So, I am still trying to find all of my bearing regarding the story and the characters, especially their personality and the tone of the story. In a chapter or two I should have it nailed down but for now I found the text a little too rought for my tastes. That's what you get anyway. In this chapter, I am mainly concerned about setting the base of the universe at large and I'm experimenting with two method: In story explanations and codex. Let me know which one you think is best.
CelticReaper: Okay.
deadal: Thanks for bringing it to my attention. I had forgot how awful this translation is.
Thanks to DeathAdder 47117 for the spell checking
Atlantean
Spirit Tongue
Chapter one: Secrets and living fairy tales part 2
Citadel Day
Presidium
"Please. I... don't know what to say more."
"Any details are important."
"But really, I don't remember much. His face was hidden by a hood and the only thing I remember are his red eyes."
Nihlus sighed. He had tracked down the asari to her workplace and used his authority as a spectre to interrogate her. Unfortunately, she had had not much to say. At first, he had suspected that she was holding information due to some threat or intimidation but as he continued to press her he had to come to the disappointing conclusion that she really didn't know anything more than the color of his eyes, that he was a user of the human drug tobacco and had a sword.
"I'm sorry."
The asari looked stressed, understandably so. Being interrogated by a spectre, someone who could shoot you at a whim without consequence, often had this effect. At least with a Justicar you had some sort of idea if she was gonna kill or not.
"No need to. You have been very helpful."
The Spectre rose from his chair and, after a last nod toward Manira, left the Citadel News Presidium office.
Really this thing had been way less useful that he had initially thought. That said, the number of humans smoking tobacco is not that high, maybe a search through the Citadel camera. No, if his image on the vid was any indication, they had already either people working on the inside at erasing them or had implanted a virus inside the system and Nihlus knew he hadn't the skill to find it if even C-Sec E-Crimes division had not found out about it already. Tracking the smell of tobacco was also a pointless endeavour, between all the other human who make use of it, the billions of odours in the Citadel and the lack of electrical noses. The Spectre climbed in his personal shuttle, he had bought one after having killed a Terminus crime-lord by sabotaging an automatic skycar on Illium. Once again he was without lead, same as after the debacle on Omega and its ring of crazy junkies, the dead human puppets on Bekenstein or the monolith cult on Euntanta.
Nihlus was revising all of those failures in his head when his omni-tool biped. The sudden message was slightly surprising; the content even more so because he was pretty certain that he had never booked an appointment with the Matriarch. Apparently his appointment had been paid for, booked half a year ago and was in half an hour. Well, he had seen complicated setup for a meeting but that had to be the most unpractical yet. Really, half a year? You'd have to be either a seer or a madman to plan meetings like that. Either way, he wanted to see it.
He walked up to the asari receptionist.
"Madam."
"Yes?"
"Nihlus Kryik. I apparently have an appointment with the Consort."
Nelyna looked down at her holographic screen for a second before raising her head, smiling.
"Yes." She pressed a touch on the floating keyboard and almost immediately a human woman walked up the stair. "If you would please follow Janira."
He walked through the lounge toward the Consort's chamber, pondering. Nihlus had never really thought about the Consort. True, she was the keeper of many secrets but since she had based her reputation on keeping them, actually, secret she probably wouldn't be convinced by bribes or intimidation. Not mentioning the many people who would protect her and thus their secrets. As for her other talents, a talk or a good fuck had never really been that high on his priority list. Though, there had been rumors of her making predictions. A couple of months ago, he wouldn't even have entertain the idea as a joke, now, well.
The door opened, revealing the chamber proper and the famous Consort sat on a long sofa. She rose from her place when Nihlus and the human entered.
"Sha'ira, Nihlus Kryik is here." The girl said, slightly bowing.
"Thank you Janira."
The girl retreated and the door closed behind the turian. Now they were alone.
The asari matriarch advanced with all the sensuality that had made her reputation.
"I must admit that I am a little surprised, Spectre. I didn't expect someone like you to come to me."
She paused for a second. "Actually, I don't think you do too."
"Hmm, true. I don't suppose you know who booked this appointment for me?"
"Unfortunately not. But I am certain it was for a reason."
Yes, though usually it's because they want to kill him. Slowly, Nihlus began to walk around the room, looking for any sign of ambush. The Consort, herself, simply sat back on her couch and watched him prow around her.
"You look troubled, more so than is expected from a Spectre."
"Thank you, but I don't need counselling to see that."
"Obviously. Though you do need someone to talk to."
Her voice was warm and invited him to confess. He finished his walk, not having detected anything suspicious, eyeing the sofa. Well, why not. After all, she could hardly have him interned. He sat down.
"Okay, I'll bite. What am I supposed to talk about?"
She smiled. "Whatever is grudging your mind."
Nihlus sighed. Really it wasn't at all like him. This whole atmosphere and Sha'ira attitude was definitely off putting.
"Well, there is this lingering sense of horror accompanied by a feeling of dread at my own ignorance that has been bothering me for some time."
"As a Spectre, I suppose horror is not something you are a stranger with. Why now feeling dread?"
"Because before I could always explain horror. Gang message, insanity, psychopaths, they all commit murder for explainable reasons. They would butcher corpses, leave parts around the house of their enemies and, though sometime it wasn't evident, there was always some sort of sense behind it. Now, I see horrors happening, impossible horrors, that seem to have no reason at all. No, wait. They do have a reason; simply, just the fact of considering it is too mad and horrifying to do so."
During his speech, the Consort had skid to his side and put a gentle hand on his shoulder.
"Sha'ira." He turned his head toward her, his face not troubled or looking for support but hard as stone and with a deadly gaze.
"Yes?"
"Do you believe in the supernatural?"
Immediately, she retracted her hand. That, Nihlus had expected it, what he hadn't expected was the expression she displayed. It wasn't the slightly condescending look with the half smile preceding the talk about how supernatural things are nothing but old superstitions and nonsense. Rather, it was a mix of understanding concern and doubt. The Spectre jumped from his seat.
"What do you know? Who set this up?"
It was the asari turn to sigh.
"Calm down Spectre. I do not know anything for certain." She made an appeasing gesture but the trouble was still in her eyes. "I have lived a long life and have seen many things in all of my years. Some truly strange and defying logic at first glance. When I settled down here I was certain that I had seen more than most. But recently, I am not so sure anymore."
"And since when have you felt that?"
"I am sure you already know."
"The humans." Always them, it seems he could avoid them anymore no matter how much he tried.
"Yes. Though I doubt they are directly responsible."
"How so?"
"This feeling of dread, of being hunted, that shadows are deeper, that eyes from the darkness watch your every step. If they really had any control or conscious knowledge about it, do you really think their bittern of ambassador could resist the temptation to brag about it?"
Ah, yes, Udina. The leading theories between the other ambassadors was either that putting Udina in its role had been a revenge against the Council for its lack of actions against the batarians or the only way the System Alliance had found to get rid of him.
"Probably not."
"Though, I do not think all humans are unaware of this strange phenomenon."
Nihlus was about to ask another question when a rapid tap against the door was heard.
"Yes?" The Consort answered.
The door opened, revealing the asari receptionist.
"Yes Nelyna?"
"Um, for you."
She extended her arm, holding a cream envelope with a big red wax seal. The Spectre just had the time to see the symbol inscribed into the wax, a large L with a flower twisting itself around it, before the Consort snatched it from her receptionist's hand. She almost ripped it while opening it before, not literally, devouring the content. She stood still for a second before springing back to life, turning her sight toward Nelyna.
"Go get her, now!"
The receptionist nodded before rushing away.
"Nihlus." She turned toward the turian. "I'm sorry but I will have to interrupt our conversation. Maybe we could continue it another time; I'll make sure you get an appointment as soon as possible."
Nihlus thought about protesting but realized he probably wouldn't win a word contest with a matriarch like the Consort. No, the best way was, as much as he hated it, was to leave and come back later. Though, he didn't have to be happy about it.
"I'll leave then." His voice dripped with sharp anger. "As you apparently have more important things do to." The insult was barely hidden.
He walked up to the door, passing it to enter the long lounge, took two steps and stopped. He had wondered what could trouble to legendary calm Consort, maybe threats by the human she had talked about he had thought. Now though, right in front of him was the reason and it sure as hell didn't look like a threat. It was a human female, or at least she looked like one. Her skin seemed as white and pure as untouched snow, cold and deadly yet inviting. Her black ink hair were like a veil of shadows moved by some intangible wind, revealing her bright green eyes, sharp and awaken. On her face, she bore a half-smile, lips red as blood. Finally, the thing that completed her definitely outworldly appearance was her unique dress that clashed with the plain robes of the acolytes and the way she moved, as if she was too light and floated over the floor, swift as a breeze. She passed by him and simply slightly turned her head toward the Spectre, it was enough to make his heartbeat rise, his breaths accelerate and make him do the turian equivalent of blushing. Then, as if it only had been a dream, she was gone, the door behind him was closed and, as if they had all been holding their breath, all of those present in the room sighed.
Nihlus blinked several times, trying to understand what had just happened. Was that one of the humans the Consort had been talking about or something else? Maybe both? But if she was here, then maybe, just maybe, the man with the sword was close. It was really pushing it, as in completely improbable, but not impossible. He shook himself off the feeling of contemplation and rushed outside as fast as he could. When he emerged on the Presidium, he searched with all the desperation he could muster until, yes, there he was, climbing inside one of the shuttles with his tobacco tube between his lips. He ran to his own skycar, now he wouldn't let him go.
They landed near the dock and so did he. He had been as careful as he could possibly be during the whole tail tailing, who knew what kind of means they had to discover him. Now, as they passed through the crowded corridors, then the less crowded ones, then the empty one save for the rare Keeper, it was becoming extremely hard to stay away. If only he had had the time to take control of one of the Citadel's millions of cameras. Finally, they stopped in one of the passages and for the first time since the beginning of his investigation, Nihlus was able to see firsthand what he had been looking for. The girl with the painting on her back pullet out what looked to be feathers from her pocket before curling up against the wall. He couldn't see her hands, but he felt the sudden gust of wind that sent chills down his spine and the surcharge of all of his gears. When she rose again, she was holding some kind of deformed black bird between her hands and murmured to him. He felt his eardrums almost rip when the little monster shrieked and flew off to do whatever her mistress had ordered him to do. Then, there was a pause for a moment before the smoking man turned the corner and another before the girl did the same. The Spectre could still hear their voices as well as the ones of two others that didn't sound like friends. They seemed to argue for a few moments, then, Nihlus heard the following.
"Our boss is Vali't, an ex asari commando. We were hired to protect a red sand deal between her and a local gang." The words tumbled out of his mouth one after the other
"How many of you are there?"
"We were twenty, I don't know if the gang or the dealer has brought peoples."
"Thanks."
So the two of them were playing vigilantes? Or had they something to do with this Vali't? The questions without answers popped in his mind before being replaced with complete surprise when two LOKI mechs suddenly turned the corner. He reached for his gun but stopped when he saw just what exactly the two mechanical construct were doing. They were hugging, yes hugging, two Eclipse mercs and calmly walking away. The two mercenaries, a salarian and a human, looked at him with the same surprise he had as they passed by and disappeared away.
"What?"
"Hey, help us." The man said.
Nihlus simply shook his head and resumed his shadowing. They could rot for all he cared.
The Spectre infiltrated the hangar is one way. He had once heard a human refer to it as the video game way, but really the Citadel ventilation ducts were the size of a Keeper so it wasn't that improbable to do so. From there, he crawled between the high shelves full of crates that composed most of the hangar, hiding behind the boxes and in the shadows to observe the red sand deal happening in the center of the room. A human girl and the asari were there, separated by a crate and discussing, well, it was more the asari dictating terms to the human but it was still a deal. He had been watching for a moment or two, he did not survived as a Spectre by charging blindly into danger after all, when the first bang happened. It wasn't a gunshot, no, it was the sound of a heavy object falling and crushing something fleshy. Almost immediately, the mercs began to panic and Vali't started shouting.
"What the fuck his happening!"
"Huh... crate problem."
"Talok and Max got crushed!" That was another of the mercs.
"Then find who did it! Now!"
Boxes don't usually crush people on their own, what was happening? Next it was a patrolling mercenary who fell over the rail, then a human got locked into the bathroom. Strange things continued to happen, some were just hilarious, others lethal, what kind of tactic was that?
Espace-
"Funny isn't it?"
He almost shrieked like a little girl when he heard the voice behind his ear. Spirits thank for the turian military enforced legendary calm. Standing right beside him, white hair, odd clothes, strange gun and melee weapons, was Helena Blake. His scanner hadn't seen her, dammit; he hadn't even heard her, almost as if she wasn't breathing. Even to his current optic, she was barely a blur.
"Why are you here?"
She smiled. It looked like the smile of some apex predator, a dangerous one.
"Now, come on. That's not the right question is it?"
"I... what are you?"
"See, that's the question."
"Will you answer me?"
She chuckled. "Of course not. That's not how it works around here. Even if the whiny newdead wished it would. Now though, I have something to do."
"What?"
"Help the beauty and the asshole."
Nihlus, by virtue of being a Specter and having done many missions in the Terminus, had seen many powerful warriors. Turian who continued to fire after both they legs had been ripped off, a salarian who could beat a Krogan in hand to hand combat, those kinds of things. He had never seen someone get shot in the back and not even flinch like Helena had been by the asari. Neither had he ever seen someone shot in the back point-blank with a heavy pistol spun around and decapitate their assailant. Both happened. Then, she became a blur of movement, only to his very eyes this time. The mercs began to scream as they got butchered by the blade wielding woman, unleashing a storm of bullets on her to no avail. It wasn't that they didn't hit her, Eclipse troopers weren't that bad of a shot, she simply didn't seem to care. It only took her a couple of minutes to clean out the mercs left after the series of pranks, which, considering she was using her fist and blades was pretty respectable.
When she stopped and calmly walked back to the center of the room, the Spectre really didn't know what to expect. Anything at this point. Which still meant he wasn't ready when she slit her wrist open, kneeled down and began feeding her blood to the human girl. Then the blue haired girl appeared from over her, except that she now had a giant pair of black wings growing from her back and which were apparently strong enough to let her glide gently to the ground. Next was the man in the coat who jumped down from one of the catwalks and seemed to slide down the crates, jumping between two shelves. With movement like these, he certainly wasn't wearing any armor. But there was something off with his movement, jumps too long without momentum, fall that landed too softly and without enough weight, just as if some kind of force was helping him. And he wasn't a biotic, no blue aura. The two of them ignored Helena and rather focused on the crate that had separated the two dealers, were they in for red sand? No, they brushed aside the drug and opened the box. So what, magical artefact? As stupid as it might sound it seemed pretty sound considering the recent events. The man was masking his view of the box, meaning he didn't expected music to start playing. It was some sort of, well the closest he thing he could imagine were some old turian military hymns but it was more energetic, more free and less strict and focused. Had they just ran through a whole Eclipse platoon just to get some music?
Anyhow, he was ready to make his way out and maybe not turn mad as a result of what he had just seen when, of course, something else happen. The sounds of heavy boots rang over the music, disrupting its flow. He heard the shout of what must have been leftover mercs, felt gun being aimed at the three, the air suddenly became charged with static. Static? The man's left gloved hand seemed to be covered by little dancing blue flames for only the briefest of instant before three electrical spikes strong enough to stun a krogan appeared on Nihlus radar. Then, the two women drew their weapons and opened fired. By the sound, they certainly weren't using mass accelerators but whatever they were using was efficient because the dot representing the mercs on the Spectre radar beeped out of existence.
This was pretty much the moment when Nihlus' mind said 'fuck it' and shut down. He might have been a Spectre and a turian but there was only so much one mind could take before breaking down into pieces and right now, Nihlus' brain had reached this limit. He collapsed against the crate he had been hiding behind, curling up like an asari maiden. The idea he didn't know what was happening was nerve racking, knowing only a little was terrifying, now he started to apprehend that learning even a part of the truth would be madness inducing. What were they? Were they real or was he insane? How did Helena move that fast? How did the girl grow wings? What kind of power did the man have? His mind was racing with those questions to the point of giving him a headache.
"Still sane?"
He raised his head toward Helena leaning over him, grinning with crimson teeth. Dripping from her tainted chin were red droplets of blood that crashed onto his armor, as to how she had covered herself with the life liquid, the implications were troubling and yet somewhat confirming a theory. Behind her shoulder he could see the girl dealer, nervousness and fear incarnate as well as alive.
"What?"
"Hum, you can still talk. That's a good sign. Aliens usually don't last that long."
"Why?"
"You lack the proper background." Proper background? "Anyway, have a good time opening the door to the world of darkness. I will enjoying watching your progress and, if you can, try to be a pain in the ass of Solomon."
And with those last words, she left, the girl following after her like a little dog. Nihlus stayed behind the box, more confused than he had ever been and with the sudden understanding what shell-shock kinda feels like. There was at least one thing he was sure of; he needed to start carrying alcohol with him, ryncol at the least.
Ordo Codex
Vampire
There are three good ways to stop a vampire: fire, sunlight and wooden stakes. There are three things really hard to find in space and space stations: fire, sunlight and wooden stakes. That, combined with the fact that the vampire population has always been proportionately linked to the human population helps explain why of all the supernatural species, the vampires are the ones who beneficiated the most of humanity's expansion through the star. It is estimated that their population is somewhere between 150 000 and 250 000. If one adds to this number their ability to easily replenish their number at will and actually choosing who becomes one of their own and they are effectively currently the strongest faction.
Biology:
Vampires are medically dead. Their hearts don't beat, they don't breathe, when they are wounded their blood doesn't flow and yet they walk around, talk and hunt. The only thing still active in them is their brain and even so, only barely. Most poisons are useless against them, especially airbone ones. From experience, the most efficient are those directly attacking the blood of the victim and necrotic poisons. Garlic is useless except in cooking, vampires date back from way before christianism, water is wet and they wouldn't have survived that long if they needed your permission to enter somewhere. Sunlight, as previously mentioned, is extremely lethal to a vampire, burning them to a crisp in under a minute. Fire as well is dangerous to the undead, capable of sending them into a frenzy if used against them. Wooden stakes are good but need to be rammed through their heart and only send them into torpor. Most of the time, vampire physical and mental capacity are the equal of what they were when they were human. In a fight though, expect a vampire to be able to be able to punch through a concrete wall, run as fast as an olympic gold winner and shrug off sledgehammer hits. They do need to drink blood but less the physical liquid and more the representation of life in liquid form which they call Vitae. This is why they can only drink fresh blood and not just simply raid blood banks whenever they feel thirsty. They are immune to almost all mundane diseases but can carry them, which, with the apparition of sida and other likewise illness. Finally, their body's perceptions to pain, heat and cold are extremely muted.
Power
Vampire powers are wide and various. The most known and who are apparently possessed by all are: the ability to pass for a human with a heartbeat, breathing and skin tone and the ability to enhance their physical capabilities. For the rest, vampires have been seen using various mind manipulations, shapeshifting, phasing, telepathy and even twilight projection. This list of power is in no way exhaustive and one should never presume to know all of the abilities of the vampire opposing him. If you do, then you clearly lack the basic survival senses that every sentient being possess and deserve all that will happen to you.
Organization:
Few things are known from the internal organisations of the vampiric race. Prince is the title given to a vampire who is the leader of 'city', the title is applied to a female or a male. The term city is a bit of a misnomer as some colony count only one Prince, if at all, and that the captain of a ship who is old enough can claim the title of Prince as well but usually a Prince's power only extends over a large city and its surroundings. It is also a known fact that the age of a vampire since his death is the main factor in measuring its level of power and importance.
Space
Though their nature has historically made travel hard and dangerous on Earth and kept them a little immobilized into cities, space travel is another matter entirely. The enclosed hull of a spaceship is a really effective protection against sunlight, not that the light of a star several light-years away was ever a problem to them because otherwise they probably wouldn't have fared that well on the early days. Fire is not really an available weapon on a starship or space station. Vaccum and the cold of space are no more dangerous to dead bodies that need no oxygen than a pinch is. They don't need food nor water and can easily survive drifting on the cold of space for years if they are left alone. When picked up though, best be careful as the lack of blood might, as in will, turn them into frenzied killers. Mass accelerator and their sand grain bullets might be effective against the various aliens of the galaxy - even though kinetic barriers and medi-gel make that as hard as they can – but the dead animated flesh of vampire was already insensible to bullets, unless they successfully blew their heart or brain into pieces, so sand grains, no matter how fast, were pretty inefficient at stopping them. Fortunately for everyone, most of the Elder kindred stayed on Earth and those that took to the stars where the desperate young ones, at first. There is still a problem a vampire in space must face. The lack of food, meaning blood, in a spaceship is quite obvious. This problem was fixed by using a large crew of ghouls and piracy.
Piracy:
The predatory nature of vampires combined with their preference for isolation, violence and need for blood led them toward pirate tendencies. A typical crew usually consisted of between one and five vampires with around ten to fifty ghouls depending on the starship size. Young vampires taking a liking to the old profession of pirate proved to be quite an odd problem for the newly created Systems Alliance as vampire does not necessarily kill their prey and thus ship crews attacked by vampire raiders would often wake up with only fuzzy memories of the event, hole in their hull, security system wiped, half the crew wounded and their cargo gone. In the first days of human space expansion, it wasn't that much of a problem as the number of vampires acting as pirates was limited to three or four ships. Before the first rocky contact with the Council, their number was more between twenty or thirty. It wasn't the violence that was the problem, as far as pirates go vampire crews tend to be somewhat okay and, really important, don't take slaves. If they wanted human/blood bags to travel with them, they bring ghouls along which are, in fact, superior to a human. No, simply the number of vampire ships and the number of attacks made some very powerful things fear for the Masquerade and began to scheme plans in consequences. It is somewhat of a running joke that maybe they were the ones that orchestrated the event of relay 314, from the turian patrol going there and opening fire and all that followed, just to get the vampire pirates away from human space and keep them in the Terminus System with the Privateer's Agreement. As of now, they are the main mercenary forces recruited when defending colonies, not that colonies would know, and the main sources of horror stories for the Batarian Hegemony, though, they too wouldn't know either. A fact that is only as funny as their blatant propaganda and over inflated ego.
Ordo Codex
Privateer's Agreement
The Privateer's Agreement was an accord signed between the five mage Orders and the vampire pirates in the wake of humanity discovery of the Council and, more importantly, the Batarian hegemony. The Adamantine Arrow jumped on the occasion to enter in a war against an enemy that went against almost all of the Order's values. Though, contrary to how they are often stereotypically portrayed - as honor before reason warriors - they knew they hadn't the resources to defend all of humanity colonies and at the same time wage a secret war against the Batarian Hegemony. They organized a meeting with the vampire captains where they proposed the terms of the agreement. In exchange for mage technologies and armament as well as monetary reward the vampires would become the equivalent of 16th century privateers, hunting batarian pirates and protecting human's colonies in collaboration with the Adamantine Arrow and other. This, of course, didn't stop supernatural piracy but did greatly reduced it as the term of the agreement didn't forbid piracy anywhere but in Council space and against other supernatural beings while preventing said supernaturals from stopping them and offered a lot of advantages. The signatories still have to follow some regulation as they have to save any slave found on an attacked ship and bring them back, answer to all calls for defense by the Adamantine Arrow, never leave any real evidence of their presence and submit their navigation logs for review. Nevertheless, the Privateer's Agreement has worked so far and has been the base upon which the secret war against the Batarian Hegemony has been built.
Citadel docks
The ship we exited was, by Citadel classification, a corvette. With a length of around a hundred and twenty meters and varying between thirty to ten meters wide it fitted perfectly what passed as a cramped ship for most of the Citadel's species. But then, since most of the Citadel's races seemed to consider three meter large corridors to be the norm, maybe the reputation wasn't that deserved. Anyhow, if the ship fitted the number for a corvette, it certainly didn't fit the style. It wasn't surprising really. Most ships were designed around an eezo core while this one was designed around an infinite energy chip that takes its power from another dimension and a fixed temperature heat sink, a little like the system laser weapons used. In fact, there were several lasers connected to it, among other things. Anyhow, to me, it bore great resemblance to an old battleship with its hull going outward rather than inward, the tower replaced at the back of the ship and going all the way through it, a large propeller on the side and, okay a slightly older kind of battleship here, a decorated figurehead. For those who still know what I am talking about, its design is almost a perfect copy of a Dauntless light-cruise but smaller.
So, as I said, compared to other eezo based ships it looked quite odd. Compared to other ships designed by the various supernatural groups, it was at the same time unique and right in the norm. Why? Because uniqueness is the norm. Seriously, it's not as if we had some sort of standardization going on, the fact of belonging to the supernatural on itself largely prevented that. The mage usual construction philosophy can be summarized as: if you like it and it works, that's a go. I do not know what the other supernatural groups mentality is, though I heard that Changeling's designs are always a little ferric.
Quickly, on the point of fleet because I don't know if the subject will ever come up. We, and by that I mean the mages at large, have few ships if we were to be compared to the other races of the galaxy. First, it's not that big of a problem since a portal or teleportation is way easier and faster when you want to travel from planet to planet. Second, the size of our ships is usually really small but some have enough firepower to turn a planet into an asteroid belt from, well technically anywhere in the universe. Just our corvette could probably engage an entire fleet without a problem. Though that is more due to our shield than our weapons so probably not a good example.
Anyway, that's enough boasting about the Firefly. Any more and it will go to its head.
So, me, Raven and Alice walked into the great Citadel, the biggest trap ever constructed. Yes, we know. It took the first cabal to come here a good twenty minutes but they managed it. But even without magic, seriously, who in their right mind chooses the massive space station in the middle of nowhere that might have been built by a race that mysteriously disappeared fifty thousand years ago as the seat of their coalition's government. Hell, it sounds more like a horror movie premise than anything else, a bad one at that. The Council chamber is even in the form of a freaking Reaper for god's sake.
Anyway, for some strange reason, it was the political and economical center of the Council races, one that most supernaturals avoided to stay at for too long. As far as I know, officially the Presidium is claimed by both the Seer of the Throne and the Silver Ladder and the two are engaged in a fierce battle for it. In reality, if the Council was to ever be bewitched by anyone and started to make meaningful decisions with real impacts, I think the wave of Disbelief would disintegrate every spell in a ten thousand light-year radius. As such, both groups settled for a lower but more direct form of command over the ambassadors and some important colony governments while fighting each other through proxies. Personally, I also think the idea of having to live on the Citadel wasn't something anyone with a connection to the supernatural envied. Really, I don't have enough knowledge on the other supernatural groups to say, but through my Sight I could see the traces of the billions of murders that had happened here. The layers of pain, agony, fear and distress that covered every inch of the Citadel; the resulting Wraiths having barely faded in the last fifty thousand years.
As such, along with the Wards, the Citadel was mostly free of any major group influence. Which meant the place was crawling with said Wraiths, violent Spirits, delusional Banishers, addicted Vampires, fanatic Hunters and other horrors. Hell, just three weeks ago an Adamantine Arrow cabal fought a mad mage who thought himself the bringer of a new age of undead domination. Hmm, with stupid ideas like that it's a miracle the Paradoxs didn't get to him before them.
Ah damn, I'm blabbering again. Let's get back to the three of us heading toward our first destination.
We passed the docks surprisingly inefficient borders and from there took an automated shuttle to the Presidium. I will take this as an example to ramble, again yes, on why the Citadel is freaking dangerous. On the Ward, oxygen only goes up seven meters up and so the only thing separating us from the vacuum was the shell of a X3M. It might not be a problem for most peoples, but I have spent enough time dabbling into the occult to know that I am doing the equivalent of handing a loaded gun to my enemies. By some miracle, we landed without dying in front of the Consort's Chambers.
Espace-
"Yes. Can I help... you."
The surprise on the asari's face was quite blatant. I suppose she doesn't often see people with as much style as us.
"Yes." Alice stepped up in front of her, immediately capturing the blue girl's attention. She wasn't one of the Fairest for anything. "I would like to leave a message for Sha'ira. Please."
"You want to make an appointment? I think I can find you a place next month. In the meantime you are welcome to come and..."
"Sorry, but no. I simply want to leave a message for her."
"Oh. Okay. What is the message?"
I'm pretty sure she was expecting some kind of verbal dictate or email, not an actual cream colored envelope written in ink and sealed with blood red wax.
"Oh, eh, I don't know if..."
"I plead to you; deliver this to the Consort today for me. An offering of beauty as reward to avoid to wither."
"Huh..." She hesitated a moment, taken slightly aback by the, even for me, odd phrase. "I... I suppose, okay then."
She took the envelope and... Bam! Would I have had my Sight up, lifting the veil over the true world, I would have seen ephemeral red ribbons entangle themselves around the asari, binding her into a pledge with a Changeling. The receptionist felt some effect though if her suddenly widened eyes, blushing and half repressed gasp were any indications. It is frightening to see how easy it is for someone unaware to fall into a Changeling contract, unknowingly binding themselves into a pledge that the universe itself is watching. Unlike modern contracts, you can't get out of those with just by saying: I lied, then run away. You break the pledge; you suffer the consequences, the end. Sure you can find loopholes if you're lucky but Changelings are pretty good at this, otherwise they wouldn't have escaped their True Fae kidnappers. Even thinking of way to break your word is sometime enough to trigger the consequences. I swear every time I talk to one I scrap my nerves trying to uncover the trap behind every words in fear of pledging myself to a suicide mission, again.
The three of us turned and walked a little farther.
"So, just how entangled is this matriarch?" I asked while lighting up a Lucky Strike.
I barely had the time to say this before the running asari caught up to us.
"Wait. Miss, please. The Consort would like to talk with you."
Raven whistled. "Damn, that's a lot."
With a wave of the hand, Alice brushed off the comment and turned toward the blue woman.
"It would be my pleasure. Just a second please." She turned toward us. "So, see you two tonight."
"You really think it will take you that long?" I was curious about that.
"Yes." She sighed. "She hides it well but a thousand years at keeping secrets gave her quite a lot of nightmares."
"I also heard that she was pretty cute." Interjected a smirking Raven.
"What? What has that to do with anything?"
"Oh, I don't know. It's just that you always seem more eager to help nice looking girl for free."
She lifted her chin toward the false sky, adopting a false scandalized expression, might also be a true one considering her origin. "Lies and slander that I will not grace with an answer." Then she took a way more serious expression. "Experience as taught me better than to trust beauty."
And with that she left with the asari who now looked strikingly more beautiful than a couple of minutes ago.
Okay, I know I harped a little previously about Changeling deals and not in a good light. But really the conditions of it and thus their levels of wickedness really depend on the one setting up the deal and for a Fairest; Alice is really what could be called a good one. As relative as it may be; she is our dream specialist and really you shouldn't be laughing. I'm not saying that she sits you on a couch and ask you about your night, no, she mentally travels inside your mindscape and manifest there with a body chosen by her unconscious and explore your brain which appear as an allegorical construct commonly called the Oneiros. From there, she can transform the most bloodthirsty krogan into a vegetarian scared of his own shadow, loot the most secret memories of the salarian Dalatrass without her even realizing it or turn the most sane of elcor into a psychotic wreck. Then, if she moves higher she can access the Temenos which is, approximatively, the general unconscious of all sentient being. There you can walk into the unconscious representation of say, the Citadel, that is formed by the thoughts, feelings and ideas of all of those that live in it. Want to have something done in the real world, do it every night in the Temenos Citadel and watch a new form of social engineering in action. After that you have the Anima Mundi which is the most impersonal of three Astral Stratum has it isn't concerned at all by you. It is, in a way, the subconscious manifestation of the entire universe, the dreams of all that lives and doesn't form this place where you are truly insignificant. By the way, no, there hasn't been any tentative to apply social engineering in this realm. The sheer size and logistic of it combined with the inherent dangers of the place makes it an insanity that even the Seers of the Throne would laugh at.
From there Raven and I took another flying coffin to the Wards.
"So, since I suppose you knew that would happen. Why did you really bring me along?"
"Do you know what day it is?"
I raised an eyebrow. "Based on which calendar?"
"Gregorian."
"3 may."
"Exactly. And tomorrow is...?"
I actually had to think a little about it. I knew that may fourth was Star Wars day thanks to my calendar, doubt it was what she was talking about, there was no occult celebration to mention, nor any grand event. "Hmm, was there a war between the Werebeasts I didn't know about and is celebrated tomorrow?"
She sighed. "Yes. But what I was talking about is Alice and Lizzie's birthday."
"Tomorrow's their birthday?"
"Yes. Though I suppose I should have expected that from you."
Yeah, I am kind of really bad at remembering details like names, anniversary, dates, those little things. I can remember faces, actions, and the content of a three thousand year old occult scroll I read six month ago but I need a post-it to remember Raven's birthday.
"Okay, okay. So, we are looking for a gift."
"No, I already took care of that. The only thing left for us is to pick it up."
I knew the smile she was making. It wasn't a reassuring one. "Yeah, no way. What went wrong?"
She shrugged. "Well, I hired some normal people to bring it from earth, they got arrested for some out of date papers and got all of their cargo confiscated. Then this cargo found itself on the edge of the terminus and the way of another stupid batarian pirate raid that got intercepted by vamp raiders who contacted me and accepted to deliver the gift here. And they did. But now the Ghoul they placed to watch the hangar got shot and apparently, Eclipse mercs have taken possession of the place. You know, the usual."
I couldn't help a small sigh. "Why are our lives so... hurg. Well, since it's Eclipse I suppose I should be glad there isn't any ritual sacrifice of seven virgins in order to contain an old god or the invocation of a fire god from old batarian legends included. Right?"
"Pfu, no way." She rolled her eyes. "The group has asari in it. With a human only group, maybe. But asari, they wouldn't believe in the supernatural even if you were to throw them into the spirit world. Which is freaking weird because they're all biotics."
"Biotics are not supernatural." That lesson had been learned painfully and is still learned by many newbies. The Abyss must have had a field day with that.
"Even so, you'd think people that can manipulate gravity would be more open to the idea of the occult. Not laugh about it at every turn."
"Honestly, I'm not gonna complain. I'd rather not see the asari develop their own Inquisition, the catholic and protestant ones are already enough of a pain in the ass."
"Yeah, yeah, I know. But hey, they have like what, thousands of years of history and even thousand year old citizens. How the hell does none of them ever even have one supernatural encounter? Not even a big one, just a ghost or a little spirit."
"The same thing could be said about humans you know." I know the argument was miserable but I like the fire in her eyes when she gets angry.
"Tss, no comparison. Humanity had several Hunter conspiracies dedicated to fight the supernatural, a load of insane scholars, madmen and such who all know about more or less about the hidden world. Okay it's less than one percent of the population but it's still something. The asari, well, any alien races in fact, nothing. I assumed the turians at least would have some sort of organization about that with all their talk about spirits."
"Agreed. And the salarians with their STG?"
"Oh come on, they're way too remote from anything spiritual to even think about it. With their need to understand everything they will turn more insane then a lovecraft protagonist two seconds after their first supernatural encounter."
She huffed, pouting. "Really this contact with alien civilisations has been pretty disappointing so far. No new werebeasts, no new Changeling kind, even their spirits look like weak newborn. It's almost as if they had had no contact with the supernatural before we arrived."
"Yeah. So far the thing has been a pretty bad deal on all levels." I caressed her two toned hair. "There is still the Ardat-Yakshi."
She leaned against my shoulder.
"Oh please. A newdead vampire could rip the head off one without breaking a sweat."
"On that point, can we count on the vamp for help?"
My question was met with an empty look.
"Of course."
We arrived at our destination on Kithoi Ward and left the automated shuttle for the large corridors that composed the Ward. The usual crowd of turian, asari, volus, humans and even the rare quarian hiding in the side alleys as a constant reminder of the Council's heartlessness and imbecility, walking around, shopping, eating, working, and begging. It was a peaceful scene that looked nightmarishly different when I used my Sight.
For the non-mage, the Sight refers to when a mage uses one of the ten arcana that categorize magic - Death, Fate, Force, Life, Matter, Mind, Prime, Space, Spirit and Time- to lift the veil that covers the universe. Depending on the arcana, how you see the universe can change quite a lot. Though all allow the same basic things; observing covert spells, magic in general and scrutinize resonance which is basically the aura of persons, things and places. I myself have trained in three of them, Force, Prime and Life. Force Sight allows me to visually perceive all of the universe's forms of energy like heat, wireless signals, cosmic radiations and more. The Prime Sight, apart from being the most potent to read resonances makes it that I only need to concentrate on someone to see his nature aura. Basically what the person is: a mundane Sleeper or a supernatural being. Finally, there is the Life Sight which is quite useful at reading the presence of mystic vital animation and also the least used of my Sight.
Now, seeing as I was walking through the Citadel with both Force and Prime Sight on, from my point of view it was as if I was advancing through a constantly changing ocean of pulsating waves of energy with colors that couldn't be described with words and that had vaguely humanoid forms of muted grey walking through it, normal people. At my side, the aura of Raven was one of vibrating violet, yellow and slight streak of silver, a Werebeast. In short, let's just say that it was pretty hard to navigate and I don't even want to think about fighting. As to why I was doing that, well, Prime was because I was still hoping to find an alien supernatural and Force was because you can actually read patterns through wireless signals, heat and elements zero radiations that would warn you of any attack way before it would actually happen. It's insane the levels of energy an armed and armored mercs squad emit, just the omni-tool of an engineer is like a giant flare to me.
Anyway, we walked toward the hangar through ever less and less populated places until reaching the Eclipse controlled area. There, we found ourselves hiding behind one of the bullet and missile proof walls that composed the Citadel at the end of an alleyway, a side door leading to the hangar at the other end. Ah, one of the advantages of being able to manipulate and even create the energy of this universe while being on a space station which walls had electricity literally running through them and was full of signals is the numbers of option available to me. Just now, one of my eyes' sight had been replaced by the one of a camera observing the Eclipse by picking up the wireless signal the little machine was transmitting. There was our first obstacle in the form of an engineer, a trooper and five LOKI mechs.
"So?" Raven was stamping with impatience, her right hand already covered with tiny scales and sporting curved claws in place of nails.
"I can take care of the LOKI's no problem." Gekkos now I would have been a little less sure. "But the two guys could use some focus redirection."
She grinned. "Hmm, a distraction then."
From her pockets she picked up small sticks, some dirty or broken feathers, tiny ropes and a pair of red LEDs. Five minutes later, the trash had been assembled together in some sort of mockery of a raven that could only have passed for one if you were really drunk. Fortunately, its appearance wasn't the point. Holding the monstrous puppet between her hands, she closed her eyes and gently blew on it. For a brief second, the static in the air reached extreme levels while the body of the creation acted as if it was drifting in a great wind; extending its wings and letting them catch the invisible flow.
"Go little one and by you be everyone fascinated." Raven murmured to the puppet.
It answered with a strangled cry before taking off into the air, flying down the corridor and landing just over the closed door. If the LOKI's didn't even flinch, the same couldn't be said of the salarian engineer and the human trooper. What Raven had just created is commonly called a Tar-Baby and unlike the one in the story, this tar-baby emotionally latches onto its victims. They are captured by its aura of mockery, compelled to focus on the damnable thing with spite and hatred. As the person is attracted by the creation, it pushes the victim onto an agitated state bordering on fury, then it evolves into absurd theatrics of rage before finally the entrapped notice nothing except the mocking tar-baby. The two mercenaries were at this state when I walked up to them and connected myself to the LOKI's mech.
Okay, again for the non-mage I will give you a summary.
1. Magic is basically an act of will on the part of the mage. The mage canalizes the energy from the supernatural realm through his soul which is then shaped by the mage's mental image of what the magical energy should do, the Imago, based on the arcana used.
2. Magic works on an idealistic level, not a scientific one. It's why, for example, shadows and darkness is actually considered a thing in itself and not simply a lack of light.
3. Each arcanum is divided into five ranks – Initiate, Apprentice, Disciple, Adept and Master – depending on how much control one has over this aspect of magic. A Force Initiate is pretty limited to a Sight, manipulate heat, light and sounds, listening on wireless signals, nightvision, hearing sub/supersonic frequencies and the like. A master like me can create EMP blasts, earthquakes, fly, summon tsunamis, manipulate gravity a little and has pretty much total control and creation power over heat, light, sound, electricity, fire and kinetic energy.
4. The universe hates mages, only mages and on a really personal level. When using vulgar magic, a.k.a. magic that stretches the laws of the universe a little too much like a thousand fireballs or changing a solid wall into sand, there is a tiny slight risk that it, the universe, takes notice and snaps back at you. If you're lucky, your spell only backfires. If you're really unlucky, there's an abyssal demon that pops up into existence somewhere around and whose eternal goal is to make your life a living hell. And of course, the more powerful you get and the more likely the universe is to notice you. One of the main reasons why I didn't charged the Eclipse mercs with lightning and flames like a demon from heaven.
To activate the LOKI's password was an Apprentice level trick. After that, it was simple to reprogram them to our side and with a couple of other protocols. The two mercenaries were still completely obsessed with the false bird when Raven came along and pulled out some zip ties. The next moment, the tar-baby dissolved into black goo and foul smelling smoke, freeing the two mercenaries who found themselves pretty confused and with the bore of a Luger P08 barrel and my pistol against the back of their heads.
"What! How did this happen?" The salarian started.
"Omni-tool new apps. Now drop your weapon or drop dead."
The human smirked. "Idiot. Team omega, protocol six."
His words hanged in the air for an instant. I am pretty sure he was expecting something from the mechs, too bad for him.
"Why did they put me with you…" The salarian sighed.
Raven pushed the end of the Luger's barrel deeper against the man neck.
"Last chance."
They were maybe ruthless mercenaries but they weren't stupid. Their weapons fell at their feet.
"Okay. Now, engage protocol valentine."
The two Eclipse watched, first in complete astonishment then with mild terror as two LOKI mechs walked up to both mercs, opened their arms and hugged them, tightly.
"Huh!?" The salarian seemed in shock.
"What the hell!?"
While they were occupied, Raven and I snatched both of their omni-tools and smashed them.
"Hey, you can't do that." That was the, now, quite upset salarian.
"Why?" That's something I was truly curious about. It seemed that nobody bothered to remove the omni-tool of the people they capture. Seriously, I saw a police officer using what he called omni-cuffs which were apparently holographic handcuffs somehow binding a person's arms but left the person their omni-tool. How low has common sense fallen for police officers to leave criminals with a freaking computer able to run hundreds of hacking programs, communications and a thousand other things capable of breaking them free? Omni-blade much. Maybe there was a law somewhere that said that you can't remove someone else's omni-tool.
"I... uh... you just don't do that."
"So much for the legendary salarian wits. Now hold still."
There was a faint shriek sound as the zip tie closed around his wrist.
Once that was done and we were ready to leave when the human looked at our weapons.
"Wait. Those aren't guns."
"Certainly not mass accelerators." The salarian added.
They were right, mine was an energy weapon and Raven was shooting the equivalent of a bullet size disruptor torpedo. Funny the thing a cabal of Adamantine Arrow armorer can come up with the entire russian stock of old AK-10x, an equal stockpile of munitions, the ability to transmute eezo by the ton and two weeks of free time.
"Certainly not." I answered with a smile.
The human let out a pitiful groan. "Dammit, she's gonna kill us both once she learns that."
"And she's gonna torture us if you don't shut it now."
I could have felt pity for the two. But it feels hard to do so considering they were mercenaries and the space mercenaries in Citadel space are some of the worst individuals you can imagine, to a few exceptions, which made Academies look like GI-Joe. Most are run more like gangs than anything else. For example, shooting employees who get captured.
Raven approached the human, removing his helmet to look at his young face. "You. Tell me what's happening in there and I let you get away."
"Pfu, as if it's gonna work." The salarian smiled.
At first, he might have been right. But the muzzle of a Luger under his chin combined with the feral aura of a Corvian can be powerful motivators.
"Our boss is Vali't, an ex asari commando. We were hired to protect a red sand deal between her and a local gang." The words tumbled out of his mouth one after the other
"How many of you are there?"
The salarian was left agape at the human blabbering of their operation on an offhand promise.
"We were twenty, I don't know if the gang or the dealer has brought people."
"Thanks."
"Now you let me go?" He was almost begging to her.
"Yeah. To C-Sec."
"What?"
"Idiot." The other merc whispered.
Calmly, the hugging LOKI's started to walk away toward C-Sec station with a full recording of his confession. The only thing missing would be Raven's face and both our voices.
"Well, that was something." I shook my head. "You call her or do I?"
Here I was referring to a certain Helena Blake, or at least it was the name she was using right now. She and her coterie were probably responsible for three-fourths of the recent reduction in drug trafficking. Why? It gave blood a bad taste and nobody wants to see drugged vampires running loose on the Citadel. She was the Prince of the Citadel and it was her job to keep the blood sucker's population in control, to deal with the troublesome and make sure nobody notices that a small part of the Council's great space station population liked to feed on the rest. Though, with a population of around thirteen million, there probably wasn't more than a hundred, hundred and fifty vampires present in the Citadel, probably way less considering the atmosphere, fewer than there is in Boston. Still, even say fifty or seventy enraged vampires could probably chew through a good chunk of the station without much problem which is why Helena was trying her best to limit the drug circulation so that none of them did. Well, at least because of drugs.
"Hey, you're the one she fears, you contact her."
"Maybe but she also hates me. It's you she likes"
"She likes my blood, that's not the same at all." The door to the hangar opened. "Me, I'm going in."
"Be careful."
"As always."
"That's exactly what I fear."
"I know." And a flying kiss later, the door closed on a smirking girl.
"Still. Be safe." I murmured for myself
The voice that rang inside my ear sounded violent, as if I had mortally insulted the person simply by calling her.
"Yes."
"It's Solomon."
There was a sort of shuffling sound and a couple of beeps. The voice that spoke next was way softer but had still a sharp edge barely hidden.
"What do you want Solomon?"
"Helena, charming as ever."
There was a groan, like the one of a wolf. "Solomon, as rude as ever. Tell me, are you always that much of an ass."
"No, only you are special enough for me to be that nice."
"Well now I know why you're parents committed suicide."
"Okay. So now that this is out of the way, I just wanted to inform you that there is a deal happening right now."
"I know. And no I won't help you get back whatever you want from that hangar. I'm not a recovery company."
She was ready to hang up. "But what if I told you the deal involve red sand?"
There was a moment of silence before she answered. "Solomon. If you are lying to me just to get my help I swear I will suck dry an entire orphanage and paint your name with their brains on the ground of the Council chamber."
"I swear to you that there is a deal going on that; based on the current information I have, involve red sand. There should be around twenty guys. Do whatever you want with that, me, I have to catch up with Raven." And I hanged up.
Helena already hated my guts ever since I burned one of her child, hanging up on her wouldn't change that by much. Now, I had to reach Raven before she start to prank the mercenaries to death.
The inside of the hangar was rank after rank of shelves full of more bulletproof crates all lit by powerful lights that illuminated the whole room. Eclipse troopers could be seen patrolling the numerous catwalks and guarding the entrances, watching for anything out of the ordinary. Which seemed a little dumb to me. Isn't hiring mercs the best way to attract attention to yourself? Also, what looked to be the two dealers; an asari clad in a black body-glove, which was called armor these days, with a look of contempt on her face and a shabby dressed girl were discussing with a crate between them. Why couldn't criminals discuss their deals in some restaurant during lunch rather than in some shady part of town? It's as if they wanted vigilantes or movie ambushes to happen. Anyhow, I followed the same path Raven took, walking some bland corridors until I reached a console. The thing was simply a stock list but it was connected to the internal system and that was all I needed to take control of the few cameras inside. With those electronic eyes, I began to observe the situation and look out for signs of Raven's usual meddling. I didn't have to wait for too long.
The first to feel was a salarian. Calmly walking on one of the catwalks, he suddenly felt and saw a black form brush past him. Reflectively, he looked at his radar, nothing. Well that's reassuring. He twisted his head, looking for whatever it was that had passed him. Further along the path, there was a strange black winged animal looking at him. What the hell was that thing doing here?
"Shh, go away."
The only answer from the bird was a short croak. How interesting. He approached it, only for the black animal to jump away and continue to look at him. As if it wanted him to follow. Well, why not. It's not as if anything bad could happen. Calmly, he began to pursue the dark bird who guided him through the footbridges on the air until they reached one of the shelves. There, the creature seemingly began to push against one of the crates before jumping on top of it and start hoping.
"You want me to push this?"
The salarian could have sworn the bird nodded. Well, that was turning into something extremely interesting. He rarely had seen animal with such intelligence. Maybe he could investigate that latter. Right now, he didn't saw any problem into doing what the animal seemed to ask of him, always had a little weakness for animal life. It felt a little odd but what wasn't at first view. He pushed the crate, easily at that.
"Happy?"
The bird let out what sounded like a strangled laugh which was almost immediately covered by the sound of a heavy object falling followed by the scream of two people.
Almost immediately, his ears were filled by the yells of Vali't.
"What the fuck is happening!?"
"Huh... crate problem."
"Talok and Max got crushed!" That was another of the mercs.
"Then find who did it! Now!"
"Well, shit."
The big raven that was, well, Raven, continued to play with them, both in a lethal and non-lethal way until they were quite literally panicking. It was quite a strange spectacle to see, one I only helped a little to create. The asari, Vali't, was looking more and more pissed off while the girl facing her was sweating profusely and looked a second away from a panic attack. Of course, it was the moment Helena decided to show up. She emerged from the shadow of a shelve alley, clad in a white and red robe that was opened on the front from the waist down, showing her black pants and scarlet boot. Strapped around her chest were military suspenders to which a pair of world war one German bayonets as well as a FN Five-seven were strapped. Yes, out of place outfit weren't an exclusivity of our group. Now, this combined with the fact that she was applauding as she was making her way toward the meeting helped explain a little why all the mercenaries simply looked at her with total astonishment and made no move to stop her. Maybe it also had something to do with her powers that she suddenly seemed to be the most important person in the room that nothing could hurt, who knows. In any case, I left the camera for a window, Helena was but a blurry smudge to them and I wanted to hear the conversation.
It took only a second after I made my first step on the metal catwalk for a raven to land beside me and, in a cloud of feathers that dissolved into black dust a moment latter, turned back into her human form.
"Had fun?"
"Plenty. What do you think Helena will do?" She sat on the railing, legs hanging thirty meters over the ground.
"If they back down, only a warning. If not... I doubt she has survived for more than a century by being shy with violence."
"Yeah, too bad for them." She sighed.
"Yep."
Down on the floor, Helena had walked up to the two dealers, not caring even a bit for all the guns that were now aimed at her.
"Welcome. Let me introduce myself, I am Helena Blake."
She bowed a little, still smiling disturbingly. Facing her, the other woman and the alien did not respond to Helena salutation. A mistake really. There was some kind of unwritten law in the supernatural world that, to a point, polite manners were really important. It was vital when you deal with spirits capable to turn an entire city into a volcano with an off thought, Werewolves capable of ripping the arm of a krogan or any other kind of thing. If someone came to you, bowed and introduced himself, the least you could do was to answer properly. Then you could go on with the fighting. When compared with the relative rudeness of everyone else, it sometimes created friction. Just now, as Helena rose from her bow, even at the distance I could have sworn I saw her twitch.
"So, you two. You might not have been informed but red sand and other similar drugs have recently become highly regulated on the Citadel under penalty of death. Though, some people never get the memo unfortunately. But, I am not unreasonable and as such I am giving you both a chance to stop this stupidity right now."
"What?" The human girl was left with her mouth hanging open while Vali't simply had a 'are you kidding me' look.
That didn't discourage Helena who took a step forward, putting herself in front of the girl and between the two.
"Miss. Whatever you think about doing, it isn't worth it. Turn back now and you might just live."
See, when I talked about Helena's powers, I wasn't kidding. The girl looked at the same time to be terrified and in awe of Helena and give or take a couple of seconds she would probably have done just as the Prince ordered. Unfortunately, the asari decided that the Helena was crazy and whipped out an M-3 Predator before proceeding to shoot the vampire in the back. Without any barrier or armor to oppose it, the heavy pistol round pierced her skin, passed through her chest whose organs had long since became useless to the undead she was and reduced to black, frail lump of organic tissue that didn't block the round in any way, chipped one of her ribs and exited her body to then smash into the human dealer. Time seemed to float for a moment as the poor girl realized there was now a bleeding hole through her, that her stomach was but a torn mess and that she was dying. It was also a time during which the asari remembered something called over-penetration, which, with everyone shooting projectiles at relativistic speed, you'd think would be a more common occurrence.
During the whole thing though, Helena hadn't so much as blinked.
"So be it then."
The dying girl didn't had the time to hit the ground that, faster than the eyes could see, the vampire had spinned, drawn her blade and rammed them through the asari, lifting her from the ground, smiling as the alien screamed before finally ripping her throat. That, that made the mercenaries react. Too bad for them that shooting dead flesh with bullets the size of a sand grain is not that efficient, as in not at all. It was already hard to bring them down with 7.62 expanding rounds, a modern assault rifle, don't even think about it. She on the other hand had no problem to jump from mercenary to mercenary at superhuman speeds and hit them through the weakness of their armor with enough strength to yank them off the ground. Some only had the time to see a blur before both their arms were separated from their bodies, others saw their legs fall under them before being thrown over the edge of the catwalk they were standing on. They could have fared a lot better of course, Helena isn't invincible. Ganging up on her with knife or bayonet they didn't have, using a flamethrower or even just rushing her at twenty would probably have had some positive result. Too bad the only thing they did was to scream and shoot at her until their weapons overheated. Oh, bashing her with overheating weapons, that could probably have yielded some nice results. In a matter of minutes, all the Eclipse troopers were either partially dismembered or agonizing their last moments or already dead.
"Seems clear enough."
"Probably." I wasn't sure about those guarding the exits outside though.
"Hmm, first to the ground wins."
I didn't even have the time to answer before she jumped from the rail, thirty meters in the air. I want to point out that I didn't panic seeing what might have been otherwise considered a suicidal action, in part because I trust her and know her enough to know that she would never kill herself unless it meant she would screw with over ten million people and also a little because the tattoo on her back had disappeared to be replaced by a very real pair of ink black wings with a span of around five meters.
"Win what?"
"What I want." She answered back.
What followed is another one of the reasons why I don't wear formal armor even though it is apparently legal to waltz around in military grade equipment. The thing weighs a ton and you are either a game character or an action movie hero if you can manage a roll or a jump with it and I am neither. I can't imagine trying to free run with anything heavier than light armor, not with heavy magic usage at least. Which is why I used something more discreet. It's a rote I got from the Ka no Maki, The Fire Scroll, which itself is part of the Hiden Gogyo Bujutsu. Long story short, it's an old set of scrolls describing outdated arts of warfare and now mostly useless except for the magical knowledge hidden in its 15th century kanji. If I remember correctly, it is called the floating step and basically it manipulates wind currents and kinetic energy around me to improve my balance and jumping ability, all while reducing my effective weight. Anyhow, I made my way down, jumping from crate to crate, ledges, nooks and such until I hit the ground with a roll, landing in front of Raven, her wings folded around herself like some kind of cloak.
"You won."
She shrugged. "Was there ever any doubt?"
"Never, with that ego of your supporting you I have no chance to beat you in the air."
She sticked her tongue out to me. "Pfu, sore looser"
We made our way toward what was previously the place of a drug deal and now was the scene of a way more disturbing event. Crouched over the body of the dying girl, Helena was feeding her, her blood. I don't know what had been the poor girl first reaction, but right now she was voraciously drinking it. I doubt she was turning the girl into a vampire, that is not something you do lightly, more likely Helena was making herself a new ghoul. I couldn't do anything, not without major consequence, and I am not sure I wanted to do anything anyway.
"Okay, which crate?"
Raven knocked the top of the one the top dealer had used as a table.
"You're kidding?"
"Nope."
Beside it, Helena rose from her position over the girl, leaving her breathless, not literally, and with the hole in her stomach gone. She turned toward us, moving slightly toward Raven, smiling. A smile only slightly ruined by the blood and fangs.
"What is in this crate exactly?"
"No idea."
"I'll tell you if you explain to me why you are here, alone." Raven retorted.
The bayonets wielding Prince shrugged. "I have lived for over two hundred years, soon three. I have fought Lupines, mages, ghosts, spirits and a thousand more things that I never learned the name of while dealing with generations of over ambitious newdead kindred and pompous Elders. I don't actually need a retinue to do the killing for me; it is simply for the sake of tradition. Especially against those modern mercenaries, I was more afraid of the gangsters of my youth. Also, I like doing some ground work from time to time, especially if it means I get to talk with you." She leaned over the crate, smirking.
Action to which Raven answered by opening the case, shoving her away to reveal the inside, all with a smile. From under the stuffing, she extracted a metal easel whose frame was an intertwinement of sculpted roses. Then, a complete painting set which also followed the rose theme
"That's for Alice. You wouldn't believe how hard it is to find physical supports for painting these days."
The second thing she pulled from the box was an assemblage of engraved wooden box and large bronze cone.
"Antique gramophone for Lizzie with..." She grabbed a vinyl. "24 Caprices for Solo Violin"
I have no idea what the price of those things was, but seeing that they were antiques from over three hundred years old, the answer was probably a lot or insanely a lot.
"Can you play it?"
We both turned toward Helena, an inquiring look on our face.
"What? I haven't heard anything but techno for the last five years."
Okay, even I cringed at that.
"Raven?"
She sighed. "Why not."
The contact of the needle against the surface of the disk produced a little ping sound that was almost immediately forgotten when the violins began to play. First heard four hundred and fifty five years ago, the composition had lost nothing of its beauty. In fact, the homogeneity of modern music made it even more unique and memorable.
This, of course, meant that someone interrupted it. The sound of a door opening and heavy metal boots against the ground clashed with the violins of old. Three mercs that must have been guarding some door far away came rushing in to their demise.
"What!? Hey, you! Don't move!"
They raised their guns at us but it was already too late.
Now, for my last commentary of the day: why I don't use barriers. Because they need batteries, powerful batteries, same thing for their weapons, that run on electricity. And so, before they even had the time to press the trigger, I had wrapped my will around the electricity contained inside all of their equipment. Then, simply directed it where I wanted it to go, the person inside the armor. The three of them got the entire electrical charge of their gear forcefully rushed through their bodies, burning their nerves, scorching their skin and short-circuiting their organs. They fell on their knee, not dead but probably bleeding from the ears, with several two degree burns over and inside their bodies, muscles locked and maybe brain damage. Didn't really matter anyway because the next instant the two girls at my side opened fire. Now, normally a kinetic barrier would make Raven and Helena weapon kind of useless for at least a full magazine. Of course, Raven and Helena weren't using normal munitions. Their disruptor bullets completely bypassed the Eclipse mercs shield and crashed against their armor. Ah yes, good modern armor with ceramic plates, entirely focused into restraining the damages caused by sand grain size projectiles. Had they been using old lead core, it would probably have taken two or maybe even three shots to shatter their chestplate. Unfortunately for the mercenaries, the Cabal producing the disruptor bullets had switched to tungsten core a long time ago, among other things, and as such the first mercenary who got hit by a nice 9 x 19mm felt like a sledgehammer had it him on the chest, a new sensation from the usual sharp burn of a mass accelerator wound immediately followed by the cold feeling of medi-gel. With his plastron now shattered into a hundred shards, the next bullets had no obstacle preventing them from turning the two mercs into shredded cheese, breaking their bones, tearing their flesh and tearing their organs. They crashed on the ground, two jagged puppets whose ropes had been cut and were now not much more than bleeding pulp of meat.
The third was only momentarily saved by Helena's intervention.
"Wait."
"What?" Raven was still aiming at the shaking man.
The Prince smiled, voluntarily exposing her fangs. "I'm a little thirsty right now after having saved a dying girl while helping out of the goodness of my dead heart. I think a little compensation is in order. Unless you..."
"Nope, go ahead." She lowered her weapon and took a step back.
"Your loss."
Helena walked up to the shaking man, removed his helmet and simply began to feed. From what I have seen in the past, vampires can be very gentle when doing it. Here though, the Prince simply tore through the man's neck and began gulping the flowing blood. It was a spectacle neither I nor Raven were really interested in watching, especially since Helena was giving a look that was all but friendly as she was eating.
"Okay." I turned to Raven. "Anything else we have to do here?"
"Nope, just need your muscle to pick it up."
"Okay, then let's get out of here before C-Sec arrives and start asking question they don't want the answer to."
I lifted the crate.
"After you."
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Disruptor bullet
Often confounded with the disruptor ammo used by many official militaries and mercenary gangs, the disruptor bullet has almost nothing in common with it. Developed by a mix Adamantine Arrow and Free Council cabal, Equilibrium, when they found themselves isolated in an ex-Russian, now European Union, arms depot by a pretty angry Vila for a week. A disruptor bullet's only major difference with regular 21st century ammunition is that a part of its core is replaced by a small part of element zero designed to interact with the field emitted by a kinetic barrier and fuck them up. A little like a disruptor torpedo does. Its creation was met with great enthusiasm as it filled two of the needs of many modern mages and supernatural creature alike. First: a munition capable of bypassing those pesky shields. Second: a munition usable with mechanical firearms as mass accelerators tend to fail heavily during supernatural conflict or be useless altogether at stopping supernatural threats. Its creation was highly controversial for its use of element zero, resulting in many cabals condemning the creators and at least two duel. The instant popularity of the disruptor bullet as well as its importance in the establishment of the Privateer's Agreement shut most of those critics and for the other, the cabal argued that the goal of the Free Council had always been to further the enlightenment of the Fallen world through the mixing of technology and magic and that even if one of their own was opposed to that he could shut his trap and go back to where he belonged, in the Seer of the Throne. That insult alone caused a minor cold war which was rhymed by the sound of arcane duels. Few things are known about how the disruptor bullets are made other than without the mage's ability to manufacture high quantites of eezo and the use of a factory half located in the Shadow world, mass production would be impossible.
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Mechanical Firearms
The percentage of mechanical firearms used by various supernatural factions and beings of the galaxy, nearly one hundred percent, might seem odd to the ones used to modern mass accelerators. There are several reasons for that fact. First: the tendency for the supernatural world to favor old, or at least older looking, weapons. The force of habit and tradition is strong in the hidden world where some of its denizens were born before the invention of firearms. Second: the highly complex and entirely electrical mass accelerator react badly when in the presence of a lot of supernatural energy, like the kind a fight tends to produce and a weapon jam is the last thing you want during one of those. Just as an example, the rangefinder and electronic optics that simply don't work against a ghost and most spirits when in the normal world, is just completely useless in the Spirit world and generally unreliable which then leads to the weapon malfunctioning. Mechanical firearms using chemical propellant on the other hand are way harder to jam, immune to hack and their iron sight is pretty hard to fool. Third: when the numerous military powers of Earth began to seriously switch from firearms to mass accelerator, they also began to sell their old stock of weapons to anyone with money and a zip code. What most considered junk, the supernatural factions rushed at like sharks at a wounded prey. The great nations of Earth saw their now outdated arsenal being dismantled and split between the various group of the hidden world who were more than happy to scavenge anything that could fire and switch its load to disruptor munitions. Fourth: enchanted powder based weapons, all kinds confounded, are way more numerous than their eezo based counterpart. As in there is none. Fifth: There is simply a strange form of glamour and attraction that old firearms have and that the boxy modern mass accelerator doesn't have yet and that disruptor bullets have probably prevented forever.
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Gekko
Mages have always made use of guardians in some form or another to protect their Sanctum or during battle. Water spirits hidden inside an innocuous fountain who strangle any who approach, ghost sentinels, demonic hounds, huge statues of animated steel spewing flames, the list goes on. With the development of robotics, first with drones then latter with humanoid mechs, many believed that a cheaper source of reliable guardians would soon be available and free a lot of supernatural resources for other purposes. Many were not happy when they saw the result and even less so when they received what amounted, for most, to a pile of scrap bolted together with the intelligence of a fat rodent and which seemed to have been designed by someone who had no idea of how to make a really effective defense robot rather than some stupid human looking idiot design. Particularly disappointed was the Adamantine Arrow who expected something that could at least hold up against a merc and got something which a disabled child could beat with a stick. It was, oddly enough, a Free Council and Guardian of the Veil collaboration that provided the solution to this problem. Using samples of geth muscles provided by the Guardians, they never revealed how they had obtained them but nobody dared to ask them either, the Free Council began to work on a mech design financed by the three other orders. The end result was shamelessly based on the fictional IRVING, the Free Council never hid it but for most it didn't mattered as the IRVING model, commonly called a Gekko, was a mech years away from the competition. Its physical abilities were at least equal to the ones of its inspiration even if the materials were different, same for its intelligence. With its regular gear, a lone Gekko is more than a match for most merc squads and the typical deployment of three can easely rip through a Mako and annihilate its occupant. A number of batarian pirates had the nasty surprise of seeing two artificial giant legs crash in front of them and flip their transport with a kick. On the defense, the Gekko armor is strong enough to withstand several rocket impacts, those that pass its active defenses at least or, seeing the slowness of modern missiles, the rare one which it cannot dodge. In short, the capability of the Gekko was everything the Orders were looking for and they all began to produce their own models. Commercialization was attempted but the hold of the Seer on the System Alliance higher-up and Earth nations were enough to prevent it. As for the other council species, unbelievable stats coming from an, apparently, small company about a new kind of mech is either met with laughs then a quick trashing of the document or just trashing the document. The stats of the Gekko are available on the extranet.
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Pentacle Order
The opposite of the Seer of the Throne, the Pentacle Order are composed of five orders; the Adamantine Arrow, the Free Council, the Guardians of the Veil, the Mysterium and the Silver Ladder. They are networks of mages which support each other and share common goals, ideals and values. Once all part of the same organization, they split up long ago a little after the creation of linear time but still have some things in common beyond a shared history like the goal to elevate humanity as a whole to the level of mage and a deep hatred of the Seer of the Throne. Once a member, a mage is expected to promote the values of his order before those of the other as well as follow the internal rules of both the Pentacle Order and the more special one of their respective order. This had led to a rather interesting mystical political scene whose rules change from person to person and is far from the calm sedate scholar's politics one might expect from mages, one where the goal is still the same as with any mage endeavour however, power. Entering an order does mean a certain loss of independence but the danger of the supernatural world is often enough of an argument in itself to convince most of the necessity of it. Even so, the dispersed nature of the Pentacle Orders in the 22th century still mean that individual mages have a lot of freedom in their actions.
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Adamantine Arrow
The military branch of the Pentacle, it would be easy to say that the Adamantine Arrow share many things in common with the Turians. Their philosophy of putting an emphasis on military thinking and offensive action would certainly indicate so. One could also find it funny to compare them to dumb knights in shining armor based on their ideals of honor and martial merit in an age of mass accelerators and starships. Doing either would be stupid. Since the beginning of its history, before the creation of linear time itself, the Adamantine Arrow has been in a constant state of war against enemies that have always been more numerous and at least as powerful, if not more, then them. Something that only ever happened to the Turian two times and they still tremble at night thinking about it. As for their so-called chivalrous ideals, if they do value honor and martial prowess, what they teach and use is nothing if combat pragmatism. They wouldn't have survived against the hordes of banishers, the machinations of the Seer of the Throne, the fanaticism of the hunters, the myriads of angry ghosts or the infinite number of spirit who haven't what could be called the best of intention toward humanity. Not to mention the number of civil wars or conflict with the other orders.
Training
The Adamantine Arrow has always strived to train all of its members in all of the aspects of war. The perfect Adamantine Arrow should be able to win a fist fight with a krogan, counter STG spies, outmanoeuvre a turian general, win a negotiation with a volus and stun an asari with his knowledge. This is, of course, impossible and the order knows it. Not everyone can be the best tactician and the best warrior at the same time. Even so, the order tries to train all of its members to the equivalent of N1 level while encouraging them to study things like economy, archaeology, military tactics, ecology, literature or other intellectual disciplines. This again is another difference with the Turians who seem to focus a lot more on the battlefield aspect of war. For the Adamantine Arrow, everything is war.
Ressources
The Adamantine Arrow is without a doubt the most armed of the five orders. Their contact in the various militaries of the world allowed them to grab a really large portion of the ex-Russia and ex-U.S arsenal during the massive selling, they have the biggest budget financing both entirely Sleepers' weapon company and mage Cabals like Equilibrium or PulseLight, the biggest fleet, number of Gekkos as well as the best military trained members. It is some sort of open secret that the order has bunkers hidden on almost all human planets and some alien worlds stacked with enough gear, weapons and vehicles to equip a division. Monetarily speaking, the order revenues are kept secret but it is known that its own major share in a number of various companies both big and small, some not at all military related, and is one of the main investors of the Sirta Foundation.
Tactic
Due to its size and the nature of its wars, the order focuses mainly on unconventional warfare like guerrilla, hit and run and small-scale action. When you are battling the supernatural, large visible invasions with armies and occupation are the surest way to get your ass kicked. As such, the Adamantine Arrow doesn't have standard formation but rather strategies to use the usual mage group, the Cabal, of between 2 to 6. With vastly different powers, unique members, artefacts, familiars and other resources, each cabal is unique and as such plans involving many must take into count the possible rivalry between them, their unique possibilities and the high independent characteristic of mages. This tends to result into highly loose plans on the surface where each cabal has a lot of initiative to accomplish their objectives. This potentially disastrous state of affair that would see the failures of many plans would they have been made by any other army is counterbalanced by the order tacticians. To be a tactician in the order is a great honor and require many skills be it in diplomacy to deal with internal frictions, fighting experience in case the enemy make a raid on the HQ or the mystical skill to read the mystical landscape of a planet. When the might of the order is unleashed against with them at the head, solar systems tend to disappear.
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Seer of the Thrones
The mirror of the Pentacle Orders, the Seer of the Throne is a network of mages whose goal is in complete contradiction with the goals of the five orders. Long and stupid story short, the Seer of the Throne want to create a wold where the simple idea of the supernatural is an impossibility. A world which would completely reject vulgar magic and in order to achieve their vision they will kill or corrupt mages, hoard knowledge and suppress any sign of magic as hard as they can. Their hierarchy and history, the few that is known, can be summed up as a massive crazy conspiracy of chronic backstabbers who want to rule over the helpless humans as high lord. Through the ages, they have extended their tentacles into every office of every government of Earth. Throughout all of the 21th century they focused their effort into the scientific domain, mostly in giving every supernatural phenomena an, apparently, scientific explanation. That did managed to reduce the general knowledge of the public on the occult but at least those that now manage to pass the veil, the few, have already a strong willpower. Or at least they are insane enough for willpower not to be a problem to them. Another of their victory was in the 22th century with the Equal Religion Act which taxed every religion in the United North American States based on their size and was a major blow against them. At least it cut the funding and network of many hunters but it is still debated if the trade-off was worth it. As of now in the 22th century, they are the dominant order on Earth if only by a little and one of the main reasons behind the worsening of the occult situation on Earth for if the humans forgot the supernatural, the supernatural didn't stopped preying on them. The United North American States and the Chinese People's Federation are considered mostly Seer territory and their government majorly under the Seer boots while the European Union is still mostly under the control of the Orders. Fortunately, they are far from an all-powerful organization and if their grip is mostly felt on human main world, it is tenuous at best on colonies and anyplace lacking a major political or industrial structure. It is widely accepted that if they weren't constantly planning against one another for meaningless positions in their hierarchy they would have long ago trampled the Orders, though the inverse is also true in some way.