Black Sun Rising

Chapter 1: The Son of Mindoir


"Jesus Christ."

Zaeed Massani took a moment to shift his eye away from the carnage and over to his fellow human mercenary, chuckling bitterly.

"He ain't around, kid," he said. "And even if he was, what makes you think he'd listen t' you, after he ignored all these poor bastards?"

"This is barbarism," an Asari Commando said through her helmet, disgust clear in her voice all the same. "If it were up to me, Khar'shan would be a smoking ruin."

"Relax, Aleena," a heavily-armored Krogan said from her left. "They'll get what's coming to 'em. Humans don't take wholesale slaughter of their kind very well."

"You got that right, Wrex," Zaeed replied, his good eye grim with barely-repressed anger. "All right, let's get moving. We still have a job to do, and even if the son of a bitch is dead, we still need to bring back proof. And keep an eye out for any Batarians. You see them, you fucking kill them."

"Roger that, Sir," the other human mercenary said, loading a fresh clip into his pistol.

The four mercenaries advanced into the nearest building with practiced caution, backs to each other, each taking point watching one of the cardinal directions. This had used to be Mindoir's most popular cantina, but the patrons were now little more than corpses slumped up against walls, sitting in pools of their own blood.

The ones who had been lucky enough not to be taken by the Batarians, at least.

The mercenaries came to a wide door and fanned back out, with the two humans taking cover on either side of the door while Aleena and Wrex took point. The Krogan was about to open the door when his friend heard something barely filter through the metal, and held up a closed fist.

"What is it?"

"Sounds like we aren't the only ones here," Aleena answered. "Be ready."

"I always am," Wrex said, before pressing his hand against the glowing green panel. The door slid open with a hiss, and the four mercenaries quickly saw that Aleena was right.

The main floor of the dive was mostly empty—the only corpses on the ground were Batarians, and it didn't take the mercenaries long to figure out who'd put them there.

"What the hell are you waiting for!?" one of the six remaining Batarians shouted to his comrades, his eyes split between rage and fear. "Kill this little shitstain already!"

The six slavers were standing in a half-circle in front of a single human holding a pistol, a young man. His back was bare and faced the mercenaries, showcasing a display of fresh and scarring wounds that was as impressive as it was horrifying. Blood dripped slowly down the human's back, highlighting the black marking of a Batarian slaver's brand on his left trapezius muscle.

"So far I'm averaging twenty of you bastards a day," the human said, his voice completely calm and all the scarier for it. "If you want to help me get to my daily quota, then stop wasting my time and let's do this."

Wrex noticed that the Batarians' grips on their guns were shaking, and knew the fight was already over. He glanced to Zaeed, who seemed perfectly content to watch this kid do their work for them.

The Batarians opened fire a moment later, but the human had already dove to the floor and raised his pistol, getting off two quick shots and burning holes between the eyes of two Batarians. One of the remaining four charged the human, screaming in rage and raising his rifle up high, ready to slam the butt down on the human's skull.

The young man pushed himself up on his arms just high enough to get the space he needed to swing his legs around, cutting the Batarian's legs out from under him even as the other slavers were yelling at their companion for blocking their shots. The human grabbed the Batarian as soon as he hit the ground, holding him up and using his body as a fleshy shield to take the next round of rifle shots for him while he got back to his feet.

The human tossed the now-limp Batarian to the floor, and the surviving slavers raised their rifles to take the clear shot—

Only to hear nothing more than a clicking sound from their weapons upon pulling the triggers.

They'd barely had enough time to register how screwed they were before the human was on them, punching one of the Batarians in the chest before grabbing her head as it lurched forward and snapping her neck. He yanked the Batarian's pistol out of its holster and leveled one gun at each of the remaining slavers, pulling the triggers simultaneously and dropping the aliens to the floor.

The human holstered his new gun and ejected a spent heat sink from the old one, squatting to the floor for a moment before reaching into the pocket of his pants and pulling out a beat-up pack of cigarettes. He took one out and held it up to the still-glowing shell casing, lighting the tip before rising to his feet and taking a drag.

"Welcome to Mindoir," he said a moment later, as the four mercenaries made their way into the room. "What're you doing here?"

"Looking for someone," Zaeed answered, holstering his rifle on his back. "On a job."

The young man turned around at last, revealing a head of short dark hair, keen blue eyes, and a face that was scarred down the right side and gaunt with hunger.

"You mercs?"

Aleena nodded, the panels of her helmet sliding away.

"When did the Batarians get here?"

"About two weeks ago," the young man said, walking toward the mercenaries as he took another drag. "Cut off all communications as soon as they landed. By the time we got the towers back up and running, the Batarians had put up defenses too strong for the local Alliance patrols to bust through."

"You held your own for two weeks against these bastards?" Zaeed replied, sounding begrudgingly impressed. "Not bad at all, kid. You got a name?"

"Shepard," the young man answered, before dropping the butt of the cigarette to the floor and grinding it down with his boot. "You must be Zaeed Massani. Who's the unlucky target this time?"

"Koral Fortram," Zaeed said. "Heard he was running this place, and someone wanted him dead bad enough to hire the four of us. Must've figured something serious had happened for the whole colony to go dark."

"Fortram's back in his office, through there," Shepard said, gesturing down a hallway behind him. "But he's probably starting to stink, just so you know."

He walked over to the bar and pulled out a bottle of whiskey from behind the counter, pouring himself a shot. Shepard drained it and put the glass back down on the counter, before tilting his head to the side thoughtfully.

"Did you leave anyone to guard your ship?"

"A small crew," the other human mercenary said. "Why?"

Suddenly, the dull, rumbling sound of an explosion reached the mercenaries' ears, and it didn't take long for Zaeed to piece together that the exploding object had likely been their ship.

"That's why," Shepard said, pouring himself another shot. "Should've left the Krogan behind."

"Goddamnit," Zaeed growled, starting to think of a contingency plan while Shepard busied himself with stripping one of the fresh Batarian corpses. After treating the fresh wounds on his back with medi-gel to dull the pain, Shepard put on the Batarian's armor and picked up the M-15 Vindicator, making sure it was loaded with a fresh clip before slinging it over his back.

"If you need another way out of here," Shepard said, "I know where the slavers keep their ships docked. I can help you out, on two conditions."

"Which would be?" Aleena asked, closing her helmet up again in preparation for their departure.

"You give me transportation off-planet, and a share of the payout."

"First thing's fine with me," Zaeed said, "but you gotta earn the second, Shepard."

Shepard smiled, life coming into his eyes for the first time.

"Works for me."

"Okay. Murphy," Zaeed continued, "you go in back and get proof Fortram's dead. Can't afford to lug his body around with us, but I'm fucked if I'm going to let some Batarian scum steal our payday."

"Got it, Sir," the other human mercenary said promptly, before hurrying off down the hallway. Once Murphy was out of earshot, Zaeed sighed.

"I really wish he'd stop with the 'Sir' crap," the older mercenary grumbled. "This ain't the Alliance." He looked at Shepard, curious.

"Who taught you to fight, kid?"

"My father," Shepard said. "Allan Karrick."

"That stubborn bastard is your father?" Zaeed said, his voice rising in surprise. "No shit. I served with him, back when I still wore the uniform."

"I know," Shepard replied, "I heard the stories." A faint smile crossed his face at the memories, but it vanished a heartbeat later.

The shift wasn't lost on Zaeed, and his expression softened ever so slightly.

"He's gone," the older mercenary said, "ain't he?"

Shepard said nothing, only nodding.

"Him, and everyone else. Nothing left for me here, anymore." He glanced over at the other dead Batarians, his head lowering slightly. "Nothing left for anyone."

"Then let's kill some Batarians and get the hell out of here," Wrex spoke up, breaking his silence. The Krogan's voice seemed to jolt Shepard back into the present, and he rolled his shoulders to stretch into his new armor.

"Sounds good to me," Shepard said, his eyes shifting back to steely as his mouth set itself into a determined line. Drawing one of the pistols from its holster, he readied it with an incendiary ammo mod and put his helmet on just as Murphy walked out of the back room.

"Got his head," the mercenary said, "and put it in my pack. Should be good enough, without needing the rest of the body."

"Good work," Zaeed said tersely, before turning his attention back to Shepard. "So, where to?"

"From what I can tell, the Batarians have turned the main weapons factory into a hangar," Shepard answered. "To keep people who might go right to the main port from stumbling on their ships. The factory's about a kilometer west of here, but they have snipers posted on the roof at every main entry point. Did you guys bring any vehicles with you?"

"Do we fucking look like we did?" Zaeed shot back, his anger at the loss of their ship boiling over. "If we had, our ship wouldn't have fuckin' gotten blown to bits, now would it?"

"Just thought I'd ask," Shepard said, sounding unfazed by the outburst. "Guess that means we're waiting until nightfall, then."

"No way," Murphy broke in. "I'm a sniper, Zaeed's a great shot, and Aleena ain't too bad neither. Get us in position, and we can clear the roof."

"Thanks for leaving me out of the party, you asshole," Wrex grumbled. "For the record, I'm a better shot than you."

"How about you two spend less time measuring your dicks, and more time moving your goddamn asses?" Zaeed broke in forcefully, his good eye narrowed in anger. "If we aren't in space by the time the sun sets on this fucking colony, I'm going to be very, very angry."

"You heard the man," Aleena called out. "Let's move!"

The five of them left the ruined cantina, beginning the trek through the hollow shell that had once been Mindoir towards the converted factory.


The final approach towards the factory involved skirting around a cliff-face, the group slowly making their way down the red, rocky slope until the gates of the building were in sight. The mercenaries all synced up their communicators, and were about to split off to find sniping perches when Shepard unexpectedly broke rank and ran down the slope.

"Shit," Murphy cursed as Aleena followed Shepard, while Zaeed and Wrex hung back to avoid increasing the chances of totally blowing their cover.

"Shepard," Aleena hissed, "what do you think you're doing!?"

But Shepard wasn't listening to the Asari. He'd stopped running, and Aleena could now see that he'd knelt down on the ground next to a prone male human. The prone one was badly wounded, and his lifeblood was seeping into the dry soil.

"Hey, Eddy," Shepard said quietly, but insistently. "Hey. Stay with me, buddy."

"J—John?" Eddy struggled to say, barely believing his eyes. "What the hell are you doing here?"

"About to get a ride off this planet," Shepard answered. "Hang in there, and you can come with us."

"No… no, can't," Eddy gasped. "Hurts. Hurts… too much. Wires… the wires are pain, John. And the nightm—" Eddy hacked violently, blood on his lips now. "The nightmares d—don't stop. I just… want to go home."

Shepard hung his head, slowly drawing a knife from a holster at his waist. Aleena didn't need to see his face to know that the human was crying.

"Relax," Shepard said, his voice breaking. "It'll be fine. Just think of home, Eddy. Think of it like it was. Can you see it?"

Eddy closed his eyes and sighed, the ghost of a smile on his face.

Shepard slipped the knife around the back of his friend's head and cut the wires, a moment before Eddy breathed his last.

Aleena didn't make a sound as Shepard slipped the knife back into its sheath, his hand clenching into a tight fist.

"Let's do this," he grit out, before rising back to his feet and walking back towards the other mercenaries. Aleena followed in Shepard's wake, sparing a short glance back at Eddy's corpse along the way.

Zaeed regarded Shepard coolly, his eye searching.

"You done?"

"Yeah."

The two humans stared each other down for a few tense heartbeats, before Zaeed nodded.

"Good. Wrex, what kind of guard detail is your scanner picking up?"

"Weird," the Krogan answered after studying the instrument. "Doesn't look like they have anyone posted on the roof after all. Just some guards at the front gate, and a few smaller detachments watching the side gates. Must have most of their strength inside the building."

"Which means less open ground and more cover," Zaeed observed as he readied his assault rifle. "Might give us an advantage after all. We just need to get inside."

"Hey, Murphy," Shepard said, "let me see your sniper rifle for a second."

"What?" the other human breathed out, surprised. "No! You don't get to ask for shit from me, kid."

"I wasn't asking you," Shepard replied, the coldness in his voice making Murphy falter. "Give me the rifle."

The weapon was in Shepard's hands a few seconds later, and he looked down the scope.

"How many, Wrex?"

"Three at each of the side gates, five up front," the Krogan answered.

Shepard exhaled a long, slow breath and pulled the trigger. Once, twice, a third and then a fourth time, all in the span of twelve seconds, each shot echoing with a crack as another Batarian fell. Only one guard was left at the front gate, and he promptly raised the alarm to his friends over at the side gates. Shepard took advantage of the lull and loaded a fresh clip into the weapon, while Murphy took the opportunity to frown.

"You missed one, jackass."

"Someone shut him up," Shepard said quietly, but there was no mistaking the tension in his voice. "This is the tricky part."

As soon as the guard details from the other gates were called over by the lone Batarian to investigate the aftermath of the attack, Shepard knew he only had a few more seconds before one of the guards was smart enough to trace the direction of the shots back to where he was. Breathing out again, Shepard let off a fluid, precise volley of seven shots. Each one dropped a Batarian, and a few moments later the front gate of the factory began to slide open with a loud, shrieking groan.

"Looks like we have ourselves a way in," Zaeed said, now sounding genuinely impressed. "Wrex, you take the west side gate. Aleena, you and Murphy go east. Shepard, you and me are taking the front door."

The group splintered up, moving into an elaborate pincer formation.

"Ready," Wrex's voice spoke up over the comms.

"Ready," Aleena's joined in a moment later.

Zaeed primed an Inferno Grenade, chucked it into the factory, and the rest was chaos.

The five mercenaries pushed into the building, blasting away anything with more than two eyes. Wrex crushed two Batarians at once just by charging into them, before lifting up another pair with his biotics and slamming them into a fuel tank so hard that the thing combusted. Only then did he bother drawing his shotgun, eviscerating another Batarian that had been stupid enough to close ranks on a Krogan.

Aleena moved with the famed predatory grace of the Asari Commandos, leaving Murphy in the dust as she weaved around the Batarian troops. Before the slavers even realized what they were up against, Aleena had snapped five necks, crushed three Batarians in a singularity and had shot holes dead in the hearts of two more. One Batarian charged up behind the Asari, only to be met with a snap kick from Aleena's heel that knocked him out cold.

Murphy buried two shots in the downed Batarian's chest and moved on, aiming his pistol at two more slavers as they closed in on him. Four shots later they were both down, but not before one of them had buried a shot of their own in Murphy's right shoulder. The human sniffed at the wound gingerly, smelling the signature acrid scent of polonium-laced rounds and cursing under his breath.

Zaeed and Shepard charged forward and slid up against cover, using the smoke from Zaeed's grenade to cover their advance. The older mercenary stuck his head up above cover just long enough to draw beads on his targets, before ducking back down and letting them waste their clips. As soon as the Batarian volley was spent, Zaeed responded with his own round of assault rifle bursts. The Batarians fell with strangled groans, not a shot wasted.

Shepard wasted no time in vaulting over the cover and drawing his pistol, quickly scanning the surroundings for any more Batarians. The slavers' numbers had thinned considerably, but they weren't done yet. Two of the Batarians were smart enough to try and flank Shepard as he settled in behind a new piece of cover, and one of them got a shot off that grazed Shepard's arm before being rewarded with three new holes in their chest. The second flanker was a better shot, burying a round in Shepard's other arm that actually hit it squarely. Shepard grunted in pain, but pushed past it long enough to tackle the Batarian to the ground. Two hard punches later, the alien's head had been wrenched hard enough that it was no longer breathing.

All told, the assault was done in five minutes. The mercenaries regrouped and advanced on the closest Batarian ship, all-too-eager to get off of the planet before a wave of Batarian reinforcements arrived to strengthen their hold on the colony.

Just as Shepard was about to board the ship, though, a sound pulled his attention back to the now-ruined factory.

"Help!"

The shout was accompanied by the much louder noise of a gas tank exploding not too far away, and the roof of the factory began to groan.

"Shepard, get in here!" Wrex shouted. "This place is about to come down on top of us!"

Shepard turned around instead, and could just barely make out the silhouette of what looked like a child in a cage. Raising one arm to his face in an attempt to keep the smoke and chemicals in the air away from his lungs, Shepard ran back down the ramp and towards the cage.

Looking in, he could barely make out the image of a young girl, who didn't seem to be much older than six.

"Help!" the girl shouted again. "Please, help! The aliens took mommy and daddy! They… they…"

Shepard didn't wait to hear anything else, slamming his shoulder against the cage door again and again, until it bent and opened with a groan.

"Come on!" he shouted, and the girl ran to him. Shepard scooped her up and carried her with him as he ran back towards the Batarian ship, barely making it onto the ramp before it began to retract into the ship.

Shepard hurried into a seat and strapped in just as Murphy punched the ship's engines, holding the rescued girl against him as she whimpered in fear.

"It's okay," he said, hoping she could hear him over the roar of the engines. "It's okay. I got you."

The girl shuddered once and relaxed with a sigh, her exhaustion finally overtaking her. Shepard closed his eyes as well, falling into a dreamless sleep.


"Hold still, or this is really going to hurt."

Shepard didn't move a muscle as Aleena's fingers pulsed slightly with biotic energy, drawing the bullet out from the wound in his arm. As soon as it was clear, the Asari shifted her attention to staunching the flow of blood. Reaching for a roll of bandages, Aleena smiled at Shepard.

"It was a good thing, what you did for that girl," she said. "I don't know any mercs who'd have made that call, John."

"I'm not a merc," Shepard replied, trying not to sound as pained as he felt. "I wasn't gonna just leave her there. She'd lost her parents, same as me. And if I hadn't done anything, she'd be dead, too."

"Like I said," Aleena continued gently, putting pressure on Shepard's bandages and moving closer to him, "it was a good thing. And about you not being a merc, well… I was talking to Zaeed earlier while you were still passed out, and he had something of an idea. Want to hear what it was?"

"Sure," Shepard said, trying not to be too distracted by the sight of an Asari Commando so close to him.

It wasn't easy at all.

"Zaeed wants to make our crew a little more permanent," Aleena explained, "and he wants to give you a spot. Said he hadn't seen a sniper as good as you in a long time, and I agree with that."

"Permanent?" Shepard echoed, suspicious. "Permanent how?"

"I don't know if you're aware of this," Aleena explained, "but Zaeed co-founded the Blue Suns mercenary group after he ditched the Alliance. The killing was in his blood by then, I guess. But then his partner betrayed him and left him for dead, so Zaeed was flying solo for a while after that. But the four of us, we've run enough jobs together by now that it's starting to feel like an actual team.

"A team Zaeed wants you on."

"A team he's going to turn into a new Blue Suns?"

Aleena shrugged.

"Maybe," she said, "maybe not. Depends. But it is true that the more of us there are, the bigger and better jobs we can pull off. Which means more money, and all the things that money can buy."

Shepard sighed, looking down at the cot he was sitting on.

"I don't care about the money," he said. "I'm using my share to make sure the girl winds up somewhere that can take care of her."

"Yeah, you're definitely winning the award for 'Most Confusing Human I've Ever Met'," Aleena said, chuckling. "Why don't you care about the money?"

"Because it can't bring back what I've lost," Shepard said, melancholy bleeding into his voice as he lifted his face to look into Aleena's deep blue eyes. "Nothing can."

The Asari smiled, taking Shepard's face in her hands.

"You lose your family," she said, "you have to make a new one. You aren't the first person something like this has happened to, kid."

Aleena leaned forward and kissed Shepard lightly on the forehead, before dropping her hands and rising to her feet.

"Get some rest," the Asari said as she walked back towards the main cabin. "I'll wake you up when we reach the Citadel, and you can make your decision there. But don't worry," she cut Shepard off before he could even object, "I'll make sure Talitha—that's the girl's name—gets dropped off somewhere safe while we're picking up the credits.

"Sweet dreams, John."

Shepard let himself fall back onto the cot and closed his eyes, hoping for another dreamless sleep.

And once again, he was lucky. It was a small comfort in the wake of everything that had happened, but at this point Shepard knew he'd be spending the rest of his life taking whatever scraps of happiness he could find.


A/N: Mass Effect's story is awesome, but it's the characters that really make it all work. So my apologies if this chapter was a bit light on the action, but the characters are just way too much fun to write. I hope I did them justice, and I hope you enjoyed it! The next chapter will have more of Zaeed being awesome in it, along with more Wrex goodness. I wanted to give them both more lines, but they were too busy kicking ass. Also, I liked Wrex's story in ME1 about Aleena so much, I felt like I owed it to her to give her some time to shine.

Shepard is 16 years old here, and he's 29 when Mass Effect canonically starts. So I'm shifting things around a bit in terms of when these characters all start crossing paths, timeline-wise.

Thanks for reading, and please let me know what you thought!

Still to come: The payoff for this contract, Cerberus, and a few more familiar faces. Should be fun.

See you next time,

JP