If It Meant Living: Mass Effect 1

2: Makings

A bead of sweat rolled down her face.  She held for a moment longer, gathering together her biotic energies, and then leaned out around the barricade.  She threw out a singularity directly at the two remaining hostiles.  Unwilling to wait for the gravitational forces to rip their bodies apart, she followed up with a throw and grinned as they crumpled against the opposing wall.

The lights came up and the virtual enemies disappeared.  The lieutenant walked through the double doors.  “Nice job Shepard.  I do believe that’s another record time.  Get cleaned up and meet up in the classroom in twenty.”

Shepard headed for the showers, barely suppressing a smile.  That was fun.  Not as fun as flesh and blood enemies, perhaps, but fun nonetheless.  She wondered if she’d have an opportunity to try to break the record she just set before graduation in two weeks.  If that last group of enemies had just cooperated and clumped up a teensy bit more she could have taken them all out at once and cut at least 10 seconds off her time.

Eighteen minutes later she slid into her seat near the front of the classroom.  “Heard you broke another record in the sim Shepard” Walinsky offered.  “Couldn’t have slacked off just a bit this one time and not made the rest of us look so bad?”

Shepard volunteered her middle finger over her shoulder without turning around.  “It’s what I do, Walinsky.  It’s what I do.”  Several of her classmates chuckled…”Serves you right Walinsky”…”Give it up man…”

Lieutenant Mickelson strode to the front of the room with a stack of envelopes as everyone snapped to attention.  Despite the focus of every student in the room on the envelopes, Mickelson proceeded to set them on the desk and teach for an entire hour on tactical decision making in small squad defensive scenarios.

As the clock at last ticked to the top of the hour he reached for the stack.  “As you know, we’ve got a week more of classes and training, then a week of examinations before graduation.  On the assumption that none of you miscreants will totally fuck up your exams, I have here your initial post assignments upon graduation.”  He handed out the sealed envelopes one by one.  “That will be all.  See you tomorrow.  Shepard, stick around a moment.”

She stood at attention until the classroom emptied.  “Sir?”

“Go ahead and open it.”

She opened the envelope, read for a moment, and failed at suppressing a smile.  “Special Forces?”

“That’s right.  You’ll have six months of the most intense training of your life.  If you don’t die or wash out, you’ll then be assigned to a special unit.  Then your real training will begin.”  He paused a moment.  “I have no doubt you’ll make it.  I can’t show favoritism in here, but you’re one of the most talented, capable students I’ve seen come through the Academy in the ten years I’ve been here.  It won’t be easy; in fact, it’ll be a good deal harder than anything you’ve faced before.  But you’ll do it.”

She reached out to shake his hand.  “Thank you sir.  I’ll try my best to live up to those expectations.”  She saluted, turned, and barely suppressed the urge to skip out of the classroom.

 ____________________________________________________

 A bead of sweat rolled down her face.  She held for a moment longer, gathering together her biotic energies, and then leaned out around the barricade.  She threw out a singularity directly at the two remaining hostiles.  Unwilling to wait for the gravitational forces to rip their bodies apart, she followed up with a throw and grinned as they crumpled against the opposing wall.

Then she grimaced.  She was exhausted, starving, and bleeding.  She glanced back around the barricade to confirm the kills – and it turned out those weren’t the last two hostiles.  She ignored the grumble in her stomach and the gash on her arm and again gathered together her dwindling biotic energies.

She hadn’t really wanted to take shore leave.  She was just starting to settle in with her unit, starting to not feel the rookie outsider in the small group of lethal killing machines.  But Alliance regulations clearly stated that all soldiers must take one week of shore leave per year, subject to emergency and wartime assignments.  So she had packed up her books analyzing the military strategies employed by the Alliance and the Turians in the First Contact War and headed off to Elysium for the week.

But those damn Batarians.

She had been strolling through the outdoor market in the center of town when the ships had blasted down less than half a mile away, blowing up a few buildings on their way down.  She turned and bolted for the local Alliance station she had passed a block earlier.  She burst in to find an officer at the desk and 3 enlisted men playing poker in the corner.

“Sergeant!  Get the weapons locker open NOW!  How many men do you have?”

“Um…six…ma’am?”  The three men in the corner stumbled up to attention.

Well that was just great.  “Get them formed up and armed and meet me at the edge of the market!”

“Um…who are you…ma’am?”

“Lieutenant Shepard.”  She sighed and rubbed the bridge of her nose.  “On shore leave….”  She straightened up and glared at him.  “Now!  Goddamned move!”  Everyone scrambled.

She ran to the weapons locker and started hunting.  Assault rifle…shotgun…Hahne-Kedar pistol - she grabbed it and clipped it to her belt…submachine guns…ahhh, there we go – Kassa Fab Harpoon sniper rifle.  She slung it over her back and ran.

Civilians were running in circles screaming and tripping over one another.  She slipped through them to the edge of the market area and started flipping over fruit carts, clothing stands, anything of substance she could find and began building a makeshift barricade.  The sergeant and his men appeared and she immediately started issuing orders.  Some of the civilians came up and started pitching in.  More than she would have expected – and good on them for that.   In five minutes they had a barricade of reasonable strength and height.  She doubted it would hold, but it was all she had.  In six minutes the first wave of Batarians rounded the corner.

Ten hours later she leaned against the barricade and gathered together her dwindling biotic energies.  Sergeant Bradley had died protecting his men from a grenade.  Four of his six men had later died in various acts of greater and lesser heroism.  Half the civilians that had stayed had died in more ways than she wanted to recall.  They were almost out of ammo.  She had been relying on biotics whenever possible, jealously guarding every sniper rifle bullet for the rare, perfect shots.  But biotics were a tricky thing; she was running out of that ammo too.

Her mind raced – what else could they use as weapons?  She looked around at the ruined remains of the market – was there anything there she could make bombs out of?  Molotov cocktails at least?  The swords from the “ancient weaponry” stand had already been gathered and stacked, waiting for what now seemed inevitable.

She breathed in deeply.  A sword fight would be kind of cool.  She’d had plenty of close-quarters combat training but had never had the opportunity for a real, live, non-sparring sword fight.  There wasn’t even a slot for a sword on standard-issue Alliance combat gear.  She put aside the thought, pulled up the sniper rifle, aimed, and took the head off the Batarian that foolishly peeked around the corner.

Shit.  There were more coming.  A lot more.  She shouted some orders to the remnants of her ragtag team, but doubted it would matter in the end.  She eyed the swords again.

Then, like a gift from the heavens – no, an actual gift from the heavens – an Alliance gunship rose above the financial district buildings, swept over their position and opened fire on the Batarian stronghold.  In the distance another Alliance gunship appeared and swept around the side.  The cavalry had arrived.

She slumped down against the barricade, spent.  Alive.

I found a way to survive Dad.  One more time, I found a way.