Four months after the fight with Auron, Atreyus was back in full health and fighting in the Crucible. Four months after the fight with Auron, his life flipped upside down. Some new Titan big-shot was running his mouth and called Atreyus a simple scavenger. Atreyus obviously didn't like that and challenged the man to a match in the Crucible. It was supposed to just be a friendly way of settling a score. Supposed to be. When the match began, Atreyus could basically hear the oaf crashing through the place to get to him. This would be a quick match. He leapt up and scaled the side of a decrepit building and sat, waiting for the man. Atreyus checked the chamber of his revolver, The Last Word, to see if it was full. Of course it was. He came prepared. As the Titan came around the corner, Atreyus leapt down and kicked the man hard in the back of the head with both feet. The large man fell face-first into the ground making a strange grunting sound as his head hit the ground. Before Atreyus could react further though, the man was on top of him, punching him in the head. Oh no...no. Not again...he thought to himself, beginning to panic. Before he knew what had happened, the Titan was gurgling up blood and scrambling for his helm. As he took it off, he coughed up a huge glob of blood. Atreyus looked at the man's chest to find the knife there. The strange knife with the shiny purple blade. The one he got off of Auron. "No...no. This isn't happening. This can't be happening. Stay with me!" Atreyus grabbed him and rested the man in his arms. "Hey big guy. Stay with me! Stay with me!" But the man was already gone. I'm still here...the sound of that voice was back. Was it really true? Had he come in contact with the Darkness? Or one of its minions? He gently pulled the knife out of the man's chest before throwing it in absolute fear. Lord Shaxx's voice rang through the communications. "Stay where you are Guardian!" Within seconds, a group of Titans was pulling Atreyus to his feet and cuffing him. Atreyus tried to think of something to say, but was tongue-tied. What had just happened? He didn't even remember grabbing the knife. Much less stabbing anyone. The footage would be reviewed and they would find the...the what? He had no idea how that could have happened. Knives didn't just move themselves into people's chests. Maybe they'd clear it as some sort of post-traumatic stress. But he would be out of the field for months. But this was not the first time, nor the last, that that knife would strike the killing blow on someone. And Atreyus would eventually find that out the hard way. Months later, it was finally cleared as a stress reaction, but the guilt of it didn't weigh any less on his shoulders when he tried to sleep at night. That infernal knife. Somehow it found its way back into his hands. Where did the blasted thing come from? Atreyus just locked it away and watched the chest from his bed at night. He hadn't slept in days. He didn't dare go out into the field. Much less out into the Tower. Cayde-6 had been in to see him every once in awhile, and Atreyus explained what had happened all those months ago to him. "So this knife...it showed up after your dream?" Cayde asked, stroking his metallic chin. "You're sure Auron didn't just have it stashed in his armor? Maybe you grabbed it and Last Word when you killed him and didn't realize it." Atreyus shook his head. "I've watched the footage from the fight over and over. I never grabbed anything off of him. Only thing I grabbed was my gun." Cayde nodded, obviously deep in thought. He was trying to put the pieces together. "Who else have you told?" He asked finally. "You and Arellanine are it...I was wondering if she would know anything about it, being a Warlock and all..." Cayde laughed in understanding. He looked at his hands for a moment before looking up at Atreyus. "Would you mind if I told Ikora? We're all worried about you, Atreyus. Tess is a worried mess. Banshee-44 is missing one of his top customers. And Shaxx? He's missing one of his favorite legends. You're a legend, Atreyus. As much as the best of them. So think about it. You know Ikora knows more about this kind of thing than any of us. This is a serious matter and she may be the only one who can help you." He didn't take his eyes off of Atreyus now. He wanted him to know how serious this was if he didn't already. Atreyus knew how serious this was...but did he want more people involved? With a sigh, he nodded. "Let her know. I want this to end." Cayde nodded. "Good choice." He stood to leave, but before he walked out the door, he looked back at Atreyus. "You should go see Tess. She does care about you, you know." And with that, he had left. Atreyus had sighed. Besides his Pack, Tess was one of the few people who had his back. She had openly expressed her feelings to him about a month ago. But he was afraid of ever loving someone like that again. At least not ten months after his fiancé had been killed by Auron. But he would go see her. He owed her that much. He walked out of his room, sure to have his helmet and hood on. He definitely didn't want anyone to see his face while on his way to see Tess. He had even bought new gear from Cayde and had someone pick up a new cloak for him from the Speaker. He definitely didn't expect them to come back with Ana Bray's cloak. Cayde told him he deserved such a cloak. And the Wolf embroidered on the back reminded him of his Wolf Pack and brought a smile to his face. They had constantly been in the field since then, but both of them had stopped to see him. Usually together. He finally reached Tess' complex and knocked on her door. She answered with a question look on her face. "Can I help you?" She asked, somewhat defensively. "It's me, Tess. Can we go inside?" He asked her. She gasped and opened the door and invited him in. Atreyus walked in and put his hood back down and removed his helmet. She walked over to him and wrapped her arms around him. "I was so scared...Cayde told me that it was probably best for you to come to me." He returned her embrace. "Yeah...it's been a long couple months." She frowned slightly, letting him go and taking a step back, pushing a strand of his long raven-black hair out of his face. "You've stayed out of the field haven't you?" Atreyus just nodded and looked her in the eyes. He could see the care and worry in her eyes. Aria would want him to be happy, but he couldn't pursue anything with Tess until this whole mess was over and that knife was out of his life for good. "Cayde is talking to Ikora now. We think this may be larger than we originally thought." He finally said with a sigh. She nodded. "I know. I'm the one who told him to bring it up to you. This definitely is a larger deal than we thought. By my estimation, this knife is Vex in origin. Maybe even Hive, but that's not as likely now that Crota is dead." Atreyus managed a small laugh and a smaller smile. Tess' ability to turn everything into a set of Algebraic algorithms amazed him. She smiled at him with a small look of innocent confusion. "What?" Atreyus just smiled and shook his head. "You just have a way of making everything so logical. Not in a bad way though." Tess giggled a bit. "Yeah yeah...not all of us can shoot every problem we see," she said, pointing to the infamous hand cannon on his hip. Atreyus simply shrugged. The Last Word had gotten him out of numerous sticky situations in both the wild and in the simulated glory of the Crucible. It belonged to his deceased friend and mentor Shin Malphur, and Shin's mentor before him. And unbeknownst to him, it would soon save him when he needed it the most... ------------------------------------------------ You can now find chapter 4 [url=https://www.bungie.net/en/Forum/Post/128211289/0/0]here![/url]