The first shot pierces the silence that had been lying heavily on the ruins for a while now. It also takes down my shields completely, leaving me largely unprotected from the dangers of whichever sniper had shot at me. I dive for cover, and pray that the sniper is alone. Another shot follows through, obviously from a different angle, confirming the presence of multiple hostiles. The shot barely grazes my reinforced armor, and though my heart is beating like a motherfucker, I am yet undamaged.
This planet is harsh environment… Tuchanka, the krogan home world, boasts a myriad of dangers. I work only in the night; daytime is too fucking hot, even here in the northern parts. I spend daytime in a damned uncomfortable environmental pod, sleeping. I spend the nights working, although work may as well be translated to desperately shooting, running, and sometimes sneaking my way through any obstacles in my way. I am a bounty hunter, and I hunt as much for the thrill of it as I do for the money. I am better outfitted than a soldier is, but not quite on par with the good mercenaries. My shield is strong enough to take a sniper bullet without hurting me, and I have a selection of weapons in my arsenal. I have confidence in my abilities, and I enjoy fighting.
Currently, I am getting more than I bargained for. It is late in the night, and I have already killed three hapless mercs earlier, and barely avoided an encounter with a thresher maw. A goddamn thresher maw that would have been end of the line for me.
End of the line… these two snipers could well spell "end of the line" anyway. My job is to take down a member of the blue suns mercenaries, who had been stealing a ton of money from Synthetic Insights Corporation through a self-developing VI virus. I figured someone like that would be a coward, but he touched down on fucking Tuchanka, so I salute him. I guess his entourage was the three mercs I had already killed, and then these two assholes. I should assume he has more mercs with him, but I really don't think he has any more than the five I have confirmed so far.
Another loud shot thunders throughout the ruins. I am in cover, but the shot pierces the stones of my cover pretty close to my face. It is time to move, and though my scanners are scrambled, I have a fairly good idea of both snipers position. I silently make my way up a staircase featuring perfect cover. I have a strong scrambler, and they can't see me. If I move quietly enough, they won't see me coming. Another shot makes its way through the stones of my cover somewhere in front of me. This is bad news for me; it means they've used their tiny little brains to anticipate my moving up the stairs… If I can just make it up there, I will have plenty of cover and different paths to take me closer to them. They will have no way to anticipate my movement. I take the chance and sprint. They won't be able to hit me if I'm fast enough, and once I'm up there, I will have so much cover they won't be able to take a shot at all.
20 meters…
10 meters and I hear an earsplitting shot fly past me somewhere behind.
I throw myself forward into safety. The ruins is that of a great temple. The stairs I just traversed led into a room with open doors in all four walls. The snipers were aiming at me while I was just outside the temple, but now that I'm inside, they have lost their advantage. They will probably switch to close ranged weapons and start searching for me. They still have an advantage in numbers, and I haven't been to these ruins before, so I'm assuming they know the layout better than I.
As I reach in to my pocket, and grab 10 tiny objects, I feel a thrill of excitement. This is why I became a bounty hunter. I am alone in an ancient temple with two capable enemies on a search and destroy mission with me as their target. I love this kind of situation, I find it absolutely exhilarating. I place the 10 tiny objects around the room I'm in. I go to one of the open doors, one I'm assuming leads to one of the snipers locations, and whistle a loud tune. I then exit through one of the other doors, into a more open room. As soon as an organic being larger than a dog, and smaller than an elcor, sets foot in that room, a neural shock will kill it. Unless it is protected by a good shield or biotic barrier, but I highly doubt any of these assholes have that kind of expensive gear. I have to keep a low profile now. I assume they are clever enough to split up, so my trap will only kill one of them.
The room I've entered is large and open, featuring four large pillars in a square formation in the center. I quietly run up to the pillars, and ready my assault rifle. Stupid limited cover. I feel quite exposed, and I know they must be on their way. Twenty seconds later and I hear a small electronic burst from the previous room, and an alarmed outburst from what sounds like a turian. Next, I hear the sound of a shield going off-line. I curse under my breath as the sounds bear witness to my trap having failed. Why does this pompous asswipe have a shield anyway? I didn't expect my target to be important enough for a five man entourage, but this is the second goddamned merc with a kinetic barrier! I remain silent, and a few seconds later, a stupid unshielded turian head starts peeking around the corner. Fast as lightning, I exit my cover and place 3 bullets in his forehead. One down, one to go.
I've made my way further into the temple. I'm starting to suspect that the second sniper hasn't moved at all. The next few rooms look smaller, and I believe my sniper is hiding in one of these rooms. He's probably got his gun pointed to the door he's expecting me to enter from. Unfortunately for him, I've circled around. I should be able to take him by surprise. I quietly switch to my shotgun, the perfect weapon for these close quarters.
As I step into the next room, my world is instantly lit on fire. I hear three thundering shots, and a bright blitz blind me for every loud bang. I feel one of them taking down my newly regenerated shields, and another one graze my armor. I cannot see a damned thing, blinded by the blitz of my opponent's weapon, so I pull the trigger in desperation. My opponent flies to the floor, and I can hear his weapon flying through the room, and landing a few meters away. I hear struggled breathing, but it is not a clear death rattle. I need to finish the job ASAP. My eyes are already re-adjusting, so I can see again. I walk straight up to the downed opponent, and ready my weapon for a killing headshot.
I'm okay with killing bad people. The way I see it, these criminals are hurting innocent people, and killing them helps stopping innocents from suffering. I think that's noble, plus it earns me money when they have a bounty on theirs stupid little heads. In addition, I see combat as a glorious and fair competition that they've chosen to participate in by becoming criminal!
The enemy lying before me is a woman. This doesn't usually bother me terribly; I see no reason to discriminate if they're capable of hurting others and are any good in a firefight. Women are capable of becoming as fierce and evil as any man.
I cannot determine her race.
I've never thought twice about killing anyone, because all my targets have deserved to die.
She's alien, but humanoid.
Not once, because all my targets fought for their life in a fair duel, and lost.
Her eyes have inhumanly large iris.
This is always very easy for me.
Her skin tone is bright blue.
I never hesitate to kill, ever.
…
Well, shit.
