Im back and with a decent sized chapter that introduces the last of the major characters.

Also cookies for people who find the Babylon five, Frontlines fuel of war, Firefly and gears of war refrences.

and thanks for all the reviews


Pinnacle station

We've been training for six weeks and God it's tiring. In the first few days we were placed into squads of four. I was in a squad with Iwan, Alex and Shepard, we were dubbed Birds of Prey.

After the first couple of weeks of 'team building' exercises we were split up as biotics had to have special training. Then to further split the groups up people were taken for specialised tech training. It was like the classes from the games.

As Shepard and I didn't have biotic abilities and could barely get music up on our omni-tools we were both taken for advanced weaponry training. I guess that makes us the 'soldier' class. As alex had been taken for biotic and tech training he must be a 'sentinel'. Wait a second that's both of our classes from the game... which means Iwan is a vanguard.

"Hawke, what the hell are you doing? I said GET DOWN ON THE FLOOR AND DO A HUNDRED PUSH UPS!" The drill sergeant screamed.

I snapped out of my day dream to see the scarred face and bloodshot eyes of the drill sergeant in front of me.
"For disrespecting the chain of command, the ENTIRE company will do two hundred push ups."

Everyone- including me- dropped down into the push up position and waited for the drill sergeant to start counting. But without saying a word he walked over to me and pulled me up by the scruff of my fatigues.

"Not you Hawke, as you obviously think that you are better than everyone else you can count for the company."

As I started to count I looked down to see everyone apart from Shepard giving me the evil eyes.

I guess I'm gonna have to sleep with my back to the wall tonight.

That Evening

After the day's training us trainees are given what could be considered as free time in which we are allowed to explore the station.

I wandered through the endless corridors until I found what I was looking for, the observation deck. I walked to one of the 'windows' and looked out into the infinite vastness of space.
I heard footsteps and turned to see Jane Shepard. She walked up to me and stared into space, literally.

"It's a beautiful view," I said breaking the silence.
"The stars are beautiful aren't they," she said.
I opened my mouth to say I wasn't talking about the stars but changed my mind last second.
"Come on, we got an hour until lights out," I decided to say instead.

The Next Day-Firing Range

"Okay Rookies, do you know what this is?" The drill sergeant said holding up an assault rifle.

No one dared speak as he walked down our line handing us a weapon each.

"This is an assault rifle or as you idiots would call it a gun it is easy to us- Carmine for God's sake don't look down the barrel."
Before he could speak his link crackled to life. He put his hand to his ear.

"Okay, yes sir I'll send them right away. Shepard, Hawke report to docking bay thirteen."

"Yes sir," we both said cracking of a salute.

As we made our way to the docking bay I turned to Shepard.
"Good thing we got out of there before we started shooting. 'Cause with my luck the sarge would have used me as target practice," I joked.
She just laughed at this.

When we reached our destination we saw that Iwan and Alex were both there and so was... no that can't be right, I rubbed my eyes just to make sure. They were right. Standing next to my brothers was my sister, Alex. Albeit she was ten years older but she had the same blonde hair and blue eyes as before.

"Will," she said.
"Al," I said hugging her.
"Actually you have to call me captain now private,"
"I've got a dozen questions,"
"Well you can ask when we get aboard my ship The New Dawn."
We boarded the shuttle to the ship, then I realised something.

"Do we have permission to leave?" I asked.
My sister turned to me, "yes don't worry you are now officially part of The New Dawn Marine Corps."

I looked out from the cockpit to see a huge Systems Alliance cruiser. It was white with a singular red line across the middle in this the words New Dawn was written.

"Firstly I want you to head to the armoury and then report to the briefing room, don't worry I'll get you an escort."

When we landed I noticed the amount of activity on board. My sister called for a soldier to escort us.

Once we got the armoury we geared up in N7 onyx armour and grabbed weapons.

We reached the briefing room just in time as I felt the ship dock with a Mass relay. My sister walked in and began to speak.

"We are heading to the colony world of epsilon three. There you will rendezvous with the squad 'stray dogs' led by Mal Reynolds and investigate the disappearance of the civilian population

Epsilon Three

I jumped out of the Mako and threw up my guts. I'm never doing that again.

I looked around the barren city and thought it's a bit early for the collectors.

"Where the hell are the stray dogs?" Shepard said.

I looked down to see a mangled body of a marine.
"Found them."
I had a realisation and turned all the way around and saw that we were on a perfectly flat circle.

I heard a rumbling underfoot and screamed "Get away from the Mako!"

Everyone just managed to dive to the ground as a thresher maw smashed out of the ground and made the Mako explode into a brilliant fire ball.

The massive thresher maw towered over us all and had towers of saliva flowing freely from its gaping jaw.

The massive thresher turned to destroy the stray dogs mako. I saw my chance and ran up its back, unclipped my multi-tool and used it to stab the beasts eye.

It screeched and I had barely enough time to get off as it slammed into the ground and dissappeared under the sand.

"Nice work, soldier boy" Shepard said
"I aim to please" I said shrugging.
"I'll call for a shutle 'cause I think we've had enough adventure for one day.


So now there is two Alexs but that will be fixed in the next chapter which will include my surprise and all I'm gonna say is that it wasnt thresher maws that took the population.

Im planning on having the next chapter up by the weekend and changing the name of the story to: Birds Of Prey

till next time
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