[b]Broken[/b] Part Two One Cabal leaped over a dugout and crushed a Warlock under its weight. Another ran to the side of a position that still held a few Guardians and mowed them all down in seconds. Then several more equipped Cabal surged forward and large energized shields spread in front of them from their arms, providing cover for their allies and pushing forward into our line. A small movement at a position a few meters in front of me drew my attention, and I watched as a Titan with armor torn up by enemy fire pushed himself up to his knees. With his right hand he tore a grenade off of its clasp on his belt- a real grenade, not one made of Light -and pulled the pin just after the main line of Cabal passed him over. I could just barely make out what he said over the noise of battle as he flung off his helmet and glared with brown eyes behind hair matted with blood. "Suck this you ugly sons o-" the explosion beat him to the end of the phrase, tearing apart several Cabal and shattering their line. Although it did some damage, his actions did not stall the Cabal's progress at all against such crippled opponents. Soon only us in the final row of trenches were left. A War Beast leapt over only a few feet to my left and tackled the Hunter, shredding him with pointed claws and teeth. As quickly as I could, I twisted my gun towards it and blasted it right off of the Hunter, but after looking at my limp comrade's body I didn't need to check for a pulse to know he was gone. As I turned back to face the Cabal I was met with searing pain in my left shoulder. The blast of the Cabal weapon hitting me caused me to flip around and fall on my stomach, head dangling down just inches above the civilians below as my helmet slipped off of my head. They had been climbing out over the opposite side of the groove where they would be hidden from sight under the watch of the Defender Titan, who now sat with his back against the wall of dirt and gun propped to aim where I now lay, but they stopped to look at me as I strained to lift my head. There was fear in their eyes, and confusion at the sudden change in their Guardians. My eyes met those of a young girl, clutching her mother's clothes as if they would make it if she just held on. She was scared, as if that even needed to be said, and I could tell my battered and probably bloodied appearance didn't help. A weak smile was forced across my face as I put my arms under me and started pushing myself up, tucking Rush away into a pouch on my armor. "You're all gonna make it," I told them with all the certainty I could muster, focusing especially on the girl. It wasn't much, especially to the older ones who knew how bad the situation was, but at least some hope flickered through the small gathering. "Go!" I waved my arm at them and clambered up to my knees. The civilians started climbing out with renewed urgency, but when I looked to the Titan sitting down there amidst them, it was clear we both knew that we couldn't by much time. Nonetheless, he rose to his feet shakily and readied his gun, giving me a nod that showed he would fight to the last. We would all fight to the last for these people. Hopefully it would be enough. My feet found purchase under me and I stood up to face the Cabal, left arm hanging limp at my side and rifle gripped tightly in my right. Somehow the Cabal were still trying to clamber over the last row of defense, but only a few of us remained, most bunkered down in spots where they could shoot the Cabal before being vulnerable themselves. One of the Cabal, clearly an officer of this unit of troops judging by its more decorated armor, saw me standing out in the open as if daring them to kill me and pounded its fist against its chest, emitting a mighty bellow. But before either of us could shoot the other, the sky erupted in blue light. All eyes went to the skies and the cries of War Beasts echoed through the streets, as they too had apparently stopped. Moments before the sky had been thickly blanketed in smoke and storm clouds with occasional strikes of lightning illuminating the City below along with the soft glows of burning buildings. But now...the clouds were suddenly a grey smog that moved down towards the earth like a crushing wall and crackled with endless streams of blue electricity. Some of the electricity condensed into one point and abruptly shot down in a column of burning light, striking the main body of the machine that the Cabal had placed around the Traveler. Smoke rose from the vessel, and a gap could be seen through its hull even from here, but then the sky flashed again and dozens more of the bolts struck down. The device spewed out fire as it was riddled with holes and the lightning peppered the surface of the shield around the Traveler, somehow seeming to bend the energy field in towards the Traveler as the gentle giant disappeared from sight behind the haze of explosions. Seconds passed before the mysterious lightning stopped, and seconds more before the smoke cleared to reveal the Traveler...or what was left of it. The Cabal shield was all but gone, only flickering portions of their barrier remaining, but that wasn't the scary part. Our defender, our hope, sank down through the air, its ebony surface riddled with holes and scorch marks. Watching with mouth agape in horror, I could do nothing as the Cabal device detonated while still hovering near the Traveler, sending cracks through it and propelling its fall to greater speeds. The ground shook with the impact, dust rising up in a plume as the sound of crunching buildings slapped my ears. The Traveler's shell shattered as it hit, splintering the moon-sized entity into many pieces, large and small, that disappeared from my sight behind the line of buildings. After a few moments the shockwave passed through, flinging dust into my face and even making the Cabal stumble. But it was soon past. Silence. Not a sound carried through the air aside from those of buildings toppling. Even the shrieking War Beasts had gone silent. But the Cabal, staring with shock at the scene just as the Guardians did, were prone to expressing their anger. A wild roar rose up into the night, growing stronger by the second as more and more alien throats bellowed their disbelief. The constant resonance became so loud that the sound of electricity striking down again was hardly audible. Once again erupting with life, the strange clouds unleashed a million tiny streaks of blue light that zipped straight down to the earth below. They blanketed across the whole City as far as I could see through the buildings, and as they touched down on the street behind the Cabal that stood before me, I saw what had destroyed the Light. Each streak that had come down was a Vex unit entering from some mode of their teleportation travel, not a streak of lightning. Contrary to whatever they had used to attack the Traveler, these Vex touched down considerably softly, each raising their weapons with one swift motion as their bodies materialized. The Cabal fell in swaths, each roaring vengefully as they rallied against the Vex assault. And the big blokes forgot about us. Someone came up to my side and I glanced over to see the female Titan that had stood strong in front of the civilian's cover earlier, her lifeless Ghost clenched in her hand. The other Guardians rose from their positions, even the Defender managing to climb up to us, and we all looked to each other. "They took everything from us," the Titan next to me could barely talk straight through her distress, "Let's repay them." With sober agreement we all turned to face the Cabal, who now had their backs to us. They had formed a line against the Vex, but it clearly wasn't holding very well against such sudden, overwhelming force and occasional streaks of projectiles from Vex weapons shot past us where we stood. The rasp of a Hunter's knife sliding out of its sheath was all it took to propel us towards the enemy. Seven pairs of boots pounded across shattered pavement and mounds of dirt. Seven was all we had. But seven ticked off Guardians was a force to be reckoned with, even without their Light. The closest Cabal was tackled from behind by the female Titan, who was quickly joined by another Titan, and fell down onto its stomach under the combined force. I didn't watch them finish it off as the rest of us moved on, a Hunter near to me leaping up onto the next Cabal as we came up to it and slashing his knife in the chink between its helmet and body armor, sending up a spray of blood and pressure gel. The next Cabal was mounted by a Warlock, who wrapped her legs around its neck and flung her weight down, twisting the head all the way around with a sickening snap before slipping off of the falling soldier. Then I was upon a War Beast, which had sensed the commotion behind it and turned to bare its fangs at me. It lunged eagerly at me, but I anticipated and flung myself to the side, giving myself room to hit the creature down out of the air and then finish it with a stomp to the head. Wincing and pressing my right hand to my side as the pain in my body grew, I looked down to see the War Beast's claws had raked my ribs, and my arm came away covered in blood. I was slower without my Light, and less strong, and I already felt my now limited stamina depleting. ________________________________ Link to part 1: https://www.bungie.net/en/Forum/Post/229945487/0/0 Link to part 3: https://www.bungie.net/en/Forum/Post/229945649/0/0 Link to Archive: https://www.bungie.net/en/Forum/Post/217384398/0/0