David looked around the party, and an overwhelming feeling of gloom and loneliness consumed him. He could see everyone laughing and having a good time even seeing his sister kiss her wife. He sighed for a moment before retreating up to his room, trying to not attract any attention to himself. He swiftly opened the door and shut it behind him just as quickly as he opened it. He flopped down on the surface of his bed, staring face first into his pillow. His ghost floated out of his body and got close to his head.

"Hey, David, what's wrong?" She asked as his Mom would have. David didn't respond; he just wanted himself to melt into the covers of his bed. He didn't like it when things would get like this. While everyone around him had someone significant in their lives. Someone who loved them a lot deeper than just being family. His Dad has his Mom; his sister has Kathrine, Emily has Sam, William has Tyler, he had nobody. He could feel his pillow start to soak up tears that went down his face.

He could feel only in his chest as he lay there. His limbs lost all feeling in them, the emotional pain that he had inside him manifested itself in occasions like this. He didn't move; he couldn't move. He heard a knock on his door before hearing it open. The flood of pleasant conversations came in for a brief moment before it was shut.

"Hey, David?" He heard his father call to him. "Are you alright?" He asked him walking over to the side of his bed.

"Yeah, I'm all right." He said muffled by the pillow in front of his face. James cocked his head to the side and got a closer look at his son. He was lying to him, obviously, but why? James sat down on the bed and looked over to his left. He sighed a little bit before deciding to ask. "David, what's bothering you?" He asked sincerely.

"Dad....why does everyone have someone in their life except for me?" He asked him. James was taken a back by this, but it wasn't something he hadn't thought about before. He set his glass down on his son's bedside table.

"David, get off the bed." He said to the boy. David sluggishly complied, his face was red with tears and he sniffled to stop his nose from running. "Come on, I want to show you something." He said opening the window in front of them. He jumped out and activated his invictus form, floating outside. David walked over to the window. "You coming or not?" He asked him with a smile on his face. David jumped out the window and followed him. James took off into the night sky with his son following close behind him. The pair after a while found themselves ascending high into the exosphere.

Then, when they got to an appropriate height, he stopped. David slowed down and met up with him above the clouds. "David, look down, what do you see?" He questioned.

"I see...." He said looking down. "Hope and Cirtugan..."

"Yeah, and what's in them?"

"Shops, buildings...."

"And?" James asked him sounding slightly patronizing.

"People?" He asked looking up at his Dad.

"Exactly, and in these two cities, there are over a billion girls out there across both of them or a billion boys, I don't know what you're into." He replied with a slight chuckle. He then floated on his knees so that he could look up to his son. Their eyes met for a moment and David could see something in his Dad's eyes. Whatever he said, he would believe. "There is someone out there for you David, I know that. Be they Awoken, Exo, Eliksni, or Human, I swear to you.." He said placing his hands lightly on his shoulders. "You will find somebody. I know you may not find them today or tomorrow and it's upsetting, frustrating in many ways. But trust me when I say this, the more you wait for it, the more you are patient, the more you will cherish them when you have them." He said looking into his son's eyes.

David started to regain feeling in his body, and he could feel tears go down his face again. He felt warm inside, and he wrapped his arms around his Dad. "Dad....thank you."

"You're welcome David." He said returning the hug.

"So, you think I'll find someone?"

"I know David. I know you will." He replied before hearing a buzz on his comms unit. "Hold on buddy, I need to take this, I'll meet you back home okay?"

"Sure thing Dad." He replied with a smile before taking off towards Earth's surface.

"Yeah?" He asked the person on the other side of the Comms.

"James, get down here, this is important," Ikora told him over the radio.

"Alright, I'll be right there." He replied taking off toward the Tower, landing slowly in the plaza deactivating his transformation and headed toward the hall of guardians. The lights were dimmed, and a large holographic projection was in the center of the room. It was of some sort of strange ship. Cameron, Sidriks, Charon, Kronah, even Saladin was present. Ikora looked over to James for a moment.

"Thank you for coming." She said to him before looking back at the ship. James looked at the hologram with intrigue at first, curious as to what this was.

"What is that?" He asked cocking his head slightly to the side as his mental gears started turning.

"That is the Dreadnought," Zavala told James placing his hands on the table. "From what we've gathered, it is a Hive battle cruiser of immense power and scale." He looked down at the data pad on his desk. "And....the Queen engaged the Hive armada an hour ago." He said disheartened.

"Zavala? What happened?" Sidriks asked him. "It is unlike her to fight a superior combative force."

"She fought the Armada, the fleet sent a distress beacon before all their comms in the area.," Cayde said snapping his fingers. "Went out like a light." He said to the group. "It's just static out there. Everything but the beacon. And what the beacon says....isn't anything good." He said pulling up a hologram with the audio file on it.

"To any and all who are within zzzzz range o-zzzzzz signal, we have been at zzzzzz hive fleet zzzzzzz superweapon zzzzzzz all awoken fleet dead zzzzzzzz fleet disabled capital ship zzzz running out of oxygen zzzzzz send help zzzz,." The radio recording said. Cayde pressed a button on the table again.

"From what we can assume that was Mara, though the fate of her brother is unknow," Ikora said to the group.

"She survived that?" Cayde remarked. "Uh, with all due respect, I don't think anyone could have survived something like this." He said pulling up an image. "Take a look at this, that was several days ago," He said then switching to another image of Saturn. James' eyes went wide, there was a massive hole in the rings around the ship. "This was taken just a few minutes ago, that hole you see right there can fit at least two Moons."

"One blast did all of this?" Cameron remarked getting a better look at the picture. "That's overkill," She sighed. "What about the ship's captain?"

"We have been unable to identify who is in command of the vessel," Ikora replied looking over at the large holographic projection. "We, however, do know, that dreadnought accumulated massive amounts of structural damage to its rear thrusters. Thankfully."

"Why thankfully?" James questioned her sounding rather concerned. Ikora looked over to him with her hands behind her back.

"If that ship got within the orbit that we share with the moon, the effects, even if we were to destroy the Dreadnought would be irreversible. The gravity of the moon and the balance it shares with planet Earth would be thrown into absolute anarchy. Tides would no longer function as they should, and, if the ship's captain was feeling so bold, he could have sent the Earth on a collision course with the sun." Ikora replied not even phased by the gravity of what she had just said.

"Also the ship itself is significantly large than the moon," Zavala remarked.

"None of the Queen's vessels were able to do significant enough damage to it from the outside. She is stronger than any of us can even begin to comprehend." Sidriks said placing one of his clawed hands on the chin of his helmet. He started to think of a means of how they could prevent this catastrophe from getting any worse. The Vestian Armada was the strongest naval power in the Sol system, the biggest issue was how large and how the Dreadnought could survive the Queens most powerful weapon. "I believe the vessel may have a forcefield of some kind. The other ships were damaged by the Queen's attack if you look at the smaller ships they were shattered by their energy weapon."

"So a naval assault is off the table," Cameron noted putting her hands on the table in front of them. "Unless we want to clip our wings entirely."

"Not only do we have a massive Hive ship in the rings of Saturn, but we also received something else that was kinda unsettling," Cayde replied pulling up an audio transmission from another, much closer celestial body. James looked at the large audio file and a holo map of the Solar System. A large red dot with pulsing ring going around it. James looked at it closer and began to understand what the beacon had meant.

"It's a distress call." He mumbled.

"Exactly, that's why it's so unsettling, you see the Cabal don't have words for retreat, so it would stand to reason that they don't have one for evacuate either," Cayde remarked. Ikora looked at him with some degree of respect for a moment.

"I didn't think you of all people would take the time to understand Cabal language Cayde," Ikora said to him looking up from her data pad.

"Well, I kinda have to, what if one of my guys needs to open a loot cache that I told them to open?" He replied raising his shoulders into a shrug. Ikroa's momentary respect for him faded to annoyance. That was typical for him, pursuing knowledge for riches and glory never for knowledge sake. Ikora sighed and looked over to the other people in the room setting her data pad down on the table.

"In any case, this signal is important, perhaps it has something to do with the ship that arrived today. We need someone on the ground to find the source of the signal and if necessary destroy it." Ikora order staring coldly at the others. "Who do we send?"

"Why don't we send Fireteam Peacewalker?" Cayde asked them. The group looked at him oddly, with James cocking his head to the right.

"Who are they?"

"Oh, sorry, forgot, they're the fireteam of Emily, William, and David. That's what they're calling themselves." Cayde replied.

"You want to send the children on a mission like that?" Cameron questioned Cayde with her tone increasing towards the end.

"Cameron, relax," Ikora said placing a hand on her left shoulder. "The boys are some of the most powerful guardians I've ever seen, they'll be alright."

Cameron took a deep breath and shut her eyes for a bit and looked down on the floor then over to her husband. "James? Your thoughts?" She demanded from him. James looked at everyone in the room then back over to Cameron.

"While I think it would be perfect for them to get out into the field, they will need a supervisor, I believe that Kronah will make a great one." He replied contemplatively. Cayde looked over at Zavala hoping to get his input on the situation. He appeared to be distracted, looking at all of the other things that were hovering above the table.

"If Kronah were to go with them, then I would be okay with it." He replied looking back at Cayde.

"Then it's settled, the children will go with Kronah to investigate the signal while we think of a plan to deal with the Dreadnought," Ikora concluded. "Meeting adjourned." Everyone left the room a few moments later except for James and Cameron. James noticed how uneasy Cameron was feeling, and he placed his hands on her shoulders.

"What's wrong?" He asked her.

"James....what if they aren't ready? What if they get hurt?" Cameron said looking out the massive viewport at the end of the Hall of Guardians. Dark clouds began to drift into the area in between the mountains and droplets of rain began to fall on the glass and stream down the window. James pondered her question for a moment before he responded.

"They're ready Cam, I know they'll be alright. Besides, they'll have Kronah with them."

"I know. But I'm still worried."

"Me too Cameron...me too."