Hey :)
This is my first attempt at writing a ME fanfiction. I haven't written fanfics in ages and this is my first one in English. I tried my best, feeling very limited in my vocabulary at times and I'm really not sure if my grammar is good enough. Tenses and all that.
Further on it's important to know that this story is only based on the assumptions and ideas I/some people had before the game came out. I picked up on some of those, so this story will probably not fit once the game is out.
Still all the discussions on BSN inspired me to give it a go. So thanks guys :)
To make the opening easier to understand: The Pathfinder and her human squadmates are on the Angaran planet, on their way to vist...something. I didn't specify that because it didn't seem that important to the story.
More explanations after the story.
Ah, and yes...nothing belongs to me but Bioware, etc etc.
Not Feeling So Hot
Sara wasn't feeling so hot.
Well...that wasn't actually true since she was feeling entirely too hot but as expressions went 'not feeling so hot' was the most accurate. But now her brain just lapsed onto the stupid wordplay and the irony of it and wouldn't let go.
That was just another confirmation of the fact that she wasn't doing so great...
Her thoughts went full circle and the same meaningless sentences echoed in her mind.
I'm not feeling so hot...Too hot...not feeling so hot. Too hot. Hot. hot...not feeling so...hot.
Over and over again until she was upset with herself. With the situation and with her own carelessness.
"Ryder, you okay?"
Liam's voice cut through her sluggish thoughts and made her look up from the purple to blue-ish bushes and plant life between the majestic trees and giant fern that seemed more real to her that moment then the human walking in front of her.
The air had a fresh if a little bit too sweet nuance to it and again...she was feeling really much too hot...though her inner voice already came up with the 'not feeling so hot' chant.
Liam in his white Initiative armour minus the helmet looked at her a bit worried and out of the corner of her eye she could see movement. White again. So Cora had come to an halt as well though she couldn't see too much of her behind a big hanging leave.
Sara took a deep breath and smiled weakly, straining herself to make it appear genuine and less forced.
"I'm fine. It's just the air that's a bit too...humid for my taste. I'll get used to it. No worries. And you didn't have any problems keeping yourselves entertained, did you?"
She laughed a bit and couldn't care less if that sounded sincere enough, though her amusement with it was actually real.
"Enjoy the time I'm not babbling on and on about how amazing this all is. You know once I start it's rather hard to stop me!"
She felt herself move on her own to accompany this claim with a hand in her side and a little grin while throwing her hair behind her shoulder with an exaggerated toss of her head.
Liam hesitated for a moment more before he smiled himself. "Got'cha." He then turned around again and resumed his walk through the brushes.
Sara sighed inwardly and allowed herself to close her eyes for a second before following him, grateful that for the time being she had avoided any more questions about her condition. Her hotness. Or lack of it...however one wanted to see it.
If she was to be the Pathfinder she couldn't let people worry about her but instead had to hold her head high (though she wasn't really succeeding with that at the moment) and solve her own problems.
Besides there was nothing they could do about her situation now anyway.
Okay...maybe 'Jaal' could have helped her or at least put her mind to rest a little bit if she told him that she very deliberately had sniffed that beautiful flower before he had pointed it out to them a couple of minutes later on their way through the forest.
'Sirasella' he had called it.
And then explained that it was some kind of...stimulant? Though her translator software worked some miracles, there were still some parts of the Angaran language it didn't know. So it was better to say that she got the meaning but not everything.
Sirasella, it seemed, was used to enhance one's senses. As a powder and mixed with something else but even on its own it had some effects as Sara experienced first hand, though she by now suspected that it might work much better on the natives than on her.
What first started off with noticing really vibrant and pretty colours in lots and lots of beautiful shades and glowing and pulsating light effects in the plant life and the small fleeing animals - the Angaran version of birds and rodents for lack of a better description - evolved now in an over sensitivity, slight nausea and a headache that was forming somewhere deep in the back of her skull to hit her full force later on no doubt.
They didn't know enough about this planet and their people, heck, about this Galaxy to even guess other side effects of her little trip and though she would have been much better off just asking the Angara accompanying them...she didn't.
Because...well...for one thing she was pretty sure that if he even had the slightest clue that his planet might be poisonous or a little dangerous to her or the other humans on her team he would have spoken up before and made sure that they kept their helmets on.
She didn't know him that well or that long for that matter but what she had seen and come to understand about him told her that he was more experienced than her complete squad combined (only counting the humans present. Drack was a completely different matter). He had seen battle. Had seen life and that made him, in her mind, considerate, thoughtful...farseeing...and...well...
She let that thought slip feeling still (or again?) too hot for it. Or not too hot. Maybe both. Probably both.
Her teeth caught in her lower lip as she pushed her focus through the haze in her mind and to the sides, looking for their Angaran guide.
In the beginning of their journey she had pestered Jaal with all her questions in her urge to get to know him and his people better and he had answered politely and engaged in discussion with her, though the translator made that a somewhat slow undertaking. It brought about a lot of confusion and nervous smiles. However since she had come down with the after effects of that pretty flower he had grown quiet as well. Listening and watching silently.
In front of her Liam and Cora had started their light conversational banter again, comparing the vast jungle like forest of this planet with other places they had seen in their home galaxy.
Their white armour gleamed through the leaves and trunks, hurting her sensitive eyes and making her uncomfortably aware of how easy to spot they all were, how easy to target.
Jaal in comparison was a lot better equipped for this environment.
The Angara in question was a couple of steps behind her and few feet next to them, keeping the complete human party in view while also concentrating on the road ahead. It was indeed an old path they were walking but everything here looked very much overgrown as if not travelled for ages. The man had pointed out some markings on the trees to find their way earlier on but she had given up on recognizing the symbols when her head had started spinning.
And partly because of it but mainly because of his attire she had needed a moment or two to actually find him between the ferns and low hanging branches of a tree that reminded her a lot of a willow back on earth.
It was his coat. The blue and cyan shades that seemed to trap the light they caught and let it run over the cloth like water. The effect was that the Angara seemed to glide through the dim shadows of the forest. His purple iridescent skin appeared just like another part of the vast plant life here while his apparent experience made it hard for her to hear much beyond the silent rustle of his cloak that even in his asymmetrical, rounded form seemed to harmonize perfectly with its surroundings.
The only thing that made her aware of his bulky form underneath all that coverage eventually were the a little bit too straight lines of his rifle that he held in one hand at his side.
Only a precaution since he didn't seemed too worried by the idle chitchat going on between Liam and Cora and he had told them before that he didn't expect them to run into any problems.
The 'not feeling so hot' sing-sang still in the forefront of her mind she felt another wave of heat rising up in her while she studied the Angara's profile.
Their first meeting had been a couple of days ago, her at gun point, him coming down some stairs. She remembered being awed by the Angaran race in general. And being awed by him in particular. She still was in a way.
Six hundred years they had slept on their way to Andromeda.
She had tried to imagine what life on the planets here would be like. What intelligent life in the Andromeda galaxy would look like if it had any.
The different races of the milky way had given her some ideas but in a way she wouldn't have been surprised to find that life as she knew it - 'humanoid' - wouldn't be here at all. She had been prepared for fungi or monstrous jellyfish. Maybe some space amoebas or giant cockroaches or just plain bacteria...to find something like the Angara was just... amazing.
And the similarities were simply astounding. To have travelled so far to find that so many many light years apart life had developed in a very similar manner...and into the Angara for her to meet...
Her heart skipped a beat at that thought and in despite of feeling not too well at the moment she couldn't help the little smile that formed on her lips.
They were aliens, yes, but being born on the Citadel and growing up with so many different species around her she probably had a complete different view on so called aliens than your average earth born human.
On earth people would still fight about different skin colours, cultural upbringing and religious beliefs. True, joining the intergalactic stage might have taken off the edge of this inner conflict but only because it was much easier now to at least see humans as humans when standing next to a Turian, Batarian or Salarian.
Mistrust and prejudices were now targeted at the other races instead.
But to her members of the other races were mostly only different individuals with sometimes hard to read facial expressions. The better you knew your, e.g...Turian the easier it got do interpret the movement of their mandibles and the nuances of their sub-harmonics. It was the same for all the other races as well and it made it a lot easier for her to concentrate on the beauty lying underneath physical appearances. The beauty of life.
...the beauty of the Angaran people.
And in that case maybe not all that focused on inner values, though they were a big part of it as well. But she would be lying if she said she didn't like what she saw when looking at Jaal.
It was weird. She did see the big pile of differences between them, the things that maybe should make her back off because it was just too..inhuman, too far away from home - literally - but in spite of that she was intrigued. More than that.
No one would fault her for a little curiosity for a complete new civilization found in their new home to be...but her interest was a little bit more personal, more selfish.
Jaal had made an impression on her. And everything else she learned about him afterwards had only helped to fuel that interest.
She thought him attractive, caught herself thinking about him at times, thinking herself crazy for it and...wondering.
It was harmless for now and nothing she would act on but that was actually part of the problem - not acting - the second reason why she didn't want to tell him about the Sirasella.
She was afraid of embarrassing herself in front of him.
Oh, she knew how stupid a reason that was but still...having to admit that she didn't think of the consequences? Just going in a completely unknown environment and touching and feeling everything? How naive and short sighted could she be?
He probably wouldn't laugh. Hopefully he wouldn't laugh. And maybe he could tell her how long she could expect the effects of the flower to linger or he might even know an antidote for it but...admitting this mistake in front of everyone when she was expected to act as their leader...she just couldn't bring herself to do it.
It made her feel foolish and vulnerable and...yes, again, much much too hot and a little angry as well that something she declared to be only innocent musings would keep her from doing the rational thing. But she couldn't help it and so she resigned herself to her silent suffering.
As if on cue, Jaal threw her a quick glance then and Sara had to force herself not no avoid eye contact but in reality she was a little bit too slow on the uptake anyway. A quick glance and a nod before he already picked up his pace and then shifted out of view. Her registration of that came maybe three full seconds later and made her stop for another one more, closing her eyes briefly.
She heard his voice in the front, probably talking to Liam and Cora.
She couldn't really make out what was being said but whatever it was it resulted in a halt of the conversation between the two.
Without their voices as a kind of anchor in the background for her swirling thoughts the forest seemed awfully quiet to her. Confusion tried to push its way past the lessening 'hot' rhyme as she took some more careful steps to close up to her team.
It took her longer than she expected. Obviously they had travelled at a much faster pace than her. And their guide had stayed behind to keep watch, huh?
Another mistake for her list today. Great.
"Where's Jaal?", she asked in a hushed whisper, not entirely sure if it was because she was afraid of the volume of her own voice or simply by intuition. Something seemed wrong.
"He said he wanted to investigate something." Cora answered her, just above a whisper herself, "said he found some tracks of something...didn't get the word correctly but his serious expression makes me think it's something big."
"And dangerous." Liam added with a little nod and a slightly nervous glance to where Sara assumed the Angara had gone off to. It was hard for her to really see anything.
The colours and shapes blurred right before her eyes and that oncoming headache seemed nearly ready to wake up from its metaphorical six hundred year long slumber.
"I see...", was all she managed to say and kept on staring ahead, waiting.
For how long they waited she couldn't tell. Maybe it was only the better part of a minute or two but she wouldn't have been surprised if someone had told her that it had been nearly thirty.
Without anything to do but wait her brain got caught in the meaningless 'hot' cycle again, exhausting her.
When Jaal did come back he was a purple-ish smudge in her vision at first and she wished she had taken the time to let her eyes rest. But that would have invited questions and worry on behalf of her squad. Maybe even criticism from Cora who she actually thought was much better suited for her position.
"It's as I thought." he stated while throwing a look over his shoulder before concentrating his penetrating gaze back on the humans, "We have to...find another way around. The Darahen is hunting but if we hurry we might make it to-..."
There he lost her again. But still she managed a small smile when he fixed his blue eyes on her. Maybe there was some hidden meaning there. Maybe he worried about her the same Liam had but if so he didn't voice it. They set themselves in motion. Cora taking the lead down the path Jaal had shown. A different one and as far as she could tell more overgrown than the one they had used before.
Liam followed suit and Jaal let her pass as well before the rustle of his cloak and the more felt then heard light vibration of his footfall was the only reminder of his presence in her back.
In the beginning it wasn't that much different from before, only more quiet but soon the silence in the forest - the lack of animal voices and movement - seemed to grow 'louder' in her ears until it masked even their own sounds. She shielded herself from a low hanging branch, lifting it out of her face and the leaves on it wouldn't make any noise. She couldn't hear herself breathing anymore and then, when she tried to listen for her own heartbeat in panic, everything came crushing down on her.
Suddenly there was a loud continuous ringing in her ears, the rustle of leaves and branches like a hurricane sweeping through it and the dark hissing cry of a creature somewhere to their right. And Jaals voice behind her barking orders.
Firm pressure in her back shoved her forward, encouraged her to run and once she started she kept on going, shielding her face with raised arms from the twigs that whipped down on her while trying to follow the white of Liams and Coras armour glancing through the trees.
She crashed into one of those trunks at one point, pushed herself of it and continued on in what she hoped was the right direction before she simply lost her footing and then she lost the ground underneath her feet, literally.
She hadn't seen the slope that opened up there but nonetheless she crashed right down. Ingrained training let her react by instinct, using her hands to soften the fall and turning her so that she slid through the brushes and plants on her back and not her face.
When she stopped sliding she pushed herself up and forwards with a groan and an angry cry.
Far off in the distance were straight lines on a large scale. Buildings her mind registered and relieve flooded her as that would mean that their adventurous trip was nearly over. It would have been far more enjoyable without the Sirasella. Or the Dara...something.
The hissing came again, a lot nearer now, answered by some panic stricken shriek right in front of her and the answering cry was more like a roar and then the sound of something really big breaking through the forest.
And something big closing over her mouth before she was pulled back against something broad and hard. On instinct she tried to struggle free but couldn't when the weight pulled her into very big shrubbery and then down.
"Quiet now..." Jaals voice came low and out of breath near her ear as he used his arm around her back to get them both lying flat on the ground. His fingers still dug into her jaw, keeping her effectively from saying anything if she had been in any state to do so.
But her heart was racing, her head spinning.
In front of them something big and violent crashed through, chasing after whatever had shrieked before and now tried to flee.
With cold clarity she could see that if Jaal hadn't pulled her back she would have been right in the middle of it or even the victim herself. But instead she was lying in cover now, the Angara next to her, his visor overflowing with to her unknown information as he stared on ahead.
She closed her eyes then, just too exhausted to care and pressed her forehead to the cold earth.
As the sounds of the fight grew farther and farther away - the victim apparently dying horribly - Jaal's grip on her loosened almost gently, before he withdrew himself from her, leaving her a little bit cold in the process. She didn't look up at first, wanting to hole up here in this spot, maybe sinking into the cold earth to hide from these horrible sounds and her throbbing head, though the surge of adrenaline had actually helped to clear her mind a little.
When she did look up he was on his knees, his lower legs in a weird angle because of it. She turned on her side, the last of his coat that he had thrown over them both sliding off her body.
"I...thank you..." she breathed and while he stood he fixated his blue eyes on her, his face unreadable to her. There was still some information on his visor. Maybe something about her now. She wondered if he had a program on it that could measure stupidity.
"You're welcome." He nodded and offered her his hand which she took after hesitating briefly. Her five-fingered hand looked so small in his three-fingered one. Even with her gloves on.
He pulled her up with a little bit too much force, as she stumbled forward right into him. Startled she tried to draw away immediately, balancing herself with one hand on his chest while he in turn tried to steady her against him, his free hand grabbing her upper arm.
"Ah, sorry...I didn't mean to..." she began, trailing off then as a wave of light-headedness hit her and let her see stars."Ow..."
She closed her eyes, caught her breath for a second and didn't resist when he nudged her a couple of steps until she could feel something firm behind here what she assumed had to be a tree.
"Sorry..I'm not...feeling so hot..." she murmured, smiling a little bit at the irony of it before opening her eyes only to be surprised how near he was actually standing.
She had never been that up close to him before - disregarding him nearly lying on top of her just a few moments ago. She could count the freckle-like markings on his face if she wanted to, see the soft nuances of his irises and study the texture of his lips.
So much for the innocence of her musing, huh?
"What do you mean?", he inquired sounding a bit confused and she had to blink several times to get herself to concentrate on the words and less on the predicament she found herself in. But her own words eluded her for the moment and she shut her eyes once more, trying to steady her irrational beating heart.
"Should you 'hoomans' be warm to be good?" he asked and she had to smile at that. A smile she nearly lost when she looked up again. Instead her heart performed a somersault and her throat went dry as she watched him take his glove off and leaning in again, raising his hand to her forehead.
She contemplated stopping him or shifting out of reach but his serious expression and her own curiosity won out. His touch was light, warm if a little bit rough due to his callous palms but not unpleasant.
"You seem warm..." he stated then but left his hand were it was, making her blush a little bit.
Yes, she was feeling rather warm now. Warmer by the second to be honest.
"It's...just a manner of speaking.", she breathed, "It means...I'm not feeling so well."
"Yes. You became silent and slow. Without your usual energy. No questions anymore." he answered and she felt his hand shift a little bit to the side, grazing her brow. "I have noticed it."
So he had. She could only nod slightly, too distracted by his touch, too nervous to really trust her own voice. He inclined his head a little, searching for her gaze which she couldn't return. For a split second though she thought she saw a little tug at his lips like a small, smug smile but wasn't sure if she hadn't willed it there because he seemed too serious then, lightly caressing her temple before something else caught his interest. A strand of her hair must have come lose from her braid, probably during her run and fall. She felt him shifting it to the side of her face, pulling it closer and rubbing it between his fingers as if to feel the texture of it.
With the tip of her tongue she wetted the inside of her lower lip to find her voice again. Because just standing here saying and doing nothing was like confessing...something. She didn't want to be read so easily.
"Hair..." she offered only above a whisper. Her intention might have been not to look weak to him but at the same time she was rather reluctant to disturb the situation they found themselves in. "we call it hair."
"I know..." he answered in a low rumble, enhancing the intimacy of the moment, "Is it..alive?"
"Not...not really, no." she smiled nervously, "I mean...I feel that you're touching it but that's because I feel the pull on my..."
She lost her voice again as his finger moved along her ear, gently tugging her hair behind it in a deliberate slow motion while he seemed to watch for her reaction. She shivered at the contact, brought her hand up to his chest by instinct and closed her eyes without meaning to.
"Did that hurt?" he inquired, his voice washing over her, sounding somewhat too curious to be genuinely worried, she thought, though she didn't really mind. This...was worth every moment of embarrassment.
"No.", she admitted quietly, this time not even trying to match his gaze. Instead she focused her eyes on his armour, studying the pattern and seams underneath her hand.
"I understand." he said after a while, his finger still behind her ear, his body filling her entire view. She felt unbearable hot now and the Sarisella had nothing to do with it.
"~Ryyyder?" a loud shout then cut through their private moment, made her jump and brought her back instantly to where they were standing right now: somewhere in the forest under the open sky.
"Saraaa?" another one, this time female, cried.
She felt a little bit guilty that she had allowed herself to get into this situation while she didn't know what had happened to her team. She had been scared and then overwhelmed but still it seemed like a lame excuse to her. So when Liam shouted for her again, she threw Jaal a quick apologizing glance while avoiding real eye contact, ducked out under his arm and answered, if shakily. "Yes we're here! Kosta, Harper! I'm here!"
She followed the sound of their voices while she could hear Jaal following her. She didn't look back so he wouldn't see her expression, that big smile that was plastered all over her face now, filling her with exultation. Apparently she wasn't the only one being a bit curious about aliens from another galaxy...
As she made her way over to her squad, covering some room to the buildings she had seen before, she still felt a little bit queasy. The adrenaline hadn't driven off the growing headache completely but that didn't matter anymore.
She felt hot. Literally and figuratively.
And this time is was actually rather pleasant.
The End
So...I feel there are some short explanations to add:
First off, this scene is not very likely to happen in any way and that's fine by me. Just had that small idea, getting to it took me a lot longer than I thought...but well, here I am, offering it :)
I realized while writing this that I should have mentioned SAM somehow...but I couldn't really bring him in without altering a lot of the story aspect. I mean...being connected with SAM would have solved the Sirasella thing rather quickly I guess. Or made the story a lot longer or more complex then I wanted. So...yeah...I ignored his existence on purpose. Sorry.
In my head, Sara's problem was actually more like an allergic reaction to the pollen of it. Nothing too serious.
The translator software...I have to admit that I still don't really know how the translator worked in the trilogy and how it should work in MEA. For story purposes I decided then that since the Angara probably had contact with humans before the Pathfinder meets Jaal they already shared some information and came up with a translator software that will shift through loads and loads of languages and stuff to find a pattern, similarities and learn by doing so as well. But it doesn't have everything in yet already. And when either party (humans or Angara) speak, it will sort through the vocabulary and give you the closest translation it can come up with - with a delay. And in a less fluent or accurate way. So if Jaal's speech does seem a bit bumpy or weird...it's mainly because I chose it to be so. If Sara doesn't sound very convincing...that is because I'm not good enough in English on a day-to-day basis to make her seem convincing enough, sorry.
I struggled.
Lastly...I contemplated writing a more neutral Sara, not giving her a name and adding a BroRyder version crossed my mind as well...but I decided against it. For BroRyder mainly because I think he wouldn't really fit into that scene. I might try to come up with an altered version where he behaves and thinks a little bit differently...but I won't promise...so...it's only canon-like Sara name and appearance-wise.