Epilogue: From a Single Choice, A World

. . .

Tam shifted next to Beck against the railing, both of them wrapped in the bright scarves and long tunics familiar to the Vanguard Tower staff. Below their high industrial-steel balcony was a milling crowd in a variety of austere blacks and whites, each member of Dead Orbit absorbing the somber welcome ceremony in their own ways.

Venn was near the end of the line of new initiates – some of whom were also from Adytum – resplendent and a little awkward-looking in his clean white tunic. High on his arm was the black insignia of the faction, shined to a soft gleam. His gaze flickered up to his old friends up on the balcony, and they returned him bright smiles with no dark feelings behind them. They'd grown up together. Slowly, all three had come to realize it was okay to grow apart.

They were going to teach him to fly. With routes opening up again through the local galaxy all the way to the Reef, the Orbit had a desperate need for more pilots willing to learn the ropes close to home. Venn talked to Tam last week, told her with hesitant pride about the transmat-capable and sluggish hauler he was going to be learning on. Dangerous work; the starways were not safe and no one knew if they ever would be again. But Venn needed to wander if he was going to figure himself out. None of his friends were going to hold him back. They had a kind of wandering to do themselves.

Tam and Beck glanced at each other with a smile as Arach Jalaal droned on about something he certainly felt was important. His rolling voice had a stridency and power to it. Beck caught a little of his speech - "And to you, my friends, I remind you of our path, our hard and chosen road. We will take to the stars and follow their guiding light, and we will never end in darkness."

"He'll be good at flying, you know," whispered Tam. "You remember how fussy he was in the yak fields when we all did that one huge babysitting job a few summers ago? He's fastidious, loves details. He'll pick it up."

"Tam, he was fussy all the time because he had a crush on you and kept showing it off like a twerp."

Angela's daughter giggled behind the sleeve of her tunic. "It was cute."

"Yeah." Beck's smile turned sad for a second. "I'm sorry that didn't work out."

"It's okay. We don't know what happens next. If we see him again, he'll still be a friend."

Another fleeting smile. Beck and Venn met for frightening cart tacos not long after she'd heard the news and no, not all scars were going to heal between them so soon. They ended the meal in a new kind of peace, however, and in her old friend's eyes she saw the little boy finally start to fade away. He was going to finish growing up all right. She could be proud of him for that. "He will. But who knows when that'll be? Let's not get too freaked out about the future yet."

Tam shot her a sideways look. "The Tower plan working out?"

"Well, moving forty-odd people is easier than sixty plus. Go figure. Once I had the trimmed down numbers, the caretakers were way more willing to negotiate." Beck resettled against the steel balcony bars. "Also, I won't lie. I asked Vance to call in a favor with the Vanguard to nudge them just a little more to my side."

"Oh, no. Cayde?" Tam laughed, her thin braids flicking back over her shoulders as Beck smirked. "I hear about that guy. Not much from Mom, though. He's infamous. Didn't he scare almost the literal crap out of one of the Cryptarchs for some reason?"

The smirk turned into a grin. She tugged at her red scarf, picturing it. The Doorknob Story. Vance loved that one. "Everyone hears about Cayde. And once they hear about him again, they get really weirdly friendly about what you need. I cannot fathom why."

"Mm-hmm."

Below them, the ceremony started drawing to a close. Tam nudged her friend's arm with an elbow. "Come on. Let's go publicly embarrass the turd with a mess of hugs before they throw him in a ship's hold. If we're lucky, they'll let us watch that part, too."

. . .

Vance-17 came up the wide stairs from the Vanguard's open hall, seeing Beck waiting for him across the square that overlooked the City. She glanced at him with a smile, then lifted her head to look back at what she was originally watching.

Still higher up was the vast balcony that opened along the side of the Speaker's incense-laden sanctum. The Speaker himself came to that edge rarely, seeming to prefer to be cloistered with his ancient devices and his contemplations. Today, though, his masked face turned up towards the Traveler in the supplication of the eternal questioner. No one knew if it answered him when he looked to the center of the City, to what had once been whispered of in the soft tones meant for Gods. Perhaps the City was, in a way, without its guide. Still, like the people that survived there, he seemed to thrive in hope.

Vance came up beside his friend. "Do you think it talks to him? Can it talk?" she asked.

"Dunno. Ghost said it might call it dreaming, but you know that little bastard."

She grinned up at him as he leaned on the railing. Before them both, a shockingly green Kestrel rose to transmat its Guardian passenger to the square before autopiloting gently over to its hangar. The color was the new fad, each ship more garish than the last. Holliday was seen on occasion pretending to throw up in a bucket, but she still took the glimmer and contracted out the paint jobs without saying anything to the paying client. "Dreams work. It think that might be right. I think everything dreams."

He interlaced his thick fingers, thinking. The soft wind of the afternoon caught his new mark to fluttering, the white stars sprinkled across its surface flickering in the sunlight. From out of the darkness into new Light. "You going to the next Tower with your people?"

"I'll have a place there, but..." She chewed her lip. "I feel like I'm still in two worlds. I like it here, too, and it means I can get more information than I would with them. I can do a lot more if I don't get sequestered away. And I'd miss Ghost." In her tone was the question – would that be okay?

"It'd miss you. Spare me its crazy rambling. It's like having a tiny Warlock in my ear, forever." He hoisted his thick shoulders in a shrug, looking across her head at the Speaker with his head now bowed in some secret contemplation. "Anyway. Sometimes to lead best, the cost is you wind up feeling a little separated. Distant. It's screwy but sometimes necessary. Trouble comes if you start feelin' like you're better than your people. Watch for it."

"That won't happen."

"Smarter than that, Beck."

"That, and you two'll knock me on my butt if I outgrow my britches." She chuckled, leaning forward to look down at the spread of the trees around the Tower's base.

"True." He rattled a low laugh. "So that's it for now. We got our peace, and our places."

Beck nodded slowly. "For now."

"Big things still on your mind?"

She clasped her hands together, looking down at them with an expression the Speaker himself might know well. "I'm not done, Vance. We're going to rebuild. Not yet. Not today. But someday we'll try again." She looked up into her friend's gold eyes with a smile made of hope and a touch of that soft, sensible fear of the unknown. "Because you're right. This isn't the world it's supposed to be."

Beck looked out at the pure white orb of the silent Traveler, wondering if, in some way, she might understand something about its dreams.

"This should never have been called the Last City. It's the first."

. . .

"From a single stone, a road. From a single spark, a flame. From a single choice, a world." ~ The Musings of a Ghost Once Lost and then Found

~fin~

. . .

Author's Notes: I want to apologize for the title. I began writing Titanomachy a little after the beta and shortly before the official release of Destiny on Sept 9, and thankfully, the posting history on both and AO3 will back me up on that. When I started I chose it because I'm not only a mythology wonk and a fan of Dan Simmons, who basically spent all of Hyperion writing John Keats fanfic himself, but because I knew one of my two main characters was an Exo Titan and I thought I was being funny. Vance would be put through the wringer as much as a 'bot can, hence conflict blah blah fall of the Titans etc. The story had a number of known values at the outset, but I still had a few gaps in the gameplan.

So I found out about the Ghost Fragment: Mysteries card in the grimoire a few days into live release alongside the popular Rasputin interpretation and I said a few things out loud you can't put in a teen-rated story...

On the bright side, that led me directly towards the idea of Warmind Churchill, lurking alone and mostly dead in a bombed-out England. So that worked out. I knew I needed something more for Part One than my initial plan, and my own accident put the story on a good path. Part Two worked out in a similar way; from inception I knew Beck's own story of conflict and doom, and that I could blame it on Hive, but I didn't know yet how specifically well that would work out until The Dark Below got closer. The rest of the timing when it came to update was sheer, wonderful luck.

This story was so much fun to write, although my second apology is for an action-packed first half tricking the reader into following me into a somewhat grimmer second half loaded up with the contemplation of life in an occasionally deathless and deadly world. Thanks for coming along for the ride, and thank you very much for all the great comments, follows, and bookmarks!

For a little credit cookie fun, these are the specs I imagine for two notable weapons in the story: Vance-17's trusty pulse rifle and Angela's sniper rifle.

Threading the Needle ~ "Shoot it 'till it stops wiggling. Then punch it to be sure." - Vance-17

[Legendary/Kinetic/Pulse Rifle]

Upgrades:

Perk Tree:

[Pressed for Time] – Snapshot sight, increased target acquisition at medium range

[Hold Still I'm Trying to Kill You] – Decreased agility at short range, increase to impact and damage

[I Hate Waiting] – Longer range with slight increase to impact. High recoil.

.

[Banshee's Bribe] – This major stability upgrade at a moderate speed cost means things are gonna die.

.

[Damage Upgrade]

Perk Tree:

[I Packed Extra] - Firing now consumes more ammo, but gives increased damage.

[Crap, Crap, Crap] – Faster reload even in the thickest of hands.

[The Unbroken Wall] – Lower recoil means standing your ground until you're the last one upright.

.

[I Really Like This Gun] – High impact piercing rounds mean enemy shields become less of a nuisance in close-quarters combat.

.

[Damage Upgrades x4]

. . .

Angela's Ash ~ "I left the City to save it in the only way I knew how." - Angela of Adytum, to her daughter.

[Legendary/Solar/Sniper Rifle]

Upgrades:

Perk Tree:

[Eagle Eye] – Amazing range, low impact and medium recoil. Perfect for scoutwork.

[Hawk's Talon] – Sacrificing range means this rifle has a serious kick to it. High impact.

[Falcon's Cry] – Low recoil and a sacrifice to range means bullets are going to take flight at faster speeds. Right through something's skull.

.

[Stay On Target] – Aiming down the sights on a target for several seconds has a high chance to increase damage significantly.

.

[Damage Upgrade]

Perk Tree:

[Higher Ground] – Good boost to impact when above a target.

[Quicksilver] - +2 Agility when held

[Wild West] – Can be drawn remarkably fast. Slight boost to impact for the first shot after draw.

.

[You Will Not Pass] – If every shot from a full mag prior to the last connects with a target, the last shot does more than double damage.

.

[Damage Upgrades x4]

. . .

Late August to Dec 22nd, 2014. MDS.

All applicable rights and copyrights belong to Bungie Inc. and no infringement on these rights is intended. Hey, are you guys hiring freelance writers?

I'm kidding.

(Call me?)