Mass Effect
The Last Little Soilder
When I awoke I felt nothing.
I was in a dirty hospital tent under heavy pain medication and when I awoke half a dozen doctors came running to me.
They told me how it was over, how the Reapers had stopped attacking and miraculously were actually helping to rebuild.
I felt hope for the first time in a long time.
It tasted like ashes.
I asked where Sheppard was, where my friends were.
There silence said everything.
They told me to rest, but no I was young then, so young and I knew everything, knowing everything was my profession after all. I wanted to know what had happened.
I wished I had never asked.
Some of it I remembered well enough it was just the fine details that escaped me. The assault had gone well at first. The Reapers suffered heavy troop loses and Hammer was advancing slowly but surely.
And then it all fell apart.
A large amount of Harvesters and Brutes attacked the left flank of Hammer; the casualties were in the hundreds in moments.
Jacob Taylor and Zaeed Massani were among them.
But still we pushed on, we had a job to do and we would see it done no matter the cost even if the cost was our lives.
And then the swarm descended Husks, Cannibals, Marauders, Brutes, Banshees, Ravagers and Haversters all in the thousands overwhelmed us.
The biotic students of one Jack, also known as subject zero, also known as Jacqueline Nought were among the first to die.
The response the reapers received was nuclear.
Jack charged a dozen brutes head on, the biotic explosion ripped through them like wet tissue paper.
They never found her body; I think Jack would have preferred it like that through honestly.
But we couldn't stop to mourn we were nearly halfway there just had to keep pushing. All the loses would be worth it we told ourselves.
What fools we were.
And again heavy resistance, mainly Marauders and Ravagers this time and they hammered us with heavy fire. But miraculously we suffered only minimal losses and no one I knew died so why should I care!
But then the shrieking started.
I still have nightmares about them. Those lumbering forms, that tall and imposing figure and of course those horrendous shrieks, I would do anything to have never heard them.
I heard Sheppard shout to get down behind cover, I ducked behind an overturned car I believe as those monsters began their assaults hammering down on us with biotic strikes.
Eventually we managed to fight back, pounding them with gunfire, biotics, tech attacks and hell everything we could think off. But they weren't easy to kill and some of them charged in close to us but we did eventually kill them.
But like most things in life there was a cost.
Miranda Lawson lay ten feet away from me on the ground. Her skin even paler that usual and her long black hair hung around her face limply; a large gory wound in her stomach had long since stopped bleeding.
And not five feet from her, Justicar Samara lay dead massive burns covering her body from those monsters biotic assault.
Major Kirrahe was in relatively better condition, but that wasn't saying much.
And still we continued
We eventually made it to a large open area that had no enemies in sight and everything was quiet, for just a moment I let my guard down.
That was a mistake I made sure not to make again.
Thousands of Husks swarmed out of the nearby buildings, in a panic we all ran in different directions it had happened so fast we weren't exactly sure what had happened at first.
A dozen husks swarmed Kasumi Goto and pulled her to the ground clawing at her flesh, I can still remember her screams. They were one of the things I never forgot.
Ashley Williams suffered a similar fate but not before she took almost 50 of the bastards out before they took her down.
And Sheppard, has he had a habit of doing, took command and saved us ordering us to run after him and we did.
But not before Tali'Zorah vas Normandy was shot in the back and killed by a stray Cannibal, she crumpled to the floor like a sack of flour.
Garrus screamed in rage and ran over to go and help her, I tried to stop him but...it was too late he was overwhelmed with husks before I knew what had happened and I had to run to stop them from overwhelming me.
We were almost at the beam; we had met up with Anderson and his division and were close to the final push.
But in front of lay the largest obstacle.
What had to be ten thousand Brutes, Ravagers and Banshees lay ahead of us. We would never get past them they would wipe us out without breaking a sweat as the humans put it.
Urdnot Wrex and Urdnot Grunt volunteered to lead a large divisionary force in to the maw of the reaper forces to distract them while the rest of us slipped around them.
According to the doctors there weren't enough of their bodies left intact to identify anyone of the diversion team.
And finally we had made it.
The beam lay just ahead, Hammer had been reduced to twenty percent strength and we had all lost friends. But it had all been worth it.
And that was when life decided to say "up yours!"
Harbinger, the oldest known reaper, landed right in front of us. And he was blocking the beam.
But we all determined we were getting to that beam one way or another.
So with a thunderous war cry we charged to the beam. All we had to do was get one of us through to the beam just one.
Harbinger started firing at us, we didn't stop just kept running as fast we even as tens of soldiers died around us.
And then as I, EDI, Javik, and James were just about to make the final push Harbinger's beam struck the Mako we were running alongside.
The last thing I saw before everything went black was Sheppard running towards us.
The doctors said that James and Javik died instantly from the explosion and I myself nearly died, I would have if not quick surgery and an evacuation by the last two percent of hammer.
EDI had gone offline I assumed that she had simply lost her connection to her mobile platform.
But no as the doctors told me the Normandy was one of the last ships destroyed before the crucible activated.
EDI, Jeff, Samantha, Karin, Steve, Greg, Diana, Ken and Gabby all of them were dead.
And yet I still felt nothing.
The beam was still active and they sent rescue crews up to find survivors.
They only found bodies. Including both Andersons and the Illusive mans.
They never found Shepards.
It has been seven hundred years since that terrible, terrible day and I write this so you can understand the price we all paid lest you ever, ever forget.
People died so you could live freely.
People died so you could live like kings, waited on hand and foot by your machine servants.
My friends died.
The man I love died.
If you ever think about forgetting read this again, remember all these names, and remember how much you own them.
And I don't this because I feel angry. Quite the contrary in fact, I still feel nothing, I have felt nothing since that horrible day.
I do this because I see the way this galaxy is heading and I hope to avoid it.
So... please read this.
And now...I shall leave
I think I shall finish the Reapers job for them.
Sincerely
Dr Liara T'soni
Or
The Last Little Soilder
Take your pick.
One little
Solider Boy
Left All
Alone He
Went And
Hanged Himself
And Then
There Were
None.