Chapter three of my story Origin. A special shout out to [b]Commandocandle [/b]for providing the concept artwork. As always, hit that survey, leave a comment, and enjoy the read. Part two will be listed below. Darkness enveloped her and she couldn’t see anything. Thinking her thermal vision was broken, she switched it but still saw only darkness. She fumbled around in the darkness trying to find a wall or some kind of structure to orient herself to. Suddenly a bright light shone directly in her face and she recoiled in surprise. It was the light from a ghost. “Where are we?” She asked peering around. “We are in a cave system deep in the mountain.” A voice sounded off somewhere in the darkness. It carried a strange accent she had never heard before. “Gaia, are you alright?” She asked. Gaia materialized and turned on her light although it was dimmer than the other ghost’s. “Yes I am fine.” “Who are you?” she asked slapping her sniper rifle to the magnetic plate on her back. “First I have some questions for you. Who are you?” The strange voice asked in return. “Velox Hunter vanguard. Blade dancer.” She said still looking for the source of the voice. “Who sent you?” the ghost floating to her left asked. “I can’t tell you that.” “I see. Ikora Rey sent you.” “How do you know that?” Velox asked in surprise. “Quite simple really. Gaia told me.” Velox turned to Gaia. “It’s ok Velox. This is the guardian we were sent to find.” She heard footsteps behind her and turned to face them. A titan emerged from the shadows moving at a slow and deliberate pace. He was a mountain and the ground seemed to shudder beneath his heavy footsteps. His armor was white and gray with a camouflage pattern she had never seen before. He came to stand in front of a stalagmite that rose nearly six feet off the ground. “My name is Azrix and this” he gestured towards the steel colored ghost. “Is Nymphinium. Please do not start any scans or try any forms of electronic communication.” “You know I hate it when you use my full name.” the ghost complained. “Well it is your name.” “That I dislike. It is too long.” He said turning towards Velox. “You may call me Nymph. It’s what everyone else calls me with the exception of that big ogre over there.” He said looking back towards Azrix. “Why shouldn’t I try any scans?” she asked a little confused. “I think that’s how the Vex find us.” He answered. Azrix turned around to inspect the stalagmite behind him and after a second, performed a side kick that caused it to explode into small pebbles. He inspected his work, with a nod of satisfaction, turned back towards Velox, and sat down on the stump of rock. “Why haven’t you been sending reports back to Ikora?” Velox asked in a hotly tone, her arms crossed over her chest. Azrix reached into one of the many pouches on his belt and withdrew a small sphere about the size of a golf ball. He tossed it up in the air where it hovered ten feet above the ground and began emitting a soft white light. The cavern they were in slowly grew brighter until it was almost entirely visible. It was small, only fifty feet wide and twenty feet high. There were crates and supplies scattered about, as well as a sleeping bag rolled up and resting on a large flat rock. On the left side, there was a small pool of water steaming with a stream running to the wall of the cave. “The reason I haven’t been sending reports back to Ikora is because the Vex are putting out a signal that is blocking all communications in a two hundred mile area. After sending my last report, they swarmed me and took over my base camp.” He was now pulling pieces of the gatling gun apart and cleaning it with a rag and some oil. “Why didn’t you return to orbit?” “When the Vex attacked, the first wave concentrated on my jumpship. They knew exactly where to hit it in order to take out the drive core. Unfortunately, the one thing I forgot to bring was an extra drive core.” Velox realized that it was getting hot. The temperature inside the cave was well above the temperature outside and her armor was still set for the outside temperatures. She accessed her suit thermostat and was surprised to see that the temperature inside was almost seventy degrees. Azrix put down his cleaning cloth and reached up to take off his helmet. There was a pop, a hiss as the seal was broken, and he lifted the helmet off his head. His hair was short , cut to military standards, and silver in color. His face was lean and angular but marred with several deep scars. His eyes were a bright green. His expression was one that she had seen before. Those who had been in battle for extended periods had the same look. He looked tire, as if he hadn’t slept in days and was weary beyond belief. “How long have you been here?” she asked now losing some of her bite. He stared at the roof of the cavern for a moment and answered. “I landed here almost six months ago. My last transmission was about three weeks ago.” “So you have been here alone for six months?” she asked shocked. “Yep.” He said returning to his weapons maintenance. “Just me and Nymphinium on an extended camping trip.” She now sat down and took off her mask in shock of how long he had been away. The longest she had been on her own was only a month and she thought she was going to go stir crazy. She could only imagine what six months would do to a person. She needed to be careful. There was no telling how far gone he was mentally. “So why are you here?” he asked not looking up from the part of the weapon he was cleaning. “Ikora said you went dark and wanted me to find out what happened to you. If you were dead, I was supposed to pick up where you left off.” “Ah Ikora. That woman is so eager for knowledge she will put anyone and anything at risk. I told her in one of my reports that if we were to continue investigating we would need a full fireteam of guardians. She told me she didn’t want to “risk the resources” until I had more information on what we were dealing with.” “So what do you know about this program of Vex?” “This is a rather long story but seeing as we can’t go anywhere for the time being I will tell you. After the Vex attacked my base camp, we barely made it out. Nymphinium remembered this chamber he had picked up on when he was doing some scans so he teleported us here. After three days, we had to make a run back to the base camp and see what damage had been done. The ship was dead, the long range communications relay was dead, but the Vex hadn’t touched the food or supplies. After shuttling the supplies back to the cave, he said he found an active conflux in the cave we were investigating.” “We went there and I had him tap into it. What we found was very strange and disturbing. We had to confirm this by observing and studying a Vex we captured. Do you know how hard it is to capture an enemy that has the ability to seemingly teleport at any time? I doubt it and I shouldn’t really call it teleporting. They have the ability, at least the goblins, hobgoblins, and minotaur’s do, to slow time for an instant and move through it at their leisure.” Chapter 3, Part 2 can be found here. https://www.bungie.net/en/Forum/Post/97273488/0/0 Chapter Index can be found here: https://www.bungie.net/en/Forum/Post/101226805/0/0