Chapter Text
She faded in and out of consciousness as her craft tumbled through space, fuming at her luck. Damned Wolf bastards hadn’t even been aiming for her. Alarms blared and whined, filling her ears with a deafening cacophony. In her brief moments of lucidity, all of that noise paled before one other, subtle and nearly silent.
A hiss, the rasp of air seeping from her craft, an hourglass slowly ticking down to an unpleasant death.
Her grip on her Vestian sidearm tightened.
*
“Eyes up, Guardian.”
She woke with a scream, which quickly devolved into coughing. She found herself immobilised by the pilot’s harness and struggled to extricate herself. An alien sunset greeted her through the shattered canopy.
“Easy, easy”, came that strange mechanical voice. “I know this will all seem very strange, but you were dead, and I am your Ghost.”
“What?” She croaked, limbs slackening. What did the voice mean, “dead”?
“It seems like you were shot down in a battle and crashed here.” The source of the voice made its way into her view. She didn’t know what to make of it at first; the Ghost, as it called itself, was a small, white drone of some sort. Triangular pieces detached themselves and orbited around a central blue eye as it scanned her. There was a clicking sound as her pilot’s harness became unlatched.
With a surge of alacrity, she scrambled out of her seat and through the shattered cockpit of the ship. Whatever it was, she couldn’t trust this “Ghost”. How could she have been dead? It must have been a trick of some sort, a ploy of…
Who had she fought against?
She faceplanted into the rust-coloured sand. Whose side had she fought on? Why had the battle been fought?
What was her name?”
“Why are there these holes in my memory?” She asked, voice shaking as she turned to face the drone. “Why can’t I remember?”
“I don’t know.” The Ghost was frank. “It’s just the way it works. For what it’s worth, I’m sorry.”
Feeling defeated, she clambered back into the cockpit. It didn’t take much rummaging for her to find some small arms stowed away. The knife seemed as sharp as the day it was made; she wasn’t as sure about the rifle’s condition. Its housing was the colour of old bone, with patterned blue cloth ornamenting it. A faint sensation of mist dewing against her skin washed over her when she touched it. A compact, purple pistol, lying near the pilot’s yoke, followed. The faint red-brown stain on its barrel didn’t bear thinking about.
“I assume you have a destination in mind”, she said as she climbed back out of the cockpit. “Though I doubt this thing could get us there.”
“I need to get you to Earth, to the Last Safe City.” It looked over the crashed ship. “Even if this ship could get off the ground, it’s certainly not spaceworthy.”
“Any ideas, Ghost?” She sighed, idly dusting sand off the hull, near the ship’s nose. Maybe if she saw the ship’s name, it would jog her memory.
Wind, sand, and time had taken their toll, leaving the ship’s name illegible. Underlining it, however, were a pair of stylised sphinxes. None of it knocked loose any memories, but it did give her an idea.
“Do you have a name, Ghost?” She asked. It answered in the negative. “How about Riddle, then? And you can call me Sphinx. Mysterious new beginnings, and all that.” Even if she didn’t know her past, the sphinx emblazoned on her ship was a tiny link to it.
Sphinx and Riddle trudged through the desert, heading towards a light on the horizon. The Ghost claimed it was an outpost, a remnant of humanity’s Golden Age. It said it was dangerous, though, occupied by aliens it called the Cabal.
“It’s our best bet for repairing your ship and getting to the City”, Riddle had said. “Failing that, we might be able to steal a ship from the Cabal. Or maybe even find some Golden Age tech!”
As they travelled, Sphinx felt an energy building inside her, an excitement for what was to come. In her past life as a pilot, she must have loved the thrill of combat.
The rifle rattled in Sphinx’s hand, and one of the rotund Cabal aliens dropped, its head fountaining oil and blood. She heard a roar behind her, and she turned to face a charging Cabal, grabbing her knife, lunging, and knowing in an instant that her stab would fall short.
Electricity filled her, and Sphinx blinked forward, catching her foe with the knife, driving it into the seam between the Cabal’s helmet and its bulky armour. The blade dripped oil and viscera when she pulled it free. Sparks danced on its surface.
“How did I do that!? What was that electri–“
Sphinx gasped as she awoke. She ran her hands over her stomach, where she’d felt a bullet the size of her clenched fist smash through her. There was no wound, nor any puncture in her flight suit.
“You died”, Riddle said in her mind. “Fortunately for you, I can fix that.”
“That was the Light you were talking about, right?” Sphinx asked. “That impossible knife attack, and this resurrection?”
“Yes”, it replied. “You’re not quite immortal, however. Some places, some foes, will prevent me from reviving you. Instances like that, you’ll need another Guardian to help.”
“But not here.”
“No. The Cabal are violent conquerors, nothing more. The stink of the Darkness doesn’t whirl around them, nor do they possess powers like yours.”
Sphinx hefted her gun. “Let’s go then. We have a ship to repair.”
On her seventh life, Sphinx channelled the Light into her blade. It crackled with Arc fire, her every slash seeming to drag her forward, her backsteps pulling her from sight. Her Arc Blade thinned the Cabal to a bare few, and her rifle finished the rest. She unloaded a few rounds from her pistol into each of their heads for good measure, and tore one of their banners from the outpost’s walls, to use as a makeshift cloak; even wearing a full flight suit, the sand was starting to irritate her.
The two of them scoured the facility for anything to repair the ship, and got lucky when they searched the third bunker; it was a workshop, with the tools and parts they would need to get her ship spaceworthy. There was even a cockpit canopy in perfect condition, though it would take some creative welding to get it to fit Sphinx’s ship properly. A Cabal vehicle – an Interceptor, according to Riddle – served as an ample transport for the parts.
It took three gruelling days and a death due to dehydration and overexertion, but the ship was ready for flight. The ungainly craft, never intended for in-atmosphere flight, struggled its way into orbit. Once it broke free from Mars’ gravity, however, it was smooth flying. It felt good to be behind the yoke of a fighter, again. Even if it was a crippled, haphazardly repaired fighter.
“Point me in the right direction, Riddle”, Sphinx said. “Last City, here we come.”