I readied out my rocket launcher and took aim quickly, only for the Kell to disappear again, along with its ship.

"And...he's gone." Petra sighed frustratedly through the Ghost's chat comms.

"We lost him again..." Ivory groaned.

I put a reassuring arm over her shoulder. "Looks like you owe me another drink."

"Can you shut up?!" She shouted angrily, throwing my arm off of her.

"No problem, Guardians." Petra reassured. "There are still plenty of Wolves in there. Best clear them out."

"We're on it." Zero replied as he took out his machine gun and opened fire on the Fallen.

I unleashed my Arc Blade ability and took out nearby Vandal swiftly. Once it had worn off, I found myself facing a Captain. It aimed its weapon at me and fired a huge blast of burning energy.

"Whoa...!" I instinctively ducked out of the way and turned to see the ball of fire impact against a wall before exploding. Well damn... "Is that supposed to scare me?" I taunted with a wicked grin spread across my face as I aimed my rocket launcher. I pulled the trigger, sending a heavy rocket hurtling into the Captain's chest, blasting it back with a powerful explosion.

I love my job.

"Well, that was fun." I yawned before setting my eyes it's weapon, which was sent skittering away from the impact of the rocket. "Hmm?" I walked over and picked it up curiously.

"Impressive weaponry." Petra awed. "Variks, what is that thing?"

A scratchy voice soon accompanied hers on the chat comms. "Scorch cannon. Powerful, and very rare indeed."

I handed it to Zero, who had walked over to take a look. He observed it on all sides before tossing it back at me in disgust.

"That thing only has ten rounds! What the hell are we gonna do with it?" He scoffed.

"Don't underestimate its power." Variks replied patiently.

"Thats right," Ivory added. "Maybe we can save it, and the Future War Cult can figure out a way to use it."

"Fair point..." My brother muttered.

"In any case, you did good today." Petra praised. "But Winter now bows to Skolas, and the Wolves have just gotten started. Titan, I'd like you to return to the Reef so we can discuss our next course of action. The two Huntresses may return to the camp and get some rest."

"Guess we'll see you later." Ivory sighed sadly.

"Yeah, well..." Zero grumbled. "Later then."

~~~

"I'm still waiting on that drink." I pestered Ivory as we made our way to our quarters.

"Leave me alone and let me rest a few hours!" She whined, slapping me playfully.

"A drink? As in you failed your mission again?" We whipped around to find Alpha and Li Ling, two Hunters from another fire team we had started getting along with lately. "S'up." Alpha greeted casually.

"Hey." I nodded back. "And yeah, we lost Skolas."

"You mean you found him?!" Li Ling exclaimed in astonishment.

"We did, but he escaped before we could even take our weapons out." Ivory sighed.

"That's amazing! Forget that drink, this calls for a girls night at the pub!" Li Ling shouted happily.

"Sounds great!" Alpha chimed in, only for Li Ling to shove him forcefully.

"Girls night, Alpha! What part of girls night don't you understand?" She scolded.

"I can be a girl..." He replied in a mock hurt expression before turning back to us cheerfully. "Go and have your fun, but don't let Ling drink too much. She gets freaky when she's high." He joked.

"Sh-shut up!" The small Awoken cried, incredibly flustered, to his amusement.

"Where's Jaeger?" Ivory asked suddenly.

"He was just called to the Reef for something." Alpha replied. "Only him, though."

"Same with Zero." I sighed. "I guess since they're team leaders..."

"Yeah."

Zero's been pretty grumpy lately over the extra amount of work he'd been assigned, just because he's our team leader. He has to go through more trainings and sometimes on missions without us. It's a little depressing, but all fireteam leaders have to do it.

"Anyways," Alpha broke the silence. "Hope you guys have fun." And with that, he took off.

"You guys can go without me." I yawned. "I wanna go to sleep."

"You want to what?!" Ivory exclaimed. "Since when have you ever turned down an offer to go to the pub?"

"Just bring me a bottle of vodka when you get back." I smiled reassuringly before heading toward the elevator.

I pressed the button with a black 5 painted sloppily on it and waited as the elevator took me further underground. I took a left turn and continued down the hallway until I found our quarters: room 517.

The first thing I did as I entered was throw off my helmet, gauntlets and chest armor before going into my room and changing into a tank top. I then trudged towards the food cabinets and searched for the last of the stale bread.

"How are you feeling?" My Ghost asked, appearing inside the cabinet to work as a light.

I found the bread and took a  bite. "Like crap." I replied with my mouth full. "My arms are killing me. All I wanna do is sleep."

I finished the rest of the food and headed back into my room, digging through my underwear drawer for my pills. I took out two big containers and plopped three pills into my mouth with a cup of water before hiding the containers again.

"I still don't see why you need to hide this from everyone." My Ghost sighed. "The pain is only going to get worse, and it will only be a matter of time before you won't even be able to hold your weapons. You can't keep working like this."

"Who are we kidding? The second Zero and Ivory find out about this, they're not gonna let me fight with them anymore. And like hell I'm gonna let that happen!" I huffed.

My Ghost just continued to give me a concerned look. I sighed.

"Look, I just gotta suck it up until they come up with a cure, then everything will be fine."

"Or you can just try to find the cure yourself." He grumbled.

I scoffed. "Yeah, sure."

"You need to tell them."

"I'll figure something out." I yawned again and stretched, sleep beginning to overcome me. "For now, let's just keep this between us. It's nothing I can't handle." I sighed reassuringly as I flopped onto my mattress. "Goodnight."

Hey everyone, welcome back! This is the sequel to The Hidden Truth, and since I'm publishing this on Thanksgiving, I'd just like to say that I'm very thankful for all the support this my story has received throughout the past year. Seriously, you guys are awesome X3

Unlike THT, I actually PLANNED this story through before publishing on a whim. I have great plans for it, and I really hope you guys enjoy this Destiny Fanfiction :)