[IC] Mass Effect: The Face of Injustice

[EliteCommander]

Avatar arrived at the space station on the third shuttle coming from the planet’s surface. The vessel bore no name of which the Council representatives had been informed, but a quick visual scan on approach had revealed some information on the station. It was an aging Scepter-class civilian transport developed by the ExoGeni Corporation twelve years after the end of the Reaper War. It was designed to be larger and cheaper than other transports, making it ideal for resettling and rebuilding efforts. It was 32% larger than a standard frigate, though modifications to this particular vessel to convert it into a space station had increased its size 5% beyond that. Based on schematics from the stock vessel, Avatar determined that it had four decks, with living space surrounding most of the core systems in the center. There was also a large, reinforced “panic room” near the core systems, though Avatar had no way of knowing if it was still present.

The meeting taking place on this station was in regards to the settlement on the planet officially designated as 2196 BH3, which had not yet received an official common name from any Council government. Although, it was virtually certain that the present inhabitants of the planet had named it. Records on these locals were sparse, so Avatar’s knowledge on them was close to negligible. They were all of Council races, but they were not officially citizens of any Council government. As the planet naturally contained dextro-amino based life, the majority of the population was Turian, though there were an unknown number of settlements which had cleared out areas to grow food for levo-amino populations. It was unknown if any Quarians were present on the planet. Despite the variety of inhabitants, all of the planet’s settlements, and indeed the planet itself, carried a low population. They had no unified government and were much less developed than most galactic civilizations. Therefore, it was the hope of the interested parties within the Council governments that they could negotiate the settlement of the planet, along with the integration of the present population, in return for resources the locals would need.

Based on the instruction it had been given thusfar, Avatar’s purpose on the station at present was minor. The primary focus of this meeting was for the Council’s diplomats to begin negotiating settlement and integration with the representatives from the planet’s scattered cities. All others who were not security were present simply to meet said representatives and answer questions they might have relating to their area of expertise. In addition, only those designated as security were permitted to carry firearms, so Avatar had left its weapons at the temporary settlement on the planet’s surface from which the shuttles were carrying all who were attending the meeting. Interestingly, despite the fact that the station itself was a minimum of fifty years old and was in a state of borderline disrepair, the weapons detectors on the airlocks were a remarkably new model, created only three years prior.

The meeting was scheduled to begin in two hours and thirty-two minutes in the largest room two decks down from the airlocks. Since it had the opportunity, Avatar elected to locate and speak to representatives from the planet, or some of the others who had arrived before it, to learn more about the present situation.

[Fallenreaper]

Raa'Kina & Voira

Voira walked into the spacious area she had cleared quickly out with the help of her biotics. She eyed it critically. For the most part it was empty, except for targets lined up at varying distances. They were varied makeshift targets(stretching from empty glasses, to pieces of wood with painted on targets), granted, but they were targets nonetheless."It could be better. But we will make it work. We've asked every guard here and apparently they don't have a dedicated training room. Considering the ship has Turians out the wazzo, we find this surprisingly sloppy." She said, mostly to herself. Voira made some minor adjustments with her biotics, then finally judged it worthy for what she was planning to do. She walked back to the open door. "Well, we don't like it but we think it'll work. You have to work on your shooting and fighting somewhere and we are not just sitting around.

Raa'Kina stood there, watching the blue, glowing objects float about and shift into an alignment that suited her friend's desire quite well. She tilted her purple tinted face mask while Voira finished up. Her three fingered hand still clenched the pistol in her hand, tightening and loosing in her anxiety in silence. She didn't want to do this but despite her meek, hesitate protests, the Asari refused to take no for an answer. Finally, namely due to her AI's subtle threat of locking Voira into her quarters, she gave in and accepted she wasn't going to find a way around this.

Ever since the near death at some raider's antics on the last ship, Voira had insisted on upping her training. So now most days Raa'Kina, or Raa as she preferred, came back more sore than ever. Thankfully by now, she was use to Voira's bellowing snores. If only the Quarian could harness how the Asari managed to make the room walls vibrate with the sound then they would've had a fool proof alarm and security system. She wasn't even sure if modern sciences could recreate such a noise.

At Voira's mention of her, Raa's visor jerked upward to her friend's direction. "I don't know, the sitting around part sounds less... dangerous."

She looked at the gun in her hands and back to Voira, if the Asari didn't see her worry over this then RK was about to make it very clear.

"Really, Voira? You know I can tap into the omni-tool HUB and aim it for her, right?" RK's bust appeared, her Quarian head glaring at the Asari, with a older model of the Quarian helmet. On first glance she looked like a common, unnoticeable Quarian save for some key differences. Her color was completely tinted orange with decorative and intrinsic designs, floral and tribal almost, covering her hood. "You know her biology isn't built for Close Quarter Combat and pushing it would only result in permanent damage. That much I can calculate without a formula."

Voira chuckled gently at the Quarian's hesitancy. She sighed as RK appeared, clearly preparing for the attack. The Asari waited for the glowing AI to finish telling her what she already knew, glancing occasionally at her omni-tool, as if to check the time. When the AI was done, Voira spoke. "We understand that, RK. We also understand that there have been instances where you couldn't help her aim, and that when you aren't there she's doomed." Voira smiled at Raa to show she didn't mean it hatefully. It was simple facts. "The fucking raiders proved that. You can't be aiming for her all the time and we don't want her reliant completely on you." Her next words were practically dripping with sarcasm. "Also, we thought Quarian's were second only to Krogans in CQC and were planning on training Raa so that she could crush the skull of any dumb ass trying to attack her."

She smirked at the hologram. "Give us some credit to our intelligence, despite all the Ryncol we drink. We're not going to train her to stand toe to toe with a damn Krogan. We're going to train her to defend against enemies who like CQC. We can't be there to stop every enemy from getting to her, and you can't stop a fly from landing on her. Unless, of course, you finally take our advice and get a body. No? We didn't think so."

She turned to Raa, her voice turning notably more gentle. "We know how nervous this makes you. But we can't have a repeat of those fucking raiders. We nearly failed to protect you because of lack of proper training, and we won't fail again."

"I know, but you know how I feel about killing. Taking a life, namely after hearing tales from Noami'lie and Tevura, leaves scars and pain. I just don't think I can handle that type of misery even if came down to my life or another." Raa sighed a bit, her lip being bitten under her helmet though either RK or Voira could see. It was a habit after all. Her fingers wrapped to constrict the lethal device in her hands while the scene from the Raiders played out, the wounds still fresh since it only happened a short time ago, the very images that crept into her head and made her wake up screaming often enough.

While Raa was ignorant of her grasp, RK wasn't. The AI had been about to retort to Voira when her sensors went off about the stress observations, the key pressure applied in Raa's gloves, causing the hologram's head to tilt down. She pointed at the gun, after initiating the safety, and gestured at Voira to take the gun. Her next look seemed annoyed and knowing she was correct that approaching this was too soon.

"Yet you still sound like a Geth...brings a lot of comfort to my server." RK stated, clearly. "Raa'Kina isn't ready for this, at least mentally. If this lesson does anything then it will prove that and likely shatter her self confidence. As for the body, if I had one then I doubt Raa'Kina would've been held at knife point in our last encounter, would she?"

"RK, stop." Raa said as she barely loosened her grip from the gun. Her face mask lifted to face the AI, though it wasn't in anger, and scolded the artificial life form. "It was my own stupidity. I shouldn't have been looking for Voira."

Voira noted Raa's tightening around the same time RK did. However, before she could put a barrier around the pistol so no one got shot, the AI shut down Raa's gun. The Asari sighed in relief, before turning to listen to RK. Voira merely glared at RK, clearly hating the hologram for reminding her of how close Raa came to death, because she hadn't dealt with the invaders fast enough. Her responding smile was paper thin. "You're right. Which makes us wonder why you haven't already gotten a body. Can an artificial life feel fear for herself? We are beginning to suspect so."

"Rather impossible as you know, organic." RK spoke calmly pointing out the problems in the Asari's logic "Machine bodies tend to need up keeping which requires time, money and energy. All three better wasted on yours and her day to day needs. Quarian food products aren't found everywhere or cheapest in certain places, meaning you'll to save the credits for emergencies. Unless you are going to acquire the massive credits for a combative model and spend the time cleansing the numerous glitches or problems in it? A third problem is storage space. It's highly unlikely I'll be in it all the time unless you've got an alternative method to monitor Raa'Kina's status or allow her to shoot should the enemy get too close? If I wasn't within her omni-tool..."

Voira's gaze shifted back to Raa, her head already shaking in vehement denial. "No. It was our fault. We should have said something to RK, or left a note, or anything else to keep you out of harms way. We should have been faster. We should have..." Voira made a sound of frustration, unable to list all the reasons for her failure and the guilt she felt for it. "Our failure is not your failure Raa." She sighed before addressing previous statements. "What if we switched your ammo to non-lethal stun rounds? And trained you for non-lethal takedowns? Would that help you keep from causing scars and pain? We can't fail you again, and we can't force you to change."

"I-I think so." Raa stuttered a bit, her voice still unsure while she weighed the option in a better light. Her head shook in agreement at last as she pulled her gun upward to shift the gun's ammo, putting it on stun rather then kill. "Voira, I willingly went out. You couldn't have known I would've woken up after all, I've never done it before. And even RK was telling me to stay in the room until you returned but I didn't listen. I didn't want something to happen to you."

RK crossed her arms over her chest and seemed to cock her body to one side. "Voira is perfectly able to protect herself. The percentage proves it, several times after all."

"I know, but I worry." The younger Quarian insisted as she paused, her fingers flickering across the interface on her omni-tool and shut down RK's targeting system. "So, which bottle should I aim for first?"

This was her first time firing without the AI's help, a matter that didn't calm her in the least, while she pulled her gun up. She aimed it at the nearest bottle and checked Voira's head for a nod, ready to pull the trigger immediately.

"We still could have done something. We should have been more careful. We should have been more conscious of the danger to you. We should have been...we don't know. Smarter in general! Everything that has happened to you as a result of those bastards is our fault." Voira shook her head angrily, not at Raa or RK, but herself. Her expression softened as Raa spoke. "Rk is right, but we appreciate the feeling. It's nice to know someone worries. Start shooting at the bottle furthest to the left and work your way to the right. We'll be able to see what your best range is." Voira nodded at the Quarian.

Raa knew arguing and trying to utter logic in her favor wasn't going to win against Voira, at least not this time. Instead she nodded and breathed. Her respirators echoed her sound, making it raspy and clearly spoken through a filter, which she had gotten use to again. If it wasn't for the fact she was new to this environment, she would've been able to remove it but to do it right now without RK monitoring her vitals and altering the system every so often to let her exposure level adapt. She knew Voira hated it. Whenever she got sick and couldn't stand upright, the Asari's protective nature seemed to have kicked in overdrive. It made the fussing over her a bit uncalled for even if Raa appreciated it.

Her finger tightened and pulled the trigger.

BAM!

Raa literally jumped when it nicked the bottle to the side, sending it wobbling, yet still standing. It seemed to mock her when she lowered her weapon to see the damage. A small, hole had dented the wall where the ammo's effect flickered and told her it was a stun shot. Though it missed. Raa turned the pistol on its side and checked it over, then tapped her omni-tool a bit. She made sure it all her instruments lined up properly which they, unsurprisingly, did. The Quarian sighed a bit at the disappointment it was her own fault at missing.

"Not as easy as it looks, is it?" She asked Voira, admitting in a roundabout way she had missed because of self error.

Voira, however, was grinning. "Nothing is ever as easy as it looks, we find. But, that was a great shot for the first time without assistance aiming. Far better than our first time. You actually hit the target. We missed by two feet and sent the bullet ricocheting around the training room. Good thing that merc had been wearing armor. Regardless, don't be disappointed. It takes practice to get good at anything, be it using your omni-tool for technology or shooting. Try again, and don't get discouraged. The beginning is always the worst." She made an encouraging gesture, watching Raa more closely this time, to see if there was anything wrong with her form.

"I remember how my first time with my omni-tool went. I ended up shorting the whole area on Rannoch in my neighborhood and it went dark, needless to say upset several quarians came knocking. Including my parents which being a youth wasn't fun." Raa answered in a sheepish tone. She inhaled again and pointed, then shot. This time the bullet missed about three inches. It hit the metal side full on and pinged off, rocketing it through RK's head.

The AI frowned. She was clearly not amused by the 'headshot' or likely by Voira's amusement from it, her eyes turned to the Asari with clear warning. "Don't you think about it."

"I'm sorry, RK, I didn't mean to hit you in the head. It wasn't my aim to." Raa gingerly commented and examined the hologram's image for damage. There wasn't likely to be any but she was still trying to figure out how she managed to get from point A to point E, skipping points B to C and going through point D in the process.

Voira smiled wider. "We'll keep your blackout and my murder attempt our secret of how we both learned the value of practice." She started chuckling as the bullet went through RK's head, quieting down and managing a mostly straight face when the hologram glared at her. "Us? Think about that? We would never." The Asari replied, feigning innocent confusion, while repressing a smile. "If ricocheting helps you get more head shots, we feel that it should be your goal. All joking aside though, we think we see your problem." She stepped behind Raa, having her aim again. As the Quarian did so, Voira placed her hand over Raa's, steadying the weapon. "There's nothing to be afraid of." She said softly, given that she was right next to Raa's ear. "A pistol is nothing more than a tool, like your omni-tool. It won't hurt you, or anyone here. Relax. You can do this."

"Little late for that, my parents already knew." Raa was blunt though she failed to notice the teasing nature or the amusement in Viora's tone, continuing. "My omni-tool never hurt anyone and I never really did more then pointed where RK told me and shot the pistol off. She did the rest really."

Raa's head jerked up when she heard the Asari walk slowly about her back, followed by the impression of her figure close and hand reached to stead her own. Her elbow was straightened which helped keep her hand from shaking as she heard Voira's whisper in her helmet side. It wasn't easy. Her skin seemed to bubble under her suit and made her shiver despite the environment controlled design causing RK's head to tilt in question. For a moment, Raa expected the suit to immediately warm up but found to her surprise it didn't happen. Instead the AI seemed to wait and watch quietly, observing her facts before acting. Her experience with the Barbacus crew seemed to have paid off well in her ability to read individual, even to understand them.

Inhaling a second time, Raa's finger squeezed the trigger again. The vibration rattled through her hand and arm, finding a place in her body while the bullet jettison forward. It sped at the nearest bottle... and nicked it. The item flopped over and clattered to the ground with a loud sound. It made Raa jump in Voira's arms, nearly clashing into the Asari behind her.

It was painful to admit, a lot.

Voira rolled her eyes and chuckled a bit as Raa missed the teasing. She noticed RK tilting her head, but writ it off as the AI analyzing her namesake's form. She steadied Raa, thus preventing them from both falling down, and smiled. "Good job. You're improving, despite all your misgivings." She hadn't moved from her position, and continued to speak quietly. "Though we do find it odd that you're perfectly fine with engines and technology banging, clunking, popping, and making a host of other noises, and yet a bottle falling on the ground causes you to jump six feet in the air." Voira teased.

"Well the hertz are quite different between the two. Noisy machines are mid-level, between 250 hz and reach up to 2000 hz, which makes the noise deafening, longer lasting and easily adaptable. Bottles are much lower, more sudden and doesn't give you much time to adapt to it. Namely since the sound dies so quick-" Raa was suddenly interrupted by RK, the AI's voice hinting to artificial sarcasm in her tone.

"Raa'Kina... that was a joke. Voira wasn't serious, she was teasing you, again."

"Oh..." Raa started to blush through her helmet, feeling heat in her cheeks and face, realizing her mistake rather well. Movement distracted her from berating her own flaws causing her head to turn slightly, still listening to Voira continue.

The bottle rose into the air and reset itself, glowing blue. "Don't think of it as a tool to hurt someone. Think of it as..." The Asari pursed her lips, thinking. "Think of it as a tool to protect. It could be to protect yourself, or RK. It could even be to protect us. We won't always be in our peak, dazzlingly beautiful, condition. Besides, it'd be nice to be fussed over rather than having you tell us we're being too protective. Which we aren't, by the way. Being so sick that you can't stand is not good and we are perfectly justified in everything we do when that happens to you." She had Raa aim again, and steadied her once more. "Try again."

"It's getting better. Quarian immune systems are much stronger than when before the Reaper War which is thanks to a joint effort between Geth and Quarians that makes it possible." Raa defended herself, still thinking Voira made a small thing out of nothing. The weakness only lasted a few days, and it wasn't like she couldn't do anything. She could sit upright, wobble around and stumble in her walk though she often collapsed afterwards. At least it wasn't going to kill her, unlike past years where she heard stories how a simple tear in the suit had a chance in being fatal. She shuddered at the thought then aimed again.

Bam. Another clear miss, though once more the bottle fell off its perch and right into the floor. After hearing and expecting, Raa was much more prepared to brace herself for the hertz reaching her ears than before. As if to encourage her, since stopping Voira's insistence was impossible, RK chirped up with a comment.

"Shot improvement by at least a millimeter."

Voira nodded. "Every time you shoot you get better." She stepped back from Raa, letting the Quarian steady the gun by herself. "One more time. We want you to hold the gun steady by yourself when you shoot. Then we'll start on seeing what you can do if someone tries to get in melee combat with you again." The Asari didn't know when the actual meeting itself was going to begin and she wanted to get at least a basic idea of what to train Raa in. Not again. Never again.

Raa's hand was still shaky as she tried to stop it, increasing it only a bit more, before she closed her eyes. Her fingers tightened and her breath shallow, her heart thumping like a scared animal. Calm... calm down. She whispered to herself, trying to steel her nerves some. Slowly her fingers tightened when her eyes snapped open, pulling the trigger.

Bam!

Ping, clatter. The bottle was hit as the bullet clipping it in the center, where the neck and main body, hitting the floor with a loud sound and shattering into pieces. Raa blinked in shock at what she did. Her body held in place, frozen, while her mind tried to register what she had done. Her surprise was broken when Voira's arms suddenly appeared around her and clasped her close, squeezing her tightly.

"Did I do that?" Raa asked the obvious question.

Voira made a sound of joy, and then promptly attack hugged the Quarian. "You did! See? We told you you could do it! All you need to do now is practice is more and we're sure you'll have it down pat!" She practically shouted in the Quarian's ear, almost shaking poor Raa in her glee. She ignored RK, knowing the AI's feelings on this 'sweet stuff'. Putting Raa down, she grinned at her friend. "And you claimed you couldn't do it. Should have listened to us, hmmm?" She practically sang.

Raa's head felt dizzy and wobbly as the Asari shook her roughly. Her glee was clear though it seemed to have been taken to a whole new level, the Quarian's body easily bruising under the suit and thankful Voira couldn't see it. It was painful but she knew Voira's reaction was only out of happiness rather than malice which only made the pain easily bared. Though, she knew it was likely a good thing she could use medi-gel for such accidents.

When Raa finally felt her feet touch ground, her breath her breath gasped and air filled her lungs again. "Maybe, but the odds of it happening again are rather slim..."

RK scoffed, her systems still monitoring the Qaurian's bio readings, when she enhanced her image into a smaller version of her full image. "I just hope you've not broken a rib with that hug... else, listening might result in bodily harm every time."

Voira snorted. "Don't give us that. It'll happen again, we know it." She looked embarrassed as she recalled how fragile Quarians were. "Sorry, we just got...over excited for you. You're not hurt?" She eyed Raa, looking to see if there were any injuries she could notice with the suit on.

Raa noticed Voira looking at her as she immediately straightened upright, her body flaring with pain while she struggled not to flinch. Bruises weren't dangerous but they did sting well enough. Her lungs finally adjusted to the new intake of air and faded in its sharp prickling pain, the younger alien managed to catch her breath easily enough. She quickly persisted to insist she was alright as she quickly replied. "No, n-no, just a bit breathless. I'm getting use to these hugs, I promise."

Her hand was still holding the gun though her grip was far more relaxed, the fingers loosely dangled it in her grip. "Now what's next? I hope it's just shooting bottles than anything more drastic, I don't like the mention of melee and shooting in your last sentence."

Voira looked suspiciously at Raa for a few more moments before accepting her answer. Omni-gel did have it's uses after all. She grinned mischievously at the Quarain. "No, you won't be shooting during this next part. We meant defending yourself against someone within arms reach who fully intends to hurt you. Stopping them from getting that close is the purpose of the shooting. Right, so what technology do you have that could stun or paralyze temporarily someone coming after you? We somehow suspect that teaching you how to hit someone is not the route to go. Thus, we are going to see what technology you have and how to best use it." Glancing at RK she added, "Technology that isn't an AI."

"Artificial Intelligence details would likely go over your little, blue head if I need to explain the difference between me and some lifeless omni-tool application." RK stated bluntly as she paced about, settling down to sit like any organic would. It seemed pretty clear she picked up some natural habits from the Barbacus' crew.

Raa ignored RK's comment, her hand gratefully putting the pistol away, while she pulled up a list from her omni-tool. The transparent screen blared back with several options useful for a variety of things from repair to transmuting into omni-gel, her finger tapped the list to shorten it drastically when she typed in offensive. Omni-blade and incendiary attack that when activated, she could back hand a target and cause a massive explosion sending them flying back. The bad part was the last time she attempted it, she was knocked flat on her tailbone and defend-less. Not very good in defending herself, save for buying time for Voira to come to her aid. Though she could download more if needed, she choose to omit that little mention to Voira should the Asari not know, and the the thought made her middle twist painfully. The omni-blade and incendiary application was bad enough.

"Just two. An omni-blade, usually used to help pry off stripped bolts and such. A incendiary application that I can use on the lowest setting but it will leave you slightly singed." Raa said in a small voice.

"Hmm. Do you have anything that can apply a shock? Not in your offensive section, but in your regular items?" Voira asked, pointedly ignoring RK and the AI's comment. She wouldn't rise to the robot's baiting...this time. "Since you don't have any actual combat omni-tool programs, we're going have to adapt ones meant for repair. Unless there's a quick way you could get stun programs?" She doubted an incendiary program was going to not kill someone, and on the lowest mode it would merely irritate whoever was attacking her. She smiled gently at Raa. "You're not making this easy you know."

Raa shifted the search engine and the list altered again, instead of shrinking it grew. Basic functions this time as she scanned the items she knew almost by heart. "Blow torch, scanner, flashlight, dispenser, camera, games, flash, overloading application, hacking, and nothing seems to be able to make a shock unless I take something machine base and overload it?"

She admitted she didn't want to download a stun program, namely since didn't know what type or how to apply it. This field was completely out of her scope of understanding which made her uncomfortable. It also felt like personally downloading them would've made her omni-tool less hers and more a weapon of destruction, made for taking life.

Voira sighed. "Unless you want to burn someone with the blowtorch, we're gonna have to take a new approach. Can you add programs? Specifically cloaking to hide yourself, sabotage to shut down their guns so you don't get shot, Overload their shields unless that application works on shields, a cyroblast to freeze rather than kill...what's the other one that merc had...the one that shut down our biotics..." Voira snapped her fingers. "Damping! That's it! Very disconcerting to not be able to use our biotics in that fight. Not to mention, our omni-blade wouldn't work either." Voira looked at Raa. "Would all of those work if you could add them? It reassures us that you can protect yourself and keeps you from killing someone."

Raa immediately shook her head at Voira's facts as she crossed over her chest. Her hips cocked and eyes fixed on her friend, listening to the alternatives. The cloaking, sabotage, overload and even dampening sounded like suitable options. Though she wasn't too keen into turning someone into a popsicle as hypothermia was a dangerous thing and not something she wanted to be responsible for. She stood there thinking for a moment while she divided the pros and cons in her head, weighing the overall risk.

Tilting her head to the side, she spoke in a mousy voice. "So yes, I can download four of the five applications. Sabotage, Dampener, Overload, and Cloaking but you realize I'm not familiar with these so we're going to have to practice with them. Knowing my luck with CyroBlast, I'll end up freezing myself to a wall."

The Asari smiled, happy that there was finally something she could do to help Raa survive one of her protector's failures again "Of course. We wouldn't just ask you to get these programs and then figure them out in the middle of a fight. We'll even be your practice dummy." Voira smirked." A little bit of payback for all the bruises we've accidentally given you from over excited hugs. Though we do suggest you get Cyromancy to actually stop someone."

"Wait, what? That's sarcasm right?" Raa asked, apprehension growing at the thought of hurting a friend. "That's not funny."

RK, on the other hand, seemed to find the prospect rather amusing. "Oh, this will be rather fun to watch."

Raa shot her AI a look, through her glare effectiveness was dampened by the face visor hiding her features. " Keelah, why do you two find pain funny? It's not and there's no way that I would attack a friend. It's not happening."

The Quarian's finger tapped the discussed additions, quickly downloading them while she looked over the spec rapidly. Her eyes flickered in determination to seek any lethal applications and possibly delete it, preventing it from being used. Though her omni-tool was difficult to hack, she wouldn't have been surprised if someone learned how to hack one and shut it down or worse, turn it on its owner. It wasn't a plausible thought but neither were the Reapers in the past and look at how well not being prepared turned out? Raa breathed deeply when she twisted on the spot and faced Voira, "So, really... how are we going to train with these?"

Voira laughed gently. "We don't find lethal or crippling pain funny. We just find minor pain that is well deserved or that the person knew would happen funny. Things that hurt just enough to remind them of what a bad idea whatever they did was, but not enough to break bones or cause permanent damage." She smiled at Raa's denial, and subsequent question.

"What?!? I don't understand how you can find that funny!" Exclaimed Raa, her head taking another look at the Asari.

Voira shrugged. "Must be a mercenary thing." She glanced at RK. "And sarcastic AI thing. As for how we'll train, we just told you. We'll be your sparring partner. There is no other way to copy a living, thinking, opponent in a short amount of time. At the worst, we'll both leave this room with bruises. You're not attacking us. You're helping us prepare you for the next time we fail." Voira activated her shields and drew one of her pistols.

She walked a few steps back. "Surprise us. Use whichever you think would be the best first move against us."

"You realize this whole exercise is pointless, right?" The Quarian utter, her words pouring out as she watched Voira get into a ready position. It was clearly too much for the female to considering attacking violently against someone she admired or cared for. "Sparring doesn't sound much different from fighting and I'm not going to fight you, Voira."

RK rolled her digital eyes, inwardly knowing there was only one way to get Raa to fight her. Give the Quarian no choice in the matter. Something the AI wasn't sure Voira would do. Deciding to kill two birds with one stone, RK jacked back into the omni-tool and immediately took over the system, discreetly selecting the Dampener. Raa and Voira, unless the Asari was putting up a pitiful argument, were likely too busy arguing to notice the omni-tool was working on it's own.

Bzzzttt. The omni-tool glowed blue and before either female knew what happened, Voira's biotics were down.

Voira sighed in frustration. She couldn't understand why Raa didn't want to attack her. This won't hurt us. We know it because we've done this before. Why is she being so damn stubborn? She smiled wryly. Look whose talking. She took a breath before replying. "We think we've rubbed off on you. You didn't used to be this damn stubborn. Just use your new skill set. We'll be fine. We assure you." She didn't notice the Quarian's omni-tool acting oddly as she watched Raa, waiting for her friend to finally act. Thus, it came mostly as a surprise when the omni-tool glowed blue and she felt and saw a familiar, half forgotten, blue crackle across her body. Voira winced, stumbling backwards and falling, caught unprepared by the sudden attack. When she sat back up, she looked at Raa, clearly caught between happiness that Raa had finally done something, and uncertainty if she actually did it when she saw the Quarian's reaction.

"Voira!" Raa shouted, her eyes widened and shock filled her body language. Immediately her body bolted forward, halting abrupt to plop down beside Voira while her omni-tool stopped glowing. She spied a hasty glare at RK, the AI slightly smirking, and held her arm to scan the Asari's figure. Her first scan showed no broken bones, ruptured organs or anything serious, merely bumps and bruises making the Quarian release a breath in relief. She had medi gel on standby in worse case situation though it seemed her distress wasn't needed. Her eyes turned to Voira at hearing her saying something.

"That wasn't you, was it?" The Asari asked her friend, smiling at the abrupt panic and concern, before looking at RK. Or, more aptly, where she currently resided. "We appreciate the help."

"No, I didn't do it." Raa growled, her tone more annoyed than pure rage. She didn't like this one bit and RK had no permission to jack in, even if it was to prove a point. It didn't stop the Quarian from glaring at the AI who brushed off the heated look with a three fingered hand wave, her figure rising to pace toward the pair and keen down beside Voira.

"Well, you did say you wanted a surprise right?" The smugness was very thick in her voice.

"We did say we wanted a surprise, but we were thinking the surprise would come from Raa." Voira replied dryly to the smug AI.

RK took Voira's attempt to barb her in better light than the Asari likely wanted, her body pulled up and cocked her hips while she looked down. "That was your flaw, organic, in not being specific. Though Raa, her bio signs are fine and it might be best not to waste your medi-gel on her if she doesn't need it."

Voira looked up at Raa raising an eyebrow at the Quarian. "Whose being fussy now? If you were that eager in the training we could have been done by now." She winked at her friend, enjoying the brief role reversal far more than she'd thought she would have. "We're fine. A bit more on our ass than we thought we'd be, but perfectly fine. So now will you start sparring with us, or should we just give up, wait for you to build or buy a drone for RK, and then continue from there? You know which we'd prefer, but it is ultimately up to you."

Raa groaned at her options. Truthfully, she didn't like either Voira or RK fighting as she continually told the pair but neither seemed to listen to her anymore. She body turned about, allowing her to settle her back against the transport ship's hull and curled her legs close to her body. The Quarian was nearly a small ball considering her small size with her mask rested on her crossed arms. "You know a drone isn't possible with our currently tight budget. Besides, I already spent 700 credits getting the applications you requested so I might as well learn how to use them."

She immediately regretted speaking when it came to mind Voira would instantly want to know where the credits came from and the answer would've been simple: her own food supply stash. Which meant she was using about three months worth of her own credits without consulting Voira first, a matter that upset the Asari since it was basically taking food out of her own mouth. In an attempt to soften the blow, the Quarian pipped up quickly. "Please don't be mad."

Voira's eyes narrowed at the mention of the cost of the downloads. That sounded way out of their budget range. Before she could ask where the money came from, Raa piped up again. That made everything click into place. Voira shot to her feet. "Raa'Kina Nar Rannoch! What were you thinking?" She shouted. "You could have just told us that you couldn't afford the mods and we would have just improvised! Don't be mad. That's like telling a Krogan not to fight." She scowled, about to go on when she saw Raa's reaction.

Taking a deep breath, she sat next to the Quarian. "We're sorry. But you have to know that was a stupid thing to do. And you're taking our share of the credit stash. No buts. We've been alive one hundred and three years longer than you, and we're better built to take any negative affects not having seven hundred credits might bring on." She sighed and then hugged the little Quarian. "You're lucky we like you, a lot, otherwise we would never put up with you. Fortunately, we like you a lot. Well meant naivety and all."

Raa cringed at Voira's reaction, her face crunched up and shoulders tensed at the shouting Asari's voice. It was like glass on her ears to hear her friend so mad. Her foot circled her toes into the smooth floor while she waited for Voira to finish her rant, bracing for the worse case scenario, and was surprised to see the Asari suddenly breath. Hearing Voira plop down beside her, Raa's mask turned to face her friend's resolution. She went to shake her head but stopped in the middle of it when Voira said no buts, knowing full well RK would lock her access to her credits and give it to the Asari. As much as the AI and her clashed, Raa knew RK knew Voira valued her own less than the Quarian's. Voira always made sure Raa took care of herself after all.

Raa leaned her head over to rest on Voira's shoulder while the Asari hugged her tightly. It was a relief she hadn't screwed up too much while the ship's hull vibrated, signaling their arrival at the station's dock. Shortly they would disembark and enter for the upcoming job Raa had to do. It was difficult getting them to accept her 'unofficial' bodyguard until she mentioned Voira was her personal security to ensure she was safe during her work. The man who recruited her seemed to have found her explanation barely plausible as she struggled with the lie, but he still allowed her to bring her friend along.

"I'm glad, I thought I really messed things up this time." Raa said in a relieved tone.

Voira shook her head, before resting her cheek on Raa's helmet. "No. Though this is right up there with that time you thought that human really wanted to have you help them treat an injured us in the dark ally, out of sight, with no witnesses, alone. Despite the fact we went into the bar for only a few moments. Like we said. We like the well meant naivety and all the rest. Even the insistence upon not killing those who might be trying to kill you. Though we suppose that's why we're here."

"How was I supposed to know? I heard gun shots, saw injured civilians and he knew your name. It's not like I was completely naive. Just didn't like the fact you might be bleeding and helpless, you have to admit you do get reckless. If I didn't have a ready supply of medi-gel, you could've been crippled or worse by now." Raa defended herself recalling the incident and the near mugging. She lost her credits, and nearly ended up being left for dead if Voira didn't show up. It was among the few close encounter with her friend's worse side she rather never remember. "I don't ever want to see you like that. You were really mad and I thought you were going to be purple for days."

Voira's face darkened as she remembered the incident, her body tensing in anger. It was the last time she had entered a bar when Raa was with her. She had entered to get a brief drink, and come out moments later, at RK's repeated alarms in to Voira's omni-tool, to find Raa injured and a human trying to transfer her credits. Voira hadn't bothered with pulling her gun out, simply using her biotics to slam the mugger into the wall. Ignoring him, she had examined Raa in a state of panic, RK having to repeat herself multiple times to get it through to the Asari that Raa wasn't stabbed or shot, just nearly unconscious.. Thus reassured, Voira turned her gaze to the recovering mugger, and her panic turned to white hot rage.

The Asari hadn't used her pistol, or any guns. She had beat the man to death with her bare, biotically charged, fists. She didn't know how much Raa had saw, but enough that Voira knew she had scared the Quarian.

"The bastard had hurt you, and was getting ready to do far worse. We weren't going to let him get away with that. We're never going to let anyone get that close to hurting you again. Not even on this mission." She sighed in disappointment and then, "We'd best get going. Don't want to be late to your meeting with whoever hired you, hmm?"

Raa nodded. Though she knew Voira had good intentions, her heart trembled at the memory and the Asari's hot blooded rage toward the mugger. She saw enough to know a quarter of what her friend was capable of doing to someone when they crossed a line. It made her grateful Voira liked her and was willing to do whatever, even if she wasn't happy about it, to protect her. "Yep, and I much rather make a good impression the first time."

Raa rose upright and bent down to help the Asari up, then when the pair started to move to the door she paused. "Ummm.... shouldn't we clean up our mess first?"

Voira just smirked, looking over her shoulder as everything glowed the familiar biotic blue once more. The objects floated and shifted, each returned to their original place just when the Quarian voiced her question. "What mess?" The biotic asked innocently as she left.

Raa blinked, adding while she following the Asari's wake and passing back the pistol. "I will never get used to that..."

[cqbexpt]

Dong & Cactus

Burning. Something was burning. Screaming. The screaming was so loud. Tacticus jumped up eyes closed tightly and jaw clenched as if a bomb had gone off. It stopped. Tacticus opened his eyes slowly. There was ash raining down all around him. He took his hands off his ears and listened for the screaming, it was gone. Infact it was quiet, so quiet it was almost deafening. the only noise was of the ash hitting the ground and his own breathing. Tacticus started panicking before he realized there was nothing around him at all. There was nothing but ash and dead trees all around him. There was also a light fog to the clearing he was in, though the fog extended well past the clearing and eventually obscured what he guessed were more dead trees. Tacticus managed to compose himself but something..... some.... feeling just made him want to fear. Once more he looked frantically around himself, nothing. He brought his hands to his face quickly and tried to rub out the nightmare. When he pulled his hands away they were black and burned, his skin peeling away to reveal charred tendons and muscles.

This inferno was like something strait out of hell. First there was just silence, almost serene. But than came the flash, and the sounds. The screeching of metal, screams that echoed in Donny's ears. He couldn't even got a chance to look around before he was knocked off his feet. All he could see was red. By the time Donny woke up, everything was white. His vision was blurry and everything was hazy. He thought it was snowing, but it wasn't cold. He smelled blood and fire, and felt ashy and sweaty. When he could see clearly, he was surrounded by ash. Crawling to his feet Donny tried to find his way around. He could only see ash, and occasionally a tree. It never occurred to him he was stuck in a obscuring fog. He never noticed how badly burned his body was; he was practically a walking skeleton at this point at this point.

Tacticus's eyes grew wide and the screaming returned. It was as if million of voices were all screaming at the top of their lungs. The sound was so intense it made Tacticus collapse to his knees and press his hands tightly over his ears. It did nothing to dampen the sound and Tacticus started yelling back at the screams, as if it would make them stop. He shut his eyes tightly again, then it stopped....again. Breathing heavily and incredibly concerned Tacticus opened his eyes again. There was a large, white, and vaguly humanoid shard in front of him. Tacticus struggled back tears at how bright it was. But, there was something that made him want to look at it. Like maybe if he reached out and touched it this would be over. Still on his knees he reached up and tried to touch it. It suddenly reached out and grabbed his forearm and the noise started again. But this time it wasn't a scream it was a high pitched whine which began jumping up and down in frequency. Tacticus tried to bring his hands to his ears but the shard would not let his arm go and grabbed his other arm. Tacticus began yelling at it aswell as fiercely as he could with tears running down his eyes from the brilliance of the being. It began leaning towards him and suddenly began to get bigger....and bigger. The noise became suddenly low pitched and large tendrils of light arched up out of it's back as the white began to engulf his vision.

And than came the screaming. It was so much worse this time, like... Like a thousand voices that were once silent, now free to unleash their eternal anguish. Donny tried to cover his ears it but was like he was trapping the voices in his head now, rebeating against his hand and skull. "Stop, shut up, SHUT UP!" Donny's own screams joined the chorus of agony in his head. He started to run as though he could flee from the screaming. That's when he saw... Him? Her? It was a white silhouette. Donny couldn't even look at it directly, as it was so bright. The screams in his head and the light from this thing was driving him mad. He swung blindly in front of him as though if he could just strike the being, this nightmare would be over. But instead it reached out and grabbed his arms. The screaming stopped, but a new noise replaced it. It was low at first, but than reached an extremely high decibel. It was like a screech, but not from any human or voice. It was so loud, and this being so bright, Donny struggled and fought to be freed, but he just couldn't manage it. He was engulfed in a white light before he could even cry for help.

Tacticus was laying down again. He blinked as the ashes began raining down into his eyes. He sat up out of the soft layer of ash he was laying it. The trees and the ash had returned, he was relieved. There was something different this time. A metal bench that seemed to be made out of one solid piece of smooth metal with no breaks was protruding from the ash. Yet none of the ash was landing on it nor was it covered in ash. Tacticus stood up and walked over to the bench. He placed his hand on it just to make sure it was real and then sat down, looking at the dead trees and ashes.

Donny was flat on the ground once more. He coughed and hacked as the ash got into his mouth. His throat was so hoarse and dry. A layer of ash had covered his body. There was no more fog, just ash and trees as far as the eye could see. But there was one new thing: a metal bench that seemed to be carved from a single slab, like a giant rock. But despite the ash raining around him, the bench had no ash on it itself, like the ash simply would not lay there. Curious Donny want over to this bench, carefully nudging it with his foot to ensure that it wasn't just a trick of his mind. Once he could feel the solid resistance Donny sat on the bench and took in the scenery around him.

Tacitcus felt a feeling of calmness wash over him as he watched the ash dance around each other and catch the air in a certain way that made them randomly change direction and speed up their never ending process of falling. He closed his eyes and leaned back over the chair which only came up to about his mid back and breathed in deeply. The air was silent and warm, it was so peaceful in fact that Tacticus wanted to stay there on that bench forever. He even heard the laugh of young Turian children over to his right, he couldn't even remember the last time he saw what he was fighting for. He looked over but did not see children. Instead there was a Turian women in full armor which looked old to him, he was also facing an Asari who looked to be in similarly advanced armor. "I don't care if you think your children are still alive! I watched them die and if you don't come with me you will join them. I refuse to allow that!" the Turian was yelling loudly at the shorter Asari.

It was strangely peaceful, sitting here on this mysterious bench. He watched the ash fall from the skies like snow, twisting and turning, fusing and falling. No matter which way they went or what happened to each flake they never fell on the bench or Donny. Relaxed he laid on his back, extending his hand to catch the ash that seemed to avoid his touch. Compared to the chaos and pain before, Donny liked this calm much more, and would have liked to do nothing but stay there forever. He heard the sound of children to his right, forgetting all about what just had occurred. But when he looked he saw no children, but a group of men, armed and armored, crouching in the ash. They seemed to be waiting for someone, and than one of the men shouted. "Go, stop them here before it's too late! We can't let them get the kids!" Than the rest of the men stood up and started shooting.

"If they were yours you wouldn't be so quick to leave! We arn't leaving until I go get them!" The Asari was crying and in rage began to glow with biotic energy and threw the Turian several meters and she landed and skidded on the ground into a tree. Obviously out of breath the Turian began reaching out to the Asari unable to muster words. Then fire erupted from the ground and the Asari took a run at it. The Turian began crawling back towards the fire when the screams of an Asari started.

"There are too many! We... We should go back, and protect the others!" Said one of the men. Soon, one by one, the men stopped shooting and ran, despite the protest of the one who Donny assumed was their superior officer. The man shouted at them, looking hesitantly back and forth between the enemy that Donny could not see, and the direction the men ran towards. Soon there was fire erupting around them, and the man dropped his gun. He looked scared, almost as though he was going to run himself. And than he pulled out a knife.

"Spirits damn it! Why!" The Turian yelled out clearly emotionally distressed. Then a large crashing noise and then an extremely loud fog horn sounding noise came from further in the same direction the Turian and Asari were in. The Turian looked further into the gray blackness and punched the ground in fury. She picked an assault rifle out of the ash and began running towards Tacitcus. But then he noticed something the Turian looked familiar. And as she drew closer to him time began to slowed down it finally clicked.

"I can't let them pass... I'm the only one left." The last man was obviously scared. He could barely stand his ground, let alone hold his weapon. But despite that, he gripped his knife and walked forward. A loud roar echoed in the landscape, like the last sound he heard before he had awoken moment's before. That's when the man turn towards Donny. Did he see him? Was he looking at something else? Regardless, the man ran towards Donny, holding his knife with the intent to us it. But as he came close, Donny noticed something... Familiar.

"G-grandma?" Tacitcus said as the two made eye contact. The fog horn noise kicked up again but this time so loud Tacticus felt his teeth chatter. He put his head between his legs and began yelling to try and dampen the noise but nothing came out. The noise just kept getting louder and louder but this time the noise sounded like it was omnipresent. No direction, no source just existing. Then the noise suddenly became less loud and the source of it moved in front of him. He looked up hands still covering his earholes and saw 2 pairs of 3 eye clusters made of light above the ground out in the darkness. Then the noise stopped. Then an incrediably powerful and deep voice said "Breach". Then a wave of fire began consuming the area in front of him. It was like a wave made of fire that rushed up to greet him. It hit his legs and burned them to but bone, his hands moved slower and Tacticus had time to watch the flesh and muscle burn and then rip itself from his hands. Then a shockwave knocked him up and out of the chair into the air. It sent him spinning and inbetween two trees.

He landed face first into a pile of ash and got some of it in his mouth which he then quickly spat and coughed out. He grabbed his side in pain and then craned his head to look in front of himself. He was staring face to face with a human.

"Grandpa?!" Donny looked into the eyes of his grandfather. The loud roar echoed again, so loud that Donny could feel the vibrations through his body. He grabbed his ears and pushed his head against the stone bench, as if it was somehow suppose to make the roar softer. Donny screamed in pain and thought his ears were bleeding. His head felt like it was getting crushed by a rock, or getting torn apart in a blender. Donny turned to see if he could find his grandfather, but what he saw instead was a set of glowing eyes. The moment he saw them, the noise stopped. Instead it was replaced with a deep and intimidating voice. "Breach." And once more, the world was turned into fire and ash. Donny felt his skin fry and his blood boil, like his entire body was going to become liquidifed in this inferno. The blast of fire was so intense that it caused an explosion that blew Donny off the bench and deeper into the forest.

He was thrown onto his back, causing a small pile of dust to build up on him as he slowed to a stop. Donny could hardly feel his body at this point. He wasn't sure if he even had one. But sure enough, as the pain continued to surge through his body, he was able to at least move his head and take a look around him. Then he found himself staring face-to-face with a turian.

[Fallenreaper]

Avatar, Voira, & Raa'Kina

It had been twenty-seven minutes since Avatar began searching for any of the planet's representatives that it might speak to, and a statistically improbable pattern had emerged among those it had found. All of the locals it found, whether they were a representative or simple security, gave common excuses meant to politely refuse conversation. Even accounting for normal variation in personal willingness to communicate with strangers, there was a 12% chance that all of the excuses were truthful. Avatar concluded that the representatives from the planet were likely avoiding speaking with it, but it had insufficient data to determine the reason. Though, the two strongest possibilities were that the local inhabitants of the planet were distrustful toward the Geth or Council, or that they had been instructed not to speak to any Council representatives until the meeting itself.

Avatar determined that its present course of action was unpreductive; however, it also could not determine a more productive use of its time with present information. As a result, Avatar elected to remain at its current location, near the end of a hallway on the top deck of the station, and perform extranet searches on the process of colonization until it found a more efficient use of its time.

The halls were pretty empty when Voira and Raa entered them. It only took a quick glance around to note there was little to one walking them, mainly since no one save those who were chosen for the project were scheduled here, allowing Raa to feel a bit less nervous. Her pace quickened until she pulled ahead of her asari friend as she twisted back, her front facing backwards while she continued walking the same direction Voira was. She has had plenty practice to ensure she wasn't about to stumble down or trip over her feet whenever she walked this way.

"Voira, you realize if I learn to defend myself than I wouldn't need you as my personal protection, right?" Raa teased, her hands folded behind her back and feet kept moving back.

Her head tilted just in time to note how far before she reached the corner and kept track of distance in the back of her head. It wasn't hard to see she was trying not to think about her first day on the job, mainly since she had only met the supervision Quarian once during the whole time the pair had been here.

Voira smiled as Raa walked backwards in front of her. It was a habit that had taken her several falls to get down pat, much to Voira's amusement. The Asari preferred the emptiness of the hall to the crowds she had expected. the quiet made it easier to notice any suspicious sounds, like a gun being loaded or steps coming to quickly behind them. Granted, they hadn't made any enemies recently(at least not to Voira's knowledge) and it was doubtful that anyone would want to kill them, but it never hurt to be careful, right?

"We'd still stick around. After all, we've been making sure you stayed out of trouble for so long, we wouldn't know what to do with ourselves. And besides, you'd miss our fussing and overprotectiveness. Not to mention, we still need to teach you how to shoot and that seems like a process that'll take decades." Voira smiled gently to take any sting out of her teasing.

As they rounded the corner, Voira only had time to notice that the Geth was there and not a threat before Raa crashed into Avatar, stumbling a few steps forward. "We think we're safe from you getting rid of us. After all, who would protect you from running into Geth?" She commented to Raa, catching the Quarian before she fell helmet first into the ground, then introducing herself. "We are Voira Sirosi. Our friend, who is about to be profusely apologizing to you, is Raa'Kina Nar Rannoch. We are here to protect her, while she is here to fix...things, or so we assume. A pleasure to meet you." She extended her hand to the robot.

Avatar detected the footsteps coming from around the corner, though it did not anticipate the Quarian to round the corner backwards and run into its platform. As the Asari introduced herself, the panels surrounding Avatar's eye shifted inward in a way that mimicked curiosity, as it noted that she seemed to be referring to herself in plural form. Curious, Avatar searched through the personnel files for the entry on Voira Sirosi. For this operation, most personnel files were brief, and focused primarily on their skills, but the "comments" section of the file did note her peculiar style of speech. It also mentioned that she was reluctant to go into detail when asked, so Avatar elected not to mention it.

Avatar shook Voira's hand, being quite familiar with the custom. "I am Avatar." It stated. There was a time when its greeting was more complicated, as it explained that the name was an identifier for the convenience of organics. However, as time had passed and its individuality had become more developed, Avatar had started to think of itself less as simply "Geth." It recognized that it had changed measurably as a result of its time apart from the Geth's primary hub above Rannoch. Based on historical data of other Geth programs, it recognized that it now drew different conclusions on some topics and situations than what most other Geth would have before and shortly after the Reaper War. As an organic would describe, it had a personality.

"It is also a pleasure to meet you." Avatar said, in order to fulfill expectations of politeness. "Your personnel file states that your role in the project is a technical advisor, Creator Raa'Kina. I am here for a similar purpose. My role is to ensure the establishment of Geth servers, and represent general Geth interests in order to ensure optimal cooperation with Creator colonists. However, the local representatives have denied all attempts at communication which I have made. It is possible that they have been instructed to refuse communication with us until the officially scheduled meeting."

Raa'Kina expected to crash into the ground, the sting would've lasted only a few minutes, but instead she felt Voira's hands reach under her arms and stop her fall dead in her tracks. The Quarian had been surprised she didn't manage to hit the hard floor and crack her helmet when she heard Voira speak to the Geth. Gently, she was settled firmly back on her feet before she spotted her friend pull out her hand for a gesture adapted by many cultures. More carefully than she had been when she carelessly walked into the Geth, Raa twisted about to face him and as Voira predicted, had been about to stumble over her apologies.

Instead she was caught off gaurd by the Geth addressing her as Creator, her nose scrunched up and head tilted at the curious title. Even if she was part of the origin race that made the Geth, she never liked whenever the other Geth had referred to her in that manner. Her hand came behind her helmet to rub the surface, a habit she picked up from other species, when he stated his problem.

"I prefer Raa to be honest. Considering my earlier actions, I don't think I'm fit for that title or anything fancy really." She said bluntly, hoping he would understand, and added. "I'm very sorry for crashing into you, it wasn't my intention really. I'm not the most observate of my surrounding most the time so I didn't see you there. As for representatives, have you tried everyone? Is there someone in perticular you need to talk to or contact?"

"Acknowledged." Avatar answered with a confirming nod before moving on to her question. "No. My reason for seeking them was only to gain more data on the current situation. It was a non-essential task. Currently, I am performing extranet searches for the process of colonization, and Turian culture. However, the extranet connection speed in this system is only 5.23% of the speed on Rannoch, or 0.64% of the speed on the Citadel. It seems that a more efficient use of the remaining time until the meeting would be to meet with other members of the Council delegation, such as yourselves."

RK, familiar with the slower speed, materialized and started to weigh in her thoughts. It was likely the Geth had already tried them but it was worth a shot. "Tried accessing it from another area within in the station? The lobby area usually increases extranet speed. Though I can't fully assess what you've tried, namely on lacking information, though despite the lengthy process, organic's method of trial and error works well enough to be worth note."

Raa nodded while she frowned at the Geth's response. Truthfully she only knew a bit about the current project and that was the basics, anything related to her current task. "Well, I'm afraid I can't give you anymore information than what I was given, Avatar. Though if your task is similar, we could likely end up working side by side during the system checks."

Avatar looked to the holographic projection. Raa'Kina's personnel file, though brief, did mention that her suit contained an artificial intelligence by the name of "RK." Although, considering that it was an AI, Avatar considered it curious that it did not possess its own personnel file. "That was a considered possibility. However, the queries I am performing are non-standard searches, and therefore not cached in local networks. Common searches are downloading at 78% of Citadel extranet speeds. The communications buoy in this system may be using inadequate technology, or in otherwise poor condition."

Shifting its focus to Raa herself, Avatar nodded once more. Its use of nonverbal body language was actually notable compared to other Geth. All Geth had access to information on organic interactions and customs, but not all had adapted said customs into their programming. "If your work involves the construction or programming of server infrastructure, that is possible."

"Part of it does, other part deals with the mining and farming machines as well as the support systems to substain the other living organisms on the colony surface. Pointless to have a base colony if the air filtering system doesn't clean out the impurities and instead, kills those who breath it, isn't it?" Raa commented while RK flickered outside the corner of her mask, the young Quarian struggling not to jerk her head around to stare at the AI. She knew RK was up to something but what, she wasn't sure. It wasn't until she spoke did Raa's curiosity cease.

"The signals are of poor quailty, though if you readjust and bounce off key statelites than the singal strength becomes stronger." She looked at the Geth a bit, her shoulders cocked as she tilited her head. "Raa, your first and main project is to ensure the programming of the server infrastructure works properly with most Qaurian and other organic systems which from the sounds of it, you'll be working with Avatar often enough. As well as will our supervisor."

Raa nodded, her shoulders slumped a bit at the thought. It made her nervous, the longer she thought of it, the worse it become though there was little she could do about it. It likely was also to keep an eye on RK though Raa had tried to ignore the few dirty looks that were directed at both of them, pulling Voira from attempting to break their faces in. Last thing that would do was to have her personal body guard becoming over zealous in her duties else the asari might've been ejected from the project and force Raa to complete it alone and exposed.

"I have already implemented your recommended solution, but it is only effective for locally cached files. Files stored out of system must be acquired via FTL download links by the communications buoy. This process cannot be accelerated without improving the buoy's hardware, or using military priority clearance. " Avatar answered.

Before Avatar could say anything further, a set of footsteps drew close enough to confirm that they were approaching. Around the same corner from which Raa had accidentally ran into its mobile platform, a group of five individuals, all Turian, approached. A few of them glanced at the trio as they walked past, but for the most part, the group ignored them. They were not members of the council delegation, and were all armed and armored, which likely meant they were a part of the local representatives' security force. The armor they wore was not uniform in model or design, bearing no identifiable markings that would link them to established groups. This would support the conclusion that they were from the planet itself, but Avatar noted that their weapons and armor were all uncharacteristically new for a planet with below-average galactic trade. The weapons in particular were al recent models, created within the last five years by Devion Industries and Ekloss Combine. The group stopped for only a moment as one of the Turians seemed to recieve a communication through his earpiece, to which he responded with a simple "Yes ma'am," and prompted the others to increase their pace. Avatar made no comment yet, instead standing silently as it performed a number of calculations on the probabilities of different scenarios created by its observations.

Voira paid just enough attention to the conversation to understand it was still about technical details that didn't really concern her. She scanned the hallways, watching for anyone who might be suspicious or hostile to Raa(yes, this included anyone giving the Quarian dirty looks). She wouldn't try to break their faces with her fist, just talk to them and make sure they got the message. If they happened to land face first on the ground, then that was just a coincidence. Her attention was drawn to the five Turians, her curiosity piqued by their rapid pace, lack of emblems, and shiny new guns. As they kept moving by, Voira spoke to the Geth. "Avatar, has the planet recieved a shipment of new weapons and armors recently? If not, RK can you run their faces through your recognition software? We're curious who these Turians are. If they're a represenative's security, they should have something marking them as such. If they're planetside, they should have something marking that as well." In preparation for something nasty, Voira put a barrier around Raa. Better safe than sorry.

If the group of Turians noticed anything Voira was doing, they did not show it. Instead, they hurried on their way, heading towards the door at the end of the hall. Avatar judged that they were not likely interested in their group at all, though their behavior was still of interest. Upon Voira's question, Avatar looked to her to acknowledge her. It quickly scanned all of the files on the planet it had access to (a process which took a total of .43 miliseconds), but found no results relevant to her question. "No data available on local imports. No conclusions can be drawn from the quality of their armaments."

RK's eyes glossed over in the image, her mind quickly gleaming whatever she could from every data cashe and nook she could access. Though it was mostly limited which proved rather insufficient. Even when she narrowed down gender, height, ratio for weight (allowing a bit of breathing room) and possible age estimations still only lowered it down to about a billion and that was just registered in the Citadel, which didn't make this search any easier with the slower speed. It was like beating against water from what she recalled Pai'Seef's description to be.

"Having a slower time here, Voira. Speed is completely inferior compared to better designs and I've been able to scrap up a billion or so files. None are matching up so far which isn't lowering the odds of trouble." RK stated bluntly as she continued to try to hasten her search abilities. Part of her was considering hacking into the server, overriding the authority and trying to gain greater permission but that wouldn't go over well for Raa. At best she would've been ejected off the project and at worse, imprisoned and dealt with by the local authorities. Neither was a option in this situation that RK was willing to accept.

Raa, on the other hand, looked from Voira to Avatar than to RK. She looked at a lost for words as she had a bad feeling where this was going to lead to: complete and total trouble. "Voira, what are you going to do?" Her voice was worried, her mask turned to the asari, likely guessing what was about to happen.

Voira nodded ,knowing as well as Raa what was likely about to happen, before glancing sideways at the Quarian and speaking in an innocent tone of voice. "What? We're not going to do anything more than just go introduce ourselves! With Avatar, because he can get their personnel files from just their names. Come on Geth, we have suspicions to ease. Also, Raa, you're staying right here." She prepared to leave.

"Warning: this course of action is inadvisable. The current probability of conflict with this group of Turians is negligible. Accounting for common personality types of mercenaries and soldiers in the Attican Traverse, if you elect to confront them, that probability increases by a factor of approximately 36." Avatar warned. It was not willing to assist Voira in confronting the Turians, as it had judged the risk associated with following them to be greater than the potential gains of information.

Before Voira could reply, RK piped in with a logic even she couldn't argue with. "You've overlooked something important, Voira. If you happen to approach, engage and provoke them into a confrontation than there's a 98% chance it will end up affecting Raa. Mainly because she chose you as her personal gaurd and that will reflect back on her logic abilities. Avatar can research the legal actions should you carry out your actions to ensure my following findings are accurate. My hypothesis is simple. The mildest sentence would be ejection from the current project and since she spent about 700 credits, it would end up hurting both her reputation and risk starvation until she can acquire another project. The worst possiblity is imprisonment, trial and prosecution for the murder of 'innocents' for both of you. Not a logical or worthy risk for her well being, is it?"

Voira's retort to the Geth was ended before it could even begin, as RK piped up and shut down anything she might have said to convince the reluctant Avatar. She sighed in defeat, removing the barrier from around Raa. "Fine. But if they turn cause trouble or sabotage anything, we will only let you know it was both of the AI's fault for about a week. You stopped us and they did something they shouldn't have. Hopefully we're wrong." She grinned at Raa and Avatar. "But if we're right, this job might suddenly become a lot more fun than we originally thought."

"I hope not." Raa said, softly, worried she might've gotten into something she wasn't aiming on. Her mask watched the small Turian group depart and shortly vanish around the corner. She bearly noticed her hands started to wring each other, nervous about the outcome and her new task. It wasn't her first. She had done many like this and worse, yet that unsetting feeling something was going to happen hung over her. Before the the Turians, she managed to ignored and now... it was much harder.

[Lucius Cypher]

Donny woke from his strange dream in a cold sweat. His mind immediately went to the thought that this was his grandfather's way of telling him he should have not joined the military. He looked under his pillow and felt much calmer however. He pulled the knife out from underneath; Grandpa's Knife. Pulling the blade out of the synthetic sheath Donny looked at the blade. It was a dull grey, not one of those shiny reflective ones, and the blade had a few knicks. But that didn't make the blade any useless to Donny; far from it. It was evidence that this was no ceremonial weapon. This knife was used in the past and bore the scars of it's actions. Everything from cutting through underbrush to slaying reaper minion. Donny was going to do this knife right, and make sure that he could continue to add onto it's legend.

"Sorry grandpa. But there's no turning back now."

Truly, there was not. After getting out of bed and dressing into combat fatigues Donny went over to one of the viewing windows. He was in awe by what he saw: Space. "Geographic conditions indicate an aesthetically pleasing view nearby. Organic lifeforms may wish to take note." Donny whispered jokingly to himself. He wasn't sure how people got used to sights like this. It was more beautiful than anything he's ever seen on Earth. Not that he's really been to a lot of places on Earth, but he looks on the Extranet for images of scenery. But nothing beats being there to see it yourself.

He would have spent the better part of the day just watching the asteroids go by, but soon there was an announcement on the comms. That meant to things: First listen for any important news, and for Donny to report to the mess hall. He was, after all, still part of the military. And their training doesn't stop just because they're now space borne. There wasn't anything on the announcement that seemed important to Donny aside that they'll arrive to the location of the new colony within 86 hours. That was a over three days back on earth, though ever since they left Earth Donny has had a hell of a time trying to keep track of time. Not having a day/night cycle really messed up his internal clock.

At the mess hall Donny lined up with other soldiers for their breakfast. Or maybe lunch? Again, Donny had a hard time discerning time without a watch. It said it was 0634, but it felt like it was 1300 right now. "Oh well. I just hope they have yogurt today." Donny had to eat his breakfast both quickly and cleanly. There were officers walking around making sure that the soldiers didn't waste time eating with frivolously things like playing with their food or spending their entire breakfast chatting. But they also made sure that the soldiers weren't being sloppy eaters and making a mess of things. Aside from that though they were fairly lenient. Donny managed to get himself some toast, yogurt, grits, and country fried steak. That is to say, a fried piece of chicken cutlet. It all taste plan, even the yogurt had no flavor, but Donny savored it for it's texture. The toast and steak were warm and crunchy, and the yogurt when added to the toast made it a bit sweet, with a smooth and silky texture combined with the toasts crunchy one. He pour grits on top of his steak to give it the additional crunchy consistency of the grits, but also as a sort of flavored gravy as Donny had poured a bit of salt and sugar into his grits prior. This made his steak have more flavor, not that it had much to begin with.

Donny finished his meal relatively quickly thanks to combining his food together, cutting down on individual time chowing down. He washed it all down with an entire bottle of water before leaving to throw the rest of his leftovers away (Which he didn't have much of) and to wash his dishes. Not even soldiers get away with being lazy and leaving their dishes in the sink. Standing along others who finished their meals Donny found himself a sponge and cleaned his bowl, plates, and utensils quickly and efficiently. He was one of the first of many to finish which allowed him some time to get to the training area with time to spare.

The training area was large enough to house a thousand with a fair amount of space. While not exactly large enough to say, have them run ten miles, a thousand jumping jacks, pushups, crunches, and so forth were entirely doable so long as everyone didn't fall over themselves. And sure enough once a majority of the soldiers, close to 800 at the time, arrived their conditioning began.

""ONE! TWO! THREE! FOUR! FIVE! SIX! SEVEN! EIGHT! NINE! TEN!

For the next three hours, with only one ten minute breaks between each hour, Donny and his fellow soldiers did a thousand types conditioning activity. Situp, squats, crunches, jumping jacks, pushups, kata, and a bunch of other calisthenics. And that was just the first hour. The second hour divided the soldiers up by their respective tasks; regular Soldiers, Infiltrators, and Engineers pretty much went to do more physical conditioning. But the biotic, which only numbered to about 100, went to do a different form of conditioning.

They went to a room with more machines that looked like a sort of target practice field. Because it was. Here the biotic worked either together or individually to exercise and hone their powers. Mostly basic stuff, such as using their powers to lift objects, first by augmenting their physical strength, than using only their biotic energy. Those in a team were given a heavier (Typically 1000 pound) weight to work with, while individuals only had a hundred pound. The purpose of these exercises was to have them able to synchronize their powers so in a pinch, a small handful of biotic could easily fling away say, a Mako. Donny himself worked in a team, not that he really knew anyone amongst them. He knew most of the people who slept in his cabin, but Donny wasn't a very social person. Still he and his team was able to go all the way up to 5000 pounds before they had to switch. Some words of encouragement were passed as they all scattered, with Donny leaving to do individual exercises.

Aside from lifting there was also a more combative conditioning. The one Donny found himself essentially wanted him to crush a inflatable target using only his biotic powers. There was someone on hand that would change the resistance of the target. the first few attempts were easy, but at around the fourth try things started to get harder. It required Donny to really put his focus into crushing the target, more so since he couldn't touch it. But sure enough he passed the fourth, and fifth, and got all the way to tenth before he was called out to switch again.

After that exercise the final hour consisted of more physical conditioning. But instead of counting off everyone was made to sing retro songs from the 21th century. Music choice was submitted by the soldiers themselves so it went from anyone to quite heart-pumping to very silly. But regardless of what sort of song was being played, everyone had to sing along. It was suppose to help moral, they say. Donny was delightfully surprised when his song came up. Perhaps a bit sexist considering that there were a sizable amount of women serving along side him, but this was his song and he had no regrets.

"We must be swift as the coursing river (Be a Man!), With all the force of a great typhoon (Be a man!), With all the strength of a raging fire, Mysterious as the dark side of the moon!"

Donny returned his his cabin with a bottle of water and a cold can of beer. He wasn't much of a drinker, but it was complimentary by some of the guys who live near his cabin. Though he only drank the water and put the beer in a plastic box, with the other cans he never bothered to drink. Right now as downtime, where the soldiers were free to mill about and spend this time for recreational activities. Most Donny knew were playing games in the rec room or at the gym. Donny tends to spend this time just laying in his cabin reading from the Extranet. However he was feeling rather pumped from the exercise and chose to go take a walk. Who knows, maybe he'll meet someone interesting.

The ship that Donny was on was the human Carrier "Charlotte". It unfortunately wasn't here to stay at the colony, merely to drop off the diplomat on board. She was a common topic by the soldiers since a vast majority of them were brought here to protect her, despite the fact that only a handful of them would actually be accompanying her. Many people felt it was a bit... Unnecessary to bring in a little over 500 troopers if only as many as fifty are actually going to stay with her on the colony. Though at least it was clear to most that the other soldiers who don't stay at the colony are being deployed at other key locations. Still, it was fifty soldiers out of a 1000 that could be one of the new inhabitants of this colony.

Frankly, Donny really wished he was chosen. He's seen aliens back on earth, but they were rare. he's only seen a few Turians and an Asari, three and one time respectively, both those times only when he was a child with his Grandfather. He always wanted to meet a Geth, a Quarian, and a krogan just to name a few. Bartarians and vorchas tend to have a cardboard cutout of them used for target practice. He's seen a lot of hanar porn back at earth for reasons that do not surprise him. Point is, like space, aliens were a new thing to him that he's never really seen in person, despite how long humanity has been working alongside them. There are just some things you don't get to see on Earth that you have to leave the planet to find.

Donny walked around the corridors of the ship before he came across a "Suit". "Suits" were what the soldiers called non-military personnel that still held some sort of authority over them due to political reasons. Like a mayor or celebrity. At least Donny thought this person was just a Suit. She did, at least, look like she was busy checking something on her datapad. Donny moved to avoid her but when she looked up she called out to him. "Who are you?"

"That seemed rather rude..." He thought in his head. Not even so much as a "Hello, who are you?" but Donny answered anyways. He stood at attention and saluted to her in case she was part of higher command. "Donny Lee. Military Occupational Specialty (MOS):11B Vanguard. Rank: Private (PTE). Grade:OR-2. Unit of affiliation: Unassigned. At your service madam." It was evident that Donny had been practicing reciting and memorize that information. The women didn't seem interested however and just scowled at him. Still she looked at her datapad, no doubt making sure that Donny's information was correct, and than looked up at him. She seemed calmer, though no less stern. "You information checks out, 'Dong'. Come with me then. I needed to fine some muscle to help move some things around my office." Donny grunted a yes, though he honestly did not want to do that. He wanted to look around and maybe talk to some people, but get pulled into grunt work. But an order was an order, and while he didn't know who this person was, it's not like he really had anything better to do. So Donny followed this stern lady back to her office. Despite what she told him she made no efforts to find anyone else to help move things, so it seemed like Donny would be the only one doing these renovations.

Strangely enough however Donny and the lady did not head towards the office area where he thought most of the desk jockeys worked at. Instead they went to administrative, which confirmed Donny's suspicion that this lady was probably one of his CO's, or at least works for one. They arrived to her office where Donny got the name of the lady: Eleanore. Strangely enough, no surname. Donny thought this was a bit strange but didn't have time to question it when Eleanore had him move a bunch of stuff around her office. It looked fairly clean, all things considered, and it's not like it was particularly disorganized. Eleanore didn't help at all and instead went to her desk where she took out her purse. And from her purse she took out rows of prescription bottles, taking out individual pills and swallowing them all one at a time. Between each pill she would tell Donny to move something else somewhere else. This went on for a good thirty or so minutes before she told him to stop, went over to a wall and picked something up. "Is that why she called me here? To look for something!?" The soldier kept his mouth shut as Eleanore went back to her desk. She was still popping more pills! "Now move everything back."

Donny returned to his cabin after helping Eleanore rearrange her furniture. He had spent two hours helping her move things without complaint. He had to as well, as shortly before he left a person came by to talk to her. Donny only caught a glimpse of it, but it was a document that had something to do with the new colony they were arriving to. Donny could guess that Eleanore was the diplomat being sent there. he had no evidence of that aside from that quick glimpse of the papers, but given his luck he wouldn't be surprised. So as he returned to his bunk he thought about what just happened.

"I just met Eleanore, and I know she's the one who chooses which soldier comes with her to the new colony. Or at least I'm pretty sure she has a say in who comes. If... If I make friends with her, than perhaps she'll let me come with her to the colony?" It was 22:12 and many of the other soldiers started to head back to their bunks to sleep. Everyone was suppose to be asleep before 2300 unless they had tasks to do, but Donny wasn't one of those people. Changing into a new pair of fatigues Donny laid in his bunk thinking about what he should do. "I should try to meet her again... Make myself memorable. I... Want to be part of this new world." Donny whispered him himself as he fell to sleep.

At first he thought it would be a dreamless rest. After yesterday's nightmare, Donny certainly wouldn't mind just going to sleep and waking up. But in this dream he saw... People? Vague colored silhouettes that Donny's mind thought as "people". Than came more people, about five or so. They met for a brief moment before stopping. Donny just watched the colorful humanoid-shaped shadows until a loud buzz rang in his ears.

Shooting strait to sitting position Donny thought he was under attack, nearly whipping out his knife. But no, it was just the Charlotte's intercom. It was 6:35, which meant everyone needed to wake up and get breakfast. Groggily Donny put on his shoes and headed to the mess hall. This breakfast was just cereal and a banana. He ate them separately instead of together as his mind was on other things. He was thinking that during his Downtime he needed to go find Eleanore and try to get on her good side. Of course, just showing up at her office wasn't such a great idea. It's not like he has permission to just barge in and talk to her. And he was only able to meet her the first time by luck. Donny was starting to give up hope when it seemed like the universe was throwing him a bone. He saw Eleanore along with some other Suits walking towards the waste disposal and sink area. It looked like they were about finished with their breakfast. He had to act now, despite not finishing his cereal.

Donny walked a quick pace to Eleanore and her entourage, calling out to them. "Uh, hey! I mean, excuse me, madams. I can get that for you." He motioned towards their dishes. A brief moment of thought passed as they seemed to wonder what Donny just said, but Eleanore was quick to leave her dishes with Donny. She left without a word. Her two Suits seemed to hesitate before Donny reassured them that he'll wash theirs as well. They thanked him and handed him their dishes before turning to follow Eleanore. Also just his luck, he managed to catch the tail end of their conversation. Something about the "Comet Club". That was the name of the bar on the ship, the only place were servicemen were allowed to drink. It had a jazz club as a few pool tables. A cool place, though Donny avoids it since he never had friends to hang out with. He wasn't sure why they were talking about it, but he figured that he could go there during downtime and see if he could catch them again.

Today's conditioning wasn't like yesterday's though he has done something similar before on the ship. While the first hour was much the same, the second hour was combat training. Everyone was gathered towards the various firing ranges, or sent to VR labs to operate vehicles. Donny himself chose to head to the firing ranges to test his marksmanship. As a vanguard he was only cleared to use pistols and shotguns, but he favored those two weapons anyways. He didn't quite have the mind for sniping and couldn't conserve his ammo well enough to use anything that could fire at full or even semi automatic for long. Donny preferred shotguns for their familiarity (He used even military shotguns back at home for hunting) and because it makes him have to think. Not so much as sniping those, but it does make him have to actively conserve his ammo, but when he needs to use it he can without hesitation.

Initially everyone simply went on the firing range with their guns and tested their accuracy at various ranges. Donny started with his pistol, which he did well at from close range, decently at close to mid, but after mid range he only managed to hit his target once in the leg. His shotgun performance in comparison was much better. Close and mid range Donny was able to hit his targets on the mark, and even at far range Donny could get some pellets to hit his target, if he didn't simply use some Carnage to pierce them right where he was aiming for. That took a bit of time however, and he only managed to hit the far range targets three times before he was made to switch out.

Part two of the second hour combat training was reflex training. Here the solders had to practice their quickdraw, target identification, and reaction time. Donny was fairly quick on the draw with his pistol, able to have it out and firing In three-quarters of a second. Though he was noted to have an itchy trigger finger since he tend to shoot despite not being ordered to. It took him a bit longer for his shotgun, an average of about two seconds. His target identification exercise was perfect however, though that was mostly due to the fact the targets were obvious. Everyone generally agrees that target identification is a bit of a joke since the targets them to be krogans, vorchas, or even reaper minions. The only time where it was even mildly challenging was when the couch at the station gave them specific targets to shoot for. Things like "Geth" or "Quarians" or "Humans were a turban" and variations thereof. The goal was to shoot only the targets and not the hostages. Donny did well with his pistol and even his shotgun would hit his targets if they weren't moving so much. He only hopes however, that if he ever needs to apply this skill on the field that he'll be able to hit his mark.

And lastly was reaction training. This ran a gamut of things from avoiding being hit by soldiers with sticks to "How to deal with a grenade being lobbed at you" sort of training. But his favorite part of reaction training was the hand-to-hand defensive combat maneuvers. Donny may not be the strongest or the best fighter, but he likes to think that he could give the best fighter on the ship a run for his money. In hand-to-hand the soldiers were taught various subduing techniques and take downs, as well as lethal ones in the event that their opponent proved too dangerous to leave alive. They also taught various defensive techniques against opponents armed with anything from knives, guns, and even the odd archaic weapons like staffs and swords of all things. It was a lot to teach in less than twenty minutes, so soldiers were allowed to chose which they would like to practice against. Donny chose how to defend himself against someone armed with a firearm. His proctor told the obvious fact: If faced with an opponent armed with a fire arm were you are not, your best option is to run. But when cornered, the proctor demonstrated the technique necessary to minimize his profile (Thus giving the opponent less mass to shoot at) as well as disarming techniques. It was rather painful looking and Donny volunteered to be the "opponent" with the gun, earning him a few bruises. When it came to his turn however, after a few initial mishaps, he was quick to learn how to preform the technique. And without even activating his biotic powers.

The last hour was much like yesterday's, which was more conditioning over the sound of the soldier's music choices. No songs that Donny liked in particular so he just went through the motions. But as he was doing some sit ups he noticed at the entrance of the training area was Eleanore. She seemed to have been watching the soldiers training. Donny cursed himself in his mind. "Shit. I didn't really do anything impressive today. I really hope that she still noticed me though... Maybe she could see my potential and take a chance? That's not too optimistic is it?" By the time the daily conditioning was over Eleanore was gone. Donny hit the showers to wash up, trying to formulate a plan to catch her attention.

As he washed himself he heard some of the other soldiers talking about heading to the Comet Club for drinks. As he eavesdropped on their conversation one of them mentioned that the band won't be showing up that night for some reason or another. That gave Donny an idea of what he could do to possibly catch Eleanore's attention. He washed up quickly and returned to his cabin, putting on his best looking casual clothing. Once he looked proper Donny headed down to the Comet Club.

The Comet Club was fairly unimpressive as far as bars go, and their selection of alcohol were limited to only what could be brought from Earth. They had some special alien stuff, but that was reserved for higher ranks or those with the credits to burn, which Donny did not have. But he wasn't here for a drink. Though the place was already pretty busy when he arrived the stage was completely empty. He looked for the barkeep and when he wasn't busy Donny went up to him. "Hey, I hear that the band isn't going to show up tonight. I don't have one myself, but if you got a saxophone I'd be willing to play for a couple of hours. You don't need to pay me, but I'm keeping the tips. Is that okay?" Donny and the barkeep had to barter over the proposition, since the barkeep did indeed have a sax, but be was hesitant to let Donny use it without a fee. So Donny settled for sharing 3/5 of his tip profits. The barkeep accepted this arrangement and told Donny where he could get the sax.

Though even with the sax in hand, Donny was a bit hesitant. He knew one song, but it wouldn't sound quite right without at least a piano accompaniment... But the universe supplies. Soon another soldier came in talking to the bar keep. A rather cute looking woman, a bit shorter than Donny, who apparently wanted to capitalize on the lack of a band playing as well. She could play the piano. And while she was able to strike a deal faster than Donny, he intercepted her along the way. He informed her of his intent to play on behalf of the missing band and offered a sort of duet with her. She agreed, but they needed to figure out a song they both knew. This was where Donny was stumped. He listed off a bunch of songs he knew, but she didn't know any of them. She listed off ones she knew and Donny didn't know any of them. This was starting to seem like a bad idea. So he suggested an even worse idea. "Let's just wing it. You take lead and... And I'll just follow you. Don't worry, I know what I'm doing." No, he wasn't. But he was willing to try, and this girl on the piano was crazy enough to do it too.

Once again acting as the mover Donny pushed a piano onto the stage where the other girl played some keys to get a feel of the instrument. Donny did something similar just to get an idea of the quality of his saxophone. It was better than any that he ever used. Before they played, Donny remembered that he never told the girl his name, "Oh, I'm Donny by the way. Donny Lee. Let's show them what we can do, eh?" The girl seemed nervous but introduced herself as Seraph anyways. "Pretty name." It was the moment of truth. Some of the patrons were watching them now. Donny didn't see Eleanore anywhere amongst the crowd, but it's not like he was going to postpone the show just to wait for her. He had to be proactive, show that he was a stand up guy capable of finishing a job without someone to hold his hand. "... Here we go."

Their first song went by unnoticed. It was expected perhaps, given that they were musical accompaniment, not the main attraction. Providing a calming ambiance was suppose to be their thing. Yet when they did play, the volume of patrons talking got... Lower? Quieter? Perhaps they were listening after all? Donny wasn't certain and he wasn't paying attention to that. He had to play his part. His mind forgot about Eleanore, about Seraph, about being a System Alliance soldier. Right now he was just a man with a saxophone, and man with a song in his heart. Not his song, granted, but a song nonetheless. Caught by the fey mood, when it seemed like they came to the end of their first song Donny simply began onto the next song without a break. Seraph seemed to have focused on her playing as well, as she showed no outward reaction to Donny's new song aside from playing along. It was almost magical, at least to Donny. He could even hear the sound of cymbals and a bass guitar playing alongside him even though it was just him and Seraph. Or so he thought.

It appeared that the band of Comet Club had arrived, subtly moving in and playing along to Donny's song. By the time he finished playing was the only time he noticed they arrived. He was fearful for a moment. He didn't want to leave yet; he hasn't seen Eleanore. She had to see him play, to be impressed with his abilities. Granted now that he thought about it his sax playing ability has nothing to do with being able to protect her, since she needs soldiers, not musicians. But the worse of his fears were alleviated when they asked him if they knew any songs by Kenny G. "The Kenny G? Yeah. I know like... Two. Songbird and Going Home."

Donny spent the rest of his downtime playing with the band at the Comet Club. He lead the next two songs, but afterwards he allowed the band to take center stage while he provided whatever sort of saxophone accompaniment he could for whatever they played. If Eleanore ever came he never noticed her. He was looking in between songs, but soon the Comet Club started to get so crowded that it was hard to see anyone without already knowing where they were at. He worried, briefly, about losing his chance to join her on the new colony but let that thought go. He was lost in the song he played with the band and worries like that just slipped away. When it got closer to closing time the band left, as did Seraph who thanked Donny for playing alongside her. He complimented her ability on the piano and said that he couldn't have lasted that long without her backing him up. Perhaps at a lost of words or because it was getting close to curfew, Seraph said very little and left quickly. Donny returned the Saxophone to the barkeep who than gave Donny his tips: a mere 50 credits. He felt like he was being cheated but the barkeep said that if Donny ever wanted to play here again, all he had to do was tell the Barkeep. He suppose that would be fine as long as he didn't have to pay the guy.

Returning to his bunk Donny laid on his bed with the songs echoing in his head. He was the last to arrive unlike how it usually is, with him being the first if he never left in the first place. As sleep was slowly coming to get him his mind went back to the thought of Eleanore and Seraph. Two fine women that he wanted to know more about. "Huh. What is this, some sort of dating sim? Well... They're pretty enough I suppose. I wonder if I'll meet another one tomorrow..." Donny's last thoughts began to drift onto various subjects, from training to the Comet Club, even his previous few dreams and the thoughts of home. He made it a mission that he'll try to call his family tomorrow and see how they're doing.

Thankfully Donny had a dreamless sleep. While he did wake up a few times in the middle of the night to toss and turn, he woke up at around 0600. The rest of his cabin mates were asleep however, so he had to carefully leave the room. He went to the bathroom to wash up as that was something he neglected to do the past few days. While his teeth were a decently white color, he could scrap some plague off the surface and decided a good brushing was needed. After ten minutes Donny finished washing up and headed towards the mess hall. An early breakfast would give him more time to limber up before the daily exercises, which will allow him to preform at his maximum potential if Eleanora showed up. He also remembered that this was his last day before they would arrive to the new colony. If he couldn't get chosen to join... Well, he supposed that there were always other places he could see. Still in his heart he wanted to come along. He wanted to be part of that new world.

Donny's breakfast was heavy: Fried eggs, bacon, toast, hash browns, with a glass of orange juice. He actually saw Seraph in line as he went to go get breakfast and greeted her. Oddly enough she didn't wear the same type of military fatigues as he did, but much more formal attire like a secretary or something. Donny asked about this and she mentioned that while she is technically a soldier, she also spends most of her time at the help desk organizing and managing the data files. Donny thought this was strange that they'd make a soldier also work as a desk jockey, but Seraph also mentioned that she chose to do this as she is rather nervous about actually seeing combat. She joined the military as her family has had a long time of service with the System Alliance, and she felt that she too should uphold that reputation. Her grandparents fought in the Reaper War, much like Donny's own, so he could understand her thoughts on the matter. Donny and Seraph ate their breakfast together, with Donny noting that no one came over to talk to Seraph despite a large number of soldiers finally showing up. He wondered if Seraph was a lonely person like Donny as well.

Seraph left shortly after she finished eating and mentioned that she'd need to change into her fatigues. "Wait, than why are you in your secretary uniform right now?" That's when Seraph mentioned that she liked sleeping in it and it's basically like pajamas to her. That was very strange to Donny, but he had no reason to think Seraph was joking or lying. And even if she was, he honestly did not care for the truth if what she said wasn't true. When she left Donny stuck around to see if Eleanore was going to show up, but a few minutes before the daily exercise routine and she hadn't seen her at all. He did see the two that was with her yesterday, but Eleanore wasn't there herself. There wasn't much time left so he left the mess hall. "Maybe I'll see her again during training."

Once more the first hour consisted of calisthenics. A thousand reps of various exercise for the entire hour. During the ten minute break Donny was about to drink from his water bottle when he heard someone curse loudly next to him. A red haired woman was looking through her bag furiously, despite it being a very small duffel bag. She apparently forgot her water bottle. There was a line to a water fountain, but the line was huge and would take her almost ten minutes, if not more. She was panting hard and heavy, despite having much more muscle mass than Donny. She was, in fact, much larger than Donny, almost intimidatingly so. He was almost certain she was part krogan. Still where Donny was breathing only mildly, this woman seemed to need the water more than he did. So he called out to her and offered his water bottle. "Here, you can take mines. I haven't even opened it yet." The woman did so immediately without a word. She drained Donny's bottle dry without taking a moment to breath. The muscle bound woman warrior than handed his nearly-crushed bottle back to Donny, saying only a word of thanks. "Y-yeah. No problem."

The second hour of exercise was, surprisingly enough, the same as yesterday. Normally they switch the second hour exercises every day. But as he looked around he noticed Eleanore and could guess that she was the reason why they were doing these exercises again. And sure enough before they were sent off to work the Drill Sargent announced that those who do well today may be eligible to join the diplomat on her job onto the new colony. This just reaffirmed to Donny that he needed to do his best. Give it his all. And hold nothing back.

Once more Donny went to the firing range to handle his pistol and shotgun. He needed to keep his cool this time and not mess this up by being hasty. While he had to show his skills, he shouldn't show off. "Professionals have standards." Raising his pistol to eye level Donny waited for the singal to fire. "Be polite." Donny scored four head shots and twelve body shots on the close and mid range target with his pistol. "Be efficient." Donny scored three headshots and twenty-four body in all shots at close, mid, and long range with his shotgun. "Have a plan to kill everyone you meet." Thirty out of thirty shots hit the target. Most of them were aiming for center of mass, and he only did long range with his shotgun. But it was with his shotgun at long range that he scored those last three head shots, one in each eye and one right on the nose. His accomplishments pale in comparison to some of the others soldiers however, who consistently landed lethal shots with casual indifference where he needed to concentrate and even go Carnage just to land those last three shots. "Be cool, be cool... Just ace the next part, is all."

But there was a change in processes. Instead of taking part of the quickdraw, reactionary, or identification courses, Biotics were told to head to a different area where they could practice their biotic powers. This caught Donny off guard but he was willing to roll with it. There weren't as many biotics on the Charlotte, so this made it a bit easier for him to stand out. Their excersises were basically a mix of all three quickdraw, reaction, and identification however, and all with their biotic powers. The proctor would send various colored clay pigeons and each biotic would need to either crush, pull, or ignore the pigeons depending on their color. Red ones needed to be crushed. Yellow ones pulled in. Orange ones ignored. "What the hell, they look almost all the same!" Worse still was that the clay pigeons were sent en masses. The first few had a really hard time trying to get the red and yellow pigeons, and even those who managed to get the Yellow ones tend to accidentally break them. This new test almost felt like it was suppose to keep biotics out of the new colony but Donny wasn't going to be daunted. He had the skills to handle this, he knew it.

When it was his turn at least fifty clay pigeons were sent out. From his observations, there were only about five red pigeons and ten yellow ones. The rest were orange and meant to mast the presence of the others. Donny immediately spotted two yellow ones and managed to pull them directly towards him, however he broke a few orange plants while doing so. He saw a red one and crushed it on the spot. He didn't need to apply much force behind it since it was just a clay pigeon. He pulled in two more Yellows but also an orange one by accident, and managed to break two more Red ones. He did that when he saw two red ones, but instead of crushing them both he pulled the furthest Red pigeon and had it collide with the nearest red pigeon, allowing them to shatter each other on impact. So far it looked like he was doing the best, but the pigeons were about to fall. He had only managed to take out three red pigeons and captured four, which he thinks is a fairly bad score. So he ran towards the clay pigeons.

The proctor never made it clear if they were only suppose to stay where they were at when they dealt with the targets so Donny took it upon himself to run towards the flock and try to get a closer look. Not only that, but he had a way to keep them air born just a bit longer. Sending out a Shockwave at the mass of Clay Pigeons, he managed to knock them all higher into the air. But he also did so with careful and precious precision, to prevent accidentally breaking any of them. This caused their trajectory to change to actually fly upwards, giving him more time to seek out the red and yellow pigeons. He spotted three of the yellow pigeons and pulled them en mass towards him, catching a few of the organ pigeons. But he also caught a red pigeon. Taking the yellow ones Donny grabbed the red Pigeon and crushed it in his hand. "Okay maybe we weren't suppose to do that, but whatever!" Donny managed to capture all the yellow Pigeons shortly after, but failed to get the last red pigeon. He returned to his proctor who complimented him on his initiative of chasing after the pigeons himself, allowing the other biotics before him to copy his idea. While their success were mixed, there was a notable improvement in success when they copied Donny's idea. Because of his ingenuity however, other more capable biotics were able to get perfect scores. This left a bitter taste in Donny's mouth as his score, while very good, was not perfect.

Than came the last hour. After snacking on an energy bar and Tupari the last hour of excises was unlike any he had done before. It was simple really: They would now be divided into groups and spar one another. "That's insane! I mean granted, it kind of make sense in the idea that we are soldiers and we should at least be accustomed to fighting, but to fight each other?" Donny's thoughts were echoed amongst the crowd around him, but they followed the orders nonetheless. They all gathered into various groups and their sparing partner would be chosen by the proctors. To no surprise, that red-haired warrior that Donny had helped earlier was in his group. It was no less of a surprise when the proctor chose him and her to spar one another. "Rosemary Thorn and Donny Lee."

Rosemary was a strait-up soldier and it showed. While Donny was a decent five-foot ten, Rosemary was six-foot six and at last twice his mass. She had wider shoulders than he did and her arm was almost as long as Donny's legs. Evidently, despite being a woman, Rosemary had the physical advantage. She stoically popped her neck and cracked her knuckles, as did Donny, and the two were going to square off against one another. There's no killing, no biotics, no weapons, and if the opponent surrenders you must let them go, and if you surrender you must surrender and not use it as a ruse to get a sneak attack. "Fair enough..." Though fair isn't exactly what he'd call it considering that he can't use biotics, but he took a stand anyways. When the proctor gave the start Rosemary charged in, putting his massive hand in front of Donny's face. He knew why; she was trying to block his vision for her follow up. Most would step back, but Donny stepped forward. He had his arms up just in time for them to block a knee that was meant for his chest. With her leg so close to his body Donny took the opportunity to grab her leg. More importantly however, she wasn't wearing shoes, so he grabbed her toes and began to crush them in his hand. This earned him an elbow onto his shoulders as the two roared in pain. But fighting through the hurt Donny took a step back with Rosemary's toes firmly in his grip, causing her to land in a split. She seemed flexible enough to handle it, but this gave Donny the opportunity to continue to twist her toes as well as stomp on her ankle. She reached out and pushed Donny away which sent him rolling onto his feet. Rosemary stood up but with a notable limp. Donny than noticed his hand bleeding. "Must have cut myself on her toenails..." Feeling the warm liquid drip down his hand, it seemed like this spar wasn't over yet.

In an act that isn't exactly professional, Donny smeared his own blood onto his arm and face. He was bleeding a lot and intended to make use of it. Rosemary wasn't phased, but the same couldn't be said of some of the other soldiers watching. "This fight... It's really making the blood flow, ya know?" It was almost insane what Donny was doing, but this was for the purpose of psyching Rosemary out and giving himself confidence. Somehow being covered in his blood made him feel invincible. "Come on then. This isn't over yet!" And after three minutes it was over. Donny was cunning, knowing that he lacked the pure strength to match up with Rosemary. But she wasn't an unthinking brute either. While he was able to fool her with trickery and agility, once Rosemary had an idea of what Donny was up to she was quickly able to put him down, chopping him right across the larynx and straddling Donny across his chest. She punched him three times in the face before he surrender. Luckily she didn't break his nose, but she did give his skull a good thrashing and blackened both his eyes. Donny was than taken to the infirmary by Rosemary herself who needed to get her foot checked and her left arm relocated after Donny managed to pull it out of socket. Not that he knew that, she fought as though all he managed to do was tug on her fingers. "Heh. Look at me. I feel so fucked up and you didn't even throw a punch."

Rosemary and Donny sat in the infirmary wing where doctors and their assistance worked fervently to help out those who got hurt. Apparently they weren't expecting a bunch of wounded soldiers to show up out of the blue and asked if there was an explosion or an attack that happened. But no, as most of the soldiers explained, it was just training. Donny was given some ointment and bandages to staunch the bleeding and an icepack for his head. Rosemary needed more excessive help, which meant that by the time Donny could leave Rosemary would have to stay behind. Before he left however Rosemary called out to Donny. "Hey! Good fighting. Why don't we meet for drinks at the Comet Club? I'll see you there!" Rosemary didn't even give Donny a say in the matter as she was taken away to get her injuries treated. Uneasy at the prospect, he nonetheless showed up to the Comet Club. It was packed full, this time with soldiers showing off the scars of today's battle. Donny couldn't show off his own since all he had were bruises on his face, which he really wished he could hide. It just made him look like he was a punching bag. He couldn't even go up to play the saxophone since his jaw was sore from Rosemary wailing on him. He noticed Seraph at the bar and figured that she would be willing to talk to him. He sat down next to her, and when she turned to look, she nearly jumped in shock.

"Hey. It's me, Donny. Like my new look?"

"Whah... What happened to you?!"

"Well..."

Donny told Seraph about his fight with Rosemary, and he didn't pull any punches when he told her about his "fighting style" of crushing her toes, slathering himself in blood, and trying his best not to let her get a clean blow on him even if he never threw a punch. Before he could finish his story by telling Seraph how Rosemary nearly decapitated him and beat his face in, the warrior herself arrived and gave Donny a much better sending off. "He really put me into a corner, so I had to give it my all. I got a lucky shot on him and took him down. I was desperate to make sure he didn't try anymore tricks so I wailed on him, but he gave up before that happened. I was glad too, because at that point all I could think about was trying to punch him as many times as I can before he breaks me." Rosemary sat next to Donny and ordered three cocktails called "Full Biotic Kick". Donny gulped at the idea of drinking since he wasn't much of an alcoholic.

Then he realized that he was now sitting between two women. While Rosemary was certainly gruff and intimating, she had a sort of stoic beauty that made her... Handsome. Seraph was cute in a way, but she was also mature and refine when he saw her play the piano. It was energetic yet graceful. Seraph and Rosemary also seem to be familiar with one another as they chatted about today's events. Seraph was apparently classified as a soldier, which would give them a reason to see each other a lot. When Rosemary asked what Donny's classification was he nearly jumped. "Oh. Uh, you... Didn't see me? I'm a biotic. A biotic vanguard." Rosemary didn't know what that was, but Seraph seemed rather interested. She said that she was always interested in biotics and it's applications to everyday life. Donny tried to play it humbly, mentioning that he only learned he was a biotic when he first joined the System Alliance, and the most mundane he's ever did with it pull his gun into his hand when he nearly dropped it. Rosemary however listed off the various things that a biotic could do and asked Donny what he could do with his biotics. "Well... I'm not very good at describing. But perhaps you'd like to see it instead?"

Somehow or another, Donny was back at the training area. It was nearly void of people however; the only ones here were cleaners, Donny, Rosemary, and Seraph. And the two women were armed with form sticks. Even though Donny was still feeling sore in the head Rosemary wanted to spar him again, but this time she wanted to test herself against his biotic powers. Seraph, despite her cute and fairly innocent appearance, also wanted to test herself against a biotic. Donny obliged with a passion, but in his head he was screaming for help. "HOW THE FUCK DID I GET MYSELF IN THIS SITUATION!?" At least he had a form stick as well, so he wasn't defenseless. It only provided him a minor confidence booster considering that he was now going to engage in melee with two soldiers. Rosemary didn't even seem like she was hurt at all during Donny's sparing, and Seraph herself looked unharmed as well. Where as Donny still had the bandages on his face and two black eyes. But there was no turning back now. Flipping the stick in his hand Donny assumed his combat stance.

"Bring it on!"

Rosemary charged forward with a lunging stab at Donny's chest. Seraph was going to move to flank Donny. He couldn't let himself be sandwiched between the two or he'll just get beaten to the ground, no matter how powerful his biotics were. He dodged to the side behind Rosemary, getting poked in the shoulder instead of dead on his chest, as he went towards Seraph. Here he demonstrated his Biotic Charge as he went strait towards her to incapacitate her. He stopped the charge short of actually hitting her and swung at her legs to trip her. She fell onto the ground as she expected a higher strike. But before Donny could take her out Rosemary managed to catch up behind him and grabbed him in a bear hug. Her breast pressed against his back would have been pleasant if she wasn't also simultaneously crushing his body. He still had some energy left however, so he used to to cause a Nova, launching Rosemary off her of him and sending Seraph skidding on the floor.

But it doesn't look like either of the girls were all too interested in giving up. Rosemary landed on her feet and was giving Donny a wicked grin. Seraph sprung onto her feet as well and resumed getting into position to flank. It was too soon for him to use another charge and they weren't close enough to spring another Nova. So he'd have to put today's training in practical application. He looked over to Seraph as she was moving into position and targeted her stick. He yanked the stick out of her hands and into his own. Thinking that he subdued her Donny turned to Rosemary just in time for her to tackle him onto the ground. In an all too familiar position where Rosemary was sitting right on top of him, Donny targeted Rosemary's stick with his biotic powers and snapped it in half. She narrowly missed whiffing him across the face. This gave Donny time to fight back, unlike last time where he was quickly pummeled the moment Rosemary was on top of him. He bucked and used the sticks in his hand to help leverage himself out from underneath Rosemary, knocking her over in the path of Seraph who seemed like she intended to take advantage of Donny's predicament. Backing away from the two women Donny took on his fighting stance meant for dual wielding, a style that he's only practiced and never really applied.

"That's enough."

Everyone stopped what they were doing and looked up at the voice. Seraph was the first to stand at attention, followed by Donny, while Rosemary only did so after she noticed what the other two were doing. Eleanore had arrived alone carrying the same Datapad that Donny first saw her with. Seraph was the first to speak out.

"A-Ambassador Eleanore! To what do we owe the pleasure, ma'am?"

Putting the datapad away Eleanore looked at the three ragged soldiers intently, as if she was scanning them. She smiled which sent a shiver down Donny's back. "As you know I'm looking for capable soldiers to accompany me to the new colony. I watched today's demonstration and none left an impression on me." Donny felt a bit sullen hearing that. He tried so hard and yet she didn't even seem curious? A certain... Anger swelled up inside of him. This made him speak out. "Than what sort of a soldier are you looking for?" Donny said with a hint of fury in his voice. Eleanore dismissed his tone.

"Someone who gets things done without causing a mess. Someone who can do more than simply follow orders and kill on demand. I'm not a general; I'm not taking soldiers to occupy a city or to fight against another army. I want soldiers who are more than tools and weapons. I am here for diplomatic reasons. The soldiers I take should be able to help, but just as security, but also to foster relationships. You are going to represent humanities best, both on and off the battlefield."

Eleanore stepped up to Donny. She was his weight but physically petite. And yet Donny felt like the small one here. "I want Commander Shepard. Do you think you have what it takes to follow in his footsteps and be humanity's next hope?"

It was 0600. Donny practically had no sleep, so no dreams. He felt his grandpa's knife underneath his pillow and took it out. At this point his eyes were accustomed to the darkness and he could see his ancestral weapon. It was a dull grey, yet the dim light from beneath the door made it shine in Donny's eyes. On the blade's edge he could see the reflection of himself. He was beaten and bruised. He was a biotic and a solider, but far from the best or the strongest. He wasn't well known and only recently started talking to girls. And the day before he told his mother that he'll be going to 2196 BH3.

"I'm going to be part of a whole new world ma! I've been in space for so long and now I'll finally get a chance to see aliens and what it's like to live on a new planet. But I'm not just going to be a soldier there ma, I have to help keep relation. You know, like, making friends and being peaceful with the other aliens. There'll be Turians and Quarians there. You know who they are right? Yeah, I'll be working with them, as well as many other types of people. Yeah, mhmm... Yeah... I am scared. I've hardly gotten to know other people, like human people, very well and now I'll be working with aliens. I'm not really sure what I'll do when I meet them. But I think I'll just be myself. I don't want them to think I'm trying to put on airs or anything. I'll just sort of let them see my true colors and let them decide what to make of me. I know that there'll be some who won't like me ma, but I can't let them scare me. I have to both protect and represent the human race now! I can't let them think I'm a coward. I mean I'm not going to go to war ma! I'm just showing them that... That I'm the best that I am. I... Yeah uh huh. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay okay, I get it ma. I'll be fine. You trust me don't you? I know you're worried, but you have to believe in me. I am still your... Little boy... But I'm also a man. I have responsibilities now. I can't let them down, and I'm not going to. I know. I'll be sure to call you and Jay and everyone else too. Alright. I love you too mom. Goodbye."

When the morning routine signal on the intercoms buzzed to life, Donny didn't head to the mess hall. He did go to the bathroom to get wash up and get dressed. But instead of his combat fatigues he donned his armor. His luggage, which consisted of a single large military backpack, contained what little possessions he had. His knife he had firmly strapped to his lower back. The box containing the beer cans he never drank, he left them on a table for his cabin mates. He left a note saying his goodbyes and good luck. After he gathered his belongings and tidied up his bunk Donny did not head towards the mess hall. Instead he went towards the hangar bay where the carrier Charlotte store most of their space craft. There he saw about twenty other soldiers, Seraph and Rosemary included. Seraph was going to come with Eleanore from the get go. They both had to coax Rosemary to come with them, as she only saw herself as a soldier. Donny reminded her of her strength and conviction, two things that represent more than just her combat prowess. She joined, but only under the condition that the other two came with her. And of course they would. They all would.

The soldiers gathered filed into the shuttle. Eleanore was already inside and informed them of where they were going: A space station above the new colonized planet where she would meet with other diplomats and representatives. They themselves would act as her security personnel as well as assistants. They will do everything from catering and babysitting, volunteering for hard labor and working administrative positions. Being a soldier would be the last thing they do if they do this right. But always expect the worse and be prepared for it. This colony has much potential, but also unknown hazards. Death is always a possibility. But they already knew that, and they came here after making that decision. Donny was daunted and scared, but he wasn't going to turn back now. He was going to be the hero that he always wanted to be. The hero that his grandpa was, the hero that Commander Shepard is. It was a high bar and the vanguard knew he couldn't reach it now. But one day he'll grow to the point that he would reach his dreams. Maybe even set a new bar for others. This was just the first step. He was going to be part of a brand new world.

The shuttle arrived onto the space station without incident. When they arrived, the soldiers had to check in with S-Sec. They were given identification tags that labeled them as security. They were also given pamphlets to help them navigate the ship, though Donny passed his along to someone else and promptly lost it. He'll regret that later. Following Eleanore and the other soldiers they reached a large corridor where Eleanore spoke to someone who looked like a receptionist. There she began to divided up the soldiers to handle various tasks. Donny was given luggage duty.

"Here is the location of where our luggage is being taken, as well as a list of identification numbers. Temporary arrangements have been made for us here, so bring the luggage to these rooms. Make sure nothing has been lost or stolen, and find it if you do. Report back to me when I return from my meeting. You are dismissed."

Donny went strait to the luggage area. Or at least he tried to. As he walked through the corridors that was the first time he came face to face with a Quarian. Two of them in fact, one male and one female. They were just walking on by when Donny nearly bumped into them. He was scared for a moment. He thought they were going to be angry. But no, instead they simply said "Sorry, excuse me." and walked on. They brushed Donny off simply, but he couldn't help but continue to gawk at them. He had seem Quarians before on the Extranet, but never in person. They seemed so much more... Exotic. He wanted to talk to them. But he had a job to do, so he fought the urge to chase them down and went to the location where their luggage was. It wasn't any easier not to get distracted once he was there however, as he than saw an entire gamut of alien races. Turians, krograns, more quarians, other humans, Asari, salarians, just to name a few that he saw. They were all talking and going about their business as if it wasn't impressive seeing them all together like this. Like a complete dork Donny looked at each of their faces as he walked on by. Some even gave him a strange look. He eventually bumped into a rather large and intimating krogan (though up close they are all large and intimating compared to Donny). "O-oh, sorry, I'll just be going now..." Donny slunk away before the krogan could see him and made a beeline strait towards where his luggage should be.

Collecting the bags into trollies Donny now needed to take them to their rooms. It was simply an empty office space with some accommodations, though obviously Eleanore was going to get something more upscale that wasn't even in the same room. It was fine with Donny though. He was still in shock over seeing all those aliens to care much about the fact he was going to sleep on a cot. It took him some time to find his room which he only managed to do when he ran into one of his fellow soldiers, who himself was tasked with finding the room and preparing it for the soldiers. Donny followed him and helped him set up, and he helped Donny put the luggage away. Working together they made quick work of their duties but also found out that something went wrong. One of the bags seemed to have accidentally been torn open. Donny realized it was his bag. He checked it for belongings and found that most of his clothes were still in there. But something more important was gone. Something that he did not dare allow out of his bag for how embarrassing it was if the others knew about it. He set his bag down and left the room to go search for this object, hoping to god that no one has picked it up and taken it.

Donny needed to go find his baby blanket.

[cqbexpt]

Tacticus felt his back and head fringes hit the inner wall of the shuttle. He let out a gasp and threw his hand behind his head to rub his back. For a moment he was dazed but he quickly heard laughing coming from various places in the hull of the shuttle. There were 8 Turians around him and across from him all in various degrees of laughter. Including the delegate they were supposed to protect. Seven of the Turians were in blue on black schemed suits of armor and the one that wasn't was wearing formal ware it was blue on a majority of white, this was the diplomat. The rest of the Turians dressed like Cactus, his Cabal. Well, they were more like Big brothers and sisters than teammates. Being the last guy to join the team even if it was one year ago, made him the rookie and little brother. Which led Tacticus to believe they were the colprets behind his sudden awakening, that and the laughing. "You are all assholes." Tacticus said suppressing a smile.

Through half a laugh one of the Turian females named Sura quickly responded through her own laughter. "Sorry about that Cactus, had to wake you up somehow! We're almost to the "station"." This lead him to believe she had pushed him into the wall with her telekinetic biotics. She always loved using that and keeping a "Final solution" grenade on her to mess with him. Rubbing the back of his head Tacticus began straining to remember the dream he was having before he was so rudely awaken. It was especially strange given that he saw his grandmother there. But the other things that didn't make sense like the "breach" and the human.......the human. Why was there a human in his dream? Then the inevitable moment when the previous nights dreams began to slip away back into the darkness from which they originated came. He started losing pieces here and there the more he thought about it until it was all but gone. But he managed to hold on to one thing, the human's face. He was atleast pretty sure he had never seen that face before so it puzzled him. The laughing began subsiding as the pilot said over the intercom that they were only about a minute out. "Alright everyone remember the core four will stay near our diplomat friend here and everyone else is to fan out and keep an eye on the whole affair. Keep your earpieces in just in case we need to switch out guards. Any questions?" Sura said quite sternly compared to her previous laughter.

"Yeah, what if Cactus goes to sleep again?" One of the other Turains at the back of the shuttle said. This garnered another set of laughter albeit more stifled this time. The shuttle slid up to the station without much fan fair. When the door popped out with a hiss and slid off to the side the Turians adopted a four man in front four man in back with the diplomat in the middle as they exited the shuttle. Tacticus ended up at the back of the formation as they began to navigate the hallways of the once freighter. The group then began breaking off into various hallways as it moved towards the room most of the delegates were already in. The idea was that no one would know exactly how many cablists were on the station for a variety of reasons and only one of which was tactical. When it was his turn he was the last to leave as the core team consisted of the team's veterans. He ducked off into a hallway just before the main room was visible. As he walked down the rather spacious corridors that was probably used to move cargo through at some point he realized that he was actually for the most part on his own for once. It had been years since he had been this alone. The suddenness of this was not lost on him as he became crippled by the fear of freedom. Everything he did day in day out was planned for the most part to the T. The only place he had any real choices had been in tactical exercises and even there one choice was usually preferred out of the infinite other possibilities.

His earpiece suddenly came to life for the first time since they did comms check back on the shuttle earlier. "Alright everyone, keep a reasonable distance from the main room our diplomat is in and pray to the spirit we don't have to do anything. Have fun kids." Tactius could almost feel the sarcasm hitting him in the head like a rifle butt in that last sentence. It was at that moment that he realized he really had to take a leak. Instilled with a sense of purpose Tacticus filled himself with determination to find a restroom.

[EliteCommander]

Since there was still over two hours remaining until the scheduled start of the meeting, and Avatar’s attempts at speaking with anyone local had been unsuccessful, it remained with Voira, Raa, and RK. The group wandered for thirteen minutes before stopping in an area designated as the lounge, on the same deck as the airlocks through which they arrived. It had an arrangement of aged furniture, holographic screens projected on the walls, computer terminals which were entirely unused, and a self-serve bar containing food and drink. Many of the Citadel representatives and their security details were waiting in this location, conversing among one another about the upcoming meeting. In addition to Quarian, Turian, and Human representatives, the Council had sent a few Asari and Salarian representatives to aid in negotiations. Volus business interests were also present, though they had not sent a diplomat.

Among the crowd at the lounge, Avatar saw only one group which it could not identify as a part of the Citadel delegation: two Turians, a Batarian, a Human, and an Asari. All but the Asari were in full combat armor that, unlike the group of Turians it had encountered before, was entirely uniform in model and design. Their armor was more modern than the previous group, and was all black with red accents. The violet-skinned Asari also wore combat armor, but it lacked a helmet and had a different aesthetic design. It was notably older than the other sets of armor, but with visible non-standard additions. It was primarily blue with white accents, and possessed hand-painted red designs on the chestplate similar to the white markings on her own face.

For approximately twenty-two minutes, the group stood by, silently watching the members of the Council delegation until the Asari seemed to receive a communication through her earpiece. Not many were actually paying attention to her, but Avatar could detect her response, even through the noise of the crowd.

“Wait, what? No, they are way too early. Just…I’ll deal with him later, let’s just get this going.” The Asari said before quickly prompting the rest of her group to follow her out of the lounge. Only a minute and forty-five seconds later, a Turian spoke up over the intercom system.

Attention: due to time constraints, the meeting will begin in twenty minutes, in the previously designated area. Please make your way to the main chamber now.

The announcement sparked a brief moment of heightened conversation from the crowd. From the conversations it could pick out, Avatar noticed that many of the representatives found the sudden change of schedule odd, or even rude, but nevertheless, they all started heading in the direction of the elevators after a few moments. Both Avatar and Raa would be needed at the meeting as well, but for a few brief moments, Avatar stood silent, running calculations based on the new data.

[Fallenreaper]

For the next half an hour, Raa felt the safest and calm. The three were wandering the vast station, barely noting the absence of fellow inhabitants while Raa shot Avatar with question after question. Each one was considered personal in nature by many organics but Avatar didn’t seem to mind in the least, a matter that pleased her greatly. Many would’ve found her topics pointless to discuss with a machine, a viewpoint still shared by many alien species, save the Quarians. In their eyes she would’ve been wasting her breath until they knew the deeper reason for it. Something that Voira knew well since their time together that, in truth, Raa was curious about Avatar. If he was like the Geth back on Rannoch or if he, like a few sparse ones, have become more independent.

With each no data learned, Raa began to draw her own conclusions. A matter that ended when they arrived at the lounge, filled with diplomates. It was the average setup which didn’t surprise her. Her mask turned to Voira, mostly to be sure the Asari, who had been scanning the hallways in paranoia, was still beside her. Unlike Avatar, Voira had been rather quiet the whole time. Raa had an inkling she knew why.

Before she could say a word, a few late arrivals caught her visor causing her to move. Her path moved her towards to the self serve bar and out of the way, bring her Asari armed guardian with her. Raa glanced briefly at the bar noting the wide food selections presented for the guests. She gingerly picked up a single serving, purified Turian cuisine, then settled in beside Voira. Her fingers held a utensil, picking nervously at it while her face swivel to absorb the room. Turian, Quarian, Humans, Asari and even Salarian representatives all were scattered about, some locked in deep conversation and others merely looking for way to waste away time.

It seemed it wouldn’t be necessary.

Raa’s head lifted from her tray to hear the announcement, her hand immediately placing her food back onto the counter and turned to Voira. “Guess this is it, isn’t it?”

She looked at the Asari, her eyes ignoring the disgruntled crowd, now started to file out, clearing aiming to be among the first to the meeting rather than the last. Raa personally didn’t care while she waited for Voira to lead her out.

[Rtron]

Voira kept quiet while Raa asked Avatar a seemingly unending swarm of personal questions, only half listening. Though the few bits of the conversation she did pick up brought a smile to her face, before it quickly faded away. The incident with the Turians had put her on edge, even more so than her usual watchfulness (though Raa claims it is paranoia). She kept a hand close to one of her pistols, ready to draw and put a barrier over Raa if things turned bad. We’d like to be wrong this time. We really would.She thought to herself as her eyes scanned the area once again, clearly tense. It wouldn’t be the first time she had been wrong, but Voira doubted she was (Granted, she had doubted she was wrong every other time she was merely being overly paranoid).

As they walked into the lounge, Voira noted each and soldier she could see in the room, her eyes lingering on the black and red uniform group. The rest were clearly security for some diplomat or other in the room, but these ones stood out. Not only for the fact that they were watching everyone there seemed to be no one they actually worked for.

She followed Raa to the self serve bar, deciding against getting any food herself. She was still too nervous about the turians and now the new odd group to even fake having an appetite. Still, she smiled fondly at the Quarian when she noted Raa just nervously picking at the food while watching the rest of the room. “Careful. You’re starting to look like us. Next thing you know you’ll start being very watchful too.” Voira muttered with a smile, watching the odd group leave the lounge. Now where would you be going? She wondered, tapping her fingers against the side of her pistol.

Her answer was soon answered, and she stood Raa put her tray down. “Don’t worry.” Voira’s hand gave Raa a hopefully reassuring squeeze on the shoulder. “We’re probably just being overly watchful again, this will all come to nothing, and you can tell us all about how you were right over the next few weeks of working here.” Despite her words, Voira made sure they were the last group to enter the room.

Just in case.

[Lucius Cypher]

Donny looked everywhere, even asked lost-and-found, but could not find his blanket. Or doubt anyone would bother keeping it, but the fact that he hasn't shown up yet since he started looking worried him. Normally he would just let it go, but aside from his knife that blanket was the only thing left he had of home. The thing was about as old as he was. He couldn't imagine losing it here of all places. But soon there was a message over the intercoms about the meeting. It was happening way sooner than Donny was told, which irked him. He was hoping that he'd have more time to search for his blanket but that was going to have to be put on hold. As sentimental as it was his job came first. Letting out a disappointing sigh Donny jogged towards the place where he was suppose to meet up with his group.

Fortunately Donny wasn't the last one up for role call however he was close. His group didn't meet in the main area immediately, rather they got together at their temporary arrangements. Eleanore looked fancier than usual, like a decorated military officer. Seraph was in charge of head counts and by the time she finished there was two people missing. Curios as to why they're waiting, Donny turned to the closets soldier and asked.

"Hey, why the head count? I doubt that all of us are actually going to be present at the meeting, right?"

The soldier he asked, a dark-skinned guy by the name of Aman, whispered back. "Professionalism. It wouldn't look good on our part if we don't come in with our full force, you know? Otherwise the other diplomats might think we can't even take taps after our own. Don't worry though, I know the two guys missing, they're probably just lost looking for the john."

Sure enough three minutes later two more soldiers arrived smelling of scented soap. With everyone accounted for the humans moved towards the main hall in formation. The Vanguards, true to their name, took point. Donny himself felt like he was on the spot despite not being in the lead: A much more formidable fellow took care of that. Donny recognized the guy; he had perfect marks all around during training. A classic "Super Soldier" they say, even has cybernetics attached to him. Alexander "Steak" King; probably the closest guy to being Shepard in the group. He even applied for N7 and succeeded. Though no one knows why he was on the ship if that was the case, or why he was here. Perhaps it was because of his success. Donny felt the sudden urge to shrink. Now that he thought about it, he remembered a lot of these faces. People who's at least had their names marked up for high performances during training, or at least had a colorful past. Donny did his best to keep his chest held high, but he couldn't help but to think that everyone was looking down at him.

Eventually the group arrived to the main area. They were one of the first, as well as the largest. Excluding the ambassador, there were ten of them acting as her personal bodyguard. Two Vanguards, Two Adepts, four Soldiers, one Infiltrator, and an Engineers. Overkill? Likely the intention. Donny himself stood with the other Vanguard and did his best to look proud and imposing. He wasn't sure if he was the only one trying to maintain the act, though at least if he felt like his resolve was wavering he only needed to grip his Grandpa's Knife. Even through his armored glove he could feel the grooves of the handle, the weight of the weapon in his hand. "My grandpa faced off against Reapers. I could handle politicians..." Or so he told himself.

"Also note to self: find my blankie. I'd rather not have it fall into the wrong hands. Oh hey, a geth!"

[cqbexpt]

The door to the restroom slid open as Tacticus stretched out his mandibles and inhaled sharply though his nose hole. He blinked several times in quick succession and felt that he had finally managed to shake the grogginess of being asleep recently. He took a sharp turn right and began walking down yet another corridor in this maze like station. When the intercom sprang to life and informed everyone aboard that the meeting was being moved up Tacticus was startled and even went into the nearest wall with his shoulder just incase it wasn't anything good. But what was actually happening was even weirder. The fact that the time had been moved up was worrying to him. There was no reason atleast that he could see for this sudden decision. His fears were further confirmed when their acting squad leader piped up over the comms."We arn't sure why the time is being moved up and we'll keep you posted on that. In the mean time Cactus and Numso get up to the main hall, the human delegation just walked in with a whole lot more people than I like. Don't be next to the delegate but be near by. Stay safe everyone." The ear piece stopped spewing information and Tacticus began making his way to an elevator.

When he arrived at an elevator there was a armored human wielding an omnitool. He was obviously waiting for the elevator and bobbing his head to some unknown beat. It was clear to Tacticus that this man was station security of some kind though he wondered why he was armed to the teeth.
All the delegates had agreed to certain concessions when attending this meeting, he knew the debate about numbers of security was hotly debated though. He wondered why they would need such armed neutral security, as his understanding was that the delegates were not to bring weapons with their security forces. But now that he thought about it that may have been something Sura would cook up just to make it more fun for the Cabal. Still though....

When the elevator arrived they both stepped into the elevator and apparently were both heading to the same floor. While he was easily a head taller than the human Tacticus couldn't make out what the engineer was doing on his omni-tool. He made note of all the weapons this man had as he walked off the elevator and went the opposite direction of the human. It was apparent that he was doing something not involving the actual meeting, which further fueled Cactus's paranoia. Though at this point Tacticus just hoped he wasn't late for the meeting.

[Sundered Echo]

Zhar stood looking out on the planet below as his ship docked soundlessly with the colonies orbital station. From the bridge viewports the planet had a unique serenity to it, which, though it was present when looking at virtually every garden world in the galaxy, still had a quite relaxing effect.

Zhar’s reverie was interrupted, however, when a message came through the bridge communicator stating that the meeting had been moved forward. A mildly annoyed look crossed Zhar’s massive, scarred face for just a moment at that. He had been looking forward to meeting and getting to know the important people here. Of course he already had some intel on them, not as much as he might’ve had in the old days, before the Reapers perhaps, but there was still nothing quite like talking to someone in person to get their measure. Still, that could always wait until after the meeting. This wasn’t exactly a high stakes meeting after all.

He quickly made his way through his ship, which was almost as large as the station it was docked with. He spared not a thought for his attire, for he was already arrayed in a fine black suit and he had long ago come to terms with his scars. Before the Reapers, he had detested scars and had any he gained surgically repaired. But the scars he bore now, they had come from defending his home, not from a petty merc raid or clan war, but from the greatest threat the galaxy had ever faced. That, in Zhar’s mind, was a worthy for a permanent mark.

Crossing the threshold into the station, he immediately noted that the majority of the crew were Turian or Quarian. He was glad that the Quarians had been able to regain their place in the galaxy, and was particularly happy to help them do so. Turians he respected, not so much for their no nonsense mentality, which usually made them a bore to talk to, but certainly for their successfully executed Meritocracy, which was, in Zhar’s opinion, the best governing method.

It did not take long to reach the meeting room, and with quick glance around he noted several distinct groups of people. The Council was here officially, of course, but there seemed also to be more than just the natives. There was also a geth present, though that was not exactly a rare thing given the now symbiotic relationship the Geth and Quarians seemed to share.

Given the short time available, Zhar decided to just get a drink and wait rather than introduce himself to anyone. He walked to the bar and, after finding the oldest vintage available, poured a slender glass worth of the alcohol.

[EliteCommander]

Avatar, Voira, Raa, and RK were among the last to make their way to the designated chamber for the meeting. For the whole walk to the chamber, Avatar was analyzing every byte of data it could observe that could be related to the locals or their security. The abnormal set of events which had occurred thusfar it had deemed sufficient to warrant heightened precautions.

As they stepped into the chamber, Avatar performed an immediate visual scan of its surroundings. Overall, the council delegation numbered thirty, with half of those present being security personnel. The majority of the security for this meeting had been given by the Human Systems Alliance, though most of the other members of the delegation consisted of other Citadel species. Presently, the local security force was equal in size, but Avatar could not visually locate any of the local negotiators. The chamber itself was notably large; being approximately 2.4 times the size required to accommodate the number of expected participants. Mostly, the area they were in was open, apart from tables, chairs, and a complimentary food and drink vendor. However, there was also a second level to the chamber 3.18 meters above the floor which consisted of a platform that encircled the entire chamber, connected across the middle by three walkways. There was currently no one on the second level, though Avatar could see doors leading to the level above them from outside of the chamber.

Just as Avatar was about to attempt to locate the lead Quarian diplomat, it, and everyone else from the Council delegation, received a priority communication for the Turian cruiser, Invector, the primary escort for the colony ships. However, before anything could be said, the channel was suddenly closed. Immediately, Avatar attempted to re-open a channel with the cruiser, with no results. "Attempting communications with Turian vessel...3,687 attempts failed...5,882 failed attempts with all allied vessels. Testing internal radio communications..." Avatar began, pausing for only an instant as it sent a communication query to RK in order to confirm that the radio was functioning within the station. When it succeeded, Avatar concluded that all attempts at communication outside the station were being blocked, but radio signals could still be sent and received within the station. This was ideal for coordinating an ambush. "...successful. Probability of intentional communications disruption: 92%." Avatar warned.

At the same time, many of the local security personnel in the room noticed the confused reactions of the Citadel delegation after the incoming communication was suddenly cut short. The Turian guard to the right of the door nearest to Avatar shifted uncomfortably as he brought his hand up to his earpiece. "Ma'am, we need to do this now. Yes, I'm sure."

After only a few moments, the local guards started rushing to the doors they were guarding, locking them down. Judging hostile intent to be likely, Avatar reacted quickly. As the Turian was about to reach the console next to the door, Avatar used its omni-tool to initiate an overload on the guard's shields, sending out a burst of electricity that immediately drained his shields and stunned him momentarily. Before he could recover, Avatar rushed him, delivering a heavy blow to his head in order to incapacitate or kill him. Without knowing the specifications of his helmet, Avatar could not estimate his chance of survival, but given the force delivered by its powerful synthetic muscles, internal hemorrhaging and fractures of the skull were likely.

"Alert: immediate retreat recommended." Avatar announced to its allies as it grabbed the shotgun which the Turian had been holding. The local guards had their weapons trained on the crowd, shouting at them not to move. Some of the Council representatives were attempting to escape, but most, especially those too far from the one remaining exit, were too afraid to move. The representatives' security too had their weapons on the local guards, but given that the room was open, with little cover, heavy casualties could be expected on both sides once they opened fire. On the second floor above them, Avatar could detect the sound of doors opening. If the locals had indeed intended an ambush, it was likely that more enemy reinforcements were incoming.

[Rtron]

Voira scanned the room as they entered, noting the position of each of the local guards, the security of the representatives, and the layout of the room. It was open. Far to open for her liking. It'd make a good killing ground if someone would just put shooters on the upper balconies. She kept the three of them near a door, ready to make a quick exit if things went south. Her eyes briefly lingered on the Human delegation, noting how many security personnel they had brought. Clearly, someone wants to intimidate the other delegates. She thought, briefly smirking before going back to scanning the room, fingers tapping on her pistol again. Voira was eager for the meeting to begin, and to show that everything was perfectly normal.

Then of course, all the citadel delegates, including Avatar, began acting confused.

Voira's eyes snapped to Avatar as it began to speak, followed quickly by the Turian. What she heard she didn't like. "Shit." The Asari muttered under her breath, stepping closer to Raa, putting barrier over the Quarian again. "Be ready to move." She drew her Razer pistol, ready for whatever was coming, just as the guards began to move to secure the exits and try gain control of the crowd. Which failed, as all the security personnel drew their own weapons and pointed them at the guards. For a few moments, it was a tense situation that was ready to explode at any moment. Then Geth took one down quickly enough, but not quietly enough. The other guards noticed the commotion and then the gunfire started. Focused mainly on the soldiers of the representatives, some fire entering the crowd. Mass panic and chaos ensued, something Voira was shamelessly happy to use to their advantage. Bullets whizzed by, some pinging off of her shield, far too close to Raa for Voira's comfort. "We're leaving!" She snapped, grabbing Raa and pushing her out of the door as the rest of the crowd began to run towards the open exit. In a few more strides she picked the Quarian up and was pushing her ahead of her again. "Run! Run damn you!"

She didn't know what the local guards were trying to do, and she didn't care. Right now, all she cared about was getting Raa to safety. A nearby door caught her eye and she yanked the Quarian towards it, slamming her pistol butt against the button and then shoving Raa roughly inside. Voira ran in herself, slamming the door shut again. She took two quick steps and then was on her knees in front of Raa, trusting that the guards will be too busy to follow, one hand near her pistol.

"Look at us. Are you hurt? Did the bastards get you?"

[Fallenreaper]

Though the room felt vast and large, the crowd number made Raa feel like it wasn't big enough. Her small body kept tightly to Voira while her face scanned the crowds for a familiar sight, namely someone she knew, and found herself disappointed when she failed. This fact coupled with earlier events had made her rather edgy now causing RK's voice to hack into the headphones and spark conversation.

To everyone looking her direction, Raa looked like she was carrying a conversation with herself. It was something abnormal and strange, that is until they took in account her AI and its abilities. Then it would all make sense, including the worrisome looks casted her way during her ignorance.

Both Avatar and Voira were on high alert since the strange Turians, a matter Raa, personally, rather much forget. Ignoring the tension of her companions, she absorbed the scenery. There wa sparse decoration as the room took on a more business manner with tables lined up beside each other and by chairs tucked into each side, allowing some of the delegates to already take a seat. The meeting looked like it would get underway anytime as Raa started to left Voira’s side for her own seat, her mind a swirling bunch of nerves, before she stopped dead in her tracks. A message started to come over her communications only to be cut off in its infancy making her unsettled, her eyes widened in surprise and hand came over her helmet side. RK had picked up on the glitch and already proceeded to scan the result. Her program busy trying to reestablish communications, reroute the data and scrub the earlier opening of the channel to determine issues. RK idly listened to the Geth rattle off his progress while he paused, his query about the radio received and returned with an affirmation that the radios were still up yet not broadcasting beyond the station itself. Something unnatural unless… it was by designed.

“RK, what’s going on?” Raa asked, her voice starting to begin to worry and fret, her hand still held over her interface. She noticed she wasn’t the only one that was unsettled about the silent transmission. Raa sense, more than saw, Voira pull in beside her causing her head to twist about to watch the older Asari. A blue, translucent shielding came up between her and the others before fading, the only indication it was there was the hairs rising on the back of her neck. For a moment her breath sucked in deeply, holding in her chest, her body frozen in place at noting Voira’s earlier curse. Raa knew this wasn’t going to be good.

The delegates were left still mumbling, their voices becoming quite disquiet, before the local security started to stir. Their figures reaching to lock the doors, imprisoning them into one room as Raa’s breath stilled within her environmental suit. It all happened rather quickly. First moment the guard nearest was about to bend over and input data to seal them in, next instant there was a loud buzzing followed by sparks and Avatar took him down with a smack to the skull back. The Turian crumbled like wet paper as the humans phrased it, leaving the door wide open. Raa flinched at the scene, her hands curled up protectively over her heart. This couldn’t be happening. Not here or not, she thought with fear rippling through her mind.

All hell broke loose.

Several bullets flow towards the Geth’s direction, their guns opened fire, as Raa gasped in panic. Her body made to duck and protect herself only to be jerked by Voira’s hand gripping her arm. Her body was shoved forward, her body crashing into the far wall when the rest of the crowd stampeded through. Legs wobbled and shook when she tried to stand, only to get pushed and shoved back down to be trampled underneath many feet. She felt her body once again pulled upright, her legs wobbly and shaken, barely able to support herself, as she was shoved down the hallway. Raa could hear the screaming, gun shot, and sounds of botics in the room behind them.

Raa was so focus on running she was far less observant of her surroundings, so when Voira tugged her towards another direction she slammed right into the Asari. Voira barely seemed to have noticed as the asari pushed her inside quickly. It was then, her legs, jello now regardless of the strength they had earlier, chose to crumble from under her. She collapsed onto her knees and started to shake, her arms holding herself to make it stop. Raa’s head jerked upright when she heard Voira’s boots step closer. The bright eyes studied her all over, likely seeking signs of injury, while her words echoed through Raa’s mind.

The quarian shook her head. “No, I’m fine. Just bruised and banged up, nothing ba-”

Her words stopped when she spotted the thin, purple line that leaked over her suit. Raa stared while trying to registered the reason. Realization hit her like a bolt causing her jerk, her hands unwrapped herself and her eyes examined the wound. “Voira you’ve been shot! Are you alright?!?”

[EliteCommander]

It did not require a detailed observation for Avatar to determine that the situation was not tactically favorable. The gunfire began 2.38 seconds after the first of its allies fled through the open door, and casualties were immediate. Three of the Turian representatives who had been relatively close to the door had started to run as soon as they were warned, but two of them were shot in the back before they could make it through the door.

By this point, Avatar had secured the shotgun from the guard it had incapacitated, so it returned fire on the group of two Turians and a Batarian who were focusing most prominently on the fleeing dignitaries. As it was a semi-automatic shotgun, Avatar was able to fire two shots before they could react. Unfortunately, at the current range, the first shot was not sufficient to deplete its target’s shields, so most of the pellets impacted the shield, and the remaining ones which penetrated did not produce a fatal wound. Regardless, the incoming fire was enough that the Batarian and the wounded Turian moved to spread out, though they had no cover which to move to. Meanwhile, the other Turian’s omni-tool activated, delivering an overload attack to Avatar. Its shields were more robust than the Turian it had stunned with a similar attack, so its mobile platform remained undamaged, but its shields were entirely depleted.

Avatar fired another shot for the purpose of suppression before quickly falling back through the door. However, instead of retreating completely, it made use of one of the only cover positions available by hiding behind the metal frame on the right side of the door. It had to take a few moments to allow its shields to recover, during which time the battle within only grew more chaotic. Several of the enemy guards in the middle of the room had formed a wedge between the allied force, forcing half of the Citadel representatives to trap themselves in a corner on the opposite side of the room. On the far side of the room, two of the Quarian representatives had been grabbed by a group enemies and were being held with weapons to their head. The Alliance soldiers nearest to them were unable to fire without hitting them, and while even Avatar could not hear what was being said over the gunfire elsewhere in the room, there was a strong probability that they were demanding surrender in exchange for letting them live. Though, in the rest of the soldiers in the room were simply engaged in direct firefights.

Had the situation remained constant, allied forces would have had an approximately 70% chance of victory, given their superior training and equipment, but on the second level of the room, enemy reinforcements quickly moved in. From all sides, they started to fire down from above, quickly turning the favor of the battle in their direction. They focused on soldiers first, though some fired at diplomats trying to flee. Avatar set out a combat drone to harass hostiles on the second floor and fired on those trying to block escape, but the enemy’s numbers were now too great for victory to be a reasonable possibility. Retreat was the only option with a potentially favorable outcome.

[cqbexpt]

Dong & Cactus

Donny looked around the hall nervously. It seemed like everyone else had no idea what was going on. He looked back at Eleanore who seemed calm, but was furiously swiping at her datapad. Without thinking he called out to her. "Ambassador, are we too early?" She looked up at down and scowled. Looking back down she shut down her datapad and put it into her purse. "Yes we are. We should-" That's when one of the soldiers gasped. The geth just smashed the head of a turian.

Shit hit the fan pretty fast after that. Almost immediately after the Geth attacked each of the bodyguards drew their guns and formed a protective wall around the ambassador with their bodies. They aimed their weapons at the other guards, largely turian, uncertain of what to do. But they had one objective, and they were going to carry it out: Protect the ambassador. Alexander took charge almost immediately. "Dong, Briar, Scope, with me. The rest of you take the Abasador somewhere safe. That geth opened up the only exit, go now!"

Training kicked in immediately for the others. Donny, Rosemary, and Aman were going to be with Alexander "Steak", and immediately they started shooting at the potential hostiles to cover the escape of Eleanore and the others. The two adepts formed a biotic barrier to cover the door, sustaining it only long enough to get everyone out. Everyone except Alexander and his crew. It seemed like they were going to stay and fight. "Move! Activate shields and use suppressing fire!" And suppressing fire is exactly what Rosemary offered. kicking into an adrenaline rush she whipped out her personal firearm, the M-96 Mattock. Donny never saw a bullet spitter like that before, and just a brief moment he thought Rosemary was a gun turret. She alone laid enough suppressing fire to cause everyone on the ground floor, including Donny, Alexander, and Aman, to get low to the ground. Aman took the opportunity to take out his rifle, the M-97 Viper, and took pot shots at the turian guards who didn't try to immediately take cover.

That's when Alexander snapped Donny back to reality with an order. "Dong, with me! We can't let them ease up for a moment!" Alexander was practically halfway across the room mid charge when Donny activated his own right behind him, tampling anything that Alexander missed. This was a mess and he didn't know how long they were going to last before they'd get peppered by bullets. On the bright side the ambasador was at least out of here.

"CONTACTS!" Sura yelled over the comms and into the room aswell. She was with two others next to the diplomat when the weapons fire began erupting all over the room as the Humans drew their weapons. He heard biotics begin to be tossed around the room by his allies and whatever the hell the enemies were. A massive biotic bubble popped up around the diplomat they were protecting supposed to be protecting. Sura and the other two were pressed close against diplomat shielding him with both biotics and their bodies. They began moving towards the door as the crowd in the room began running or attempting to take cover on the floor.

Tacticus threw a weak biotic barrier over himself and pushed a human in front of him forcefully to the ground with his left hand and drew his Ursus pistol from his plain clothes holster. Rounds began whizzing past him as he attempted to shoot at what appeared to be an Asari firing at the crowd. Unsure if any of his rounds were even hitting quickly turned his head to see that the bubble was moving for the one exit in the room. He turned his head back to the Asari who was moving towards the door and still firing pot shots into the crowd. Tacticus let biotic energy flow freely through his body and decreased his mass significantly. He catapulted himself bioticly at the Asari and flew across the room and delivered a punch to her head. The blow landed but barely broke her barriers and hit her open faced helmet only hard enough to dent it slightly. She swung her rifle around before Cactus could fully recover from the large expenditure of energy and hit him with the butt of the rifle in his shoulder.

Her retaliatory strike was luckily off hand and only really served to push Tacticus away from herself. Being pushed off balance by the strike and out of arms reach, he threw more biotic energy into his right leg and brought it around for a kick. Using her own biotics the Asari deflected his leg away from herself with her forearm. Realizing his kick was a failed endevour Tacticus put the remainder of his energy into one final punch with his pistol wielding hand downward onto the hunched over Asari's back. Finally connecting a punch he brought down enough force to put the Asari into the floor and breaking her shoulder and back armor. He began pulling the trigger on his heavy pistol as fast as he could possibly manage before a force knocked him off. It sent him flying and several feet away from the Asari and onto to the floor back first. He arched his back in pain for a moment on the ground before he heard someone yell over the comms at him.

"CACTUS! Get your ass to the door now! We are leaving! Everyone regroup at the elevators and we'll figure a way off this dump!" Holding his back for a moment Tacticus scrambled to his feet and exhausted began sprinting to the open door barely holding onto his pistol. Several rounds whizzed by him and a few even impacted his barrier and dropped it for a moment. Without his barrier he was rather vulnerable so he dove for the ground for the last few feet to the door. Pushing himself just a little to make it all the way to the door where most of the crowd was now running through or atleast attempting as they were being picked off. When he came to the edge of the door he grabbed it and threw himself with his remaining momentum up to the inside of the large door. Where he began taking pot shots back out at the betrayers.

The room was getting cleared of both enemies and bystandards. Though frankly with all the chaos going on, it was hard to figure out who was an enemy or who was a bystandard. The best they could guess was that anyone protecting a diplomat probally wasn't their enemy, but they could be like Dong and his ground and purposely left their diplomat in the hands of others to fend off these attackers. All in all, there was some miscommunication somewhere down the line.

Fortunately Dong's group was doing rather well for themselves. Rosemary provided substantial covering fire allowing less bullets being fired at Dong and Alexander, who put on pressure on individual hostiles. Aman picked off targets, but noticed movement topside. "Enemy reinforcements!" Alexander took notice as well, tapping Dong's shoulder. He motioned with one hand towards the door and tried to shout over the gun fire. "Dong, to the door!" Alexander pulled out his assault rifle, firing into a group of hostiles. He didn't intend to hit them, just get them to duck and cover. Dong took the opportunity to make a biotic charge strait towards the door, bowling over anyone unfortunate enough not to stand clear. He at least cut a path for Rosemary and Aman who followed him, shortly by Alexander bleeding from the mouth. Dong looked over to him and noticed a bloody wound on his abdomen.

"Steak! You're injuried!"

"Yeah, but I'll be fine. Let's keep moving, we got to find the ambassador."

That's when Dong and his group noticed a group of turians before them. Uncertain of their loyalty the group aimed their weapons at the turians, but Donny noticed something. Or someone. Someone familiar.

Tacticus felt warm blood spray into his face as one of the other several dozen Turian civilians in the room was shot and killed right in front of him. Tacticus almost fell over as the body slumped over into him. He quickly grabbed the body and threw it to the side of the door and out of the way of the running crowd. For a second he wondered who that was, but that was quickly pressed out of his mind as he ducked from several more rounds impacting next to him in the door.

When he popped his head back out he saw one of his squad mates blink into exsistance right in front of him and then also fall over and slide past him. He didn't hear him get up but he decided to keep firing and handle it in a minute. That was when he saw the face. The human from the dream. The one thing Tacticus had held onto from that dream and there it was, 20 meters in front of him running at him... weapon raised. The comm sprang to life with more activity this time it was Sura. "We got several Humans running at the door! Their inbetween the non-co's, hit em if you can!"

Tacticus immediately pressed his left hand to his throat and said. "Don't fire! Their part of the Human delegation!" He then moved his hand down and yelled at the approaching weapon wielding humans. "Don't fire we're friendly!"

Donny spoke out before his team could open fire. "Don't shoot them! They're not the enemy!" Donny emphasized this by lowing his own gun, turning his back on the turians to stand before his team. A risky move, but he had a... A gut feeling this was the right one. Alexander lowered his gun slowly, followed by Aman, and lastly Rosemary. They still kept their fingers near the trigger, ready for any violence. "I hope you're right Dong. We can't afford to lose anyone in this mission, more so since this was a trap." Alexander said matter-of-factly. Rosemary glared at the turians, almost as if she was shooting them with her eyes. "How can you trust them?! It's their people who fired on us first!"

Donny raised his hands defensively. He honestly had no real justification for why he did what he did. "Because I saw him in my dreams" was hardly a reasonable answer. But the fact he wasn't shot in the back at least proved that they weren't after the humans. "Briar, we can't risk making an enemy out of everyone on the ship because we lack intel. I want to know who our enemy is too, but I can't just go and assume every turian is the bad guy! Let's just find Eleanore and figure out how to get out of here before the entire firing squad shows up!"

That's when Alexander stepped in. "Hold on. Dong you're right that we lack intel. But we can't just stay with Eleanore and hope that the others would communicate with us. I want you to stay with the Turians for now, and feed us any information you can find out about this attack." Alexander then turned to the turians, his weapon now pointed towards the ground and his fringer away from the trigger. "I'm willing to take in and protect one of your men as well for the purpose of intek, if you'll allow one of my soldiers to accompany you. This way we can at least minimize friendly fire accidents."

Dong couldn't beleive he was getting volunteered to go with the turians. Sure he knew at least these guys weren't his enemies, but now he's being traded over with them? Not exactly his idea of a fun time. But now wasn't the time to make complaints. He had a vital role to fulfill and he was going to do his job. "Yes sir. But Steak, make sure you get that wound checked out." Donny turned to the turians, taking a deep breath, and took a step forward.

"Donny Yang, callsign Dong. Pleased to meet you. I promise I won't be a burden."

"Good to meet you! We don't really have time for pleasantries here." Sura yelled irritated with this whole situation. Flaring her nostrils and mandibles she yelled over the comms again over the gun fire. "Ruvea, you're gonna be with the Humans till we get out of this death trap! Keep us in the loop so we can avoid killing each other!" She quickly ran up behind Tacticus as weapons fire began to come down at an angle from above. "Hope you're right Cactus." She said then leaning out of cover and throwing a bubble of bitoic energy back out at the attackers.

As Sura slipped back towards the diplomats Cactus felt a wave of chills run down his spine as he realized how much trust Sura was putting in him. Then another voice called over the comms "Get everyone in I found a way to shut the door!" Tacticus looked across to the other side of the door where one of his brothers had ripped a panel off a wall and had his omni-tool activated.

"Everyone get in we're leaving!" Tacticus called out towards the few still running for the door. He leaned out of cover squeezing off several more rounds into a Human with tech armor. His few pistol rounds most likely making nare a dent in his shielding.

[EliteCommander]

The estimated duration of the fight was extended by the use of biotics on both sides, as they were able to create biotic barriers to serve as cover in the largely open room. However, once hostiles engaged from the second level, the situation deteriorated rapidly. The allied soldiers on the far side of the room, unable to maneuver or escape, were being cut down from above. The diplomats who were too far from the door were mostly unprotected, though the enemy seemed to be attempting to capture, rather than kill them. Those closer to the door were also being targeted, though they had a greater chance of escape.

Avatar maintained suppressing fire as much as possible, along with a Turian who had taken cover on the opposite side of the door. However, after only a few moments, another, recognizably different group of five hostiles arrived on the second floor, opposite from the exit. Unlike most of the hostiles, they were uniformed, and filed into the room with much more coordinated precision than the local guards. At their head was the Asari Avatar saw in the lounge, who quickly instructed her soldiers to take up positions along the railings. Unlike the other local guards, who were acting without apparent central organization, the Asari’s team waited for her order, which came only an instant later.

“Lock it down!” The Asari shouted, her gaze fixed on the open door. Avatar directed its combat drone to harass the leader and, at the same time, opened fire with its shotgun. The range at which it was engaging did diminish the effective impact of the shotgun blasts by approximately 23%, but even so, it detected less instability in her barriers than it would have expected. As well, she spotted the holographic orb immediately and dispatched it with a brief blast of biotic energy, before it could enter the range of its primary attack.

The Asari’s soldiers were coordinated in their attack. As Avatar focused on their leader, the Batarian to her left fired a single shot from a high-powered rifle which found its mark on Avatar’s shields and depleted them immediately. The Geth was already ducking back into its cover position, but the Turian on the Asari’s right side had been ready to exploit the opportunity. He carried a semi-automatic marksman rifle, the first shot of which hit Avatar’s left side in a spot analogous to the abdomen. The round punched a hole roughly six centimeters in diameter through its platform, causing a momentary loss of power to its left leg that threw it off balance. It began to fall, but fortunately, its momentum caused it to fall back into cover.

Avatar’s damage control efforts were immediate. It rerouted power around the damaged area through secondary circuits to regain control of its leg, then isolated and cut off the damaged tubes which were leaking conductive fluid out of the breach. Its self-repair systems also went into effect, though it could not fully-repair the hole without doing so manually. Avatar was again in full-control of its platform by the time it hit the ground, and it was well within acceptable operational capacity, but for any allied forces or noncombatants to survive, the door would need to be locked down quickly.

[Sundered Echo]

The moment the shooting started, Khel Zhar raised his omni tool and activated the shield boost program. Though his suits built in shields were quite powerful, being the only Krogan in his room would mean drawing a lot of fire (despite his reputation as generally being a non combatant). With that done, he spotted the nearest exit and broke into a lumbering run. It was no Battlemaster charge, but it was certainly not something any non-krogan would want to be in the path of... As a hapless Turian shooter discovered when he failed to get out of the way fast enough. Zhar lowered his shoulder and barged the man out of the way. The sound of armor buckling could be heard as he struck and when the man flew backwards and sideways out of the way, several bones could be heard snapping. He certainly wouldn’t be getting up.

Still, a lot of fire had been impacting on Zhar’s shield, and he knew it couldn’t last much longer. The door was close, but before he got to it, he ducked behind the nearest corner large enough to mostly conceal his bulk. He stood still for a few seconds, taking the time to mentally curse not remaining primarily in the information business. He would never have walked into this kind of trap one hundred years ago. But this was the price one paid for trying to help the galaxy. He checked his omni tool then, noting that his shields were at ninety percent now. Good enough. He peered out of cover with one eye, aiming his omni tool as he did so. Fire had mostly shifted onto the remaining uncovered targets, but a few rounds bounced off the wall next to him and his shield. He quickly spotted the shooter and hit him with an energy drain, siphoning the power straight to his own shields, temporarily overcharging them.

He then began moving as quickly as possible to the door. From there, he would head to where his ship was docked and get out of the system. He had a feeling this was all going to go downhill very quickly. He did not flee completely on reaching the door however. Taking cover by it, he triggered his omni tool’s minifacturing suite, ordering it to build a recon mine. A second later, it was ready, and he carefully aimed the tools launcher to land the mine behind a cluster of enemy troops. He detonated the weapon as soon as it was in place, the shaped charge wreaking havoc among the hostile forces. Moments after this, he had triggered tactical scan to make sure he wasn’t flanked, before proceeding to look for a way out of this mess.

[EliteCommander]

Avatar and Cactus

---

The last of those who were close to the door had fled, but over half of the diplomats were either dead or cut off from the exit, and the allied soldiers had fared no better. One of the Turians, who Avatar identified as a cabalist based on his use of biotic barriers, was attempting to interface with the door controls, presumably to lock down the exit. Avatar considered this to be inadvisable, considering that he was entirely exposed to enemy fire, especially from the second level. However, organics were prone to making rash decisions when placed in stressful situations.

As expected, now that there were few targets returning fire, the hostile team lead by the Asari shifted their focus to the cabalist. His barriers were depleted quickly by automatic fire from an assault rifle, followed by two shots to his back from a designated marksman rifle. His armor provided some protection, but the rifle was sufficiently high-powered to allow both shots penetrated into his body. Since Avatar was in cover on the opposite side of the same wall, it was in a position to attempt to render aid. Leaning out of cover, Avatar launched an incineration orb, but programmed it to detonate prematurely in mid-air to provide a momentary visual obstruction. At the same time, it reached through the open doorway and grabbed onto the cabalist's arm in an attempt to pull him to safety. He had fallen to the ground after being shot, and presently, Avatar did not possess enough data to determine if he had survived.

Tacticus hugging the doorway continued to fire out at the locals. There were so many bodies on the floor that he could see in the edges of his vision. It was just them and the ones that wanted to kill them now. He picked out a Human that was running at them with a shotgun and quickly began unloading into the charging attacker. He noticed he had adjusted all shielding to be forward facing as was evident from the massive blob of holographic orange that was in front of his body. The assailant now entered range and started firing and cocking back as fast as he could. Tacticus managed to fire six rounds all impacting in the chest before he was forced back into cover when his biotic barrier dropped.

He quickly managed to get another barrier up and continue firing. When he turned back out several machine pistol rounds were impacting into his chest which Tacticus then quickly added his own pistol too. The combined fire quickly dropped his barriers and he took several rounds before tripping into the pile of bodies. More rounds narrowly missed Tacticus and a few even hit the small of his forearm once again dropping his barrier. As he squeezed back into his crouching against the wall he looked over to his right where a Geth was now occupying the other cover. But there was something else, Sul on the ground next to him face down behind cover. Cactus quickly fumbled for his comms and called out. "Sul is down, Poria pull him out! We need a new exit plan, there is no way we're closing this door from here!"

Just then Sul started sliding back as blue tendril of energy grabbed onto him and began sliding him across the floor further into the corridor. Slightly panicked he looked over at the Geth. "Wouldn't happen to have any ideas would you?"

There was no audible response from Avatar. Instead, it went about immediately implementing a potential solution to the problem. There were still allies present in the room, but based on available data, the probability of successfully extracting them was negligible. However, locking the door now would improve the probability of survival for those who had already escaped.

Avatar shifted its shotgun to its left hand, then leaned around the corner and fired two shots into the door's control panel inside the room before quickly ducking back into cover. It was only exposed for 3.28 seconds, so its shields protected it from the few assault rifle rounds it had recieved. With the enemy's ability to interface with the door controls temporarily removed, Avatar simply pressed the button on their side of the door to close it normally. It was not locked down entirely, so it would not be difficult for the enemy to bypass the control console in order to open it, but that option would be more time consuming than taking an alternate path around the door, through a different hallway.

Those who had managed to escape to room had the potential to escape the station, but were still in considerable danger, Now that the door was closed, they needed to act quickly to develop an escape plan, something which Avatar had already dedicated some processes to determining. Firstly, it needed to determine the current state of allied forces, as the presence of wounded would alter how they could move through the station.

"It he alive?" Avatar asked simply to the cabal knelt over the Turian, Sul.

Sul coughed out "I'm go.." Before he started spitting out blood in a coughing spurt.

"Shut up before you hurt yourself more." Sura said as her omni-tool lit up and began applying medi-gel to Sul who had taken a few rounds in the back. While her Omni-tool delivered life saving aid to Sul she looked up at the Geth quickly and Tacticus. "Yeah he'll live, suprised we only took one casualty." Sul groaned as the omni-gel began to seep into his body."Keep your head down till we get out of here, that's an order." After helping Sul against a wall she quickly returned to the Turian and Geth."My name is Sura leader of the cabal on the station. Right now I'm sure as hell hoping there are more of you geth somewhere on the ship. Those locals are much better equiped than us and I assume you know no one can get contact to the outside. Right now though we need to figure out how to get word to the cruiser or we're all dead." Pausing for a second she looked back at all the terrified diplomats and security who had made it through."If you got any better ideas right now...uh geth I'm all ears. But for now I'm going to go and try to convince the humans to help us raid the stations communications room. Surely they wouldn't cut themselves off from the outside atleast completly anyways."

"I am the only Geth program assigned to these negotiations." Avatar answered. "I recommend we gather all surviving officers to develop a plan of escape. There is a 62% chance of hostile forces reaching us withing five minutes, increasing with time. We should act quickly."

With that Sura turned on to her heels and began her search for the Humans commander. Tacticus turned to the Geth. "Thanks for saving Sul back there. I don't know if he would have made it without you dragging his ass in. Oh and I'm Tacticus by the way, do... you have a name?"

"Acknowledged, I am Avatar." It answered as it started to scan the crowd for faces or uniforms that matched the files it had on record for officers.

Nodding to the less than talkative machine he saw the Human that was now attached to his cabal. After shaking off the severe feeling of deja vu he again turned back to the Geth. "We should probably go see what their planning." He said as he gestured with his arm towards Sura and the Human he had seen giving orders earlier, who were now talking.

Avatar joined the growing group of officers and other security personelle who were frantically attempting to create a plan of action. The Cabal, Sura, was suggesting that they search for a communications center, though Avatar did not find this to be the best option. The unarmed diplomats they would be escorting would drastically increase the difficulty of combat, so it calculated that going directly for an escape route would lead to the lowest probability of casualties. However, given how quickly hostiles were likely to arrive, Avatar concluded that it would be advantageous to select agree on a plan quickly, even if it was suboptimal, rather than deliberate for an extended time. It still intended to give its own suggestion, but would not attempt to defend it if there was strong enough opposition.

Activating its omni-tool, Avatar projected the scematics of the stock-variant of this station which it had downloaded earlier into an empty space between the group. "It is improbable that these schematics are entirely accurate since this station has been modified, but they can serve as an approximation for its layout. The presence of noncombatants among us will increase the difficulty of combat, so I recommend finding a mode of escape quickly, instead of pursuing other objectives. Leaving the station will allow us to contact our allies." It suggested.