[i]Disclamer: I am not the Author of this story, I merely wished to share it with the community as I really enjoyed it. Very rich in lore and great story. I found these on the Planet Destiny site. All merit goes to the real Author -CHET KIRKHAM Due to the length of the story, I will be posting all the chapters in sections[/i] The Daughters of Praedyth (Chapter 5) Life was just better if you could fly. Air streamed through the curled horns on Christina’s helmet, tugging her head back a bit. The long drop into the Gorgon’s Labyrinth reminded her of Gilbert. When he returned to the City, they lost themselves in each other. Dropping off into a cycle of clubs, bars, drinking, dancing, and sex that lasted for days. Then, one day, they would wake up, hungover and still exhausted after having passed out hours ago, and the freefall would be over. Gilbert would get in his ship and head back out to she knew not where. Sometimes she would think of his deep brown eyes and easy smile, but for the most part, he didn’t enter her mind until he came back to town. She could sense Jale and Sweet Susie on either side and just above her. The air her two friends displaced as they fell sounded, to Christina, a little like turbines spinning up. It occurred to her that she could just ride this feeling all the way into the ground. Her friends, assuming they didn’t do the same thing, would revive her and they would all be on their way. Even after all the times she’d died, she found the idea of just crashing into the ground for the hell of it distasteful. Wasteful, somehow. She Blinked, teleporting up as the she rushed toward the ground. Her momentum was displaced and she dropped lightly to the ground, knees barely having to flex to absorb the small amount of energy left from her descent. Christina looked up, smelled the ozone scent of the Labyrinth and sent a hopeful thought out into the Universe that she would see a blue sky again. Jale made sure that Christina and Sweet Susie saw her and then gestured for them to follow her. All three members of the team knew that, until they were past the Gorgons, it was vital to make as little noise as possible. They would communicate only with hand gestures and would whisper only in an emergency. No one was to use a weapon unless there was simply no other option. Fighting the Gorgons was akin to making a last stand for the principle of the thing. Study of the recollections and recordings of the successful raid team indicated it was possible that the Gorgons could be killed with enough firepower, but that remained only a theoretical possibility. If anyone had ever fought the Gorgons and lost, they’d left no records of any kind to indicate what the fight had been like. Indeed, the reason why there was no memory or record of a losing battle with the Gorgons is that, if a Guardian lost a fight with the Gorgons, that Guardian was rendered into non-existence. The Gorgons were, by design, unknowable. It was known that if the Gorgons saw you, you ceased to ever have been. The mechanics of how they accomplished such horrifying attacks were unknown. They picked their way slowly along the route the raid team had used. The first twittering cry in the distance froze them all in place. It was one thing to read a story about monsters. It was another to hear one call out to you. Jale tried to calm her pounding heart and forced herself to take another step forward. After the first step, it was easier. Their heads swiveled in different directions, looking for the telltale blueish glow of the Gorgons. Each member was responsible for keeping watch of a different sector for a count of ten, then they shifted their gaze. In this way, the three of them kept a simultaneous watch in all directions. The tap on Jale’s right shoulder let her know that a Gorgon had been spotted to her right. Quickly, but not frantically, she moved to her left and looked for cover. It wasn’t until she’d found a boulder to get behind that she looked to see where the Gorgon actually was. It cruised through the near dark of the cavern like a shark. Blue white tentacles floated lazily behind it. The blipping, sonar-like noises it made were calm and regular. It hadn’t seen them. Jale looked to her right and found her companions. As per their training, each of them raised a hand when they’d seen her. Another quick hand gesture, drawing a circle in the air with her forefinger, and the team formed back up and moved forward again. The next Gorgon came from their left. They all heard it before they saw it, and the Daughters moved to the right around a large outcropping of rock. When Jale again felt a tap on her right shoulder, she clenched a hand in frustration. Gorgons to the left and the right, the only way to go was up. She jumped up, hoping that she could find a landing spot above the Gorgons’s view. Increasingly frequent pings emanated from the Gorgons. They suspected intruders. The Guardians’s extreme vertical jump had put them out of immediate danger. The team huddled together on a hillock of stone listening to their hunters circling below. Jale looked at her companions, pointed to her ear and then held up two fingers. Sweet Susie and Christina nodded. There seemed to be two Gorgons below them. Jale pointed again, this time in the approximate direction of the Gorgons. Sweet Susie and Christina nodded again. If they waited, the machines might either leave or they might come up and find them. Jale made a decision, better to go and not be there to be found. Turning, Jale headed for what sounded like the widening gap between the two Gorgons. The Daughters came to edge of their temporary safe haven and jumped lightly down. The Gorgon sounds were dopplering away to their right and left. Jale checked behind her and found that Christina and Sweet Susie were following her. She turned back and found herself facing a Gorgon. It was so close she thought she could smell it. It stank like seaweed for some reason. In pure animal reflex, she raised a protective arm against the imminent killing blow. It was raining. A steady beat of rain fell on Jale’s helmet and shoulders. It hadn’t started to rain, it was just raining. Instead of stone under her feet she felt something much smoother, but just as hard. It was night, but she could see a couple of buildings to her left and right. Both the buildings were large, multistory, blocky constructions that had lines of windows. The building on the left was about a story taller than the one on the right and its windows glinted with a kind of gold tint that contrasted against the red stone of its walls. Sodium arc streetlights, stationed at regular intervals, cast a yellowish color onto the building to her right. In daylight, the building would probably look light gray. It appeared to be a parking garage. “Ghost, where am I? What happened?” Her Ghost didn’t answer. She checked her backpack and found it empty. The rain continued to pour down in sheets. Below her, a fountain, circular in shape except for a pie piece wedge cut into it, accepted the rain and shot streams of water back into the air. A glint of light on coppery metal attracted her eye. She focused and brought her sniper rifle up. Training the scope on the roof of building to her right she found a Vex Hobgoblin raising its Line Rifle. The machine wasn’t pointing the weapon at her, however. It was aiming toward the red building to her left. Whatever the Hobgoblin was doing, whatever was going on, there was an enemy in front of her. She couldn’t hit the robotic sniper in its so-called “juice box”, the container that held its organic processing core. The Hobgoblin was facing the wrong direction. Landing a shot anywhere else wouldn’t be a guaranteed kill, which meant that the robot would still have a chance to fire before she could take it out. She would have to put more damage on it more quickly. It would take precise timing. Jale manifested a solar grenade, judged the angle and the distance, and threw. While the grenade was still in the air, she whipped her sniper rifle up to her shoulder. Readouts on the scope gave her range to her target and windage. The grenade seemed to float through the air, falling like a feather rather than a piece of ordnance. An internal glow began to light Hobgoblin’s rifle. It was preparing to shoot. The grenade descended and Jale squeezed the trigger, just the tip of her finger pulling millimeter by millimeter, steadily applying more force until the shot cracked out. The bullet and the grenade hit at the exact same moment. Somehow the Hobgoblin’s protective shield snapped up, but too late. It was protecting a mass of junk. The combined power of the grenade and the high caliber rifle bullet had done their job. The enemy sniper was dead. A miniature sun shone on top of the building as the solar grenade burned out its plasma fuel as a shining orange corona. The Hobgoblin’s own reddish shield added to the light. It was as if noon had come hours early. Jale took advantage of the light to check the robot’s target. The bright light rendered the tinting on the red building’s windows basically useless. Jale could see through the window that the Hobgoblin had been aiming at. The scope on her sniper rifle brought distant detail into sharp focus. A woman lay in a hospital bed and held a newborn baby swaddled in her arms. The woman’s mouth had dropped open and she squinted out into the sudden light outside her window. The orange glare of the grenade colored her blond hair. Her face looked familiar. It was not raining. Jale looked through the blueish white field of light created by the relic on her arm at the Gorgon. Tentacles flailing the Gorgon reared back and made a high pitched screech. Christina charged forward, a black sword in her hands. The weapon trailed purple Void energy as she swung it in an upward two-handed slice.