Post by Joe Fischer on Sept 13, 2014 19:48:37 GMT -6
Joe hunkered down on a street in Omega, trying to be as inconspicuous as possible. Given his size—and the fact he was wearing armor under his clothes—it wasn’t easy.
He and his N7 team were there as backup for a sting operation. Blueprints for new Alliance weapons had been finding their way into the wrong hands, but a careful investigation had tracked down a seller, a particularly vicious salarian crime boss, and now an undercover agent was going in posing as a buyer. If all went well, the salarian would be arrested and questioned to find the leak.
The team had staked out a building in one of the run-down sections of the station, disguising themselves as homeless people; after all, who paid any attention to them, especially in a place like this?
They had broken into three pairs: Joe had been teamed up with Kaida Kosugi, the team’s infiltration specialist; the team commander, Captain Arthur Pennington, had holed up in a fleabag hotel with Jacqueline Wilson, the team’s tech specialist, who had hacked into the area’s security cameras and radios in order to monitor the area; and the final pair was Martin Santos, the team’s Vanguard, along with Christine Michaels, the team’s Adept.
Santos had set himself up as a street musician, strumming a battered guitar and humming a nameless song; to his credit, a few passerby had thrown credit chits into the open guitar case next to him. So far, no one had tried to rob him, but that was probably because of the Eviscerator shotgun in his lap.
“Doing pretty well, Santos,” the captain said. “Keep it up, you might earn enough to retire on.”
“Muchos gracias, senor,” Santos said with a noticeable accent. One of his many talents—including music—was that he could effortlessly thicken or thin his accent, depending on the situation. “I listen to the whispers of my people and set it to music.”
“Bullshit,” Joe interjected. “You’re from Brooklyn, the only music you got there is gunshots.”
“Dios mio, such jealousy,” Santos replied, his accent thickening noticeably. “I forgive you, mi hermano.”
“Heads up,” Wilson said, breaking up the light banter. “Talons coming, five of them.”
The Talons were one of a number of small-time gangs that operated on Omega. While not officially under control of Aria T’Loak, the undisputed ruler of the station, they nevertheless paid her a substantial amount of credits in order to operate. It was made up of turians who wore red facepaint, and their primary operation was the smuggling of the drug known as red sand.
Looking at the group, he could tell something was off with them. He had conducted numerous exercises with the turian military, both training and real, and they always walked rigidly, as if their spines were made out of solid steel. But these ones were different; their posture was much more loose, as if they were drunk.
Or maybe they just tried some of their own product, he thought.
A laugh off to his right drew his attention. He glanced over to see two batarians—one adult, one child—coming in the opposite direction and on a direct collision course with the turians.
He saw the adult’s posture change. He saw him straighten up, his fists clench and then gently touch the heavy pistol on his hip. He also gently pushed the child at his side until he—or is that a she?—was behind him.
He felt himself tense. If the turians decided to make trouble, the noise might draw the attention of the buyer and blow the whole operation.
Walk on by, just let them walk on by…
He looked over to the turians. He could see their posture had straightened and they had spread out, taking up the whole street.
Guess God is busy somewhere else…
“Well well well, look what we have here, a four-eyes,” the lead turian said.
“I work for Aria,” the batarian said, his hand on his pistol. “Back off.”
“Well, that blue bitch isn’t here now, is she?” the leader said.
“Sir, got a situation here,” Joe whispered.
“I see it, Gunny,” Pennington replied. “It’s got nothing to do with us, hold position. Any sort of trouble might spook the buyer.”
“Father?” the young batarian asked.
“And look what we have here, a little four-eyes! Is that a boy or a girl? I really can’t tell the difference. Maybe I’ll find out,” another turian said as he drew a saw-toothed knife with a bloodthirsty look in his eye.
Joe’s jaw clenched. Everything Pennington had said was true; getting involved in Omega’s politics would do nothing for the Alliance and any sort of violence could scare off the buyer. But the thought of watching them do what he thought they were going to do was too much—even if it was a batarian.
“Sir…” he hissed over his radio, his intent clear.
“Hold position, Gunny,” Pennington hissed back.
Joe’s heart sank.
“…unless you can do it quickly and quietly,” Pennington continued.
Joe was not a particularly religious man; the few times he had gone to church was only because his older sister had dragged him. But one story about God stuck with him: a man was trapped in his house by rising flood waters. Three times people came along and offered to help, but he refused, saying God would save him. God didn’t save him, so the man drowned and went to Heaven. He met God and asked Him why He didn’t save him, and God replied that He sent those people to save him; why didn’t he accept their help?
He thought God was like that. If you asked Him for something, He just didn't serve it up on a silver platter. All He did was give you the opportunity to get it; you had to have your eyes open for it and be ready for it when it came.
“Pistol,” he whispered to Kosugi, holding his hand out behind him, and a moment later he felt her put it in his hand. It was an M-11 Suppressor, a variant of the M-6 Carnifex. The only noticeable difference was that the M-11 was painted all black and had a suppressor attached to the barrel.
Out of habit he checked it, and as usual it was good to go. She might not be the most sociable member of the team, but she was the most reliable.
“I’ll take out the two talkers, you take out the other three,” he whispered.
“Okay,” she whispered back.
“On three,” he instructed. “One…two…three.”
Personally, he didn’t like the M-11. While he recognized the need for stealth at times, he also knew that he was not a stealthy person by nature; at 6’4” and 250 pounds, most of it muscle, he was made for smashing through obstacles rather than sneaking around them.
But that didn’t matter. Over the course of his 13-year career, he had dedicated himself to learning about all of the firearms put out by the numerous arms manufacturers in the galaxy: not only their specifications, but also how to break them down and put them together, as well as shooting them.
Consequently, he was able to bring the M-11 up and acquire his target—the lead turian’s head—with no trouble and putting a round in it, sending him to the ground as if a krogan had jumped on him. He immediately snapped over to the other turian and put one in his head as well, dropping him as well.
He brought the pistol bear on the other turians, but he needn’t have bothered. Kosugi had just finished taking out her targets as well. It looked all three had fallen to her sword. She then activated her cloaking technology and disappeared, reappearing a moment later behind him as if she had never moved at all.
His eyes flicked over to the batarian, who had pushed the child into a nearby doorway and was shielding him—or was it her?—with his body. He was looking at Joe, and the N7 imagined he was still trying to process what had happened.
Joe looked to see if the violence had attracted any attention, and there was none. This didn’t surprise him; on a place like Omega, minding your own business was the number one way to stay alive.
He looked back at the batarian and said, “Go.”
The batarian just looked at him, clearly trying to decide whether to inform his boss about what had happened.
“This has nothing to do with you, or Aria,” Joe continued. “You were just in the right place at the right time.”
“Everything that happens here has to do with Aria,” the batarian countered.
“I’ve got some more friends,” Joe said. “They’re hacked in to all of the security cameras in a three-block radius and right now they’re wiping the footage of what just happened.”
To emphasize his point, he swiveled the M-11 in the batarian’s general direction.
The batarian’s four eyes flicked to the pistol, then back up to Joe, and nodded. He stood up, picked up the child, and started heading back the way they came.
“One more thing,” Joe said, and they stopped and looked back at him.
“That child with you…is that a boy or a girl?” he asked.
“I’m a girl, of course,” the child replied as if he was an idiot. “Have you never seen one before?”
“Not until today,” he replied with a slight smile. “Go.”
To their credit, neither one looked back until they left his field of vision.
*****
The team was back on a shuttle heading to Alliance space. The sting was a success, but three members of the primary response team were killed when the salarian tried to fight his way out. He was on another shuttle, heading to a place staffed by humorless people who would ask hard questions.
The captain was busy composing his report up the chain of command and Wilson was piloting the shuttle, while the rest lounged about the small cabin. Kosugi was sitting in a lotus position, apparently meditating, while Santos and Michaels flirted with each other.
Joe sat by himself, cleaning his weapons. While he was certainly pleased the salarian had been caught, he was more pleased by saving the batarians. He thought it was because they weren’t part of the mission; saving them was above and beyond the call of duty, and he prided himself on always doing more than what was expected of him.
“Gunny,” came Wilson’s voice, snapping his reverie.
He looked over at the petite tech expert.
“Call for you,” she said. “Marked ‘Private’.”
“If it’s your girlfriend sending nude shots of herself, I got dibs,” Santos called out.
“Like hell you do,” Michaels said.
He passed the bickering couple and sat into the cramped co-pilot’s seat, and Wilson stepped into the cabin to give him some privacy.
He turned on the comm system and was greeted by the sight of a batarian—the batarian he had saved.
“I wanted to…thank you…for what you did, human,” the batarian said, the effort of speaking painfully obvious; he either considered himself self-sufficient and was having to acknowledge it, or he disliked humans.
“You didn’t have to do what you did, but you did it anyway,” the batarian continued. “I owe you, human, and I pay my debts. Next time you’re on Omega, let me know, I’ll get you in to Afterlife. My name is Brask.”
The screen went blank.
*****
Joe stepped back into the cabin, where he was greeted with several expectant looks.
“Wouldn’t you know, it was my girlfriend sending me nude pictures of herself,” he said. “And on a completely unrelated note, Santos’ mom is a very limber woman.”
Laughter filled the shuttle.
He and his N7 team were there as backup for a sting operation. Blueprints for new Alliance weapons had been finding their way into the wrong hands, but a careful investigation had tracked down a seller, a particularly vicious salarian crime boss, and now an undercover agent was going in posing as a buyer. If all went well, the salarian would be arrested and questioned to find the leak.
The team had staked out a building in one of the run-down sections of the station, disguising themselves as homeless people; after all, who paid any attention to them, especially in a place like this?
They had broken into three pairs: Joe had been teamed up with Kaida Kosugi, the team’s infiltration specialist; the team commander, Captain Arthur Pennington, had holed up in a fleabag hotel with Jacqueline Wilson, the team’s tech specialist, who had hacked into the area’s security cameras and radios in order to monitor the area; and the final pair was Martin Santos, the team’s Vanguard, along with Christine Michaels, the team’s Adept.
Santos had set himself up as a street musician, strumming a battered guitar and humming a nameless song; to his credit, a few passerby had thrown credit chits into the open guitar case next to him. So far, no one had tried to rob him, but that was probably because of the Eviscerator shotgun in his lap.
“Doing pretty well, Santos,” the captain said. “Keep it up, you might earn enough to retire on.”
“Muchos gracias, senor,” Santos said with a noticeable accent. One of his many talents—including music—was that he could effortlessly thicken or thin his accent, depending on the situation. “I listen to the whispers of my people and set it to music.”
“Bullshit,” Joe interjected. “You’re from Brooklyn, the only music you got there is gunshots.”
“Dios mio, such jealousy,” Santos replied, his accent thickening noticeably. “I forgive you, mi hermano.”
“Heads up,” Wilson said, breaking up the light banter. “Talons coming, five of them.”
The Talons were one of a number of small-time gangs that operated on Omega. While not officially under control of Aria T’Loak, the undisputed ruler of the station, they nevertheless paid her a substantial amount of credits in order to operate. It was made up of turians who wore red facepaint, and their primary operation was the smuggling of the drug known as red sand.
Looking at the group, he could tell something was off with them. He had conducted numerous exercises with the turian military, both training and real, and they always walked rigidly, as if their spines were made out of solid steel. But these ones were different; their posture was much more loose, as if they were drunk.
Or maybe they just tried some of their own product, he thought.
A laugh off to his right drew his attention. He glanced over to see two batarians—one adult, one child—coming in the opposite direction and on a direct collision course with the turians.
He saw the adult’s posture change. He saw him straighten up, his fists clench and then gently touch the heavy pistol on his hip. He also gently pushed the child at his side until he—or is that a she?—was behind him.
He felt himself tense. If the turians decided to make trouble, the noise might draw the attention of the buyer and blow the whole operation.
Walk on by, just let them walk on by…
He looked over to the turians. He could see their posture had straightened and they had spread out, taking up the whole street.
Guess God is busy somewhere else…
“Well well well, look what we have here, a four-eyes,” the lead turian said.
“I work for Aria,” the batarian said, his hand on his pistol. “Back off.”
“Well, that blue bitch isn’t here now, is she?” the leader said.
“Sir, got a situation here,” Joe whispered.
“I see it, Gunny,” Pennington replied. “It’s got nothing to do with us, hold position. Any sort of trouble might spook the buyer.”
“Father?” the young batarian asked.
“And look what we have here, a little four-eyes! Is that a boy or a girl? I really can’t tell the difference. Maybe I’ll find out,” another turian said as he drew a saw-toothed knife with a bloodthirsty look in his eye.
Joe’s jaw clenched. Everything Pennington had said was true; getting involved in Omega’s politics would do nothing for the Alliance and any sort of violence could scare off the buyer. But the thought of watching them do what he thought they were going to do was too much—even if it was a batarian.
“Sir…” he hissed over his radio, his intent clear.
“Hold position, Gunny,” Pennington hissed back.
Joe’s heart sank.
“…unless you can do it quickly and quietly,” Pennington continued.
Joe was not a particularly religious man; the few times he had gone to church was only because his older sister had dragged him. But one story about God stuck with him: a man was trapped in his house by rising flood waters. Three times people came along and offered to help, but he refused, saying God would save him. God didn’t save him, so the man drowned and went to Heaven. He met God and asked Him why He didn’t save him, and God replied that He sent those people to save him; why didn’t he accept their help?
He thought God was like that. If you asked Him for something, He just didn't serve it up on a silver platter. All He did was give you the opportunity to get it; you had to have your eyes open for it and be ready for it when it came.
“Pistol,” he whispered to Kosugi, holding his hand out behind him, and a moment later he felt her put it in his hand. It was an M-11 Suppressor, a variant of the M-6 Carnifex. The only noticeable difference was that the M-11 was painted all black and had a suppressor attached to the barrel.
Out of habit he checked it, and as usual it was good to go. She might not be the most sociable member of the team, but she was the most reliable.
“I’ll take out the two talkers, you take out the other three,” he whispered.
“Okay,” she whispered back.
“On three,” he instructed. “One…two…three.”
Personally, he didn’t like the M-11. While he recognized the need for stealth at times, he also knew that he was not a stealthy person by nature; at 6’4” and 250 pounds, most of it muscle, he was made for smashing through obstacles rather than sneaking around them.
But that didn’t matter. Over the course of his 13-year career, he had dedicated himself to learning about all of the firearms put out by the numerous arms manufacturers in the galaxy: not only their specifications, but also how to break them down and put them together, as well as shooting them.
Consequently, he was able to bring the M-11 up and acquire his target—the lead turian’s head—with no trouble and putting a round in it, sending him to the ground as if a krogan had jumped on him. He immediately snapped over to the other turian and put one in his head as well, dropping him as well.
He brought the pistol bear on the other turians, but he needn’t have bothered. Kosugi had just finished taking out her targets as well. It looked all three had fallen to her sword. She then activated her cloaking technology and disappeared, reappearing a moment later behind him as if she had never moved at all.
His eyes flicked over to the batarian, who had pushed the child into a nearby doorway and was shielding him—or was it her?—with his body. He was looking at Joe, and the N7 imagined he was still trying to process what had happened.
Joe looked to see if the violence had attracted any attention, and there was none. This didn’t surprise him; on a place like Omega, minding your own business was the number one way to stay alive.
He looked back at the batarian and said, “Go.”
The batarian just looked at him, clearly trying to decide whether to inform his boss about what had happened.
“This has nothing to do with you, or Aria,” Joe continued. “You were just in the right place at the right time.”
“Everything that happens here has to do with Aria,” the batarian countered.
“I’ve got some more friends,” Joe said. “They’re hacked in to all of the security cameras in a three-block radius and right now they’re wiping the footage of what just happened.”
To emphasize his point, he swiveled the M-11 in the batarian’s general direction.
The batarian’s four eyes flicked to the pistol, then back up to Joe, and nodded. He stood up, picked up the child, and started heading back the way they came.
“One more thing,” Joe said, and they stopped and looked back at him.
“That child with you…is that a boy or a girl?” he asked.
“I’m a girl, of course,” the child replied as if he was an idiot. “Have you never seen one before?”
“Not until today,” he replied with a slight smile. “Go.”
To their credit, neither one looked back until they left his field of vision.
*****
The team was back on a shuttle heading to Alliance space. The sting was a success, but three members of the primary response team were killed when the salarian tried to fight his way out. He was on another shuttle, heading to a place staffed by humorless people who would ask hard questions.
The captain was busy composing his report up the chain of command and Wilson was piloting the shuttle, while the rest lounged about the small cabin. Kosugi was sitting in a lotus position, apparently meditating, while Santos and Michaels flirted with each other.
Joe sat by himself, cleaning his weapons. While he was certainly pleased the salarian had been caught, he was more pleased by saving the batarians. He thought it was because they weren’t part of the mission; saving them was above and beyond the call of duty, and he prided himself on always doing more than what was expected of him.
“Gunny,” came Wilson’s voice, snapping his reverie.
He looked over at the petite tech expert.
“Call for you,” she said. “Marked ‘Private’.”
“If it’s your girlfriend sending nude shots of herself, I got dibs,” Santos called out.
“Like hell you do,” Michaels said.
He passed the bickering couple and sat into the cramped co-pilot’s seat, and Wilson stepped into the cabin to give him some privacy.
He turned on the comm system and was greeted by the sight of a batarian—the batarian he had saved.
“I wanted to…thank you…for what you did, human,” the batarian said, the effort of speaking painfully obvious; he either considered himself self-sufficient and was having to acknowledge it, or he disliked humans.
“You didn’t have to do what you did, but you did it anyway,” the batarian continued. “I owe you, human, and I pay my debts. Next time you’re on Omega, let me know, I’ll get you in to Afterlife. My name is Brask.”
The screen went blank.
*****
Joe stepped back into the cabin, where he was greeted with several expectant looks.
“Wouldn’t you know, it was my girlfriend sending me nude pictures of herself,” he said. “And on a completely unrelated note, Santos’ mom is a very limber woman.”
Laughter filled the shuttle.