Ahem. Apologies for the delay. College has kept me busy. I'll admit I was more than a little lazy writing this. Also, some changes to the syntax. This is more elegant and FFn doesn't butcher it.
chapters[10] provider
"They've got dropships, coming in from all sides!"
"Defensive positions, defend the digsite at all costs!"
Using my mind, I bring up a map of the area. Okay, there's the digsite. It looks like what I imagine a digsite would look like, which is trenches and holes with junk in them. There's a bit important looking thing in the middle- that must be the beacon. Then there's the 212th- I don't care if they really are or not but I'm calling them that. They're taking cover behind stones and equipment and stuff. And then there's the stream of geth streaming out of dropships into the digsite. They're going to decimate them.
On cue, a quartet of drones pop out of the jumper and streak toward the geth. Who have now spotted my uncloaked jumper and are shooting at it. Shitshitshitshitshitshit!
The jumper snap rolls to the left of its own accord, narrowly avoiding a missile. I re-engage the cloak and accelerate into the clouds. Damn mind controls are touchy as hell!
"I don't know what the hell those were, but if you can, keep it up!" That's Ash's voice through the comm system. I guess she's referring to the drones, because there are lines of half-vaporized geth where the drones were fired.
Do I stay or do I go?
"Not sure if I can repeat that, but have some drones." Er, the other kind of drones. Damn it, I didn't even realize they're both called drones until now! Okay, those of you who don't know what I was talking about before, the drones I fired are "Ancient Drone Weapons". The ones I'm about to deploy are the future version of "NSA Assassination Drone". If you're watching, NSA, please don't use one on me.
ashley:summonfriend(drone, 5);
Exception MethodNotDefinedForClassException
ashley:rcon("summonfriend drone 5");
command "summonfriend drone 5" executed by actor ashley
"Got 'em!" The drones begin to engage the geth units as I circle around for another pass. The drones are floating around shooting at the geth... and one of them dropped. And another bit the dust. They just kind of sit there, kill some stuff, soak up bullets, and die.
I figured the AI would be better than in game, not worse.
"Do you have anything bigger?"
"One gunship coming up." This time I decide to use my toolgun to drop them in. Only I don't want to spawn them in the jumper. Is there some way to filter where they spawn?
toolgun:settargetingfilter(intent);
I unholster my toolgun, aim and pull the trigger twice. Two gunships appear right beside each other, directly over the line of geth.
And then they drop straight to the ground. I guess they needed crews. Oh well, they crushed some geth in the process at least. "Eh, guess that didn't go so well."
"You don't fucking say!" Angry Ash and gunfire.
You know, I'm remarkably nonchalant considering everything that's happening around me. Which is odd considering how badly I would freak out Before, over minor things.
I'm sure there are some side effects involved.
It's hard to tell how they're doing down there from up here. It looks like the geth are slowly advancing, and I can tell a few of the soldiers are down. None of the ones in my special armour, though, so I guess it works. I decloak the jumper and let off a few Ancient Drone Weapons, or ADWs as they shall henceforth be called, to avoid confusion, until I forget about my own nomenclature. I quickly pull up and recloak before the geth start tearing my jumper apart.
"Damn it! Your guns suck! I'm already out of ammo!"
Shit, I forgot about that. "Standby for supply drop."
"You know, you could have just said, 'I'll drop more ammo'?"
"But that doesn't sound as cool!"
ashley:rcon("spawn .slugCase 12");
command "spawn .slugCase 12" executed by actor ashley
"Is that enough?"
"How the hell did you do that?"
"Well, I-"
"Rhetorical question! The geth are wearing us down, if you've got more-"
"On it."
I drop the jumper out of the clouds and fire a crapton of drones into the geth positions. Satisfying little explosions as the units blow apart. I feel some bad stuff happen to the jumper as they shoot at it.
"More dropships! If you can take them out-" Less agitated. You know, she hasn't screamed at me once, which is surprising considering they're getting shot at down there. You'd think that that would make you go fucking crazy yelling and running around on adrenaline and shit.
"On it." The HUD shows the dropships coming down through the atmosphere and a combination of me and the jumper make a turn to intercept them. I think of shooting them down and nothing happens. The jumper is still uncloaked and the pods are still out. Why isn't anything happening? I think harder.
"Oh fuck!" I'm out of drones. And still uncloaked. Before I can think 'cloak', I hear a series of thuds, there are audible warnings and a distinct feeling of foreboding occupies my mind. The jumper begins to decelerate and plummet toward the ground.
"Fuck fuck fuck!" I'm in a spacecraft on a collision course to a geth-infested ground. The lights flicker and die but the foreboding feeling doesn't disappear. The jumper begins to accelerate more sharply.
Is this plausibly survivable?
Seconds later, the dead spacecraft slams into the ground. It's worse than the last crash, I can tell, but I don't feel any pain or soreness, which is really fucked up. Have you ever felt a sharp deceleration without any of the associated effects?
I hear geth noises, that electronic whirring clicking speech outside the ship. Oh great, they're already here to investigate.
"There's too many of them! We have to fall back!"
"We can't abandon the artifact!"
"We don't have a choice!"
Oh great. Wait, I guess they have to do that anyway for this to work, so it saves me some trouble. Saren needs to get the beacon, and so does Shepard.
Where the fuck is Shepard? Are they even going to get here in time? Am I going to have to teleport her here and ram her face into the beacon?
The geth start pounding on the rear hatch, putting some dents in it, which distracts me from my thoughts. A jumper is tough but it's going to get through and I need something to get rid of it.
Do I still have my pistol? No, I must have despawned it. Well, I guess I'll spawn something cool and classic Earthican.
spawn Prime:Glock17Gen4 1;
spawn Prime:Glock17Magazine 5;
As soon as the hatch collapses, I raise my newly spawned weapon and pull the trigger. I don't even know where the bullet went. I pretend my real gun is an airsoft gun and aim down the sights and pull the trigger again. The recoil surprises me and instead of a centre mass shot I get a perfect headshot. There's a flash and the geth raises its rifle. Shit! I keep pulling the trigger, and the bullets keep hitting its shields.
Meanwhile, the confused as shit geth is pumping rounds into me, that just despawn when they hit my body. It feels weird and I hate it.
I drop the magazine out and fumble one out of my pocket into the gun. The geth has started to approach me, and I panickily empty another magazine into it. Fifteen rounds in, the shields finally collapse, and the next two rounds bounce right off its armor.
"Ohshitohshitohshit!" I start fumbling with another magazine when I hear a series of staccato gunshots and the geth collapses. An armoured figure appears in the hatch. It looks like Ash- I think it's Ash, anyway. It's hard to tell through the faceplate.
She looks at me, and then she looks at my half-reloaded gun. "Where did you get that relic?"
Okay, it's Ash. I reply, "Would you believe me if I told you?"
"Probably not." She upholsters a significantly larger and much more futuristic looking pistol and hands it to me. "Do you know how to use this?"
Wow, a real Mass Effect gun! This would be so much more awesome if this was one of those self-inserts where you couldn't just spawn whatever the hell you want at will.
"Hopefully."
"Good enough."
I follow her out of the jumper. There's gunfire and lots of flashes and falling geth on a hill to our right, and I'm surprised when Ash pulls me left. "Isn't your unit-"
"Over there? Yeah. I had to pull your sorry ass out." Oh great. She's really pissed now. I mean, obviously, she was before, but she isn't hiding it. She mutters something about being pulled away from her unit to escort some dumbass civvie.
"I can hear you, you know." Sort of. "It's not-"
"Get down!" she hisses, pushing me into a ditch. The ditch is wet. I hate wet.
"You can go back to your unit," I whisper. "I can take care of-"
"Bullshit. If I let an exec die, it's my ass."
"And you've got enough to worry about already, in that regard," I mutter. Oh wow, that probably sounded really wrong.
"What was that?"
"Nothing important."
"Asshole. Okay, move." She pulls me forward. I guess we're proceeding by ditch?
I look up. Lovely. More dropships. They're headed right toward where the rest of her unit was. She asks sarcastically, "Got any more miracles?"
"Maybe." Actually, now that I think of it...
hart:rcon("spawn SGD:StarStreakGLauncher 24");
"What the hell?" That's Hart. She sounds even less feminine in battle.
"Call it a parting gift!"
"Not so loud!" Ash admonishes. We're still crawling through the ditch. It's odd that my knees don't hurt like hell like they should. Because they're not very good. Not bad. Just not very good.
"So, uh, where are we going?" I ask.
"Away from the geth."
I should mention at this point that there are a lot of flashes and erratic lighting from all the fighting. The sound of gunfire is constant, and occasionally punctuated by a large explosion. Also screaming. And screeching of engines or machines or whatever. And it is fucking loud and has a lot of dynamic range and impact. Like, way the fuck more than my $20 thrift store speaker system.
The air smells of death, whatever that smells like. As a primitive backwater moron with FTL once said, by the gods, what a stink!
And that stuff raining from the sky is not rain or ash.
It's intense and horrifying and yet I feel numb to it, even though I should logically be freaking the fuck out right now.
"That's not very precise," I comment. Still following. I can't feel the knees but my feet are soaked. Next time I'm bringing something better. Is there a command for drying myself?
"There's a militia unit a few clicks south. Hopefully they'll have their shit together."
"That's kind of a slim hope, isn't it?" Let's see, they're a militia unit, not professionals, probably didn't have time to organize, probably have bad training and worse equipment, and probably don't know what they're doing.
"Probably." Okay then. "Then again, all the geth are-"
Suddenly the sounds of battle are drowned out by a loud roaring. It's coming toward us. I look up.
There it is. The Normandy. It's unmistakable and beautiful. I watch as a door pops open and a vehicle comes flying out, thrust jets burning hard to keep it from smashing into the ground.
Weird, I don't remember them bringing the Mako. But whatever, rescue has arrived.
Now let's make sure everything goes as it should. Except better.