Mass Effect: Reaper Dreams

The Mouse and the Bear

"If you want to keep a secret, you must also hide it from yourself."

George Orwell

May 23rd, 2187

Susan Rizzi

Miranda didn't exactly walk so much as she slinked through the light gravity, or at least it appeared that way from Susan's perspective. It was exceptionally attractive in a rather disturbing sort of way. Why disturbing? Was it that she'd never looked at a woman that way before, with a touch of lust, or was it simple jealousy? Susan was a mouse, a well-trained, lean, muscular, biotic mouse, but a mouse nonetheless. The lieutenant was the antithesis of everything about Miranda Lawson.

Susan came from a poor family, was never exceptionally good in school, and spent most of her childhood in hospitals. Juvenile pilocytic astrocytoma, a fancy way of saying brain cancer. In her case it had been thrice recurrent. The first time at age five, the second at age nine, and the third time at age fifteen. She'd been cancer free for nine years now, but the ghosts still remained. Occasional dizzy spells, migraines, and most of all, the ever present fear that it might return.

If her hand developed tremors, cancer scare. If she came down with a virus, cancer scare. An ache in her leg, fuzzy vision, cancer scare, cancer scare. She kept it to herself for the most part, but it was maddening. She coped by spending her life over-analyzing every situation. It was painful, often detrimental to her relationships, and certainly an impediment to her career. Fortunately, times being what they were, the alliance was in need of powerful biotics, especially biotics who were seemingly unafraid of death.

How little they knew! Well, she wasn't afraid of death on the battlefield, because there weren't any personnel associations on the battlefield, aside from glory. The ghosts were all in her head, literally, but the battlefield was virgin territory and in that space she was fearless. She felt as if she owned it, that it was her canvas to paint on—in blood and fury.

From the beginning of her military career she was ahead of the curve. Her biotic potential was measured among the highest in her generation. When Susan was a teenager Cerberus made many attempts to recruit her, but the Alliance moved quickly to put a wall around her and place her on the fast track. It was the Alliance who saw to her medical treatment and the welfare of her family, especially after her father died.

Susan was the first of a new breed of biotic soldiers. She'd spent almost her entire military career in the ITC, first at the villa, and then running high risk assignments. She was just wrapping up her Advanced Zero G combat training, the last obstacle for the coveted N7 rank, when the Reapers hit Earth. In the months that followed she'd been deployed to so many battlefields across the galaxy she'd lost count of the systems, let alone the battles.

Now here she was, reassigned to special ops and working with a Cerberus defector. Susan wasn't sure how she felt about Lawson; all the same orders were orders. Her CO, Commander Briggs, told her that the old man wanted her on this. She found it hard to believe that Admiral Hackett even knew who she was, but if Briggs felt it was important enough to invoke the old man, then she'd approach the assignment with due diligence.

She'd only had a few hours to get up to speed on Miranda Lawson, and unfortunately she hadn't gotten deep into the dossier by the time she was deployed on the assignment. Lawson was nothing like the woman described in the reports. She was quiet, reflective, and friendly of all things. She'd greeted Susan with genuine courtesy, if not warmth. All the dossiers had described an ice queen, a ruthless Cerberus bitch who would stop at nothing to achieve her objective. Perhaps the Miranda she had known these past few hours was a guise, an act that concealed what was underneath. All Susan could do was watch and wait.