Chapter 2. Inward and Outward

'This is fun!'

Sam found himself laughing in an almost manic delight as he unleashed his outpouring of energy upon the ugly, cowardly marines before him.

'They obviously mean me harm, I doubt if I showed mercy that they would return the favor.'

Sam unleashed from his left palm, another lightning blast, charring more marines to a crisp.

And before he knew it, all of the immediate platoon was slaughtered, stinging the air with a stench of much over-cooked human flesh.

"An extraction ship is waiting for you, but the grineer will be hunting you."

'That must be the Lotus, the guiding mother of Tenno.'

Somehow instinctively Sam knew that such an extraction ship could not possibly make it through all the foliage of the overgrowth surrounding him. Between the ruined building and the trees outside, there was absolutely not enough clearance for a ship to get near enough for him to reach.

And so Sam went jogging, still brimming with a liveliness that exceeded that on any living human.

After a few minutes, Sam saw a light in the rainy, dark, forest. Upon approach, Sam realized it was a repurposed ship. Or at least the crashed remains of a small ship, so old and overgrown that a hill had reclaimed over half of it to time. And yet there was a bright light in there, as if a hunter had left his hunting outpost to pursue some game in the wilderness.

'Or maybe he was driven off or scared off by the grineer's arrival.'

Either way, the hunter (assumedly) had left two melee weapons behind in his haste.

The first weapon was a gleaming blade. A short-sword a little longer than a traditional gladius, but curved in the fashion of a cutlass. Somehow, Sam just knew that it was called a Skana. It sacrifices a little bit of range for a great deal of speed, and cutting damage.

The second weapon, equally as shiny grey and reflecting in the fluorescent light, was a long pole with several bands of color (different shades of gray, but still a color). Somehow, Sam intrinsically knew that this weapon was called the "Bo Staff" and that the banded ends contained denser metal, enabling it to land heavier, bludgeoning strikes with decisive clubbing.

'With its shape it could probably just as easily be used for "clubbing" too, heh.'

"Arm yourself."

Sam nearly jumped out of his skin from how spooked he was from the Lotus's voice all of a sudden.

'Can she see what I'm seeing? Or does she just know this is here already?'

This ran a quick chill down his spine.

After that moment however, Sam picked up the only weapon he could reliably cosplay as a pirate with.

Seemingly serendipitously, Sam heard a grumble in a language he did not understand.

He instantly ducked and turned in place, sword drawn.

In front of him, about 200 feet away, he saw him; a grineer marine on patrol, clearly searching for something.

'Like a Tenno such as myself.'

Sam raised his blade, following the motions that his muscles seemed surprisingly familiar with.

The marine raised its head with a start, as if he could feel some impending doom himself.

"Growr?"

Sam struck.

Quick and true.

His blade cut the marine cleanly in half with superhuman force.

Sam looked quizzically at his own hand.

'How the hell did I generate that much force?'

"Good. The extraction point is up ahead. Hurry, before Vor finds out you've escaped."

'Heh, she probably can't see what I'm seeing, otherwise she'd know how much I just messed him up.'

Sam paused for a minute.

'Wait, maybe I can talk with her...'

Sam raised up a finger to his ear, miming a headphone.

"Sam to Lotus, Sam to Lotus."

The Lotus sounded like she fell out of whatever chair she was in.

"Tenno... You can talk?"

'Oh shoot that's right...The original story doesn't introduce your own conscious ability to talk until much later...'

"Yeah, by the way, I ripped off Vor's arm earlier; I think he very much well knows that I've escaped."

The Lotus responded immediately.

"Good, that should buy you some time; He's unlikely to pursue a foe that has recently dismembered him."

'Maybe it's the fact that the Lotus isn't human that grants her that superhuman mental processing power and confidence in her own words.'

"That being said, you still need to extract. Head to the extraction point."

Sam felt his mind pull toward a point in space.

"On it."

Sam took off at a jog once more.

Sooner than he expected, he arrived at a circular clearing in the forest canopy; an orbiter approached the clearing slowly, but loudly. Somewhat self-consciously, Sam now decides to look around. Sure enough, There were dozens of Grineer marines lying in wait for their commander's mark in the shadows.

Too late, Sam realized another subtle detail, a shimmer in the dark, night air above the trees.

"Lotus, watch ou-"

The ship collided directly with the almost invisible force-field in the sky. What appeared to be an electric current surged over the surface and its engines cut out, crashing it directly into the ground in a fiery explosion.

The marines now moved into the clearing, probably to ensure that there would be no survivors among the wreckage of this obviously unmanned ship.

Sam crouched down close to the ground. He'd rather not test his warframe's shields if he didn't have to, stealth could accomplish this feat easily.

"That is most unfortunate, before his own retreat, Vor must have activated the area's lockdown protocol."

"No shit sherlock, would you mind finding me another way?"

Sam could feel the Lotus's disgruntled emotions.

"Tenno, I am actively striving to extract you, a modicum of grace would be greatly appreciated."

Sam immediately felt bad, she's right, she's done nothing but help so far.

"Sorry... I just don't like being stranded places."

The Lotus seemed to broadcast sympathetic emotions across his comms, somehow.

"I found a console at which your old ship is docked. This is your only chance."

A new coordinate in 3d space was imprinted upon Sam's consciousness.

"Got it, thank you Lotus."

Sam took off at a jog, away from the now crowded clearing, towards the waypoint.

A few minutes later, he arrived at what was clearly a Grineer outpost, absolutely crawling with hostiles.

As expected, there was an arming station out near the forest with sidearms.

Also as expected, there were several parties out at the moment, so only two side arms were left, a pistol called the Lato, and kunai.

Without even putting much thought into it, Sam picked up the Lato. It does more damage, and who doesn't like shooting a pistol.

'Target practice time.'

A patrol was growing near again.

Sam popped up and steadied his arms on the arming station, aiming for the Grineer in the back of the group, that was carrying a sniper rifle.

'First shot, let's make it count.'

Sam pulled the trigger, and all 5 heads swivel towards him.

Aiming a gun is harder than you'd think.

"Tenno!!!!"

Instantly Sam's body sprung into action, disobeying his prudential mind screaming to stop.

He vaulted off of the arming station and kicked the nearest grineer in the head, cleaving the head off of another at the same time.

By now the grineer had their guns up and pointing at him.

Sam raised a hand, terrified by the gigantic barrels pointed at his face. But his other hand, holding the skana, disobeyed him, running through one of the aggressing marines.

Then the Grineer shot.

Well, technically it shot a bullet, but to Sam it felt like he was punched by a younger sibling with an age in the single digits. And to add to the absurdity, the guns were highly suppressed for some reason, apparently grineer are afraid of attracting greater beasts.

'What the hell am I afraid of? My body obviously knows what to do much better than I."

Returning to his earlier battle-trance of sorts, Sam smiled with glee. Inside his mind of course, warframes can't smile.

The grineer would only see his hand lash out, grabbing the barrel of his fired gun, to wrench it out of his grasp.

With borderline startling speed, Sam threw the gun at the sniper who was taking aim. And threw it hard. The gun exploded into pieces upon impact with the Grineer's face, knocking the life straight out of it.

Sam turned towards the now disarmed Grineer.

"Uh oh."

'Hah, it appears they have adopted some human sayings.'

Sam's hand brought itself up and snap-shot the grineer in the face with the Lato. Blowing it to bloody pieces, leaving the body to collapse to the ground alongside the others.

"Good job, A Tenno flows like fire over the battle terrain. I see you are regaining your skills rapidly."

'Well that's an understatement, that felt awesome!'

"Yeah, how is the disabling of the lockdown going?"

"I cannot influence a shield from the outside, you need to overload the protocol from the access panel while you free your ship."

"On it."

Sam took off at a jog up the stairs once again, but this time not even stopping as he casually popped off shots with his Lato, his muscles doing all the work his brain could never do. Before long, he came across a table with two misplaced primary weapons, a rifle called a Braton; and a bow, called the Paris.

"Finally! Time to try out some true marksmanship!"

Sam instantly snapped up the bow into his hands as he continued his rapid pace towards the point.

After about 20 minutes of searching through the outpost, Sam finally arrived at an area he could reliably call a "ship landing pad" at which was an orbiter, identical to the one shot down earlier.

"Ataaaaack."

Two grineer rounded a corner within 2 feet of Sam, ready to blast him with their Hek shotguns.

Sam ducked and cracked his bow upon the back of one. Taking the arrow out with his other hand, Sam wasted no time skewering the other Grineer's metal framing of an excuse for a skull. The other grineer, staggered and dazed from the sudden impact, tripped forward and fell onto the ground.

Sam couldn't help himself but to let out a laugh, this is surprisingly exhilarating.

He drew his Skana, stomped on the grineer's lower back, and plunged the blade right through its midsection, nearly cutting it in half.

After he returned to his senses, Sam turned back towards the ship, sure enough, there was a computer panel right beside the ship.

"Your Parazon is a versatile tool, use it to breach this panel and restart the ship."

The Lotus's voice was much less surprising this time, after all what other human-ish voice could he be hearing.

'A parazon? what is...'

His hand drew itself toward the lower part of the panel, and a hidden blade shot out of his wrist, connecting directly into the computer's systems.

He saw the data of the computer, writhing, constantly encrypting, re-encrypting and morphing to evade discernment, and access. He needed balance, stability.

Like three spokes of a bicycle wheel sticking out, he could see these sources of imbalance.

Sam reached out with his mind, and fixed the wheel back up.

"Stop touching me, you— what? Are my sensors deceiving me? Operator, is that you?"

Sam could recognize that voice anywhere.

This is his ship cephalon, Ordis.

"Yes Ordis, let's return to orbit."

"Right away Operator, just give me a few moments to cycle the engines."

Conveniently, Sam had killed any grineer within earshot of this area, he simply sat on a metal fixture as he awaited Ordis's calibrations.

Wordlessly, the ship started up after a few seconds, and a passenger-shaped indent revealed itself on the bottom.

Once again, Sam's body, the warframe, knew what to do.

He jumped up and grabbed hold of two hand-holds, taking care to lock both of his feet into sockets at the bottom as the ship proceeded to lift off, and rotate him into the interior of the ship.