Eyes Up, Guardian

Chapter 32

"Alright." His voice came through the radio. "I'm on my way into the plaguelands." He told them.

"Great." Shiro said, sliding on a headset so it rested on his shoulders, the microphone aimed towards his mouth. "The fallen have occupied a military bunker in the plaguelands. We won't get any reinforcements in that area until the Fallen's artillery is taken out."

"The Fallen are a symptom, Shiro." Saladin cut in, his voice sounding through the radio from wherever he was in the temple. "SIVA is the disease." He told them. "The Iron Lords believed we could contain SIVA by destroying the chamber where it was produced. These Fallen must've restarted the process. We need to get back into the chamber and cut off the flow of SIVA at the source."

"Without reinforcements, I don't like my odds of heading back into that chamber." Damian told them. "I'm with Shiro on this one." His ship began to slow, and a moment later he was transmatting out into the Rocketyard, where he'd been the day before.

"Alright," Shiro said, "Vanguard reinforcements are standing by, but until those guns are down they can't leave the Hangar. I need you to shut them down." He told him.

"Roger that." Damian said with a nod, following Kylie's lead back into the room he'd made contact with the fallen the day before.

"Guardian," Shiro said, moving inside their little buildings to one of the workstations they'd set up, complete with a few more screens and interfaces. "There's a... dead vandal near you. Can you get me a scan?"

They watched as Damian paused upon entering the room, then found the Vandal Shiro had mentioned and headed over to it, kneeling down beside it and releasing Kylie. After a moment, she spoke up.

"He's Fallen, basically, but armor is enhanced, weapons have been modified. Even cybernetic enhancements." She said, retuning to Damian after a moment.

"Most Fallen houses have a sect dedicated to this sort of thing." Shiro told them, not sounding surprised by Kylie's information. "They're called splicers. They're like bodyhackers, bioengineers."

Saladin breathed a heavy sigh. "It is worse than I feared." He said, "The splicers are not only using SIVA to transform this place, they are using its technology to transform themselves."

Tessa watched as Damian moved into the next room, following Kylie's makers- Shiro had given her a set of points leading towards the occupation site- as Saladin spoke. She couldn't help but think of the SIVA swarming the nodes Damian had found the day before. Thinking of that inside something, or someone... she grimaced.

Meanwhile, Damian's path was cut shorter as he easily moved through holes cut haphazardly in the walls, allowing him to avoid having to go around to doorways and halls.

"The Fallen have done some remodeling." He remarked, making his way through another hole in the wall.

"They're taking the metal for something big." Shiro said, "I hope they're not using it to toughen up those gun emplacements.

"It couldn't be the worst thing they could do with it." Tessa remarked, mostly to herself as she looked away from the monitor screen, realizing Tyra had also moved into the building.

"You haven't seen those guns." Shiro reminded, leaning out of the doorway and handing her a wireless headset. Unlike Saladin, Shiro had been open, if not encouraging to her input and overall participation in the situation, whether that was on comms, or helping him and Tyra pull through the logs Damian had brought back the day before.

She thanked him, sliding the headset on the same way he had, as the radio broadcasted Damian and Saladin's voices out just fine. She did, however move it so that she could lean her back against the wall and still see Damian's view projected out.