it. “I got it,” I told him, easing him aside. I took a breath, let it out, then re-aimed my gun right at the chest … and fired.

The sound ricocheted off the wall, loud and final as the body jerked, black bio-fluid splattering and oozing out onto the otherwise pristine floor.

I saw the same black fluid all over Cayde. All over me. My armor. Seeped into my gloves. I looked down. It was still on me. I’d forgotten to wash it off.

I felt cold. Cold to my core.

“Wh-what other injuries were there?” I asked Ghost, trying not to let it get to me.

“There’s no need to do anything else,” he assured me. “All we need is this one injury to see if it’ll work.”

I deftly nodded and holstered my cannon, then picked the body up.

A flash and I was suddenly back at the prison, carrying Cayde out to the ship. I looked down at the body in my arms. Instead of seeing an empty shell, I saw him.

Lifeless.

Everything went numb. I felt dizzy. Detached. Like I was outside myself.

I looked away, closing my eyes. I counted to three and opened them again.

“You alright?” I heard Ana ask over the comm.

“Yeah,” I managed.

I hoisted the body up onto the bed and stepped back, the soles of my boots squeaking. When I looked down, I saw the smeared trail of blood droplets that had leaked from the body and the small puddle on the floor from where I’d shot it.

The metal floor of the prison dock.

“Starting it up,” Ana said, drawing me back once again. “You might want to stand back a bit further,” she advised.

I looked up and around. “You can see us?”

“Tapped into the security cameras, yeah,” Ana confirmed.

I backed up a bit further, getting myself and Ghost fully clear.

Like before, everything suddenly seemed to come to life at once. The monitors projected imagery of the body laying on the bed and soft ultraviolet toned lights shown down from the arches, flickering and blinking back and forth over the body as a full diagnostic scan was taken, appearing on the screen nearby. Then, a female voice sounding a lot like the Stranger spoke. “Working,” it stated, and the lights grew brighter, pulsing over the body before focusing on the chest area. “Shell diagnostic complete,” it stated. “Found issues: Outer casing damage, torso. Interior casing damage, torso. Circulatory damage, severe. Lung damage, severe. Do you wish to proceed with repairs?”

I blinked. It was talking to me?

“Do you wish to proceed with repairs?” It asked again.

“Aislin?” Ana asked over the comm.

“Uh, yeah. Yes,” I finally said aloud.

“Repairing,” the voice said, as the arms started moving, going to work, easing inside the chest cavity and moving at almost lightning speed. I noticed some tubes attached to the arms were twitching and a heavy electrified metallic scent wafted through the air as sparks and soft, small curls of steam and smoke rose out of the wound.

“Do you see that?” Ghost whispered in fascination, lifting himself higher to watch.

I nodded.

Slowly, the arms lifted, working on another layer of the wound, then lifted again to work on another, and so on, until all the internal damage was fixed and a new metal breastplate was placed. Lastly, tiny little needle-like fingers folded over the torn parts of synthetic flesh, laying them back over the plate, and fused them back together, while another arm jutted back an forth, dropping dollops of hot gray liquid into the open area where there was no skin. The smaller fingers moved over them, flattening them, and blending the liquid with the skin already there, until the chest was fully rebuilt and reformed as if nothing had happened, save just a few very fine scars from where the two came together.

When they were done, the fingers stilled and the arms folded up and backed away. The ultraviolet lights also dimmed, giving way to softer white lights that gradually came up, lighting up the area. “Repairs complete,” the voice then said.

“That only took two minutes,” Ghost said in awe as we both went over to the bedside and looked at the shell.

It was in almost pristine condition save incredibly fine, almost invisible lines, like scars, at the center of the chest. I carefully laid my fingers on it, feeling the heat as the synthetic skin continued to cool but was otherwise firm and smooth.

“Ana … did you see that?” I asked.

“Yeah. That’s … It’s incredible,” she uttered. “Do you know how many Exos this could help who don’t have Ghosts?” She asked.

I nodded. “Yeah. But that’s a discussion for another time,”I told her. “We need to get Cayde here.”

It had worked! There was a chance!

I got the shell off the bed, placing it onto another out of the way. The bed started back up without any prompting, cleaning and sterilizing the surface once it was clear. I watched it for a moment, watching as the bio-fluid was washed away. “I’m going to go into orbit to open the comms,” I finally said. “Will you be okay here alone for a bit?”

“We’ll be fine. Get Cayde here,” Ana told us and I hurried for the elevator, Ghost in tow.

❣️

Within an hour, Zavala and Ikora had Cayde to us and met Ghost and I in Saturn’s orbit where we guided them down to the moon’s surface next to the spire.

Securing my ship, I got out just as Zavala and Ikora were exiting theirs, Zavala carrying Cayde bundled in a heavy fur blanket and what appeared to be a sealed yet transparent protective bodybag of sorts, a softly illuminated flexible blue screen built in near the top, regulating the temperature. They both nodded to me before hurrying to follow, getting Cayde inside.

We brought Cayde straight down to the third level while Ana and Jinju remained at the computers, able to monitor what was going on and run the controls.

Ikora and Zavala both noticed the black splatter on the floor after we got off the elevator, all of us walking around it. I just shook my head at their questioning looks and directed them to the bed. “Set him on there. We’ve got to get him out of everything,” I instructed. I pulled my helmet off, setting it on a nearby lab table, Ikora doing the same. Zavala placed Cayde on the bed and I took the blanket as he removed his own helmet while Ophiuchus appeared beside Ikora, who was already removing the protective covering, Ophiuchus collecting it.

I went to Cayde’s side, leaning over him, pulling my glove off, cradling his cheek in my palm, feeling the cold of the room already seeping into the metal of his face. “Hey,” I whispered to him as, behind me, Zavala removed the med gown and gauze covering the bullet wound.

“I know I’ve been saying this a lot lately but it’s gonna be okay. Alright? Trust me,” I murmured, focusing on Cayde’s closed eyes. “We’re all right here. You’re not alone. Everything’s gonna be alright.” I really had no idea if he could hear me. If he could hear anything or knew what was happening. But, if he could, now more than ever I wanted him to hear something comforting. Just incase this didn’t work. I leaned over and kissed his forehead. “I love you, Firefly,” I breathed, pressing my forehead to his. “Always.”

Then, reluctantly, I backed away, composing myself. “Ana? Are we set?” I asked, clearing my throat.

“Ready,” she said.

I motioned Ikora and Zavala to step back, noticing Targe had appeared as well, hovering with Ophiuchus and Ghost.

Once we were all clear, I nodded. “Run it.”

We all watched anxiously as the tech came to life once again, the room dimming as the soft purple-pink hues of the ultraviolet scan commenced. “Working,” the voice said.

I kept my eyes on Cayde’s face, my jaw tight, repeating over and over in my head that this just had to work. It had to. Please.

When the scan finished, the voice spoke again. “Diagnostics complete. Damage severe. Core mind integrity fading. Found issues: Fractured facial plate, left. Fractured jaw, left. Fractured eye socket, left. Circulatory damage. Internal hemorrhaging. Collapsed lung, left. Shattered sternum. Fractured ribs, left. Numbers four, five, seven. Fractured ribs, right. Numbers two, three. Fractured hip, right. Fractured knee, right. Fractured ankle, right. Broken pelvis.”

Out the corner of my eye I watched Ikora bring a tightened fist to her lips as Zavala briefly closed his eyes, his own hands clenching at his sides.

“Do you wish to initiate repairs?” The voice asked.

“Yes,” I immediately stated, swallowing against a heavily acidic taste in my mouth.

The machines got to work, several moving at once, each addressing a different injury. The monitors lit up, each showing detailed camera footage of the repairs in progress, the internal workings flashing on the screens so intricate, so finely complicated, it was no surprise to me that even Ghosts had no real understanding of how it all worked, just that it did.

That same sickening, heavy metallic smell began rising into the air with more tendrils of smoke and steam. Small orange sparks spat out and bounced along Cayde’s right leg and at his chest, and at the side of his face as metal was reshaped, realigned, and fused back together. It was more like watching Amanda repair a ship or sparrow than a living person being mended back together.

I closed my eyes. The computers words: “core mind integrity fading” repeating in my head. He had to still be in there. He had to pull through. Cayde was tough. He could do this. “Please. Please,” I prayed to anything that might be there listening.

I startled when I felt something go around my shoulders. I looked next to me and saw Zavala, his arm around me, keeping me steady as he stared straight ahead, watching the arms work. His other hand was on Ikora’s shoulder. I deflated some but not fully. I didn’t want to give in to the comfort. I couldn’t. I wouldn’t come back if I did.

I felt like a porcelain vase. Cracked all over but still standing. A simple, slight push and I’d fall to pieces.

Stiffening, I redirected my attention back to Cayde’s face, watching the sparks continue to fly.

There was so much damage that needed to be mended.

As we waited, my mind ended up drifting to one evening at the apartment. I’d spent the day with a couple other Guardians, the three of us wandering the Infinite Forest, bouncing through portals and taking out Vex and dozens upon dozens of simulated Hive, Cabal, and Fallen. I was exhausted and my feet were killing me; the hot shower I’d taken hadn’t done much to make them feel better. Cayde had come over. I’d thrown on a pair of black leggings and a long black off the shoulder sweatshirt, coming out to see him watching an old movie, comfortably kicked back on the couch, barefoot, having changed into civilian clothes for the evening - a pair of brown ranger pants and a knitted cream top. He was eating a sandwich, another one on a plate nearby set out for me. Hearing familiar lines, I looked up at the television and saw it was Tombstone. I smiled. “Watching this again, hm?” I asked him as I sat down on the couch beside him. “Whaff? Ah luff diff,” he managed around a mouthful of sandwich. I chuckled and laid my head back for a bit. “You’re definitely a Doc Holliday,” I told him, then picked my right foot up and rubbed at the arch, wincing. Next thing I knew, Cayde had set his plate down, wiped his hands off, and scooted forward. He’d reached over, taking my foot into his lap, and started gently massaging it. I was going to tell him he didn’t have to do that but it felt so good, I couldn’t bring myself to protest. “Eat your sandwich,” he dotingly told me as his fingers worked. How they could feel so soft and gentle with those inlayed metal tips I have no idea.

About halfway through eating, he motioned me to give him my other foot, then started working on that one.

I ended up watching him more than the movie, simultaneously grateful for the massage, but also feeling a little awkward at not knowing what to say about it, if anything. Was it possible for friends to do something like that and not have it mean more? Or was it just me, wanting to tell myself it didn’t mean more because I was afraid he saw it as something innocent and I wanted it to mean something? Or did it mean something more to him, too?

I was overthinking it and too afraid to ask.

By the time the movie was over, I’d decided to keep my thoughts to myself and, instead, thanked him for making me the sandwich. He’d smiled and gave me a nod, then, hands stilling, he turned to me, looking at me carefully. “I have a question for you,” he said.

I nodded. “What is it?” I’d casually asked, setting my plate down on the coffee table.

“This is a serious one, ‘kay?” He said, his tone taking on the air of something very important he needed to ask me.

I sat up a little straighter and nodded, giving him my full attention, thinking he was going to address what I’d considered the obvious elephant in the room.

He looked nervous for a moment, then leaned in a little closer to me. I had felt my heart speed up a bit and I think I stopped breathing. He then frowned contemplatively and whispered: “Should I grow a mustache?”

Completely taken off guard, any disappointment I could have had instantly disappeared with the welling of pure amusement that question elicited, and I hit him in the face with a pillow, laughing!

I wondered now if he’d had the same thoughts in that moment but decided to play it off with a joke rather than address it.

I also wondered what would’ve happened if we had.

“Assessing cerebral lock.”

The computerized voice pulled me out of the memory and I opened my eyes. ‘Cerebral lock’? What was that?

“Preparing for cognitive cerebral-neurological re-establishment,” it said.

The interior of the cylinder at Cayde’s head flashed with a bright spectrum of light and shifted forward, covering him, obstructing his face from our view. “Pathways clear,” the voice informed. A high-powered whirring sound began emanating from the bed and the nearby tubes of murky liquid bubbled and gurgled. Cayde’s head jerked as something beneath it came out of the port of the bed and attached itself to him. “Cerebral connection initiated. Neural connection commencing,” the voice said. The scanner on the cylinder lit up again and the monitors around the bed showed a detailed digital close up of Cayde’s brain on one, his full body on the other.

Suddenly, his brain lit up, as if electrically charged, and trickles of light flowed down the nerve endings, making the faint teal lines embedded in his synthetic skin sparkle. On the monitor, more went down the back of his neck and spine and throughout his entire body, moving like soft tendrils. Cayde’s body twitched then violently jerked, his chest arching up off the bed, his whole body trembling before slamming back down, rattling the machinery! I gasped, taking a step toward him as I watched him go through what looked like a seizure! Zavala’s arm around me stilled me but my heart clenched with worry, thinking something had gone horribly wrong and instead of helping him, I’d just killed him!

“Cognitive cerebral-neurological reestablishment successful,” the voice then stated. Cayde went still. The port disconnected from the back of his head and all the arms slowly folded back up and eased away from him as the lights came back up.

“Did it work?” Ana asked over the comms.

My heart was in my throat by this point. I looked over at the monitors, each one with check lists of various things that had needed repair now all in green. Ikora hurried over to his side, gently laying her hands on his arm, studying his face. I forced myself to let out the breath I hadn’t realized I’d been holding and joined her, Zavala walking with me, our Ghosts by our sides.

I looked down at Cayde. His body, like that of the shell I’d tested earlier, was now fully repaired. The bullet hole in his chest was gone, a faint circular outline of where it had been the only indication anything had happened. I checked his side, seeing another series of lines in his skin from where the robotic fingers had opened him to go in and repair his ribs. Down along his right hip and leg was the same. As well as across his abdomen. I then focused on his face, every single last little detail of it back exactly the way it had been. I carefully touched him, my fingertips following along the lines and ridges of his features and down over his jawline. Even some of the age-worn loss of the teal color to his faceplates in some areas was now returned, and the cream tone of his forehead was polished and soft to the touch.

It was like his body was brand new.

He was so … beautiful.

“Cayde?” I whispered as Zavala laid the blanket over Cayde’s lower half. “Can you hear me?” I asked him, caressing his cheek.

Cayde’s eyelids fluttered a bit then slowly opened, his aqua optics crisp, dilating and contracting as they adjusted to the light around him. 

“Cayde?” I tried again, and his eyes instantly focused on me, starring.

❣️♠️❣️

Chapter Text

CHAPTER FIVE
❣️♠️❣️

I cannot heal you.
But I can love you
In your darkness.
Hold your hand while
You process the pain.
I can be the silk
In your hands as you
Close the wound.
~JM Storm

“Hey,” I whispered, smiling against the tremble in my bottom lip, caressing his cheek as I held back tears. “Welcome back.”

“Hey,” Cayde weakly replied, his voice soft, eyelids droopy. He looked and sounded very tired but he smiled back at me anyway. “Ain’t you a sight for sore eyes.”

“You should be on this side,” I told him, my smile broadening as I touched the newly forged plates on his face. I leaned over him and put my arms around him, hugging him close as I sighed with relief. I felt him return the hug, his arms curling around me as he turned his face against my cheek and sighed, too.

“I had such a nice dream,” he murmured. “Don’t usually have those.”

“Yeah? What was it about?” I asked.

“I was … I was layin’ in the cool grass by a fire lookin’ up at the stars. Just … takin’ it all in. So vast and so … so dang … beautiful. And Sundance… she was there. She was … nestled on my chest. And I was … caressin’ her shell as she nodded off. Heh. So peaceful. So … So peaceful …” he took a slow, deep breath in and let it out as his body slackened against me.

“Cayde?”

His chest rose and fell slowly against mine and I felt warm puffs of air brushing the side of my neck.

He’d fallen asleep?

Ikora and Zavala both stepped closer, Ikora laying her hand on his calf, caressing it. “Cayde?”

He didn’t stir. Didn’t even twitch.

“What happened?” Zavala asked, a hand on Cayde’s shoulder as he stared down at his face.

I looked up at Ghost who was already coming over, immediately beginning to scan him. His beam of light went over Cayde’s entire body from head to toe before he sighed with relief. “He’s alright,” he told us. “He just seems … exhausted. The repairs might’ve been a lot on his system.”

“But he’s alright?” I asked.

“Well … Minus the … the Light. Yes. Everything else appears normal.”

“It’s the neuro-link,” Ana chimed in over the intercom. “It causes a massive jolt to the system. When it looked like he was having a seizure, that’s what that was. Looks like there’s also some kind of built in sedative.” She paused and I could hear keyboard clacking. “It’s a failsafe so none of them wake up aggressive. There’s notes in here about Exos waking up unaware of where they are or even what they are and attacking and killing doctors or even themselves. Something to do with whatever their last memories were before shutting down mixed with overlapping DER.”

“So many of them had been put through hell in places like this,” Ikora quietly said and she shook her head. “All because one man wanted immortality. No wonder he has nightmares.”

Ever since the end of the Red War, when Cayde and I had started spending more time together, every now and again, I’d see him wake up from one. It was never anything violent. Not anything like Ana had described. More just started or confused. At least, that was all he’d let me see. But I knew the Light, mixed with whatever memories that had leaked through from the reboots … Yeah. It did strange things to their memories and dreams after being reborn a Guardian. Sometimes Cayde wouldn’t even have to be asleep. He would just stare off at nothing in the middle of writing in his journal or reading a book. He’d come back but … Even now, after having seen it a few times … It was unsettling.

“How long will it last? The sedative?” I asked.

“Shouldn’t keep him knocked out more than an hour from what I can find,” Ana replied.

“Let’s hope he keeps having peaceful dreams, then,” I said, stroking the side of his face. Seemed what I’d been whispering to him while he was unconscious had had an effect. “Can we move him? To someplace more comfortable? Maybe get some heat on?”

More keyboard clacking. “If you go out the door you came in and … two more down to your left should be the hospital wing. There should be beds there. I’ll see what I can do about warming the place up a bit.”

*
After we moved Cayde to the infirmary and found a comfortable bed for him, Ana managed to get some of the environmental systems running while Zavala got him dressed and Ikora brought her ship to orbit to contact Holliday and Petra.

I found myself in the washroom across the hall, braced against the sink, my eyes closed, and just willed myself to breathe. I was going on a cup of coffee I’d had before we even left for the prison and fumes. I didn’t even know how the hell I was still standing at this point.

I looked up into the mirror. My eyes were heavy with dark circles underneath them and I had dried smears of Cayde’s blood under my chin and along the side of my neck.

I sighed and started pulling my armor off, letting it fall to the floor, then peeled the under armor off, dropping it to the floor as well, standing there in just my underwear. Bruises from blasts that had ricocheted off my armor dotted my skin, mostly up my left side. I looked haggard. After finding Cayde, neither myself or Ghost had thought about healing. And every part of me hurt anyway, so I honestly hadn’t realized how banged up I was. I looked around the room, finding some soap and a towel, and started washing up, the hot water soothing against my skin.

By the time I was done, half the bruises I’d seen - most of which had been on my torso - were gone and, looking down at the now stained towel, I’d realized some had been spots where Cayde’s blood had leaked though under my armor and had dried to my skin.

I sighed.

There was a knock at the door.

“Yeah?” I called and Ikora stepped in carrying something.

“Oh,” she said, seeing me standing there as I was. She bowed an apology. “I can come back …”

I shook my head. “You’re fine. Is Cayde okay?”

“Still asleep. Zavala got him dressed and comfortable, though. He, Ghost, and Targe are sitting with him. Ana came down to see him, too.”

“I shouldn’t be long,” I told her. I’m almost done.”

“Here,” she said, handing me a pile of clothes she was carrying.

I looked at her, surprised as I accepted them.

“I knew you’d need them,” she said.

“Thank you,” I said and started getting dressed.

“I’ll leave you to it,” she said and turned, heading for the door.

“Ikora?”

“Yes?” She turned back to face me.

“How … How do I tell him? If he doesn’t know … How …?” I shook my head.

“About Sundance?”

I nodded. “I’ve never personally known anyone who’s lost their Ghost in a time when I’ve been here. And Cayde …”

“Cayde is strong.”

“I know,” I nodded. “I know he is. But he also pushes a lot down and puts up a hell of a facade. I don’t know how he’s going to react to this. And …” I swallowed the knot in my throat. “I could always ask Sundance for advice. On what to do if I saw he was upset or needed something. She always knew or knew of a way to sneak around that wall of his to help him when he needed it most. And now she’s gone and I … I’m afraid I’ll say or do the wrong thing and only upset him more. Cause I … I’m not good at this.”

Ikora’s features softened as she came back over to me, hands clasped behind her back. “Do you know, in all the years I’ve known Cayde - and it has been a very long time - I have never seen him look at anyone the way he looks at you? So many Guardians and civilians have passed though our halls over the years. Have worked beside us and lived within the Tower among us. Ones he’s interacted with personally for years. And none of them have ever caught his eye or captivated him in such a way as you. If you were anything other than what he needed, or didn’t seem like you understood him or had the kind of patience to allow him to be as he is until he was ready to share something deeper with you, Sundance surely would’ve made a point to let you know. She was always so protective of him. So, trust me when I say, you will know what to tell him and you will know how to be there for him.”

I took in her words - the weight of them and the responsibility behind them. “When did you notice?” I asked. “Him looking at me like that?”

“From the very first day you walked into the Tower,” she smiled, then turned and left the room, leaving me finish getting cleaned up and dressed.

❣️

I peeked into the infirmary and saw Cayde laying in the bed on his side on the far wall, blanket draped over him, Ghost nestled on the pillow beside his head, and Zavala, with Targe on his shoulder, was sitting in the chair nearby. The lights were dimmed and the Commander’s head was bowed, arms crossed over his chest, his eyes closed. I’d assumed he’d nodded off but the instant I stepped into the room his head jerked up, eyes open, looking over at me as Targe briefly lifted into the air like a tiny sentry, surveying the room.

I gave them both a curt nod that Zavala returned as Targe settled back down, and made my way over to them.

“Still asleep?”

“He hasn’t moved,” Zavala said. “Ghost has been monitoring him. He’s fine. Just asleep. I believe Ikora went to see if there was any tea to be made.”

“In this place?” I asked. “It’d be centuries old. Even frozen, I’m not sure I’d want to drink it.”

“That’s what I said,” Zavala nodded, smirking. “But you know Ikora and her tea. It calms her. And I think we could all do with a bit of that.”

“Yeah,” I conceded. “Did she get hold of Amanda and Petra?” I’d forgotten to ask.

“Amanda, yes. Petra, no.”

“She’s probably got her comms off if she’s tracking Uldren.”

Zavala nodded.

“Ana back up at the computers?”

“She checked in on Cayde then went back up, yes. She thinks we need to open this whole place up to other Exos. That it would help them.”

“She’s not wrong,” I admitted. “Cayde’s proof of that. But there’s just too much unknown of this place. Too much that feels off. Was it worth the risk for Cayde? Yes. I definitely think so. But we only came in here for one thing. We have no idea how big this place is, what else it was used for and can do. What dangers there are or could become of it if we start opening it up? And I think Cayde would be furious if that were to happen. He wanted to keep this place unknown. He had his reasons and I trust whatever they are.”

I noticed Zavala looking at me, an almost amused expression on his face. At least, I think it was. I was very tired.

“What?” I asked.

“Nothing,” he shook his head. “But you are correct. Every point you’ve made is exactly why I’m not allowing this place to be known. Not until we know better what we’re dealing with here - the tech beyond what helped Cayde - and only if it can be safely used in other applications. I don’t want to give hope where there might not be any and bring disaster where there is none. Especially if this is the only functioning facility we can find and its resources are limited. It could spell chaos.”

“Black market. People killing each other to get their hands on what’s here.”

“And let’s not forget our enemies,” Zavala nodded. “SIVA was bad enough. We don’t need a repeat of that.”

I couldn’t agree more there. “I think Cayde should have the last word on it,” I then said. “Or at least be offered the last word.” I shook my head. “He knows something. Or he did and the other him that figured the pieces out wrote it down and he’s following them the best he can. Either way, I wouldn’t do anything more than we already have without talking to him about it.”

“Mmm. That’s a subject for another day,” Zavala said as he stood, facing me. “Right now, what needed to be done here was done. Once Cayde is awake and able, we’re leaving and this place is getting sealed back up and not spoken of until the time is right. Besides,” he sighed. “There are other things that need tending to first.”

I nodded. Uldren and the Barons.

Zavala stepped past me, laying his hand on my shoulder. “If he needs anything - if you need anything - we’ll be with Ana.”

“Thanks,” I whispered, smiling up at him.

He gave me a nod, then left the room.

Ghost opened his eye, his shell perking up a bit when he saw me. I smiled at him, then kicked off my boots, the icy cold of the floor immediately seeping past my socks and to my bare skin. The room was much warmer than it had been thanks to Ana, but the floor was still freezing.

I shivered and went over to the bed, pulling the blanket back. Cayde was fully dressed in a pair of his brown ranger-style pants and a deep red knit sweater - one that appeared to be Zavala’s handy work - and even had socks on his feet.

I found myself standing there, his back to me, watching his shoulder slowly move up and down with each steady breath he took.

It was such a relief to see. It really was. And I wish I could say I felt more in that moment, but I was so damned tired, and so damned thankful he was alive, I think whatever else was there just wasn’t registering.

Carefully, so as not to disturb him, I climbed into the bed behind him and smoothed the blanket back down over us, then pressed up close to his back and slid my arm around him, holding him as tight to me as I dared, the palm of my hand over his heart, feeling the steady pulsing swish and letting out a tense breath.

He was alive.

He was here.

Shifting a little, Cayde pushed back against me, then sighed and settled, his hand laying over mine. I kissed the back of his shoulder then laid my head on the pillow, the sensation of the cool, soft, fluffy fabric so inviting, I immediately closed my eyes and let sleep take me for a while.

❣️

Movement woke me. I felt something shifting under my head.

As my eyes slowly opened, I saw a sea of red laid out before me against dim light. I frowned and blinked, bringing my eyes into focus.

Fuzzy?

Slow rocking movement.

No. Breathing.

I was warm.

Something was around me.

I blinked again, coming to, and tilted my head up to see Cayde’s chin. My eyes darted around and I realized I was laying on his shoulder, pressed to his side, his arm around me and his chest slowly rising and falling, the soft sound of him breathing the only sound in the room.

“You awake?” I whispered.

“There she is,” he murmured. “And here I thought I was the one dead to the world.”

“That’s so not funny,” I told him, shaking my head.

“It was a little funny.”

A hint of a smile tugged at my lips. “How’re you feeling?” I asked.

“Terrible,” he muttered.

“Your head?”

“Everywhere.”

I lifted myself up enough to see his face. “A lot of pain?”

He shook his head, eyes still closed. “Just … aches. Like I took a good hit from an arc jolt. It’s gettin’ better.”

I nodded to myself. “Do you remember anything?”

“Everything.” His eyes slowly opened, focusing on me. “Everything,” he repeated in a whisper, a slight tremble to his voice he seemed to be trying to hide. But I heard it.

I sighed, a pang in my heart. “Cayde, I - ”

“Don’t,” he quickly said with a slight shake of his head, cutting me off. “I can’t. So don’t.” His hand shifted up my back, rubbing it. “Just … Just be with me, okay?” he said instead, coaxing me to lay back down against his chest.

“Okay.” I laid my head back on his shoulder and wrapped my arm around him, briefly hugging him before laying my hand back over his heart.

Aside from the soft sounds of our breathing, the room was quiet. I didn’t see Ghost, either, but I was pretty sure he was nearby.

“What the hell made you think comin’ here was a good idea, Ais?” He suddenly murmured, breaking the silence.

“It was the only chance you had. I thought you’d died back in the prison but you didn’t. Camrin said you have some kind of internal back up. Something that’s built into Exos that protects your consciousness if the rest of your body is severely damaged. But there’s no tech advanced enough to fix you. Not in the City. And we were on borrowed time so …”

“So you came here,” he concluded with a sigh.

“I know I don’t fully understand what I risked in bringing you here. I know that. And I know you might be mad at me - ”

“Damn right I’m mad,” he interjected, his tone and expression stern.

“What would you’ve had me do?” I asked him. “Just let you die? You know I could never do that. If there was a chance to save you, there’s no way I could just … I couldn’t do that,” I told him, shaking my head emphatically. “Zavala and Ikora could never do that, either.”

“I know, I know,” he said, wincing as he rubbed at the spot on his forehead just below his horn, like one would pinch at the bridge of their nose. “I know,” he said more softly this time, sighing. “I’d - I’d’ve done the same for you. All of you.”

He dropped his hand back down onto the bed and looked at me again, the tense expression becoming apologetic. “I’m sorry, darlin’, I … I know. I know you were just trynna …”

“Save you?” I offered, smiling a little.

His eyes became downcast, like he was embarrassed. “Yeah,” he muttered.

“Hey,” I whispered, my finger under his chin, gently coaxing him to look at me. “What is it? What’s wrong?”

He shook his head. “It’s all cause-a me.” He uttered the words so softly, even this close to him, I almost couldn’t understand what he’d said.

“What do you mean?”

“I was stupid. I-I did something so stupid. And it … It …” His eyebrows knitted together and he quickly looked away as his chin and the plate at his bottom lip began to tremble.

“Cayde?” I leaned over a bit to try and see his face, to get him to look at me, but he only turned it further away from me. “Mm-mm,” he quickly grunted, shaking his head.

“Okay,” I nodded. “It’s alright,” I said, backing off. “How ‘bout I just lay here with you, then? Would that be okay?” I asked.

He nodded but still wouldn’t look at me.

“Okay.” I settled back down, laying my head back on his shoulder and rubbed his chest, trying to soothe him.

I could feel the tremors running through his body. Feel him shaking and the tight, hitching in his chest. “It’s okay,” I whispered. “I’m right here.” I felt his fingers curl into the fabric at my shoulder, the grip tight. It was like he was trying everything he could to steel himself against the emotion. I glanced up toward his face. It was till turned away.

Part of me said not to push. Another part said that was what he needed. What Sundance would coax me to do. But, gently.

So I sat myself up once more, scooting up a little, and braced myself on my elbow as I reached over and tentatively started to softly stroke the side of his face with the backs of my fingers. He didn’t flinch away, but he didn’t look at me, either. “You don’t have to say anything,” I whispered to him. “You don’t have to talk about it. And you don’t have to go through it alone. You’re not alone.”

At first, there was nothing. No reaction at all.

But, then, a single sob shook him.

And then another.

And another.

Until it just wouldn’t stop.

I sighed to myself with relief that I’d made the right choice, but my heart ached for the grief I knew he was going through. For that pain of separation from Sundance I remembered, myself, when Ghaul shattered my connection to Ghost and to the Light.

The only thing in this case was Cayde had no way to reconnect to it. And I knew that was the least of what had broken his heart. I knew Sundance was what he really cared about. It wasn’t so much the Light as it was her presence in his life. Her spark. She’d been his companion for centuries and his true best friend. Someone who knew and loved him in a way no one else could. The bond shared with Guardian and Ghost.

And now, that bond was ripped from them. Forcibly torn away somewhere in the depths of that prison. And Cayde was left here, feeling like his very soul had been ripped apart as well.

I shifted closer and slid my arms around him, something within me just knowing what it was he needed, coaxing him to roll toward me. “Baby … C’mere,” I whispered, wanting to give him something to hold onto.

I’d expected him to protest again. At least a little. Cayde was a very private man, I knew that. I knew he wasn’t one to wear deep emotions on his sleeve or openly share them. Even with close friends. That was just not something he did. That was what the sense of humor was for. That was what his whole outward personality was for. To deflect. To hide what he didn’t want others to see or what he simply didn’t even want to deal with himself.

But, sometimes, it just couldn’t be helped. And right now, there wasn’t even that. No humor. No wildly outlandish declarations. No changing of any subject. No hint of that man everyone knew as soon as he strolled into a room.

Nothing.

Just raw pain that was not going to be hidden away behind any facade.

As soon as he’d turned, he grabbed onto me and pressed his face into my shoulder and just started letting it all out; that raw pain pouring out of him like a fresh open wound the previous hole in his heart couldn't even compare to. He wailed Sundance's name and then completely crumbled like he wasn't just letting out the grief of losing her, but like there was something else there with it. Something I couldn't get a read on, but it was just as deep and just as searingly painful.

I didn't say anything. I just held onto him, becoming his shield against everything else. He was safe. He could let the facade down. He could let the walls down. He could say or do whatever he needed to. And I'd be right here with him the whole time just as he's always been with me.

I would be his armor.

❣️

I don’t know how long we laid there, tangled together, but, eventually, Cayde quieted and relaxed, his breathing evening out, just an occasional hitching of his breath as it all ebbed. I knew he hadn’t fallen asleep but he was drifting, somewhere in between.

Mostly I think he just didn’t know where to go from here. What to say or do, so that was the safest place to be for now.

And that was fine. I’d hold him however long it took for him to get his bearings back. For him to get some sense of himself back to the point he felt he had control again.

Shadows outside the doorway across the room caught my eye and I saw Ikora and Zavala about to step in - no doubt to check on us. I was sure we’d been down here a while.

I instantly halted them, putting up my hand to stop them, hopefully without alerting Cayde. He didn’t tend to miss too much, though. It was possible he’d heard their footsteps and knew it was them.

If he did, he made no indication.

Thankfully, they noticed my gesture and stopped, not saying a word as I waved them away. I didn’t think Cayde could handle either of them seeing him this vulnerable. Fireteam or not. Friends or not. He needed to be able to maintain that image he’d honed for himself. He’d already lost so much, I wasn’t going to let him lose that.

What was it about me, though, that put Cayde at ease in a way no one else seemed to? What was it about me that he felt he could let the facade slip? He was centuries older than I was. Had seen, experienced, and learned things that were far beyond me, despite what I’d been able to accomplish in just a handful of years. There were times when I felt on par with him, and others when I felt I was still just a days old New Light in awe of just standing in his presence.

And, yet, it seemed like, from day one, just as Ikora had said, he looked at me differently than the other New Lights at the time. Held me in a higher regard. Trusted me with more. Had more faith in my abilities than even I did at times, and shouldered me with no more responsibility than he felt I could handle but what was always more than those who’d been here at least double my time risen. He called me his favorite - even if just whispered - and told others to follow my lead into situations usually reserved for more skilled leaders. He was the Hunter Vanguard, I was a Titan … and I’d spent more time with Cayde as my mentor, guiding me and in my ear, than Zavala.

I heard a staticy buzz come form Cyade followed by the sound of him clearing his throat. “How - How long’s it been?” He managed. “Since the prison. How long was I out?”

I thought for a moment. I honestly wasn’t too sure. I had been counting time because it’d been limited but, once we’d gotten Cayde here … and then I fell asleep with him … it kind of got lost in the background.

Everything got lost in the background.

“About maybe eight or … ten hours?” I guessed.

I felt him nod then start to move, rolling away as he sat up, moving to get off the bed.

“Hey,” I gently said, touching his arm, stilling him for a moment. “Where’re y - ”

“I gotta get going if I’m gonna pick up the trail,” Cayde said.

“Hang on a second.” I sat up, myself. “Look at me for a minute.”

He didn’t at first and I knew he was mentally pulling everything back in, packing it all neatly into whatever box he had within himself.

“Cayde?”

He visibly swallowed and looked over at me.

The facade was back.

I scooted over, sitting on the bed beside him, taking his hand in mine. “Listen … I know you don’t want to deal with this - ”

His heavy sigh cut me off as he looked away.

“Cayde.” I have his hand a squeeze. “I want you to look at me. Please?” I asked once again.

He hesitated, then did as I asked.
I didn’t bring up not having the Light anymore which, if he was going to go after them - and I knew he would - scared the hell out of me. One wrong move; one lucky shot by an enemy … But bringing that up wouldn’t help him. I knew he was already very well aware of it and it would only make him angry and feel less than in some way, which would lead to him doing something even more reckless than I was sure he already had planned, just to prove a point.

I decided to take a different approach.

“I’m not going to pretend I fully understand what you’re feeling right now. I know I don’t. But I do know you’re hurting. A lot. And I know you are well past furious and want nothing more than to rip them all apart and make them feel exactly how you’re feeling right now. I know,” I assured him, nodding, petting his hand as I continued to hold it.

He didn’t say anything, but I watched his optics shifting back and forth between mine as he listened to me. “But,” I continued, “like I said, you’re not alone. Especially not in this. I have your back. We have your back. We’re going to be right there with you. Whatever you need to do.”

Ghost appeared then, Cayde’s attention snapping to him the moment he came around to face us. “We’re in this together,” Ghost told him with an affirming bob. “For Sundance.”

Cayde looked at Ghost, and I saw a pang of something strike him, but it was so brief - a blink of an eye - that it was gone almost instantly and I didn’t have time to really consider what it might’ve been. He looked back at me, straightening his posture a little. “Ais, what I’m gonna do - ”

“You’re gonna go after Uldren and the Barons and kill every single one of them. It’s not going to be neat and it’s not going to be pretty. And it’s certainly not going to be quick.” I nodded. “I know. Believe me, I know.”

The way I’d said it, the tone of my voice, I hadn’t meant to allow that deep rage and hurt come through, but it did. And I knew Cayde heard it loud and clear. They had torn Sundance from him and very nearly killed him. Would’ve, too, if not for this place and whatever luck had led Cayde to finding it before now. I could never be as angry and as hurt as he is for what they’d done. Not without experiencing it personally for myself. And I hoped I never did. But I felt it for Cayde. For Sundance. And Ghost did, too. I knew that. Both of us were going to be right by his side through it all. No matter what.

He seemed to be contemplating me. “Zavala and Ikora …” he shook his head.

I twisted around a little to face him better. “You should talk to them,” I told him, rubbing his back. “Before doing anything else.” He opened his mouth to protest but I gently stopped him. “Petra is on Uldren’s trail. Wherever he is, the Baron’s won’t be far. She’ll contact us. She told me she would. Okay? You know she won’t let up until she has them pegged down. So take a minute. Catch your breath. Get your bearings. We need a plan and we need supplies. And you need armor.”

Cayde glanced down at himself. “Right,” he uttered, then looked at me again. “Where’s my cloak?” There was some concern in his voice.

“Last I saw, it’s back in the infirmary at the Tower with the rest of your things. I’m sure it’s fine if not needing a good wash. Like I said, we’ll get everything together. But let’s go see Zavala and Ikora first.”

Cayde nodded.
❣️

When we arrived back up on the top floor, I saw Ana and Zavala on the other side of the window to one of the rooms adjacent to the doorway and in what appeared to be a somewhat heated discussion.

“That’s how you got in,” Cayde uttered, his eyes focused on Ana.

“Cayde?”

Both of us looked over to see Ikora coming out of one of the other rooms, her eyes fixed on Cayde’s face, searching as she tentatively walked toward him, her expression hopeful yet still a bit guarded, like she was afraid that somehow it wasn’t going to be him.

“Hey … Ikora,” Cayde softly greeted, actually looking a bit timid as she approached.

She looked at me and I nodded and that was when relief washed over her. She quickly closed the gap between them and pulled Cayde into a hug.

Cayde seemed startled at first - surprised, even - but then relaxed and eased into the embrace. “Heh. Careful now. Everyone will think ya like me.”

“Don’t push it,” she murmured, her rarely seen affectionate posture and the way she was holding him in stark contrast to the more stern tone of her voice. She eased back to look at him, shaking her head. “What the hell were you thinking?” She asked him, gently touching the side of his face that had been torn away mere hours ago, caressing it softly. “Why didn’t you tell us where you were going? What you were doing?”

“Wait, they didn’t know?” I asked, taken aback as I looked between Cayde and Ikora.

Cayde glanced sideways at me, bowing his head a bit before turning back to address Ikora, looking every bit like a child who was in more than a little trouble.

“I… I didn’t know it was gonna … I - I didn’t know …” He didn’t seem to have the words and he was stumbling over the few he could muster. Ikora’s expression softened some. She was obviously mad at him for apparently going off to do something he should’ve told her and Zavala about - and roping me in with him without authorization to boot - but knowing what he’d been through - what he’d lost … It suddenly seemed like that didn’t really matter now.

“It’s going to be alright,” she whispered to him, pulling him back in for another hug. “This changes nothing.”

Heavy bootsteps next to me briefly pulled my attention away from them and I saw Zavala coming out of the room beside us, Ana behind him.

Cayde eased back away from Ikora, looking over at him. Zavala stared at him, waiting, whatever he might be feeling or thinking hidden behind a stony expression.

“Hi, big guy,”Cayde eventually quietly said.

Zavala’s eyes closed and he sighed, the harsh lines on his face melting away. In two large gaits he was right in front of Cayde, pulling him into a tight hug, rocking him from side to side. “Thank the Light.”

Cayde let out a painful groan but nodded, making a weak attempt at a return hug around all the heavy armor Zavala had on. “Me, too, big guy. Me, too,” he managed.

Zavala held onto him for a while and Cayde’s eyes eventually closed as his head tilted down to rest on the large piece of armor at Zavala’s shoulder. “You scared the absolute hell out of us,” Zavala told him.

“I know,” Cayde murmured, his tone chastened and apologetic.

Zavala eased back, but held onto Cayde as he looked him over, his gaze briefly fixed on Cayde’s chest. Nodding, his eyes went back to Cayde’s face. “We’ll discuss it later,” he said, his tone firm but with a gentle undertone.

I noticed Cayde’s optics shift to look past Zavala’s shoulder at Ana who was leaning back against the doorframe, watching the interactions. “Bray,” Cayde nodded.

“Good to see you’re okay,” Ana nodded back, a hint of a smile on her face.

“Thanks,” Cayde nodded. “And, um … thanks for … for workin’ your magic on things here. I guess I owe ya one.”

She shook her head. “Not for this,” she sincerely told him. “I’m just glad it worked.” She shifted her gaze to Zavala. “Like it could for others.”

“We are not having this discussion again, Anastasia. They are both up here now. Shut it down.”

Ana looked to Cayde. “It saved your life. Don’t you want that for other Exos?”she asked him.

Cayde just looked at her, his jaw tightly set. “Hey,” I said, stepping between them. Cayde had enough on his plate right now. “Now is not the time,” I told her.

“Now’s exactly the time,” Ana argued. “We’re here.”

“And digging around in this place and its secrets and tech was not why we came here,” I reminded her. “It was to see if there was anything here to help Cayde. Period. We did that. Now we go. Anything else waits until later.” I turned toward Cayde to walk with him out to the other room where the lift was.

“When it might be too late for others,” Ana added.

“This is not a discussion we are going to have right now!” Zavala barked. “You will follow my orders, Anastasia!”

I turned to face her anyway, unable to help myself. “Tell me something, Ana, what are you gonna do with this place, hm? We all leave, you stay, it remains open to any and all? Is that what you’re thinking? You going to put out an advertisement to Exos to come here to get repairs?” I asked, holding my hands spread out questioningly as I looked at her expectantly. “Exos, many of whom don’t even have the capability to leave Earth, let alone make the jump here. Did you consider that it’ll take considerable City resources - resources we don’t currently have - to make that happen? And then let’s not forget this place, itself. You don’t even know what’s here or what it’s capable of, or what it has available. And to do so could take weeks or months. Meanwhile we don’t even fully know of or understand the defense capabilities of this place.” I pointed up toward the ceiling. “Fallen ships are continuing to come into this system searching for any and all resources they can scavenge and steal. What happens if your activity here is picked up by them? And then let’s not forget you’re orbiting Saturn. Right where the Dreadnaught is. Where Titan is. Where Hive and Cabal fleets are moving though. What if they pick up this place being active? What then? I get that you want to help people. I get that there are ties to your past you just can’t resist wanting to dig through. But this is not the time or place to talk about it. We had one purpose in coming here,” I reminded her, holding up my index finger. “One. It’s done. We seal it back up and we leave it dark until all of us can discuss it at length.”

Then, I stepped closer to her, noting her expression had changed. Things she really hadn’t thought of in the heat of the moment and the excitement of wanting to scour every inch of this place and every last bit of data hidden away in the computers finally dawning on her. “And just so we’re clear, I do appreciate what you did today. I really do,” I said with true sincerity, nodding. Then, my tone quickly changed as I glared down at her hard. “But if you don’t do as Zavala not only asked but ordered you to do, right now, I’ll do it for you.”

A gentle but firm settled on my shoulder. I glanced out the corner of my eye to see Zavala. His eyes were fixed on me and he tilted his head to the side, signaling me to go out with Cayde.

I gave Ana one last look of warning, then did as asked.

“I overstepped, didn’t I?” I asked Cayde and Ikora as the three of us walked out to the other room.

“Perhaps a little,” Ikora replied. “But if Zavala were truly upset, you would know.”

“That’s cause he knows Aislin was in the right,” Cayde said, noticing a bag sitting on one of the benches, a heavy parka laying next to it. He looked questioningly to Ikora as he pointed at the items. She gave him an affirming nod. “I wouldn’t worry about it, Ais,” he told me as he went over to the bag, unzipping it, looking inside. “You didn’t say anything that wasn’t true or that Bray didn’t need to hear.”

“We’re not here on any official capacity, either,” Ikora added. “Meaning rank doesn’t necessarily have any weight. I’m sure Ana is aware of that, which is why she was pressing her luck. But you, I think you got through to her.”

“I think I’m just - ” I cut myself off, taking a breath, calming myself. “It doesn’t matter.”

Ikora stood silently, her sage eyes scanning me before she nodded then turned to Cayde. “Zavala figured on the exact threats Aislin mentioned. We brought some equipment with us to secure this place and monitor any activity once we’re gone. Make sure this place remains undetected. If Ana is seeing to what she is supposed to, Zavala and I will make sure everything’s in place and then we should be ready to go. I know you’re anxious to get out of here and find them.”

“Go do what you gotta do,” Cayde nodded and Ikora left us alone.

I sat down on one of the benches, sighing. Cayde came over and sat down next to me. “That was pretty damn impressive. You almost sounded more like Zavala than Zavala.”

I shook my head. “I just got so damned angry that she seemed to be using you as an excuse to dig around this place.”

“Mighta been part of it,” Cayde acknowledged. He looked at me as he rested his elbows on his knees. “You know Andal, he, uh … he mentored her.”

“He did?” I asked, a soft smile pulling at my lips.

Cayde nodded. “Yeah.” He chuckled a bit. “Y’know, when he was Vanguard and I used to come visit him in the Tower, whenever Bray was around, he’d joke that I was Rasputin.”

“You?” I asked, smirking, shaking my head in disbelief.

“Crazy, right? My Russian’s terrible.” Cayde chuckled. “Eeeh, but it got under her skin somehtin’ fierce. She’d get so pissed.” He chuckled again. “And then, uh … then Twilight Gap happened.”

“I read about that,” I nodded. “When the Fallen nearly took the City, right?”

Cayde nodded. “That’s right. It was … it was a hell of fight.”

“Wait … you were there?” I asked, sitting up.

“Yep. Shiro and I both were. Mostly down in the City itself, tryanna get civilians to safe zones or up into the Tower. Protecting who we could and killin’ anything with more than two arms.”

I shook my head. “I had no idea.” Light, I forgot how old he was sometimes.

“Eh, it’s not something I really … like to talk about,” he told me, waving it off. “And It wasn’t like I was one-a the big names up on the walls.”

“But you still fought in it.”
“Lots-a people did, Ais,” he reminded me. “Where I was goin’ with all this, though, was Bray fought, too. And was presumed KIA. But, obviously, she wasn’t. She faked her death so she could go off and pursue diggin’ into her past.”

I recalled being with Ana on Mars, when Xol was woken and a threat to Rasputin. Zavala had shown up. He’d been less than happy with us being there but mostly with Ana. I remembered him saying to her that instead of being in the City with us when Ghaul attacked, that she was doing what she always did. What she was never supposed to do. “So that’s what he meant,” I uttered to myself.

“Hm?” Cayde asked, eyebrows raising.

I shook my head. “Nothing, just remembering something Zavala’d said to her. So … she faked her death to dig into her past?”

Cayde nodded. “Which is why there are a few - namely Zavala - who aren’t too happy with her. And Andal … well, he … he never knew she wasn’t really dead and it … it affected him. Thinkin’ she wasn’t ever comin’ back. He felt like he’d failed her somehow. Like it was his fault. If he’d only taught her more or been a bit harder on her, maybe … He took it real personal.”

“And that’s why you’re not fond of her,” I nodded. “It’s nothing to do with who she was.” Like I’d assumed.

Cayde nodded. “I ain’t got nothin’ against who someone was before their Ghost found ‘em, Ais,” he told me. “When you’re reborn, whoever you were before is dead and gone. If you wanna go pokin’ into that past, that’s up to you. I don’t agree with Zavala that it shouldn’t be allowed. Should be a choice. Just know your choice comes with consequences.”

“And she doesn’t seem to think ahead to the consequences,” I added with an understanding nod.

Cayde shook his head. “She gets focused on something, that’s it. Consequences - even if involving other people - are secondary.”

“Well, it explains why you were so short-tempered when she showed back up a couple years ago.”

“I wasn’t short-tempered.”

I eyed him skeptically. “Cayde, I remember the day I came back from meeting her on Mars and you were in the hangar, kicking the absolute shit out of your sparrow all cause a single screw went missing from the housing. Took Amanda a couple weeks to fix what was broken underneath, pull the dents, and repaint it.”

“Okay. Okay, yeah. So maybe I was a little … grouchy,” he admitted.

I smirked. “A little’s an understatement. Least I know why, now.”

“I’m sorry, kiddo.”

“Don’t apologize to me. There’s no reason to. Your poor sparrow on the other hand …”

He snorted, smiling a little.

My own broadened but, then, slowly faded as I considered everything. “Maybe I should’ve just tried getting in here by myself.”

“No,” Cayde shook his head. “No, you needed her.” He looked over at me again. “If for anything cause the system would recognize her. That I know.”

I nodded, then leaned over and rested my head on his shoulder, taking his hand in mine as I laced our fingers together. “I do owe you an apology, though,” I told him.

“Me? For what?”

“I know you’re angry that I brought you here.”

I felt him shaking his head. “What I said earlier … Ais, I ain’t mad at you, so forget it, okay? You saved my life.”

“You don’t hate me for leaving you without the Light?”

“Hate you for - are you crazy?!” He asked, obviously shocked I’d even suggest such. thing. “Look at me,” he demanded.

I lifted my head away from his shoulder, doing as he asked.

“You didn’t take the Light from me. You didn't take Sundance from me. So don’t let me ever catch you thinking you’re to blame for either. You got that?” He asked, pointing his finger at me.

I nodded. “Yeah,” I uttered, a bit shaken by the forcefulness.

“Light above, Ais …” He sighed, pulling me into a hug.

I hugged him back. “I just … feel guilty. Somehow,” I admitted. And not just for him now being Lightless, but for not staying by his side int he prison to begin with.

He didn’t say anything at first. Then, he gave me a gentle squeeze and eased me back. “I get it. I do,” he nodded. “But you didn’t do a damn thing wrong. It was me. This is on me. All of it.”

“Cayde - ”

“Stop.” He held up his hand, silencing me. “It’s on me. No one else. And I don’t want to hear anymore about it.”

I opened my mouth to say … well, I wasn’t sure, actually. And it didn’t end up mattering because the stern look he gave me told me it was best to just do as he said and let it go.

So I did.

He nodded and pulled me back into the hug.

After a few minutes of relatively comfortable silence, I decided to break it, offering up a change of subject. “So, you gonna tell me what’s in the bag?”

“Bag? Oh! My helmet,” Cayde answered.

“You have a helmet?” I asked, easing back out of the embrace as I looked at him, genuinely surprised. I’d never seen him wear one. Never even knew he owned one.

“Course,” he smirked, his mood lifting a little. He then motioned for me to go ahead and have a look.

I got up, going over to the bag on the other end of the bench. Ghost appeared and looked over my shoulder as I reached in and pulled the hemet out.

The first thing I noticed was it had a sleekly designed horn that protruded from the forehead to fit around Cayde’s actual horn. The helmet was even painted to match and had a ridge that went up over the top, mimicking Cayde’s mohawk. The rest of the it had a hard structure but was covered in a thin but strong layer of brown leather to match his armor with the pixelated red design of his hood adorned on the right side and a white spade on the left that stood out among several tiny white diamonds, like the ones on the armbands of his gloves. The eye shield along the front was a transparent yellow, almost the same color as his kneepads, and looked to have a few fine scratches on it, along with the edges of the leather surrounding it, giving it a weathered look.

“From the sands on Mars. From my racin’ days,” Cayde explained, apparently noticing I was trying to figure out what had caused the damage.

“So you really were a Sparrow Racer back in the day?” I confirmed, grinning as I tried the helmet on for myself. It was bigger than mine and loose around my head so I had to hold it up. Plus, the horn covering on the front made it feel heavier and tip forward a bit.

I heard Cayde chuckling as he stood and came over, helping to me keep it steady. “Course I was! Me an’ Marcus ran all the circuits,” he explained. “How I got a good chunka the glimmer I used for … Er … well … habits.”

I snickered. ‘Gambling’ was what he meant to say. I eased the helmet off and Cayde snorted, sliding his fingers through the mussed strands of my hair, affectionately fixing them back into place.

“Shiro designed it for me,” he then added.

“Yeah?” I smiled. “He’s a good friend,” I nodded. I liked Shiro. I hadn’t had the chance to work with him much and, after handling SIVA and stabilizing the Plaguelands, he headed back out to the Wilds to continue his scouting missions for the Vanguard. We hadn’t kept in touch personally, but I occasionally asked Cayde how he was doing and to say hi for me, to which Cayde would tell me Shiro was doing well and said hi back.

I turned and sat back down on the bench, turning the helmet in my hands, admiring the details more closely.

It was really beautifully made and fit Cayde’s personality.

Cayde sat down beside me. “Yup. He’s one-a the best.” He gently took the helmet from me and held it in his hands, looking at it with fondness. “The dust out there - well, y’know it can be hell, ‘specially on a windy day. And with a face like mine … always ended up fulla sand by the end-a the race. I was knockin’ out sand for days.” I smirked again as I listened. “I tried wearin’ my scarf up over my face,” he said. “Didn’t do much good. Was finally forced to admit I needed a helmet but, well …” He tapped his horn. “Needed somethin’ custom and … you know me. Sorta never got ‘round to it.”

I knew it was more likely he didn’t have enough glimmer for such a thing, considering what debts he had and how easily the gambling bug struck. But there was no point in wounding his pride so I just nodded. “Anyway, one day I was gettin’ ready for a race and Shiro surprised me with it. Made a world-a difference, too. One of the best presents I ever got.”

“That’s really sweet,” I told him, smiling again. “Been a while since you’ve seen Shiro, hasn’t it? Mostly just been talking to him over the comms, right? I mean, I haven’t seen him since I last worked with him and that was a couple years ago now.”

Cayde shrugged. “He’s got his own thing goin’ on.”

“If he has some free time, you should invite him to the City,” Ghost suggested. “Go have a day out with him. Catch up.”

Cayde seemed to smile a little, even if there was an edge of sadness behind it. “Yeah. Maybe,” he nodded and leaned over me, placing the helmet back in the bag before sitting back, resting his head against the wall. He starred up at the ceiling, eyes half-lidded.

“Tired?”

“Shouldn’t be,” he said, shaking his head.

“That sedative might still be making the rounds through your system,” I suggested.

“Maybe.”

I was pretty sure of it. Cayde had been hell bent on getting out of here to join up the search for Uldren and the Barons with Petra and now he was mellowed out and drowsy. Whatever it was in that cocktail, it was still in there.

I looked down at the end of the bench then scooted over to it and turned, leaning my back against the wall and beckoned him over. “Come on. Come lay back and close your eyes for a bit while they finish things up.”

He looked over at me, seeming to contemplate my offer, then smiled a little and shifted down the bench, turning, laying back against me. As I wrapped my arms around him he hugged them against his chest and laid his head back onto my shoulder. “This feels … deja vu.”

Shit. He was right. It was exactly the way we’d been sitting those final moments in the prison. “Do you wanna change - ”

“No,” he shook his head. “Not unless you do.” He paused for a moment. “Believe it or not, Ais - even though I was … I - I was … in rough shape - I ain’t never felt …” He didn’t seem able to find the words so he just hugged my arms tight instead.

“Yeah,” I whispered, hugging him back, tight.

“You didn’t let go, did ya?”

I shook my head. “I had to eventually. But it wasn’t my choice.”

“Never is,” Cayde murmured back.

“I’m glad it wasn’t permanent.”

“Me, too.”

Ghost appeared beside us and Cayde looked over at him. “Hey, pal.” He pet his chest, inviting Ghost to settle down with us.

Ghost looked down then back up at Cayde. “That’s where Sundance …”

Cayde nodded. “You’re not takin’ her spot,” he told him. “Just keeping it warm for her. If you want.”

Ghost looked down again, then slowly descended and settled into the plush knit weave of the sweater against Cayde’s chest, his shell drooping as he relaxed into the nestled spot. “I’m sorry, Cayde,” he sadly murmured.

“Me, too, pal. Me, too,” Cayde murmured back, gently petting him.

I hugged Cayde a bit tighter then pulled my arm out from under his, laying it over Ghost as well.

All this time, I’d been so focused on saving Cayde, and sensitive to how he must have been feeling … I hated realizing that it hadn’t dawned on me just how heartbroken Ghost must have been as well. As far as I knew, he’d never formed a bond with any other Ghost the way he had with Sundance. As Cayde and I had grown closer, so had they. And I wasn’t sure if the feelings they shared had become more, the way Cayde’s and mine had, or if they’d simply remained friends. I’d never asked. I’d never even asked Cayde if he’d asked Sundance, either.

I felt terrible about that, too.

Whatever the case, though, it was clear Ghost felt the pain of her being gone. I think he’d just been doing like Cayde and was focusing on anything but that as a distraction so he didn’t have to dwell on it.

My thoughts drifted back to the prison. To that moment. When I’d heard the shockwave of Light as it echoed off the metal hull, bursting out away from Cayde and passing through everything around it. An instant later, seeing it rush toward us - feeling my heart drop and every part of my being grow cold as all the hairs on my body stood on end while my stomach lurched and tensed with the realization of what it was.

I’d felt him. Felt that Light before. I’d know it anywhere.

I could even smell it. The life about it. The life that was so uniquely Cayde’s. There was no way to describe it beyond his name. I don’t even think there were any words in existence that could. Not in any language.

Just his name.

Cayde.

Since that moment, I swore there were times I could still smell it around me. Feel it, like ghostly arms wrapping about my shoulders. And then, nothing. It would fade as quickly as it seemed to appear.

I was so shaken by it, I hadn’t even registered the pain in Ghost’s voice when he’d said her name. “No. Sundance. She’s dead,” he’d barely uttered, as if the words were caught on a breath he didn’t have.

And then, so quickly, his attention shifting to concern for Cayde.

I curled my hand around Ghost, caressing the side of the upper part of his shell with my thumb. Soft fingertips grazed over my knuckles and I looked down, seeing Cayde’s hand had slid over mine. I lifted my fingers, easing them between his, and he slid his hand closer into mine, entwining them together as he did. He softly sighed and I felt his body relax against my chest, growing heavier as he settled. Ghost’s eye had closed, his little body now tilted into the crux of Cayde’s elbow.

Eventually, Cayde started to softly snore, the sound not unlike a cat purring, mingled with a slight robotic sound from deep in his throat. The soft orange glow of the light in the back of his mouth flickered against the wall beside us like a dim candle flame, oddly soothing.

After a few minutes, though, he shifted, arching his back and stretched his right leg out some, making a soft, uncomfortable whimpering sound.

I knew why.

That damned coupling.

I’d seen him react like this on more than one occasion when having fallen asleep on the couch.

I would’ve thought the medpod would’ve fixed that along with making the other repairs.

Unless it had and this was something else?

Of course, I could just be overthinking it. Maybe the coupling had been defective right from the start? Maybe there was no way to repair it.

It didn’t really matter right now.

I carefully freed my hand from his and slid it down to the spot, gently massaging the outside of his thigh, just above his knee. He grunted and settled back down, going still once more, the snoring resuming. I smiled. Apparently that had been it.

Yawning, I laid my hand back over Cayde’s, tucking my head in against his, as I listened to the peaceful sound of him snoring, my eyelids growing heavier and heavier, my thoughts drifting away, before I finally gave in and let myself drift off to sleep once again.

❣️♠️❣️

Chapter Text

CHAPTER SIX
❣️♠️❣️

I want to thank you
For being the love
I needed when I
Thought I didn’t
Need love.
It changed me.
It softened me.
And even though I
Didn’t know it at
The time, it saved me.
~JM Storm

I couldn’t tell time here. Not like on Earth. All I did know was it was brighter outside than it had been when I first arrived with Ana hours ago. The tint of the landscape had taken on a lighter, more putrid green color with offset deep green shadows cast by the tall, jagged arches of ice waves and heaving mountainous glacial structures that had gradually protruded up from the surface since the moon first formed eons ago. It almost reminded me of some places deep within the Moon where the Hive had taken root. That same unsettling glow, fractured surface, and unwelcome atmosphere. The dunes that piled between these alien structures were more like sand than snow; crystalline ice particles that shimmered in the gauzy light. Some became caught in the slow foggy vapor that drifted out away from the geysers and lazily ambled over the dunes from deep below the surface. They swirled and wafted about, the only signs of any activity as far as the eye could see.

When we stepped away from the structure, Ana lifted her wrist up, a small light orange-lit hologram of some kind of cube-like shape appearing from her personal comms device. She touched it with her free hand, her fingers pressing against the different sides. Soon after, a loud rumble echoed around us, the ground trembling as the massive doors to the facility began to slide closed, leaving it just as we’d found it, save the mild disturbance of our footprints in the snow and the freshly cracked ice barrier that had formed over the frame which was already getting covered once again but the snowy dust that blew over the haunting ice swales that curled up out of the surface nearby.

I looked over at Cayde, seeing his head tilted back. I could tell he was looking up at the spire but his expression was hidden behind the light shield of his helmet.

“You okay?” I quietly asked as I stepped closer to him.

He didn’t say anything.

“Cayde?” I touched his arm. He jumped with a start and looked at me.

His mind had been anywhere but here.

“Hey,” I soothed, rubbing his arm. “You okay?”

“No,” he whispered with a shake of his head, then turned and gently brushed his hand against my arm in return. “Let’s get outta here,” he said, and headed for my ship.

I looked over at Ikora, Zavala, and Ana. “We’re all set?”

“We’re set,” Zavala nodded. “All security and monitoring links are uploaded and will be interfaced to a secure computer at the Tower.”

“We’ll contact you on the secure line as soon as we drop Ana off on Mars,” Ikora then added. “Once we’ve conferred with Amanda, we’ll bring you in.”

“How long do you think we can keep it a secret?” I asked.

“As long as we need to,” Ikora told me.

I nodded, spotting Ana as she came walking my way. I pressed my lips together and sighed. I had to at least make an attempt. “Ana, I - ”

“Save it,” she said, not giving me a chance to apologize for earlier as she walked past me without looking at me. “You made yourself very clear.”

I sighed. Yeah, I had. Hadn’t I?

Zavala stepped up next to me. “What you said was not wrong,” he told me, once Ana was a few steps away. We watched her as she made her way to their ship. I looked over at him. “But, in the future, it would do well for you to remember who the Commander is,” he said. “Regardless of the situation.” His tone was gentle but with a very stark and stern warning that, even though the visor on his helmet, I saw clearly reflected in his eyes.

I winced. “I’m sorry.”

“Emotions are running high,” Zavala nodded. “I understand what you are feeling and why and, because of that, will let it go this time. But don’t let it happen again. Ever. Do we understand each other?”

“Yes, sir,” I nodded.

He nodded back and pet my shoulder as he walked past me.

Ikora paused before joining him. “If you need anything …”

I nodded and looked over my shoulder, watching Cayde board my ship. “I know,” I said. “And thank you. But it’s not me who needs something, it’s him. And we’re not going to get it standing around here.”

*

As I walked up onto the ship, I saw Cayde already in the co-pilot seat, helmet off and stowed, flipping switches, the engines coming up as he activated each one in the proper sequence, readying the ship for take off. I closed the ramp and pinged Zavala. “We’re secured,” I told him, Ghost appearing, floating over to where Cayde was as I spoke.

“As are we,” Zavala replied. “We’ll see you back at the Tower. Fly safe.”

“You, too,” I nodded. “City Hawk out.” The commlink ended and I pulled my helmet off, securing it in the holder on the back of the pilots chair. As I maneuvered into the small gap between the two chairs I caught the arcing trail of the engines from the ship the others were on as they lifted off, watching it break orbit through the window. I noticed Cayde and Ghost watching it, too, as I took my seat.

“So, slow ’n steady ride in, then?” Cayde asked, his gaze shifting to me once the others were out of sight. “Give ‘em time to do what they gotta do?”

“That’s the plan,” I nodded. “Shouldn’t take long, though. Amanda should already have the hangar cleared.”

“Right,” he nodded and sat back in his chair, pulling the harness over his shoulders and clipping it at his midsection.

“Once we break Saturn’s orbit, we should try Petra again,” I told him. "Zavala told me Ikora tried but got no response.”

“How long ago?”

“Before you woke up,” I told him.

His metal lips drew a tight line. “If she’s on their trail, she’ll keep ‘em off so she doesn’t get made.”

“Even knowing we’d be trying to contact her about you?”

“Yeah,” Cayde nodded. “It’d be too risky.”

“Alright, well, let’s see if she had any luck, then.”

I lifted us off, following the same arc of ascent Zavala had made, bringing us up into the murky glow of Saturn’s outer ring, tiny bits of debris clacking against the outer hull. As I continued the arc up out of the field, I looked over, noticing Cayde looking back out the window then over at Saturn before his eyes searched the inner ring fields.

I knew what he was searching for. I opened the monitor on the console seeing the blip coming around.

“It’s just on the other side of the horizon,” I told him, pointing out the window at the approximate location it should soon be in. “Keep your eyes to the inner rings.”

Cayde sat up a bit straighter, looking out where I’d indicated and, sure enough, within a couple minutes, the Dreadnaught appeared, its position within the rings unable to be missed.

“First time seeing it in person?” I asked him. I actually didn’t know if he ever came out here after the Taken War and the subject never came up.

He nodded. “Funny, all those times on the comms with you, felt like I was there, myself,” he murmured.

“Maybe one day you will be,” I told him. I knew how much he’d wanted to see inside that place, regardless of the reports I’d sent back. His curiosity was just too great.

He looked over at me. “You planin’ on making a return visit there for some reason the Vanguard ain’t aware of?”

“I’m not planing on anything,” I told him. “But, if the day ever comes I need to go back there … You’re always asking me to take you with me. Come with me.”

“Even now?”

I nodded, softly smiling at him. “Even now,” I murmured, taking his hand, tenderly caressing the backs of his fingers. “Now and always.”

His eyes held mine as his cheek plates shifted into a brief but warm smile. He nodded. “It’s a date,”he whispered.

I gave his hand a loving squeeze and he looked back out the window, something clearly on his mind but he didn’t say what.

He also didn’t let my hand go.

A short while later, we broke Saturn’s orbit and Ghost searched the comms channels until he had Petra’s.

“Ready?” I asked Cayde, as Ghost got the comm link set.

Cayde cleared his throat, sitting up a bit straighter. He took a deep breath and, as he let it out, I watched his whole demeanor change. The melancholy and sombre air about him faded away as something much more familiar appeared. Something more akin to his usual jovial self. It was like a whole other personality revealed itself while tucking the other one away. It was … a bit unsettling.

He then gave me a nod. “Go ahead.”

Even his voice sounded different. Lighter. Happier.

I must’ve been staring at him strangely, cause he looked at me and gave a little shake of the head, like he didn’t want me to keep staring or it would throw him off. I sat back in my seat and focused on the signal strength monitor on the console instead as Ghost opened the channel.

“A - … Yo - … A - Aislin?”

“I’m here,” I told her, adjusting the strength.

There was a deep sigh on the other end as the channel cleared. “I was getting worried. I hadn’t heard from you,” Petra said.

I was about to tell her Ikora had tried earlier, but Cayde cut in, replying for me. “Well, she was kinda busy puttin’ this ol’ Exo back together,” he told her. I glanced over at him when he said that, feeling a strange pang in my chest.

“Cayde?!” Petra gasped over the comm.

“The one and only, P.V.!” Cayde told her, a bright smile in his voice.

“You’re - You’re alright?” Petra asked, and you could just hear the joy in her voice - the slight tremble of relief.

“Yeah, but I ain’t tellin’ ya anymore-a my secrets,” Cayde teased, chuckling. “Thought you told me all you Queen’s Guard were supposed to be tight-lipped and to the grave?”

I heard Petra huff a subtle laugh. “This was an exception I couldn’t deny,” she softly told him. “Aislin was right. You were still in there. And it was the only chance we had. The only chance you had. We couldn’t do nothing. I broke my vow to you and I’m sorry. But I don’t regret it. You mean far too much to all of us.”

Something strange passed over Cayde’s features then. Like something had struck him in a way he hadn’t been at all prepared for. I knew what it was and gave his hand a gentle squeeze. He didn’t look at me, but he did tighten his grip in return and swallowed with obvious effort before responding. “Yeah, well …” he cleared his throat. “Don’t, uh … D-Don’t let it happen again, ‘kay?” He told her.

“Don’t go dropping yourself down a hundred stories into a high-level cellblock again and I won’t have to,” Petra countered.

“Hey, if I’m gonna go out, I’m gonna go out blazin’!” Cayde told her, his free hand fanning out like fireworks for emphasis, even if Petra couldn’t see it. “But, uh … yeah, that’s- that’s a good point.”

On the other end, I heard Petra softly laughing again, a fondness to her tone, and I could only assume she was picturing his expressions accurately without having to see them. “So, what was there? On Enceladus. Was it what you thought might be?”

“It’s, uh … It-It’s hard to explain, P.V.. But … Hey! Important thing is, it worked, right? And, uh … Listen, all joking aside, I … thanks. Thanks for tellin’ Ais. I … I owe ya.”

“You owe me nothing. Cayde,” she gently told him. “I’m just glad you’re back with us and alright. Things would never be the same without you.” There was a pause. “I’m … I’m sorry. About Sundance.”

Cayde suddenly had a haunted look about him, his features instantly flattening, like the reality of it all had just struck him again like an open palm to the side of his face.

If he were flesh and blood, I’d swear he’d gone pale, it was that obvious how hard it hit. The facade he’d put up just instantly fell away.

“Cayde? Are you there?” Petra asked.

“Uh … Y - Yeah. Yeah, I’m here,” Cayde stuttered, trying to regroup as he nodded and blinked, snapping himself out of the reaction. “Just broke up a bit, there,” he lied. “Thanks. Um … So, uh … W-We’re, uh, we’re gonna … head back to the Tower and take care of what we need to there, get some supplies, then join ya.”

He then leaned forward as he pressed his lips together, calming himself before continuing, the direction of the conversation changing. “Look, this thing with Uldren … P.V. … I know he’s -”

“Cayde … He was lost a long time ago,” she carefully stated, her tone having softened even more - grown sad, even. “I know that. And I’ve made my peace with it as best I can. What’s important now is to stop him before more harm is done. I’ve been on their trail. Word has it they were heading for the Tangled Shore. Sources there haven’t seen Uldren, but the Barons are definitely there. I’m just not sure why and any Vanguard or just general Guardian activity will shut locals up real quick. I know you want to be there. I know you want to get them. And I promise, we will. But give me some time to see if I can find out why they’re on the Shore in the first place. ”

Cayde’s eyes narrowed, a rare seriousness now overshadowing his other emotions. “You going to meet with Spider?”

“I’ve been in contact with him. But you know how he is. He doesn’t give up anything for free.”

“Course not. What self-respectin' crime boss ever gives up anything outta the goodness of his own heart?” Cayde asked.

“Wouldn’t be any fun if he did, now would it?” She asked.

“Yeah, don’t wanna spoil the fun,” Cayde agreed. He sighed. “Alright. You watch yourself out there, P.V.. And … Don’t - Don’t do anything I would do. It … doesn’t seem to end well.”

“Cayde …” she softly sighed.

“Just be careful,” he told her not letting her finish whatever it was she was going to say. “And you make sure you contact me as soon as you know what’s up. We’ll be ready to move.”

There was a pause, like she’d wanted to say something to him anyway, but then decided not to. “I’ll be careful,” she promised. “I’ll contact you as soon as I know or if anything changes. And, Aislin?”

“I’m here,” I told her.

“You take good care of him.”

I smiled a little and nodded, not having time to make a verbal reply before she ended the comm.

Cayde sighed and shifted in his seat, leaning back, staring at the speaker for a moment before looking out the window again. “So … Tangled Shore … wonder what they’re after there?”

“Who’s Spider?” I asked him. “Sounds like you’re familiar with him.”

“An old Fallen Archon turned crime boss. Strucka deal with the Queen long ago. Don’t know all the details but he runs a smugglin’ ring on the Shore and she turned a blind eye to it. I think it was somethin’ ‘bout him keepin’ an eye on some stuff for her or … somethin’ like that. Maybe not. I forget. Hmm.” His eyes narrowed a bit.

“And, being at the top of the food chain there, he’s going to have his ear to the ground. Like who’s coming and going on this Tangled Shore and why,” I surmised. He sounded like just the guy we wanted to talk to.

“Exactly,” Cayde nodded.

“Alright. So we’ve got a plan.” I set coordinates for the Moon, figuring we’d hold orbit there until receiving contact from Zavala.

Giving Ghost control of the ship, I sat back as we entered the jump, continuing to hold Cayde’s hand while softly petting with with my other.

“I need a drink,” Cayde sighed as he looked out the window at the waves of colors and streaks of starlight that went flying by.

“We’ll get you one when we get back,” I promised.

“Maybe more than one,” he amended.

“Whatever you want,” I nodded. “And a shower,” I added.

“That sounds nice, too,” Cayde agreed.

Silence fell over us for a while.

And then, I heard Cayde softly whisper, “Thank you, Ais,”

I looked over at him. “For what?”

“For being here.” He turned to look at me with a brief, subtle smile.

“Always,” I whispered back.

❣️

When we were cleared to dock in the hanger, I checked the time and saw it was early afternoon. That had made it almost eight hours we’d been gone.

It seemed like so much longer and I could honestly say, I’d never been so happy to be home.

As I unbuckled my belt, I saw Holliday hurrying over to the ship. I smiled and gently nudged Cayde, jutting my chin out in Holliday’s direction. He peeked out over the top of the console and chuckled. “You think she missed me?”

I smirked as I got up, leaning sideways, kissing the top of his head. “I think you’re in trouble,” I grinned.

He looked up at me. “I’m what?”

I snickered and went to the back of the ship, opening the ramp door. When I stepped off, I saw Holliday slow in her jog, looking up at me, her features tentatively hopeful. I smiled at her, nodding, and stepped aside as Cayde came down the ramp just behind me.

Amanda’s eyes instantly lit up. “Cayde!” She ran up to him and nearly knocked him down, tackling him in a hug!

“Whoa!” Cayde grunted as he chuckled stumbling backward a little, returning the hug! “Hey there, pal! Glad to see me, eh?”

She leaned back, looking him over, running her hands over his face, then his arms and chest, like she was inspecting him to make sure he’d been put back together to her standards. And then, suddenly, without any warning, she punched him in the shoulder.

“Ow!” Cayde yelped, backing away a little as he rubbed the spot she’d just hit, blinking and gaping at her in shock. “What the hell?!”

“You gosh dang, idiot!” She yelled at him. “Don’t you ever - EVER - scare us like that again!” She told him, then grabbed him back up in a hug. “Guardian’s aren’t supposed to die, ya big lug. Don’tcha know that?” She whispered, quietly sobbing with relief.

Cayde stood there, starring straight ahead for a few beats before he snapped out of it and put his arms back around her, sighing. “I’m so sorry, kiddo,” he murmured, soothingly petting the back of her head. He looked over at me and I flashed him a little smile, then let the two of them be. They needed some time alone.

❣️

“What’s on the Tangled Shore?” Ikora asked, looking at the three-dimensional hologram of the outer debris field of the Reef floating in front of her.

“I don’t know,” I shook my head. “But Petra said the Barons were definitely there. She just didn’t have a location on Uldren yet.”

“And this Spider? Cayde seemed to know him?” Zavala asked.

“He’s familiar with him, yeah,” I nodded. “He said he used to be an Archon but now seems to be running the pirates that go through that area. He also said something about Mara Sov making a deal with him long ago in exchange for the Shore.”

Zavala frowned but nodded, his eyes narrowing as he studied the clustered group of asteroids strung together with high-tension cables as they lazily floated in a sea of purple mist.

The door to the briefing room slid open, interrupting the contemplative silence, and Cayde stepped in surveying what was going on before stepping down into the space. “No rest for the wicked, I see,” he said in greeting as he joined us, stepping up beside me.

“Indeed,” Zavala acknowledged.

“Amanda okay?” I asked.

Cayde nodded. “Yep. And I’ve been threatened with a severe beating if I ever scare her like that again.”

I smiled. “I suggest you don’t then. She has some seriously big wrenches at her disposal.”

He pointed a finger at me as he nodded then looked back at the hologram. “Okay, so, Tangled Shore. What’re we discussing?”

“Are you sure you’re up for this?” Ikora gently asked.

“I’m not sure about anything right now,” Cayde told her. “But this … this feels … normal. And right now I need me some normal. So …” he gestured to the hologram.

Ikora nodded. “We were just discussing what Petra relayed,” she told him.

“What can you tell us about this Spider? How do you know him?” Zavala asked.

Cayde leaned back on his heels as he crossed his arms over his chest and stared at the hologram. “Well, he runs a Fallen crime syndicate out that way.”

“That’s it?” Ikora asked, arching an eyebrow at him.

Cayde held her gaze for a a couple beats then sighed. “He’s former House of Wolves. Word is he broke form that house long ago and formed his own. Took over the Shore, ran the syndicate. At some point he struck a deal with Mara - don’t know what that was. Just know her end of the deal was to turn her back on what he was doing, givin’ him free reign.”



“And how do you know him?” Zavala asked once again.

“I mighta had a run in or two,” Cayde shadily replied.

“Cayde …” Zavala’s tone was that of a man who was tired and just wanted straight answers.

Cayde sighed, looking down as he held up his hands in surrender. “Look, I mighta … gone off on my own a few times to put some baddies in their place and mighta blown my cover getting in a fight or two in the wrong place - where fighting’ ain’t allowed - and maybe, to make up for it, I mighta took - or been forced to - take a job rounding up the Barons who were causin’ him problems.”

“Wait. The same Barons who attacked you at the prison?” I asked.

Cayde nodded.

“That can’t be a coincidence,” I said, shaking my head.

“I - ” Cayde sighed and shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe? Probably. Very likely. Look, I put ‘em there. So, if they broke out, seems the thing to do would be to call me, which is what Petra did.”

“Yeah, but she called you for a riot, not a break.”

“Hold on a minute,” Ikora interjected. “Did I hear you right?” She asked Cayde. “Did you say you’ve been going off on your own?”

“I …”Cayde sighed. “Yeah … Ikora,” he admitted, nodding.

“When did you start doing this?” She asked, narrowing her eyes at him.

I looked between her and Zavala, both of them with stony features as they practically glared at Cayde.

Ikora had told him they were supposed to be a team.

Shit.

Cayde took a moment to answer, not looking at them as he did. “Just after the Red War,” he quietly said. “Look, I just - I - I needed to get outta here. This place was … feelin’ like a tomb after the war.”

“Let me get this straight,” Zavala said, leaning over the edge of the table that circled the hologram, bracing himself on his fists, his voice stern and even. “You, without authorization, started venturing in secret out beyond our walls on unsanctioned missions against our enemies at a time when we were short on people and needed all the help we could get and, in the process, you not only got into a fight that brought attention to yourself and who and what you are, but ended up indebted to the leader of a Fallen crime syndicate and the target of high-ranking and very dangerous Fallen adversaries who you had locked up in a high-security prison under the authority of the Awoken? And, then, knowing you could still be a target, given the Barons’ rank and the Fallen code structure - because I refuse to believe, despite all else, that that thought didn’t enter your mind - brought a Guardian out into that territory - again, without authorization,” he said, pointing at me, “putting her in danger and resulting in the death of your Ghost? Is that what I’m to believe?”

Zavala’s voice grew more elevated and tight with anger with each accusation, his lips drawing back from his teeth, his brow furrowing as his eyes lost all their veiled warmth.

Cayde had been looking down at the floor the entire time Zavala had been speaking, his hands clenched in tight fists. Only when silence fell over the room at Zavala’s question did Cayde finally look up, his lips pressed tightly together, his chin plate faintly trembling as unchecked tears pooled in his eyes, one spilling over and disappearing into the crease of his cheek. “Yes,” he ground out, barely able to say the word.

Zavala’s features hardened further, a shadow eclipsing his face as Ikora’s eyes closed.

“Out,” Zavala said, his voice like iron, his searing gaze turning on me. “Now.”

I opened my mouth to protest, but Cayde’s hand was instantly on my wrist, painfully gripping it like a vice, stopping me. “Go,” he whispered, not looking at me, his eyes locked on Zavala.

I swallowed, my mouth suddenly dry, hesitating only a brief moment in what I wasn’t sure was fear for Cayde or fear of Zavala. When I finally got myself to move, I slowly backed away, Cayde letting go of my wrist as I did, and left the room.

❣️♠️❣️

Chapter Text

CHAPTER SEVEN
❣️♠️❣️

I don’t want to see
You cry, which is it
Say I’d rather you
Be happy.
But if in time the
Tears become too heavy
And you cannot hold
Them back, understand,
I don’t want to miss it.
~JM Storm

“Did Sundance ever say anything to you?” I asked Ghost as we waited in the hallway.

There was no way in hell I was going anywhere.

“No,” Ghost replied, shaking back and forth. “At least, not anything that stood out. Only that Cayde was really busy handling some stuff he’d gotten reports on and it was Vanguard related so she couldn’t discuss it. And we were all busy. Seemed like we were getting pulled in every direction back then. So I never thought anything more of it.”

“I wouldn’t’ve either,” I admitted.

I noticed Ghost glance toward the doors. “He was … crying.”

“I know,” I quietly said with a nod.

“That’s not like him,” Ghost pointed out. “I can understand regarding Sundance. But this?” He turned to look at me. “Do you think it might have something to do with Enceladus? With fixing him?”

“If there was a suppressing agent of some kind used to quell whatever emotions could’ve been triggered with that neuro-link, like Ana said, then it’s possible. Right now, what’s causing it isn’t as worrisome to me as his emotional state in general. I can understand Zavala and Ikora being angry Cayde kept this from them. But Zavala was angry in way I’ve never seen before. And Ikora … I don’t know which is worse. Her being angry … or as disappointed as she looked in that moment. And neither are things I think should be directed at Cayde right now.”

“Cayde said they didn’t all get along in the early days,” Ghost commented.

I nodded. “He said he didn’t feel welcome for a long time,” I recalled, looking over at him, wondering where he was going with that statement.

“But that’s not true anymore,” Ghost said. “They may be the Vanguard, but they’re friends. I can’t imagine this would break them up.”

“It’s because they’re friends that it could,” I pointed out. “I think that’s why Zavala’s as angry as he is. Sure, Cayde maybe disobeyed direct orders Zavala had in place. I don’t know. But I think it’s more that he went off and did something behind their backs when they’re supposed to be able to trust each other. And it resulted in something awful happening.” I sighed as I leaned back against the wall. “I can’t blame them.” Even if I did think the reaction from Zavala was too much considering what Cayde has been though.

“Are you angry with him?” Ghost asked.

I shook my head. “No, of course not. But I am worried about him. And I want to know what the hell happened. I thought - for one - Zavala and Ikora knew what was going on. Now that I’m thinking about it, Ikora asking me what happened when we brought him in, I’m guessing that wasn’t just regarding how he got hurt. And, two, yeah, Cayde may be …”

What did I call him now? We’d said we love each other. Our gestures toward each other since he woke up had been more affectionate than before. So, did I still say ‘friend’? Or … was he … my boyfriend now?

I frowned. I didn’t know how to define it or even if I should at this point.

“He may be very dear to us,” I said instead, “but he’s still a Vanguard. He asks me to go on a mission, I don’t question it. I don’t ask if he has permission. Hell, I don’t even think about him needing permission cause I forget Zavala’s actually got the final say. Not only that, it’s Cayde. He’s got lifetimes of experience. He knows what he’s doing.”

Ghost immediately gave me a skeptical look.

“Usually,” I amended.

“Mmm,” Ghost grunted.

“Whatever happens, I’m staying by his side,” I told Ghost.

“I wouldn’t’ve expected you to do any less,” Ghost gently told me. “And so will I.”

❣️

An hour went by. The doors hand’t opened.

I paced the hallway and checked the comms to see if there was anything from Petra.

No updates. Nothing.

I was anxious. Worried about her and what was going on out there. And, like Cayde, I wanted to be doing something. I wanted to go after the Uldren and Barons.

I also wanted to know why. What had happened to Uldren? How was he associated with those Fallen? Why had they attacked Cayde so brutally? And why Sundance? All questions that had entered my mind at some point while in the prison but, obviously, other things had become far more important.

“Aislin?”

I looked up at Ghost.

“You’ve been pacing that same spot for the last half hour. Why don’t you go to the Bazaar and get a cup of coffee and some food?” He offered. “Take a breather. I’ll stay and wait for him.”

“I don’t feel right leaving,” I said.

Ghost floated down so he was right in front of me. “I know. But you haven’t eaten in over twenty-four hours now. And you’ve barely slept more than a few. And I know you’re saving that energy booster for when Petra calls. You need food to take that. So go. Get food. Get coffee. If he comes out, I’ll call you. It’s not like it’s far.”

I glanced at the door.

“You’re not going to be any good to him if you collapse,” Ghost pointed out. “Go.”

He was right. I knew he was.

I sighed. “You call me the minute he comes out.”

He bobbed an affirmative. “Go,” he repeated, jutting his shell in the direction of the Bazaar.

*

I sat at the ramen bar eating a small bowl of tonkotsu and drinking a cup of coffee, blankly starring ahead, only briefly pulled out of the stupor I’d found myself in when the cook behind the bar set a bag down next to me with the order I’d placed for Cayde and a sealed cup of coffee with it.

“Thanks,” I nodded, offering them a smile before going back to eating the rest of my food.

I kept going over everything I could remember from the prison. Even everything I could remember from the few hours before we left to go there.

Everything seemed fine.

Except …

Well …now that I was thinking about it, Cayde had seemed more exuberant than usual, even for him. He’d been joking around more. Silly, even in a weird, almost obnoxious way. His comments over the comms were very distracting, too. Like he was deliberately trying to take our attention off something.

I frowned. Why would he do that?

My comm pinged. “Aislin?”

I was immediately back to the present. “Ghost?”

“He’s out.”

I took one last bite of my food, thanked the cooks, and grabbed Cayde’s food and coffee, hurrying back.

*

When I got back, I saw Cayde sitting on a nearby bench with Ghost at his side, the two of them quietly talking. The hallway was otherwise empty and quiet, save the soft trickling sound of water from a nearby fountain.

I slowed my pace, walking softly, not wanting to disturb them.

Of course, Cayde, no doubt, had already heard me a mile away. He looked up and offered me a bit of a smile. “There she is.”

“Are you okay?” I asked as I approached them.

“Well, I’m missin’ a good chunk of my ass but, outside-a that, yeah. I’m okay.”

I gave him a skeptical look. It seemed like he was going to be anything but okay from the way things had been left.

“Really, I’m okay,” he nodded.

I took a seat on the bench beside him, offering him the cup. “Cream, two sugars, and a hint of nutmeg,” I told him with a smile.

He looked at the shop icon on the cup. “You got this at the ramen shop?” he asked, eyebrows rising as he took it.

“Well, I know the way you like it so I asked if they could make it special to save me a trip down to the other quarter. I didn’t want to go too far,” I told him. “I also got you a bowl of tonkotsu,” I said, showing him the bag before setting it down next to me. “Made sure it was the extra spicy one. So, if you feel like eating, it’s here for you and, if not, hey,” I shrugged, “I’ll stick it in the fridge for later.”

He smiled, this time more warmly and genuine. “Thank you, darlin’.”

I affectionately bumped my shoulder against his. “So, what happened?” I asked, a bit more serious now.

He sighed and took a sip of his coffee, his eyes briefly closing as he savored it. “We had a good long talk about what it means to be a fireteam,” he sighed, looking down at the cup in his hands.

I nodded and laid my hand on his wrist, giving it a gentle squeeze. “When I left, you were crying,” I carefully said. “Why? Were you worried about or afraid of something?”

He visibly swallowed, shaking his head. “No.” He looked over at me. “I just felt … awful. And I … I couldn’t … hide it,” he said in a quiet voice, shaking his head again as if baffled by it. It all but confirmed my concern that there was residual affects from the healing.

“I was trying to do something good,” he continued. "I was trying to take some of the burden off their shoulders. Or so I thought.” He looked down at his coffee cup again, then took another drink from it. “Y’know when I first came here, as Vanguard, Ikora and Zavala hated me? Not, uh, not in the stand-offish way one thinks of, bein’ new and not readin’ the room right. I mean they openly showed and told me that they didn’t like me.” He looked back down at his cup.

“What?” I uttered in disbelief.

He nodded. “Yep. Never told you that one, did I?”

“You told me you felt like you didn’t fit in; that you didn't feel welcome,” I recalled, then shook my head. “But never that they openly said they didn’t like you.”

Again, he nodded. “Yeah. But hey,” he perked up a bit. “I didn’t hold it against ‘em. I mean they …they just lost … Andal and, uh … Yeah.” His demeanor quickly fell and he focused on the cup again. “Grief it … it does things to people,” he murmured.

There was a long pause and I didn’t interrupt it. I just comfortingly pet his wrist.

“Course it prob’ly didn’t help that I was the one responsible,” he added.

I opened my mouth.

“Don’t …” He shook his head, immediately cutting me off before I could say a word. “Don’t tell me I’m not. Okay? I don’t wanna hear it right now. You weren’t there, darlin’. I know you mean well, but don’t.”

I nodded, biting my tongue.

He took a deep breath, letting it out then took another sip of his coffee. “It wasn’t just them, either. Word travels fast among Hunters. Most folk knew and understood what’d happened. Didn’t blame me, even though I blamed myself. A small handful held a grudge. Still do. But, as far as Zavala, Ikora, and I … It took a long time for that hurt to ease up. And it took me provin’ myself in every way I could to show them I could be part of the team. That I had their backs. And, little by little, things changed. Tensions eased. And we became friends.”

“And that’s why Zavala was so angry?” I guessed. “Not so much you breaking the rules, so to speak, but it all reminded him of long ago?” I guessed. “With Andal. And it reminded you of it, too.”

Cayde nodded. “Yeah. And Ikora. She wasn’t so much angry as she was …. disappointed. And that - with her - is worse. And I gotta say, I - hand to the Traveler - didn’t think of that. All I saw when I started all this was her and Zavala takin’ on so much and gettin’ pulled everywhere, and here I was, stuck in one spot, checkin’ maps, markin’ off territory recovered, just makin’ sure supplies were gettin’ out to my Hunters and that they were makin’ sure it was all gettin’ where it needed goin’ … I was getting restless and bored … I wanted to do more. I wanted to help. So … when Petra contacted me, needing some help of her own and - from the sound of it, if help wasn’t given’ we all coulda had even more problems on our doorstep - I jumped at it. And I didn’t tell Zavala or Ikora cause they were stretched thin as it was. I really thought I was helping. But …” He shook his head. “Shit backfired on me. In a long, round-about way.”

“What exactly happened?” I asked. “Now that I’ve had some time to think about it, what was Uldren doing there? I thought he was dead. And who are the Barons and what exactly are the Scorn?”

He held up his hand to me. “Shh, Shh, shh. This isn’t something we really should be talkin’ about in the open. So, tell ya what, how ‘bout you go back to your place, get that shower you wanted. I’m gonna go back to mine, do the same, and I’ll meet you at your place after. I’ll tell ya everything I know.”

I nodded, relenting on pressing the subject further. “Okay. There’s only one other thing I’d like to know,” I requested. “Are the three of you going to be okay?”

He smiled at little. “We’re fine. We talked it out. Yeah, they’re pissed, but we’re okay. So don’t worry, alright?”

I was so going to worry. Especially considering his reaction. Whether it was lingering effects from the neuro-link being re-established or not, it was obvious how deeply sorry he’d been for hurting his friends, even if he hadn’t intended it. But I took him at his word that things would be alright between them. “Where are they, by the way?”

“Damage control,” Cayde said in a way that sounded like he felt guilty about that, too. “Don’t worry your pretty little head about it. Really. Mom and dad are mad right now, but still love me,” he joked, giving me a wink.

I smiled a little then put my arm around him, giving him a hug. “Shower and back to my place,” I told him. “Just please don’t do anything without me? I want to help you.” I eased back, looking at him as he smiled at me.

“I promise,” he nodded.

I kissed his cheek and got up to leave, relieved things hadn’t gone as badly as I’d thought they might, but still worried about him. I recognizing his veiled ask to have some time alone, though. He nudged the bag toward me. “Take that with ya? If it goes to my place, no tellin’ when it’ll be seen again. Might end up with something growin’ on it I’ll end up having’ to give a name.”

I picked up the bag. “It’s a good thing you’re an Exo,” I told him. “Otherwise I’d be force-feeding this to you.”

“Kinky,” he deadpanned.

I smirked.

❣️

Showered and feeling a little better, I’d put on some comfortable clothes, made more coffee, and put Cayde’s ramen on the stove to keep it warm. I was hoping he’d at least try to eat a little when he came over. Not that it would make a physical difference. It wasn’t like he could starve to death. But, usually, something hot and comforting to eat helped more than one could imagine.

I checked the comms again while I slowly stirred the soup, even though I knew Ghost would alert me if there was anything at all from Petra.

“I don’t know how he eats that,” Ghost said as he looked down into the pot from over my shoulder. “I don’t even have a nose and I can pick up on the spices.” He wrinkled up his shell and shuddered.

I smirked at him as I stirred. “An acquired taste, I imagine,” I said. “I don’t know how he can eat it this spicy, either. But he loves it, so …” I set the spoon down and looked over at Ghost. “How’re you doing?” I gently asked.

Ghost gave the equivalent of a shrug with his shell. “I’m here,” he admitted, then glanced over into the living room, his eye seeming to settle on the little basket on the shelf over the couch, an old scarf of Cayde’s balled up inside it, a bit of it dangling over the edge. “Part of me wanted to immediately curl up in it as soon as we got here,” he sadly murmured. “Another part didn’t want to dare touch it. Wanted to leave it exactly as she had.”

I reached out and pulled him to my chest, holding him close as I tilted my head down, tucking him under my chin, and leaned back against the counter.

“I wish I could cry,” Ghost uttered in a broken, static-laced voice.

That statement alone brought tears to my own eyes and I nodded, holding him a little tighter.

A few minutes later, I heard the door open then close. Cayde. It was followed by quiet shuffling as he was undoubtedly taking his boots off. When I looked up he was coming into the living space, dressed in a fresh set of civilian clothes and had his hands in his pockets.

The moment his eyes settled on us huddled in the corner of the kitchen, he came over and put his arms around me, pulling us both against his chest. I sighed as I slipped my left arm around him, hugging him right back as I continued to hold Ghost close.

There were no trite words of comfort we knew would do nothing to help with the pain. We just held onto each other in quiet solace, the contact alone saying more than anything else could.

I rested my cheek on Cayde’s shoulder, closing my eyes, the soft, musky scent of soap and fresh cologne gentle against his synthetic skin and the metal of his jawline. It was warm and set me at ease, and, yet, somehow, I felt guilty taking comfort in it. But I did. Because he was still here.

He was still here.

Eventually, we managed to let each other go, Cayde pressing a tender kiss to my forehead as he did, while brushing his finger against the side of Ghost's shell. I motioned him to take a seat at the table while I poured him a bowl of the ramen and brought it over.

“I know you might not be hungry, but try a little?” I offered, setting it down in front of him.

“You ate, right?” He asked me.

I nodded. “At the bar. Coffee?”

Ghost settled down on one of the two small round pillows on top of the table. His and Sundance’s ‘seats’ so they could always join us if they wanted.

I noticed Cayde look over at him, then at the empty one before blinking, shaking his head. “Actually,” he looked up at me, "there any of that green tea left? The jasmine one Ikora likes?”

I didn’t mention noticing how he looked at the pillow. “It’s cold,” I told him as I nodded.

“That’s fine,” he said and dipped his spoon into the soup and brought it to his lips, tasting the broth.

“Ghost and I were talking about how it was you could eat that, being so spicy,” I said as I got him the tea.

“It’s an acquired taste,” Cayde answered and I cracked a smile, looking at Ghost.

“Told ya,” I said to him.

Ghost just shuddered again in reply.

Cayde softly chuckled, picking up a set of chopsticks, grabbing some noodles.

I brought the glass of tea over to him, setting it down by his bowl then sat down, myself, happy to see him eating.

“So, you wanna know the basics or the whole story as I know it?” Cayde asked.

“You don’t have to get into it just yet. Eat,” I said, gesturing to his food.

“You do realize I can talk and eat at the same time, right?” He asked. “Like, literally at the same time.”

I smirked and nodded. Yes, I did know that. The fact that Exo’s voice boxes and throats weren’t connected like ours were made for some eerie ventriloquist skills I still wasn’t used to.

“Okay, if you insist. Whole story as you know it,” I told him.

“Right,” Cayde said, then looked down at his ramen and frowned. “Soy,” he uttered, and held his finger up to me as he got up, grabbing some from the fridge.

Shoot. I’d forgot to set some out.

“So,” he began as he sat back down, drizzling a little on his eggs, “this all goes back two years ago.” He paused. “No. Scratch that.” He shook his head. “Actually, make that three …”

I sat and quietly listened as Cayde started not long after the Taken War. Apparently - and obviously now - Uldren had survived the Awoken’s engagement with the Hive around Saturn but somehow ended up marooned on Mars of all places. It was a damn long way from Saturn and even Cayde wasn’t sure how or why he’d ended up there. Regardless, as Cayde had heard the story - relayed from what Petra had learned - Uldren had struck a deal with the House of Kings, the Fallen who were residing on the planet, for transport back to the Reef. What the terms were, Cayde didn’t know. All he did know was, with Mara dead, the Reef was leaderless, save proxies, like Petra and the Techeans. And Uldren was next in line of succession, so him getting back was crucial.

In the meantime, though, rogue Fallen cast out from the House of Exile, a Fallen House that actually lived among the Hive, had joined together to become known as The Scorned Barons, led by a heretic priest named Fikrul. Over the course of a year, they decimated the House of Wolves - the loyal House to Queen Mara - starving them to death by destroying all their Servitors, their only source of ether.

Cayde didn’t know why they’d done it. Again, this was just what he’d learned from Petra.

With the House of Wolves now extinct, the Barons were free to terrorize and control most of outer Sol.

Having had a taste of some excitement outside the Tower during the Red War, it left Cayde anxious to want to get back out and do more rather than being stuck behind the walls and with what seemed to him like menial tasks and endless paperwork. So, a few months after the war, when the opportunity came knocking to pull together a team and do some more good, namely going to Petra’s aid in the Reef and putting a stop to the Baron’s reign of terror, Cayde jumped at the chance.

He formed a six man fireteam that consisted of Petra, Hawthorne, Banshee, Nadiya, a fellow hunter, one of his scouts, and member of the Six Coyote’s whom he used to work with back in the day, and Jin, a human survivor who, even though he’d hung his guns up long ago, was a formidable fighter and old friend who worked in one of the ramen shops down in the City.

One Baron, Araskes, A.K.A., the Trickster, had been found and tracked to the Tangled Shore. More specifically, to Spider’s Palace, a place where all the dredges and the lowest of the low within the Sol System gathered to drink, gamble, make deals, trade in stolen goods, parts, and drugs, and enjoy other nefarious pleasures.

The only rule of the Palace?

Neutral ground. No fighting.

Petra’s plan was simple. Slip in quietly, keep their heads down and identities hidden, find the Baron and bring her in. Alive.

But Cayde, he wasn’t very good with rules in general. Yeah, some he knew to never break, but others? Some could be bent and some - well, if the moment called for it, yeah. To do some good, he’d break the rules. And in this instance, to get what they needed - to do good - he had to break the rules. And not only Petra’s.

He knew it wouldn’t be as simple as walk in and just find Araskes and grab her. And, even if they’d managed to do that, then they’d have to track down all the rest. So, Cayde did what he knew would lead to a better outcome. An “eight for one deal,” as he called it.

He’d started a fight.

He claimed ‘someone’ - totally not him - threw a bottle at Araskes. Hit her right upside the head with it, too. And, whoo, was she pissed!

It led to exactly what Cayde was hoping for, though. Pure, unadulterated, seedy bar fight chaos. A full out messy, no holds barred, hittin’ below the belt kinda fight, as Cayde described it.

It was a blast!

And, in the midst of all that chaos, he slipped a tracker on Araskes.

Yeah, he’d blown their cover by drawing attention. And yeah, it kind of indebted him to the Spider for breaking the rules. For a bit. But it had worked, because when Araskes fled the Palace and the Shore, she’d led them right to the other Barons.

Of course, turns out they knew Cayde was tracking them.

But Cayde knew they knew.

It was all part of his plan.

Once the team found the Baron’s hiding place, Cayde went in alone to ‘talk’. And, well, that went about as well as one would think and exactly where Cayde figured it would. He ended up putting three Golden Gun rounds into Fikrul’s chest, sending him tumbling into the depths of the asteroid they were hiding on, and Petra ended up doing something else Cayde had already figured on. Not trust his plan and call in the cavalry of Corsairs to make the arrests.

All seemed to go according to his plan. Their leader was dead, all the Barons were caught and locked up in one go, and the Reef was safe. Easy-peasy, done and dusted.

A few months later, though, the Reef came under attack once again. But this time, the attack was being led by none other than Uldren himself.

Cayde said it didn’t make sense. As much of an asshole as Uldren was, why would he attack his own people? But when Cayde got there and saw Uldren for himself …

He said he’d become deranged. Twisted. Like a bad copy of an already bad original. Then, joking aside, he said there was genuinely something very wrong with him. Something dark and malevolent. Malicious. Yeah, Uldren was no picnic on a good day and he made Cayde want to punch that snide smirk off his pompous face every time he’d been around him.

But this was something completely different.

He was slaughtering his own people.

Cayde didn’t like Uldren but one thing he could say about the guy was he knew he’d never harm his own people.

Until now.

It was like he’d gone completely mad. And what was worse, he had an army with him. An army of what appeared to be Fallen. At least at first - until you got closer to ‘em. And then you didn’t want to. They not only looked dead but smelled dead, too.

The part that had really knocked Cayde back, though, was who emerged from the throngs of creatures swarming the Reef like frenzied ants.

Fikrul.

Cayde said he’d froze right in place for a moment when he saw him, his eyes immediately going to the heretic priest’s chest, searching for the tell-tale bullet holes he’d left.

He didn’t see any.

Fikrul’s chest was covered.

But Cayde knew it was him.

How he’d survived, he didn’t know. But, what Cayde did know, was something had changed. Fikrul didn’t look right, even for a Fallen. He looked and smelled just as dead as the others but was up and walking around just as easily as the rest.

Cayde paused in his story, looking down at his bowl of half-eaten ramen. “For a minute, it … it felt like Taniks all over again,” he quietly said. “He was dead. I was sure of it. And then there he was, up and walkin’ around, plain as day.”

I reached over, laying my hand atop his. He curled it around my fingers, giving them a squeeze.

“What happened?” I asked.

“We managed to get the upper hand,” Cayde quietly continued. He then shook his head, as if something wasn’t right. “It didn’t make sense, though. We shouldn’t’ve been able to. By sheer numbers alone, they had us outmatched. And Uldren would’ve known the Reef’s defenses. But he let the army he brought walk right into it all. They got mowed down by every last turret there. Ran right into ‘em without a care. Then he and Fikrul just … surrendered.”

“What do you mean?” I asked. “Like, just threw down their guns and gave up on purpose?”

He nodded. “Like they wanted to get caught, yeah. But we didn’t think much of it at the time,” he shook his head. “To be honest, we were all … in a bit shock. And Uldren was batshit crazy to boot.” He shrugged. “Nothin’ he was doing was making any sense. So we chalked it all up to somethin’ that happened between the Taken War and him bein’ back at the Reef. And Petra … she knew what it would mean if word went beyond the Reef that Uldren was not only alive but had gone insane and murdered his own people. So … we did the only thing we could do. Ain’t proud of it - much as I hate the guy - but … she was right. Uldren had to stay dead. So …”

“You locked him and Fikrul up in the prison with the others,” I surmised.

Cayde nodded. “All hush-hush. No one knew. And anyone who had seen him and was still alive, they learned that he was ‘killed’ in the battle.”

“So, in the end, the only ones who knew the truth were you and Petra.”

“Well, and Variks.”

I frowned. “Variks?”

“Yeah. He’s the warden of the prison, remember? He’d have to know. He controls everything that goes on there.”

That’s right. He was. It had been so long since I’d been there prior to yesterday that I’d honestly forgotten all about him. Variks had been the one hosting the tournaments there.

Wait …

“If he’s the warden … Then where the hell was he during the break?”

Cayde opened his mouth as if he were about to answer, but paused as the question seemed to slowly process. He closed his mouth, a deep frown forming as he shook his head. “No, that … ”

Then, suddenly, like a switch had been flipped, Cayde’s features flattened and a slow, quiet rage came over them. “Son-of-a-bitch.”

❣️♠️❣️

Chapter Text

CHAPTER EIGHT
❣️♠️❣️

Sometimes we don’t
Want to heal because
The pain is the last
Link to what we’ve lost.

~JM Storm

“You’re sure?” Zavala asked Cayde as the two of them led Ikora and I to the hangar.

“There was no one else, Zavala,” Cayde told him as he finished clipping his cloak to an older set of armor of his he’d put on in place of the damaged set. “Way I see it, either he did it, or he’s dead cause someone else learned about ‘em and killed him to get to ‘em,” Cayde said. “And, form where I’m standin’, his better option is dead, cause I get hold of him, it’s gonna be a long, slow path to it.”

I didn’t have to see the hard line on Zavala’s lips to know it was there as we rounded the corner and stepped down into the hangar.

“Holliday. Status report,” Zavala barked, gaining her and her crews immediate attention as they bustled about around my ship, loading ammo and supplies onto it while refueling it.

“She’s almost ready, Commander,” she replied with a nod.

“Cargo pending,” one of the Frames burbled from nearby, holding a sealed crate.

“Yup, that’s it,” Amanda confirmed. “Load it up and make it quick.”

The Frame nodded and turned, hustling up the ramp into the rear of the ship with the crate, it’s metal feet quickly clapping all the way in an almost comical fashion.

Cayde double-checked the cargo list. “You added the extra crate of heavy rounds?” He asked Amanda.

She nodded.

“And the rockets?”

“It’s all there,” she assured him. “Made sure of it personally.”

Ikora stepped up to him. “If it wasn’t Variks and you do find him - dead or alive - do you have any idea who else it could be? Another prisoner? Maybe a guard that caught wind of something or a survivor from the Reef who saw what happened?”

Cayde set the list down on the crate in front of himself, shaking his head. “It was just the three of us,” he said, shaking his head, as if there just could be no other explanation. “Petra arranged it so everyone believed Uldren died in that fight. It was all carefully planned. We even went in a secret way so no one would see us, bag over Uldren’s head, the whole deal. It has to be Variks,” he said with conviction, rapping his fist against the crate.

“What would he have to gain by it?” Ikora wondered aloud.

Again, Cayde shook his head, his features hardened. “I don’t care about what he had to gain. I care about what he took.” He looked over at her and there was a flash of vulnerability in his expression.

Ikora laid her hand on his shoulder, giving it a squeeze, then stepped close to him, leaning in so her lips were right next to the side of his hood, her voice too low for me or even Zavala or Amanda to hear what she was saying to him. She looked pained and even a bit remorseful. Cayde closed his eyes and shook his head, then pet the hand she had on his shoulder. Orange light flickered at the back of his throat. He was saying something back to her but, like Ikora, he was speaking too quietly for me to hear. With a nod, Ikora pet his shoulder, letting her hand slowly slide off as she stepped away. Her gaze found Zavala and he looked between her and Cayde, his stern features softening. He and Cayde shared a brief glance at one another, but nothing more.

Then, with a soft sigh, Ikora looked back at Cayde. “If it was Variks and he’s out there, we’ll stop at nothing to find him,” she assured him. “He’ll answer for what he’s done,” she vowed.

“You’re damn right he will,” Cayde nodded, then, without another word or looking back at either of them, he boarded the ship, the Frame that had been loading the supply crates hurrying back down the ramp past him.

“Aislin …” Ikora looked at me. Her face was almost expressionless but her eyes begged me not to let anything happen to him. Even Zavala shared in the emotional glance but otherwise remained silent. I think part of him wanted to say something, especially to Cayde, but his pride and stubbornness from earlier was likely stopping him.

“I know,” I nodded to them. “I’ll be right there with him,” I promised then turned and joined Cayde on the ship.

As I came up the ramp, I saw he was already in pre-flight mode, bringing up the engines, Ghost hovering over his shoulder giving him the layout of my ships controls. I gave the cargo a quick check, tugging on the straps, making sure everything was secure, then stowed my gear and took the pilots seat next to him.

“Everything’s secure,” I told him, buckling in.

He nodded.

It was very strange being around him and having him so quiet and serious. He usually had something to say to make things light. A joke. A witty comment. Anything that took the tension out of the air.

I wished I could muster that for him. Give him anything that would draw him away from wherever he was in his head right now. I was terrible at jokes and timing or even any real wit, though. I often thought of things but it wasn’t until long past the moment. I had no idea how Cayde came up with half the things he did so quickly but I’d admit, I was a little jealous of that.

So, instead, I did the only thing I really knew how to do. I reached over and laid my hand atop his, giving it a squeeze.

At least I could be comforting.

Cayde paused in the pre-flight prep, looking down at my hand on his, then up at me. I offered him a reassuring smile. It must’ve helped because Cayde relaxed a little and smiled back, turning his hand over under mine, returning the gentle squeeze before finishing up flipping the last of the switches. He then gave me a nod.

I pulled the seatbelt straps over my shoulders, buckling in as I opened the comms. “Tower, this is City Hawk, pre-flight complete. Standing by.”

“Tower to City Hawk,” Amanda replied. “You’re all clear for take off.”

“Roger, Tower.”

Cayde finished buckling in as well, then sat back as I lifted us off, slowly backing the ship away from the dock.

“Fly safe, Guardians,” Amanda added then closed out the communication.

❣️

An eerie calm settled over me as the prison emerged within the purple-hued gasses that lazily drifted all around us. It was listing to one side now and a few decks had flickering lights while others were completely dark. Smoke curled out into space from breaches in the hull and droplets of cryofluid bobbed around, bouncing into each other and other bits of debris that had been pulled out through the open tears in the side of the structure, some of it globing against the windshield as we neared.
“Comms are down and power’s low,” Ghost told us after running a scan. “There is oxygen, though.” His shell twitched. “I’m reading some high heat signatures on a few decks as well.”

“Must be what’s left of the fires still burning,” I guessed.

“Take us down there,” Cayde said, pointing down low on the prison. “Swing us around back."

Once we transmatted down, I looked around. We were on a short catwalk similar to the one we’d landed on earlier when we'd met Petra. This one, however, was smaller in size and littered with a lot more space junk and what appeared to be random hunks of metal and parts to who knew what. Most of it looked as if it had been swept against the sides and pushed into the corners just enough to make it easier to walk though. Old, tattered, tarp-covered caches and crates were also piled up on the dock ahead of us, a messy collection just jammed up against the the hull, loose rope with broken clips on the ends lazily rippling to an invisible currant in the near zero gravity. Many of the crates and caches looked as if they'd already been opened and emptied and had now been left here for disposal.

“This is the secret entrance?” I asked. “Looks more like the Tower East reclamation facility.”

“Well, see, here’s the thing about secret entrances, darlin’…” Cayde said as he stepped over to a large pile of crates covered in a tattered gray tarp. “They’re meant …” he grunted, straining to reach at something behind one of crates, “to be ‘secret.” After a little finagling and a muttered curse, Cayde made a triumphant “Ah-ha!” and a soft click sounded behind the pile. It was followed by the low, unmistakable sound of gears turning somewhere deep inside and then another click as the whole pile partially slid away from the hull on the right side.

“Okay. That’s kinda cool,” I admitted, nodding, now impressed.

“Right,?” Cayde asked, smirking. “I said the same thing first time I saw it.” He seemed amused by that as he stepped up beside me, hands on his hips, looking over the whole hidden entrance. “Was actually hopin’ to get a few more gigs from the Reef involving coming in this way. Was diggin’ the whole cloak and dagger vibe. ‘Specially since I already got both,” he lightly joked.

He paused and looked downward, the smile he’d had fading. “Eh.”

I laid my hand on his back. “You still could,” I encouraged. Cayde had proven time and again that the Light was an asset but not what defined him or his abilities. Would I be worried? Yes. Very much so. He only had one life now. But I knew how skilled he was. I knew how smart he really was. And I knew he’d be miserable never being out in the action again. I wouldn’t try to deny him that, no matter how scared I might be of the unknown.

Cayde sighed and shook his head. “Think those days are over, darlin’,” he said, his voice quiet and melancholy.

“We’ll take it a day at a time,” I offered instead.

He flashed me a bit of a smile but it was halfhearted and forced at best. Then, before I could say anything more, he shrugged it all off and pulled out a hand cannon he’d selected from his private arsenal to use in place of the Ace until he got to pry it back out of Uldren’s cold, dead fingers. “C’mon,” he said, motioning me to follow with a tilt of his head.

Inside, smoke and dust lingered in the stale air, particles reflecting in the light, making the prison seem more like a place that had been floating adrift out here for years rather than just a couple days. It was cold, like a tomb, and advection fog generated from the cryo cells and damaged systems lightly drifted over the floor looking more like a faint coat of snow at early winter than a gentle mist. It scattered as we walked through it, delicate tendrils curling up into fading wisps at our feet. It was unsettlingly quiet, save the occasional low creaking of the metal hull and the distant screeching sound of the transport system still operating on autopilot, both sounds echoing through the entire facility, creating an uneasiness I couldn’t really describe, but made the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end.

It was a far cry from the chaos of explosions and gunfire not too long ago.

Cayde walked ahead seeming unfazed, ducking under wires and cables that had rattled loose and drooped down from the ceiling. The faint gray glow of the emergency lighting was so dim at this point, it cast more shadows than dispelled them. It wouldn’t be long before this place was nothing more than a derelict tomb adrift in the outer rim; another bit of space junk circling our system.

“Where are we?” I asked, looking around.

“Last level of the prison. Right below Deck Zero.” He waved his hand at me to follow him to the left. “This way.”

“This where Uldren and the Barons were kept?”

Cayde shook his head. “Nah, that’s levels up, half way. Furthest point from either exit and closest to the Warden’s quarters.”

The last of the emergency lights near us flickered and faded out as we stepped through a doorway into a hall that followed the curve of the outer perimeter. Ghost appeared, hovering at Cayde’s shoulder, casting light to guide the way.

“Getting anything on the tracker?” I whispered to Ghost, looking around in the almost pitch black now surrounding us.

“No,” he replied. “We’re all clear. If anyone’s still here, they’re not this far down.”

I nodded. “Where are we going?” I asked Cayde.

“There’s a monitoring station over here,” he said, pointing ahead. “Should be on its own system. Wanna check security. See if any camera’s are still going and what they might’ve picked up.”

When we got to the station room door, Cayde punched in a code on the keypad next to it. It made a grating beep, flashed red, then went silent. Cayde muttered something under his breath and tired again. This time, it accepted the code, but the door only slid half way open. Cayde sighed. “Damned hunk a metal’s older than me,” he grumbled as he motioned me back then turned and grabbed onto the open edge, giving the door a good yank with a hefty grunt. The whole thing groaned in protest and then made a loud clattering snap as the mechanism inside the wall broke against the force, the door screeching back into it.

My eyebrows rose.

I often forgot how strong he was.

Cayde dusted his hands together and stepped inside. I followed, blinking against the strobing light of the flickering screens, seeing nothing but static. There was power, but it appeared all the cameras had been disabled or destroyed. Cayde leaned over one of the consoles and started pressing buttons but nothing seemed to help clear up the screens or bring anything back online. “Shit,” he muttered.

“Let me try,” Ghost offered and Cayde stepped out of the way as Ghost got to work.

“You really liked doing this work, huh?” I asked Cayde while we waited for Ghost. “The sort of bounty hunter, mercenary thing you were doing for Petra?” I was going on what he’d said earlier about the cloak and dagger side of it all.

Cayde was quiet for a few beats before he answered. “I was good at it,” he said, his voice quiet and a bit distant but wistful in memory. “It’s all I knew for so long. It’s what I did to survive in the early days so I kinda had to be good at it. But, sometimes … sometimes it was even … fun - depending on the gig. I miss it. I miss the action of the old days and the freedom of not havin’ to answer to anyone. I miss the adventure - of not knowing what each new day was gonna bring. It was exciting.”

Then, his expression became a bit sad. “I miss my old friends,” he whispered and I knew he was thinking of Andal and even Tevis as he said it. “Save Shiro, the original gang’s all gone now.”

I reached over and laid my hand on his arm and he briefly closed his eyes, sighing before he smirked and shook his head. “Boy do miss the fun we had,” he said, the smirk becoming a fond smile. “Don’t seem to get too much-a that these days bein’ a Vanguard.”

“I didn’t realize you were so unhappy,” I said. I felt terrible he’d been carrying this around with him. “Have you ever talked to anyone about it?”

“You mean like a shrink?” He asked, a strange, uneasy tone in his voice. I felt him almost instantly tense as his eyes widened, his head tilting back away from me a little as he almost gawked at me.

“No. Nono,” I sook my head. “I mean like Ikora or Zavala. Or even Petra or Shiro,” I clarified. Clearly, I’d unintentionally struck something there and I didn’t want to push too hard. Not right now.

“Oh.” He relaxed. “No,” he shook his head. “No, I …” He looked over at me. “Ais, for as big a braggart as I am, talking about my feelings ain’t really my thing.”

He then frowned. “Yeah, I - I see the irony there.”

I smirked.

“Nah, I … I like talking to you, though. Don’t know what it is, you just … You make it easy.”

I leaned over as I smiled, nudging him affectionately. “You make it easy, too.”

A smile tugged at the corner of his mouth plates as his optics brightened some. “So I was the one who finally cracked the ‘strong silent one’, eh?”

I shook my head. “I wouldn’t say ‘cracked’. You just … you were there. And you listened. And never judged or pushed.”

“Same can be said for you, darlin’.”

I slipped my arms around him, giving him a hug. “No matter what it might be, you need to get something off your chest, I’m here. Just like always. I may not always understand exactly what you’re feeling, but I’ll listen and I’ll do my very best to help,” I whispered.

I felt him hug me back. “I know,” he whispered, then placed a soft kiss on the top of my head.

I looked up at him, the tender gesture the first of its kind he’d conveyed in such a way since he’d revealed his feelings for me. My eyes held his for a moment before they slowly shifted down to his lips. He watched me, as if taking the moment to reassure himself of something, then started to slowly lean down and -

“I might have something,” Ghost said. “No visual. A recording. On a loop. Made around the time of the break.”

I side-eyed Ghost, biting my bottom lip in annoyance, but he wasn’t paying attention, the back of his shell to us, focused on the computer.

I knew it wasn’t his fault. He didn’t know. But still … Ugh.

Cayde, however, frowned, his eyes closing as he let out a frustrated sigh, his expression apologetic. “Impeccable timing,” he sarcastically muttered. “As always.” He then flashed me another soft smile and stroked my cheek with the back of his gloved finger, winking at me. The moment was paused for now, but would be picked up again.

He stepped over to the console, leaning against it. “Let’s hear it,” he nodded.

Over the speakers I could hear chattering and low clicks though static.

“That sounds like Fallen,” I said.

“Can ya clear that up any, pal?” Cayde asked.

“Trying,” Ghost said. “There’s a lot of damage to the systems.” He finagled with it a bit more. “Let’s see if that did it,” he muttered, trying to play it again.

This time, it came through much clearer. It was very obviously Fallen language and, what was more, it was very obvious who’s voice it was.

“That’s Variks,” Ghost said.

“It is,” Cayde confirmed, his own voice hardening some.

“Do you know what he’s saying?” I asked.

Cayde squinted his eyes. “Something about … nowhere to go. No one to be.” He shook his head. “He’s talking too fast. My Eliksni’s rusty as hell to boot.” He leaned back, crossing his arms over his chest. “Not like whatever he’s sayin’ will save his hide.”

“And you’re sure it couldn’t’ve been anyone else? A Corsair who might’ve seen or heard something? A guard that spotted all of you bringing them in? No one like that?”

Cayde shook his head. “It’s crossed my mind,” he admitted. “But, even if any one of them spotted us and could’ve been the one to let them go, I can’t figure a why. Any scenario I play out, nothing works to anyone’s advantage in the Reef.” He shook his head once again, more emphatically this time. “No. Wasn’t someone from the Reef. And no prisoners here would be able to pull it off. They were all in cryo. They wouldn’t’ve even known. Only one that leaves is Variks.”

“Or Petra,” I offered.

Cayde flashed me an accusatory glance, as if the very thought of that was insane. “No way,” he immediately stated. “If you knew her history with that piece a - ”

“But I don’t,” I gently reminded. “Which is why I said it. I like Petra. But I don’t really know her, even after working with her a few times. Not like you do. And if the three of you were the only ones who knew they were here, I had to put it out there. If you say it wasn’t her, I believe you.”

Cayde relaxed, his expression softening. “No. No, you’re right. If … If I were where you are, I’d be askin’ the same thing. But no. Trust me. It wasn’t her,” he assured me.

I nodded. “Variks, then. But why? It doesn’t make any more sense with him, does it?” Was there something I didn’t know?

“I think I might know,” Ghost said. “I found the same recording, only this one he broadcast with his synth device. Listen …”

More crackling static sounded on the speakers at first, then cleared, Variks’s voice coming through. “Nowhere else to go. No one else to be, here,” he slowly spoke in his usual drawn out broken tone. There was a pause, followed by a low wheezing breath, then the familiar thump of his staff, the talismans dangling from it chiming. “And so I become Variks, the Kell. House Judgement envoy to the Eliksni people.”

The recording paused, then repeated.

“Kell?” I asked, frowning as I looked at Cayde.

His expression had flattened.

Then, slowly, the plates around his mouth shifted downward, a deep, seething frown forming. “It’s a prophecy,” he ground out in explanation. “From what I know, some Fallen believe there will be one who will unite all the Houses under one banner and lead them to a new home. The Kell of Kells.”

“And Variks thought he was this kell?” When had that happened, I wondered.

“Why release all the prisoners, though?” Ghost asked.

Cayde shook his head, an angry grimace etched into his features.

Variks’s broadcast repeated once again and something inside Cayde must’ve snapped. He lost his temper and put his fist right through the console’s speaker! Sparks went flying and I jerked back, shielding my eyes as Ghost spun out of the way!

“Cayde - ” he sputtered.

“All this for a damned prophecy. Sundance for a damned prophecy,” Cayde ground out, now so tense he was shaking. “If he wanted to help his people, why do it this way? Why cost so many so much? Does he have any idea what the hell he’s put back out there?!” He shook his head and kicked the bottom of the console, denting it, then backed off and paced, looking over at Ghost. “Can you bring up video surveillance on the Warden’s quarters leading up to the break?”

“Er … well …” Ghost looked down at the damage. “I - I can try. Give me a moment,” he sighed, shifting to another monitor on the other end.

I tentatively set my hand on Cayde’s shoulder, trying to calm him some. He stilled and looked over at me, his expression terse but his eyes sad. “I know you’re pissed off,” I gently said. “I know. But it’s not going to help anything if you destroy our only means of finding out exactly what happened before we can,” I sympathetically explained.

Cayde regarded me for a few moments then took a breath and slowly let it out as he nodded. “Yeah, I - I know. I know. I just … ” He shook his head. “Why? I don’t get it. He wanted them locked up as much as the rest of us. Why the hell would he let them go?”

I shook my head. “I don’t know,” I whispered. But I wish I did.

“There’s some recorded video feeds,” Ghost said. I looked over my shoulder as he got one of the monitors working. “I can’t tell what they are, though. The files are a bit mixed up. I’m not even sure if I can get the actual video to play but I might be able to get the sound to come though.”

As Cayde and I moved over to where he was, Ghost played what he’d found.

Silence.

“I’m not hearing anything,” I said as I watched the screen in front of me jumping with with static.

“I’ll try another route,” Ghost said.

With a bit more crackling and a few uncomfortable screeches, Ghost managed to switch to the overhead speakers. Broken sound crackled and gradually cleared, giving way to a faint voice that began coming though.

“-m sorry.”

I looked at Cayde. That was his voice.

“For what?”

And that was mine.

“For being me. Going rogue. Getting you into - into this. If I hadn’t - ”

“No. No, shhhh. ‘Kay? Shhhh,” I’d soothed. “It’s not your fault.”

“This … this is why … you’re bad at poker,” Cayde’d managed and, now, I’d managed to pick up on the faint ebb of humor he’d been trying for in the moment.

I shook my head. Even then, he was trying to make light of the situation.

There was another screech and a garbled sound, as if the recording skipped, then came back.

“Ais - ” Cayde’s voice was distant in the background, fading as he gasped.

“No. No, Cayde!” Rustling followed, and I remembered I’d started shaking him at that point, trying to wake him back up. “Nonono! Don’t go! No. Nonono. Cayde! Cayde! Stay! Please! Please stay! Cayde!”

The last shrill scream of his name echoed with such pain and anguish I almost didn’t recognize my own voice, but I remembered all too well the sudden icy grip I’d felt on my heart in that moment and the unbearable tightness in my chest and throat. Even though I knew Cayde was standing right beside me now, I still couldn’t help feeling it again.

I’d thought he was gone.

Truly gone.

And I found myself once again wondering what I’d ever do without him. How dark and dreary and sad life would be without him part of it.

Not just for me, but for all of us.

Cayde held such a place in all our lives … I don’t think he truly understood the strength he gave us, as well as the faith in ourselves. I don’t even think he knew that Ikora and Zavala actually looked up to him. Maybe he just didn’t believe in himself in that way. That he could be that in their eyes.

But he was.

He was the glue that held the Vanguard together. He was the wild card they needed in dire times. And he was their dear friend.

Cayde had such a hard time believing he held such a place in their lives.

It was why they’d been so angry, finding out he’d gone off without them. They almost lost him, too, and it had terrified them.

Just as it had me.

Because, for me, he was Light itself. Joy and humor that I so desperately needed in my life while facing the Darkness. He gave me something special to look forward to every single day when I came back from fighting it. He voice was reassurance and comfort when I felt alone in the deepest pits of it all. His companionship eased the burdens I bared on my shoulders.

All our lives would be far less without him part of them.

We weren’t us without him.

And we loved him. Dearly.

“Turn it off,” I heard Cayde whisper to Ghost in a slightly broken voice before warm, strong arms were around me, pulling from my thoughts. I numbly leaned into them, laying my palm over his chest as I rested my head against his shoulder, closing my eyes for a moment, the room feeling like it was spinning.

He didn’t say anything.

Neither did I.

What could be said?

I knew it had been just as hard for him to listen to as it was for me.

There was no need for apologies and no words of comfort could do anything at that moment.

So we just held each other and let that be enough.

“Pal, um - ” Cayde cleared his throat. “Is, uh, i-is there any way you can go back further on those? About, uh … maybe twenty minutes or so?”

“What am I looking for?” Ghost asked, his own voice quiet and full of emotion.

“I need to see if any of the cameras caught who shot Sundance.”

There was a pause.

“You don’t need to watch it pal. It’s okay. I just need to see if …”

“I know,” Ghost replied. “Um … hang on.”

I finally opened my eyes. “Cayde. You shouldn’t have to - ”

“I need to,” he whispered. “I … I’m almost positive it was Pirrah. I remember a laugh. The shot coming outta nowhere up above. But I got to see it. I gotta …” He shook his head and I could hear the swishing beat of his heart speed up, his chest fluttering with each careful, emotion-filled breath. “I gotta see it so when I get hold of him, he knows.”

I rubbed his chest. “Okay.”

“Cayde? I think I found it,” Ghost said.

I looked up. Cayde’s jaw was firmly set. He was starring at the blank monitors. I pressed a bit closer to him, tightening my arm around his waist.

He nodded.

Ghost played the recording, each of the screens showing a different camera angle of the large space. He slowly floated back toward us and I reached out, drawing him in against my chest as he settled into my palm.

We stood there together, holding each other, and watched the cameras that had caught the frenzy of Scorn as they swarmed into the open loading dock clambering over broken concrete and twisted rebar as they dodged fires that had broken out and were scattered throughout the destruction. I heard Cayde’s voice off to the right of one of the screens, just out of view, as he said something. What exactly, I was unsure, it had gotten lost in the frenzy or shrieks and petulant cries of frustration from those chasing him.

Then, I saw him dashing into view on the lower screen, doing an effortless front flip as he leapt out of the way, an explosion going off behind him. Some Scorn dropped motionless from it, others just trampled the bodies in hot pursuit of Cayde, not showing any sign of care or remorse. One managed to grab him and threw him into a pile of broken rubble, Cayde sitting back up, casually muttering that that had hurt as he rubbed the back of his head.

As he got back onto his feet, another Scorn grabbed a large section of broken catwalk and smacked Cayde with it, sending him flying and slamming into the rest of the dangling catwalk that was hanging from high above. Cayde had slowed his fall by digging his knife into the metal, sliding down most of the way before shooting the hinge holding it all up, dropping the massive piece of architecture down onto the Scorn below as he rolled out of the way.

“Sorry! Not sorry,” Cayde had mockingly apologized, then dashed off, more Scorn in hot pursuit as Cayde’s cannon fired off round after round as they attacked from all sides.

I took my eyes off the screen just long enough to look at Cayde. His eyes were narrowed. He wasn’t watching the events like we were. He was searching the screens, looking for something.

A flash of light on one of the screens caught my attention and I watched as Cayde had cast his super, flames erupting all around him. He spun around, mid-air, aiming his cannon at the hoard leaping after him. He was about to fire when one body slammed him, Cayde yelping as both of them painfully crashed down to the floor, the Scorn that hit him smashing into broken concrete, killing itself as Cayde bounced and rolled out of the way.

That was the second I knew he was in trouble. He was off his feet and surrounded.

I held my breath as I watched them gang up on him, knocking his cannon away and start beating on him, choking him by yanking him back with his own cloak, and smashing his face into a piece of concrete, knocking him back down to the ground before kicking the hell out of him.

Even though it was already over, I couldn’t help the mixed emotions of fear and rage that warred within me. My blood boiled. I wanted to jump into the past and set them all on fire. I wanted to watch them writhe and scream in agony as they turned to ash and crumpled to the ground knowing they’d gone after the wrong man.

Fire suddenly erupted at the Scorn’s feet, blasting them back as if they’d been standing on a bomb. Cayde leapt out of the crowd, his body engulfed. He twirled upward, gracefully amidst the violence, then threw his arms out, fiery blades piercing the heads of several enemies, turning them to smoldering, blacked piles on the floor.

Cayde landed on his feet, stumbling a bit, finding his cannon and picking it up.

“That’s it! Now I’m pissed,” he declared.

One of the Scorn charged him, slamming him up against a pile of rubble, choking him as it held his cannon hand up out of the way. Cayde struggled with the creature, unable to force his hand down enough to get a shot off. Eventually, he headbutt the damned thing, stabbing it with his horn. The Scorn’s body immediately went limp as it died, dropping Cayde, its body falling away to the floor.

Cayde shook his head and stumbled out into the open. “Now was that really all you got?” He mockingly asked, looking upward.

Steadying himself, he held out his hand.

Cayde tensed against me and I felt him suck in a sharp breath.

On the screen, Sundance appeared over his palm.

“Help me out here, little buddy,” Cayde requested.

An razor sharp streak of purple light from somewhere above them flashed across each of the camera angles followed by a deafening shatter. Pure Light burst out from where Sundance had been. Cayde jerked against me just as the screens all became static and then went black followed by near silence.

I looked up at Cayde.

His optics were focused on the blank screens. He wasn’t blinking but his chest was rising and falling in quick, shallow breaths.

“Cayde.” Ghost floated upward as I turned to face Cayde, rubbing his arms. “Hey. Hey, look at me,” I whispered, reaching up, touching his cheek.

He swallowed and blinked, his eyes turning downward to me.

“It’s okay,” I whispered.

“I - I couldn’t - I,” he stumbled, unable to really speak.

“Shhhh,” I soothed. “It’s alright.” I rubbed his arms some more.

“I couldn’t see him.” He shook his head. “The cameras … The angles. Play it again.”

Ghost looked at me, clearly taken aback. “Cayde …”

I shook my head. “No, Cayde. You don’t need to watch that again.”

“Play it. Play - ” He pointed toward the screens, sounding like he was about to pass out.

“Come’ere. Sit down,” I said, and instead guided him over to a nearby chair.

He didn’t argue and sat, breathing a bit heavily as he looked back and forth at nothing in particular while shaking his head. “Why? Why did I call her?” He asked. “Why did I…?”

I crouched down in front of him, resting my hands on his knees, idly rubbing small, soothing circles with my thumbs. “I don’t know, baby. I don’t know,” I quietly told him, shaking my head. “Maybe you thought there was no threat to her.”

“I was surrounded,” he uttered, eyebrows furrowing, shaking his head as he looked at me completely dumbfounded, his chin plate trembling with the threat of tears he was barely managing to hold back.

I’d never seen him as vulnerable and shaken as I had in these past twenty-four hours. Ana had warned the neuro-link and whatever cocktail was mixed into his system to keep him calm would likely cause some imbalance for a while but it did nothing to ease my concern. I was not used to him like this. Cayde was always the reassuring one, ready with some off-handed quip that even Ikora and Zavala tended to look to when things got dire.

Who did Cayde turn to when he needed that reassurance? I mean, besides what appeared to be me now.

I took a calming breath.

“You were in the middle of a fight. You’d just gotten the shit kicked out of you,” I gently reminded, reaching up, caressing the side of his face and then the back of his head before I let my hand trail down to his chest. “We’ve all had those moments where so much is happening and we’re so banged up we aren’t always thinking as we should.”

“It cost me Sundance,” he whispered, his features pinching as he swallowed thickly.

“I know,” I nodded and shifted up enough to draw him into a hug. “I know,” I soothed, rubbing his back. “You weren’t expecting it. Not in a place like this or with a weapon like that. Who would?”

How had they managed to get hold of a weapon that could kill a Ghost so easily?

I felt him let out a shaky sigh and hug me back, tight. I looked up at Ghost who was hovering close, his shell drooped. I reached up and coaxed him down to us, all three of us huddling together for a while, silently offering each other comfort.

“I’m gonna call Ikora,” I told him, making a decision. “See if she’ll look over the feed. Maybe she can see what we’re not able to right now.”

There was a long pause before I felt him nod. “Yeah. Yeah, okay,” he managed.

Then, he took deep breath and let it out, easing back away from me. “I gotta go get her,” he said. “I can’t leave her here. It’s a tomb now but I don’t want it to be hers. I want to bring her home.”

I nodded. “Okay.” I looked to Ghost who had shored himself up a little. “We’ll help you,” I said, Ghost bobbing a reassuring affirmative before I looked back at Cayde. “If you want us to.”

“Yeah,” he uttered, nodding once again.

*

Ghost compiled all he could from the prison archive that were linked to Variks and what had happened in the last seventy-two hours - all video and audio feeds and all logs - then sent them to Ikora.

After that, Ghost and I followed Cayde to the collapsed level he’d crashed into and faced off against the Barons and hoards of Scorn.

There were no fires now, only purple-gray rays of dim light shining down from far above and heavy shadows cast all around the outer perimeter and within dark corners and crevices created by the heaps of structural debris laying all around us.

I drew the back of my hand up against my mouth and nose as a foul smell struck me. I winced. The lingering smoke was heavy but the odor of already decomposing corpses was even heavier. I reached into one of the pouches on my belt and retrieved a nasal air filter, pressing the two small attached nubs into my nostrils, almost instantly breathing with relief as it eliminated the smell.

As we came to the center of the space, Cayde stopped and looked up at the broken floor that circled the outer edge of the far wall.

“See something?” I asked.

“They stood up there,” Cayde said, then started turning in place, looking for something up along the ridge.

When he seemed to find it, he walked forward a few paces then stopped, looking around on the floor.

I watched him carefully.

Suddenly, something caught his eye and he crouched down, reaching for it, drawing a small flared golden arch up out of the ash and dust that had settled over most of the floor. It was one of the tips of Sundance’s shell, a broken piece of the main body still attached.

Cayde stared at it, tenderly tracing the curve of it with his other finger then folded it into his palm and drew it down against this chest, holding it over his heart as he bowed his head. “I’m sorry,” he whispered. “I’m so sorry.”

Before I could step over to him, Ghost moved in, settling down on Cayde’s shoulder, lolling to the side as he leaned into his hood. “She would never blame you for what happened,” he murmured. “She loved you, Cayde.”

“I wish I could’ve had just a little more time with her. Been able to tell her how much I love her, too. How much I’m gonna miss her.”

“She knows,” Ghost murmured.

Cayde shook his head. “I still can’t believe she’s not here. I keep looking for her. Keep waiting for her to suddenly pop up outta nowhere and do that little twirl-a hers. Nag me about something. Snark back at me. Counter a joke or lay on the heavy sarcasm.”

“Me, too,” Ghost whispered. “She was one in a million.”

Cayde nodded. “That she was.” He reached up and pet Ghost’s shell. “She loved ya, pal. You should know that. She just … she was like me and … found it hard to find the words and the guts to say ‘em, even though she wanted to.”

Ghost’s shell settled around him and he tilted in against Cayde further.

“I knew,” he whispered.

❣️♠️❣️

Chapter Text

CHAPTER 9
❣️♠️❣️

I see you, but more importantly
I feel you. I feel the things
About you that cannot be
Described with words. Parts that
Only the soul can understand.
Pieces that I want to care for.
Fragments that speak a beautiful
Language that is impossible to
Not hear.
~JM Storm

I walked over to where Cayde was silently sitting on a section of conduit housing raised up out of the metal floor like a bench. His back was to me as he appeared to be starring out past the landing bay at the vast swirling purple hues and softly sparkling stars beyond.

I paused in the open doorway, watching him, my eyes tracing over his form, noting the slight hunch in his shoulders rather than the usual confident way he often sat with squared shoulders and a slightly cocky yet comfortable demeanor.

“You gonna come sit or just marvel at how good I look in purple?” He asked me over his shoulder.

Despite the sombre moment, I couldn’t help smiling a little. I should’ve known he heard me, even if I had been quiet.

As I stepped around the housing, I saw he had removed his scarf and was now holding it, draped over his cupped hands, pieces of Sundances body and shards of what we’d managed to find of what was left of her shell lying within it.

He briefly acknowledged my presence with a glance then scooted over as his focus returned to the unending sea before us.

I sat.

“We couldn’t find any more pieces. I think that’s it,” I said, my voice almost a whisper.

It didn’t seem real. Even to me. Even now.

How was she gone?

My eyes settled back down on what Cayde held in his hands.

How was it someone so vibrant, so full of life and joy … How was it all that was left of that precious little light was a mere handful of shattered metal shards and chipped paint? Sundance … she’d been so much more than what those tiny pieces seemed to suggest.

Cayde nodded as he looked back down, taking a moment before he tenderly folded the edges of his scarf around the pieces, bundling her up safely to take home. “Our little buddy?”

“He’s taking a few minutes,” I said. “I think he just … I think he wanted to be in there alone for a bit.”

“Mmm,” Cayde grunted then sighed as he continued to stare at the small parcel in his hands, his thumbs softly caressing over the folded fabric before his optics resumed their seeming futile search for something and yet nothing within the nebula.

I slipped my arms around his bicep and laid my cheek on his shoulder.

After a while, I felt him lay his head against mine with a soft sigh.

“Y’know Sunny and I would often sit right here in this very spot together and wonder what was out there. Not the planets. Least, not the immediate ones. But beyond those. Wonder what was out past Sol and if we’d ever get to see it. Hop in a ship and just … take off one day. Go as far out as we could. Just like the good ol’ days.”

“The good ol’ days?” I asked, rolling my eyes up toward him, my eyebrows raising questioningly.

There was a pause. “Mmm,” he eventually grunted. “Back in the day, before the City, out in the Wilds, on clear, cool nights when the sky was crisp and bright, we could lay out in the fields and stare up at the stars - at the Moon. Dream of one day gettin’ back up and out there like in the Golden Age.”

“Do you remember much from that time? Of traveling to other moons and planets?”

“Some,” he nodded. “Not sure if they’re all memory or just … pieces I put together in my imagination of what I pictured from the journal the other me left. Hard ta - Hard ta separate it all sometimes. But I knew I was up there once,” he said, nodding again. “Before I knew more about … stuff I know now. I knew I’d been up there. And, soon as I was able, I kitbashed a ship together with whatever I could find, barter, or …”

“Steal?” I smirked.

“That’s an ugly word. I prefer ‘long borrowed’.”

I snorted, laughing a little, feeling Cayde shake a little with some laughter of his own. “The tech was finicky as hell, too. Knocked out every now and again. Had to keep kickin’ the intake manifolds to jar it all back into workin’. Made me wonder if we’d ever get there, let alone get back. Worth the risk to me, though.”

“You mean the manifolds on the outside of the ship, right?”

“Are there any others?”

“You … went outside the ship and kicked the manifolds? While floating out in space?”

“Well, how else was I gonna get ‘em working? ‘Sides, not like I was gonna run out of air. Worst that’d happen is I’d go floating off into nowhere forever.”

“Don’t joke about that. That terrifies me.”

“Obviously, I didn’t,” Cayde pointed out.

“I know. But that’s … one of my fears. Ending up out there. Floating away. No way to get back. Just endless … nothing. Just thinking about it … ” I shuddered.

I felt him shift his hand to my knee, soothingly petting it. “If it helps, I was smarter than usual and tied a rope to my waist. I ain’t none too fond-a goin’ floatin’ out there, myself, either.”

I smiled. “It does.”

I slid my own hand down to his, laying it on top, lacing our fingers together. “So, I take it your first stop was the Moon?”

“Yep,” he nodded,” giving my fingers a gentle squeeze.

“And this was back in the early days, right? Of the City?”

“Mm hmm.”

“Before you were a Vanguard?”

“Before even Andal was a Vanguard,” he nodded again. “Before Tan - Before any of that.”

“Wasn’t the Moon off limits back then?” I asked, as if I hadn’t noticed what he’d almost said and did his best to avoid.

“Only if you weren’t experienced. ‘Sides, they had to know you were goin’ before they could threaten to ground ya, so I just didn’t tell ‘em.”

“Why am I not at all surprised?” I asked, my smile fond as I shook my head.

“Cause you totally know me.”

I chuckled. “Is this the before part of the story of when you met that Fallen Archon? When you both were being chased by the Hive?”

“This is the one,” he confirmed.

“So, when you started doing side-jobs for Petra … now and again, those same thoughts would come back to you when sitting here? That same wonder? You’d ventured out this far, why not go further?”

He nodded. “Yeah.”

Since then, obviously, Cayde had ventured further. As far out as Saturn.

“I think that’s why Zavala and Ikora were really so pissed at me,” he said. “And still are - even if Ikora’s apologized.”

“For wondering?” I asked, frowning, tilting my head to look at him.

“No - well, yes, but … It ain’t just that I almost d - died. It’s … It’s that I - I went off and did something without them and it not only upset them that I left them behind but it … I think it made ‘em feel like I’d rather be alone - on my own - than with them. That the … the friendship wasn’t as important to me as it is to them. It hurt ‘em.” He shook his head, looking over at me, his expression earnest. “But that ain’t true. It is important to me. But I just … I wanna get out. I wanna do something that isn’t bein’ chained to a figurative - sometimes literal - desk and to paperwork. I feel stuck. Not like I’m not helping or doing anything good. I know I am. I know I’m helping. I know I’m doing good. In my way. I just … I …”

“You feel like you need a good long breath of fresh air every now and again or you’re going to go stir-crazy,” I offered.

He nodded. “Yeah. Yeah, exactly.” He then shook his head. “It ain’t a slight. I just feel like the walls are closing in on me every now and again. And I … I miss the old days.”

His expression became wistful and a bit sad. “I wasn’t ready. To be a Vanguard. Not like it was an aspiration to begin with. I never envied Andal bein’ stuck in the Tower. And I always felt bad about it. My place was always outside the walls. But I woulda traded places with him. In a heartbeat. Thing is, though, he was good at it. He took to it. And I think I hated him a little for it. Cause he was there and not out with us. Where he belonged.”

I saw the parallels he was making with Ikora and Zavala there, even if I wasn’t sure Cayde fully saw them. I think, subconsciously, he knew, though. He was making Ikora and Zavala feel the way Andal leaving him and their crew had made them feel. Even if it wasn’t on purpose. And all those old feelings were just bubbling to the surface along with everything else.

It had to be overwhelming.

“Y’know, sometimes I still don’t actually know what the hell it is I’m doing?” He said as he rubbed at his face. “Most’ve the time I’m just crossin’ my fingers and hopin’ for the best. Ikora and Zavala … They seem suited to the job, just like Andal was. They seem like they belong there. Me? I … ” He frowned, as if looking for how to finish that.

“You feel like your strengths are being wasted,” I guessed in realization.

Cayde’s expression fell and he stared down toward the floor, his lips pressing together in a thin line. “I could do more if I wasn’t stuck there. It’s what I was trying to show them. That I can still be the Vanguard and be out of the Tower. I was trying to help. To help them. To make it easier on them. I was …” His face twisted little and he looked away, cursing under his breath. “I was trying to make them proud,” he whispered, his voice unsteady. “To make me proud. And Andal … To show I still had it and could do more. That I was actually useful for more than handing out bounties and chiming in over the comms.” He shook his head. “But all I ended up doing was getting Sunny killed, letting the Barons and Uldren go, and nearly dying myself, all while putting you in harms way. … Seems to be a pattern with me.”

I felt so sad for him. And I wanted nothing more than to prove to him how loved and valued he was. That he did make the people he cared for proud. That he made me proud.

But I was pretty sure if I tried to tell him that right now it wouldn’t help. It wouldn’t feel earned or real for him. It would feel more like a platitude. I’d have to wait for the right moment. When he was feeling good again and proud of himself first.

There would be a moment.

I knew that.

I just had to wait for it.

In the meantime, I turned and drew him into a hug.

He didn’t protest in the slightest, sagging against me with a heavy, shaking sigh, his head dropping to my shoulder as if he were exhausted.

He was carrying so much around with him and I now understood why - even if they were close - he didn’t breach this topic with Ikora or Zavala.

An earlier question came to me once again: Who did Cayde turn to when he needed reassurance?

I wondered if Andal had been the last really close friend he’d had around him who he could turn to with the really deep things. I wasn’t sure about Shiro. They still seemed close, though, and I knew they got together to meet and catch up whenever Shiro came to the City - which was rare, but he did. But, beyond that, I didn’t know the details of their friendship. If it was ever considered a close one, like family in the way it had been with Andal. I never asked, though.

It didn’t matter right now.

“I’m … I’m not great with the humor or wit like you,” I quietly said while softly rubbing his back. “So I know saying the last couple of days haven’t gone as planned isn’t going land as well as if you said it.” I actually heard and felt him huff a bit of a laugh. I smiled. “But, Cayde, I … I don’t think feeling like you let anyone down or blaming yourself is the right thing. Petra called asking for help and you came. That’s what friends do. That’s not a fault.”

“I was careless. I made too light of the situation.”

“You didn’t know the situation was what it was. We all thought it was a riot. You didn’t know the Barons had been freed. Or Uldren. And you certainly didn’t pull the trigger.”

“I may as well have,” he murmured.

“Baby, Variks let them go. Variks is responsible for what happened. They attacked you. They killed Sundance. If not for Variks’s actions, none of that would’ve happened. I don’t care what his reasoning may have been. It’s no excuse. Because of him, all of this was set in motion.”

He was quiet and still for a while and I wondered if maybe I’d pushed the objection a bit too much and he’d closed off, feeling like I didn’t understand.

But then, I felt him shift and slip an arm around my waist as he nuzzled his face more fully into my shoulder and sighed once again only this time with what sounded like relief. “Say it again,” he murmured.

“Variks is responsible,” I whispered.

I felt him shake his head. “No. The other thing.”

I frowned. “Which other thing?”

“What you called me. … Say it again? Please?”

“Baby?”

“Mmm,” he exhaled, the sound content and relaxed.

I smiled. “Has no one ever called you that before?”

“They have. It just never felt as nice or as … reassuring as when you say it.”

I turned my head, kissing the side of his through his hood. “Can I ask what happened?”

“It’s boring,” he muttered.

That sounded like a ‘no’, so I just nodded and held him, closing my eyes as we settled into the comforting intimacy.

“Thanks,” he whispered.

“Always,” I whispered back.

❣️♠️❣️

“Are you sure you want to stay for this?” Ikora carefully asked Cayde as her hands softly closed around not only the folded scarf containing what remained of Sundance, but around his hands as well, her fingers tightening slightly as her eyes searched his.

Cayde averted her gaze, looking down at their joined hands and the bundle they both held.

He hesitated, then managed a nod. “I need to see it,” he tightly replied.

She studied him for a moment more and nodded. “Alright.”

He eased his hands out away from hers, leaving the folded scarf of Sundance’s remains in Ikora’s care.

I watched as Ikora moved over to the data center in the middle of the briefing room. Cayde came over to where I was standing near the closed doorway and stood next to me, taking a careful breath, slowly letting it out.

Wordlessly, I took his hand, giving it a gentle squeeze.

He glanced over at me, a weak smile tugging at the corner of his mouth as he squeezed my hand back, his eyes then returning to Ikora.

“What’s she doing?” I whispered as I watched her carefully extract what remained of Sundance’s actual body from the outer shell pieces, placing them on a lighted graphed table screen imbedded in the console.

Cayde seemed about to reply when Ghost quietly answered instead. “All the recordings I capture during our missions to later upload to the Vanguard terminal for briefing? Sundance would’ve done the same thing. If she … If her body isn’t - isn’t too badly damaged, the CPU should be able to extract that same kind of data, compile it, and show us a virtual reenactment of what happened. Of what the surveillance recordings at the prison couldn’t capture.”

“We’re going to be looking at her last memories, you mean?”

Ghost nodded.

I looked over at Cayde. That was why Ikora was so hesitant. She didn’t want him to have to relive it again.

“I’ll be alright,” he said before I could ask. He didn’t look at me this time, instead keeping his eyes on Ikora while trying to sound calm and collected. I heard the waver in his voice, though. The slight twinge of static.

I wasn’t going to argue it. It was his choice. If I was in his place, as hard as it would be, I’d want to know the last things Ghost had seen. Especially if it meant confirming something important I needed to know. I just didn’t know how Cayde was going to react. He was … tense, to say the least. And I had no idea if the jolt from the neuro-link was still affecting him or if it had dissipated. I saw cracks, though. Hints of emotion trying to come to the surface. But I had no way of knowing just how much, if anything, of that was from the neuro-link and how much of that was Cayde’s natural reaction and being just too worn down to try and hide it. He usually masked so much behind humor and diversion. When he was stressed or when things got too close to the vest, he tended to get really annoying and disruptive, unconsciously going overboard to compensate.

He wasn’t doing that here, though.

He was quiet. Reserved. Turned inward and shaken. All things one would expect given what happened. Except, this was Cayde we were talking about. What one would expect didn’t usually apply to him. And all of it was making me see him in a new light and wonder just what really was hiding beneath the facade that even I hadn’t seen yet, despite how close we’d become.

I just hoped the way I was approaching it all was correct. My instincts told me to be protective and caring. To be gentle with him but not smother him. It … wasn’t easy. I had to kind of let him lead me where he wanted and needed me before I could really help. And, in the meantime, I felt like I wasn’t doing enough. But I didn’t dare want to push it.

“It looks like most of her memories are intact,” Ikora said, glancing over at us - at Cayde - her lips pressed together in a tight line as she waited for his say-so.

He nodded. “Don’t drag it out, just do it, Ikora.”

A nod in reply before she typed a few commands into the computer.

I wondered where Zavala was?

The CPU hummed to life, requesting authorization. Ikora spoke her identification code. It confirmed and the graphed screen beneath Sundance’s remains softly glowed.

Suddenly, the room around us came to life, tiny projectors from all over, imbedded in the walls, casting different video feed angles, mapping out the entirety of the lower prison level Cayde, Ghost, and I had just been to. I glanced down at the floor, noticing my foot and part of my lower leg were overtaken by the projection of a section of upper decking that had collapsed. It looked so real I had to reach down out of curiosity, my hand disappearing into it.

Unsteady, ambling footsteps drew my attention upward, the rock projection forgotten as I watched an equally real projection of Cayde stumbling toward us, his armor covered in dust and torn, one of his shinguards broken, the kneepad missing. The metal plates of the left side of his face were torn off and what was left was badly scratched, the hinge to his jaw bent outward and broken. I winced. Even being an Exo, I knew he’d been in pain. He was just damn good at masking it.

I glanced over at the man standing beside me, his face tense but otherwise expressionless as he watched the phantom of himself pause and hold out his hand. “Hey, help me out here, little buddy,” he’d said. Sundance appeared in a glittering, misting sparkle of Light just over his palm.

And that was when I heard it. Somewhere overhead there was a low, burbling whir of energy as a weapon powered up, and a low, deep, menacing laugh accompanied it.

It all happened in a split second.

Beside me, Cayde gasped, his body lurching forward toward Sundance, his hand ripping away from mine as he instinctively grabbed for his cannon. “No!”

The shrill terror in his voice echoed all around us as a searing line of magenta cut through the darkened space like a knife, the flash making me jump as I quickly closed my eyes, Light bursting everywhere.

It was the last thing Sundance saw.

The holographic world around us shattered and then, just like that, we were back in the briefing room.

I blinked, trying to get my eyes to adjust as I looked around. “Cayde?”

He was a couple steps away from me, breathing heavily, his eyes darting around the space where Sundance had been, his hand still reached out to where she’d been, suspended, holding nothing but thin air. “No … no,” he uttered in a shaking breath, the cannon in his hand trembling.

I carefully stepped toward him, barely brushing his shoulder with my fingertips. “Cayde?”

“No!” He suddenly snapped and quickly backed away from me, shaking his head. “No, don’t touch me! Don’t … Don’t touch me.” His chest heaved as he stared downward toward the floor, his hand out toward me in a gesture to stay away.

And then, after a few moments, he looked up at me and I saw regret on his face and a silent apology in his eyes.

I understood all too well. Not from loss but fear. Being trapped in a moment in your head. Waking up in the middle of the night, the room dark, and Ghost suddenly there but the images and feelings from a nightmare still so fresh and real, even him being there just trying to offer comfort was too much.

That’s where Cayde was.

He thought he’d be alright but seeing it all play out again had just put him right back in the moment.

“It’s okay,” I assured him.

He shook his head again, lips parting, like he wanted to say something but nothing would come out. His eyes locked with mine and then, without a word, he rushed out of the room.

I didn’t even notice Ikora had come over and was standing next to me as Ghost and I both looked after where Cayde had gone.

“Should we …?” Ghost asked.

I shook my head. “No.” He needed to be alone right now.

I looked over at Ikora. “I recognized the sound of that weapon. It was something other Scorn were shooting at us at the prison. Got hit by one a few times. A singe bolt can hurt like hell even through the armor. Cause some real damage. A lesser experienced Guardian it might kill if it hits them in the right spot. A New Light, definitely. But someone like us or a Ghost with the right protections on their shell, like Sundance had.” I shook my head. “It also fires three bursting bolts of Void light, not a single powerful one. Not so far as I know or saw, anyway. So what the hell was that?”

Ikora’s lips were pressed tightly together. I knew she was worried about Cayde but understood, as I did, going after him right now wouldn’t be wise. He wanted space. He wanted to be alone. The best way we could help him right now would be to find answers.

“Let’s play it again,” she said, turning, walking back over to the console.

I stepped over to about where I knew the hologram of Cayde would walk in and waited. As the scene booted up again, Cayde’s hologram stepped up next to me and I quickly stepped sideways so I could get the same line of sight Sundance had. Once again I heard the whir of the weapon overhead followed by that horrid laughter, and then … the burst.

“Freeze it!” I quickly said.

“Freeze playback,” Ikora instructed the CPU.

Unfortunately, the frame it froze on was just after Sundance’s shell shattered, leaving the room in a blanket of bright light.
“Can we back it up two seconds?” I asked, squinting.

Ikora nodded and backed the memory to just before the trigger was pulled. “Freeze it there,” I requested.

Ikora did, then gave the CPU another instruction. “Computer, accept voice recognition and instruction from Guardian1615, Aislin Avalbane.” She gave me a nod.

“Authorization accepted, Ikora Rey,” the CPU replied.

“Thanks,” I nodded back.

I looked up to where the weapon had fired from. It was up higher than I’d guessed. Way up. The shooter had climbed the side of the hull and was clinging like a spider to the rebars that had become exposed when the concrete of the upper level had broken away.

As I squinted to get a better look at the weapon - to confirm it was what I thought it was - I frowned, wondering if there was some kind of glitch with the computers compiling of Sundance’s memories.

It looked like … a Cabal war beast.

And then I realized the shooter was indeed one of the Scorn Barons and it was wearing a pelt. A war beast pelt.

What the hell?

“Resume playback,” I said.

The CPU unfroze the moment and I unconsciously flinched as the weapon fired right at me. “Stop!” I called out. The moment froze. “Back up a half second.”

The CPU backed the moment up and froze it to right where whatever was being fired was just a few feet in front of me, suspended midair and surrounded by a sickening pink glow. I tilted my head, eyebrows furrowing as the shape within looked eerily familiar but couldn’t possibly be. I moved to get a better look at it from the side and immediately felt a cold chill run up my spine as my stomach dropped. “That can’t be what it looks like,” I uttered, shaking my head, instantly recognizing the pointed, almost organic shape. It wasn’t exactly like the ones I was familiar with, but there was no mistaking it.

“That’s … that’s not possible,” Ghost uttered my thoughts aloud as he came to hover next to my head, shaking himself back and forth in disbelief.

I looked over at Ikora. Her face was stoic but her eyes held the same disbelieving horror I felt. “Computer, analyze. Cause of death? What is this?” She demanded even though, like me, I knew she already knew what the CPU was going to say.

“Payload matches the ballistics of a Weapon of Sorrow or a comparable Hive implement. Subject ‘Sundance’ appears to be the victim of a single, catastrophic wound from a Devourer Bullet, modified to fire from a Scorn launcher. Projectile classified as ontological.”

I swallowed. Hearing it said aloud did nothing but make the gravity of the danger all the more heavy. “They fired … a Devourer Bullet … from a regular weapon?” I slowly said, trying to process it - to let it sink in - as I shook my head, looking over at Ikora. “How’s that possible?”

Ikora also shook her head, a troubled look on her face. “It shouldn’t be. Weapons of Sorrow and the ballistics they fire go hand-in-hand.”

“Apparently, what we thought we knew, we don’t,” I said. “And if regular weapons can fire those ballistics and the wrong people find out how to get hold of them …”

“The implications are enormous,” Ikora acknowledged as she gave me a cautionary glance. “There is someone who might know more about this we should consult.”

“Eris?”

Ikora nodded. “But, until we’re certain of what we’re dealing with here and how far it goes, this information is classified. No one beyond the five of us are to know. Understood?”

I nodded. “Where’s Zavala, by the way?”

“Personal business. I’m going to contact him immediately.” Her tone and voice then softened greatly. “Find Cayde. I understand what he’s going through and I know how hard this all is on him, but he needs to know. Now.”

❣️♠️❣️

It felt like I had static buzzing in my brain as I quickened my pace down one of the long hallways that led in the direction of the old Tower where Ghost was getting a read on Cayde’s communicator.

I still couldn’t believe it. A Devourer Bullet. How the hell had the Scorn got hold of one and how the hell had they got it into the prison? It was super max. If they’d so much as had a speck of lint hidden up their asses it would’ve been known.

Could Variks somehow’ve given it to them? Part of his larger plan with this Kell of Kell’s thing? And, even if that was so, where would he have gotten it? From whom? And modified no less. I didn’t want to think it was Petra. Cayde trusted her. I believed him when he said she had nothing to do with any of this. But Cayde had said it was just the three of them who knew the Barons were there. And I knew it wasn’t him. So that only left the other two.

I exhaled sharply and turned my attention back to the task at hand. Finding Cayde.

He’d shut down emotionally back there, no doubt trying to steel himself for what he might need to face and do next. But after witnessing Sundance’s final moments, I knew his resolve might shatter at any second. Despite grieving Sundance back on Enceladus, there was still something more bottled up besides rage toward her killer.

Next to me, Ghost sped along, matching my pace. Even he seemed shaken by what we’d discovered. For a long time, there was nothing but the echo of my footsteps in the hall.

“He’s not going to take this well,” Ghost finally spoke, his voice low and cautious, like he didn’t want even the walls to hear.

“I know,” I said quietly. I wouldn’t either.

Ghost hesitated, like he wanted to say more but decided against it. Instead, he hummed briefly and scanned ahead. “I think I found him. His communicator’s pinging not too far from here.”

The signal led us out into the cool, dusk-lit air of the south-facing wall along the old Tower's outer edge. Far up ahead, a figure was seated on a section of broken wall overlooking the Last City, the tattered tails of his cloak lightly tossing in the soft breeze.

Cayde was hunched over, his silhouette barely distinguishable against the dying light of the day.

As I approached, he didn’t move. His hand rested on his knee, his cannon still dangling loosely in his grasp. I could see the tension in his body, the way his shoulders were bunched up as if he was trying to hold the world in place. He didn’t turn around as I stepped closer, but he knew I was there.

Under more normal circumstances, I would’ve immediately told him what we’d learned. But looking at him, his demeanor, reading the charge in the air around him, my gut told me not to. Not yet. So I followed my instincts.

For a moment, neither of us spoke. I simply leaned over the wall next to him, resting my elbows on the cool stone as I clasped my hands together and looked out at the horizon with him. The City below seemed so peaceful from up here, not a single soul aware of what had happened in the last 48 hours.

“You ever wonder what they think of us?” Cayde finally said, his voice sounding distant. “The people down there. Do they think we’re invincible? That nothing can break us?”

I followed his gaze. “I think some of them still think that. Maybe not as many since the Red War, though.” I shook my head. “I think it’s more that they don’t realize it’s not that we’re not invincible or that we can’t break … but what we lose. That’s what’s hardest on us.”

He nodded absently, his grip tightening on the cannon. I watched it carefully before looking up at his face.

“They didn’t even give her a chance,” he muttered. “She didn’t stand a chance, and I ... I couldn’t …”

He stopped, choking on the words, his voice cracking under the strain.

“You weren’t supposed to have to see it again,” I said softly. “Ikora was trying to protect you from that.”

“I don’t need protection!” Cayde suddenly snapped, his voice breaking through the night. He got off the edge of the wall and paced, his hands shaking, the cannon swinging dangerously. “I needed to be there for her! And I wasn’t. All the times she was there for me. And when it mattered I wasn’t fast enough. I wasn’t strong enough. I could - I couldn’t … I couldn’t save her.”

I stepped forward and gently placed my hand on his shoulder. I wanted to repeat to him what I’d been telling him. That it wasn’t his fault. Tell him that he wasn’t faster than a bullet. That there had been no way to stop it. But I knew he didn’t need or want to hear me repeat myself. Especially since he didn’t believe it to begin with. Not yet, at least. And to say the rest … well, it just sounded trite, even to myself.

My eyes, though, they seemed to be conveying what any hollow words I could conjure in that moment couldn’t. He stood rigid under my touch but when his own eyes locked with mine, I knew he saw it.

Maybe even believed it a little this time.

In that moment, his body sagged, the weight of his grief too heavy for him to carry anymore. The cannon dropped to the ground, clattering against the stone as he turned toward me. His face, usually hidden behind all the corny jokes and bravado, crumpled with raw, unfiltered anguish. “I don’t know what to do,” he whispered sounding so lost, his voice barely audible. “I don’t know how to …” The sentence trailed off as the plate above his chin trembled.

“I’m here,” I said as I pulled him into an embrace, feeling the tremors building as he shook against me. “It’s okay,” I whispered. “Let it out.”

Cayde’s arms slowly circled around me, hesitant at first, as if he wasn’t sure he deserved the comfort. But then, as if something inside him broke free, he tightened his grip, holding on as though I were his last anchor in a storm that had been threatening to consume him. His body shook, his breath catching in his throat. He didn’t speak, didn’t move—just held on.

The walls he had so carefully constructed around himself, the ones built from humor and deflection, had finally fully crumbled, leaving him vulnerable in a way I’d never seen before, not even back on Enceladus. And in that vulnerability, he seemed to have found a different kind of strength. The strength to grieve. The strength to be human again, even if just for a moment.

I rested my chin on his shoulder, holding him close, rocking him gently from side to side as his silent tears soaked into my jacket. I could feel the warmth of his breath against my neck, uneven and strained, each exhale an effort to contain the flood of unchecked emotions he’d kept bottled up since Sundance’s death. He was breaking in my arms … but sometimes, you needed to break before you could heal.

We stood like that for what felt like hours, the soft breeze from the city below carrying the distant sounds of life and normalcy up to the old Tower’s edge. But here, on this high precipice, we were removed from all of it. This was a private moment, a space where Cayde could just be ... Cayde.

Eventually, he pulled back, wiping at his eyes with the back of his hand. His face, still marked with lines of grief, held a quiet sort of resolve. He didn’t try to joke or push me away with some quip to hide behind like he usually did when he felt embarrassed.

“I’m sorry,” he muttered, his voice hoarse. “I’m supposed to be the one keeping it together, not falling apart.”

“You don’t have to apologize for being human, Cayde,” I said gently. “You’re allowed to feel this.”

He let out a bitter laugh, shaking his head. “Funny thing to say to an Exo.”

I smiled softly, straightening his hood as I tenderly brushed a stray tear from his cheek. “You know what I mean. Your body may be an Exo but you’re still human in there. It’s okay.”

He smiled a little, his gaze drifting out over the city again, his shoulders having relaxed just a bit. The tension that had been coiled so tightly within him was starting to ease, though I knew he wasn’t done grieving. Grief isn’t something that just goes away after a good cry. It’s something that stays with you, that you carry with you.

“I just ...” He hesitated, rubbing a hand over his face. “I feel like I failed her. Like I failed everyone.”

“You didn’t fail, Cayde,” I said, soothingly caressing his upper arms. “You did everything you could. No one expects you to be invincible. Not even Sundance. She knew the risks just like we all do.”

He sighed deeply. “I guess it’s just hard to let go of that. That feeling of ... being responsible. I’ve been through a lot, lost a lot, but losing her? It’s different.”

“I know,” I whispered. “But you don’t have to carry it all on your own.”

At first he didn’t respond, just stared out at the city, his face set in contemplation. Then, slowly, he nodded, as if finally accepting what I’d been saying all along.

“I’m gonna make sure they pay for this,” he said quietly, his voice taking on a harder edge now. “Uldren. The Barons, whoever else was involved ... They’re not getting away with it.”

I nodded. “We’ll take them down together. For Sundance.”

He looked over at me, something like gratitude in his eyes.

We stood in silence again, just taking in the weight of everything. There was still a long road ahead, and we both knew that facing Uldren and the Barons wouldn’t be easy. They were already dangerous but now, with the revelation of the Devourer Bullet, there was no telling what else we might be facing.

“There’s something I need to tell you,” I said.

Cayde arched an eyebrow.

❣️♠️❣️