Exos were never intended to be able to experience fear or dread, but Cayde feels at least something similar to it run down his back when he sees Zavala and Hawthorne drag Ikora between them, the normally so pristine Warlock looking ruffled and bruised.

"Cayde, with me," Zavala commandeers, his voice hard. "Now."

The expression on his face is severe enough for Cayde to drop any attempt at making the situation more lighthearted.

Without another word the Exo jumps down from the crate he has been sitting on, heading in front of the other Vanguards and Hawthorne to pave the way if the crowds gather too close.

"Where to? The barn?"

"The barn," Zavala confirms tersely.

Ikora, as banged up and bruised as she is, still manages to keep a firm grasp on Hawthorne for the entire walk. She clings to the other woman momentarily for balance when needed, at least until she is seated on a chair, only then letting go. Her face as grim as Zavala's, Hawthorne immediately digs around for a bottle of antiseptic in one of her pouches, and puts it down on the table already holding the maps.

So many are still without their Light, and while Guardians are leagues healthier than civilians, infected wounds can very easily claim their lives when current affairs are as they are.

"I'll look for some bandages and rags to clean you up with," she says before exiting the shack, leaving the three Vanguards behind to talk in private.

The silence feels thick, almost real enough to taste in the air, and for every moment that Ikora sways where she sits, Cayde feels that dread-like sensation run rampant throughout his systems. It's like something is stuck in-between his joints and small internal cogs, something that refuses to leave and instead gnaws and gnaws and gnaws.

He doesn't like the feeling.

"Zavala… Cayde…" Ikora breathes heavily, one hand curled protectively around something small, looking more relieved to see the two of them than Cayde has ever seen her before. It's mildly concerning when he is much more used to see her looking austere and collected, not frayed and tattered.

"Ikora, what happened to you? Where's the Guardian?"

Zavala's query has Ikora look down at the muddied floor of the barn with a heavy look in her eyes, which only lets Cayde's mind spin worse and worse conclusions to her unspoken answer. Without a word she holds out the hand she has been keeping close to herself, revealing a scratched-up Ghost.

"Hold on, that's…"

No…

Cayde falls silent as he stares down at the small machine lying in Ikora's hand. He'd recognize that anywhere from the pale green lacquer that coats its frame and the just as green lens.

"The Guardian, she… she stayed behind on Io, allowing me to escape on her ship and getting here," Ikora speaks quietly as she too stares down at the small machine being cradled in her hand. "If not for her, I would not be here right now."

"Stayed behind?" Cayde echoes, faceplates meeting in a frown. "Explain."

"Vex and Cabal were shooting at us from every direction, a simple reconnaissance had gone wrong. I was hit but she dragged me to her ship and had me thrown in along with her Ghost. She told me to find you."

Ikora strokes the Ghost in her hands with a gentle touch and the small machine flickers online, whirring as the outer spikes rotates into place.

"Commander Zavala? Cayde?"

Its voice is… scarily quiet, almost hesitant as its lens focuses on the Titan and Hunter in front of it. Honestly, it reminds Cayde too much of those other scattered groups of guardians he has seen gather on the Farm, all cradling their dead Ghosts in their hands with blank expressions on their faces and a noticeable lack of Light around their personas.

"I am sorry for this, little one," Ikora continues in that same quiet tone from before as she lifts the palm holding the Ghost, "but I need you to show your video logs of our departure from Io."

"Of course, Master Ikora," the Ghost rattles out, making Cayde almost wince from how detached and mechanical the voice suddenly sounds.

He has become used to the Ghost of his unofficial favorite—"Favorite? Naw, I have no idea what you're on 'bout, Zavala!"—Guardian always sounding just a bit more… humane, much more lively than… than this. Nonetheless, Cayde focuses on the little guy as its lens flickers between black, blue, red, green, and lights up the room with a shaky recording.

The sound of gunshots is loud and echoes through the air. Two shapes, Ikora and the Guardian, are running in front of the camera, with the Guardian looking back every few seconds to reach behind with her gun and fire off shots of her own. Her helmet is gone and her cape is tattered with bullet-holes.

Ikora is bleeding from a wound in her shoulder, but the camera focuses on a ship not far from where they are. The sound of Cabal legionnaires can be heard somewhere behind them.

"There it is! Our ship!" the Ghost calls out and the camera shakes up and down before stabilizing once more. "Guardian, it's not far now!"

"Ghost, get Master Ikora to the Farm!" the Guardian yells as she keeps a tight grip around Ikora, her face shown to wince when a shot from somewhere behind them chips the rock by her head.

They all stop in front of the ship but the Guardian aims at something behind the Ghost's field of view and fires off a series of shots with her hand cannon. Cries of Cabal dying somewhere behind the Ghost can be heard.

"Guardian, you must be out of your mind!" Ikora's voice cuts through, but it is laced with obvious pain despite her not being seen by the camera. "There are too many for you to take on alone!"

"That ship can't hold more than a guardian and their Ghost, and right now you are the bigger priority. Get to the Farm and figure out a plan against the Cabal!"

The camera flies closer to the Guardian and she reaches out to rub a gloved hand against its side. A smile appears on her face before she nudges the Ghost towards Ikora with that same hand.

"I'll be fine. I'll hunker down somewhere an—MOTHERFUCKER!" the Guardian is cut off when a shot from one of the Cabal hits her arm and she drops the hand cannon with a curse. "Go, Ikora. NOW!"

More shots are heard as the Ghost's camera flies between Ikora and the Guardian before something grabs it out of the air and then the vision shows the inside of the ship instead before static interrupts the image and fades to black.

"The recording that you just saw is more than a week old," Ikora sighs as she stares down at the Ghost and puts it down on the table in front of her.

"A week?!" Cayde snaps, inwardly reeling at how furious he suddenly feels. "How the Hell did it take you more than a week to get from Io to Earth?! What, your warp drive malfunctioned?"

"The Cabal were on my trail from the moment I exited Io's atmosphere, Cayde!" Ikora bites right back, defensive as all Hell, but rightly so when he's acting like this. "I had no choice but to travel as covertly as possible if I did not wish for the Cabal to find or track me to here!"

The Exo bites back a curse as he turns on his heel and begins to pace from one end of the small barn to the other, wringing his hands as his processors starts to draw up one plan after the other, every new one just a tad more daring and downright ridiculous in an attempt to find a solution to the situation.

It's not really helping, but if he doesn't do something, if he can't get something to do, then he'll explode.

"Cayde, you must calm down! We cannot give room for anger and quick tempers if we are to find a solution to this!" Zavala says, his tone straight and to the point as always, but that… that doesn't matter.

It's not Zavala's protégé currently missing somewhere in the ass-end of nowhere on fucking Io. It's not Zavalawho is just about ready to combust if he doesn't find something to do.

The news of the Guardian, one of his own Hunters, has Cayde rattled in a way he has not experienced in a long, long time. The usual itchy feeling he usually gets whenever the Tower becomes almost too claustrophobic is suddenly back, only ten—no a hundred—times worse.

He was the one to lead his hunter towards Io, fully believing them capable of handling whatever issues Fate decided to throw their way. He was the one to pat them on the shoulder and give them a one-armed hug before waving them off towards the stars. He was the one to… to…

He had been the one to send the naïve, little squire straight into the dragon's lair, fully believing that they would slay the beast, and now he might never see them ever again.

A small noise interrupts the whirlwind that is steadily building inside his mind, making Cayde stop and look towards Ikora who was still holding the Ghost in her hands.

The small Ghost quivers as it floats mere centimeters above Ikora's palm. It almost seems as if the small machine is trying to curl up around itself—looking at it is downright painful.

"Save my Guardian! Please, save her!" it pleads, lens focusing on Cayde as it wobbles slightly before taking off from the table, slowly floating towards the Hunter Vanguard.

When Cayde sent the Guardian towards Io he didn't really think much of it. After all, it was only a matter of getting Ikora here to Earth, to the Farm, so that the Vanguard is gathered once more and they'll be able to kick Gha-whatshisname to kingdom come. He has never once doubted that his little protégé could handle it.

Taking out the Black Garden? Not a problem.

Surviving Ghaul's onslaught on the Last City? Pfft, as if that had gotten them down for long.

He never thought that he could actually be proven wrong. It's not a very nice feeling.

Cayde lets out a sigh, the noise rattling and eerily mechanical as his vocal units spark to life. There's just no way that he is going to allow one of his own to be stranded somewhere without the backup that they so desperately needs; he has already lost so many good friends to the Cabal, the Vex—to so many of the Traveler's enemies, and damned if he is about to lose his protégé as well.

"Zavala," he states, squaring his shoulders. "I'm going to need a ship."

oOo

Cayde-6, Vanguard of the Hunters of the Last City.

Too whimsical, a Hunter stuck with ideas of glory and battle in his silly, horned metal head.

He knows what the Warlocks and the Titans whisper behind his back when he isn't paying attention, knows that the whispers more often than not result in brawls at the local bars when his Hunters learn of their backtalk. He just smiles through the never-far-behind lecture that Zavala stands ready with as soon as he hears about it too.

Of course, Cayde is down at the orderlies the very moment he gets out, just to pay the bail for his Hunters and make sure that they promise to have new, interesting stories when they come home again. As repayment for him bailing them out, naturally.

It's not as if the other Vanguards can stop him from looking out for his own, 'cause he sure as Hell has enough blackmail on both of them—of course he won't ever really use it, but the threat of it is always nice to have.

He knows about Ikora sneaking sweets to the Warlocks who often hunkers down in the Archives to research and study, despite her vehemently protesting that they were something she has confiscated and is about to dispose of. He knows about Zavala quietly taking some of the best raids and strikes off the official rosters and handing them to some of the best among the Titans, convincingly surprised whenever someone points it out how odd it is that the Titans more often than not seems to have such daring, thrilling missions to complete.

They all have their favorites, the ones among their respective classes that they try to wrap in grandeur, glory and who knows what else that sounds spiffy and fancy and all kinds of weird, even if the others always turns their noses up at such preposterous behavior.

Cayde was a Hunter, and a damn good one at that if he might say so himself, before he was a Vanguard, and Hunters, they always look out for their own.

They look out for those who are lagging just a bit behind, and have the backs of those who are in the front, scouting ahead.

Hunters have each other's back, no matter what happens, and this is certainly not going to be any different. One of his own is out where they're not able to reach the safe shores, so he's going to be there for them.

End of story. Capishe, Zavala?

"Zavala," he says, squaring his shoulders. "I'm going to need a ship."

Silence fills the barn at the Exo's bold statement—no, demand.

"Absolutely not!" Zavala thunders a few moments later, an almost identical expression on his face, but Cayde is having none of it.

This time he is not going to just back off and go grumble in a corner like a petulant child who has been put in the timeout corner. This time he is going to do what is right and not what his associates demand of him.

He ain't having it, cowboy. No siree!

"You are needed here, Cayde, with the rest of the Vanguard to plan an attack to take back the Last City from the Cabal! If you are off gallivanting across the system, then what are we supposed to do?"

"We can't afford to lose the Guardian!" Cayde argues right back at him. "So far, they are the only one who somehow regained their Light, and you'd what? Rather send out some random, ragtag fireteam to get her back here? They're Lightless, Zavala!"

"Your point being?"

"My point being that if you send out some barely-wet-behind-the-ears fireteam this'll only end in tragedy! At least with an experienced soldier you'd be able to guarantee at least a chance of success!"

Ikora keeps silent as she watches the two of them bite and snarl at each other. Quite frankly, Cayde is beyond caring at this point. He knows that both of them just as headstrong as the other, but neither of them will back down from this.

They're probably going to give her a mighty fine migraine at the end of this, if they don't end up eating each other alive, that is.

"Both of you, enough!"

Both Cayde and Zavala stops snapping at each other, each of them looking to Ikora instead. She's standing on shaky legs, even Cayde can see that, but she brushes off his attempt to help her sit down again with an irritated huff and swats his hand away. Definitely not in the mood for a helping hand right now.

"Fighting amongst ourselves will not help us here. We need to figure out a plan in any case, because like it or not, Cayde is right, Zavala!" Ikora's voice is sharp and stern, like a teacher scolding two of her students, and right now Cayde would be feeling damn close to one if it wasn't because of the Hunter he's currently missing. Ikora looks at the both of them with which can only be described as disappointment. "The Guardian is the only one so far who has managed to regain their Light, and therefore we need them. None of the other Guardians, ourselves included, have managed to even regain a semblance of the powers we used to command."

"Letting Cayde go gallivanting off on a hero's journey is nothing but a risk!" Zavala starts, but quiets down when Ikora holds up but a single finger.

"It's the lesser of two evils, Zavala!" Ikora finally snapped at him, causing Zavala to jerk back in surprise. "Send out a fireteam of tired, mourningGuardians and we lose both them and her. Send out Cayde and at the very least there is a chance that it might succeed!"

Cayde stares at Ikora in something akin to wonder as he hears her defend him and his actions—his demand. Silence echoes in the barn as the yelling finally ceases, stops all together, but the thick sensation from before is right behind it. She needs to teach him how to do that finger-thing. It'd be damn useful out in the field or when his duckling Hunters needs some breaking in.

"And you!" Ikora snaps, twisting like a whirlwind and suddenly Cayde is finding himself on the end of her hawk-like gaze and outstretched, reprimanding finger. "You should know better than to act with your typical bravado, Cayde! We know that this is a stressful situation, especially for you, but I was there! I could only look on while she fought off who knows how many Vex and Cabal, so how do you think I feel about letting her stay there?

"If I could then I would have switched places with her, that is what I want to do, but my head tells me no, that it would only have ended in tragedy if I were to fall and she would have left Io with only disappointment and blood on her hands and her soul!"

She's barely keeping it together, he realizes while staring at Ikora. Her eyes are bright and glistening, and he realizes that…

Ikora is holding back tears. She's sad that this happened in the first place.

"We cannot truly stop you, can we?" Zavala finally sighs, suddenly sounding a lot more tired than he appears, and sits down on a rickety folding chair. "You are going to scurry off, one way or another."

"Damn straight I am," Cayde snorts, keeping his air of bravado close around himself like armor, before his faceplates shifted to form a serious expression. "I told the kid about Io. 'S my fault that this happened in the first place."

"You were the reason she found me?" Ikora frowns as she discreetly wipes at the corners of her eyes and Cayde pretends not to see how the fabric of her gloves come away moistened, it's the least he can do when she practically upended her heart about the situation just before.

"Yeah, but now the only real Guardian we had is gone, Ikora!" Cayde snapped, wincing when the Ghost on the table made a despairing, mechanical noise. He turned from the two of them and crossed his arms. "I have to make this right somehow, and I'll start with getting our Guardian back here."

A heavy hand fell on his shoulder-plate, Zavala's, no doubt.

"You do realize that there is no room for mistakes in this, Cayde? If you screw this up, then that's it. There won't be a second or third chance for you this time. No amount of jokes will bring any of you back."

"Just who do you think I am, Zavala?" he smirks, faceplates twisting to display a savage grin, all mechanical teeth and rage and for a moment Cayde truly feels more like a machine than he feels human. It's something he revels in while it lasts, because he knows that there will be no room for regrets here.

"Very well then. Go to Io, get the Guardian out of there. But promise that both of you will come back."

Cayde turned to look the Awoken Titan in the eyes, "Damn straight we will."

oOo

Hawthorne points him to a ship, Ikora throws a tightly packed duffle bag at him and he's off. Heading for the stars in what seems like forever, even though he took a ship off Earth before to Nessus and then from Nessus back to Earth only days ago.

But he's free.

For the first time in freaking forever he's free and he's himself and he's feeling fucking wonderful!

His Sundance collides with his horn and lets out a whirring, chiding sound that makes him look at her immediately.

"Focus, Cayde," she chides and bobs up and down in the nonexistent gravity of the cabin. "The mission, right?"

She centers him, always has like the little bobbing ball of light and hopes and dreams and purpose that she is. Cayde loves her with every bit of his soul and being. She's amazing, is what she damn well is.

He can't resist making his ship do just one more whirl before he stabilizes in empty space, hovers far enough above Earth that he can see both the planet and the Moon not too far away. With the stars of distant systems covering the background, it sure is a pretty picture being painted before him here.

"Set coordinates for Io, would ya?" he mutters and taps his Ghost on the side of its frame. "We've got a Guardian to save."

Around him stars become stripes and Earth becomes nothing but a blue and green little blur for a few precious moments before it fades from view. He's off again, flying through the stars.

Traveler, how he missed this!

With a warp drive at hand the trip won't take more than maybe thirty minutes, forty if he's unlucky and the drive can't handle too much strain, but he doubts it.

The time is passed with cleaning his Ace of Spades thoroughly, checking his ammunition, poking at his little Sundance until she stings his fingers in annoyance. Space is flying by outside, stars still stripes and the planets nothing but momentary smudges of color.

Was this what she saw as well before she landed?

Did she see the stars zoom by before she tumbled to Io's surface, high on the adrenaline and the sensation than nothing can stand in her way?

Maybe she-!

"Cayde."

His Ghost brings him out of his musings, and when Cayde looks up he sees Jupiter looming in front of him, the enormous gas giant lazily twisted by the ever-raging storms that dots its dazzling surface.

Not far from where they hang in the emptiness of space is Io, a ball of yellow and orange and brownish red.

"Let's go," he says tersely, assuming manual control and steers towards the surface.

A hand reaches down to grab his gun, holds its handle tight in a vicegrip and continues on.

The Vanguard gets left behind among the stars, staring down at Io, and in its place, the Hunter assumes its spot.

Io's surface is dust and blood and mechanical parts.

The coordinates that Ikora jotted down for him are an absolute mess. The natural rock formations are twisted to Hell and beyond by shots from both his wayward Hunter and her pursuers, no doubt.

"This… this is gonna be a lot tougher than I thought it would."

Remains of Vex litter the ground, rotting corpses of the Cabal are scattered liberally around as well, but what makes him go a little weak in his knees are the tracks of blood—"Human," his Ghost speaks softly, as if she's afraid of his reaction—that zigzag in the yellow sand.

Io has had little atmosphere left ever since the Traveler left it behind, so practically everything that is stepped on is preserved almost exactly as it is, or at least degrading slow enough for anyone to not notice right away, and the tracks that zigzag across the sand, splattered with blood, indicating a struggle.

She struggled as she was taken, he knows that now.

She might not be alive any more, no Ghost nearby to resurrect her or anything else to save her, a treacherous little voice whispers in his mind and Cayde slams a hand into the sand as he kneels down.

"Shut the Hell up!" he hisses and clenches the hand buried in the sand. He digs his fingers down, down, down—as far down as his fingers can go—and obscures the tracks before him, only stopping when the sound of metal groaning against the force being put on it reaches his audio units.

"She's alive."

He says it like a mantra and begins to follow the tracks, continues on when traces of struggling legs are replaced by wide marks, marks of Cabal tanks.

Goliath-class, the same little treacherous voice from before whispers again, but this time its helpful and not obnoxious.

He can work with that.

Cayde continues down the hovercraft's tracks and uncocks the safety from his gun. His Ghost hovers close by. Together they begin their search.

oOo

Once upon a time Cayde was young and idealistic and thought that he would always just roam around, never settling down—ever.

That was before Andal and the Vanguard Bet—back when his human life still was nothing but a hazy blur and the name 'Ace' still rang clear as day despite everything.

Before he had to write everything down, before he—!

The Cabal's terrified noises drags him out of his melancholic thoughts, drags him back to the present.

Bang

Cayde pulls the trigger and watches coldly as the Cabal in front of him jerks when his bullet collides with the floor mere centimeters from the Cabal's feet. He lets out a sigh as he raises the hand cannon to point at the Cabal's face.

"I guess we'll try this one more time, big fella… Where is she?"

"You will get nothing from me, cur!" the Cabal splutters and tries to scurry back against the wall.

It is almost pathetic how desperate the alien acts now when death is staring it right in the face, but Cayde's not about to take pity on the damn thing all of a sudden.

Looking back, it had been almost too easy for Cayde to get his mechanical ass into the Cabal encampment and get to this idiot.

"That's the wrong answer, pal," Cayde snarls as his grip tightens around the handle of his Ace of Spades, curls around the trigger. "Now, I suggest you think reeeal carefully just one more time before these walls are gonna get decorated real fancy with your innards."

The Cabal howls one insult after the other at him, curses him up, down and to the Moon and back, but at this point Cayde is beyond caring. He raises a foot and slams it down on the alien's leg, hearing the crunch of broken armor and the scream of the now-injured Cabal.

He's not proud of it, but if this is what it will take for the asshole to talk, then this is what it will take.

"Holler all you like, there aren't anyone around to hear ya. I made damn sure of that."

The two continue for quite a while like that.

It takes a while. It takes a very long while before his unwilling idiot talks, but talk he does, and oh, there are so many things to talk about!

A gathering of gibberish and just a bit of bloodied spittle later, Cayde is strolling down the hallways with his gun in one hand, a map of the premises in the other, and Sundance is busy lighting the way for him like the darling little thing she is.

The holding cells are not far from where he ambushed the Cabal from before, and the only resistance he meets is a pair of overworked guards just sitting outside a single cell.

Really, he's doing them a favor with two well-placed stun-grenades and a firm pistol-whipping to the face.

Whistling a catchy little tune he discovered not long ago, the tone sounding more mechanical than he'd like, he snatches the keycards to the cells off one of the guards and shuffles through them as the tune reaches its crescendo.

It takes a few tries before he finds the correct one for the cell, and the rest are thrown haphazardly behind his back as the cell-door opens and he struts inside.

The sight that meets him has Cayde feel as if he has short-circuited.

The Guardian lives, although it looks like that might soon be rectified if the Cabal have any say in it.

Her face is bared to the world but covered in purple and black bruises on almost every inch. The only places where the bruising is gone is instead covered in cuts or caked, flaky spots of dry blood.

If he had been human Cayde would have been hard pressed to keep from retching.

She stirs when the door opens and lets in the dull orange light that illuminates the corridor outside, but then turns away and has her body curl up as if to protect her vital parts from incoming danger.

No doubt that is what she has been subjected to before he got here.

Cayde only breathes her name before he kneels down before her, hands stretched out carefully towards her as if she is a spooked animal and not a fierce warrior.

"C-Cayde?" she rasps and her eyes crack open to look at him. Slowly disbelief begins to set in as she blinks to clear her vision. "Is this real… or is it just another nightmare?"

"Nightmare?" Cayde laughs, although the sound is strained as he slowly reaches out a hand and barely holds back a curse when she flinches away the moment that their fingers come into contact with each other. "Sweetheart, I better be the products of your wildest dreams or not at all. Come on, we're gettin' you outta here!"

One moment's hesitation turns into sheer desperation for friendly contact as she suddenly clutches his hand tightly and doesn't let go when Cayde shuffles closer to try and pick her up.

Her pained whine stops him immediately.

"Fuck, should've brought your Ghost along!" he hisses and begins to retract his hand but another whine from her has him hesitate long enough for her to yank him back towards her.

He barely catches himself before he is about to slam into her and leans away just enough for him not to be crowding her, gives her space to breathe.

She only curls around him, one shaky hand snaking itself around the back of his neck and pressing her almost completely flush against his body.

Good girl, his mind coos. Cayde only tightens the grip he has on her.

"My Ghost?" she rasps and he shifts a little awkwardly when he sees the tear-tracks now running down her cheeks.

"Arrived safely with Ikora. Little guy's been worried sick 'bout you, actually. It isn't good for them to be so far away from their guardians, y'know."

"Cayde… I want… I want to go home," she cries and Cayde feels as if his heart is breaking, just a little bit inside.

"We're going home now, cross my heart," he croons at her and once more tries to move around so he can lift her off the ground. This time she allows it, although from the way her face twists up in a grimace, it is no doubt a pain-filled endeavor.

Cayde straightens up with his arms full of injured Guardian and walks out of the cell in silence but breaks it every few moments to talk quietly to his Guardian.

He's found her and he's bringing her home.

The Cabal can just try to come and take her.

Let them fucking come.