Fireteam Odium

by EchoTheFloof

4) Kervis' Journey

The first thing Kervis felt was pain. Pain everywhere, it felt like he had just fallen down a cliff with no armour to protect him. He brought a hand to his forehead, hoping to at the very least dull the intensity of it. Realising that such a simple movement wouldn't help him, he opened his eyes, squinting at the sudden change of light.

He appeared to be in some sort of cell. The walls and floor were concrete, and a single cot in the corner was all that decorated the small room. He got up and walked to the solid door, peering out of the small gridded window that was built into the upper half of the door. He couldn't see much, just other prison cells, but he assumed that he was not the only one in the building.

Looking down, he noticed that he had been stripped of his armour. His normal white and green armour had been replaced with some tattered robes. He normally would have noticed his lack of protection sooner, but the pain was clouding his mind.

Seeing no reason to stand around, the Titan walked over to the cot and sat in it. He needed to get his stuff back, but he didn't want to enter a fight with no protection.

“Ghost?” He called out hoping for his friend to be okay.

“I'm here, but I have to be quiet. Sound travels easily in this building,” he heard from his right.

He turned to face the voice, knowing that his Ghost was merely invisible, “Where are the others? And where's my stuff?”

“I can't read the other two very well, some sort of interference, but they are not here. You had been captured pretty quickly, too fast for me to get any usable scans. Your belongings have been taken by the ones that captured you.”

“But who is it? Fallen? This looks like something they would do...” Kervis asked, looking around the cell.

“It isn't Fallen, nor is it anything I have ever seen before. They- they are coming, get ready.”

At that, he began hearing heavy footsteps coming closer to his cell, they sounded much too heavy to be a human, and too light to be Vex or Cabal. He got up and backed up against the wall, shifting his Light to Solar.

Not long after, a massive face appeared at the grate. The door quickly unlocked revealing his captor. It appeared to be a bull/human hybrid. Its head and legs were that of a bull's, but its chest and arms were human. He had seen pictures of things similar, but the name of them eluded him.

“You're finally awake,” The bull said, stepping closer, “can you talk?”

“I can,” Kervis responded, moving slightly away from the wall.

“Good, it is always easier when they can. I have come to explain why you are here,”

When the bull got no response, it continued, “You are here to entertain our king. You don't have a say in the matter, and you will do as we say.”

Kervis gave a smirk at that, “Or what?” He asked.

The bull glared at him, “Or you die a painful death. Your choice.”

Kervis' smirk dropped. He had guessed that to be the case, but normally the people that had captured him would lead him on, expecting him to do something for them, the simple way he gave that threat said a lot about what he was willing to do.

“Fair enough. How exactly do you want me to entertain your king? I am not exactly a man of many talents,” The guardian asked.

“A fight to the death. You will be released in the arena tomorrow, and you will fight until you either die, or kill every opponent. Whatever the outcome is, you will die in the end. This is your life now, slave, get used to it.”

The animal finished his explanation by closing and locking the door, the sound of clunking metal signifying the end of the conversation.

“Hmph, not gonna sugarcoat it huh?” Kervis said to the door, knowing that the bull could hear him. It gave no indication that it had, however, and continued walking away, the sound of another slamming door could be heard as his captor left the cell room.

He turned and sat down on the cot, thinking about his options. He could very easily break out of the cell, a single punch would send that door flying. But he had no idea where his gear was, and without it, he was stuck.

As he thought, a sound started to filter through to his cell. Looking up, he recognised it as crying. He stood up and walked to the door, attempting to find the source of the crying. After a few moments, he determined it to be coming from one of the nearby cells.

“Hey, you okay in there?” he called out. The crying ceased with a gasp before he even finished his sentence.

“U-Uh, yes, I'm fine,” a female voice confirmed.

“Really? You don't sound it.”

“I'm okay, I just... I miss my family,” The woman whimpered out, sniffing slightly.

“I am sure you do, but everything will be alright, you just gotta hold up,” Kervis assured, hoping to help her calm down.

“I appreciate you trying to help, but I think we both know things aren't going to be alright.”

“As long as you don't give up, nothing bad will happen to you,” The Titan pressed.

“Maybe... but it still doesn't stop the fact that we are going to die tomorrow.” She stated, her voice growing quieter.

“Hey, you aren't going to die. What's your name?”

“L-Lemon Drop,”

Kervis' mind instantly drew a blank, Lemon Drop? What sort of name was that? He pushed those thoughts away for the time being, he had to say something or this poor woman could die in the morning.

“Well, Lemon Drop, tomorrow you stick with me, I'll make sure you make it.

She gave a little laugh through her sniffles, “Thanks... what's your name?”

“Kervis, pleasure to meet you,”

“The pleasure is mine,”

- - -

Kervis slowly woke from his sleep. He had been talking with Lemon Drop for a long while, she ended up fairly happy and went to sleep a bit earlier than him in preparation for the next day.

Before he could properly get up, however, the heavy footsteps began sounding through the cell block. He looked up to see a multitude of those bulls walking down the hallway with spears and swords. They were unlocking each cell to pull out the prisoners that had been locked in them.

It didn't take long for a bull to open his cell, but before it could grab him, the Titan stood and raised his hand, “That won't be necessary,” he said. The bull grunted and followed him out closely, his hand on the hilt of his sword at all times.

When he left the cell, he heard a whimper and a small squeak from his right. He turned his head to see a small animal lying on the ground, its eyes closed. It appeared to be a pony, but other than the obvious four legs, hooves, mane and pony looking muzzle, the similarities ended. Its fur was a deep yellow, slightly darker than its mane and tail. It had huge eyes that were an amber orange when it opened them.

It took a second for Kervis to realise that the pony had come from the cell that Lemon Drop had been in. Putting two and two together, he guessed that the pony before him was Lemon herself.

When she opened her eyes, she caught sight of the human. Her eyes went wide as she looked him over, but neither of them got any time to speak as they were shoved down the hallway towards a large iron door.

They moved in relative silence. Some of the prisoners were crying, others were shouting. But many just remained quiet, accepting their fate. Lemon moved up closed to Kervis as they walked, looking up at him and giving him a small smile.

“Good to properly meet you,” She said.

“Better late than never,”

The rest of the walk was pretty uneventful. One or two of the prisoners attempted to fight back against the bulls, but were quickly put down. None of the others tried anything after that. They were mostly ponies, though there were some other species he had never seen before. Some of the ponies had horns or wings which nearly blew his mind when he finally managed to get his head around it.

They were corralled into a large pen, where shelves resided in the corner with some armour and weapons placed upon them. It appeared that the forty-something prisoners had been expected to distribute the items between themselves, but that, naturally, wasn't how it turned out.

As soon as the group noticed the weapons, there was a scrabble to grab as many as they could. Lemon almost went and joined them, but Kervis managed to grab her before she got herself hurt.

When the small fight subsided, three were dead, and five had been injured. Kervis and Lemon had stayed at the side, away from the mass of prisoners and so had not been touched by them.

As the group dispersed to other sides of the pen, a large set of doors opened nearby. Six bulls walked in, each clutching huge swords and wearing what appeared to be personalised suits of armour.

“Alright you lot, get out there! Any that try to run will be killed here and now!” One of them yelled. The group fell into silence immediately, beginning to filter out of the pen and towards the large set of doors.

As they passed the doors, they were met with the sound of cheers coming from all angles. They appeared to be in a large Colosseum, the walls surrounding them were filled with bulls and other creatures of all sort of species. Straight ahead of them, a part of the wall jutted out, and a huge bull dressed in ornate looking clothing sat within the section.

“Welcome, ladies and gentlebulls, to the forty-second annual deathmatch!” The bull in the section of the wall yelled out. He could somehow be heard by everyone in the crowd, leading to a new roar of cheering.

“I wish you all the best of luck with your bets! Now, let's not waste any time. If the first group would like to come forward, let's get this fight started!” The bull had been standing during this little speech and sat back down when he had finished. As soon as he sat, another set of doors on the opposite side of the arena opened, revealing a large team of bulls all armed to the teeth.

In comparison with how the prisoners were equipped, they were like an army. Kervis quickly pulled the yellow pony to the side when he caught sight of the team.

“Alright, Lemon. You are gonna have to trust me, okay?” He said quietly, looking straight into her eyes. She had started tearing up earlier on and was beginning to break down.

She nodded her head in response to his question, following him back as he walked behind the group. Coming up with a plan, he got ready.

“Ghost,” He whispered, “Get ready to resurrect, and make sure that Scorched Earth is prepped,”

He didn't need a confirmation, his trust in his Ghost was all he needed. He began channelling solar energy through his hands, not enough to be visible, but enough to hurt something should he need to.

The prisoners were set upon immediately by the bulls, screams coming from those that were not at the front. Lemon's look of fear grew substantially, and she jumped behind Kervis in an attempt to hide.

One of the bulls took notice of the human and pony and charged, its sword raised high. As it charged, Kervis raised his fist as quickly as he could, shrouding his hand in fire. The bull realised its mistake a moment too late as the fist slammed into its chest, setting it alight and punching a deep hole into its body.

The towering beast screamed in pain and fell forward onto the ground, rolling and hitting itself in a vague attempt to extinguish the flames. The bulls around him turned to see their ally injured, confusion written across their faces. They looked up to see the Titan standing there, fire covering his fists.

They all charged at once, their weapons ready to kill. Kervis only had a split second to react.

But that was all that he needed.

He threw his hands up, trailing fire behind them. As his right hand trailed down to his side, the sound of a hammer striking an anvil could be heard cleanly through the maelstrom of shouts and screaming. As the sound rang out, a massive hammer made purely of solar energy formed in his hand.

He brought the hammer up at the nearest bull, slamming it into its jaw. It erupted in fire, creating a huge cloud of fire that injured the other bulls that had charged. Kervis took this opportunity to strike. Quick as lightning, he threw his hammer out at the nearest cluster of bulls, the hammer exploding on contact and decimated what had been left of that small cluster. A new hammer appeared with a clang in his hand.

Turning, he noticed a few more bulls attempting a flanking attack, but they didn't get far. They hadn't even gone ten feet before an explosion cut them off, smothering them in searing flames. Wave after wave this went on, the smell of burning flesh filling the air as the Titan did his work.

It didn't take long for the waves of bulls to cease, leaving piles of dead, charred corpses in their wake. Not many of the prisoners had made it through the fight unscathed. Many of them had been killed as soon as the fight had started but a couple of them managed to make it through Kervis' retaliation.

He looked behind him to see Lemon Drop standing there, staring in awe at the destruction around her. She looked a little burnt but otherwise unharmed.

“You okay?” Kervis asked, kneeling down before her and dissipating the solar energy. He gave her a quick check over for injuries he might have missed.

“Y-Yeah, I'm fine...” She stuttered, her eyes locked on one of the piles of bodies.

“Hey, look at me,” It took a moment before her eyes shifted to him, “We're going to make it out of this, but you need to stay calm, alright?”

She only nodded, her eyes beginning to wander to the carnage around her.

Kervis sighed and stood up, turning to the bull that had given the speech earlier.

“I'm assuming you're in charge here, so I will say this only once. Let me and the remaining prisoners go free, or I do what I just did to the audience aswell,” He threatened, channelling more energy to his fists.

But instead of replying to his threat, the bull simply laughed and waved his hand, the crowd cheering once more at the gesture.

The human began looking around him, searching for the reason that the crowd had become so excited. His search was short-lived, however.

A door had begun to open, and a huge bull stepped through once the door was wide enough. The beast was immense, at least three times the size of the original ones he had been fighting. It had a warhammer in its two hands that it dragged behind him, it apparently being too heavy to lift properly even for a being of its size.

Backing up, he put himself between Lemon and the bull and spoke up quietly, “Ghost? Any ideas?”

“Your ship. It's your only option right now as your Light is still recovering from Sunbreaking just now. If you can survive for about thirty seconds, I can get it down here and provide support.”

“Good enough, do it. I'll distract this asshole,”

At that, they both began their work. Kervis ran forward, pushing back some of his remaining Light for use in case he needed it. As he got closer, the beast attempted to take a swing at him, only missing by an inch. It swung slowly, but he could practically feel the force behind it. If he got hit by something like that without armour, he would most certainly be downed.

Thinking quickly, he slammed his fist into the bulls knee, hoping to at least injure it. But all he got was a kick to the chest, sending him flying backwards. The flames had barely singed the bull, who had begun closing in on him.

Kervis jumped back up, pushing a chunk of Light forward from his dwindling reserves. He only needed to keep the bull fighting long enough for the Vienna to arrive. When it did, the fight would be pretty much over.

The bull began another swing, forcing him to move and avoid being hit. He leapt forward, slamming another fist into its knee. This one got more of a reaction as the flames erupted from the impact, setting the fur on its leg ablaze.

It roared in pain, staggering back a bit and staring at its leg. It seemed to not be used to its prey fighting back, nevermind actually hurting it.

“It's here! Get down!”

Hearing his Ghost's warning, he looked up to see his ship bearing down upon them at full speed. He whirled around and pushed Lemon to the ground, covering her the best he could. No sooner had they hit the ground, explosions began raining down from the sky as the Vienna's cannon began firing on the bull.

Each round fired tore chunks from the beast, the flesh raining down from it. Soon, the ground had been stained red with blood, the audience near the arena grounds looking much redder than when they had arrived.

As the disgusted cries from the audience grew louder, the Vienna swung around to hover above the arena.

“Ghost! Get Lemon in the ship, I'm going for my gear.” Kervis called, turning towards the gate they had entered from.

As he ran towards it, he glanced over at the yellow pony. She gave him one last look before turning into a cloud of Light. When she had teleported, the ship backed off, flying out of the reach of the arena.

He reached the gate not long after that, and found the only metal parts of it to be the joints holding it to the wall. And so, reaching into his Light reserves, he pulled out a thermite grenade and slammed it into the structure, backing away from it before it detonated.

The grenade shattered the wood, leaving a huge hole in its place and allowed him to pass through without issue.

There were no guards beyond the gate. Kervis came to the assumption that this was due to the security becoming lax over time, thanks to the lack of prison breaks.

He began walking through the hallways, dodging around any guards that might have been running by to try an find him. He was no Hunter, but he understood how to use shadows to his advantage from his time with Kalis.

Eventually, he came across a more heavily built door. The language above it was far beyond his comprehension, but he figured the structure of the door signified something much more important on the other side. During his time trying to find his gear, his Light had restored somewhat, giving him the ability to summon another hammer. When it appeared in his hand he threw it as hard as he could at the door, the wood detonating on impact. While reinforced, it had clearly never been built for something that intense, what remained simply fell from the iron hinges it was fitted to.

He passed the smouldering doorway to find a large room with various equipment scattered across tables. There were two bulls, one seemed to be female, dressed in white coats in the corner of the room. The male was standing in front of the female with his arms raised in a defensive manner, but Kervis had no interest in them. There, sitting across a large table, was his armour.

It looked like it had been roughed up a bit, but that was nothing that his Ghost couldn't fix. He quickly ran over to it, throwing the various sections of plating into position. The bulls in the corner continued to watch as he donned his gear. The male had lowered his hands a bit, apparently realising that the human cared more about his belongings than them.

When the last piece of armour was set in place, the Titan felt a surge of power. The suit had been storing excess Light in case of an emergency, and had detected his lowered Light level. He had been given a massive boost to his Light level, leaving him far stronger than when he had arrived.

“Ghost, I have my stuff, get me out when you can,” He said into his comms, turning to walk towards the doorway.

“Got it, shouldn't be any longer than three minutes,” Was his response.

While walking, he began checking his HUD for damages. He had no idea what the bulls had done to his armour, but it almost felt... sluggish. He himself felt stronger, but the helmet's response time to his commands felt a little off.

A sound drew his attention from his helmet's display to the hallway before him. There was a small team of bulls wearing armour that looked much less ornate and more combat capable. They were all outfitted with spears and swords, and the one at the front had a primitive crossbow in his hands.

The team stopped walking when they noticed the guardian was looking at them. A few behind the leader looked wary, almost fearful, but the leader had a look of pure rage.

Screaming, he threw his crossbow up and fired at Kervis, the bolt striking him in the chest. The plasteel took it well, but the force of the impact knocked him back. The bulls used this moment to dash forward, slashing at him at the same time.

“Ghost!” He yelled, raising his hands and blocking a couple of the weapons. The majority of the attacks hit him, but his thick armour took the blows.

“I'm here, still moving to get you. You need a weapon?”

“A sword, if you could,” He replied, glancing a couple more attacks off of his gauntlets.

As he shoved a bull back, a blinding light caught them off guard. When it lessened, the Titan had a new object in his hands. It was a huge sword, about the same size as him, made out of shining metal. Its wide surface had detailed patterns etched across it and the entire blade was surrounded by purple energy.

“Much better,” Kervis said, raising his sword and taking a swing at the closest bull. The blade cleaved quickly through the armour it wore and sliced into its flesh, leaving a massive gaping cut.

At the sight of their ally falling, the others fell into a blinding rage, all of them flinging their weapons left and right in an attempt to hit him. Kervis simply smiled behind his helmet.

As his attackers began to bunch up, he jumped forward and spun left, holding his sword at arm's length. His continued his spin, the sword slicing through anything in its way. Void energy circled him, following the blade and burning through the armour it touched, giving the metal an easier time cutting through.

He ended the spin after three revolutions. The bulls that had survived the attack had either backed way off or were still lying on the ground, their wounds audibly burning.

But the human ignored all of this, opting to just rest his sword on his shoulder and walking forward, retracing his steps towards the arena and allowing the remaining bulls to tend to their fallen.

- - -

Lemon looked over the small lights and monitors with an obvious look of fascination. She had no idea what any of it meant, but it certainly looked pretty.

She still gave the little white machine cautious glances. While she didn't see how it could possibly hurt her, she had an odd feeling about it.

“Kervis, I see you down there. Coming down for a pickup.” It said, looking at the monitors before it.

After a couple of bumps from the ship, a being she assumed to be Kervis appeared on the ship. Only this time he had a large suit of armour on. The main plates were a bright green, and most of them had lights creating patterns over the surface of it. His shoulders were incredibly thick, and had large white spikes jutting out from multiple areas on it.

“Thanks Ghost, I have everything I need, let's get out of here,” He said, taking his helmet off and revealing the face she recognised as Kervis.

Before sitting in the front chair, he looked around the rear of the ship until his eyes fell upon Lemon.

“You okay? They didn't hit you did they?” He asked.

Lemon shook her head and sat down where she was standing, looking over the armour that Kervis wore.

The human gave a nod and turned to sit in his chair. As he started to push various buttons on the metal before him, Lemon went back to looking around at the lights within the ship. Each surface had a large array of lights and buttons, some labelled, some not.

One light was flashing more rapidly than the others, one labelled 'Radio'. Apparently, the small white machine noticed it aswell.

“Kervis, transmission from the team,” It said, hovering over to the light.

The human turned to look at his companion, and upon noticing the light, he got up and walked over to it aswell.

When he reached the console, he began pressing various sections of the console until a new voice sounded throughout the ship.

“This is guardian Kalis-29 to fireteam Odium. If you are receiving this, please respond.”

The Titan instantly grew a smile at that.

“This is Exodus, how are you doing, Kalis?”

Kervis looked like he almost wanted to laugh right there and then. The timing was almost too perfect; even Lemon had to agree.

“Exodus! Oh man, it's good to hear from you,” Kalis said, audibly happier.

“And it's good to hear from you, though you didn't answer my question,” Exodus responded.

“Oh right, well, not bad considering the situation. Met with a local, I'm assuming that you have aswell?”

“That I have. Apparently my Ghost thought it would be a great idea to stow a youngster on board the Galliot, so I guess I have a little companion now,”

“Always knew you were a softie, Exodus,” Kalis commented, laughing a little.

“Yeah, yeah. You heard from Kervis?”

When his name was mentioned, the human in question quickly jabbed at a button, “Until now, I was kinda busy,” he said into the console.

“Oh shit, hey Kervis! How you doin'?” Kalis asked.

“Same old, same old. Just happy to know you guys are alright,”

There was a moment of silence before Kervis spoke once again, “So what now? I would want to meet up, but I have no idea where I am,”

“And the same goes for me; the little one only knows a couple of towns outside of the forest he lived in,” Exodus explained.

They could practically hear the smirk come through and Kalis gave her reply, “Actually, I might have you covered on that front,”

Author's Note:

So that only took like three weeks...

Really sorry for the time it took. It had actually been done up to the beginning of the scene where Kervis is talking on comms for about two weeks but I just never got round to finishing it. Also, I know that this chapter is significantly shorter than Exodus', and there is a good reason for that. The Journey chapters were designed to introduce each character, show off their abilities and personalities. With Exodus, the chapter kinda just wrote itself. I initially wanted it to be around 4000 words but it ended up being over 7000 . The chapters in this story will be aimed at around 4000 words unless the story forces me to go way over that. Don't expect them all to be 7k words long

I tried doing something different with Kervis. Not sure how it turned out, guess I will have to use the like to dislike ratio to figure that out. If you have any feedback on how I did with this chapter, please, feel free to let me know. Any feedback at all will help me progress, even just an "It was good," as it means that what I did was okay and I can try it again in the future.

I have been blown away by the popularity this story has gotten, and I can't thank you all enough. It may take some time for me to get chapter out for this but I have some pretty nice ideas for this story that I think you guys might enjoy, but that is for me to know about and for you guys to find out ;)

Hope you all enjoyed this, OC's are always being accepted in this story, so if you want to see your OC in it, throw me a message!

Votes have been taken and the antagonist has been selected. Thanks to everyone who voted, the next chapter will have a screenshot of the overall votes so you can see how many people voted alongside you.

Comments

[ChromeShield]

Good chapter, eagerly awaiting the next one!

[EchoTheFloof]

8096222 haha, got some plans ready, but it is gonna take a little work. Thanks for sticking around for the new chapter

[EchoTheFloof]

8096398 Really happy you enjoyed it :D And thanks for sharing it, the extra publicity is always welcomed regardless of who they are. The voting had to be a single choice, I'm afraid, as it would have been confusing to have multiple choices, but there are already votes placed and at the rate that it's going, I think I know which one it is going to be

Hope you enjoy what I continue to put out!