[i]*Fanfiction. This will be by far the longest chapter I've released to date. Take your time... no need to read it all in one go. It's a long read so sit back and relax and hopefully you'll enjoy this tumultuous ride. Please feel free to comment and critique! Feedback is always welcome.*[/i] [url=http://www.bungie.net/en/Forum/Post/87862826/0/0/1]Chapter One[/url] [url=http://www.bungie.net/en/Forum/Post/93946748/0/0]Previous Chapter[/url] [url=https://www.bungie.net/en/Forum/Post/96272135/0/0]Next Chapter[/url] [i]"Rivers of black... Where wind rises... Quells the sea of flame."[/i] [b]--- Chapter Six or The Chamber, Part 2 ---[/b] [b][i]Several months before…[/i][/b] [b]”Let’s go tincan…”[/b] The voice echoed from behind, filling the empty halls before Lock with the sound of a man who didn’t much care for his job… or his prisoners. He was shoved forward by the shoulder and pushed toward the end of the hall where the other inmates awaited… where an eternity in captivity presented it’s open arms. Lock stopped moving after only a couple steps. [b]”Hey… are you deaf? I said move.”[/b] No response. [b]”Move!”[/b] Lock received a jarring blow to the back of his head and was sent tumbling forward and over his own feet. He crashed into the cold hard floor, his metal ass sticking up in the air. [b]”Get that idiot up… no… no turn him so he’s facing me.”[/b] Lock was hoisted off the ground and spun around until he was staring a guard directly in the face. Deep purple skin complimented the dark green eyes of the man returning his glare. He stood almost equal to Locks height, a mere inch shorter at the least. Not a man taken to building up his body or so Lock presumed. He wasn’t skinny but he didn’t have the broad shoulders of someone who carried himself with pride. He was just… there. The spark of a wide smile however changed his outlook. With teeth of rotted yellow and breath as foul as the fingernails of fermenting thralls, the guard was rather… repulsive. Lock leaned away from the man, not wanting his stink to rust his metal. [b]”You’re going to be here a long time… so let’s get things straight between us.”[/b] He placed a long dry finger against his chest. [b]”In here… I am king. I decide when you eat, when you sleep, when you dance and when you get to blow your own dick.”[/b] Lock raised a brow. [b]”You…”[/b] The guard placed a finger on Lock’s forehead. [b]”...You are my b*tch and you’ll do as I say or receive the same punishment as a disobedient dog.”[/b] He pulled the finger away and leaned in close. [b]”Do you understand?”[/b] The moment of silence that followed was both deafening and rather short. Lock mused his answer over in his head before deciding on a reply. [b]”What’s your name?”[/b] [b]”My name?... Dez. Remember it. When you dream, wake up… take a piss.”[/b] [b]”As long as you remember one thing…”[/b] Dez let a soft chuckle tumble from his lips. [b]”And what’s that?”[/b] Lock tilted his head back… and slammed the hard metal of his forehead against the bridge of Dez’s nose. The man screamed, his lungs expelling too much air at once and his throat tightening so that the noise sounded more like the shrill cry of a female than anything else. He doubled back in pain, catching himself on the edge of a wall with one hand while grabbing at his bleeding nose with the other. [b]”You son of a b*tch.”[/b] The beating Lock received was both painful and yet rewarding. Despite sensors telling him that his bones were being broken and his skin was rupturing, watching blood drip from the nostrils of the head guard made him feel right as rain. There was nothing they could do to him that would leave permanent damage, physical nor psychological. He was a machine and despite the odd fact that he could feel pain… he understood his limits to be well beyond that of his organic counterpart. Dez however… he’d be feeling the pain of arrogance and idiocy for months… and when it was finally time, he too would receive a just punishment. Till then, he simply had to endure abuse meant for being lesser than himself. Eventually his assailants grew tired and opted to simply throw him in with the rest. They delivered his beaten body to the inmates waiting at the end of the hall and left him there to fend for himself. He didn’t move for a long time. It wasn’t until the buzz of the room was broken by the sound of an odd tongue that he was roused. [b]”[Get up.]”[/b] He couldn’t see who it was but he knew the voice calling out to him wasn’t human or Awoken. The language was foreign to both and the hand lifting him off the ground was abnormally large. He opened his eyes and came face to face with the pale blue eyes of a Fallen Captain. Words caught in his throat. Pupils, deep and mysterious, studied his beaten metal frame. Behind the alien gaze was a sense of understanding, of curiosity, a feeling of warmth. [b]”[He is a machine.]”[/b] She spoke in native tongue, looking over at her compatriot to see if he understood. A second Fallen Captain stepped to the fore, slightly larger than the first and touting two more arms. [b]”[He is weak. Leave him.]”[/b] [i]...Oh?...[/i] [b]”[No… He’s not weak Vahn. He’s different… like us. An outcast...]”[/b] Soft blue eyes looked him over again. [b]”[... An outcast in a sea of people that have been cast into the dark themselves. He understands… I think he understands… and that gives him strength.]”[/b] [i]...Hmm…[/i] Lock’s glowing white eyes blinked. He looked from the Fallen who’d picked him up to the one named Vahn. The latter was a rather obvious idiot but the former… was different. Smart… almost aware of her situation and more importantly… of his own. He smiled. [b]”[Lock. That is my name. And you are...?]”[/b] Four pairs of eyes blinked in unison. It was a handful of seconds before either of them were able to respond and it was the “woman” who spoke first. From underneath her mask, she slowly opened her mouth and let a word slip out like a gentle wind carrying the only syllable to her name... -- [i][b]The Prison of Elders. Second Floor.[/i][/b] [b]”Sky!”[/b] As soon as the guard placed his hand on Lock’s shoulder, she moved. The Fallen captain stepped in between Lock and the other half of the room with blinding speed and answered the call of a revolver. A sound was like that of an explosion cut through the silence of the chamber with violence and echoed endlessly against walls of black. It was the first note of a song, the tell of an invisible bullet as it was thrown through the air… a song cut short by the translucent blue film manifesting itself around Sky. Her shield caught the projectile near her forehead where it collapsed. The jarring sound of a gun going off set Lock in motion. He reacted instantly, grabbing the hand on his shoulder with a vice grip and twisting the arm around until it could go no further. The guard screamed in intense pain and immediately fell silent as Lock caught him across the chin with a solid blow. The body went limp and the gun dropped into Lock’s open fist. He immediately swung around and tossed the weapon toward Sky where it was caught by the butt, aimed and fired. Not a second was wasted on second guessing. Every move from then on was methodical and precise. The resulting bullet was sent careening across the chamber and into a guard’s shoulder where he stood on the second floor. He was thrown against the wall and his gun tumbled from his grip and off the edge of the scaffold into the mass of panicking Awoken below. [b]”Open fire! Open fire! Kill them all!”[/b] Dez screamed, his orders already two shots too late. A second bark. Another bullet collapsed against Sky. She ripped out one of the spent Ether capsules with one arm and replaced it with a third, her shooting arm already taking aim at her next target and firing yet again. A burning piece of metal buried itself into the neck of a guard where it exploded into shrapnel and tore open a large gaping hole. He toppled over, the wound gushing blood into a puddle around him. Lock stepped underneath Sky’s swinging arm and found Randar by the back of his neck before shoving him into the ground… with a little too much force. The unusually thin human coughed and sputtered foul words that no one could hear as he tried to find his lungs once more. Lock, ignoring the protests from his bounty, hoisted the unconscious guard up in front of himself, pulled the gun he’d taken off Izzy and lifted the cannon into the air. He took aim, pulled the trigger and let the piece buck in his hand as it spat out a bullet. At the far end of the room, a guard’s head snapped back with unnatural violence and his body hit the floor. [i]...5…[/i] A count of his remaining rounds. Another bark pierced the air from the opposite side of the chamber. Lock felt the body in his arms jump against his chest and watched red mist explode around his head. Awoken blood, stained with darkness, drizzled down around him, spotting his metal frame with a deep cherry color. He found the offending gunmen by the flash of his muzzle and answered the call in kind, setting the irons between the man’s crown and pulling the trigger. [i]...4…[/i] Before the body could hit the ground, Lock had already set himself on his next series of victims. A trio of guards lined up on the second floor and paying their predator no heed. His arm swept across their figures in a single motion and his finger began an itch that could not be quelled. Three pulls… three challenges… and three more bodies littered the floor. [i]...1...[/i] By now half of the guards above were dead and the rest below were just realizing that a gun fight had broken out. They fumbled with their weapons and fired carelessly into the crowd of inmates accomplishing a lot of nothing. [i]*Continued below...*[/i]