[Mercury, Fields of Glass]
A lone jumpship cut the horizon and dropped into Mercury's thin atmosphere, ripping through its glossy clouds. Heat bled off the hull as the ship's trail shimmered behind it. Ikorra kept the nose low and took the long arc towards the north.
She piloted the ship over the barren plains of vex machinations, the Fields of Glass. Ikorra steered through it, weaving across ruined pylons that speared up at oblique angles. Finally, Ikorra reached the very ends of the field, and her jumpship glided to a stop.
Ikorra transmatted out into a crystalline maze, where sand became glossy spikes protruding through the surface, until the wind eroded and broke them down into gravel that scattered to dust.
Her eyes scanned the barren plains ahead. She reached for her belt and drew a small artefact—trapezoid, edges worn smooth by use, green runes hammered into its face.
She pressed a thumb into the seam. Light gathered under her skin and fed the device. It opened in segments, pieces rising and turning until they hung in orbit around her palm. Runes flared, then reoriented into an arrow that pulled toward the west.
Her eyes shifted. An instant later, Ikorra's body flickered. She warped forward, leaving only a faint after-image behind.
—
[Burning Shrine, Mercury]
Ancient stone steps climbed out of the sand, forged and bound to chains that hung from a floating stone citadel.
Heat rolled off the stone in waves, boiling the air around it. The citadel's gargantuan gates were open, almost as if it beckoned any that dared to walk in. Loaming above its two peaks were watchtowers that squared its courtyards, serving as its sentinels.
Light flickered inches away from the gate. The fabric of space twisted and glimmer scattered into the air, rapidly coalescing into a lone figure.
Ikorra walked without slowing. She looked up at the gates, her eyes flicked towards the watchtowers, but her stride didn't waver.
As she reached the top of the steps, two Sunbreaker Titans dropped from the tower platforms and hit the flagstones below hard enough to crack them. They stood shoulder to shoulder in front of the gate, helms down, hammers in hand.
They didn't speak. But a fiery aura rippled outwards, and a blistering heat wave washed over Ikorra.
Ikorra didn't stop. Her Light flared, clean and controlled, condensing onto her frame and rolling off her by a hand's breadth. She set her heel, and her eyes darkened.
Then, her lips parted.
"Move," she said. "Or be moved."
The air tensed, Ikorra's figure blurred, and a harrowing pressure spilt out, weighing down everything around her.
But the stare-down held. Heat crawled across the courtyard. Her Light climbed a degree, then another. The stone underfoot started to hum, the citadel itself shook, but Ikorra's gaze didn't waver.
The titans grit their teeth, a terrifying pressure weighed on their shoulders, but they, too, refused to give.
Ikorra's light pulsed again, and the citadel shook, its gates stirred open.
A woman in scorched red stepped into the light. Liu Feng took a breath, measured Ikorra with a long look, and lifted a hand. "Stand down," she said.
The Titans withdrew their aura, and Ikorra's light reeled back to her figure. The titans heaved a breath and peeled back without a word. Liu held the gate and waited.
"Ikorra....welcome to the Burning Shrine," she said. "State your business."
"But before you say anything, you do know that the Vanguard have no authority here," Liu added, almost a sigh, as if closing a door she had closed too often.
Ikorra shook her head. "I'm not here as the Vanguard." She lifted the trapezoid. Green runes burned steadily. "I'm here as Osiris's disciple."
Liu's eyes went to the artefact, then back to Ikorra's face. The set of her shoulders dipped a fraction. She stepped aside and turned. "Fine. Follow," she said. "Quietly."
They moved through the stone halls, decorated with chalices that burned with flames. As the two walked down the shrine, many sunbreakers paused at a distance, helms shifting as they took a look and then returned to work.
Liu led Ikorra up a narrow stair that opened into a chamber with high slits for windows. Heat ran in bands across the floor. At the far end, on a raised stone, sat the Empyrean.
Ouros leisurely lounged on her throne; a slate hovered before her eyes as she pored over documents, busy in her research. When she heard the footsteps, Ouros finally turned her head. She saw Ikorra and let out a low chuckle that didn't quite reach a smile.
"So you've come," Ouros said.
Ikorra's eyes narrowed, the gesture small and honest. She didn't hesitate and quickly chimed in, "I need to know where Osiris is."
Ouros laughed properly this time, bewilderment in it. The sound bounced once off the stone and echoed in her chamber. "Is that what you're here for?"
"It is."
"No."
Ikorra's frown deepened. "I don't have time to be turned around at the door," she said, voice flat. "Osiris hired you. The pact he made with the Vanguard stands. You owe him. And I know he met you before his exile."
Ouros rested her chin on one hand, her eyes flicked to Liu Feng, and the titan bowed subtly, leaving the room.
"It seems to me that leading the city has finally gotten to your head." Ouros stretched lazily, "I do not know about what you speak of." She lifted her hand, palm up, empty. "Osiris was not a fool. And to find him would be no easy task. That's why no one knows where he is. No one."
Ouros waved her hand and brushed Ikorra off, "Go home, warlock. Carry out your futile search somewhere else, preferably somewhere far away from my planet."
Silence slid into the room and held. Ikorra breathed in and let it out. A range of emotions ran through her, and a grim frown settled on her face.
"Osiris himself gathered the Sunbreakers for council before he disappeared. Are you denying it? Are you really claiming that you never saw him? That he never spoke to you?"
Ouros cut her off before she could continue, "So what if he did? And what if I am? Osiris also spoke and offered counsel to the awoken queen, yet I don't see you at her outpost, warlock."
"Stop your search and go back. There is nothing for you here." Ouro's brows furled, she slammed the armrest of her throne.
Ikorra grit her teeth, closed her eyes and took in a breath. She raised her palm to show the artefact. "I need answers. I need to save someone. If I don't, the last hope this City has might die with him."
"I don't know why I thought of him. I don't know why I used it." Ikorra paused, just for an instant, "All I know is that this led me here." Ikorra thumbed the trapezoid, and it flashed green. The fragments unfurled, hovering in the air.
She raised her head, "I need your help."
"Please."
Ouros's gaze shifted; she scoffed. She stood, and the heat shifted with her. "Come."
They entered a smaller chamber, and a single pedestal stood in the centre. Resting on it was a twin to Ikorra's device—trapezoid, green runes cut deep, edges worn smooth.
"Osiris left me one last instruction," Ouros said. "He knew someone would come, someday, looking for answers. He said that when they told me why, and I believed it, I should show them this."
Ikorra stepped close. The runes pulsed back, slow as a heartbeat.
"One condition," Ouros said, already turning to leave. "Only the one who came may view it. When you're finished, you destroy it. His words. Not mine."
Ikorra nodded. "I understand."
Ouros walked to the door and paused. "I don't know who you wish to save, warlock", she said, "But I pray that you do. Because to seek Osiris's answers can only mean that there is truly no other way left." Ouros turned and walked away, not staying a second longer.
Ikorra rested her palm on the artefact and fed it Light. Mechanisms woke with a quiet clatter—a thousand small plates unfurling, spinning, locking in place. The air shivered. A plane formed over the pedestal, then another, then a third, stacking into a shape that wasn't quite a cube.
A hologram blinked and took over the room.
Osiris stepped in from a side angle as if he had been waiting. The lines around his eyes were deeper than the last time Ikorra had seen him, but the focus was the same—sharp, patient, as if already measuring the person before him.
Then Osiris turned towards her. As if somehow Osiris really did know she would come. Ikorra's lips parted in anticipation.
"Welcome, whoever it is, friend or foe," he said, voice low, "I do not know who you are, indeed I did not see that far back, but I know what you are here for."
Ikorra's eyes widened.
The hologram flickered, "To free the one in the heart of darkness."
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