Waking

[Ina_meishou]

Mass Effect fic, Shepard centric, first person, begins at start of ME2.


There's a blurry brightness in my eyes, noise buzzing in my ears, and pain blasting down my limbs.

Eyes? Ears? Limbs?

Information cascades over me, a torrent like a waterfall.

Waterfall?

More information, too fast to process, but I know what eyes and ears and limbs are.

Know what a waterfall is too.

The haze clears, and I see lights, and strange shapes, tools, monitors, holoscreens...

A...medbay, that's the word.

I try not to think about it, try not to try and attach words to what I see. The rush of knowledge is very unpleasant.

Then the buzzing turns into more words.

ô...time. Get up, we are under attack. Get UP!ö

The voice isn't familiar, don't remember ever hearing it before. Don't remember ever hearing any voice before, but I know, somehow, that this one is different.

Another sound intrudes, and I'm halfway across the room, eyes tracking the walls, before my brain puts a name to it.

Explosion.

I see a...thing, locker, touchpad on upper right, press controls like so, door slides open.

Inside is a Combat Hardsuit, unknown model/performance don by unsealing tab on collar thus...

I put it on, the motions clean and without thought. I discover that things are much easier when I don't try and think about them.

The voice is still talking.

ô...even listening? This facility is being overrun with mechs, get a pistol from the locker and get moving.ö

I seal the tab on my hardsuit and look back in the locker, there's another wash of information and the shape at the bottom resolves into a pistol, not, again, a model I'm not familiar with.

I pick it up, my hands pushing, pulling, twisting, the boxy thing opens like a...flower. Metal leaves and petals spreading out to show it's insides. My eye sees no flaws, I'm not even sure what I'm looking for, but I know I'd know it if I saw it.

ôThere aren't any thermal clips, so you'll have to find those as you go...someone's trying to bypass the door locks, take cover behind the PimSDaT.ö

That seems decent advice. I make sure not to think about the machine I'm crouched behind, I don't know if I know about it, but I don't want to find out. But something she said...

What the hell is a Thermal clip, recent development in months after Reaper assault on Citadel, method for increased Rate of fire through ejectable heat sinks...

I shut the deluge down, as well as the half dozen new rushes of information that it triggered. No time, have to focus.

The door explodes.

It isn't until I've ducked out of cover and brought the pistol arround that I remember that it can't fire. My shields flicker under a half dozen shots before I duck back. I do get a good look, at what's trying to kill me though. It's a mech, designation LOKI, light security bot running VI...

Shake head, clear thoughts, focus on how to kill the thing.

Nothing in front of me, and I don't see any cover on the other side of the room. The mech is talking, damn things never do shut up, and the voice over the speakers is yelling something. I ignore them both, need to think.

My shields read as full, and I duck out for another look, hoping to find something to use as a weapon. The mech is close now, I'm staring straight down the barrel of a machine pistol.

Thought vanishes, only action. Arm flows forward and up, ending with flick of wrist. It's so smooth I don't even notice it's started until the mech is flying back through the door...in pieces.

My arm is glowing.

That's new.

More information in my head. Biotics, Eezo, Dark Energy, too much data, shut it off, shut it off...

The voice is talking again, focus on it, don't think about the impossible.

ô...going on, are you alright? Shepard?ö

Shepard...

Forget focusing on the voice, that word, something about that word, no, name, Shepard is a person, who the hell is Shepard...

Heart pounding, cold, sweating, vision blurred, roaring in ears. History, memory, too much, all at once.

...little girl in blue dress, bare feet curling into rich soil, sun-streaked hair shining like fire, tongue pushed out and hand's on hips...

...same girl, older, body filling out in lean curves, hands rough on skin, skin smooth under hands, moonlight glitters in hair cropped short...

...two figures in doorway, stern faces cold under harsh lamps, yelling, man red in face, stands, arm rising...

...man on floor, surrounded by blood, woman crying over him, loud noises, flashing lights...

...overcast sky turns red long before dawn, clouds belch a half dozen ships, screams, so many screams...

...same girl, eyes wide, shirt ripped, hole in forehead, staring into rain...

Faster

...more ships, figures in armor, haze of rage and loss, pistol kicking in hand, figures falling...

...hands grabbing, pistol gone, legs collapse, too many tears to see....

...man sits in chair and nods as if he understands, like words mean anything...

...older man, gray hair, uniformed, screams at lines of youths, sun beats hot on shaved head...

...gun in hand feels cold, feels right, target isn't, too round, no limbs, no eyes...

...stars overhead, and glass, gravity low, spacestation, ranks drawn up, speeches...

Faster

...rocks uneven under feet, barely stay upright, small moon cast's pale light, screams behind you, sound of guns, roars...

...dead, all dead, no bodies, took the bodies, shivers won't stop...

...the roar again, closer, but no more running, leg twisted, draw gun, turn, ready...

...more crowds, more speeches, heavy gravity this time, planetside, overcast...

...new team, new men, never close, Batarians, Torfan, assault mission...

...blood, Human, Batarian, what's the difference? Blood everywhere, on walls, on suit, in hair. Bodies everywhere to...

Too fast

...images don't connect, turian, dead turian, live turian, blue painted face, mandibles wide...

...Krogan, scars on side of face, voice pulses though bones...

...eyes through blank faceplate, two stars in cloudy sky...

...Blue face open like child, eyes wide, nervous stutter, can't look, better times...

...doesn't make sense, random colors, words turn green and wash away flesh...

Pain turns white.

Haze in my eyes again, doesn't matter, clearing. Voice buzzing in ears again, doesn't matter, stranger. Pain blasting through limbs again, doesn't matter, still alive.

I stare up at the ceiling and think.

So, that's who John Shepard was.

 

[Mercsenary]

Oooh...

 

[Ina_meishou]

The routine is easy, like a program executing. Check shields, full, stand, check room. Take machine pistol from corner, tuck to small of back, hear click as maglocks engage. There's a pack of thermal clips in a thigh-pack on what's left of the mech, I take them, tuck them into the packs on my own armor, and load the heavy pistol.

ô...Damn it Shepard, we don't have time for this. You have to get to the evacuation area. I'll try and...ö

The voice stops talking in a rush of static. I move out.

Wherever I am, Lazarus Research Station, shut up shut up, anyway, wherever I am, it's a real mess. Crates are scattered everywhere, looks like the corpses behind them dragged them out for cover when they were still alive. There's not much blood though, the mechs seem to make clean kills.

Except on me.

The mechs don't have shields, they're easy to kill. It looks like the humans were overwhelmed through sheer numbers. At least they took down most of the mechs first.

The humans don't seem to have had time to get to whatever armory they might have, most died holding pistols like mine, though I manage to scrounge up a shotgun as well.

At least there's no shortage of thermal clips.

It's not until after I find a grenade launcher, and why the fool I found it by bothered with it instead of something more practical I can't say, that I hear gunfire and a voice up ahead. I turn the corner just in time to see an impressively large black man yank a half dozen mechs over a railing with biotics and drop them down a pit.

Not bad.

ôShepard?ö the man says, ôI thought you were still a work in progress.ö

Before I can respond, the door across the pit opens and more mechs run out. I duck under the lip of the railing before my shields fail, give one last check to the heat level in the pistol, and start firing.

The black man is a good shot, mostly killing a mech with every round. Given his obvious biotic talents, whoever is running this place must be well off indeed.

My head is strangely silent on this issue. No name worms its way into my thoughts.

Later, mechs to kill.

There seem to be an awful lot of the damn things on the other side of the doorway, whenever we kill one, another steps up to take it's place.

Maybe the fool with the grenade launcher was smarter than I thought.

I unsling it, trigger the activation, let it unfold, then take careful aim. Two rounds brings turns the doorway into a smoking wreck. Should keep them mechs off us for a bit.

ôNot bad Shepard,ö the man says, ôgood to know your skills are still sharp.ö

ôYou know where the evac area is?ö It seems the best question to ask. He's fighting the mechs, and the mechs are shooting me, all I need to know about him, for now.

ôYeah, I'm...ö he keeps talking, I stop listening. ...Taylor, Jacob, Security chief for Lazarus cell...

ôRight, lead on.ö

He nods and turns away, pistol sweeping up to lead. We go through more corridors and rooms, shooting mechs all the while. I lose count somewhere around fifty.

What the hell was so important they'd have this much security.

Just before we reach yet another intersection Jacob stops, a gauntlet of light forming over his hand. He twiddles something in the ...omni-tool, multipurpose device including synching software and microfacture capability...


My own fingers twist in a half familiar pattern and my own tool springs up.

And this, this feels right. Left fingers press against control wheel, twist left, left, right, down, three lights across top, press in sequence thus.

A voice fills my ears.

ô...fried, totally irreversible. Look, who-ever's running the mechs now traced me, I've got two dozen LOKI headed my way, and what looks like a YMIR. You've got to help...ö

ôWilson, calm down, what's your location.ö

My hand is moving before the question is out of Jacobs mouth. The network security is good, but I've hacked AI before...I think.

ôServer Room B.ö the voice and I speak as one.

Taylor gives me a look, but keeps talking.

ôAlright, we're in C wing, Level D, intersection twelve, can you give us a route?ö

ôGive me a second, we?ö

ôShepard's up and shooting.ö

ôShepard? That's impossible, he should have been out for another month, we haven't even started the synapse thera...nevermind, got it. Take corridor 7 towards station starboard, the main routes are all choked with YMIR, but there's a hatch to the service tunnels twenty meters past intersection 5.ö

ôAnd you're sure the tunnels are clear?ö Jacob sounds dubious, don't blame him. Cramped, narrow space is a bad place for a firefight.

ôOf course they're not clear, the whole damn station is crawling with mechs,ö the voice sounds agitated again, ôbut the tunnels are too small for YMIR, you shouldn't have to deal with anything but LOKI and a few FENRIS. Could you hurry?ö

ôGreat.ö

Jacob looks a question at me, can't tell what it is, don't know him well enough.

I shrug, check the corridor labels, and tilt my head towards corridor seven.

ôLet's go.ö

He nods, and takes point.

 

[Ina_meishou]

In no time we're back to the routine of blasting the heads, limbs and assorted parts of robots, stealing their thermal clips, and hustling down the hallways. I open the vents on my pistol in one stretch, no sense wasting a heat-sink when it can cool on it's own and be reused.

The first thing I see when Jacob crack the hatch is a LOKI turning around. I drop it and roll into the small maintenance room, tucking myself up next to a thick pipe of some sort. The room has two more mechs that I saw on the way down. There's a sharp crack and the whirr of failing joints and I drop that count to one, Jacob remains a good shot. I pop the other one, swing over the pipe and check the exits, there are three, not counting the hatch we came in through, all leading down cramped shafts with subpar lighting and a bunch of ironmongery on the ceiling and walls, most of it useless for cover.

Something glows behind me and a glance shows that Jacob has his omnitool going again, a mess of lines that would probably be a map if I took a closer look at it hovering in front of him.

ôThis way,ö his gun hand swings to point down the passage to the left from the entry hatch. Since he seems to be busy poking at the map, I take point, following the occasional instruction and blowing away the more numerous mechs.

I'm getting really damn sick of mechs.

By the time we get to the damn server room, the voice, Wilson, Stephen, Dr. Head medical...whatever, has gone silent. Door whirs open and we storm through, Jacob takes the right, I take left.

Room clear.

There's a dispenser of medigel on the wall, from the look of Wilson's leg though, it's hardly a surprise he didn't make it. What is surprising is that he's still breathing. There are plenty of LOKI units in pieces on the floor, but no YMIR, maybe whoever is running the things is sloppy.

Or Wilson misread the screens, or he's hiding something.

Have to ask him about that once he's conscious.

There's more than enough medigel in the wall unit for Wilson, so I pack his injuries to the gills and settle down by Jacob to watch the other doors. It'll be a few minutes at least before the good doctor is ready for a hit of stims.

A door opens and a loud, warbling set of clicks echoes through the room, followed by a rhythmic clunking.

And then followed by a rocket shooting through the door and slamming into the improvised barricade I'm crouched behind.

Fortunately, the makeshift barricade included a portable Mass Effect field generator, so the rocket just shook it a bit, rather than sending it, and more importantly me, flying across the room in a writhing heap.

Unfortunately, YMIR are the only mechs equipped with rockets. This thing is going to be a pain.

I bring up my omnitool. I may not remember how to hack in detail, but do remember being pretty good at it. And after all, it's not like a pistol is really going to make a big impact on that thing. Jacob is again on the ball, swinging into cover and drawing it's attention while I bring up a synching tool and try not to think about what my hands are doing.

The sounds of combat, mostly the rapid cracks of mass accelerators, the mech seems to be out of rockets, seem to fade as my hands work at the omnitool without my conscious control. That thread of information the the back of my head seeps back to the fore, slowly turning lines of meaningless letters and numbers into a fantastically intricate code.

And then, it starts to make sense.

Wilson was right, in a sense, whoever did this was good, very good, certainly better than me, or Shepard, whoever. I drop a trace bot to try and track where the original hack started, but it gets squashed in seconds.

On the other hand, I do see a few holes, opportunities in the code. This would be so much easier if...damn, tip of my tongue...library, if I had my library of tools and programs. I'll have to rebuild that before...

There's another roaring thump, I suppose the mech wasn't out of rockets after all.

Deal with the library problem later, giant deathbot problem now.

One of those opportunities in the code catches my eye, and I edit in a quick change. The sound of Jacobs shots redirecting into the walls and ceiling changes to the sound of them slamming into the mech's armor, gouging chunks off it.

That won't last long of course, if whoever's running this fiasco is on the bounce, they'll spot that code change soon, and then the kinetic barriers will go back up.

But while they're busy with that, they won't be looking at other sections.

I drop the trace bot again, just on the off chance it works this time, and go hunting through the code for something more permanent to end this mess.

Ironically, it's Wilson who does that, by the simple expedient of shooting the damn thing in the face. I assume Jacob was too busy dodging to do it himself, and I was certainly too busy relearning how to hack.

Regardless, that means the good doctor is up and moving, which means I'm one step closer to getting off this station and getting some questions answered.

 

[Watashiwa]

Heh. I remember this segment in-game. Very annoying.

So...Shepard is a Sentinel now? When he used to be... an Engineer? Or an Infiltrator? And I take it that Cerberus did a data-dump on him, filling him in on what he's missed in the last three years?

 

[Ina_meishou]

Heh.á I remember this segment in-game.á Very annoying.

So...Shepard is a Sentinel now?á When he used to be... an Engineer? Or an Infiltrator?á And I take it that Cerberus did a data-dump on him, filling him in on what he's missed in the last three years?

If you really want to equate his skills to a class, then I'd say that pre-Lazarus, this Shepard was somewhere between an Engineer and an Infiltrator.

Post Lazarus, he's been made into a fairly powerful, if inexperienced, Biotic, so mix in a bit more Vanguard.

In essence though, he's probably closest to a sentinel, in the sense that he's a Jack of All Trades type of character. He can pick people up with scifimagic, but not as well as, say, Jack and Sammara, he can hack, run a drone, etc, but not as well as Tali or Legion. He's a good shot, but not as good as Garrus or Thane.


That Said, the last bit of this sequence.


Wilson and Jacob are talking, something about whether or not we should go save someone named Miranda. I'm not really listening.

Instead, I'm looking at the results of my trace bot. The thing is a fairly high end bit of code, not like the pathetic program set shipped with the usual civilian omnitools. And goddamn I wish I knew how the hell I knew that.

Anyway, while the control for the mechs was busy trying to fix my hack on the YMIR, the bot managed to trace the access node they were working from.

It's in the evac area.

I'm about to speak up, say that we should go and see if we can get this Miranda to help us crack through to the evac shuttle, or whatever they use to get out of this place, when the voice, the first voice, pops up again.

ôShepard! Shepard can you hear me?ö

I hit the propper command on my omnitool, which activates the microphone planted in my voicebox, which I don't remember having before...this, but whatever.

ôI hear you.ö I say, ôwhat happened.ö

Out of paranoia, more than any real suspicion, I drop another trace bot into the connection.

ôA YMIR, happened, whoever is doing this doesn't want to leave witnesses, all lines of communication outside the station are jammed, and it's nearly...ö

She goes on and on about something, most of it is babble, I look at Wilson and Jacob, but neither of them seems eager to interrupt her.

Wilson, in fact, seems like he's about five seconds away from curling into a ball and shaking. Weird.

ôLook, Lady,ö

ôMiranda.ö she cuts me off, ôMy name is Miranda.ö

I roll my eyes, as if names are important at this juncture. ôRight, Miranda, can you meet us at the evac area, we need to get off this station.ö

I don't add that once we do, I'll be asking some hard questions.

Such as why the hell the trace on her comm signal and the mechs control both lead to evac.

Fortunately, the evac area isn't far at all, barely five minutes after we crack the doors and hustle Wilson out into the halls, we're opening the hatch to a small hanger with a shuttle inside.

And a stunningly proportioned woman, who promptly shoots Wilson in the head.

My own gun, the shotgun I'd just used to clear a squad of mechs blocking the hall, snaps up. But she's already lowered the gun and raised her hands.

ôShepard.ö

For a moment, I'm reminded of a massive Krogan, with deep eyes, but the tone is all wrong, sweet and hinting at promises instead of flat and clear. Verything about the woman is enchanting, the way she stands, the tilt of her head, the curve of her lips, the warm voice.

The eyes give up the lie though, dead, like a snake.

ôWhat the hell was that for?ö Jacob asks. He sounds rather angry, understandable.

ôHe was a traitor, he's the one who reprogrammed the mechs.ö

It's a lie, not even a good one, if Wilson's leg was self inflicted than I'm a zombie.

Okay, not the best metaphor.

Jacob seems to take it at face value though, odd, he struck me as sharper than that. Maybe he's got a soft spot? Something to think on.

I lower the shotgun, but keep it in hand. I don't trust any of these people, and this Miranda woman least of all.

I gesture to the shuttle.

ôLet's go.ö

 

[Watashiwa]

God yes, I never trusted Miranda, even before that. Makes me wonder if Jacob is actually star-struck or just brainwashed.

 

[Munch]

Well, I think he and Miranda used to be an item or something, if I remember what was vaguely hinted at in-game correctly. So, probably still a bit of that.

That said, this fic is freaking awesome. MOAR.

 

[Watashiwa]

Eh. There's an iPhone game called Mass Effect Universe that's about Miranda and Jacob. Don't think that they hooked up though.

 

[SotF]

Eh. There's an iPhone game called Mass Effect Universe that's about Miranda and Jacob. Don't think that they hooked up though.

They do in the game from what I heard, and if you clear Universe, it unlocks some things in ME2

 

[Ina_meishou]

God yes, I never trusted Miranda, even before that. Makes me wonder if Jacob is actually star-struck or just brainwashed.

This pretty much, I never trusted Miranda on principle, but one thing that really clinched it was her body language in this scene in the game. it was so obviously mechanical it put me off her pretty well permanently.

as to Jacob and Miranda, Jacob does mention, fairly overtly, that he and Miranda were an item sometime in the past, but that it's over. In this fic, well, you'll find out.

 

[Ina_meishou]

The image quality of the hologram around me is outstanding. It's the sort of thing that can't be achieved with standard comm gear, the bandwidth can't handle it. Which means that this Illusive Man is indeed on this station, or he's got a private, and high end, comm relay set up.

Given that this entire space station, not to mention the one I left, is privately owned, operated, and presumably built, I wouldn't rule out the latter.

The image itself is worth noting. Big, empty room, the entire back wall is a window, looking out on a dying star that looks so close it has to be filtered and magnified. The only furnishing in the room is an elaborately simple chair.

In the chair is a man, fit, graying, shining eyes that have to be implants, wrinkles starting between his brows. He's wearing a plainly cut, square necked suit, with an open collar shirt, has a lit cigarette hanging between the fingers of one hand, and a glass of something resting in the other.

He looks insufferably pleasant.

ôCommander Shepard, good to finally meet you.ö

The voice oozes amicable manners, he's much, much better at this than his tame bitch.

ôSkip it,ö I say, might as well be blunt, ôMiranda tells me you brought me back to life, why?ö

Ten hours in a cramped shuttle, maybe half of them in a fitful sleep, helped settle my head a bit. It's getting easier to sort out Shepard's memories...my memories, from the reams of data that constantly wash through my mind. It's still not perfect, there are...holes, big ones, but I remember most of my life. Or I remember most of what they want me to think was my life...

I definitely remember death, or passing out from vacuum exposure while looking forward to a headfirst dive into an atmosphere.

Close enough for Council work I guess.

ôI suppose that's fair. Human colonies have been disappearing, we've lost hundreds of thousands of people already, nearly twelve colonies in the Terminus Systems.ö

I frown, colonies, especially small ones outside the official boundaries, go missing from time to time. Pirates, slavers, rogue governments, they all do their share, but twelve in two years is a stretch.

And if it were any of the normal causes, even the Alliance would have done something.

ôThe Alliance?ö

The Illusive Man shakes his head and takes a short, angry puff on his cigarette.

ôThe Alliance is too busy rebuilding their fleet and securing their new power on the Citadel. So far, no colony officially under Alliance jurisdiction has been attacked so, they've swept it under the rug.ö

I frown in thought. If true, and it feels true, then this whole situation sounds like a disaster in the making. Someone capturing humans, lot's of humans, and nobody giving a damn...

ôThe Reapers.ö

It's a guess, but I think it's a fair one. It was a Human fleet that killed Sovereign, a human ship that tracked Saren. Still, this is one of those times I hope like hell I'm wrong.

ôThat's our current theory.ö The Illusive Man says as he stands smoothly and paces towards my hologram, ôWhich is where you come in.ö

Finally, we get to the meat of the discussion.

ôGo on.ö

He gives me a long, considering look before he speaks again. ôOur intelligence reports that the Freedom's Progress colony was hit very recently, I'd like you to go there and see what you can find. You tracked a rogue Spectre working outside the relay network, maybe you'll find something we've been missing so far.ö

ôYou'll forgive me if I use the transit time to check your story.ö

He sits down and picks up the glass, looking at it rather than me.

ôIf I wasn't sure you would, I wouldn't have bothered bringing you back.ö

He gestures, and taps once at the control holo that appears, and the connection cuts out. I'm standing once again in a small, bare room. A bare room in a facility run by an organization that might, if I were feeling charitable, be described as terrorists. I turn and head back to the mission prep area I left Jacob and Miranda in. I have no doubt they're going to be my only backup. Big damn job but the brass isn't willing to give me a few armies to make it maybe a bit less suicidal, same shit different stamp on the credit transfer.

Maybe I wasn't brought back at all. Maybe this is my own personal hell, watching everything fall apart, and forcing myself to work with scum just to try and hold the universe together.

God damn that's a pleasant thought to start a job on.

 

[Skelethin]

i like it.

a very interesting way to start things off.. with a very nice skill set.

You going to be showing Shepard asking some of those 'hard questions' that he was going to be asking earlier, or is that an off screen thing?

 

[Ina_meishou]

i like it.

a very interesting way to start things off.. with a very nice skill set.

You going to be showing Shepard asking some of those 'hard questions' that he was going to be asking earlier, or is that an off screen thing?

A bit of both. Alot of the infodumping will be offscreen. I'm assuming those reading this are reasonably familiar with ME lore.


But yes, I intend to work in Shepard taking the measure of his underlings from time to time.

 

[Ina_meishou]

I will give Cerberus one thing, and it's something the goddamned Council never did manage. Mr. Man understands that when you give someone a rough job, you issue equipment to match. I checked the specs on the Hardsuit in the shuttle, a very nice lightweight setup with decent shields and adaptive armor that provides near perfect freedom of movement. On the weapons end, the armory case in the ready room makes me want to drool.

I leave the shotgun on my thigh, the spread is finely tuned in ways that automatics just don't match, and I keep hold of the Predator pistol as well, though I do grab a number of mods for both, Incendiary, Disruption and Cryo shots have their uses. The machine pistol I switch out for a proper SMG, and it's comforting, having some real weight across the small of my back again. I almost ditch the grenade launcher, but none of the other heavy weapons look particularly useful, and it's not that much extra weight.

I do pick out a beautiful X-97e Viper. As much as I love close range combat, and I really don't, there's a charm in killing things from a nice long distance.

My final selection is grenade mags for the launcher. Lots of them.

After gearing up, it's back to the shuttle. Apparently Freedom's Progress is close enough that a real ship isn't needed. Ten more hours in a shuttle waiting for Lawson to shoot me in the back doesn't sound fun, but I'll deal with it.

O0O

ôExecute Setup, Activation lambda pi three two two seven epsilon.ö

I'm already fumbling for my gun, an activation code is not what you want to hear when you ask a psychotic bitch ôso what did you people do to me while I was out?ö

But then a voice, queerly similar to Miranda's, rings out in my head.

ôGreetings end user, this unit is Adaptive Implant Interface Terminal Application, ident Seven Six Two. At this time, would you like to begin setup of conscious command protocols?ö

ôMiranda, what the fuck is this thing?ö

She gives me a look like I'm something she might scrape off her shoes.

ôIt's the VI program that coordinates and manages your implants."

Fair enough, I'm honestly surprised there was enough left of me after my little fall to bother with. Still, having a voice in my head would be bad enough even if it didn't sound like snake eyes over there. A few attempts at thinking at the VI do nothing, so apparently I have to actually speak to interact with it, I'm sure this will do wonders for my reputation whenever I get back to the civilized galaxy. Jacob is studiously ignoring everything but the gun in his lap, and Miranda is staring at me with something between disgust and envy. But She's been doing that pretty much since she first saw me, so it's simple enough to ignore. The Pilot hasn't said anything in almost an hour, and the viewports show nothing but the compresses starfield of FTL. There's nothing else to focus on, so I just close my eyes and start working with the VI.

ôRight, VI thing in my head, let's do this.ö

ôSetup sequence Confirmed. Running...At this time, would you like to change the official designation of this unit?ö

hmm, at least the thing has a good parser.

ôHell yes.ö

ôConfirmed, Opening Unit Information Archive...Ready, please input new designation.ö

ôBitch.ö It fits the voice.

ôThis unit will be designated Bitch, Confirm?ö

ôyes.ö

ôThis unit is Bitch. At this time, would you like to change the Activation Protocol for Direct command input?ö

ôFuck yes.ö Like hell I'm snapping out that string of junk whenever I need to adjust something in there.

ôConfirmed, enter new command.ö

ôYo, Bitch.ö There, much simpler.

ôActivation Code, Yo Bitch confirmed. Please state your desired form of address from Bitch.ö

ôSirö At this point, I pause for a peek at Miranda's face. I don't think I've seen that shade since I told Udina to suck a Drell. I don't know why she thought it would be a good idea to program her own voice into this thing, but damn if I won't milk it.

After that it's mostly quibbles. Setting up conditional recordings from my eye implants, partitioning the impressive archive space in the bio-computer in my head, checking just what the fuck is now under my skin, in my bones, on my bones, and any other way to fuck with my body you'd care to think of. I do manage to turn off that stupid automatic data dump function though, damn annoying, and dangerous in a fight. I'd much rather focus on hitting the people shooting at me than learning about the artistic properties of whatever I'm taking cover behind.

That takes up another few hours, and a last one gives me enough time to sort through a large store of articles, archived, of course, no coms at FTL, that generally confirms Mr. Man's story. Of course, I got this archive from Cerberus, so it can't be fully trusted, but a basic check shows it to be mostly free of tampering.

At that point, it's time for a nice nap, rack time is happy time after all, even if you have to make do with a moderately uncomfortable bench instead of a real rack. I have bitch set to wake me an hour before arrival, just time enough for a last gun weapons check and another look at the colony map, and hit the hay.

 

[Skelethin]

*cackles*

When you have a woman with an ego the size of a small planet, you should expect her to do stupid things like use her voice on a VI where it totally isn't needed.

The fact that you have shepard abusing the fuck out it to make fun of here is just ironically delicious.

I have never understood just why so many people like Miranda so much.

Shes a cold hearted bitch that first shows any resemblance to being human when she needs you to save her sister... that she has been manipulating from a distance pretty much the girl's entire life.


Why can't Bioware make a character that you can make perverted comments about, in game, without it turning into a romantic relationship? There were a couple spots where i just about went 'Where the fuck did that come from?' after Miranda's loyalty mission.


I am /very/ curious as to how you are going to have Shepard use Jack to piss off Miranda more... and how much Jack will be milking for all its worth to piss her off even more. THAT would be a migrane and a half for the poor, poor 'perfect' bitch...


Anyway, Nicely done. Always hated the storyline requirements to get weapons, though it does make sense from a storyline perspective. Most people forget that you can steal the weapons from your enemies, cuz you can't in the game. Which lets you get all the really nice, advanced weapons whenever you want.

 

[blackkyuubi]

Eh, I just like her for her ass.

 

[Skelethin]

Eh, I just like her for her ass.

Well... since she IS a total ass, that is a good thing, ne?

Doesn't change that she is the type of person I would rather personally send to the fiery depths of hell than date, though.

 

[Vorpal]

Eh, I just like her for her ass.

Well... since she IS a total ass, that is a good thing, ne?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tOIcSB1IEdg

Actually, I'm surprised that the interpretation that the attack was orchestrated by Miranda simply didn't occur to me in-game, although I was rather distrustful of her motives in all other areas. It does make a twisted sort of sense, though I wouldn't discount Wilson (in-game, not necessarily for this story, where circumstances are a bit different). I guess I was prepped to suspect Wilson due to his log about money troubles and dislike toward his employers, the way he initially reacts to Shepherd being alive, his location in the server room despite not having a relevant job, and most of all:

It's a lie, not even a good one, if Wilson's leg was self inflicted than I'm a zombie.

In-game, Wilson starts screaming "oh god, they found me" after Shepherd and Jacob walk into that room with two LOKI and one FENRIS and ask Wilson if there's an alternative path. There are no more mechs between them and Wilson. So when I got to him, I immediately thought, "alright, what shot you?" because I expected to be pulling his fat out of the fire and there was simply nothing there except him and a conveniently located medpack about three meters away.

 

[Ina_meishou]

The colony looks...exactly like every other small scale colonization effort I've ever seen. Or every small scale human effort anyway. Lots and lots of prefab construction units stacked and bolted together, with add-ons of local materials and a few buildings of the same scattered about. The landing pad is nice and solid, with a well laid, if worn, surface, but it's tiny, barely large enough for a bulk transport shuttle. On the opposite side of it from the town, planted fields with waist high crops stretch off towards a distant looking dark splotch that's probably some type of native growth.

One thing isn't normal though. The whole place is dead silent.

There was no human response to hails as we approached, no guidance to the pad but the automatics, no greeting crew of surley, distrusting men with prominent weapons to make sure we weren't trouble.

Nothing at all like I would expect.

We did, on the other hand, find a concentration of weak looking lifesigns as we came in. Not human, the thermals weren't even near a match for that, but large enough to be potentially dangerous.

There was also a massive number of mech ident tags swarming everywhere.

And that means it's probably a mech that just took a pot shot at us as we hustled from the shuttle to the nearest wall.

I sign Jacob to draw fire, the man has a Barrier that is purely unbelievable, he apparently took one of the rockets form our YMIR encounter head on and kept going, and Miranda to start pinpointing what exactly we're dealing with. Meanwhile, I line up the mech that shot at me and remove it's head from it's shoulders.

Miranda starts feeding me data about enemy positions, cursing the whole while about something, presumably whoever is running them, since she's having trouble shutting them down. Which implies that there's someone still here. Survivor? Attacker? Scavenger?

Whatever they are, Miranda did manage to trace them to a warehouse on the other side of town.

We're halfway there when three spindly shapes dart out of the night and start pouring fire at us. I can't even begin to track them, and the amount of fire is wearing through the Barrier Jacob threw up the second they appeared. We're pinned against a wall.

As good an opportunity as any to test my new hardware.

ôYo Bitch, Slow.ö

And just like that, everything seems to stop, or nearly. I bring up my Viper, and it feels like I'm moving through water. But since the rest of the world looks like it's moving through molasses, that's not a problem.

The spindly blurs resolve into some sort of flying mech, Mass Accelerators slung by the central body and a very small rocket launcher slung beneath it.

The first round from the viper shatters the first thing's shields, the second rips off a plate of armor, and the third smashes through it's tiny body and presumably destroys it. It drops to the ground and stops shooting in any case, good enough.

Two more bursts take care of the other two things, and then before I can give Bitch the command to go back to normal everything snaps back into motion, and I'm suddenly conscious of how heavy everything is. My limbs feel limp, like I've just run for hours. My eyes ache like nothing I've ever felt before, my heart is pounding and I'd swear I could feel the blood pulsing along every vein and artery.

Right, remember to limit the duration of that particular trick.

ôYou people,ö I manage between pants, ôneed to write better manuals.ö

Miranda just sniffs, the whore.

 

[SEG-CISR]

Ah, first-person narration. It can add so much to a story. Lovin it, ina.

 

[kingdark]

We need MOOORE! Epic baby! HELL YHEA

(ahum sorry about that) :headbanger:

 

[Ina_meishou]

It doesn't take long for us to come up on the source of the mech's control network. But long before we see the place, we can hear the sounds of a fight. Lots of personal arms, some sort of heavy machine gun, and an occasional rocket blast.

No coms though, whoever is fighting whatever it is has good security.

Jacob is running point this leapfrog, and flattens himself to the side of a rather large prefab, ducking out to steal a glance before signing at me and Miranda.

Unknown infantry fighting a YMIR.

Joy.

I signal Miranda to move up past Jacob and take cover behind the opposite prefab, then hustle towards and over a low wall for my own cover before risking a look.

Well, Jacob is showing himself trustworthy so far. That is indeed a YMIR making mincemeat out of a team of what look like quarians.

Quarians? Here? Makes no sense.

Still, have to take them alive to get answers, and the YMIR doesn't seem to be going for that outcome, given that it just squished one of them like a bug.

So, kill the giant walking tankbot.

I signal for an attack. Jacob throws up a barrier and charges, shotgun pumping out what look like disruptor rounds.

It's a nice distraction, and Miranda makes use of it by launching an overload charge at it. I can see its Kinetic Barriers flicker and die, and its movements turn jerky as the disruptor ammo starts fucking with it's control systems.

I load up an inferno layout to my viper and start melting off the head armor. It's tricky. Jacob is making good use of his skills. Keeping it distracted by standing n the open with a barrier, then ducking into cover to give his biotics a short rest. Miranda is mostly picking away at an omnitool, occasionally taking a potshot to draw it's attention away from Jacob.

Which leaves me to get the thing down for good.

As usual, it's a long slog. YMIR are built tough, lot's of redundant systems. I remember back in basic, we always hated exercises putting us against them.

Finally though, the last of it's armor boils off, and my next shot turns it's head into a molten spray across the prefab behind it.

One bit of stupid design really. Putting the control systems in an extremity, still, much less trouble than wearing down the thigh thick belts of armor on it's torso.

The quarians made good use of the time, from the blood trails it looks like they got their wounded and holed up in the prefab to the left. Miranda is poking at the carcass of the YMIR, and Jacob is carefully checking the entry points to this little square for more hostiles, so I head up the ramp and into the prefab, shotgun in hand but not up.

There's four of them, not counting the two corpses and the puddle of quarian pate still in the square. Only one of them is uninjured. It's a female, and there's something about it...

She turns , and suddenly...

 

[Ina_meishou]

She turns , and suddenly...

...eyes through blank faceplate, two stars in cloudy sky...

...a voice in the dark, defiant, gunshots...

...calm, cool, tension in every limb but stillness...

...chattering excitement burbles like a stream...

...humor in the darkness, light in the clouds...

ô...Tali...ö

For a minute, maybe more, we just stand there, staring.

The sensation of seeing someone that Shepard knew, that I knew, is...like nothing I can describe.

Every emotion he, I, ever felt seems to crash into me at once. Reality seems to blur and slip, the past overlaying the present in flashes impossibly vivid. It's not quite like the data dump from Bitch, but I can remember with perfect clarity every instant I've spent with this quarian.

And then the world fades back in.

ôShepard? Shepard! I...You...I thought you were...ö

my shields flare at the same instant a pistol cracks from one of the quarians. Three seconds later, everyone in the room has a gun out and leveled.

Which leaves me outnumbered, as usual.

ôTali...ö

ôShepard...What are you doing here? And with Cerberus...ö

Ah, that would be a slight hitch. This hardsuit is plastered with the Cerberus logo.

ôCerberus is a resource. If they think otherwise, that's their issue.ö

Her shotgun shifts fractionally down. But the other two quarians well enough to reach weapons don't move at all.

ôIt's been two years Shepard. Why didn't you...?ö

ôTwo years,ö I snort, ôI just woke up maybe a day ago.ö

Some people...you take a dive off your ship and they worry that you haven't sent them a note?

The shotgun lowers another fraction, but I need to speed this up, Miranda and Jacob are probably going to be here any second, and while Jacob seems the type to keep his cool, I'm pretty sure Miranda would just start shooting everyone.

I'd put my gun away, good way to ease tension that, but the quarian on the floor to Tali's right looks about a hair from yanking the trigger for that assault rifle. Best keep it up where it's making him nervous about a reflex shot.

ôSo, Tali, did that Geth data get you on the ship of your choice? The Neema wasn't it?ö

She's starting to relax, the shotgun is drifting away from my chest. Everything is going great.

ôYes, yes it did. Prazza, Sonli, put those away.ö

From the body language, there's some debate going on over their coms. Not really important, Tali slaps It down and all guns are lowered when Jacob and Miranda rush through the door.

ôShepard, are you...ö Miranda see's the quarians and starts to jerk her pistol around, I knock it aside and the shot goes into the roof.

ôYou kill what I tell you Miranda. Stand down.ö

She's looking mutinous again. But she said she'd follow my orders, and if she means to be a loose cannon then she'll be a cannon with a hole in it's head.

The twitchy one, Prazza, has his hand back on his rifle, but Tali's taking care of that. Looks like the years have been good to her, tempered that overeager fire into some real drive.

ôWe're here to investigate the missing colonists,ö I offer, nice as it is to see a friend, time is sort of a factor here.

ôAnd we were here looking for one of our people. His name was Veetor, he was here on pilgrimage.ö

That's...interesting.

I think back to the utterly basic colony. It was solid, well laid down and prosperous enough. But there wasn't a single thing valuable beyond the colonists themselves.

And the Migrant Fleet wasn't running slaves, last I heard.

Quarians are nice enough, but philanthropy isn't their gig.

Something here doesn't add up.

 

[Ina_meishou]

ôMiranda, Jacob, take five. Tali, a word?ö

She nods, and follows me out of the structure and back into the courtyard. Once I'm reasonably sure we're in private, I turn to face her again.

ôCut the bullshit Tali, there's nothing here worth dragging back to the fleet. What was one of your people doing on this pisshole?ö

ôBullshit? Bullshit!ö Oh, she's pissed now. ôShepard, you disappear for two years, and everyone thought you were dead. Then suddenly you show up in a Cerberus uniform and you talk to me about bullshit! How am I even supposed to know that you're not some fake?ö

Well, that's...ouch. She's really getting into it. Screaming something about clones and tricks. I think she's actually slipped into some dialect the translator can't parse.

It seems privacy was a bit much to hope for. At least the mechs are all scrap.

Still, it's good to hear a familiar voice. It feels...easy. Like I can really relax for the first time since I woke up on that table.

Familiar.

The translator isn't even trying now, and her suit's speaker is spilling the strange tones of whatever language she's using across the abandoned colony. But she seems to be winding down. The pauses are getting longer and she's not gesturing quite as strongly. And eventually, she winds down to a stop, blank visor staring at me, chest heaving, hands on hips.

It's utterly adorable, doubtless somewhat the opposite of what she's going for.

ôYo bitch,ö Tali squawks in fury before I wave her back, ôNot you Tali, Bitch, compress all data in your records and prep it for transfer.

'Please note, sir,' Miranda's voice chimes along in my head, 'certain data segments are encrypted.'

Well, it appears Bitch is also Captain Obvious. As if it wasn't plain as fucking day that Cerberus was hiding shit from me.

ôDoesn't matter, copy it with the encryption intact, I want a backup.ö

'Copying sir.' Bitch chimes.

Sure enough, when I open up my omnitool, there's a file copying over from my implant network. I ping Tali's code and start the transfer, and she accepts it by reflex.

ôI need a favor, and you're the first person all day I can trust.ö

She's already scrolling through the data, shooting me looks every now and then.

ôThere's everything I have on Cerberus, and whatever they used to bring me back. Feel up to it?ö

She closes her omnitool as the transfer ends and stares at me for a minute.

ôVeetor should be in that warehouse over there. We should find him before he does something even more crazy.ö

ôSure.ö

ôAnd Shepard,ö she stops, half turned away, ôI'll get back to you.ö

Even hours later, in the shuttle with Miranda glaring daggers at me, I still can't wipe the grin off my face.

It's good to be home.


and thus closes the first chapter.

Thoughts, comments, etc?