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The Exo sat on the edge of the Tower, staring at the Traveler. She was cleaning her rifle, but the action only took up a fraction of her circuitry, and her mind was elsewhere. Her Ghost floated around besides her, doing... whatever it is that Ghosts do. She'd never thought to ask. But right now, there was something that was bothering her, chewing up her spare cycles.
<query[purpose]: rel-time-positive[DESTROY obj-CITY] [LOCATION: second-person] negate-CHANGE>
Spoken language was never her thing. Too messy, too imprecise, compared to Protocol.
"Well... I wanted to believe. Believe that I could still save the Traveler. That I could still save you." Her Ghost dipped a little in midair.
The cloth in her hand slid up and down the side of the barrel, blue chassis on white fabric on black metal. <probability[SUCCESS] intensifier-LOW>
"Of course I knew that. But what else could I have done?"
<scope[PLANET] LOCATION CHANGE goal[LOCATION: VANGUARD]>. The cloth slid into the barrel, came out black and dirty. She set it aside, picked up another one. A pistol appeared in her outstretched hand, and she set to work on it.
"Do you really think they would have had a chance without the Light?" The Ghost turned to face the Guardian. "You remember the Hive on Titan. The Cabal on Io. The Vex on Nessus. Without the Traveler and the Light... everyone in the Tower would be dead right now."
She paused for a moment, her hand still. <probability[STATEMENT-CORRECTNESS] intensifier-HIGH>
"Besides. Someone has to speak Anglic for you."
A burst of static: the closest thing she had to a laugh. She gently set the pistol atop the rifle, and a moment later, a rocket launcher took its place in her hands. This time, instead of cleaning it, she placed her finger atop the control point and let her mind dive into it, recalibrating the firing parameters as she went.
<hypothetical[first-person negate-EXIST]: second-person[STORAGE-ALLOCATION-FAILURE REPEAT]>
An exasperated sigh. "See? I bet you don't even know how to translate that!"
She pulled her mind back, gave it as much thought as she could. Trying to reduce her mental language to Anglic was taxing, and she didn't want to set the rockets to explode a meter out of the launcher. Even when she was done, she didn't speak; she sent each word one by one.
<"If I did not exist, you would be creating financial transactions that your shell would be unable to successfully reconcile.">
"That's." Beat. "Well, it's better than I expected, at least."
She just went back to her weapons.