The Death of Hope: Shattered Past Book 6 (Destiny 2)

13: Dealing With Your Past

Cameron walked out of the Dark Forest, her body and armor had been covered by the dust of the hundreds of Taken she'd butchered. The Shield of the Sentinel was still firmly wrapped around her forearm as she walked, glowing brightly through the fog and giving her a sense of hope and power. She was feeling all of her memory with each step. Every battle, every punch thrown, and every friend lost. But most of all, the thing that had become more clear to her was her relationship with the team's lead scout, Lena Oxton. It was the thing that made her heart pang each time she thought about it.

She and Lena loved each other. It was hard for her to accept and understand her own sexuality for a long time. And when Lena kept hitting on her, and her feelings toward her starting to feel more like love, she kept hiding herself away in the confusion of it all. She'd always been that straight Latina girl from Dallas. Though, it seemed as if it wasn't always that way. There were a few times where that part of her surfaced and she just tried to bury it further. Lena helped her to understand that there wasn't anything wrong with who she was.

After all of this time, the Traveler had been with her ever since she was twenty-two years old, and she'd been its guardian ever since. As Cameron exited the forest on a different side from where she'd come in, she noticed that there was a significant Red Legion presence here. They appeared to be just a scouting party, a small group of Legionnaires and a Centurion. Cameron quickly hid back behind one of the many large chunks of metal debris in the area and watched them carefully. The Centurion barked a few sentences at one of the Legionnaires who nodded in complacency before walking off with his headlamp on.

"Athena. We need to find out what they're doing here," Cameron said sternly looking over the rock for a moment before locking a cylinder of handcannon ammo into her pistol. "And once we're done with that. You and I are going to have a little chat." Cameron could swear she heard Athena gulp in the back of her head.

"You're mad at me, aren't you?" Athena asked, her voice sounding somewhat quakey.

"Damn right I am," She replied genuinely as the Cabal started walking away up a path toward some other sector of the EDZ. Cameron looked up at the cliff that was just above her and used her lift ability to climb up to the top of them. Making it much easier for her to follow the Cabal patrol that she'd spotted, creeping through the underbrush of some of the trees and bushes.

"Look. Cameron, I-"

"Did you know all along?" She asked as she continued to follow the Cabal up one of the destroyed highways leading toward another area. "Or is this news to you too?" She asked, the sound of her thoughts increasing their tone and intensity. Athena didn't respond as Cameron continued to follow the Cabal, as the brush and destroyed streets gave way to a small gulch, with a large tunnel and a destroyed Hawk craft in the center of a lake. "Athena. Answer me."

"Okay...I did, I knew." She said with a sigh.

"And you didn't think to tell me?! Why?!" Cameron shouted in her head as she continued following the Cabal. The front of the large tunnel was being guarded by two Colossus' with their weapons trained ahead of them. The Titan started making her way back, transmatting up to the same ship that Hawthorne loaned her. Cameron then sat in her ship for a moment. "Athena, come out," She ordered. A minute or so passed, and Athena didn't come out. Cameron sighed and pulled up the dashboard radio. "Hawthorne, come in," She said.

"This is Hawthorne, what's the status guardian?" She asked.

"I got my light back, and I'm ready to bulldoze some Red Legion," Cameron replied readily.

"Good, so, what we've got on the docket right now is pretty simple, we need to start broadcasting a signal to get more people to the Farm." She replied. "Care to lend a civie a hand?"