Zaeed: War Stories
Dogfight
Don't suppose you ever been to London? Didn't think so. Lived out there when I was a little grubber. Between the smoke and the fog, you can't see shit-all, but there ain't much to see in Whitechapel, what with the gangs, the graffiti and the rubbish strewn everywhere. It's where Jack the Ripper killed those girls back in olden times, real sordid story, if you ever read up on your Earth history. Nicer than Omega, but still a bad lot all around.
My old man, my brother and I had a flat out there and we had this dog. I wasn't supposed to give it a name 'cause we were fighting it. My father told me it doesn't do to get too attached and that's true, but I called him Nipper, just 'cause it used to bite the other dogs and hold on for dear life. Damn good mutt that one was. Part terrier of some sort and God knows what else. He had a nice black patch around his eye that made him look like somebody punched him a good one in the eye. Tiny ears and a stubby little tail, which was for the best, because fighting dogs tend to lose anything that sticks out too much. We fought 'im for six months or so, raked in a bit of cash from it, but you know how it is. No matter how well you train a dog, one day it's gonna slow down, get old, take one licking too many. Still, it made me angry to see Nipper go down in that last fight. You never realize how much blood those creatures have in 'em 'til you see one die in the ring.
Anyway, I must have been about eight or nine, real little pisser I was, and I go running into the ring and start kicking the other dog, going at his ribs with my boots, which were damn near falling apart as it was. You'd think a fight dog would've fought back, but the thing just cringed and whimpered, like it felt sorry, like it knew it deserved to be punished for killing old Nipper. And of course, whole time I'm ranting, just angry as a hornet, and I don't know what I saying, but I'm guessing it wasn't pleasant. My brother goes hollering at me and the other owner is cussing me out and my dad is shitting a brick because if I kill the bleeding thing he's gonna have to pay restitution and he's already lost a dog and the income that goes with that. Anyway, my father and my brother manage to prise me off the thing before I murder it or it murders me, so all's well that ends well, I guess. First time I really thought about that in years. Watching a dog fight has a way of making me sentimental, I guess. A reminder of home.
Habits to Break
When I first got up to Lowell City, I ran into a lot of Americans like you, Shepard, who'd say, "Massani? What's a limey bastard like you doing with a name like that?" Damn ignorant question. My father was Italian-Albanian. Immigrated to London from Tirana and hooked up with my mum, who was a genuine Brit, had family in Manchester. Guess it didn't work out, because she took off right quick after I was born. The old man never spoke about it much and I didn't have much curiosity. As I see, if the old cow couldn't be bothered to hang around, there isn't much use in whingeing over it. Good riddance, I tell myself and I just get on with what I'm about.
My dad, my brother and I were in a neighbourhood full of meth freaks, nasty, filthy sorts, so maybe that was what got her. Never touched the stuff myself. I like to keep a clear head. I believed the old public service adverts. Just say 'no' to drugs. And cigarettes. Those things will kill you. My bad habits are gin and nice, clean whores, the trustworthy kind who don't try to stab you when you're sleeping. It's hard to find those out here in the Terminus Systems. This is the frontier, so you can't expect the comforts of civilization – good manners, high society, cheap booze in clean glasses and all that bollocks.
Blue Suns and Planets
I'd been soldiering for a while when I ran into Vido. Should have trusted my first instinct about the fellow. He was young back then, but still an ugly son of a bitch – flat nose, caveman brow, got the sly look of a grinning ape. Anyway, I'm sitting at the bar and he offers to buy me a drink and I look at him thinking, Damn, this bloke better not be mistaking me for queer 'cause space gets lonely but even I ain't that desperate yet. But, hell, I ain't gonna refuse good ale, so I take the drink and listen to him natter on about starting a merc gang. He had the idea of putting together something for us humans – back then, there was Eclipse for the salarians and the asari, Blood Pack for the krogan, a bunch of rogue turian militias and of course, more batarian pirates than you could shake a stick at. Humans were new to the Terminus Systems and at first, nobody wanted to have dealings with us.
That piss-ant Vido was selling it to me all patriotic-like and I kind of bought into it, 'though I should have known better. He even had an idea for a name – the Blue Planets. Like Earth, right? Blue and green. Well, for the record, I thought it was a bloody stupid name. Nobody wants to join your gang if you've got some ridiculous fucking joke of a name like that. And I tell him that outright. "You'd be better to call it the Blue Stars or the Blue Suns, for that matter," I say to him. "Nobody gives a damn what the name means, so long as it rolls off the tongue. It's got to sound good when you're bragging about it to your woman. That's how you know you've got a winner." And so Blue Suns...that's the name we went with, 'cause the asari serving bar was a looker and she thought sounded alright.
At the time, I figured founding the Blue Suns might be an opportunity to make a name for myself. Back then, I was always on the look-out for a big score. Didn't understand that a working man's real pleasure is in his work, doing things quality, you know? 'Course, Vido didn't know much about the business of soldiering. I was going to be running that end of things. He was strictly business and accounts, pencil-pushing work. Not my line at all, so I was happy to let 'im deal with it. Stupid move on my part. One day it came back to bite me in the ass. All that bullshit that Vido was talking about making a name for humanity out in the Terminus Systems? Lying through his teeth. He sold us out to the batarians first chance he got.
Nowadays you don't see so many humans getting recruited for the Blue Suns. The higher-ups are mostly batarians and turians who got disillusioned with the Hierarchy. Bastards don't even know where the name comes from or who put the outfit together. It's sort of funny if you think about it. The batarians think they're so political, got a stick up their collective arse when it comes to humanity, but they haven't got the faintest idea they're running with an organization that used to do contracts for the Systems Alliance, all the dirty work of suppressing colonial mutinies, killing slavers and keeping the villagers in line. Like it or not, they're still flying our flag. Like it or not, the Blue Suns belonged to me. They can rewrite the history books, but it don't change the facts.
A Bullet and a Target
It's surprising, actually, how little it hurts to have a bullet in your head. I mean, I won't lie to you, there's pain when it's going in, when it's splintering through your skull, but after the bullet gets lodged in there, it isn't much worse than a bad headache. It's like the most terrible hang-over you'll ever have. I was lying there for an hour after they shot me, going in and out of consciousness, and all I could think was that I really wanted an Aspirin and some gin, straight-up. Hair of the dog that bit me. For a while, I was fantasizing that the bullet missed me entirely, but then I'd look at the blood pooling around me and remember Vido's ugly face sneering at me, so smug, thinking he'd won. But he didn't win, 'cause I didn't die. The bastard was stingy – if he wanted to finish me off, he should've used a few more bullets.
What's real unfortunate about whole mess is the bullet severed the optic nerve behind my right eye. Surgeon couldn't dig all the shell fragments out of my brain either. He said I was better off letting 'em lie. Taking 'em out would be the rough equivalent of getting a lobotomy and I want to have my wits about me when I slaughter that Vido like the fucking hog he is. As it stands, I could live to a hundred or I could stoop down, bend the wrong way and start bleeding to death a minute from now. But we've all got an expiration date. I didn't get into the mercenary profession because I was figuring on living to retirement age.
My Girl Jessie
Who calls a gun 'Jessie', you ask? Well, what else are you supposed to call a gun? Was I supposed to give 'er a bloke's name? Anyway, Jessica is a good enough name. I'm sure I've met a couple good-looking whores in my time who went by Jessica or some such, so maybe I named it after one of them. I don't really know what was in my head. I haven't got a great memory for details. I reserve most of my head-space for good kills, decent places to drink and safe spots to take a leak when I'm on Omega. You'd be surprised how many men get killed walking down the wrong corner to have a piss. I'm not joking. It's right ugly out there.
Anyway, the main thing about Jessie is that she's stood by me, better than any woman, better than family even. That's a lot to ask, even from a gun. Some weapons will rust up and jam when you need 'em, but not ol' Jessie, not 'til the very end. I had a real funeral for her when she went. Got myself ginned up, penned a eulogy and everything. She's dead now, but she's left a beautiful corpse. Sweetest gun I ever had and that's saying a bloody lot.
Vido
First, I thought I'd string him up. Maybe use one of those hooks from the him by his arms with his feet just off the ground. Let gravity drag on him, ripping ligaments apart, wrenching bones out their sockets.
If I had time to spare, I'd work him over with a knife. Do some carving, a little engraving. Give him scars to match my own and a few extra just for old time's sake. I remember my brother had this book on torture techniques, what people used to do to enemy combatants in all the POW camps during the big wars and purges of the 20th century. Right gruesome stuff. I'd try out a few of those tricks. It'd be good to see Vido suffer a bit. The thing with revenge is, you want to draw it out. I've been waiting 20 years and I want to get at least 20 minutes of satisfaction out of bleeding that bastard's carcass.
After that, I wouldn't shoot him. That'd be too quick, too easy. I don't want to let him curl up and die. That's the coward's way out. What I'm thinking is fire, a nice controlled one toasting his toes, then working its way up his legs, cooking him slow so that he can smell his own flesh burning. I'll turn him around like a pig on a spit. I've always had a fondness for barbecue. There's something very fitting about fire. It's what I've had raging inside me for a long while, blistering and boiling my insides. Nothing will douse those flames, not 'til Vido is dead. Not 'til I can stand over his corpse, spit on his face and grind his ashes under my heel. Maybe you thought you were showing compassion rescuing those workers, Shepard. My dad was a factory man and I got a touch of sympathy on that end. But whatever suffering they would've felt in their last moments, it would've been over quickly. Most of them would've asphyxiated in the smoke. The pain wouldn't have lingered on for 20 years, tormenting them. The fire might've charred their bones, but it wouldn't have been 1/20th of the burn I got searing under my skin when I watched Vido making off on that shuttle, running tail between his legs like the shit-licking coward he is.
I've lost my best chance to murder that bastard. I'd like to be able to curse you, Shepard, but I don't have any vile words left to spit at you. There's no more venom hanging on my tongue. You've extinguished me. Isn't nothing left to do, but sit down, shut my gob and play nice with your team. I kill for you and I do it well, because that's the language I speak. It's the only skill I've got, but it's a damn useful one. It's taken me all across this galaxy. Doubt you can guess how old I am, but I'm a lot older than you. The reason I reached this advanced age is 'cause I know when to fight and when there isn't any use in resisting, when refusing to cooperate is just gonna end up a clusterfuck.
I'll tell you upfront, though, Commander, before I drop the matter once and for all: you've got one hell of a nerve to snatch my revenge away from me. It's going to take me years to pin that son-of-a-bitch into a corner again and yet you don't give me a word of apology for letting him off the hook. That's some gall, you've got, woman. You're talking up these high and mighty ideals, trying to play the hero, but as I see it, it's arrogance. And you must be one sadistic bitch to make me think that maybe this mission means something more than creds, maybe even more than the vengeance you wait twenty years for and that this is how a man gets to feeling half-way human again. This life is a dogfight, Shepard, and we don't have the right to act like we're anything more than bloody animals. Anything else is pride and looking for a fall.
