*spoiler allert: may contain no actual spoilers* [spoiler]Prologue: The Last City, the final safe haven for humanity on earth for the past 200 years. Surrounded by the greatest walls the planet had ever known, walls that were forged by the blood, sweat. and light of over a million guardians. It stood as a testament to the will of humanity to survive, to never give in, to continue to strive to a better future, no matter how bleak the situation. But all of this would change, the day the Traveler fell. [/spoiler] Story Arc 1 It was a quiet, peaceful, beautiful day on both the tower and inside the walls of the city, a rare occurrence for the later as the hustle and bustle of the sprawling city made even some pre golden age cities look quiet in comparison. Zavala stood on the tower balcony facing the mountains that helped serve as a barrier against outside attacks, the likes of which had finally begun to decline due to the efforts of many valiant guardians. Indeed, if we had this many capable warriors even half a century ago perhaps things could of ended differently at the battle of the twilight gap, he thought to himself, remembering the battle, the old wound, his many comrades now forever gone, and the scars both on his body, and in his heart. "Enjoying the autumn breeze for a change Commander?" Said a curious but calm voice behind him as Ikora walked up behind him. "As much as I can. How have you been? Still nothing but headaches and cloudy omens?" "Yes, the speaker also suffers from them as well, at this point I'm starting to think there isn't a single warlock that isn't. Something dark is coming." "I leave the hall of guardians for 5 minutes to take a leak and I come back to see you two love birds up here chatting about the weather" said a voice that could only be Cayde-6. Ignoring both the comment about him and Ikora and the line about an Exo needing to use the restroom, Zavala turned to face Cayde and responded "What word do your scouts have of enemy movements?" "That's the thing Commander, there isn't, I've got hunters posted to find anything that comes within a thousand miles of this place, and all of them are saying the exact same thing, not a single fallen has been seen in over a month. I think we are finally starting to win this thing, so without further ado, how about that request for some vacation ti-" Suddenly, a great ball of fire roars out of the atmosphere and strikes the traveler. Not a single man, woman, or child could of missed the sound as it hit, a great thunderous explosion that could be felt all the way to Zavala's position, globs of molten metal and plasma raining down on the unfortunate citizens below. A chorus of sirens begin to wail in the city, as an alarm goes up in the tower alerting everyone to their battle stations. "Where the hell did that come from!?" Zavala shouts into his ghost which served as a com unit between him and the entire Vanguard network of information. A panicked voice responded, clearly belonging to a new hire for the long range reconnaissance sensor station, a normally very quiet and easy job on any day but today. "Cabal, mortar cannon, outside the atmosphere. More incoming!" Zavala's face went dark "The Cabal!? Here? Impossible! How did they slip past Rasputin's defenses?!" "The flayers!" Ikora realized "when they went after Charlemagne on Mars they must of found some way to slip past his defenses on earth." "Yea, but not for long, take a look at that." Cayde said, pointing up at the sky, the glow of other mortars could now be seen, but before they could become distinct, they were exploding in mid air, still raining fire and debris, albeit much less dangerous than before. "Looks like the Old Man still has some fight left in him, and a few tricks still up his sleeve." "But not for long," Zavala said "Ikora, how quickly can you have a strike team ready to go?" "Already on it commander. Two fire teams are en route to the Cabal starship holding position just outside of Uranus' orbit, and another fire team is headed for the mortar battery they have set up in Old Australia." "They landed that shot from Uranus? Note to self: never try to place bets against those Cabal on their accuracy." "Cayde!" Zavala yelled. "Right, right. Oh, that's not good" Cayde said as the battle cries of fallen warriors began to emerge from below The Tower, on the [i]city side[/i] "They must of dug their way in somehow," said Ikora, sounding all the more like her old self as the chaos began to worsen. "And that's not all, I'm picking up Vex signatures appearing all over the city" "Great," sighed Cayde-6 "now all this party needs to be complete is our bottom feeding chitinous friends from the moon." "THE VOICES ARE BACK AND ARE CLAWING AT MY MIND!" Shouts a pained Eris. "THEY HAVE COME TO SNUFF OUT THE LAST LIGHT!" Almost as if on queue, hive seeders begin to rain down on the city, each one no doubt jam packed with innumerable teeth and claws ready to tear into the people below, his people, Zavala thought, the people he was supposed to be protecting by leading the Vanguard. He opened up a com-line, all channels, all ranges, "Guardians! The City is under attack. Return immediately to the Last City. Repeat-" The transmission was cut short as a giant explosion rocked the base of the tower and sent it crumbling down. Guardian and faction ships alike begin to dive to the city, evacuating the people below, but for every ship that is able to carry someone off world to the safety of anywhere but here, dozens are left behind, firefights spring up everywhere in the streets as the agents of the darkness and humanities last line of defense clash. End opening cutscene. Begin destiny 2 gameplay. 1st mission summary: fight off the darkness, protect the citizens. Fairly simple mission, don't shoot the humans/exos/awoken that are fleeing and deal with any Fallen, Vex, Hive, and Cabal in your path. You progress by winding through the streets and buildings until you get to a large open area where you fight off a few waves of enemies before getting an order to pull out and abandon the city. Mission end cutscene As you fly out of the city in your ship, your ghost urges you to look back at the traveler, as you do, you see that it is now severely damaged and is falling down to the city below. As it crashes and burns cheers can be heard from the Cabal, Vex, Hive, and even Fallen. "I don't understand..." Says Ghost "I thought the fallen wanted to take The Traveler back for themselves, never would I have imagined that soo many of them would of bonded together to [i]destroy it.[/i] We should head to The Reef, where the others are headed, if anyone would know why the Fallen would do this, it should be Variks." Scene ends with your guardian's ship fleeing from Earth with hundreds of other ships in the background. As your ship navigates the wreckage of the reef on the way to the Vestian Outpost, Ghost fills you in on the post battle carnage. "It seems that quite a few members of the tower made it out alive if I'm decoding these transmissions correctly. Amanda Holiday apparently had a cargo jump ship stashed away for just such an emergency, I know she had to prepare for anything on her pilgrimage to the Last City as a child, but that was an impressive amount of disaster planning." "Who else made it out?" "It looks like, yes, yes! The leaders of the vanguard all survived! I knew it would take more than just a couple hundred thousand tons of rock to put them out of commission. Though they only had the time to board Zavala's ship it seems. Cayde's ship is also active it seems, let me see if I can open a transmission and take a peek at who's in the driver seat." The com panel at the front of your ship flashes and reveals a battered Eris, who somehow managed to stuff most if not all of her possessions into the red leather interior of Cayde's ship. She can be heard muttering the phrase "He stole my ship, so I stole his!" Over and over. "Well, glad to see she is doing... Well" Ghost says after ending the transmission. "I'm also seeing a lot of FWC and Dead Orbit ships as well, even a few New Monarchy members made it off world as well, there's lots of guardian ships as well, but not a lot of guardians... It seems that many guardians chose to stay behind, several of those even willingly gave up their own ghosts so that their light would live on..." The scene transitions to your ship dropping you off in a now crowded hanger, a crowded table where the leaders of the Vanguard, Shaxx, Petra, Uldren, and Variks are all in a heated argument. Ghosts can be seen floating around the hanger bay. "So, just because your precious city is destroyed, you think you can just barge in here and set up shop in [i]our[/i] home!?" Uldren demanded, ever since the loss of almost all of the awoken fleet at Saturn, his temper had done little to improve. "This is war is bigger than both the City and the Reef, your [i]Highness[/i]" said Zavala sternly. "The fate of all of humanity, Exos, and Awoken now rests on the shoulders of [i]our[/i] Cooperation." This is still a work in progress so check back for more Info and bump often! Link to the rest of it thus far https://www.bungie.net/en/Forum/Post/191959225/0/0