originally posted in:The Black Garden
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(I wrote this in another thread in the Destiny forum but thought I should post it here. I edited it for this as well as for the original upload.)
This is my rendition of the final battle on the Wall at the end of the Collapse.
The war-broken Titans were scattered amongst ash and ruin within the remaining sections of the Wall. Their comrades littered the outer fields as an unstoppable force known only as the Darkness rained down on them. They had called for reinforcements until their communications broke down; none came. There weren't even one hundred of them left.
And then he entered. The outlaw from the ruins of Mars. He had led a band of what he called Hunters for a time, but he was the last one. They didn't move when he entered, their eyes only fixed on him. Their broken armour echoing the image of the walls around them. The pounding of the enemy beat through the rubble and earth. At the end of all things, he was no longer and outlaw to them, just a Hunter amongst Titans. A wolf amongst bears.
"This is not how it ends." He said from under his hood and helm. A few of them looked up at him with pain and curiosity in their eyes.
"What I see now, in the eyes of the last defenders of the Wall, of the City, in but a shadow of what you once were. Defeated before the battle is even done; hopeless and shattered. I cannot give you hope, but we can fight so that those who will one day walk these passages can may it." More heads stirred; some rose, others nodded.
"Are you not Titans? The defenders of Humanity. Gifted with strength and power from the Traveler itself. And here you sit, like the ruins around you. But no, this is not the end. The Traveler is coming. I will not stay here at the end of the war, cowering in the halls of our once great City. I choose to fight; to fight the enemy who has brought us to our knees, but never to kneel." They began standing one by one, agreeing in their quiet murmurs.
"What say the warriors of the City? Will you die with me, for the sake of our people. Will you show this Darkness that we will not be stamped out so easily? One last push! One final battle to prepare for the Traveler's coming. For the end of this hellbent war." Their answers grew louder to his words.
"We'll fight with metal," he chated.
"Yeah!" The cheered in response.
"Blood!"
Yeah!"
"With our last dying breaths to defend the City!"
Their war-cries echoes through the Wall. They gathered and armed themselves for the final fight.
"You will be remembered as the Titans who fought to the brink." He pulled his assault rifle off his back, standing on a broken pillar at the entrance to the battlefield. "Come, let's show this Darkness the strength of Humanity." And with that, they cried out in one final charge.
...
Broken armour and soldiers littered the field. The energy was still radiating out of the Traveler. The air was still, but the world moved slowly. Smoke rose from the ashen warriors. The sky was dark and blanketed with clouds. And there he was, in the centre of it all. On his knees, blood stained and broken. Peering down at his hands from his cracked visor, under his tattered hood as he rested on his knees. But he was not kneeling, he would never kneel to his foe. The great sphere was broken, but hovering over the ruins of the Last City. His head slowly tilted up, only to see a darkness not ten feet from him. The Darkness. Just a fragment of what had come; a remnant of dark energy. It was as though it stared back at him as his eyes dimly lingered on it. A gentle breeze ruffled his cloak and the last of the Darkness disappeared in the dust. But he knew it was not over, not just yet.
He slowly staggered to his feet, picking up his weapons from the ground and holstering them. "Ghost," he commanded, barely above a whisper in a tired voice, "it's time to go back...home." The word wasn't exactly what he meant, but it fit. The hovering companion appeared before him, slightly damaged from battle, but functional.
"Understood, my ki— sorry, Charlemagne." He knew he didn't like being called that, but he still would say it anyway, to remind him.
King.
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It was a decent story, and it wasn't too long for my attention span.