Many thanks to @Keltoi, @DemiRapscallion, and @BinaryApotheosis for betareading and fact-checking.
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Varré
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"What the hell is that?"
"Don't you recognize it, big guy?"
"Oh, you bet I recognize it—where the fuck did you get it?"
"Wouldn't believe me if I told you. Wanna go give it a spin?"
"Give it a—sweetheart, are you out of your mind?"
"Not in the Crucible! I just mean, like, out in the Cosmodrome patrol zones. I've always wondered what the real thing would do to some Fallen scavs. Turn it on the enemy, you know?"
"This is a bad idea."
"Scared, Barrett?"
"…Damn it all. Fine. Let's go."
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It doesn't take us long to scramble up to the little mausoleum.
Always On Time is obviously up to a little hill, and even though the ascent looks too steep for Torrent, the creature takes me by surprise when it leaps nearly its own height into the air…
…And then jumps again.
That was a double jump, Winchester observes over our private channel.
Paracausal, you think?
I'd assume so, I subvocalize.
But, well, the gravitational anomaly and the giant glowing tree already told us this world had paracausality to go around. And all the shit Melina was saying about people 'escaping' death, or whatever.
Winchester snorts.
Right, like you followed a damn thing she said.
I followed bits, I protest.
I guess it's good for a Guardian to be generous. Even to themselves.
I don't bother to answer that one.
The man in the white mask is seated cross-legged when we reach him, his back to a bush bearing small red fruit. Just a couple feet from him is a glowing mote of golden light. It hovers a foot or so above the grass, washing out the green blades in pale gold. It flickers like firelight, drifting in and out of an indistinct shape that might be a crude effigy of a person. Faint ribbons of sparkling gold orbit it in the air around us, dancing on a breeze that doesn't so much as ruffle my cloak.
"I see that the Grace of gold is visible to you, then," says the man in the mask. He sounds satisfied—and intrigued. "How unexpected. What manner of creature are you? And how did you come to be touched by Grace?"
I shoot him a look with a raised eyebrow. "You greet every stranger like that?"
"Only the interesting ones," says the man. Huh, a sense of humor. Nice. "Come, sit. I am Varré."
"Barrett-12," I say, swinging my leg over the side of
Always On Time and striding towards the golden light. Beside me, Melina dismounts from Torrent. The creature vanishes into pale blue mist.
"And I am Morna," said Melina.
I don't react. She's entitled to give me and Varré different names, though I'd be lying if I say I'm not curious why. I also don't even know for sure which name, if either, is really hers now. But that's fine. I'm a Guardian, names don't mean as much to us as to people who were born to them. Or, well, they don't
have to mean much. Sometimes they do anyway, when we choose to make them.
"To answer your question," I say as I sit down across from Varré, "I'm an Exomind. That means a human named Barrett once had his mind transferred to a metal shell, centuries ago. I'm what came out the other end of that."
"Then you were once a man?" Varré asked.
"No," I say firmly. "I'm the pieces of a human put together in a new configuration. That doesn't make me the same person as that human."
"Ah. A rebirth, then, of a sort. Reborn in steel." Varré sounds… almost reverent. Weird.
"You could put it that way."
"And how did you come upon this rebirth?" asks Varré. "Did you, perhaps, undertake pilgrimage to Queen Rennala of the Full Moon, who possesses, it is said, a Great Rune capable of bestowing transformation? Or do you seek out Lord Miquella's Haligtree, where all transformed and misbegotten wretches may find a haven?"
"Misbegotten wretches?" I ask, more amused than insulted. "Really, friend, I've never been so flattered."
Varré draws back slightly. "My apologies. I meant no offense, of course. I have nothing but admiration for Prince Miquella and those who eagerly await his return."
"None taken. But no, I'm not from around here. I only just arrived in… what did you call this area, Morna?"
"The Lands Between," says Melina.
"Oh, indeed?" Varré leans forward slightly, the golden light casting strange shadows across his mask. "From beyond the Fog you come, then? And yet you are no Tarnished, clearly. A true unknown. How… fascinating. And yet, already you have found yourself in the company of a Finger Maiden."
"I am no Finger Maiden, Sir Varré," says Melina quietly. "Merely a traveler seeking to return to her roots, like so many others."
"Truly?" Varré shoots her a look, eyes glittering behind the holes in his mask. Whatever he sees there satisfies him, and he nods. "No Maiden, then, for the strange Master Barrett Twelve." He sounds amused, and pleased, by that. "And yet—Tarnished or no, you can see this Site of Grace before us. Come, touch it. Let us see how it reacts to you."
I glance at Melina. She nods. "I confess myself curious as well," she says. "For a Tarnished, or any other bestowed with Grace and purpose, a Site of Grace is a place of rest and guidance. It may also be so for you."
I look down at the flickering gold.
Think it's safe, Winchester?
Dunno. Not without scanning. You want me to come out and give it a look?
Sure, why not. We've already trusted Melina without much good reason, what's one more?
Two's company, Winchester points out.
And three's a fireteam. Get out here, buddy.
With a sigh, Winchester pops into being over my shoulder and drifts towards the glowing Grace. Varré starts. "What is that creature? A weapon or spell of some sort?"
"Winchester's my Ghost," I explain. "He's just gonna give this thing a look before I start fondling it."
"Guess you
can teach an old Hunter new tricks," mutters Winchester, eye flashing as he scanned. "Not putting any old thing in your mouth like a toddler anymore?"
"You shut up."
"No." Winchester turns back to me. "Definitely paracausal," he confirms. "Neither Light nor Dark, and it doesn't look like it's meant to cause harm directly. It might be usable as a power source for some kind of weapon or trap, but I don't see any sign of that here."
"Neither Light nor Dark?" I ask.
"What's so surprising about that?" Winchester grunts. "Anthem Anatheme's non-polar. So are the Awoken Techeuns. And the Nine."
"Yeah," I say. "Which is why it makes me nervous when we run into shit like this. None of those are what I'd call family-friendly or safe."
"Quit your bitching," my Ghost says, vanishing back into hammerspace like the ornery bastard he is.
I sigh and reach out. I won't lie, I'm a little nervous when my fingers brush the edge of the flickering Grace.
The world goes
gold.
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The sun is setting behind the mountain. Its jagged, rocky teeth cut the light into fractal shapes, dappling the plain in patterns like firing synapses.
Before the notched mountain is a tower. All around the tower is a plain. Once, this was a fertile field of golden wheat, gently whispering in a soft breeze. Maybe it will be again. Today, it is blackened. Burned.
I reach out and take Lex's head between my hands, my metal palms on their temples. I squeeze until my best friend's skull cracks like a watermelon.
Then Blackwall charges me. I dodge to the side, avoiding him, and grab him by the arm as he passes. I plant my feet, roll my hips, and throw him. He tumbles, and I follow, sprinting, raising one foot and stomping down as hard as I can until his ribs cave in.
Next is Grant. Poor, young Grant, all curiosity and optimism. I catch his punch in one hand and snap his neck with the other.
Then Parvati. My fellow Exo's eyes are wrong, glowing gold instead of red, sparking like the circuits in her head are frying. She leaps for me. I roll under it, spin, and kick her into the air. By the time she comes back down, I'm ready to catch her and pummel her directly into the ground.
I've only just finished the job when Thermidor grabs me from behind. He throws me off her, then throws his full weight onto me, trying to pin my arm. But I slip out of his grip and bury my fist in his eye, pushing deep enough to break the skull.
Then there's silence. All around me are the corpses of my friends. My family. My fireteam.
I turn to the tower. Only it isn't a tower anymore. And that's not the sun setting behind it.
The Erdtree rises over the plain of ash and death, and its falling leaves trace my sins in the dust. I feel my blood—the Clarified radiolarian fluid flowing through my frame, carrying the fractal image of my imitation consciousness with it—ignite.
I scream.
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I actually do scream. Like, in real life. Not sure what I say, but it's enough that both Melina and Varré are scrambling back by the time I come to. Winchester dives for me, pushing his shell into my cheek in that way he knows I find grounding. "Hey," he says. "Shit, bud, what happened? You see something?"
"Crypt vision," I manage to gasp out. Then, after a couple of deep breaths, I manage a vehement "
Motherfucker."
"Shit," says Winchester. "It's all right. Wasn't real. You know that. Take your time. Just breathe."
I do. And while I'm in the middle of
just breathing, I hear hoofbeats coming up the hill.
So does Varré. He glances back, over the bush, and then leaps to his feet. "The Sentinel is coming," he says sharply.
I force myself up. I can see it now, galloping up the hill. It looks like a giant of a man, bigger than most Titans I've known, in ornate golden armor astride a horse with matching barding. There's a massive halberd in one of his hands, and in the other is an enormous round shield.
Now, I love the Dead Man's Tale. Katabasis, that poor bastard, left me one hell of a gun. But I know what she's good for, and this ain't it. If I were up to a protracted fight, maybe, but as it is I still feel like my insides are on fire. "Winchester," I gasp out, still half winded. "FILO!"
The shotgun,
First In, Last Out, drops into my hands. I raise it, left palm on the stabilizer on the gun's underside, right finger on the trigger, and aim.
The Erdtree Sentinel lunges at me, its horse leaping high into the air.
I fire.
The Arc slug drills a hole directly through the warrior's visor. He recoils as his horse bears him past me and Varré. Melina, I notice, has vanished. Varré, on the other hand, is drawing a mace that looks a bit like a bouquet of roses. Something's glowing gold in his left hand.
But there's no time to focus on that. The Sentinel is coming back around, despite the hole in its face, halberd whirling through the air like the blade of a fan.
My Super isn't up. I haven't been in a fight, I wasn't
braced for a fight, and even if I had been before the Crypt dream would have driven my focus away. But I have my other abilities.
I channel the Light into a weighted knife, flip it between my fingers, and throw it at the new hole in the Sentinel's helmet. It hits. He bellows in pain, but somehow he's
still coming. I have to roll out of the way of his halberd, and it clips me in the leg on the way past. Lotta weight behind that swing, and I definitely feel it.
"Go for the horse!" Winchester shouts in my ear. Which, you know, fair. It's a good idea.
I fire a FILO slug into the animal's head. Apparently it's less durable than its rider, because it goes down, vanishing into pale dust and sending the Sentinel tumbling. I holster my shotgun as I run towards the fallen man, calling out to my little transmatting robot buddy. "Sword!"
The familiar weight of Quickfang falls into my hand as I thrust it out to the side. I lunge as the Erdtree Sentinel tries to stand.
Turns out, no matter how durable a son of a bitch is, he don't survive having his head liberated from his shoulders.
The man's body dissipates into dust and I breathe heavily, standing over where he was, favoring my injured leg until the Light can finish knitting me back together. Then I turn back.
Varré is studying me. The head of his mace is surrounded by blood-red fire, now, but he doesn't seem concerned about it. "Most impressive," he says. "Your weapons are passing strange, and surpassingly powerful."
I sheathe Quickfang. "Sorry if you were hoping for a piece of him," I say.
"No, no," says Varré. "I am pleased." Then he cocks his head. "As should you be, with the number of Runes you have harvested."
I blink. "Runes?"
Varré chuckles. "My, my, but you truly are a lost lambkin, aren't you? Well, Runes are a source of power for those who have a Finger Maiden to make them so. But, since you are Maidenless, they are unlikely to serve you so. Still, they may serve as coinage with which to trade."
"But what
are they?" I ask impatiently, gesturing at the—conspicuously empty—ground where the Erdtree Sentinel had fallen. "What do you mean I
harvested them?"
"Paracausal trace, looks like," says Winchester, flickering into solidity beside me. "Moment the big guy died, something that was following him attached itself to you."
"Alive?"
"No. Or, at least, not completely." He hesitates. "If anything, it reminds me of Soulfire."
I shoot him a look. "I do not like that comparison, Chester."
"Nor do I, bud. I'll look into it, take some scans."
At that moment, Melina fades back into being beside the grace. Her expression is tight. Ashamed. "Forgive my disappearance," she says.
I walk over. "Nothing to forgive," I say. "I'm a Guardian, I'm used to being the guy who fights. Would have appreciated a warning, though."
She nods wordlessly.
"Well," says Varré clipping his mace back to his belt and clasping his hands together. "Clearly you can handle yourself, Master Barrett Twelve, and with that Sentinel gone my path forward has cleared. If you have need of me again, seek me at the Rose Church in Liurnia, to the north."
"You heading out?"
"I am," he confirms. "I was stymied for a time by the Sentinel, but my purpose can wait no longer. Farewell, Master Barrett Twelve."
"Just Barrett, please." If I hear him call me 'Master Barrett Twelve' one more time I'm gonna lose it.
"Barrett, then. I do hope we will meet again." And with that, the odd man turns and starts down the hill and a gentle jog.
I sit back down at the Site of Grace, letting out a heavy breath. Melina settles beside me. "I am sorry," she says again.
"Like I said, nothing to forgive, sweetheart."
She shakes her head. "Not for failing to fight," she said. "For failing to warn you. There are things you should know, if we are to travel together. Things I should have informed you, which did not occur to me. It is as you say—you lack context. It falls to me to provide it."
I gesture at the Site of Grace. "Seems like we've made camp," I say. "Now's as good a time as any, wouldn't you say?"
"Indeed." She turns her gaze skyward, the boughs of the golden Erdtree reflected in her golden eye, and begins to speak.
