Mass Effect: Andromeda is owned by BioWare Montreal/Electronic Arts. Credit goes to "SpaceCowboy" for the concept.
Ruminations: Lieutenant Liam Gary Kosta
The blare of klaxons and the cavatations of the Bell Aerospaces' UT-47 Kodiak Utility Transport Vessel had Security Officer Liam Gary Kosta jostled about as alarms shrieked and the shuttle bang about as if it were in a dryer. The former Lowell City Police Department Officer (Mars) and search and rescue member of Heavy Urban Search-Terrain 1 (HUS-T1) gripped an 'oh shit' bar at his side as he watched Engineer Technician Sara Elaine Ryder hold onto an overhead strap, being tossed about as much as he was as electrical ionization outside of the Kodiak threw the small vessel completely to shit. Pilots Richard "Dusty" Kirkland and David Fisher were calling out warnings and emergency broadcasts while Security Officer Andrew Greer held on on the other side of the Kodiak as Liam briefly wondered if all the cargo they had strapped down was going to hold with the shuttle flying like a top. Last thing they needed was some box to turn the inside of the shuttle into a bouncy palace.
Another crackle of electricity, another blown transformer inside the vehicle, another brazen of alarms as Liam held on for dear life. Good thing, too; the shuttle door had blown out as well.
Liam discovered himself dangling outside of a flying shuttle, holding onto a bar. Not good.
"LIAM!" He felt a hand on his wrist, looking up from the fast-approaching (and spinning crazily) world underneath him to see that, somehow, Sara Ryder had used her free hand to grip his wrist that had him connected to the shuttle. Girl had practically half-thrown herself out of a falling shuttle with the door blown open to grab him and hold on! He could see her eyes through the full-face visor of her Andromeda Initiative's Deep Space Explorer Armor, wide and fearful, though her fingers were latched onto his wrist.
There was another electrical explosion. And then there was weightlessness and the rush of wind.
Liam found himself tumbling in the air, having been blasted out of the Kodiak as his heart rate jumped to about a million beats per minute as he flailed, finding himself going end-over-end in the air above Habitat Seven, the ground coming up rather quickly. OhGodOhGodOhGod was about all Liam could think of as ground became sky became ground and he finally remembered that his Armax Arsenals' Auto-Recycling Technical and Combat Interface Armor (the ARTCIA Armor generally known as 'Scavenger Armor' as it was less awkward to say) had jump jets and horizontal-oriented boosters. He righted himself as best he could with a short burst, going into the classical freefall position as his saw the altimeter on his HUD on the inside of his helmet finally read the distance until impact.
Then he saw a body zip right past him, tumbling about end-over-end, never slowing down. He saw the armor; Deep Space Explorer. Ryder… Liam thought with a pain in his heart. Oh God, she had gotten thrown out trying to pull him in! Now she was falling towards a certain death and there was literally nothing he could do about it.
Kosta activated his jump jets when there was less than fifty meters left on the altimeter, grunting at the increase of gravity from the deacceleration as his air speed dropped significantly, bringing him towards a speed that would likely have him survive. Within the last few meters, he both 'jumped' and 'boosted' forward for a classic airborne jump landing that they had been taught in the Initiative Explorer Program meant for the Pathfinder teams. He landed on his feet, doing a running landing for a few steps before momentum and inertia had him tumbling, falling on his chest as he panted, rolling onto his back to look up at an alien sky, breathing hard as the realization that he had just avoided being splattered all over the Hab Seven landscape came to him.
I'm still alive, he thought to himself, the cool water of relief flooding his veins as Liam laid on the ground for a moment, letting the feeling wash over him.
But he hadn't been the only one ejected from the shuttle, the former search and rescue officer remembered.
"Ryder." Kosta got to his feet, grunting at the soreness of his body, likely from the rapid deacceleration. He pushed that to the back of his mind as he looked into the direction he had seen Sara fall towards. They couldn't be too far as he moved towards the location he thought likely to find her. Pleasepleaseplease! let me find you alive, Liam thought with a pang as he walked over foreign soil, seeing alien plant life growing amongst the crags and rocky terrain. He would worry about that later.
Please don't let my first act in Andromeda be digging a grave.
Liam walked for only a minute or two when he found a figure standing around a spur as he bypassed a ridge line through a saddle, aware of a looming cliff side to his right when he saw a figure standing there, obviously working their OmniTool, likely to gain contact. The figure was wearing Deep Space Explorer Armor!
"Ryder!" Liam called out, seeing the figure turn around to address him, and though the helmet hid the lower portion of her face, he had no doubt that she was smiling the way her face looked through her visor. "You made it!" God, he had been so worried. It would have killed him to know that she had died trying to pull him back into the shuttle.
"Yeah, not exactly how 'first small step' was suppose to be!" Sara huffed, sounding a little winded. "On a side note? Don't breath the air." That had him pause. He doubted Sara would have taken her helmet off in an unknown environment; that was just rank stupidity. That meant she had suffered a seal breech, a suit breech, or a visor breech. "Cracked my glass on landing and rolling down a hill." The former Alliance Engineer told him, and Liam saw that, at the very least, the problem had been dealt with. "You holding up okay, Kosta?"
"Heart's still going, so I'm good." His eyes swept the environment, unable to believe that he was on a true alien planet; no one had been here before. "Electrical storms, floating mountains, poisonous air. Sure know how to throw a party, Ryder."
"I know all the best getaways." That had Liam chuckle. How she managed to retain her sense of humor was beyond him, but then again they had both just avoided death. Some people got introspective, and others just laughed at Death. Evidently, Sara was the latter. "The shuttles were heading in that direction," the Engineer said, pointing past a series of cliffs that loomed over them, "and I can't get anyone on comms. Best idea would be to get to higher ground for either eyes on or a chance to establish a comms link. We go this way and see if there's a path upward. But let's do a quick equipment check first. Lost my damn Avenger when it popped off me when I landed and it went off the cliff." Liam looked to the nearest cliff in question, only a few meters away from the edge. Sara had been that close to rolling right off a cliff!
"Yeah, good idea." Liam did a quick touch-check of his gear before looking at his HUD to check his systems read-outs. "Got my Predator and my Charger. Little less than six hours of air, ten thermal clips, three Universal Power Cells, two hydro units, and a sense of humor."
"Uh oh." Sara looked to him, her own humor bleeding through her suits' vox. "You know if this were an English film, you'd be the hero and I'd be the plucky comedic relief, right?" That had Liam chuckle, Sara teasing him about his accent. "But if this were an North American film, I'd be the dashing heroine and you'd be the villain. Genius intellect, well-dressed, graduated from Oxford or Cambridge, a legion of anonymous henchmen, charm with a beautiful woman on each arm."
"You forgot the car. Don't ever forget the Aston Martin." Kosta supplied, making Sara laugh. "Well, my wardrobes' limited, I went to LondonU for engineering but ended up a cop, I've got a legion of bad jokes, and lo and behold! My arms are rather unoccupied at the moment."
"Definitely a British film, then." Ryder winked at him, and that had the former HUS-T1 member snort yet smiling. "Plucky comedic relief thinks disaster and danger is this way," she pointed at the direction she had before, "so let's see what trouble we can scrounge up, Doctor Livingston!"
Liam couldn't help it; he was reduced to a peel of laughter.
Techiix Resistance Forward Camp, Voeld, Nol System, Heleus Cluster, M31 Andromeda, June 24, 2819 CE/Day 532 Nexus Arrival
Lieutenant Liam Gary Kosta threw his helmet at an offending wall, having upset him for happening to exist within range of his rage.
The helmet bounced off the rocky surface and landed somewhere a few meters away, having rolled to a stop as Liam gripped the side of a crate and did his best to crush it with he grips of his hands; impossible, of course, but he needed to vent. He spent several moments trying to reduce a metal freight box into atoms with his hands and his frustration as he used up all his anger and helplessness against the defenseless object, giving up with his hands and delivering a good swift football kick with his foot. He didn't even notice the sting in his right foot from the punt as he walked away from the crate, his hands clutching at the hair on top of his head as he paced angrily.
God, they're lost, they're lost, they're lost and there's nothing we can bloody DO!
Jaal Ama Darav watched from a distance silently, never interfering to telling him to calm himself.
"Is there… any kind of mobility in this base we can use, or scrape up, or scrap together? Anything?" Liam asked, his frustration leaking through his voice as he looked at the Angara sniper, still pacing as he threw down his hands, alternating his hands from fists of rage to imaginary throttling, back and forth. "A speed bike. A hover skid. A forklift. A… bloody bicycle!" The crate became the focus of his frustration once more as Liam gave it a good swift kick when he neared it, planting the bottom of his armors boot into its side. It solved nothing but it felt pretty good. "Our friends could be out there, injured and dying, being hunted by Kett, freezing to death, and we're stuck here!?"
"Yes." The sniper replied, his tone neutral as his turquoise eyes stayed on Liam, nothing else on him moving.
"Then why aren't you crawling up a bloody wall, ready to tear something out?" Kosta asked, turning on Jaal. Jaal was his friend, but so was Vetra and Sara. God, please let them be okay!, the former police officer tried to bite back on his anger and frustration. Jaal wasn't at fault, wasn't to be blamed. He hadn't taken the news of the lack of transportation well, either.
"Because I have been in situations like this before, Liam." The Angara replied simply, and that had the anger leak out. Kosta knew what the sniper meant, knowing of the pains that the Angara suffered under the yoke of oppression and occupation by the Kett. No doubt Jaal was not a stranger of situations like these.
"Then… what do you recommend?"
"Keep you wits, your senses sharp, and find opportunities or solutions." The Angara offered, his feline-like face calm. "You will not help them if you are too angry to think."
"Argh! You're right! It's just…" Liam finally rested his hands on the abused crate, finding himself looking out into the environment of Voeld, seeing the heavy snowfall as the wind whipped past the entrance to Techiix, the cold held back by heating units and the natural insulation the ice cave gave the forward station. "Been in this situ only once, y'know? But then, I had her."
"Ryder." Jaal stated quietly.
"Back on Hab Seven." Liam continued, his eyes on the deepening blizzard outside. "Shuttle got knocked out of the air, we're both freefalling, and miracle of miracles!, we're both alive and on the ground." He closed his eyes, remembering those events. "Sara… joked through it. Not all of it, not in a smart ass way, but she'd kept the humor up, kept our spirits up when it was just the two of us running around on a poisonous planet we had no maps for, our supplies and people scattered every which way, and our first introductions to the Kett." He turned his head slightly to look at Jaal. "I never would have made it without her. I would have been lost and wandering until I ran out of air, or killed by the Kett, or God forbid captured and tortured by them. Sara… Sara was with me every step of the way. Despite how terrible things were, how dangerous it was, how difficult it got… I never felt wanting, never felt helpless. She just had… that pull? Like if you stuck with her, it was all going to work out." The Englishman snorted as he looked at the crate he had abused. "Did, too; work out. Kett coming at us from different directions, finding our people… carrying Kirkland on her back because I had the better weapon, carrying his body to Fisher so he knew we had gotten his friend back." That had been an emotional moment, seeing David Fisher take that news hard, but utterly grateful that the had returned Kirkland to them. David had broken something in his leg, unable to move, and the man had heroically told them to forage on while he remained behind alone on an unexplored planet with a hostile species on the prowl. When they had reunited with the Security Officer, Andrew Greer, Liam had been all but certain that they had been charmed. "Just… I know she needs us, needs that hope, but we're stuck here."
"I understand." Jaal replied quietly, and Kosta knew the Angara did. Likely, he had felt the same way many times over over the years, been in the same position as Liam, but came back wanting. How the Angara did it, kept that hope and spark up was sometimes utterly amazing.
"Tempest to Kosta, Tempest to Kosta, do you read me?" The former cop heard the voice of Doctor Suvi Katy Anwar come over the SquadCom transmitter in his left ear.
"Tempest, this is Kosta, I read you." Jaal perked up, knowing what they had been waiting for.
"Roger. ETA to your location is fifteen mike." The astrophysicist had certainly gotten better with her military-oriented lexicon since becoming the unofficial 'radioman' for TEAM PATHFINDER, having been taught the terminology and phrases used. Liam wasn't sure why 'mike' was used instead of 'minute'; likely there was some confusion back in the days of old radio or minute was used for something else other that time. There was always the option of confusing an enemy who might be overhearing said transmission, too; all plausible scenarios. Police departments tended to have the same lexicon as the military, and it wasn't unusual for a police force to have a healthy percentage of former service members with the badge.
"Understood, Tempest. We're here with bells on." Liam replied, hating the fact that waiting was all they could do. Jaal and he had already restocked on everything they thought they would need, and he could feel the old rhythm of his HUS-T1 days in his blood, doing search and rescue during disasters and post-battles. He had enjoyed those days, fighting for lives when all hope seemed lost, but now it was personal. He owed Sara and Vetra; one his life, the other an apology. Then there were the three Angara members on the shuttle as well; San de Kjol, Irvam de Sjon, and Yalsi Avria. When TEAM PATHFINDER had wanted to make the Kett's day (and lives) go badly, the Heskaarl had donated both themselves, supplies, and transportation for their efforts, joining in on the series of guerrilla strikes upon the militant occupiers. They were brave men and women who fought for their species, having trained and pushed themselves further and further to be better than the average Resistance fighter (whom were well-trained themselves) to bring war back to the Kett. Every single one of them had volunteered to work with TEAM PATHFINDER, seeing the opportunity to strike out against the Kett in a way they had never been able to do before. Nearly twenty exhausting missions in twenty-four days, and yet they were having their effect. The Kett were reeling, bases empty of life or undermanned trying to reinforce conquered positions, vehicles and supplies 'redistributed', the overall effectiveness of the extracluster race degrading rapidly. Voeld had been a bit of a bloody bitch at first, but a month into it and the headway they were making was amazing.
But now Sara was missing; Pathfinder Down. Liam didn't need the reminder of when Captain Alec Clancy Ryder lost his life, how badly things looked then when he and Cora came upon his lifeless body while Sara, unconscious, breathed blood.
No, never again, Liam promised himself.
The fifteen minute wait was atrocious, but the AISS Tempest came from above, dropping through the atmo at an almost vertical approach so as to not alert any Kett aerial forces of their arrival, the Survey Vessel being battered by the gale-like winds of the hurricane-strength blizzard that wasn't even the worst he had seen as the ninety-five meter long vessel set down in front of the Techiix Forward Camp, using the blizzard to mask the location of the Resistance Base as well as eliminating time constraints by making Jaal and Liam come to them. The Survey Vessel landed none-too-gently as the retractable landing gears extended to hold the vessel from the snow-locked ground, heat pouring off of its hull from the re-entry burn as the deployment ramp dropped down to accept passengers. Already were the Angara sniper and Human male moving forward to embark upon the vessel when they realized they were joined by two more.
Commander Khay De Qjanar and Ovfa Sjef.
"More people to search means more ground covered and less time used." The Heskaarl said over the roar of the Tempests' ODSY engines and antiproton thrusters located under the canard and wings of the vessel. Liam knew better than to argue; Commander De Qjanar was correct, and his own men were out there in the snow and blizzard. The Angaran Rangers had a motto very similar to that of the Systems Alliance Rangers; leave no man behind.
"Awright, let's pony up so we can find our people." The Security Officer said as the four men stepped onto the ramp.
They didn't have time to screw around.
Author's Notes: Richard "Dusty" Kirkland is, in fact, the canon name of the shuttle pilot who was executed by the Kett. I'm 90% certain that Andrew Greer and David Fisher are the correct first names as well. Kirkland and Fisher are shuttle pilots, but there's no mention of what Greer does. Hayes, the comms specialist on the other shuttle, doesn't even get a first name.
I haven't even mentioned what kind of combat profile Ryder is yet. It's… a little unique, but she's an Engineer-type.
Doctor Livingston, I Presume? - Doctor David Livingston was a missionary, physician, abolitionist, and explorer, and a famous British hero that discovered many of the lakes and rivers in Central Africa when he undertook an expedition that went from west to east, discovering the Zambezi River and Victoria Falls. He is also credited for the discovery of the use of quinine for malaria in 1864, in which there had been no effective cure, treatment, or prevention of, as well as the relation between malaria and mosquitoes (before, people knew that malaria came from swamps but didn't know how the disease was contracted save for the word malaria itself; Italian for 'bad air'). He went missing for six years, and journalist and explorer Henry Stanley (another famed hero and explorer) found him in 1871, and uttered the famed quote, "Doctor Livingstone, I presume?" Doctor Livingston passed away in 1873 at 60 from dysentery and malaria in Rhodesia (now Zambia) and is buried in Westminster Abbey.