Beneath the Black Flag Story Arc: 3.2
Leet waited with Siren and Rorrim as the airlock finished its cycle. While the procedure only took a few moments, it still seemed to take an incredibly long time to complete. He took a moment to gauge how the girls were faring, seeing them relaxed for the most part. Well, about as relaxed as he expected they would be considering they were wearing Cerberus uniforms about to initiate a heist the likes of which topped the Bulgarian job.
His lips slowly widened as he remembered the uncontrollable cascade of events that happened to them, back then. Good times. He really could have done without the sunburn though...
The door opened revealing three people. The guys in the back held assault rifles loosely, but steady in their hands while an older guy stood just a bit in front looking Leets party over. Getting back into character he squashed his inner amusement and straightened his posture to something a bit more formal than his usual stance..
"I am Commander Richards. Welcome to Depot-Argus Twenty-six."
Siren stepped forward, a winning smile more than a few guys on Bet never stood a chance in resisting, on her face as her mouth moved silently. Leet had a good idea what she was saying but whatever it might have been was lost to the filtering tech everyone was wearing, except for Siren. It was weird, the first few times they ran this scam back on Bet, but by this point it didn't even phase Leet. Instead, he watched the eyes of the stations spokesman. It was there that the first indication of Siren's power showed. Leet had to suppress the reemergence of his smirk as almost immediately that guy's eyes started softening, looking slightly glassy. A quick check to the two behind him showed the same effect taking place.
"Excellent." Richards stated as he took the datapad from Siren. "I don't see any problem there, of course your tech can install the upgrade. I'll just notify the Normandy to expect him."
"Ah, yes I can see how that would complicate things. My personal command codes will allow that."
"Of course, I'll send them now, and no, I don't see that as a problem."
"A superb idea, I think the crew would enjoy that."
"Just for the station? I don't see that as a problem."
"Not an issue, I'm very aware of where all monitoring devices are located."
"Of course, why I don't I send that information to your associate so they may see to that detail?"
"A tour? Absolutely, and thank you for thinking of our sleeping team mates. I'll send Mr. Pratchett along to make sure everyone is assembled. What would you like to see first?"
"The CIC, of course. While we might not be as well equiped as say, Arcturus Station, I think you will be impressed with our operations, Ms. Morris. Shall we?"
Siren easily took Richards arm while matching his stride as they walked away. The two mooks holstered their weapons before they also turned around, keeping pace behind the duo.
"So broken." Rorrim muttered next to him.
"Right?" Leet snorted. "And I say that being a tinker. That had to have been the best thirty-five k' spent, ever. Seriously makes me glad she's on our side. Can you imagine the fate of Earth Bet had she decided to use her power like Heartbreaker?"
"Don't even joke about that, Leet." Rorrim whispered with a shudder. "Heartbreaker's power over women was just sick. That he used it to create a harem of amoral sex dolls, was beyond disgusting. Siren may joke about stuff, but she'd never rape anyone, or make them do the horrible things he did to those women. You know how I feel about some of the stuff we do, Leet, but the day we killed Heartbreaker, I slept like a baby."
"Shit, I hear that. Guy had it comin for a long time even before he set his sights on trying to control Matriarch and Vates. I was just sayin', you know?"
"I know." Rorrim answered.
"Well, we'd best go get our part done. It's the only loose thread that could screw us."
Leet walked confidently toward the open ramp that would take them to their objective. Rorrim nodded, falling in step. It didn't take the pair very long to board the Normandy or to cross through the cargo deck to summon the elevator. "Are you sure he's going to be okay?"
Leet pushed the indicator to take them to the crew deck. "Atlas tested and approved. "
"I know, I just… don't like this."
"Uber, Matriarch and I, along with Cessi and Lia ran our own tests. Three times. We showed you the results."
Rorrim grudgingly nodded. When the elevator doors opened she again followed Leet as he led the way. Thier destination as clear as the large white letters on the wall beside her, Med Bay. "I know, doesn't help me feel better about it."
"He'll be fine, you know. Matriarch isn't going to let anything happen to him."
Leet's compassionate assurance was rewarded by a knowing smile on Rorrim's face. "I know, she dotes on him almost as much as I do, but I'm a mother, I'm going to worry, whether I want to or not."
"There was no way we could bring him on the mission, Rorrim. Not with Siren in play and we needed your power in case something here messed up the script. Besides, once we get through this stretch, you can relax more. Alex is going to be way happier here, on the Normandy, than he is on the Exiled. More safe areas." Leet assured her as they reached the door sitting at the back of the room. "That, and I don't see us needing to split up like this again since we'll have shuttles! Man, I can't wait to get my hands on one to tinker with. Did you see the two downstairs? So many possibilities."
"You just miss the Trident." Rorrim teased as she poked Leet in the side, getting a slight jump from the tinker.
Taking a knee next to the wall of computing hardware that housed their objective, Leet nodded. "Loved that ship. Ugly as fuck, but so handy when the Exiled was just overkill, or too eye catching. The cool thing about our set up now, is that the Normandy can carry a few vehicles, unlike the Exiled. Think I could talk Matriarch into letting us get a Mako? Plenty of space down there and Renegade said those things rocked."
"Did he tell you the same stories he told me?" Rorrim asked while narrowing her eyes at the kneeling tinker. "Because in no way shape or form did any of those stories imply that thing was anything but a poorly designed menace."
Before Leet could reply, a holographic pop up appeared in front of them comprising a blue sphere on a slightly inverted base. "Hello. I am the Normandy's Enhanced Defence Intelligence. The crew often refer to me as, EDI. May I ask what you are installing into my servers?"
"Sure." Leet replied as he raised the small device retrieved from his thigh pouch, clamping it to EDI's server housing.
"What are you installing into my servers?" EDI promptly asked.
"A containment drive." Leet pushed the indicator in the center of the device, instantly plunging the room into darkness. Rorrim couldn't see him, but Leet looked up at her anyways. "Actually based this on the one Renegade made for Dragon, but it's like the 2.0 version after it was augmented by Atlas. Even I was surprised with how well it came out."
"She's going to be okay, right?" Rorrim asked as the lights flickered slightly.
"I have control." Atlas's voice broke into the room just as the lights returned to full power. "There are several hardware blocks that are going to need to be removed, Leet. Here, as well as in Engineering before I can fully integrate into the Normandy's systems."
"Awesome, I'll take care of it. How's EDI?"
"EDI is currently contained, and unharmed."
"That's good." Rorrim commented as she took the device from Leet. "Want me to set her up over here, Atlas?"
"Yes please. I look forward to talking with EDI while preparations for departure are completed."
"That would be nice. Let her know this isn't personal, but with the Cerberus scripts compelling her to obey them, we didn't have much choice but to take her prisoner."
"I will fully inform EDI of the situation as well as our plans going forward that are not classified." Atlas assured the thinker.
"Hopefully, she's not the kind to hold a grudge, but I think we're going to have that problem with a lot of the guys we're kidnapping today." Leet muttered as he activated his omni tool. "Gunny, time to set up. Vates, get the prisoners ready. Lia, Cessi, standby with the drones for the salvage OP. Siren, showtime."
XxXGatecrashXxX
The stations command center consisted of a multitude of terminals, a maned crew of eight, within a circular room. Siren stood humming to herself as she looked over the display in front of her checking different systems and information banks for spoils. A pleased smile on her face as she adjusted a one time on a list before she addressed the man hovering to her right. "This is perfect, thank you Michael. Something I just noticed, there are thirty eight people on the station, right?"
Her guide nodded easily. "Correct. We haven't needed a larger work force for some time now."
"Okay. You know, that's still a lot of people to fit into the mess hall. How about we set up in the loading bay? I'm sure the crew of the Swan wouldn't mind a chance to stretch their legs and that would give us a chance to talk to everyone at the same time."
"An excellent idea, Ms. Morris. I will let Mr. Pratchett know immediately."
"Wonderful. Paul?"
The man sitting across from her station turned in his chair when he heard his name. "Ma'am?"
"How are we doing on communications?"
"Everything in station is set to receive your broadcast." Paul reported immediately. "I included omni tools address as well since you were concerned someone might miss out on your performance."
"Oh, how thoughtful. That was nice of you to think of that. What about signals leaving the station?"
"No ma'am. We are completely dark right now, no signals leaving and all access to the extranet has been rescinded and locked out, per your request."
"Wonderful, you've been a big help, Paul. Thank you very much."
The cape turned away from the blushing young man, turning to face a dark redheaded woman in her thirties at her left. "How long until everyone's assembled, Jessica?"
"Twenty minutes, Ma'am."
"Okay. By the way, who did your hair? It's really nice but I can't see Cerberus having a hair stylist just lying around on a super secret space station."
Jessica smiled, her hand raising upward as she answered. "Thank you. My friend Lisa did it this morning before our shift. It's generally frowned on, but Lisa's a follower on Surin's advice column. That's where she found the instructions for this style. According to the posts, this style was something unmarried quarian girls usually wore, back before the Morning War. It's similar to a french braid, with the notable difference being the pattern, knots, and the circlet."
"It's pretty." Siren noted appreciatively. "Vates and Matriarch have long hair, I bet they would love something like that. Stylish, and yet, very functional. Why is it frowned on? You can't tell me Cerberus really cares that much about fashion."
"Well, its more to do with the fact that Surin is an asari, and the style's quarian." Jessica replied while pointing one of the techs sitting across the room. "Really its not that big a thing since it's only people like Commander Richards who get upset about it, but we usually keep it quiet to avoid the hassle. Lisa and I don't really buy into our groups dynamic, but Cerberus pays really well for skilled technicians. Both of us are colony raised, so you can imagine we're not exactly well established in credits, and college was expensive while the job markets available to us were very limited."
Siren looked to the man in question. "Commander?"
"I do run a tight station." Richards admitted blandly. "While I have nothing personal against Ms. Surin, I am not fond of the havoc alien influences have had on human concerns. While hair care might seem a trivial issue, it is through that crack other influences rush through. The line has to be drawn somewhere."
"Hmm, spoken like a true Space Nazi. You shouldn't think that way." Siren chided as she turned to the tech Jessica pointed out a moment ago. "Lisa, right? Think I can talk you into doing my hair like that?"
The brunette technician smiled. "Sure. Right now?"
"Please." Siren confirmed as she took off her hat. "But please be careful of my feathers, I haven't clipped them in a while and they're a bit sensitive."
As Lisa moved behind her to work on the braid, Siren accessed the terminal in front of her. The others in the room returned to previous tasks, which mostly consisted of keeping the lockout in place, and letting the stations crew know to gather on the loading deck. For her part, Siren moved carefully from one screen to another, checking inventories of various items, and marking a few that were of interest. Those she sent to Lia and Cessi's omni tools. Other items of interest, such as logs about Cerberus operations and such, she sent to Leet's. She continued to hum, occasionally breaking out into non lyrical songs, as she worked until her own omni tool beeped at her.
Leet: Showtime.
Siren smiled. "Are we ready, Commander Richards?"
"Yes ma'am. Everyone is assembled and waiting."
"Lovely."
XxXGatecrashXxX
Siren stood at the front, the three highest ranking officers on the station in chairs just behind her. Vates watched her mouth move, knowing she was talking but being unable to hear. So weird, but she knew that without the filtering tech, she would have be just as spellbound as all the Cerberus guys sitting in front of Siren.
Instead of focusing on that, Vates moved through the lanes of the crowd. She focused on each person she passed for a moment, after checking the data pad in her hands. Those whose names matched the list, Vates took one of the stickers from her board, and put them on that person. A few others received a different one, and of those left, even fewer got any of the last kind. No one questioned her actions until she was practically done.
"Um, excuse me ma'am."
Vates pulled back her hand from placing the sticker on the woman in front of her as she turned to the older man sitting in the next seat. "Yeah?"
"Just a quick question, but why did you put a gold star on Gabby?" The man asked in his rich scottish brogue.
"Gabriella…"
"You're Kenneth Donnelly, right?" Vates asked instead of answering his question.
"Er, yes? I mean, yes ma'am, I am."
Vates peeled another of the gold stars away from the board, sticking it on Kenneth. "Well, to answer your question, I put a gold star on both of you, because you're on my list. People on my list, get gold stars."
"I think what Kenneth means is, what do the different stars signify?" Gabriella asked.
"Well, aside from what I mentioned, a gold star almost guarantees you a spot on the Normandy."
"But, me and Gabby are already assigned to the Normandy. We are engineers." Kenneth pointed out.
Still smiling, Vates nodded. "Yup, and that's why you get gold stars, because you're coming with us when we leave."
Kenneth blinked, looking a bit confused, though that could also have been from him trying to pay attention to the conversation, as well as whatever Siren was saying. Gabriella also seemed to have having that problem but it didn't stop her from asking her next question. "And the silver ones?"
"Possible spots, but I won't know for sure until tomorrow, or the next day, so they're coming with us too." Vates explained to the confused pair. "Bronze won't be, they're taking a shuttle."
"Oh." Kenneth muttered. "So, what about the one's who don't get a star?"
"They're staying behind." Vates smile wilted slightly, but wasn't noticed by either sitting in front of her. "I should get back to this. Don't worry though, I'm sure Siren will let you guys know what's going to happen next. Just pay attention, you'll see."
Vates moved down the line, letting the two engineers go back to listening to Siren. No one else from the station, or the Swan, questioned her allowing her to complete her task in short order. She only paused long enough to look at Siren and nod, before heading to the Normandy trying to ignore the migraine that was throbbing behind her eyes.
Once up the ramp, she noticed Gunny finishing setting up the detention cells they were going to need within the cargo hold for those they were taking with them. All temporary until she had the chance to rest so she could fully vet them, or disqualify them. Not exactly a great way to recruit, but Vates knew better than most, just how important the mission was. While taking risks was sort of SOP for them, taking stupid risks wasn't and anything that jeopardized her surrogate family, qualified as a stupid risk in her book.
Lost in her thoughts as she was, she never noticed when Gunny walked up to her until his hand rested on her shoulder. "Hey, you okay?"
"Yeah," Vates lied, turning to the crowd still sitting in front of Siren. Lots of nodding along had Vates wondering which song she was doing. Judging by the way Siren was swaying back and forth, probably not one of the faster pace ones. "I'm okay."
"You don't look okay."
"Mig-, um, Gunny?"
"Yeah, chicka?"
"Tell me I'm not a bad person for not giving everyone a star."
"That depends." Vates finally turned, seeing the concerned look on his face as he continued. "It depends on whether anyone who didn't get one, deserved one or if you didn't miss anyone when you were checking them."
"I checked everyone, twice." Vates returned. "I-I didn't want to mess up."
"Then you're not a bad person." Grunny stated confidently.
"It doesn't feel that way." Vates argued, turning once more the sitting people across the room.
"I know," the muscular spaniard sighed, bringing Vates attention back to him. "You remember back when Matriarch got hurt? The Bakuda fight, when she lost her arm."
Her body shivered, "Don't remind me. One of worst days of my life. I was so worried about Ta- I mean, Matriarch."
"Yeah, I didn't know her personally then, but that was just about the time I joined. I'd been trying to find an 'in' with the team for a while by that point, but it wasn't until a day after that happened that I got my shot."
Slightly confused, Vates asked, "What does that have to do with what's happening right now?"
"Hear me out. See, Renegade found me, sort of like he found Imp, by back tracing my attempts to get in contact with Matriarch. We met in this bar way out on the east side. So, we're talking, you know? And I'm telling him about what I could bring to the team when he changes things on me and starts asking questions about what brought me looking for them in the first place. Which was a hard thing for me, because I was still hurting and angry about losing me familia. But he keeps pushing until I tell him and I like, I start falling apart because of what I let happen to them, how I failed them.
"So then, Renegade starts talking about himself and some of the things he'd seen and done. The good, and the bad, and it's crazy shit. I mean some of the things he told me were completely loco, but I listened. After he was done, he says to me, 'There are two kinds of soldiers. Both will go looking for a fight, and both will kill. The difference between them is what they fight for, and why.'
"So I asked him about Matriarch's fight with the city's gangs, what kind of fight was that? And he tells me, 'the necessary kind.' You see?"
"No, I don't." Vates answered confused.
"Part of what we do, is things like this. It's not nice, pretty, or heroic. Sometimes it's bloody, or messed up, but it's not really villainy either. What it is, is necessary. That's what Renegade was trying to tell me back then. What I fight for, and why I fight should only be for a better future, not just for me, but for all the good people out there, like my family, who either can't fight or don't know how." Gunny put his arm around Vates, pulling her into a one arm embrace as he continued. "It's the difference between a good soldier, and a bad one."
"I don't feel like a good soldier," Vates mumbled into Gunnys chest armor where her head rested. "Much less like a good person."
"The good ones never do." Gunny softly whispered.
XxXGatecrashXxX
I sat in my chair, leg bouncing nervously, as I tried to keep my thoughts from scattering in a hundred different directions. We had arrived well ahead of schedule and were waiting for Liara to meet up with us, but it was a long transit from Sol to here. Which meant waiting. While I had a love/hate relationship with waiting that, at best, resulted in grudging tolerance of each other, being this close to achieving our goal had me practically ready to sever ties. Preferably with murder. Okay, preferably with a lot of murder.
"That is not relaxing."
The voice distracted me enough to focus on the figure in front of me. Leaning slightly forward in his chair, Steve shook his head. I blinked a couple of times as I realized he'd been trying to get my attention for a while. "What?"
"You need to stop. I mean full stop. Seriously, you're starting to freak me out here, and considering how long we've been running together, that says something. Put. The. Bugs. Down. Slowly step away from the bugs. I promise you they will still be there later."
Finally catching on, I frowned. "We still need-"
"You need, to fucking chill. You walk into that station like this and everything is going to go to shit. Man, you know that better than I do."
Until his statement I hadn't realized just how focused I'd been on my connection to my bugs. Busted, I deflated slightly, willing my bug drones to return to their docking ports. The rest of my arsenal I sent to their habitats and away from the multitude of projects I had them doing. "I know."
Steve nodded understandingly as I slouched into my chair. "Alright, call it then."
Grudgingly I looked at my hand. "Eight."
"Go fish."
I reached for the small folding table between us pulling a card from the deck. "Crap. Why aren't we playing Rummy again?"
"Because I can count cards and you decided that if you're going to lose, you'd rather lose at Go Fish than Rummy." Steve replied easily. "Two."
I pulled the sole duce from my hand, giving it to the cheating thinker. "Right, I remember now."
Steve chuckled while he arranged his cards. Once he seemed satisfied with the new structure, he brought his eyes back to mine. "Seven. We still got hours to kill, if this isn't working for you we can try something else, but you seriously need to relax."
"In all honestly, it won't matter." I confessed. "Go fish."
"I get that being this close makes the waiting worse, but there isn't much we can do about that right now." Steven said, pulling a card from the deck. "Or is it how quiet it is?"
I knew he was referring more to the fact it was just the two of us than any literal sense of the word. Considering the volume of the music coming through the speakers, I hoped this wasn't his definition of quiet anyway. The song playing at the moment was fast paced, no lyrics which meant it was a score from one of his games. It wasn't bad if similar to a lot of the music he chose for his half of the playlist. Completely different than those I picked which tended to be more somber, reflecting my mood I guess. With the player set to randomly pick, we ended up with a rather bipolar playlist that tended to flip flop more than the shoe of the same name. Funnily enough, it fit my current state considering how much difficulty I was having trying not to think about the task ahead, or prepare for it, or check our equipment, or -again- go over all the things that still needed doing...
"I don't know. Maybe." I sighed as I lowered my cards. "No, it's not the quiet so much as I was just thinking about all the stuff that brought us to here. Steve, do you regret any of it?"
"That's not vague." Steve mumbled as he lowered his own cards.
"Just, you know, any of it? The life, or whatever." I clarified unhelpfully.
Steve leaned back after setting down his cards. "Well, glad you cleared that up. Like what, joining up? You didn't give us much choice in the matter. If I remember correctly our options were join, or become a human Happy Meal for a couple of thousand bugs. The Wards fucked me up enough I couldn't have fought off a half drowned cat in a sack. Back then, Greg wasn't much of a fighter and it wasn't like we were geared up for it. Kind of an easy choice to make."
"You know I wouldn't have actually done that, right?"
"Yeah, now, but back then? Back then I didn't know shit." Steve answered. "Best thing that ever happened to me was making the mistake of pushing you to far and getting recruited. The way things were in Brockton Bay, Greg and I would probably be dead right now otherwise."
"I doubt that. You guys have always found a way to keep just ahead of things before. Neither of you are stupid. Childish and a bit insane, but not stupid." I teased.
"Hey, you don't want to play the insane card. You're crazier than I am by an order of magnitude, and that says something, cuz I'm fucking nuts."
Despite my thoughts, I snickered at his apt comment, even nodding to his point. "True, but I guess that's kind of the point. So, regrets?"
"Well, wouldn't have minded sleeping with Miss Militia-"
"You and a quarter of the population of Brockton Bay." I rolled my eyes. "I'm being serious here."
"So am I." Steve returned. The dirty smirk and wiggling eyebrows were overkill but actually got me to laugh.
"Seriously, Steve. After Leviathan and things settled down-"
"That was like, what? A week before we had to go back?"
"Okay, that little bit of drama aside-"
"Little drama? Is that how you remember it? Because I remember something completely different. Do I need to get the video? Cuz, I got it, not that Brockton Bay ever forgot the day the Exiled appeared over the city and started firing."
"It was just to make a point-" I started to say before he cut me off again.
"Oh yeah, you made your point alright. Do not fuck with Matriarch because she'll drop your ass so hard archeologists a thousand years from now will find the imprint and say, 'Holy shit, who did that guy piss off' and 'Man am I glad who ever did that shit is dead'." Steve laughed.
"Now you're making it to be a bigger thing than it was." I groused. "I admit I got a little… medieval and might have overplayed things, but you can't argue that it was effective."
Still chucking, Steve shook his head. "That's one way to put it. Another way would be that you went off your nut and decided to make an example of the first idiot to go after Dinah."
"I don't remember you complaining at the time," I huffed, narrowing my eyes at the thinker across from me. "I distinctly remember your idea was something far more grandiose. Something about skeet shooting Merchants and using them for live ammo training over the Atlantic?"
"Hey, we needed to work out the issues with the targeting matrix anyways!" Steve argued before he lost it and started laughing which got me to laughing again. It took while before either of us settled down. By that time the song playing had switched out for one from my selection, one of Paige's more somber numbers that I hadn't heard in a while.
After listening for a few moments, I shook my head, last vestiges of good humor leaving me. "What the hell's wrong with us, Steve?"
"Just shit." He half answered, half deflected. "Cape shit does that to people and we weren't exactly in a good place back then. Way too much anger with way too much tech. You said it yourself when you told us about your idea to go into hiding. You saw the writing on the wall before any of us. We all agreed with you that it was go into exile, or take over, and who the fuck wants that job? Man, can you imagine the paperwork?"
I nodded to his point. "Lisa didn't seem to mind it. Actually, I think she enjoyed it."
"Different strokes for different folks." Steve stated neutrally. I nodded to his point but remained quiet. Steve continued when he realized I wasn't going to. "Besides, that day was us at our worst. Leviathan wasn't even cold when Skidmark took one hit too many and decided to make his play. We just lost Shepard and Chatika, and dropped off Dinah. Even Paige was foaming at the mouth when that shit went down, and you know what her plan was. The only reason she didn't do it was only a tenth of the city had power and there was no way to broadcast her voice over the whole city without that. Of all the over the top and vicious plans we came up with, yours had the least long range consequences, you know."
"I know."
"Besides, we only did that stuff a few times. What about all the other things we did? Like all those terrorists we dealt with? Or the their financial backers that we robbed blind? Not only did we make a small fortune doing that, but we cut down on them being able to hurt people. Also, don't forget all the little people we helped. Like that village that almost got murdered when that volcano erupted and we stopped the lava flow from letting them get away.
"Hell, I'll do you one better and bring up all those people we helped here and there who had local problems with capes not keeping to civility? Don't even make me bring up all the times we ran disaster relief for Endbringer Events. We saved a lot of people during that time just running supplies until the Protectorate could pick up the slack."
I smiled. I had forgotten about that stuff, and there were a lot more moments where we helped people than we hurt them. "True but-"
"But, you still regret shit." Steve finished for me.
I shrugged. "Not the helping people stuff or even the what we did to protect Dinah. Over the top or not, I like to think we saved more lives than we took. We were always careful to make sure our counterstrikes were surgical to keep civilian involvement out if it, or at least to a minimum. After we did our thing general villainy was non existent in the city for a long time. Hell, general crime plummeted in the city after one of our runs according to Sharee."
"Alright, so if not that stuff, what's got you like this?"
After a few false starts, I finally managed to to articulate the thought that had been bothering me. "Just… Thinking about back then, and the bad stuff we've done. I mean, yeah, we managed to do some good, but we did a lot of bad too. Like that fuck up in Mexico."
Steve slouched at my reminder. "Oh man, you had to bring up Mexico. I'd forgotten all about that. Man, how were we supposed to know the President wasn't dirty? Every bit of evidence we had said he was."
"That was the point. We got played and ended up with a kill team hunting us non stop for several weeks. We're just lucky we were able to lose them in LA otherwise we'd never made it back to the ship. Paige has come a long way but she could barely avoid hitting a mountain back then, much less bring the Exiled close enough for us to get aboard without compromising it. Things might have been different had we had Atlas back then, but we didn't. Another couple of days like we had and that would have been it. We'd have been done. Really, when you sit down and look at it, it's really unbelievable we're still alive."
"Yeah, I can see your point." He reluctantly admitted. "I also remember you said something similar once, back when you decided you needed a break."
I nodded, remembering. "Yeah. I tried, Steve. I really did, but it just… felt fake. Like something was missing or that it wouldn't last. I kept looking over my shoulder and even during those moments when I managed to forget, I still felt on edge. Like I should have been doing more, or even doing something. It makes me wonder if I'll ever be able to stop or, you know, settle down. Now we're here, and we have this whole thing with the Reapers to deal with, you know?"
"We'll figure out a way to kill the Reapers." Steve pointed out understandingly. "As for that other stuff, that was then. Now we're here, and we're here to stay. Like I said, we're going to win this thing, and when we do, you can figure out the small stuff."
"You say that like it's going to be easy." I chuckled mockingly. "Sebastian did it, but I dont know how. I know it wasn't easy and had something to do with a Prothean super weapon called the 'Crucible'. Even then, Sebastian wasn't around long enough to see the results of what it did, so it's entirely possible he might have lost."
"Yeah well, okay but now he's going to have us, and we're bullshit." I looked up smiling at the smirk on Steves face. "Besides, we have some time. Who knows what you'll remember between now and then? Even if you don't remember, or we dont find out about it elsewhere, we'll find a way to win. You'll see."
"I hope so. I mean, it's the plan anyways. Assuming we don't get killed and actually do win this thing, What about you?"
"What? Like, me settling down or something? Wife, house and mini me's?" I nodded watching as he leaned back. A soft smile on his face as he thought about it.
"Yeah. I mean, I always figured I'll settle down some day. Can't be a villain forever, you know? Not sure about putting down 'roots' unless it's a kick ass place though. Well, maybe after I do some spacing, or maybe do something like Greg and I did on Bet with a website, just without the villainy. I'm sure there's other stuff I can get into that people will pay to see." Steve nodded to his own points before bringing his full attention back to me. "First we have to kick the Reapers in the balls, but yeah, you know, someday. Maybe after I find the right girl. Someone who can keep up, or at least, keep me on my toes."