Mass Effect: Argent
Chapter 1: Exordium
Three years ago, I was an above average reconnaissance officer in STG. Until an unfortunate incident at least.
Yet what would have be considered irksome and a burden – is now my supreme advantage.
2185. Elysium.
The day was some sort of holiday. One of those human affairs based on forgotten ancient traditions and folklore used as an excuse for drinking. Bright. Shinning. Distracting neon and LEDs.
Would be exciting.
But tonight was not a prudent time.
I was following a suspect. Had been for a few days now. He went by the name of Art Finnegan. Smuggler. Slaver. 'Shmuck'. A robbery of his went south, rather comically, so he fled to the nearest human colony.
Risky move.
I assumed he would hide in the boisterous crowds – which he did.
Smart move.
Nonetheless I had his him in my sights. Finnegan knew where to move, but not how to cover said moves. His tracks were as visible as a noisy 6ft vorcha wielding a M-451 Firestorm in the Council chambers.
I knew his contacts. Easy to obtain and extort. Clumsy. Cowardly. Thanks to one of Finnegan's unfortunate lackeys, I knew where he would try to go. My foot pressed on the poor man's neck quickly made him spill.
Rough business.
A sadly necessary context.
The main square of Illyria, Elysium's capital, branched off into many intricate and maze-like high streets.
The crowds were difficult to navigate. The screaming and cheering of some obscure slogan I had no idea about. Diverting.
Fortunately I made it were I needed to be. And waited.
15 minutes later, Finnegan appeared. The human was stocky. Dressed almost entirely in red. He was dishevelled; anxious looking. On guard.
He was headed to a dingy local café. The lights flickered intermittently. The smell of rusty metal and roasted coffee filtered through the stale air.
It was getting darker now. The shouts of celebration distant – background noise.
I'd set up a spy drone high above the street to see him approach. The dark, almost pitch-black ally I was in gave little field of view, but a perfectly discreet hiding place.
Seeing Finnegan round the corner, I shut off the drone.
Poof.
I would gamble that poor old Art was going to enjoy some coffee and a snack with his acquaintance waiting in the café. He'd talk, and then disappear. Lay low. Be gone.
Thankfully, food would not be wasted on this scumbag.
He passed the ally beside the café – and would have succeeded. But, of course, I grabbed him.
Advantage of surprise. I pulled him in by the scruff of his collar. Kicked downwards just below his knee.
'Crack'.
Shock took over. Finnegan fell down panting on the ground.
"Wh..oo? Who are you?" He stuttered feebly.
"No-one important," I replied confidently. "Your contact's not important either. Luckily for him, he won't meet me today."
I strode towards his fallen body, and his face shone with a a gruesome expression of shock.
I towered above him.
No ordinary face.
No ordinary strength.
And no ordinary figure of intimidation.
He fell unconscious at the kick of my boot.
Why was I 'not ordinary'? I'll explain.
Three years ago, I was an above average STG officer. Me along with a squad of 14 other officers were investigating a lead pertaining to an old mining complex on Erinle.
Supposedly overrun with amateur mercenaries. Nobody popular.
Half-way through the investigation, we encountered the mercs. Under-equipped. It should have been easy.
The mercs had the geographical advantage. High ground. Better cover.
We had better weapons and training. Our skills surpassed theirs and they were downed quickly nevertheless.
Yet the leader, a tenacious and ruthless fellow, ceased an opportunity.
Before he bled to death, he noticed a rusted and precariously hanging metal rafter on the ceiling. He shot it down before he finally expired.
The rafter plummeted down from the high ceiling, and crushed my legs.
My right arm was trapped.
The whole squad of other officers downed weapons and rushed towards me. They tried to heave the heavy piece of jagged metal off me – but that only made it worse.
The metal lifted, and quickly fell again. On to my face. My eye – pierced. At that, I fell unconscious.
I awoke four days later in an STG medical clinic on Sur'Kesh. White lights dazzled me as I woke slowly. My legs were gone. Below the knee at least. I couldn't feel my arm. That was gone too.
My vision adjusted to see a bespectacled salarian doctor smiling at the bedside. The limited field of vision made me aware that one of my eyes was also gone.
"Awake at last I see."
He was too cheery for my predicament, I thought.
"I am sad to say I have some bad news."
How blunt.
"But before that; I am Dr Flolus. I'll be over-seeing your recovery."
"What's the bad news? Get to it." I retorted.
"Very well," he said with an odd optimistic flair, "We cannot replace your legs with organic tissue copied from your DNA. Your DNA has a peculiar coding, a mutation, that inhibits the re-creation of limbs in medical practice."
"Nice to know," I said through gritted teeth.
"But there is...something – if you are up for it?" The doctor sounded unnervingly excited.
"What is it then?"
"Well...STG have been working on a project for a little while. Your...unfortunate situation is actually an opportunity."
"Seems difficult to believe." I replied.
"Someone will be in later to fill you in with the details."
With that he left.
An hour later, a salarian female followed by something resembling a small harem of men entered my private room.
She was silent, while her team of serfs projected schematics and vids from their omni-tools onto the whitewashed wall.
There were flashes of silver. Incomprehensible readings. Laboratories with robotics chiming and buzzing away. Controlled minor explosions. Broken walls. Even for a salarian the pace of the images and vids was hard to take in.
It turned out that this was a long term project into robotic and cybernetic development. And this project would rejuvenate my brief and futile existence, temper my nihilism, and somehow give a cogent purpose.
I signed up to the project almost immediately. Impatient and brash.
The salarian women, a Dalatrass, explained the processes as they happened. My eye socket, absent of organic optics, would be supplemented by an advanced-yet-subdued, yet-powerful, telescopic lens and computing system to aid in depth perception.
My missing lower arm was, at first, replaced with a metal frame. A few days of gruelling procedures added to the arm a light-armoured casing, reinforced hydraulics – krogan level strength - non-lethal weapon systems, an EMP module, a suppressed firearm, indeed two, and a cutting-edge integrated omni-tool system.
My leg would be just as complex, and just as sterling.
A micro-carbon fibre spring system (hardened with mass effect fields), neurologically controlled gyroscopic footings, a constrained ramming device concealed in the right leg, and two small jump-packs 'borrowed' from a turian Armiger Legion suit.
The whole process took around three weeks. Burdensome weeks. But eventually rewarding.
This came with one caveat.
The hydraulic systems worked with the help of a toxic form of grease. Sadly there was no other substance that performed its function as well.
Thus, a daily cocktail of medications would be required to stop myself from being poisoned.
It was done. I was liberated – albeit shaken. And now, over-eager for action.
"You will be used for...special operations," said the female salarian ambitiously.
She was Dalatrass Illorian.
Sly. Opaque. But persistent and inspiring.
There were certainly 'special operations' all right. I worked alone. Hunting the most devilish criminals with complete discretion and ease.
Too much ease.
I got cocky. I would act as if above most, if not all, of my peers. I lost friends – but I thought the power was worth that cost.
That would soon change, but not before a strenuous string of events.
Streets coated in blood. Hidden predilection. The hatred of philistines. I would encounter all of that.
I was unrestricted. I, was Project Argent.
