Starlight, My Mother

The Record of Arrae Vehn, Awoken of the Reef and Guardian of the Tower. [Roleplaying and Lore in Destiny]

[starlightmymother]

Home

From the journal of Arrae Vehn, Warlock of the Vanguard and the Praxic Order:

The Taken War is all but done. Oryx is dead, as are several possible claimants to the throne. Taken activity is beginning to drop off systemwide. No sightings of Echoes have been reported in months. The Cabal, too, are depleted, as are the Hive that fought alongside the Taken. There are still scores of hundreds deep in the moon, but they have to be hurting. Even the Fallen are on the back foot, following the elimination of the last vestiges of the House of Wolves. Those that wear Wolf colors now belong to nothing but a fading spark that will soon gutter out, as it rightly should.

In short, the system is in its best shape in years. I helped make it happen. I fought in the Taken War as one of the Vanguard's many living weapons. I claimed the Arc from the observatory, and then from Pinnacle Station, and made it mine. To protest now that I am nothing special would be to surrender to delusions of impotence. If there are those more powerful, those more skilled, those closer to the Light within the Vanguard, then there are many many more that look up at me, look at my crackling robes and the storied weapons at my side and back, and think 'someday, I will be like that.'

It should all bring me a good deal more satisfaction than it does, shouldn't it?

Home. That, I think, is the greatest lack. I feel more keenly, now that matters have somwhat settled, the aching emptiness where the Corsairs used to be. Where the easy cameraderie with my copilot and friend and family could soothe the ache of constant fighting, of constant vigilance.

Twice I flew in defense of colonies in the Reef, throwing my ship and Ghost and body in the way of harm to prevent another Cybele. Twice, my fireteams and I succeeded, though not without cost. I wear the crest of the Queen's Guard on my bond with Petra's approval, and fly a Galliot almost identical to the one I lost. Yet I am not precisely Awoken, the acceptance of the Reefborn comes as distantly to me as it does to any Guardian, and I cannot help but think in the dark watches of the night that when they need me no longer, they will strip me of even that little bit of belonging. We Awoken are not known for our hospitality and tolerance of that which is Outside.

It doesn't help that the rumors of the Queen's fate continue to fly, all these months later. She is gone, some whisper, gone to the Void and never coming back. Others whisper that she has retaken her throne, but is avoiding contact with the Vanguard to avoid awkward questions. Still others speculate that the power of Oryx, the power of the Deep, was unclaimed after his defeat and final death. Who better to take it than the Queen?

Some even whisper she already has. I offer them a spinfoil hat with a sardonic grin, but in my heart I wonder if they haven't touched a seed of truth.

Is my home the Tower? No. No, not yet. That is more my fault than anyone's, for still I crave the home I knew, and perhaps have not put enough effort into cultivating the home I was given. I stay professional with other Guardians – I let them know there is a person behind the helmet, that I care, and then I shut up and turn my full focus to the mission. The Arc consumes me, the need to purge the Darkness overwhelms me, and I fight as I have grown accustomed to doing. And in the down times, the quiet times, I return to my room and rest and read terrible fiction and eat food I should not, doing little of value except isolating myself from my peers.

Nominally, I cleave to the Praxic Order of Warlocks. Ikora Rey made it clear that a loose Stormcaller would cause the Vanguard some small amount of worry, and the Praxics have a very simple and practical approach to thaumaturgy that appealed to me. Yet there is a culture with them, a history, celebrated names like Nymarch and Julen and Erianna, and a host of those who fix their big, worshipful eyes on the prize of the Cormorant seal, and I find myself an ill fit for them. I can work with them, but I am not one of them.

I have achieved the success that many point to as the end goal of a Guardian; powerful, respected, owner of a fast ship and a fast Sparrow and a host of guns, each with a name and personality. Yet it still feels hollow, and I don't know what to change.

A new season turns now, a new time in the Tower. Perhaps it is best that I put my dreams of the Reef to bed. Perhaps it is best that I accept I am no longer one of them, shed the violet, and shed the crown. But even the thought of it nauseates me, fills me with ill tingles. I am afraid, I realize – afraid to lose the few anchors to my past life than I still have. And I wonder if it is a bad fear, keeping me from a home I can cherish, or a good fear that warns me what sentiments are wise to keep.

I suppose time will tell.

[starlightmymother]

I’m Awake, and I’m Alive

( Hi there, folks. I am tremendously, super, exceptionally sorry that I left for such a long time without so much as a by-your-leave -- got really burned out on the writing front, then lost enthusiasm in Destiny. April update, though, has rekindled both, and I promise I won’t be leaving again without at least a sappy note!

Going to be a bit looking around the community, seeing what’s become of the neighborhood, but I’m hoping to have some IC journaling up soon detailing what happened with Arrhae after the Pinnacle incident and during the Taken War, to bring her up to plot-able status. )

[starlightmymother]

( Hi, folks. Please give me just a bit longer to deal with replies; this time of year hits me hard, and I’ve let some other responsibilities back up. I’m here and I haven’t forgotten you, promise! )

[starlightmymother]

( Replies coming soon, but I just choked down a big block of grind to get Iron Banner to 5, and now there’s a Fallen / Eliksni OC in my head scrabbling and demanding a proper game proxy and a sideblog.

Aaaaaahhhhh.

I could do all this so much more easily if I didn’t have this annoying work thing taking up 40-50 hours of every week. )

[starlightmymother]

👌{{This is going to be A+ hilarity right here}}

Arrae had just finished negotiating the delivery of a mass lot of engrams – Rahool had been in a generous mood, so she was stepping away with several of those odd coins Xur would cradle and talk to when no one was looking as well as a small stash of parts for her old Suros. Damn cranky thing was always in need of maintenance…

And in a reflective piece of metal she caught a glimpse of a certain Hunter, her hood down for once, and the angle of her eyes offering little doubt as to where she’d been looking.

Calmly, Arrae backpedaled a few steps, tucking the coins in a belt pouch, until she was right next to the vault and next to the figure the metal had given away. “I know I’m lovely,” she murmured just loud enough to be a whisper, a sly grin teasing her lips. “And I know my robes are stunning. You’d best be careful. I doubt he’d mind – he’d probably be far more amused than irritated – but your brethren might, to see you looking so enviously at how my robes hug my backside.”

She leaned close, playing up the conspiracy in her body language. “It’s not too late, Io! Forsake the cloak, and turn to the robe side! It’s so cuddly…”

[rpsandstarters]

Send 👌 for my muses' reaction to yours checking them out

[starlightmymother]

( Okay, I normally don’t reblog ask memes, but this one looks hilarious. I could use some hilarity to break up Iron Banner. )

[starlightmymother]

Pinnacle, Part Three

“It is no accident that modern warlocks struggle and toil with the Arc when it finds a natural home in the fist of the Striker and the blade of the Dancer. For Solar Light loves to be grasped and accumulated, slammed and packed into the body of the user until there is room for nothing else, not even death. It answers to rage, to a controlling hand. And Void Light loves to be purged, to be pushed away until the wielder's body is an empty shell and all of it is outside, creating a hollow to be filled – by resilience, by stolen life, by the vigor of one whose body has no room for death. It loves the cold detachment, the clinical eye of one with no use for passion. But the Arc loves neither of these things, for its use lies not in the giving, or the taking, but the transfer. The balance of charges.

It's so natural to the sleeping mind, so easily done by those who let the Arc guide them, but so difficult for those who seek to grasp it like they would the stuff of a Nova Bomb or Solar Grenade. The Striker lets go conscious thought, and finds a home between rage and serenity in the moment, suspended in air, when he becomes one with the Arc. The Dancer lets go conscious thought, and finds a home between rage and serenity in the moment, one with the blade and the Arc. But we Warlocks, aha. We hate to relinquish control. We hate to enter that flow-state where we are no longer quite in control of ourselves, and there we will fail over and over. Until we learn that the lightning cannot be grasped, but must be channeled.”

- Toland, “Arcana III: Arc Light”

–

The fall through the storm had taken five minutes. The strike of lightning took fifty microseconds.

There was no conscious thought, in fifty microseconds. Neurons had barely begun to connect and fire. But there was room for a choice in the Light, a choice whether to grasp the lightning, to ward it off, or to let it be.

Whatever part of Arrae could react in fifty microseconds of a hundred million potential electron-volts... chose not to react. She did not resist. She did not grasp. She was part of the platform, a part of a completed circuit, something that had to be, needed to be.

Was she any greater than the metal plating, the scattered molecules of nitrogen and oxygen and ozone, the droplets of water between which the bolt snaked? No. For that moment, she was not. She was a conduit for something greater, and nothing in and of herself.

An afterimage, pink when she stared and green when she blinked, consumed a good half of Arrae's vision. Slowly she pushed herself upright. Her whole body tingled. Nothing in her helmet showed information; every display was dead. She wasn't, though. She felt more alive than she had in a very long time.

“Lambent?” she quietly whispered into the rain.

The Ghost materialized a few feet away, optic focused on Arrae. [You're alive. I... don't even really want to ask, do I? Warlock stuff?]

Slowly, Arrae pressed her hands against the side of her helm. A soft hiss reached her ears as it separated from the collar of her robes. She turned her face up into the rain and grinned. The forks of electricity and arc above were no longer frightening but comforting. They wouldn't hurt her. All she had to do was pass them through to where they were going anyhow.

[Uhh, Arrae? That's a crazy grin. I'm a bit worried. You're not doing a Toland on me, are you?]

“Heh! No... no obsession, Lambent. I'm fine; I'm alive. Just... aware now. Aware of something very important.” Slowly her smile faded, and she looked down at her helmet. “Are my electronics dead, by the way?”

[Oh – yeah. One moment...] Lambent's scanner beam played over her. [Yeah. Everything that worked through electron transfer... that's your helmet HUD, your comm, your weapons... fried. I can fix it, given time, but I'm not sure we have it.]

At the last statement, Arrae frowned and pulled her Dynasty clear of her belt. The casing was untouched, washed clean by the rain, but the counter was dead, the sight dark, and when she pulled the trigger it gave a sad, unsatisfying click.

[So if there's danger in that outpost, you're going to have to face it without any weapons. Just... the Light, which is giving off some very odd readings. The Arc has grown stronger in you – exponentially stronger.]

At that, Arrae chuckled again, though she tried her best to keep it less deranged for Lambent's benefit. “It's as strong as it always was, Lambent. I just didn't know what to do with it. Now I do. It's so simple – it's something I spoke a time or two, but I didn't know how to do it until just now. The Storm taught me.”

[… whu-?]

She stepped forward through the rain. Already it had soaked through her hair, matted it to her scalp, drenched her skin, but she cared nothing for that. Her gloved hand reached out for the dead controls of the door nearest the platform where she'd landed, and for fifty microseconds she let go.

A crackle and blinding jolt traveled between her index finger and the controls. Light came, where darkness had been moments before, and the display lit up. Slowly the door hissed open.

Lambent's rear nodes whirled as she turned between Arrae and the door. [You're not taking my job away, are you?]

Arrae laughed. “Until you can hold a gun, your position as door-opener-in-chief is safe as can be, Lambent. Now, come on. I know what I have to do now.”

The robed Awoken stepped through the doorway, out of the rain, though the Storm came with her. Lambent took a moment to squint suspiciously up at the sky before a near strike convinced her to follow Arrae inside. Thunder rolled behind them.

[theawokenqueen-archive]

Ronja leaned against the railing, elbows resting on the narrow strip of metal, and perching her chin on top of her intertwined fingers as she listened to Arrae’s story. She made a few comments and sounds of interest as the older Awoken spoke, but otherwise stayed quiet to keep from interrupting her.

“Sounds like it’s straight out of an action movie, or something. Even got the mysterious man in there, and the sneaky plot. But I guess the whole Guardian thing is kinda action movie-esque.” To her it was, anyway. Heroes being raised from the dead to fight for some higher cause; it surprised her that she had never actually seen a movie like that, even in all the times she and Mira had stayed up to watch the ones her parents told them they were too young for.

She raised a brow at Arrae then. “What? Havin’ to deal with people wanting me outta the way?” She actually did pause and think about that for a moment; did she ever actually have to deal with it, and just never took notice? She had been raised by a Corsair and a Crow, so it was entirely possible they had gotten her safely out of the way before anything happened. But her response was to simply shrug.

“Not yet. I’ve only really been in the court for a few months now; Mum handed me off to Mira’s two mothers to raise me until I turned thirteen. I guess that was to keep that from ever happening until I was older and less vulnerable.” She shoved away from the railing so that she was leaning against it with just one hand holding her weight up. “I have to deal with the noble kids, though. Worse thing they do is try to make me look foolish in front of the adults, but it could get bad as we get older, I suppose.” 

She shrugged again. “I usually just tell them to go fuck themselves, or threaten them with tellin’ my Mum on them. But I don’t think things like that would work if the person was actively tryna kill you, would it?”

[starlightmymother]

“It might, actually.” Arrae’s eyes dimmed a little as she stared out at the shifting jumpships; one entering damage from a flight, two more awaiting clearance to take off. “The universe is full of cowards, full of those who will lash out in fear. If there was a conspirator on the Reef, they struck at me because they feared what I represented. Feared what closer ties between the Tower and the Reef might mean.”

She paused, then offered a small smile aside to Ronja. “I hope you don’t think I’m pressing a political agenda here, by the way. It’s not the time, and you’re... not the person calling those shots. But -- I really hope, I truly do, that someday the Reef and the Tower will be close enough that I’ll no longer have to choose. That I can serve both of them. It’s a stupid, foolish, naiive hope... but it remains. I just wish circumstances weren’t forcing us towards it so -- unhappily.”

Arrae realized that she was skirting very close to some uncomfortable and painful ground. Time for a happy thought. Hope. Hrrhn. She scrabbled in her mind.

“Ronja... let me ask you this. When you picture a bright and successful future, what do you see? For the system, for yourself? Is the shape of success the continuation of things as they’ve been? Or do you hope for something else?”

[acomedicdreg-deactivated2016022]

Roleplay with Starlightmymother

@starlightmymother

“No. Bring your bond. You need to show your with the vanguard. And you’ll need the light. Anything glowing down here is a blessing. If you don’t mind attracting bugs. But we do have some…interesting creatures we live amongst. We also domesticated two of them.” Heksis said looking down in into the hangar for a moment with his back turned to her. He always took those times to take it all in. He built this massive place. He built this…hideout…no…not hideout… Sanctuary! A place where all houses could meet and coexist. This was the future Heksis wanted for his species. And he happily give his own existence if that meant his species wouldn’t be the honor less pirates they were now.

“Now…I understand you might feels doubtful…being led into a town you have never been too without any self protection… Well…believe me. No one has ever been mugged when I’m in the area. Even the criminals have respect for me in a way…whether that’s a good or bad thing is up to you…” Heksis said as he picked up his hand cannons that were in the box behind his seat, and then holstered them.

Then Heksis got got something that simply looked lethal. He pulled a small shock dagger with a thick blade from the box. It looked completely normal, she had seen plenty of shock daggers and ended hundreds of their wielders. But this one was different. “Like this one? You’ll get one if you can convince the elders to let you do some favors for them. Their standard issue for every House Market Guard.” Heksis held the blade out in his hand pointing up the left and stepping to the right so there was space. “Looks normal…” Heksis said before he pressed a button on the handle of the dagger and the tip of it slide out, extending into a longer more swordlike blade. Then he pressed another button on the handle. And the sword turned blue with arc energy. “Isn’t normal…pretty handy for fights. That and the fact that it can fire its electricity out for a short time.” Heksis said clearly sounding proud of the weapon being used only by his house.

When she went to get dressed Heksis instinctively looked to the floor, waiting for her to finish doing so. He then felt the clothing he had offered being snatched from his open hand and then she started to put that on. He looked up just as she finished and immediately regretted it, seeing some of her uncovered parts for a few seconds. He just tangled his mandibles up nervously, looking up at the roof of his ship trying to look like an innocent angel…

He didn’t listen when she ordered her ghost to disarm her “surprises” and his ghost filled in for him. “Whoa…” The Vanguard shell said, staring down at all that ordinance…

[starlightmymother]

“Don’t worry,” Lambent chirped. “They’re all disarmed, and most are small-yield. I used to carry at least as many when I was scouting; it’s a tough system for a Ghost that’s truly unarmed. Took up the habit again after Arrae found herself almost out of ammo in a tight spot in the Cosmodrome. Figured that explosives beat empty hands any day.”

As she finished dressing, Arrae nodded and snapped her bond back into place. It felt... much better, now, and as long as the Light was with her she had little need to fear criminals, whatever their opinion or odd respect for Heksis. Then again, Arrae knew that calling on the Light was a terrible idea except in extremis. The City’s population reacted with terror more than wonder to most Guardians’ gifts, and Arrae expected these citizens of House Market to be at least as skittish.

The bond threw off a soft, violet light as it resynchronized to her, and she nodded to Heksis. “All right. I’m ready... or as ready as I can reasonably get. Lead the way.”

As she moved to fall in behind Heksis, she spared his odd arc-blade a look that she couldn’t quite admit to herself was envy. It was a nice piece... even though bladed weapons were an anachronism in the arsenal of Guardians, she had a keen appreciation for craft. It made Heksis story about their foundries and ties to Omolon that much more believable, at least.

[starlightmymother]

( About to go to sleep, further replies tomorrow, but it makes me sad that anon asks harping on people for shipping things are even happening. I’m not going to reblog the affected posts because I don’t think the original posters deserve even that much additional attention, and any similar asks I get will fall into the grey void of never acknowledged, to be eaten by the Ask Gorgons.

No one ever has to justify anything about their shipping to anyone OOCly. As for ICly? That’s delicious conflict that could be fun to write.

That is all. )

[starlightmymother]

Pinnacle, Part Two

Known as the "Beacon of Maracaibo," the Catatumbo lightning has guided sailors for centuries. It can sometimes be seen on the horizon from as far away as the Lesser Antilles, more than 200 miles distant. In his 1597 poem "The Dragontea," which tells the story of Sir Francis Drake's last expedition, Spanish poet Lope de Vega tells how the lightning—"flames, which the wings of night cover"—illuminated the silhouettes of the English privateer's ships, tipping off the garrison at Maracaibo to his surprise attack. During the last major naval skirmish of the Venezuelan war of independence in 1823, the lightning was said to have helped steer the ships of Adm. José Prudencio Padilla to victory over the Spanish fleet. The storm is so central to the region's identity that the state of Zulia put a large lightning bolt in the middle of its flag.

- Joshua Foer, “An Everlasting Lightning Storm”, Ancient Periodical Archive XXVII: SLATE (http://www.slate.com/articles/life/world_of_wonders/2011/02/an_everlasting_lightning_storm.html)

–

Primal fear clutched at Arrae's gut for a moment as she spread her arms and legs. She was not supposed to be falling, yammered a hundred thousand years of instinct. For someone born and bred in space, this was a world away from the controlled drift through zero-gee.

She distracted herself with numbers until the fear should pass. It'd take her between ten and twelve seconds to reach terminal velocity, which even with her limbs spread would send her hurtling towards the ground at a hundred and fifty miles an hour. The whole fall would take something like five minutes. So she began counting heartbeats, consciously trying to slow them, and looked down at the world.

Ten.

Once, this area of the South American Waste would have been lit by cities more than thunderstorms, dark only around and in the Old Amazon. Now, only scattered points of light from encamped Devils joined the strokes of lightning in illuminating the spread of the landscape below.

Soon the sun would finish setting and the brilliant reds of the western sky would fade into darkness as well. The storm would truly be the only source of light where she was going, though not the only source of Light. It would contend with hers.

Twenty.

She was at terminal velocity right now. Acceleration no longer tugged at her stomach and she could enjoy the drift. Wind battered at her underside hard enough to nudge the strength bar of her fieldweave from time to time, but it did not endanger her.

What might endanger her was the storm into which she fell. As she drew closer, the dozens of smaller strikes she'd missed earlier began to resolve themselves, a crackling web of electric discharges infused with the Arc. Thunder rolled in an almost continuous boom, audible even in the rarified air at fifty thousand feet. In the cloud itself the displacements would be far more violent, and the winds...

The anvil of the stormclouds below her loomed closer. They reached up past thirty thousand feet at the very least. She'd be in the heart of the storm soon.

One hundred.

That was her first minute. Apprehension began to build again. Sweat slicked her palms under her gloves. She blew out into her helmet, slowly inhaled, distracted herself by reviewing what she knew about Pinnacle Station.

During humanity's Golden Age, the Ishtar Collective had established research sites in many places, warring in a friendly academic manner with the more application-oriented Clovis Bray to claim new scientific and technological discoveries. It was during the Golden Age that the Three-Light Thesis was first formulated and proven, that the early precursors of Warlocks had done their research into how the fundamental forces wielded by the Traveler might be put to use by clever machines. One of the Collective's research projects was focused on the documentation and exploitation of the greater truth behind electromagnetism, a phenomenon that went by several names before the standard of 'Arc Light'. At the mouth of Lake Maracaibo, at the site of the most persistent and powerful lightning storm on Earth, the Collective had forged a great pillar to hold their station in the middle of the water. A huge grounded spire towered towards the heavens, an out-thrust middle finger at secrets of the universe that would not reveal themselves.

And for that defiance, those secrets finally began to whisper themselves into the ears of the Collective's scientists, one trial at a time. Decades after its construction, Pinnacle Station housed the first and most powerful of humanity's Arc Reactors, giant machines designed to create perpetual energy flow. On the back of the Arc and its cousins, humanity had demolished the laws of thermodynamics and expanded science into realms once considered mystical.

And then the Collapse. Whatever had happened at Pinnacle Station, its reactor now surged out of control, no longer taking power from the storm but feeding it. Those clouds were not natural stormclouds, but manifestations of the raw, uncontrolled Arc. Like the similar storms bred by Clovis Bray's own nanomachines and perpetual reactors on Mars, it would never die down. Four Guardians of the Vanguard had attempted to reclaim the facility. All four had plunged into the storm in their gleaming craft, and none of the four had ever been heard from again.

Of course, none of them had been crazy enough to abandon their vessels – flying lightning-rods – and free fall into the storm. One had approached by ground after earlier failures, but it had found him no success.

Two hundred fifty. Any time, now, the--

Wind currents seized Arrae in their grip and hurled her bodily. She cried out uselessly into her helmet, felt her vision darknen from acceleration, then felt the blood flow back the other way as the wind tossed her to and fro.

Status indicators in her helmet blinked red. [BLACKOUT WARNING] [OVER-G] [STANDBY GHOST]

Lightning struck so close she felt the surge through her fieldweave. And then came the rain, droplets of water falling around her, slamming into her, thrown by the same winds. She was fully within the cloud now, her universe one of darkness and lightning and water blown by the wind. The lack of up and down seized her hard, bludgeoning her with vertigo worse than she'd ever experienced in space.

Blackness and pressure beckoned again. Silver spots danced in her vision.

[That's more than halfway!] Lambent's voice was a sudden reminder that she was she, that she was a person, that she was Arrae. [Stay with me, damn you! Stay with me!]

“Lambent...” She sucked in a breath as a wash of water slammed into her helmet, obscuring the lightning-struck view. “Can you... get me an... altimeter?” Stupid of her, not to ask before now. Stupid, stupid.

The Ghost flashed numbers on the side of her display, just above her grenade, scrolling down with dizzying speed. 13,455. 12,823. 12,098. And then she felt the wind seize her again; the descent slowed, and the numbers gained. Raindrops around her began to freeze, and raindrops tossed two or three or a dozen times now lingered among those freshly condensed.

[Hail!] Lambent warned. [Brace yourself!]

Tiny daggers of ice, a score at a time, battered her chest and back and legs all at once. The rattle of them on her helmet deafened out all other sound. And then she was falling again. Someone was screaming, she realzied, and then further realized it was her.

Her fieldweave indicator flashed red and pressure turned into pain. Her defenses were breached, her vulnerable flesh now open to the battering and bruising of the icy tormentors. For a fleeting moment between the cries torn involuntarily from her throat, Arrae wished for an end to it, any end.

She felt the storm shift around her. Something changed. She plummeted, released from the grasp of the wind. Hail no longer fell around her.

What had happened? Had the storm sensed her presence, sensed the Light leaking from her battered body?

Arrae could only speculate, but found a moment's silence and respite as the fieldweave indicator filled again, showing full protection. The pain stopped, now only a distantly-remembered ache. And she found herself drifting again. Though the storm raged around her and she had no idea which direction was down, she fell towards it without complaint.

[Guardian. … Guardian! Arrae! We're low! Get ready to land!]

She blinked out of her trance, realized that almost a minute had passed and the altimeter had scrolled past four digits to three. “Copy,” she rasped into the helmet. Her throat was sore. Why was it sore? Why had she been screaming? It was all so obvious now, even though she could put words to none of it.

566. 432. 298.

[Arrae!]

136.

A spire flashed past her, so brilliant in the gloom that it seared her retinas even through the protection of the helmet. Its vast surface writhed with the current of hundreds of arcbolts, spawned them into the sky. The darkened facility flashed past her in a heartbeat.

And as she had learned to do from her first days alive again, Arrae extended her will through the soles of her boots and glided. The momentum of free fall bled off instantly without the organ-shattering wrench of deceleration and she lightly touched down on a darkened metal platform.

A smile cracked her lips under her helmet before her legs gave way, sending her sprawling to the surface in a heap. They wouldn't answer her commands. Her arms lay slack, and her head lolled back. She stared up at the storm as rain pelted her prone body, entranced by what it represented.

The great spire crackled once, and lightning struck her in the chest.

[starlightmymother]

Pinnacle, Part One

“It was only with the advent of the Traveler's wisdom that we learned arc was greater than mere electricity, greater than the equaling of charges. There was a universal truth behind it, a truth that hinted at the edges of Light and Darkness. Scientists set to understanding it with a will, but their research was slow and yielded disappointing failures while arc's bright and dark cousins spilled their inner workings more easily. Why, then, did the ancestral orders and shamanistic worshippers of the Traveler find so much more success? Why did Hive Wizards and Cabal Psions alike choose to wield Arc, and why do they still? Why did it find shape so easily in their hands and ours? Those who dismissed mysticism only began to learn the truth when they listened to the old tales, and built their great spire under the stormclouds of Catatumbo.”

- Toland the Shattered, “Arcana III: Arc Light”

Arrae stood on the prow of her vessel and stared down into the heart of the storm. Even from sixty thousand feet above the surface of Lake Maracaibo, it was an imposing sight. Flashes strobed across towering thunderheads that reached almost up to her location. Great arcs sang across the sky, bringing together poles miles and miles apart.

Vertigo almost took her; she reeled backwards in reaction, a foot dropping back to steady her.

[You don't have to do this,] Lambent murmured into her mind. Even in the slightly deranged, slightly damaged ghost's voice, concern lurked. [Arrae, you know how dangerous this is. Even if there isn't a single Fallen there, even if the Ishtar equipment hasn't disgorged a single Vex, that storm has shut down every Vanguard vessel that's ever tried to scout the storm. We haven't gotten back one scout. Even Ikora says that Mars is safer. Mars, for crying out loud!]

“You're right, Lambent.” Her words fogged the inside of her helmet ever so slightly until the visor minutely compensated. “I don't have to do this. This... is a choice. Just like remaining a Guardian was a choice. I made that one – the one to stay with you – because I wanted to do some good. To make the system safer for their people and mine.”

She stared down at her gloved hands, flexed them. “And I can't do that if I'm inhibited. If the Arc I took into myself on the observatory remains hungry and unfed. You know how hard I've been driving to master the Void, but it won't answer to me. Not like it should.”

The Ghost projected the impression of a sigh. [I just wanted it said.]

“And you don't have to go through with this.” She eyed the four-pronged indicator in the upper right of her helmet, the visual cue that Lambent's physical shell was dispersed through her Light. “Ghosts are more valuable than Guardians. You could leave. You could find another.”

Lambent barked a harsh laugh into Arrae's consciousness. [You wouldn't offer that to me if you knew – if you really knew – the gentle hell that is being unbound. We were programmed, crafted, forged on the Traveler's dying breath to find our partners. Without them we are programmed to be empty, unfulfilled. It's not a thing we can escape.] She paused. Arrae's heart beat loudly in her ears twice. [And... I believe in you. I came to you after all those years for a reason. I have to believe that the Traveler knew what it was doing. You may be crazy, but you're my crazy, and I'm with you to the end.]

Arrae gathered her nerve and stepped to the edge of the prow.

“You've uploaded your pilot package to the ship?”

[If we can calm the storm it will find us without a problem,] Lambent assured her.

She nodded.

“Well then... let's do this.”

And before she could change her mind, Arrae stepped off the edge.

[starlightmymother]

Danger Close

[lightsofio-blog]

Io moved when Arrae did, creeping along the back wall and rounding behind the Wizard. It took everything in her not to lunge into battle besides the Warlock, to protect her new friend from harm and see her safely out of the situation. But now was not the time for that, and she had to trust in her own ability to still the Wizard so Arrae could kill it. 

Her back tucked against the incline and she watched the Void vortex swirl about, capturing several Hive in its wake. It was the last thing she could watch, needing to ascend the incline of the back wall and make herself ready. Her first two movements were fine, feet grabbing the dingy wall well enough and her hands finding small but stable purchase. She still wasn’t high enough, though, and Io took her blade and lodged it into the cavern wall. She used it to climb, and once she was up she rested one foot on it and one on the back wall. Arrae was fleeing a cloud of noxious looking smoke, and she seemed to be struggling. But she’d pulled the Wizard’s attention to her, and now Io had to make it worth something. 

She wouldn’t fail Arrae.

Resolve set, Io forced all of her weight away from the wall and leaped toward the Wizard. She was airborne for only a few moments before she collided into the back of the Wizard, arms wrapping tightly around it. It was slick, though, magic and dampness making it hard to hold. It began to shreik, moving back and forth in an attempt to free itself.

Her grasp gave, and Io fell to the cave floor, her landing resounding with a loud echo.

Luck was on the Guardians side. Io had fallen straight into a pool of leftover light from Arrae’s Nova Bomb, and she intended to use it. Her arms were moving and she cried out, forming the Void bow in her hands and drawing back. She leased the arrow and it flew directly upward, splitting the Wizard in two and leaving a balled anchor midair. It tethered a few nearby acolytes, and once they were destroyed, Io managed to stand. 

“It worked, Arrae! Are you okay?” She made her way to the Warlocks side, placing a hand on her cheek and checking her over. She’d sustained injuries, but she seemed alright. “We did it!” 

Io was grinning, but it faded quickly when her eyes found the Tomb Husk. Everything fell together, and her gaze fell back on Arrae. “And I don’t think this was coincidence.”

[starlightmymother]

It took two tries for Arrae to successfully release the empty magazine from her autorifle, its last few bullets spent putting down the acolytes that Io’s anchor had tethered. Her vision wavered, and she stalled for a moment to breathe in and out. Pain coursed through her scorched flesh where the shredders had found their mark.

But even as she gathered breath to answer she felt weight lift from her shoulders and chest. The pall of Darkness began to lift, slightly, ever so slightly. She straightened. Once more the Light mended her hurts; only the memory of pain remained to mark where they had been.

“I’m fine, thanks to you. That was an ... inspired shot,” she offered to Io. The touch on her cheek was a welcome reminder of life and warmth, and she rested a hand on the Hunter’s shoulder in turn, took a moment to just appreciate the simple joy of the two of them still being alive.

The high didn’t last for long, though, as her gaze followed Io’s to the tomb husk. Even as Arrae watched, the last of the strange energy wisps died away, leaving the orb to pulse a steady, sickly green as though its corrupted energies ebbed and flowed with the beating of a distant heart.

“No, it... certainly wasn’t,” she agreed as she stepped away and picked her way across the floor towards the corrupted thing. “Lambent, secure the orb for transport. We need to get this to the Vanguard, to Ikora, so she can determine what ritual the Hive used to summon these things. What they are... what we can do against them.”

“Acknowledged.” The Ghost floated over. Its nodes shivered for a moment, moving out of harmony. “Ugh. If I had nerves they’d be crawling. Maximum energy to containment.”

“If you sense anything amiss, jettison the engram and scorch the data,” she advised Lambent, feeling a bit of dread creep into her own stomach at the thought of what had gone into the creation of the orb. “No matter how important, no data is worth you.”

“I’ll turn that line back on you when you do something stupid, Guardian. Just saying...” A moment later the orb vanished in a swirl of Light, and Lambent bobbed. “Got it. Engram is stable. And in better news, I’m getting signals from the surface. We’re not far...”

***

It was less than five minutes’ walk through another smaller chamber, up a winding passage, and through the dessicated bulk of a Hive seeder landed months ago. Arrae smiled softly as the first sunlight in hours touched her cheeks.

There was less to smile about when she fully emerged, however. Though there was remarkably little threatening nearby and the motion tracker showed clear, the sky over the Cosmodrome to the south danced and crackled with barely contained Darkness. Orbs of shadowstuff hung like blimps above the horizon, sacs of corruption. Even as Arrae watched one discharged an arc of fell light and flitting shapes carved from darkness tumbled free towards the ground below.

“Void’s mercy,” she breathed. “The Cosmodrome’s overrun. Lambent... is the City safe?”

“Establishing contact... yes. No reports of contact from the Wall patrol zones,” Lambent broacast for the pair of them. “But the Cosmodrome is red-flagged as an unknown threat location. I’m reading three high-priority ops and at least two Titan orders with general mobilization orders to try to contain the situation.”

Arrae pressed her lips together and glanced aside to Io. “Extraction may be ... difficult then. I don’t know about your ship, but there’s no way mine can make it through all that unaided. We’re... going to have to wait for reinforcements. Find somewhere safe.”

If anywhere safe remains, she soundlessly added, and glanced back towards the south.

Her gut told her that this was bigger than any ritual. Bigger than a potential Hive invasion. Something dire had happened. Something had changed the face of the system.

[ir-halak-archive]

can we talk about how Oryx is basically the worst naval strategist ever

sure, he wins the Battle of Saturn, but in the the process he

obliterates his own fleet due to friendly fire

reveals his most powerful weapon and trump card to everyone in the system

doesn’t even attempt to defeat the Awoken forces by conventional means

destroys an enormous amount of natural resources he could have used to rebuild his forces

cripples his naval capability so badly that he has to totally cancel his assault on Earth and just hang out in Saturn’s rings until we come to him

and last but not least, somehow allows a Skyburners capital ship to ram itself directly into the side of his Dreadnaught and deliver an entire legion of Cabal soldiers

he probably spent the aftermath of that battle on his Space Phone calling Xivu Arath like “Hey yeah, I blew up my own military. Yeah. Would you mind coming to help me out? You’re busy? I’ll just call Savathun. She’s busy too? Fuck.”

[starlightmymother]

( Hey, I’m convinced that Mara Sov’s plan was to force him into making some of these bad choices. And while there was a bit of engagement with the Awoken flotilla and the other elements of his fleet, they were getting wrecked pretty hard -- especially when the Harbingers came in.

Still, yeah, Oryx. Too used to the aid of your sisters. Too used to being able to roll over the top of things. Good job snatching stalemate from the jaws of victory.

Also, I still think there’s a chance Savathun is the Awoken patron, or somehow associated. In which case she’d have known and been able to communicate exactly how to ruin his day and make him sad. )

[theawokenqueen-archive]

Ronja had to bring a hand up to shield her eyes from the sunlight. Even after spending over a week on the Tower, she still wasn’t used to the whole bright sunlight thing; in the Reef, the light was always filtered in through the Reef’s dust clouds, and wrecks, and was never this bright. It didn’t help that she had spent the last few days completely indoors.

“Really weird,” she replied. “I don’t think I’ll ever be used to it. I’m hoping I won’t be here long enough to get to that point, anyway … No offence meant to your home.” She just really didn’t like how different it was; it had definitely been one hell of a culture shock for both her and Mira when they had arrived. “But yeah, definitely all of that is really odd. Even the air feels weird. Did you notice that too, when you first got here? I don’t know if it’s because the Reef’s air is so filtered, but Earth air kinda makes my throat feel itchy.”

Her eyes wandered across the vast hangar bay as the narrow path yawned into the docking area for the Tower’s many ships. Even as she watched, a ship soared into the hanger and set down on one of the platforms as gracefully as a bird, and then disappeared as the platform dropped below to make room for the next ship to come in.

“And I feel like everyone’s always lookin’ at me,” she continued. “I mean, I get that in the Reef too now, and it’s weird there, but at least people are nice enough to try and be subtle about it. Everyone just wants a glance at the Crown Princess, I guess.” Her tone suggested that the attention wasn’t all that welcome. “But here? I dunno. Maybe I’m just being paranoid, but it feels like the stares I get here aren’t all that friendly. I mean, I know my Mum isn’t––wasn’t liked by everyone, but I’m not her, y’know?”

Her thoughts were pulled to the Arrae’s ship a moment later, however, and she let her eyes wander across it. “Weird lookin’ thing. But I guess it works if, like, the majority of Guardians use ships like that.” The two winged design was so foreign to her as a Reef-born Awoken. “Stranded in lunar orbit? That sounds scary; did the ship just give out on you, or something?”

[starlightmymother]

“Actually...” Arrae hesitated. Here, she tread on a new kind of unfamiliar ground. Should she tell this daughter of the Queen her suspicions? How would Ronja react to such accusations without proof? What political factions would be courting her, and which ones would she support?

She sighed, and looked out over the ship. A bad habit of hers, overanalyzing. Right now, the princess needed a friend, not a political advisor or another person courting favor. Right now, the story as it happened was the best balm for hurts.

So Arrae related the tale of how she’d been napping in her bunk when her ship’s NLS drive overloaded, how she and Lambent nursed the vessel to lunar orbit, the intercept of strange fighters and the signal’s demand that she dock. She offered up the lightest of smirks as she described the Mercenary’s mysterious nature, his handsomeness. This was a familiar trope in Awoken tales she remembered: the Black Knight, the male who held strange power. Uldren most often played the role at court.

Or used to.

They had lost far too much.

“... so in the end,” she concluded, “that was that, the repairs were finished and I was on my way. But the mechanic and I both concluded that the drive failure was far too believable an accident. That if someone wanted to discreetly sabotage the ship, they’d arrange for what happened to me, almost exactly.”

Arrae offered up a chuckle. “Maybe I just have a penchant for drama, or see plots where there are none. But I know there were some people back in the Reef who would’ve preferred it if I wandered off into the Void and got conveniently lost away from prying eyes. It’s... a new thing for me, that kind of subtle paranoia. I really don’t like it.”

She tapped her fingers on the rail.

“You must have to deal with that sort of thing quite a bit, even indirectly. How do you manage it? Any... heh, any tips and tricks to share?”

[acomedicdreg-deactivated2016022]

“I’m….sorry if I offended you…” Heksis said as he got up from his seat.

“But…since your here… These are the rules…they don’t apply to the guard however. No armor…this is meant to help guards when fighting criminals. Next one. No weapons. I know your probably going to want to keep your weapons but as you said…mission first. Next one. All clothing you bring here is to be left on the ship. The hangar watch will give you a set of clothing for free every week. As long as you pay taxes. But since your not an official citizen…” Heksis reached down onto the floor and opened up a small compartment in the floor in front of his chair. He pulled out a large web tunic. Web. Spider web. How they could use it for clothing was anyone’s guess. But the eliksni here were creative. And more importantly. Inventive.

[starlightmymother]

“Including my bond too, I assume.” Arrae pressed her lips together. She was going to be entering this place awfully unarmed and exposed. But lacking a bond wouldn’t completely kill her ability to touch the Light... just make it harder. As long as Heksis was telling the truth and the populace was unarmed, she was confident she wouldn’t be in any trouble.

And if the guard were against her -- either she’d messed up, or the Vanguard had messed up, and she probably wouldn’t live to apologize or gloat as appropriate.

Still, Heksis was making his reassurances, so she nodded and began to disarm and disrobe. Her gunbelt went to the floor, followed by her boots and scaled gloves, the latter with a faint echo of a whisper in her mind. She paused here and eyed Heksis sidelong.

“Fieldweave requires full skin contact, so I’m not wearing undergarments. Just to advise you, since I don’t know if Eliskni do modesty.”

She, however, was determined not to look weak or hesitant or unprofessional, so she just settled down and stripped out of her robes, laying them across the rest of her clothing. Without trying to appear as though she was hurrying, she slipped into the spidersilk thing that Heksis had offered. She’d expected it to be sticky and uncomfortable, but it slid against her skin with ease. Arrae nodded in mild approval; perhaps this wouldn’t be so bad.

“Oh... before we enter. Lambent, disarm your surprises and leave them with my weapons, please.”

“Auww.” One by one, the Ghost plunked out of transmat a terrifying array of bombs, mines, explosive canisters, and other things. Ever since the tunnels, her Ghost had insisted on ‘staying armed.’

She gave Heksis a wry look. “Lambent assures me they’re all inert until she activates them. Your ship is safe. And... both of us should be now, too.”

[starlightmymother]

Report I: Sooner Than Expected

// ROUTINE WEATHERSAT UPDATE MODULE M-133-A

// PIGGYBACK DATASTREAM DETECTED

// SENDER VERIFIED

// CONTENT VERIFIED

// PASSWORD VERIFIED

// PLAYBACK COMMENCES

Hello, Erron, this is Arrae. Sorry if I’ve been quiet. It’s been a hell of a few weeks for us. I can only imagine how it’s been for the rest of you. For the rest of the system.

I’m ... I still can’t believe the Queen is gone. Rahool found me a copy of some playbacks that Ikora had decrypted, and... it looks bad. I keep hunting for the threads of some greater plan in there, some -- scheme. It’s not like her to mount a frontal assault on a superior force, to make the sacrifice play. But you saw the fleet. Even without the Dreadnaught it would have laid waste to the city. Even if there had been survivors -- it would’ve made Twilight Gap look like a pleasant summer’s day.

Now... its master is untouchable, but rooted. The Taken will spread, but it could be a lot worse. We all have a fighting chance.

That’s the Tower parlance, by the way; thank Eris Morn for that apellation. Apparently, the dreadnought’s master has assimilated them through Hive magic, or... well, Ikora tells me it’s an order of magnitude greater than Hive magic. Direct communion with the heart of the Darkness. I believe them. Every creature is recognizable as what it once was, but they’re remade. New abilites. New weapons forged out of the aether.

File one is a comprehensive record of all the Taken types I’ve encountered. Note the ‘stupid shit they do’ cards at the bottom of each type dossier, and pardon the crudeness; I figured having explanations that aren’t full of warlock-ese might be useful to your men, and ‘large ball of swirling darkness that blinds you’ is a really important thing to watch out for, among others.

File two is documentation from weapon telemetry; I was field-testing something for the Tower’s armory when a Taken vortex opened, and while I earned a few more lasting scars for it, the data confirmed drastic dropoff in effectiveness of unmodified weapons. Banshee-44 -- that’s the Exo in charge of Tower weapons and modifications -- estimates that Taken forces, Hive improvements, and Fallen and Cabal adaptations will render some of our best weapons completely incapable. I hope your forces can use this data in case you run into more Taken out in the system, which I can guarantee you will. They’re bloody everywhere.

File three is the location of a site I intend to visit soon. I... don’t know if you can do anything with this information, but I wanted someone to know outside of the Vanguard. It’s a defunct Golden Age research outpost created to forge an understanding of Arc Light, back when researchers first began to realize it was more than lightning. The outpost is located in a perpetual lightning storm that I theorize to be related to the facility’s decaying arc reactor. If I can ride the Storm down, if I can find some answers down there... I may be of greater use to you, to the Vanguard, to all the people counting on me to protect them. If not, it’ll at least be a hell of a way to go.

However, I’d be irresponsible to go off on an adventure without nominating someone else to be a potential liason. I recommend you get in touch with Io Cantor, file four. Guardian, wields Voidlight, a close friend of mine. One of... only a few. Lambent has arranged for the message key to pass on to her Ghost if something should happen to either of us so you can get in touch with her. She is not the most skilled Guardian, or the most fearless, or the best-armed, but she has a noble and caring heart and she will be receptive to your plight. I owe my life to her and her quick thinking when we first encountered the Taken. A story that I’ll tell you sometime over drinks... multiple drinks. Many drinks.

I hope at least some of this will help. Thinking of you and your men -- stay safe, stay strong, we’ll weather this storm.

All the best,

Arrae Vehn

// ATTACH ONE: taken_dossiers.data

// ATTACH TWO: omolon_test_rrx1617a.data

// ATTACH THREE: pinnacle_station.data

// ATTACH FOUR: vanguard_ir_cantor_io_02.data

// END TRANSMISSION