Ciaphas Shepard, Hero of Elysium
I had been granted some much-needed shore leave after my last involuntary escapades, and chose to take it on, I thought, the last planet likely to attract trouble beyond the odd drunken brawl. Elysium – so called, not only as a marketing stunt to draw the tourists, but because beyond the settled areas it really does consist of little more than rolling meadows of the most glorious green as far as the eye can see.
Unfortunate that the green is a result of toxic compounds strong enough to drop an adult Krogan in under a minute, but every pro has its con. Besides, as far as I was concerned, the deadly view made an invasion even less likely.
What little did I know.
Scarcely a week into my self-appointed mission to find all of Elysium's most entertaining locales – and by entertaining I mean full of poor, unsuspecting locals thinking to fleece poor, unsuspecting tourists – and its most entertaining locals – by which I mean its ladies of negotiable virtue – and all hell broke loose.
Being situated close to the spaceport as I was – ports, whether space or sea, always have entertainment of all kinds readily available – I was woken from my slumber by the sound of the entire Alliance fleet descending like the wrath of God. My two companions also awoke, and promptly prevented the loss of my hearing to the cacophony outside by deafening me with their own, point-blank shrieks.
I'd paid for their time already, and their screaming was only going to draw whoever was invading down on me as well, so I hurriedly dressed and fled the scene. Started to flee the scene at least. By the time I stepped out of the front door, a crowd of local and visiting civilians was sweeping towards the source of the noise, anxious to claim the best gawping spots, and apparently oblivious to the idea that whoever was arriving in such force and with such reckless speed might not be friendly.
Like a chip of wood caught in a flood, I was bumped and pushed and swirled along in exactly the opposite direction from the one I had intended. As if Fate, unkind mistress that she is, was watching, further Brownian motion determined that I ended up rather closer to the front of the milling crowd, than the rear, where I might reasonably have expected to be able to worm my way in a slow retreat – or at least head the stampede away once those around me realised what was going on, for I could tell, all too clearly at this distance, that Elysium was, against all probability, being invaded.
Well, the civilians might have been 'ooh'ing' and 'ahh'ing' the disparate fleet of ships that had landed, and the motley horde of god-knew-what-but-not-friendly armed aliens being disgorged from them, but I and the members of the spaceport's security force were rather less sanguine. It was quite clear, to us, that the incoming force was overwhelming, both in numbers and determination.
There was a half-hearted attempt to shoo the civilians away, which became much more effective when the closest invaders started taking pot-shots. Fortunately they were still too far away to do serious damage, but the mob mentality caught on quick, and fled quicker. Which should have been all well and good for me, as it cleared my own escape route, except for the fact that it also cleared the line of sight between the captain of the spaceport's security and myself. Said captain, whose ample charms had led to my making her off-duty acquaintance earlier in the week, inevitably recognised me and summoned me to join the doomed resistance.
Shore leave being no excuse in the face of such a clear, military emergency – or, for that matter, a uniformed officer with a gun and the will to use it – I grabbed a string of grenades and their remote detonator off a young security guard who looked more scared of them than the enemy, took the range, and set myself to slowing the enemy charge.
The series of percussive explosions that ripped across the most eager invaders, coming after a set of smoke grenades along their line of attack – to confuse and disorient – successfully deterred the saner of the bunch. Unfortunately, most of them appeared to either be insane or Batarian – which amounts to much the same thing – and kept coming.
The captain dithered – the worst thing to do in a fight in my experience – and crumpled to a lucky shot. The security guards' resolve collapsed with their officer, and they fled in disarray. I spared a moment to mourn the loss of the captain's bosoms, relieve her of her sidearm, and then – knowing full well that only in the holos does one man ever defeat a rampaging army – began my own, hasty, retreat.
The main spaceport on Elysium was unusual, in that it had virtually no defences. There was a low – no more than three feet, just enough to crouch behind – fairly ornamental wall around the perimeter, with a high, elegant stone arch over the broad stretch of entrance and exit lanes. Figuring that the arch was doomed anyway, I armed the last of my grenades and sent them on their merry way, detonating them just as the first invaders came level. Most of the force of the explosions was directed outward, but the ominous sounds of unstable stone shifting was clear to me. Reasoning that all the arch supports needed were a little nudge – just an encouragement to one, which the others would then imitate, like falling dominoes – I focused my biotics and pushed.
The result was even better than I'd hoped. The massive arch fell with a thunderous roar, almost louder than the invaders' descent. As the clouds of dust slowly cleared, I was faced a single Batarian, its six eyes squeezed shut – either in terror or to protect them from flying debris. I didn't care which; I raised the pistol I'd taken from the fallen captain and 'double-tapped' the stunned invader, walking over to his corpse and calmly putting a third round through his head – just to make sure.
It was at that point that the cheering broke out.
Ragged, but enthusiastic, it came from behind me, and turned out to belong to a swelling mob of civilians. Most were armed with a collection of weapons so ancient that I doubted even half would work correctly, and feared what the ones that didn't work correctly might do instead.
"That was amazing!" one man gushed – I later discovered he was the port administrator, and had been first to flee when the invaders' ships were detected. "The way you toppled the Pearlite Gates…" He trailed off, face going ashen. "The Pearlite Gates…" he murmured, now looking on the verge of weeping.
Fortunately – for me or for him, I'm not sure – by this point the rest of the crowd had overcome their shyness and surged forward, surrounding me and all but singing my praises. I caught a glimpse, on the fringes, of a few faces that seemed familiar; though they were no longer wearing their spaceport security uniforms, the regulation weaponry set them apart from the rest. Between their embarrassed presence and the odd intelligible congratulation from those around me, I concluded that this misunderstanding – for I had collapsed the arch with the intention of buying myself more time to flee – had come about thusly.
The regular spaceport security guards, on fleeing after their captain's death, had promptly told everyone they met of the overwhelming odds they'd faced, and that were now advancing, unchecked, towards the city itself. But the civilians, with their antique weapons, had decided to go down fighting, assembling into a rough, utterly disorganised militia, and heading for the spaceport and the invaders.
They'd arrived just in time to see my wanton architectural destruction obliterate some dozen or more of the invasion's lead elements, and my cold-blooded execution of the sole invader to make it to the city's side of the fallen arch. Hence, their increasingly fervent belief – as minutes and then hours passed and no more invaders plucked up the courage to pick their way over or around the debris – that I, Ciaphas Shepard, had single-handedly saved them.
It's possible that my fortune in bringing the Pearlite Gates down, a feat only achieved thanks to a design flaw hitherto unnoticed – I can understand that they didn't think to stress test with grenades – and desperation giving my biotics a little more punch than usual, caused enough uncertainty as to the state of the defences that the invaders hesitated. They had seen a handful – a small handful – of defenders apparently flee, and then one man, or so it seemed, had collapsed a colossal arch in front of them. Perhaps they presumed that there was, in fact, a small army in concealment, or pre-laid minefields and traps to give the negligible defences a deceptive edge of surprise.
Personally, from the reports relating to the space-borne part of the whole affair, I believe word was already spreading about their losses. Pirates and slavers are tough enough when they think the odds are in their favour, but if you can convince them they're not…
But the truth will never truly be known. As far as Elysium – and the rest of the galaxy – are concerned, I held off an entire army single-handed…even if I did destroy the colony's founding monument in the process.
I'm told that the arch will be replaced, and that a Pearlite statue of myself will form the central column; double-sided, so that it may glare at invaders whichever direction they approach from. I am also told that the central column will have a special base, fitted with explosive charges so that the defenders can call upon their hero to crush their enemies as he did once before.
Thinking about it, I find the whole idea so unintentionally ironic that I can't help but laugh until my ribs ache and tears seep from my eyes.
AN: So…I read the Ciaphas Cain (Warhammer 40K) omnibus…and I loved it. Not long after reading it I discovered that I'd lost my ME/ME2 saves (must…replay…), and then, many convoluted mental processes later, this fic was born.
Ciaphas Shepard is, for those wondering, an infiltrator at heart, and a vanguard in practice.