Red Sand. It was more like a fine powder, really; dark red, the kind of red that smelled like licorice and tasted like blood. Bitter, metallic, tangy. It undulated up the nose and then slithered through the brain's synapses like an electric snake. Blue like the sound of thunder. Loud. Violent. Sudden. It ripped apart the stillness, the previous quiet of the mind and shred it into chaotic confetti…confetti that rained down on the devil at his birthday party in hell.
Hot, hot hell. Heat that was like the sight of waves lifting off the pavement in summer. The taste of spicy peppers. Sweat, the smells of sour, baking refuse in the bleaching summer sun…
Dakota swore off the stuff twelve years ago—the Alliance Military had done a good job at keeping her clean—and now she was covered in it. The drug had stained her skin a deep crimson and caked her armor in a thick, red crust. It had plugged up her nostrils and smeared into her tear ducts. And the sweet, sweet euphoria came crashing into her nervous system like the way a car accordion-folds into a concrete wall.
She took a deep breath and it coated the insides of her lungs, sticky. Her pupils dilated and her vision hazed; she narrowed her eyes at the squad of Asari commandos on the other side of the warehouse and grinned widely. Every Eezo node in her body lit up at once and the bliss was almost enough to kill her as her biotics flared a bright blue.
The high from Red Sand was a thousand times better than the best sex. Intoxicating in every sense of the word.
"You just made the biggest mistake of your life," Her voice came out in a feral growl. "I'd run while I still had the chance," she roared, "drugs are no good to you if you're dead!
The leader snorted. "You bitch. You and your friends are going—"
Dakota didn't even wait for her to finish the sentence before rushing headfirst into the fight. She swung an arm out and sent a large shockwave barreling across the room, a snapping blue freight train that tore across the floor in enormous columns. The force of it rose sharply and crashed violently at blinding speed.
The drugs enhanced her biotics; it had been the only way she'd been able to make any sense of those abilities back when she was gang-running as a kid.
The power trip was maddening…
She whipped out her pistol and fired into the wave as it progressed, chasing at its heels. Shepard leapt over crates and railings, hurtling towards the group of blue aliens, landing a few headshots along the way. And they fell, one by one.
"Commander!"
"Haha. Let her go, pyjak. Doesn't look like she needs our help."
The voices of her squad were loud and getting louder as her senses started to amplify. Vicious, exponential magnification. The sound of hearts thrashing like anger, gargling moans of the enemy; ragged breath, the roaring tear of black gunfire and shattered skulls. The smell of hot, wet blood.
The taste of red sand.
Now it was getting hard to see. To stand.
Too much—she'd had too much. She slit her eyes and staggered and the floor gave out from under her, spinning, like some terrible carousel with hideous demons fastened to the poles. Everything blurred and the sky burned white hot, as her brittle bones flailed helplessly on the ground. A billion needles impaling her skin.
A rusty silhouette of a man glided towards her head, to watch as she burnt out from both ends like a bunked firecracker on the Fourth of July. Snap-snap-snap-SNAP. The eezo nodes blew apart, one by miserable one.
The red shadow reached for her; she howled loudly.
"Don't touch! Don't…"
The base of her brain exploded and put a stop to the whole universe.
Everything went dark.
The comedown was agonizing and painful—she felt like she'd been hit by a charging elcor head-on. She was shivering and cold, sweating and nauseated. Her vision was still blurry, her skin was covered in gooseflesh and she wrapped herself in the blanket tighter. Swinging her legs off the edge of the bed in the med bay, she fidgeted endlessly.
"Dr. Chakwas," her voice was hoarse. "this is…this is bad."
"I can't imagine, Commander. Give the sedative some time to work—you'll feel better in about twenty minutes or so."
"Mnn…" Shaking her head a few times, she hopped off the bed and began to pace. "Can I…go to my quarters…? The lights here…are bothering me. My head hurts. Please, Doctor Chak."
The gray old woman shook her head and herded her back to the gurney. "You shouldn't be left alone."
Dakota stumbled around her and began the long journey back to her room anyway. "I'm going AMA then. Sorry…I just can't…ugh…"
Her ears felt like they were filled with water, but she could vaguely hear the doctor say something as she passed through the door. It sounded like, "Keep an eye on the commander for me, would you? She's being stubborn again."
The moment she careened face-first into bed, she heard the door to her quarters open and close. She didn't bother to look up—she didn't need to. "I'm dying, Kaidan…"
A weight sunk into the mattress beside her; curling forward, his hands spread across her shoulder blades. "Don't go, 'Kota."
Every nerve in her body was shot to hell, but as his fingers dug into the muscles of her back she found herself gradually unwinding.
"Stay with me."
"I…I hate…that shit…so…mmnnn…it gives norms just a high but…biotics…fffuckkk…"
"If the withdrawal is so bad after the first hit…hmm…no wonder it's so addicting…"
Dakota gave a short bark of laughter, mostly muffled by her pillow. "The Fed-pen cleaned me up. Please, I'd been…a user since I was running with the Reds. It was the only way I could…make sense of my…abilities."
His motions faltered for a fraction of a second, and it made her wonder—was the addiction part never mentioned in her dossier? "It's…awful. So…good, but…awful. A vice. Kinda like…grilled cheese sandwiches and…barbeque and…" Her sentence dropped off and she held her tongue.You, she wanted to say.
To label Kaidan a vice would imply he was something bad for her—and he wasn't—but was still like a drug in so many ways. She needed him, craved him. His love made her so drunk she couldn't see straight; his touch gave her highs second only to that accursed red sand. He seeped into her veins and when he flared she felt it in her own nerves. She got antsy when he wasn't around—just knowing he was there when she needed him gave her a little piece of mind.
Hmm. A drug with no harmful side effects?
Well. He was goddamned distracting…
What would she call it? This…Alenko drug…
Alenko was probably just fine. It…suited him.
Ahh drugs. None of this made any sense, but it was just as well. She'd much rather be coming down from an Alenko high as opposed to a sand one.
His thumbs pressed into a node at the base of her neck and she sucked in a shallow breath through her teeth. Her shoulders flexed instinctively and he pursued, pushing a little harder in slow, concentric circles. Dakota's upper lip twitched as she began to sink into the sweet, sweet oblivion of…drugs.
The ones the doctor had given her earlier and then Alenko…she was drowning and didn't care.
"Kaidan…" His name came out automatically when he hit another node further down her spine, eliciting a shudder.
"Don't talk, 'Kota. Just close your eyes and go to sleep. You'll feel better when you wake up."