#finished It was over they had won. I looked out into the void of the reef and remembered the events leading up to this point. The Vex. An evil robotic race of monstrosities that had worshipped the dark heart in the center of the black garden, they had did this. We had thought that we were safe from them, they had great powers and machinery yet they never once made a move to attack the city. We were and insignificant threat to them so we thought they wouldn't attack us, or rather hoped to ourself's. I guess we got too big, too noisy killing their axis minds and daring to raid the vault of glass. They attacked the walls with a force the likes of which the city had never seen. They had created a machine monstrosity that overwhelmed our defenses. It had a design similar to Atheon yet it was pure black with four arms like that of a fallen kell, and three eyes like the hive, yet these eyes glowed a dark crimson. I don't know why they chose that design maybe it was to inspire fear in us but every time I think of that I wonder whether the Vex know the concept of psychological warfare. And this thing had one glaring difference that separated it from being a Vex, the radiolarion fluid. It didn't have what made the Vex even a little bit organic, it was pure machine. They fought towards the traveler right through the streets of the city and anything or anyone that got in their way, the city was burning, screams filled the air, and the streets were flooded with blood. We emptied our guns into the never ending mass of machines and watched as our guardian brothers and sisters fell beside us in a desperate hope to protect the traveler. They pushed us back and we were forced to retreat away from the traveler we were trying so hard to protect. Unsurprisingly they stopped pushing and gathered around the metal monstrosity as it stood underneath the traveler. I had to watch in horror as the thing emitted a black , wispy, smoky substance then sent it up to the traveler. The traveler was consumed in that darkness when I realized that the machine had remnants of the black gardens heart and shot it into the traveler transforming it into their new heart, then I watched as the light was torn from my body forcefully and painfully. I watched as that light too was consumed by that darkness, and I watched as my ghost become that dark black color while screaming out in pain and for help and turned to ash, blown away by the wind. We retreated out of the city, some stayed on earth while others, like those Dead Orbit cowards, left the system to be consumed by the vacuum of space. The Vex began to transform the Earth into one of their machines like Mercury. I watched as the Earth was slowly replaced with Vex technology and architecture, growing out like a cancerous tumor on the horizon. Then the cabal came, their empires' red legion came into orbit with their fleet and, after a few hours, opened fire on the Vex. The planet became a war zone between the Vex axsis minds, and the cabals' overwhelming military force. I watched as the planet burned and remnants of golden age city's were toppled to the ground and destroyed. Rasputin, the AI warmind, set up a safe zone in the forgotten shore shooting down any red legion ships that came close with orbital ordinance, while he gave us former guardians weapons the likes of which we have never seen. We began to hope again. That's when we learned Rasputins' true intentions as our new weapons shut down and Rasputin became unresponsive. He gave us ships, but not nearly enough for all of us. That's when I realized that Rasputin waited for there to be too many guardians for all the ships he had, this was a test, some sort of sick experiment to see what we would do, for what purpose I had no earthly idea. He might have wanted to give us hope in order to crush it, gave us a way out to see what humanity and light was left in usWe started killing each other brutally. He disabled our weapons so we would have to fight with our bare hands. I couldn't stand the sudden change, friends killed each other for ships, for a chance to escape. So, I left deciding to take my chances in the war zone that now was Earth. A few weeks later I stole a red legion harvester ship as it unloaded its crew onto the ground. I sent a distress signal to the reef and waited in low orbit watching the fires burn on the Earth below. I was picked up by two reef scouts who brought me back with them where I learned the status of the hole system. The fallen houses made a deal with the reef, afraid of the Vex and driven off of there respective planets, and their ketches floated in space protecting the reef from red legion warships. The hive just up and left, the Dreadnought disappearing from Saturns' rings and hive tunnels abandoned. Venus was transformed into a machine planet like Mercury, and the Vex and Cabal were still fighting over mars and now Mercury for whatever reason. Apparently the cabal wanted the traveler for themselves and attacked the Vex after they learned what they did. I sat in a bar watching the holo feeds trying to drown away my sorrows as former guardians burned images of the traveler in hate. That's when I saw it in the feeds and rushed over to Petra. "The cabal are planting fusion bombs in the Earths' crust!" I yelled at her "We have to do something before they blow the planet apart!" She looked back at me with unforgiving eyes, "There's nothing we can do guardian," she said uncaring, "Unless you suggest that we engage the cabal head on and get ourselves killed?" I looked back at her in disbelief clenching and unclenching my fists, before I realized she was right and left despair settling in my heart. All I could do was watch as the bombs went off and the Earth was torn apart. The red legions warships passed by the moon before they left the rest of the system to the Vex. As they passed by cracks formed on the moons' surface and green energy seethed from within. The moon exploded in a ball of green flames and taking out two of the cabal warships with it, one last trap set by the hive before they left. The Cabal, undeterred by the loss of their warships, left the system leaving us with the Vex. It wasn't the loss of the traveler that made me give up hope, or even the destruction of Earth, it was when I saw two men rob a 6 year old girl only to have her kill both of them a few days later. It was the now never ending cycle of pain and death that made me give up hope. The Vex haven't bothered us anymore deeming us insignificant again. Murders, robberies, and even suicides were no longer uncommon in the reef as more people gave up hope. I watched more former guardians, and city citizens alike, burned images of the traveler in the streets of the reefs' towns with hate in their eyes, renouncing the traveler. I sat on the edge of the reef staring out into the void thinking where it all went wrong. I then thought of the traveler, if it never came to our system none of this would have happened. The despair in my heart replaced with hate for the traveler as I joined the people burning the travelers' image.