Hunter's Retreat

   Servitors. How should I describe them? They are above Kells in Fallen hierarchy - they are like both the priests and deities all at once. I don't suppose that is all that unlike a number of ancient Earth societies - the clergy often became the gods of their villages after all - the clergy, the scholars, the scientists; whatever magician of the given age was the power-that-was. Servitors are bio-mechanical floating orbs of onyx, emitting a strange purple field around themselves and their minions, and possessing a single concave circle eye which doubles as weapon and trebles as communication device. They float, shoot, command, and sometimes gloat. They are nasty, irritating globes of annoyance and burning plasma. I despise them, but they often carry precious materials. So I hunt them whenever I can.    Sepiks Prime was an especially nasty servitor. As the Prime of the House of Devils, he essentially ruled the Earth sphere. Though there were other Fallen Houses that occupied terr

   "Ghost, how many times have you had to re-integrate my body?" Patrols had netted us weapon upgrades, new vehicles, and even new skills, but it had come with a price as well.    "One hundred forty six times." Somehow this wasn't surprising, just a little depressing.    "What about how many times other guardians have saved us from the dark?"    "Forty seven."     Since the Speaker had called for an all out assault on Sepiks Prime's stronghold in the Cosmodrome, the Devil's Lair, guardians had been going out in larger and larger groups. Our patrols had been skirmishing against their patrols for years, but now things had escalated. Where we had been running three and four man fire teams, now we were running platoons. The area known as the Rocket Yard was crawling with Fallen. Redoubts and entrenchments had been constructed and were reinforced constantly by air and orbital drop. Aside from the large drop ships, even a gi

   What does a new guardian do with a newly repaired ship, fresh riches, loads of ammunition, and updated gear? He goes patrolling. He does patrols till glimmer is dropping from his pockets and he is so loaded down with engrams that he has to go back to the tower to store some items and sell others. Oh, what are glimmer and engrams? Yeah, I guess I really didn't explain glimmer before, I just mentioned it as being a currency. Glimmer is programmable matter. Essentially, engrams are as well - they just typically have already been encoded or programmed with an item or items. Old earth physicists had long told people that matter and energy were simply different states of one another - glimmer and engrams are a brilliant application of the principle.    So, although I could travel to the ends of the galaxy and back in moments, I was tasked with patrolling the Cosmodrome. That ugly, near-barren patch of permafrost, over-laden with the remnants and reminders of a dead society, would

   Guardianship, what is it? Why would one being be a guardian of others, why be responsible for others? What makes it necessary, what makes it right? Why does being chosen by some alien, some invader suddenly make an individual responsible for others? Where does a moral obligation begin and why? Perhaps these are valid questions, I would suppose if we were students in a philosophy class in some lyceum of old we would have time to indulge ourselves in such reflection and reverie. But the truth is, we inherently know and feel this obligation from the moment we are aware of our own abundance of talent and other people's lack. From a practical sense, we can see and understand the need for society - individuals have need of other individuals at the basest level to propagate the species, but also for higher needs, psychological, production of food, water, and shelter. And on top of everything, defense of self and species is reliant upon having the numbers to defend with.    Those tha

   The tower was splashed in bright sunlight that fateful afternoon. I say fateful, because it was that afternoon, after listening to the Speaker, that I finally knew my path. I haven't wavered from that path since then, but enough of that, I first need to tell you of the Speaker.    Well, no, let me take this in order. First I went to the gunsmith. Banshee, what a name and what a character. I found out later that the banshee was a legend from ancient earth, a ghost with a terrifying voice and otherworldly power. Somehow the Hive Wizards come to mind when I think of them, but that is a tangent I will follow some other time. Banshee's voice grated like that of someone who had smoked cigarettes for thirty years. To me that seems funny more now than ever - Banshee is an Exo, and noone has smoked, really smoked, in a few hundred years. And of course, I shouldn't have any idea how a smoker's voice should sound, yet somehow, somehow, it was all too familiar. Memories, and m

  The Tower is an amazing place. The hustle and bustle of a thousand guardians, vendors, faction leaders and others running about in various directions fills the air with constant chatter. Space and air crafts of various shapes and sizes buzz in and out adding to the ever present noises of the various machines that keep everything operating.  The colors were such a contrast to the dull, sad Cosmodrome. Ghost let me stand and soak it in for a moment before pushing me toward a downward stair and hallway to the north.   "Time for you to meet the Vanguard." Ghost floated ahead.   "A vanguard? This place doesn't look quite big enough for a whole army." I retorted.   "Don't be silly. These are the guardians who head each class of Guardian in the Vanguard." Ghost sounded impatient.   "I'm not being silly, words have inherent meanings you know. Besides, how am I to know yet what you mean - I don't really have a context for what you are

  I wanted to look at everything around me - everything was new, familiar but new. From the cover of the larger building, the command center I suppose, I could see crumbled highways, rusted hulks of vehicles, and broken down heavy equipment. It was amazing. It was also depressing.  All these things were a testament to the greatness and failure of humanity all at once.   "We need to get to that ship, hurry!" Ghost was virtually pulling me further into the building.   "What happened?" I was still entranced by the massively morbid scene.   "The collapse? It was essentially an extinction event, or nearly so. I'll tell you more later, just get moving. We need that ship - we need to get to the Tower." Ghost chirped fearfully.   "You really are scared." I chided him.   "Only because I know the danger." Ghost fired back.   We made our way through rooms that were rough husks, burned and rusted out computers and equipment filled t

   So what is it; to be human that is? I certainly wasn't sure what I was when Ghost woke me. I had skill sets and knowledge that displayed training and years of it. I had the muscle memory of a warrior. My encounter with that first Dreg told me it wasn't just that I was a warrior - I was closer to a living weapon. But I wasn't just a dumb weapon - I understood combat, timing, emotion. I knew fight or flight decisions meant the difference in life or death. Survival of not only myself but others depended on the decisions I made. I didn't know who I was, but I felt there was a great significance to not only surviving but becoming more capable.    "We need to move more quickly." Ghost was not frantic, but he certainly wasn't calm either.   "More of those?" I pointed back to a pile of Dregs we had just come through.   "Worse. These are just the lowest level combat and recon troops. My sensors are picking up far greater energy signatur

  So many thoughts, so many emotions. When my Ghost woke me from whatever plane of existence I was on, there were floods of images, pleasure, pain, loss, elation. There were the sensations of heat and cold - the wind on my face carrying a strange, acrid smell as I looked at the burned out and rusted hulks of metal around me. Bones and dust, decay and life - plant and animal - it was all so confusing for a moment.    And then there was Ghost, shouting at me to move and to hurry into a nearby building for cover. I heeded him, hesitating for a moment, like a child unsure of his parent's command. Why did I need to run? Why that building? Why did I need a weapon? Why did this all come so naturally? Though Ghost filled me in later on a thousand years of history, in that moment, I was very confused. Lucky for me, the confusion wasn't paralyzing.    Despite the dilapidated condition of the facility, the building was still warmer than the outdoor; unfortunately, I was not the on

  Ghost said my last post was a little lacking in explanation.  He said, "What if the reader has no idea who the Traveller is or what a ghost is?" I told him he was being nit-picky and annoying.  However, I will try to explain a little more, since the whole purpose of this charade is to record our doings, my doings, for posterity. I can't help but feel silly, but Ghost insists it is for the best.   Who is the Traveller?   Who knows? To look at him, or it, certainly isn't very revealing. He looks sort of like a big ball of rock that his been cracked and broken in a couple places, but as Cayde would say "looks ain't everything." I suppose I will have to explain who Cayde is later - just know he would definitely say something like that, then follow it up later after something unusual happened with an "Am I right or am I right? Right." That's Cayde, but I was trying to explain the Traveller, and that is another story. It is really diffi

 I am a guardian - Teirnan Starfall of Earth. That sounds rather pretentious, let me try again.  First of all, Ghost made me do this. Well, I suppose " made"  would be too strong a way of putting it, but you know what I mean. Ghost thinks more records need to be made of how life is being lived. So much history has been lost after all.   I have no memory of who I was before - before Ghost reassembled my body and consciousness into a single coherent, cohesive being. Whoever I was, whatever I was before the fall - those things were washed away by years of entropy. When Ghost woke me, wretched remains were scattered round me - husks of humans and their machines - dessicated by the weathering of untold seasons. "Automobiles." Ghost told me some time later - those machines around me. There was a great herd of them around, all empty save the dust of decay.   So Ghost found me, and pulled me together using the Traveller's light. and then what. Words he spoke - and I

  Teirnan is a character I have created many times over.  In my poetry and fiction he is a mariner of the heavens - a grand voyager who led his people into the stars and continues to light the way forever. In Destiny he is a hunter. He hunts his enemies, Earth's enemies; he hunts truth - the truth about the fall, the truth about himself. This is his story - his destiny.