Chapter 1: Rebirth

"Agh!" Pyrrha cried out as she fell to the ground of what was once Ozpin's office. The desk on it's side, the cogs the operated the clocktower thrown all over the place, and shards of glass littered the ground. Her sword was broken into three pieces and her shield who knows where after she threw it. The only thing she knew for certain was Cinder had outmaneuvered her, overpowered her, and out played her. She had killed Ozpin, taken what was left of the Fall Maiden's power from Amber, and coordinated a strike on Beacon Academy.

And now she was walking towards her, "It's unfortunate you were promised a power that was never truly yours." Her venomous voice told her. She didn't meet her face but Pyrrha was sure the vile woman was smirking. The glass heels came to her vision when she could spare glasses through each seething gasp. Pyrrha felt a hand as warm as fire grip her chin as Cinder knelt down almost to feel pity, "But take comfort in knowing that I will use it in ways you could never have imagined."

She knew this was it, if Cinder had killed Ozpin with no hesitation than she would do the same to her. There was no fight in her left, there was no way to escape, and there was no way Cinder would let her leave. Not even her spiteful demeanor would prevail over Cinder's desire for power. Wincing at the pain in her ankle, the glass arrow deeper into her skin she looked back directly at Cinder. To Cinder's surprise, Pyrrha didn't appear angry, she didn't appear afraid and grovel for mercy, but instead she stared at Cinder. Green eyes to golden amber. Through labored breaths, Pyrrha had to know.

"Do you believe in destiny?"

Amber eyes narrowed down at her, "Yes." The definite reply came and Cinder stood back up, she pushed Pyrrha back and it took what little strength she had left to not fall over. Glass rushed to Cinder and formed into a bow and an arrow followed shortly. Pyhrra's thought went to her parents, her friends, to the professors of Beacon. To everybody in Vale, and the rest of Remnant, how would they get back up from this? Then her thoughts finally floated to the one person she wished she could spend the rest of her life with.

"Jaune," she thought, in her current state tears were hard to come by but if she could have she would have been crying. He meant the world to her, she treated him as just a regular girl for the first time in her life. She had been put on a pedestal for so long, seen as nothing but a prolific fighter rather than a human with her own merits, her own interests, her own life. But nobody ever seemed to notice or care. Except Jaune, always Jaune. At the very least, if she died here, she went knowing how she felt about him. With one last breath she gazed at the tip of the arrow, "I'm sorry".

The longest second of silence ensued when the glass tipped pierced her body, then she started to gasp as she felt her lungs fail. The shaking of her body as her arm weakly rose maybe in an attempt to remove the arrow. But she knew that would do nothing so the limp limb fell by the wayside. Her hearing went away and she felt the tips of her fingers go numb. Her vision blurred and she was barely aware of when something warm gripped the top of her hair.

Everything after that turned to black.

-X-

It was early in the morning in the Last City, the sun had barely risen above the horizon. Most of the townsfolk hadn't even gotten up to start their daily business besides maybe the farmers tending to their crops. However above the walls and away from sitting underneath the monolithic, fractured body of the Traveller was the Tower. It was bustling with activity as it always was. The Tower rarely, if ever slept, protecting the universe from the Darkness never rests. The protectors, the Guardians, returning from long missions, to debrief, or to relax after patrolling the various planets and systems. Overlooking it all, standing on top of the vista was the Titan Vanguard, Zavala, Imposing, calm, composed, his blue skin serene that would match the summer sky rapidly approaching. He kept his eyes to the Traveller as he did everyday, hoping for a sign of things to change. The moon had been recaptured, it had been several months since then, but all he knew was that there had been an underlying evil this whole time. The Guardian that led the expedition into the Pyramid had given him the full report on the matter. He had been put into a position he despised, on the back foot waiting for the Pyramid to make a move. He had to wait and watch.

Away from Zavala, passing through the mass of Guardians going about their business turning in bounties and decrypting Engrams was a small cubed shaped light. "Hi, excuse me, passing through, step aside Ghost doing Ghost business," the floating red and black cube said. He waited behind another Guardian who had come between him and the Vanguard Commander. Typical it was.

"The coordinates for our target lie on Mars, I trust them to you, give them hell," Zavala had told the Guardian who walked away. He barely noticed when the solitary Ghost came up to him.

"Commander Zavala," the ghost said in a thick cockney accent, the Awoken Guardian turned back over to him.

"I just gave you the coordinates, is there something else you need?" He asked.

"Actually, that wasn't my Guardian, I don't have one," the Ghost said, "but what I do have is the most recent budgets from Chief Shipwright Holiday. She said she needed more tools due to the increase of ships making it through the hangar." The Ghost pulled up a screen with a blur of text until it scrolled to the bottom.

Zavala eyed it with skepticism, he didn't think he noticed that many ships come through lately. But Amanda did know what she was talking about, and he himself was busy controlling the Vanguard and monitoring the system. "Approved, she will have her equipment soon." At the bottom of the screen was a blank line soon filled by his signature.

The ghost quickly closed the screen and kept it's single eye neutral as it looked at Zavala, "Excellent, I'm sure she'll be glad to hear that." The Ghost then made his way away from Zavala and back into the mass of humans, Exos, and Awoken. Zavala turned back to the Traveller much to the Ghosts' pleasure as it quickly shifted course and dropped in between some pipes in the underlying infrastructure. He avoided the hissing steam and dripping water as he went into an alcove he called his own.

"Ok, now let's see," he said to himself as he scanned several items. A basic rifle, a sidearm, some ammunition, and some pieces of armor he had managed to acquire. He brought up the signed document just to make sure he was ready. "Alright," he said transmatting the materials and floating away towards the hangar.

The hangar was a noisy place, the sounds of torches, drills, and other awful tools sounded off to the Ghost's dismay. Amanda Holiday was at her usual place fixing what looked like an engine to a Sparrow. Her forehead stained with oil and her gloves holding a wrench as she flipped through some screen. The Ghost quickly floated towards her and cleared his throat, "Excuse me, Shipwright Holiday?"

The woman looked up from her screen and engine, she stood up with a smile, "Well hi little buddy, what can I do for ya?"

He ignored the 'little buddy', he hated that, "I have a ship requisition request from Commander Zavala, hangar twelve." He brought up the same screen that he had shown Zavala, only this time more slowly letting her read it over.

"Hangar twelve?" She scratched her head, "That should be the Nautilus Zero. Did he say what for?"

Here was the moment of truth, "A Guardian out in the Reef got stranded, his ship got damaged and is requesting assistance."

She scanned over the paragraphs the Ghost showed her, mulling it over, "Well I guess everything is in order, you and your Guardian heading out soon?"

"Immediately, Shipwright."

"Okay, then make sure to tell that stranded Guardian not to crash their ship again," She turned back around without so much as a second thought.

"I will make sure to tell them that," he replied and if he had feet there would be a skip in his step as he made his way over to hangar twelve. True to her word as the Nautilus ship lay dormant.

According to the documents he had the ship was freshly made, and the gunmetal grey color scheme proved that. Hopefully it would change when he returned to the Tower. To describe the ship, he would say it was bubbly. Round on top of round spheres merged together making the entirety of the hull which held the extra fuel cells enabling its specialization for long distance travel. The round bulbous cockpit didn't extend as long as the main two thrusters that flanked the pilot's seat making an awkward 'U' shape.

Quickly before anyone noticed the Ghost burst forward and its body dissolved into a light blue mist and the next second he reappeared in the cockpit of the Nautilus. "Alright," he said, sending a beam of similarly colored blue at the terminals of the ship. The dark cockpit lit up slowly as the terminals and screens came to life displaying engine status, location, and a few other warnings as most ships usually do when they start. Scanning through the screen the Ghost disabled the locking mechanisms keeping the ship stuck in the hangar. From outside he heard the muffled whirring of motors as mechanical arms colored in black and yellow tape receded from the ship. Interfacing with the ship again the hum of thrusters could be heard behind the Ghost. He didn't feel it but the cockpit turned and rocked slightly as it went airborne.

There was a small moment of hesitation, there was no going back he thought. There was no telling if he was going to be welcomed back into the Tower if they found out what he really was doing. The open sky was out there and so many ships were in view. Coming into the hangar, leaving the hanging, crossing through the landscape maybe heading into the European Dead Zone, and some going across into the open vastness of space. The free, dangerous, exciting vastness of space

"No," he told himself, "I have to do this. If I spend one more day analyzing monetary reports I will go insane. At least out there I can find somebody."

When the ship gave him the message he was all clear he fired the thrusters to take him out slowly, as if nothing was wrong with a solitary Ghost leaving the hangar. No one even bothered to look as it usually was a daily, hourly, common occurrence of seeing a ship leave the hangar. The morning sunlight hit the cockpit and subsequently on the red shell of the ghost. Seeing the stark difference between the Last City and the Tower was staggering and beautiful. Large building in the city looked like nothing compared to the monolithic structure overlooking it all. The moment the whole ship was out of the hangar he increased the speed and forced it to ascend into the clouds. The burn of the engines could be heard as the ship rumbled towards the sky. Clouds parted in front of the cockpit as the Ghost looked onwards. The blue of the sky slowly gave way to midnight black as twinkling of the stars could be seen. However their bright lights could not match the Ghost's optics. He was beaming with energy.

"I did it!" He proclaimed, "I'm free!" His small body danced around the cockpit as he laughed and laughed. This had taken so long to plan, so many months spent creating documents and careful planning. "Alright time to find me a Guardian."

Two Weeks Later

"Oh I'm just about ready to give up!" The Ghost shouted, the Nautilus sat above the Reef, a loose string of asteroids, crashed ships, and other assortments of lifeless rocks. Right now the ship was in the middle of a thick cluster of asteroids. The grey sheen of the ship had been dulled from travelling in space, a few scorch marks from the engines. "How hard can it be to find someone special?! How did the others do it?!" He looked out into the Reef, "What good are you eh?! Sitting there with all those ships and whatnot, you can't have someone special?! I've had enough of you!"

Sending out a beam of light into the terminal he changed the coordinates, maybe the moon Titan over by Saturn. There was the arcology, there could be somebody in there. The ship turned slowly as it was pointed to the general direction of Saturn. He first would need to get out of this field of space rocks. Cautiously he navigated through the field while prepping the engines for a jump. He would need to find someone soon, there wasn't much fuel left in the engines. And he couldn't go back after lying to Zavala, he might put the Ghost on garbage monitoring duty. Or worse, working as Shaxx's audio technician while he commentates Crucible matches. Zavala wouldn't be that cruel would he?

Oh who was the Ghost kidding?

As the ship was making its way through the field the engines were nearly ready and he cleared the commands for a new set of coordinates and go ahead for a jump. But while looking down he didn't notice that the ship was turning after getting hung up on a heavy asteroid. The only notification he got was the sound of groaning metal coming from behind him.

"What?" He turned around quickly for a second and then went back to see the ship was now pointed in a completely different direction than what had been planned. His single optic drifted downward and the countdown for the jump had already begun and he couldn't' shift the ship back in time. He gave a sigh and shook his body, "Just my luck." The ship zoomed forward as the twinkle of stars became long streaks of light and colors zoomed past him. While leaving the asteroid forced the ship to snap back into a straight path which in turn cause the ship to shake. The Ghost hadn't been paying attention to where he was relative to the ship's cockpit and the shake of the ship sent the roof of the ship colliding with his body. "Agh!" He cried out as he hit the roof, then smacked optic first into the amr rest and then landed in the seat where the hit knocked him out of it. He groaned as his vision faded and lights became blurred. Without much strength left everything went to black.

-X-

The Ghost was woken up by the sound of beeping and the sudden rush of the Nautilus coming to a quick stop. And by that, the Ghost actually slammed, once again optic first, into the glass of the cockpit. "Agh, for Traveller's sake!: He yelled, shaking his body and blinking his optic. Then the Ghost noticed an important detail, he was in orbit of a planet. A green planet which he had never seen in the archives. He checked the terminal in the ship and looked through the database using the coordinates it was displaying. Nothing, there was nothing about this planet in any of the star charts, maps, or books.

Could he-Did he discover a lost planet?

No, no that was preposterous, there are no records of the Traveller's Light reaching this place. It wouldn't make sense. Quickly he checked the fuel reserves left in the Nautilus, then quickly checked the log from the last jump. "Okay, we can make it back to the City, but that's it," he said, it may have been sobering to admit but this had been an unmitigated disaster. He would go back to Zavala in shame. He looked back to the planet, and a part of him felt conflicted, then the logical side said it was stupid. But if-no that would be ludicrous, there's no way. The Light had not traveled this far. In the off chance it did though-No, he needed to stop thinking of that. However if he found a guardian in this world, proving the Light had been here once, even for a little bit, then this could change so many things. It also could change nothing but he chose to ignore that.

"The ship would be fine left in orbit," the Ghost said to himself, just a little trip wouldn't hurt? He could just get right back on the ship after a few hours of scanning. The Ghost set coordinates to transmat to the surface, judging by the lights it was near a large village or maybe town of some sort. "Only a few hours," he told himself, what was one more disappointment?

-X-

He had been wrong, oh so wrong, it wasn't just a small town or village. It was a city. A full functioning city harkening back to the days before the Golden Age. He could see it in the faces of the people walking by, they weren't like the people of the Last City always thinking about the next threat. No Red Legion to steal their light, no Vex to assimilate their planet, no Fallen to scavenge and pillage, and no Hive to infect and destroy everything they touch. There were humans too, that had to be evidence of their relations to those of Earth. But then he would see people with parts belonging to animals that once walked the Earth more commonly. And judging by his scans he concluded they were naturally growing and not implants of some sort. But he couldn't find any Exo or Awoken among anybody in the passing crowd. Their transportation too was old, yes he saw the occasional ship pass through the air, all the cars went across roads on tires rather than a Sparrow which hovered off that ground.

Currently he watched all of this action from a lamppost between the street and what he assumed was a shop. Probably a cafe like he had seen in the City. It was nearing evening wherever he was and there was a male and a female sitting at a table. This was probably what they called a 'date'. However what he was interested in was the small screen peeking out of the male's pocket. Descending slowly so he couldn't be seen he got close to the pocket and fired a beam of light into it. Data, information, knowledge streamed from this device into him. Coordinates, history, technology, all of it. The fact he was able to easily hack into this thing was telling of their security measures, but right now he wasn't complaining. Soon enough he got enough information to make a sound conclusion about this world.

It was absolutely pitiful.

No space travel at all, no satellites, communication was incredibly limited, their fuel source was off a highly finite resource they named simply 'Dust'. Why not make another one and call it 'Dirt' just to confuse the masses? They don't even know much about their planet and have only had the chance to colonize small parts of it. Sure most of Earth was not inhabited, but there were certain circumstances regarding that one. Of all the places he could have stumbled on to, it had to be this backwater world. The fact the Darkness hadn't swallowed them was a feat in itself. The only interesting thing were these 'Huntsmen' and 'Huntresses' who were the protectors of this planet. However if they were like most of the Hunters he knew then maybe this wouldn't be a good idea after all. Now he just needed to find one of them. Preferably dead. With his new database he looked for where most of these protectors were supposedly located.

"Beacon Academy," the answer was, and it was pretty close to where he was. So at least he had that thing going for him. Looking across the water he set a point at where this place was. Since there were no satellites on this planet he had to use the Nautilus to cross reference the position. Without much reason to stick around the Ghost left the street and went across the street going close to the road. Nobody really noticed except for one small child who watched with utter curiosity and waved to him. The child was quickly pulled aside by their parents as they kept their head turned to the floating blue eye.

Seeing Beacon Academy when he reached it was an utter disappointment, the pictures had made it seem like a more lavish site. Lush bushes, marble buildings, springing fountains. But nope this place was desolate, craters and fractured cobblestone lined the place. Trees were messily cut down and left to decay, the fountains were growing algae in them, and the grass was discolored. The buildings were torn down with holes in the roof and concrete sprawled out across the place. It honestly looked like so many places on Earth which shouldn't have surprised him but seeing the recent images and the contrast of the city with this was ever more curious. But since he was here, he may as well start scanning to see if he could find traces of someone.

From his eye came a wide, thin beam of light that looked over the ground. Footprints, trace minerals, and other biological material. But very few remains of people who may have walked his place. Judging by the images and maps he had stored in his memory he was near the docks where airships would come in from, maybe if he went deeper into the classrooms or housing facilities he would have better luck.

The Ghost floated its way through broken windows and cracked walls cutting a shorter path than going around. There was an eerie atmosphere about this place much more than the Reef he had spent those two weeks earlier. The silence, the decayed state of the academy, and the hopeful search for a Guardian. Off to the side he heard a crunch of something and immediately he bolted from view, hiding under a pile of rocks.

Footsteps, two sets of feet walked past him and stopped close by just within earshot. He could only see their legs from where he was. "I swore I saw something," a deep male voice said.

"Maybe, you're just going crazy," a feminine voice replied, "doing these Grimm clearing missions might be getting to you."

"Whatever, let's just get back, Oobleck and Port are going to be expecting an update. We almost made it to the Tower this time."

"No," the woman argued, "we barely made it past the main courtyard, the Tower's still got a long way to go."

"But just think, if we get the Tower then we'll get a good aerial view of the other half of Beacon, we gotta keep pushing."

"We'll do that after we get back to camp, we've expended all our Dust rounds today, we won't last much longer if we go any farther."

"Hmm, fine," then the two people then walked back in the opposite direction.

When it was safe the Ghost poked his head out from the rocks. Those must have been the hunters he quickly read up on. However what intrigued him was more about this Tower, a full view of the campus would help immensely. Going back through maps he determined that it was in the center of Beacon. So he floated himself in the general direction of the Tower keeping his same plan of weaving between buildings.

However it was when he was nearly to the Tower, he could even see it, when the Ghost heard growling. Looking to his left, all he could see was black. A large black furry creature stood before him, but by the looks the Ghost was facing the creatures backside. Before the creature had noticed the Ghost flew back into the previous building and shot through his memory banks. Going through his new database of this planet and found what it was.

"Beowulf: Creature of Grimm, common in many areas native to Remnant. Resembles other canine species. Older Beowulfs, or Alpha Beowulfs, are described to have harder carapaces covering their faces, arms, claws, and legs. Typically travel in packs of eight or more."

The term 'Grimm' was unknown to the Ghost, they must only exist on this planet called 'Remnant'. He then went further into what the Grimm were.

"Creatures of Grimm: Enemies of Humans and Faunus. Most mirror other regular animal species on Remnant however others exist (see: Apathy, Geist). They are drawn by negative emotions and while their exact senses are unknown, evidence suggests they can detect these emotions from kilometers away if there are enough people in an area. While they are not territorial like other animals, they have been seen fighting other animals such as wolves or bears. Nobody knows where the Grimm came from, but multiple theories suggest ancient experiments, natural phenomena, etc. "

Well that explained the lack of colonized lands, having a creature specifically looking to kill you would definitely hamper your progress. While the Ghost could sit there and read up on all of this he still needed to find someone. And the Tower was close by so hopefully he could get a good survey of the area. So this time, cautiously, he wrapped around a wall and zipped past the Beowulf who was left none the wiser. The base of the Tower came quickly and he noticed an empty doorway. Peering in he sent a beam of light up and scanned. It was an elevator shaft, it just happened to be missing an elevator. Both directions though were empty, as if the elevator was pulled out or shot to the moon. The first decision he made was to go downward. The shaft went down deep into the ground.

There was only one floor, and was far below the ground. It was too dark to see so he floated to the walls where there was an open access panel and fiddled with the access panels. Eventually he found the lights and turned them on. The panel sparked first but then the lights flickered to life. It was a massive hall save for the pieces of rubble that had fallen from the ceiling. He began to scan once again and discovered the remnants of one person possibly buried beneath the rubble in the middle of the floor. He could resurrect them, but for right now he was going to continue on with exploring. At the back of the room was a giant machine, with what looked like two people sized containers. One was empty with the door blown off, and the other closed with some type of glass sticking out of it.

But inside was a full skeleton of a person.

"Well hello there," the Ghost said, scanning over the remains, "what happened to you?"

This might be as good as it gets, so the Ghost prepared to resurrect this individual. However the sound of rubble falling over caught his attention. When he turned he saw red eyes similar to that of those Beowulfs, they must have traveled down the empty elevator shaft. He couldn't resurrect if they came after him, so he fled and the monsters gave chase. They scampered over the debris and their claws scraped the glass floors as the Ghost reached the elevator shaft. With some quick thinking he fired a beam of light at the access panel and ducked into the shaft. When the black and furry arm reached the elevator door, the metal slammed shut on the arm. A basic trick messing with the sensors in the elevator Moving on from the Grimm the Ghost rocketed up to the top of the Tower, he needed to survey the land in order to find something, anything, at this point.

When he reached the top of the Tower he found it to be as big of a mess as the basement below. Cogs, rocks, glass, and scorch marks littered the area. Then he turned around and noticed the giant monstrous dragon-like creature behind him. He freaked out initially, who wouldn't, but then he noticed it was encased in stone. Frozen in a single moment of time.

"I want whoever can do that," the Ghost said, but that would have to wait. He turned around and surveyed the campus a large beam of light going as far as it could and going over buildings and anything in its path. Faintly, he could hear the slam of metal. "The Grimm are coming." He needed to act fast, he needed to get out of here. The Ghost made his way to go behind the dragon when something appeared in his optic. In his scan was the outline of a person, but no remains were there. It wasn't unheard of, but it was extremely rare. So long as there was a remnant of the person they could be resurrected. Scanning the ground he found a residue, some type of dust.

The banging from within the elevator grew louder.

There was no other choice.

Seeping deep within his systems the shell of the Ghost split open and sectioned off with glowing Light. The Light formed a sphere around the Ghost leaving his optic in the middle as he used the dust leftover as the basis for resurrection.

"You better be worth this trouble!" He yelled and discharged life giving light.

-X-

Pyrrha's felt off, her hearing was muffled, she could barely see, she could barely feel. When her eyes came too, she looked right up at the monster of pure terror, a long snout frozen in time and stone. Forever stuck in neverending scream for release. She had no idea what could have done that.

She looked down and saw a floor riddled with debris, like a war had been fought at this very point. Rubble and rocks thrown to the side, glass laid on the ground like tiny spikes, and metal bent in awkward directions.

Something sounded off to her side, but she was still enamoured with what was happening. She looked at her hands and immediately noticed her hands were covered by some weird armored material. She went to touch her face and found another piece covering her face. That thing kept calling to her, she was starting to make out what it was saying.

"Guard-" it said, sounded like a man, "Guardia-."

What was he saying? Something guarding?

She looked up and was met face to face with a floating cube with a single optic that burned light blue.

"Thank the Traveller," it said as the cubic pieces shifted up and down, "I have got to get you out of here, but first we have to take care of those things coming up the elevator shaft."

Those things? What could he be talking about?

Pyrrha soon found out as the doors to the elevator shaft flew open. she narrowly ducked underneath as the metal slabs zoomed over the office and went to land back on the ground beneath the Tower. The girl looked forward and saw a grouping of large beasts, five at most. They snarled and roared at her, bone like carapace covering their faces, arms, and legs. Spikes jutted out of their backs, some were broken and crooked. They...seemed familiar to her, but from where she didn't have the faintest idea. Her head was pounding, everything just seemed off.

They gave another snarl and she took a step back, either they were hungry or she did something to upset them. She was high up as well, so jumping off was not an answer. She would have to fight her way through them. But she didn't have anything to fight with.

"Don't worry Guardian," the cube said. Guardian? Was he referring to her? "Weapons coming up!"

As Pyhrra stood up a rifle fell into her hands. It just appeared, from a light and it just materialized. She also felt something weigh down on her and saw a pistol. Also next to the pistol she saw she had some kind of red cape at her hip. At least she had that. Somehow, she pulled on the rifle and prepared the gun without thinking. The cube then came beside her, not knowing what he was but if he gave her a weapon then he was at least on her side. The beast across from her growled and launched at her.

"Eyes up Guardian," the cube said, "time to see if you were worth the trouble."

Hello everybody, thank you for taking your time to read this, means a lot. For some basic background, as you may have found out this is set after Shadowkeep but in terms of where we are exactly we don't know. I left it a little ambiguous in case anything happens. My knowledge of Destiny lore is very limited. So will I get things wrong, possibly, I hope not. But there is always that chance. Peace.