(Page 61) "Someone's hacking our comms." Shadow lowers her rifle. Sure enough, an accented voice comes through her earpiece. "You're late. Here I was thinking I'd be hunting Uldren alone." [i]Late? You have no authority to tell me I'm late.[/i] "Petra Venj," her ghost responds. "We need to talk. Face-to-face." [i]Oh, great. Just what I need to see, your smug face.[/i] "I'm on my way to see an old acquaintance. Word is he wants Uldren and his Barons dead as much as we do." Shadow raises one black eyebrow, curiosity piqued. "Problem is, the feeling is mutual, so my acquaintance is laying low in a hidden bunker. If we want him to open the door, we can't leave any witnesses. Clear the area." Though she doesn't want to waste her time with Petra... this may be the perfect opportunity to ask her if she has any knowledge of where Variks is. "I'm sending you some back up. Please- don't shoot the back up." [i]Back up? I'm a guardian. Shadow grits her teeth offendedly. I don't need back—[/i] The last thing Shadow expects is for two strangely adorned eliksni to turn and look at her without firing. An odd anger twists in the pit of her stomach. Petra had eliksni friends?      Pushing the unsettling feeling away, Shadow instead considers not knowing what house their armor is from— and with a skip of her heart, that they're only half clothed to begin with. Although neither of them speak, they wait for her to catch up to them. Curious but unwilling to appear rude, the hunter averts her eyes and follows them. "Our back up... are fallen," her ghost confirms, bewildered and taken aback. Shadow shoots him a glare. "Eliksni." "Oh," Petra responds. "Did I forget to mention that?" Shadow grips her gun hard enough for her hands to turn even whiter. She trails after the eliksni as they take up positions to battle the corrupted fallen. Eyes wide in unconcealed fascination, she watches them. Excitement fizzes over her skin. Fighting alongside eliksni, it feels right.     Despite not knowing them personally, she revels in the feeling of comradery. She can't help but show off, blasting through a horde of scorn with her arc staff. More than once, in the heat of the action, Shadow mistakenly shoots in their direction. She cringes inwardly, ducking her head apologetically. She hates how killing eliksni has been so deeply ingrained in her that most four armed movements trigger a reflex.      Neither of them seem to care, hardly giving her more than a twitch of their shoulders. Taking on another bout of scorn, Shadow finds herself overwhelmed. Fear pulses sharply through her chest as a scorn captain thrusts her against a wall, driving the breath from her body and pinning her there. Shadow hisses furiously, kicking at the ugly creature to no avail. If they could kill Cayde and his ghost, surely they could kill her. The eliksni lunges toward her, saliva strung between needle like teeth that are seconds from piercing her neck.     The hunter is suddenly dropped to the floor, the captain flung aside with a powerful blow to the head. She lets out a breath of relief, looking up to see one of her eliksni allies striking the scorn with claws sharp as knives.      They pause to stare at one another.      "Thank you." Victorious laughter rasps from his throat.      She shudders, feeling very small beside him. Petra's voice interrupts their moment. "The Barons' leader, the Fanatic, has the power to resurrect dead fallen as frenzied, bloodthirsty puppets. And he believes Uldren gave him that power." Confused questions buzz around the hunter's mind, but one thing remains clear. They killed her vanguard.      Fresh sorrow, deep and raw, pierces her heart more fiercely than any knife when she recalls Cayde's last moments of life.      But it is swiftly replaced with a slow, boiling anger that has been building within her ever since he died. Shadow follows the eliksni until both of them take up positions on either side of the lair belonging to Petra's acquaintance. She hesitates, curiosity getting the better of her. Taking a few slow steps backward, she observes the closest eliksni to her. Her fear of rudeness seems to evaporate in her fascination. "Wow..." she breathes, leaning in to inspect her new ally. "Erm, hi." He growls in return. "My name is Shadow." Silence. "Uh, what's yours?" He looks straight at her through his mask, and replies with a husky, accented voice that sends shivers down her spine. "Arrha." His exoskeleton is dark and shimmering, rising and falling with each breath.      He tilts his head at her.      She hardly notices, his twitching hands catching her eye, studded with sharp yellow claws. Is that what Variks's hands look like? She becomes lost in admiration. He grunts, startling her. "Sorry," she says self consciously, backing away from him. "I just— I've never seen an eliksni... like this, before." She stares at him in awkward silence. "Um, thank you for your help. I hope to see you again later."      His chest heaves once and she wonders if he is amused. Finding Petra waiting right around the corner for her causes the hunter to jump in surprise. A wave of irritation soon follows. Petra's single, narrowed eye meets her own. "Shine your shoes, guardian. You're about to meet... the Spider."