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It is rare these days that Zavala has time to do rounds of the Tower. Admittedly, the more he thinks about it, the more ‘these days’ seem to stretch back a long way. It feels like they’ve been lurching from crisis to crisis, each one leaving a tangle of ruin and bureaucracy in its wake. It would have been a lot to deal with, even with the full Vanguard, but with Cayde gone and his seat still unfilled-
They’ll handle it. They always do.
Somehow.
But for now, it is one of those rare days when he has a little spare time, even despite the horrors heading their way. A cancelled meeting, and he’s hit the point where a walk will do him more good than sifting through reports and paperwork and evacuation orders.
The Festival of the Lost is just around the corner, and decorations have sprung up throughout the Tower; artificial cobwebs and pumpkins carved with grinning faces, plastic skulls and paper bats. Monsters that can be harmlessly packed away until next year at the end of the festival.
He heads down towards the hangar, following the trail of orange and black. It’s been a while since he visited outside of official business, and there is one person in particular he feels he should catch up with.
Like most Titans of the City, Saint-14 had been a role model to him in his youth. He had been instrumental in the creation of the Last City. Zavala had seen him act as emissary between the Speaker and the disparate groups of survivors; Warlords and the Iron Lords, the Pilgrim Guard. He made people believe that better things were possible.
He owes Saint a more personal debt too - the Titan had been one of the people to recommend him to the Vanguard when he had taken up his crusades, although considering the troubles now, the paperwork piling up, perhaps he should be cursing Saint instead.
It had been a blow when Saint had vanished, a deep blow to so many people, one that Zavala thinks he has never stopped blaming Osiris for, even with the assistance the Warlock has provided recently, and his relationship with Ikora. It’s tinged too with memories of bitter arguments, meetings dragging on because of Osiris’s stubbornness, and tasks piling up as he chased his latest obsession.
But that is the past. He’s not too proud to accept assistance, and Osiris, for all his faults, has deep knowledge that is of use.
And he had been instrumental in returning Saint to them, which is something that Zavala can respect. The people need a legend to look up to, and Saint is far more charismatic than Zavala has ever managed to be.
The Grey Pigeon is in its usual spot in the hangar. Zavala grits his teeth at the Osirian symbols spread out around it, the blazing eye, but they’re currently joined by more festive decorations. Strings of paper bats and pumpkins are hung from the rafters, and Zavala can see bowls of colourful candy set out around Saint’s workspace, in between the candles and- Is that a sparrow wrapped in bandages?
He approaches the ship, intent on speaking with Saint. Checking on how he is adjusting, how the Trails are running, if there’s anything he can help with. And perhaps reminiscing. He wouldn’t say asking for guidance exactly; he has been part of the Vanguard for longer than Saint ever was. But the Titan has a way about him that is encouraging, that inspires optimism.
Zavala thinks that they could all use some of that at the moment.
Saint isn’t at the front of his ship though. Zavala hesitates when he hears soft voices and sees the Exo further back, towards his workbench, along with another figure. A figure in a familiar feathered cowl.
Ah, Osiris. Taking his exile as seriously as always.
He should come back later. Avoid an argument that will probably be inevitable if Zavala approaches.
And yet-
He watches, frowning at his own curiosity as much as what he’s seeing. Osiris removes his gauntlets and perches on the console. Not strange in itself, except for the movements; small, sharp, the way the Warlock picks at his nails, fidgets. Zavala has never seen Osiris be anything other than cool disdain and the flare of solar anger, even when he was exiled, but now? He seems… nervous.
“Quiet your mouth,” Saint says, loud enough to be heard while Osiris had been inaudible.
Zavala should turn away, but there’s a strange compulsion to what he’s seeing; legends, one a hero and one a pariah, but stripped of filters and personas and armour until they’re just people.
He watches as Saint lifts Osiris up from the console he’d been sitting on, and Osiris goes, with none of the protest or wounded pride that Zavala would have expected from him. He doesn’t see what Saint gives him, but he catches a glimpse as Osiris eats them, the small orange candies that seem so popular at this time of year.
Osiris says something, and Saint laughs. “Yes, have some more.”
And then, Osiris reaches up to touch Saint’s cheek. It is a touch of painful intimacy. Zavala doesn’t think he’s ever seen Osiris initiate physical contact with anyone before, not outside combat. But he watches Osiris stroke Saint’s cheek, and Saint lean down to press their mouths together in an unmistakable kiss.
He’s seen too much. Guilt floods him, and he feels like an intruder on something intensely private, something that he shouldn’t have been privy to, despite them being in the middle of the hangar.
Saint rests his forehead against Osiris’s, his arms wrapping around the Warlock to hold him close.
Zavala turns and hurries back to his office, and doesn’t dare to look back.
—-------
“Did you know?” Zavala asks.
It’s late now, the city glittering with lights beyond the window of his office as he and Ikora go over the day’s activities.
“Hm?” Ikora asks, not looking up from her datapad. “Know what?”
“About Saint-14 and Osiris?” She knows Osiris better than anyone (or at least, he had assumed better than anyone until what he’d seen in the hangar). Would she know about this? Osiris was intensely private, but Ikora had been his student.
Or perhaps he will finally be able to surprise her.
That does seem to get her attention. She looks up at him, arching an eyebrow in question. “What about them?”
There’s a note to her voice that implies the unasked question of ‘what has Osiris done now’. It’s the question that can be tacked onto any discussion that involves the exiled Warlock. Last time it had involved literally breaking time across Mercury.
Zavala glances at the door, half expecting Osiris to be standing there. But the door is closed, and there’s no sign of him.
“I encountered them in the hangar earlier,” he begins, and there’s still that pit of guilt over having observed their actions. “I hadn’t realised that they were… involved.”
Ikora stares at him for a long few seconds, and for a moment, Zavala gets to believe that he has surprised her with something new. Then she smiles, and gives a soft laugh. “You didn’t know?”
He sighs and shakes his head. Of course she would know. “No. How long have you known for?”
“For several centuries,” Ikora replies as though it’s the most obvious thing in the world.
Centuries? But that… He’d assumed that this was some new relationship, forged in the aftermath of the Sundial incident. Old comrades brought back together. But for them to have been together for centuries?
“That means they were together when Osiris was exiled,” Zavala says. “I saw some of their arguments. Some of which escalated to actual combat.” They had been bitter things, heated and laced with betrayal and disappointment and… hurt.
He supposes this does add a new dimension to some of them.
Ikora winces. “They never allowed their relationship to get in the way of their duties. Or… avoidance of duties in Osiris’s case,” she adds wryly. “But I know it hurt them both. When they found Saint’s tomb in the Infinite Forest…”
Saint had been presumed dead for decades, but the confirmation had shaken Zavala. Hard to see a legend die. And to retrieve one wayward, heretical Warlock who had seemed to cause nothing but problems during his time in the City.
He’d assumed, like many, that Osiris would feel nothing more than a brief flicker of guilt, and then move on to other things, his endless schemes and machinations. And then the Sundial-
Well. Perhaps he had misjudged Osiris. A little.
He remembers the gentle way that Osiris had touched Saint’s cheek, the nervous energy. So different to the proud and haughty Vanguard Commander that Zavala had known, although he has no doubt that Osiris is still arrogant and dangerous.
But…
He sighs and rubs his forehead. “I’ll see what I can do about easing the terms of Osiris’s exile. I hope he won’t make me regret it.”
Ikora’s lips curve into a smile. “I’m sure Saint will appreciate it.”