...and we're back! I've had a few comments mentioning how odd it is that a story called Shepherd of the Stars doesn't really have much Shepard in it. Yes. That is odd. Let's fix that, shall we? For those of you wondering, yes, I will eventually give Shepard's gender and backstory. It would be too cumbersome not to, in the long run. But for now, I'm milking this gimmick for all its worth.
This is also our first look at what things are like on Thessia. There's a lot of stuff I had to leave out, largely because Ash wouldn't know or care, but much of how things have shaped up on the planet are based off nuclear blast simulations on real cities and historical disaster response to events like the 2004 Tsunami.
Reviews are naturally appreciated! The next Codex will be coming later this week, and is a look a SolForce's capital, as written by The Poarter. See you then!
"This is Thessia? I don't understand."
"What's not to get?" Jacob asked, pulling a large crate from the shuttle's cargo hatch and dropping it to the ground with a thump. "Antimatter bombardment isn't exactly pretty."
"Yeah, but the Leviathan attacked months ago. I thought they would have at least started rebuilding by now," Ashely said, surveying the area around them with a wary gaze. "Human colonies can have hab-domes up in hours. These people are living in tents!"
The city looked more like the images she'd seen of Tuchanka than the usual graceful spires she associated with Asari worlds. The city of Niacele used to be one of Thessia's larger metropolises, and the Leviathan had apparently taken that into account. Niacele had been hit with ten different missiles, the full payload of an IOBM MIRV, and from the looks of the craters the warheads had been set to airburst for maximum damage. Several of the city's huge skyscrapers had been toppled or completely annihilated by the blasts, and the rest now loomed over the gutted city like the decaying skeletons of giants.
The many walkways and thoroughfares that connected the battered spires hadn't fared any better. Most had collapsed, and the rest were pulverized messes of debris and rubble. The thousands of skycars that would normally have crisscrossed the city's skyline in endless streams were gone now, replaced by several dozen military transports that flitted around like flies on a corpse, each on their own errand. The remains of the skycars could still be seen in the scattered craters and trenches smashed into the landscape as the vehicles had been thrown out of the sky in their hundreds following the impacts.
"The missiles destroyed a majority of the local infrastructure," put in Shepard. Like the rest of the ground team, the Commander was covered in bland brown rags similar to the ones favored by Utilitarians. The pacifistic order was one of the few Human groups still welcome on the Asari homeworld, and posing as aid works gave them an easy excuse for the heavy crates she and Jacob had just finished unloading. "Just trying to build enough support facilities to start rescue operations would be a major task. Civilian housing is a secondary priority."
"The Commander is right," Jacob said, handing her the final crate. She heaved it onto the gravity sled they were using to move them to the drop point and took up a position beside Shepard at the head of the sled. She felt exposed without her combat armor, and the large pistol she wore beneath her disguise was a poor replacement for her fusion cannon. "Rescue work isn't like setting up on a frontier world. It's long and complicated, and the sheer amount of refugees here just makes it that much harder. The Asari don't have the space or the legal right to just build a prefab city wherever they want."
"You've done rescue work?" Ashley asked, surprised.
"Yeah. I used to be Utilitarian, so when I was younger I traveled to a lot of Freeholds trying to help out," he remarked, assuming a casual rear-guard position as Shepard crouched down to punch their destination into the sled's navigation computer. It lifted off the ground and began to drift forward as the Blue Section operative continued. "Then the Skillian Blitz happened, the Batarians started upping their attacks on Freeholds, and rescue work just didn't seem like it was enough, you know?"
"I know what you mean. Pulling people out of a collapsed building is great, but it's better if you can stop it from collapsing in the first place." Ashely nodded as they began walking, carefully keeping pace with the sled. The landing platforms for civilian vehicles were on the edges of the sprawling shanty town the city's surviving population now lived in, and its forest of prefabs and rescue tents weren't set up with vehicles in mind. A hover transport would draw too much attention anyway. "Still, Utilitarian? I bet your family took the news of your enlistment well."
"It hit my mom the hardest. She raised me Utilitarian, and she couldn't understand how I could wind up Broken. I'd like to think my Dad would have gotten me though. He believed in the ideal of the Greatest Good, but he never really took to the pacifism. He and my mom agreed to disagree. His ship was lost out in Verge back in '99, so I guess in the end I'll never know how he'd feel about it."
There was an awkward pause, filled only by the noises from the refugee camp ahead and the crunch of shattered tile under their boots. Desperately trying to find a way out, Ashley looked toward the Commander, but Shepard gave no sign of even having heard what they were talking about.
"I'm sorry," she said finally, wincing at how insincere that probably sounded. "I didn't know."
"No reason you should have. Honestly, it was almost ten years ago. I've come to terms with it," he replied. "Still, how about you? Religious at all?"
"Neo-Catholic," she answered with a nod.
"I've known some Neo-Catholics before. Good people, for the most part," Jacob said, before straightening to address the head of their little procession. "How about you, Shepard?"
Shepard said nothing, but the Commander's lips turned up in a small smile. Instead of becoming annoyed by his leader's taciturn response, Jacob just laughed.
"One of these days, you're going to give me something."
The smile grew even broader, but vanished instantly as two figures darted out of a nearby building. She saw the Commander's hand twitch almost reflexively, but then relax as the shapes resolved into a pair of Asari children. Which was an odd phrase, Ashely reflected, consider either of these 'children' could be older than she was.
"I don't remember seeing any of you around before!" chirped one of the girls, smiling through the dust and dirt that covered her face and clothes. "Are you new?"
"Tristana, this isn't a good idea. We should just go," said the other, a slightly smaller girl who hovered nervously in the first's shadow. "They probably don't want to be bothered."
"Oh, come on Eshme," stated the larger girl, before turning back to face the trio. "If you're new, you probably need someone to show you around. The camp's pretty big, and there aren't any signs. Where are you headed?"
"Tistana!" whined the second girl, leaning in closely to whisper into her partner's ear. "We shouldn't be talking to them! These aren't Hivers or Tarka! It's not safe to talk to Humans!"
Ashley was unsure which affected her more: the second child's laughable attempt at whispering, which had hardly been any softer than her normal voice, or the idea that a child might actually be scared of her. Hivers were two-meter bug monsters with blades, spikes, and a natural urge to kill anything secreting estrogen. Tarka were steroid-fueled killing machines that could out-muscle a Krogan and were prone to violent rages. And it was the short, hairless apes these kids were scared of? She wasn't sure if she should be flattered or horrified.
"It's okay," Tistana said comfortingly, not even bothering to whisper. "Look at their clothes. They're Utilitarians! Remember? Utilitarians are okay. They won't hurt us."
Eshme didn't seem fully convinced, but she stopped protesting.
"So?" asked Tistana, smiling again. "Where are you all going?"
Something in the Asari girl's face reminded Ashley of her youngest sister Sarah. She started to smile reflexively when a horrible thought entered her brain. What if this was a trap? Crime was rampant on Thessia right now. Billions were homeless and destitute. Since almost everything had to be imported, Blue Sections' reports claimed that even essential supplies were stretched critically thin. Local law enforcement would have been swamped at the best of times, and most of them had died in the initial strikes. The planetary government had even started hiring Eclipse mercenaries to help keep order, which was always a recipe for disaster. Mercs tended to cause more problems than they solved.
It would be all too easy for a gang of thugs to hire a few kids to front for them, pretending to be poor orphans so they could lure unsuspecting visitors into a lethal ambush. Since the three of them had a loaded grav-sled, Ashley guessed they'd be extremely attractive marks for such tactics. Real Utilitarians didn't carry weapons, so they'd be the perfect targets. Even if it wasn't something so sinister, they could easily be thieves of a more mundane variety. She'd read Dickens, and the Artful Dodger was clever enough without forty years to hone his craft.
Now that she knew what to look for, the girl's resemblance to Sarah was obviously just glamour. She could still see it, but now that Ashley knew what to look for the effect was severely lessened. That by itself wasn't evidence of guilt, since Asari used their glamour reflexively. A girl who wanted to be liked would activate it even without meaning to, but these two seemed pretty young to be so skilled with such tricks. Even their initial fear might have just been part of the ruse. It created an illusion of vulnerability and played off natural parental instincts. Humanity was famous for having some of the strongest connections to their offspring of any species, after all, and these two were at least as old as she was. Someone that old would be more than familiar with the techniques needed to use her youthful appearance to her advantage.
"Shepard, we're already running late," she snapped, her tone harsh. She couldn't openly warn the Commander about the girls' possible treachery, but she'd been on Shepard's team for a while. She knew how to talk without actually speaking. "We don't have time for this."
Shepard nodded and waved the sled forward, sliding around the two Asari children with barely a second glance. Jacob was more social, trotting forward a few steps to crouch in front of the pair.
"I'm afraid she's right. Don't worry, we already know where we're going," he explained, before fishing around in his pockets to pull out a small plastic back. "Here. This is for you."
"Thanks!" they chorused behind her before darting off to enjoy their spoils.
"See, I told you they were okay! Utilitarians are nice!" echoed Tistana's faint voice as they walked away.
"The lady wasn't very nice. And the other one didn't even say anything!"
"Yeah, but look what we got! There's chocolate in this! Human chocolate, not the bitter Tarka stuff!"
"Chocolate? I want some!"
Ashley shook her head as they rounded a corner and passed out of pair's line of sight. Even if they were decades-old psychics, they obviously still had a lot to learn about guilt trips. Her younger sisters were much more vicious about it.
"You shouldn't have given them anything," she declared finally, shooting a quick glance back at Jacob. "At best those two were panhandlers. It's obvious they were just looking for a handout."
"So? They're kids, Williams, and all I did was give them some trail mix. What was I supposed to do, tell them to quit slacking and get a job?"
"It was a con. They play the pitiful waif routine when new arrivals show up so they can sucker bleeding hearts like you out of some credits or candy," Ashely explained with a frown as they began walking along the edge of the camp. Her eyes glanced habitually from the milling Asari refugees to their left and the empty ruins to their right as she tried to guess where a surprise attack would most likely originate from. "That kind of thinking shouldn't be rewarded, regardless of how old those kids were. You should have ignored them."
"Really? Does this sound familiar? 'Give to everyone who asks you, and if anyone takes what belongs to you, do not demand it back.'"
"It's Luke 6:30. And I really wish people would stop quoting the Bible at me every time I get into an argument," she snapped. "My religion isn't a weapon you can use to try and prove a point."
"No, your religion, like all religions, is a set of stories, beliefs, and rules that are supposed to show you how to live a good life," Jacob countered. "And the religion you claim to follow has some pretty specific rules about charity."
"Pope Theodore IV clarified those passages back in 2246. The faithful are not obligated to give charity if it would be harmful to the recipient's moral wellbeing."
"Isn't that like saying it's alright to torture someone into conversion, because the benefit to his soul outweighs the harm to his body?"
"Oh, you really want to go down this road?" Ashley snapped angrily. "Fine. 'War is like holding a shit eating contest. The winners are somehow proud of their superiority at a task no sane person would wish to be skilled at, the losers feel the need to start a second contest simply to justify their own effort, the observers are both fascinated and disgusted at the same time, and everyone involved comes out with a bad taste in their mouths. The good news is there always seems to be one of these contests going on nowadays, so those who wish to become soldiers are free to pull up a plate. There's plenty of shit to go around.'"
"The Gospel of the Comedian. There's some funny stuff in there," agreed Jacob with a nod. "Christianity might have spread faster if Jesus had thrown some off-color jokes into the Sermon on the Mount. I'm also impressed you have such a long quotation memorized. Are you sure you don't want-"
"Quiet," interrupted Shepard, holding up a hand. "We're being watched."
She glanced around and saw an oval drone skimming along the wreckage to their right, carefully keeping pace with them.
"Asari recon drone," Ashley subvocalized, the implants in her neck clearly transmitting her voice to the others. "It's an older model. Probably belongs to the Eclipse."
Shepard nodded before looking at Jacob, glancing toward the drone, and then closing one fist. The psion nodded. His eyes flashed and a small section of wall gave way above the drone. A wave of metal and glass showered down on the hapless observer, crushing it instantly.
"They're going to know we had something to do with that," Ashley warned. "They'll send another drone."
"It doesn't matter. Legally, they can't prove we did anything, and we're almost there."
Shepard pointed toward a collapsed building just ahead of them. Someone had painted the phrase "Blue Power" in an eye-assaulting cyan color on one of the walls, but had apparently departed in a hurry. The final letter trailed off in a curve leading around the far edge of the building, away from the camp's line of sight.
They followed the paint around the end of the structure, and Ashley noticed the line continued for several feet, ending in a final downward curl. Shepard walked over to the wall, stooped, and pulled a small camouflage net off the ground to expose a large metal hatch. The Commander's omni-tool glowed, and the hatch swung open to reveal a set of stairs leading downward.
"Don't just stand there, get your asses down here!" growled a gruff voice from within.
She didn't like the tone but obediently led the way down, carefully guiding the front of the grav-sled while Jacob took the rear. The stairs led to a basement of some kind, but it was carved out of the glassy clay the Asari used instead of the mat-gray concrete favored by SolForce. It had likely been a storage area of some kind, but the neat racks of smooth containers had been torn apart and shoved into a huge pile in the corner of the room. Someone had rearranged them into a vaguely chair-like formation and covered it with a blanket, though she couldn't fathom exactly why.
"Welcome to my little underground kingdom," said the voice broadly. It belonged to a balding, slightly over-weight man in white pants and a blue tunic. He sat sprawled on the crates and blanket, and his cocky smile finally explained what strange setup was supposed to be. It was a throne.
That alone would have been enough to make Ashley dislike the man, but the rest of the small basement was no better. An outdated suit of white and blue combat armor was heaped carelessly in a corner, and an old A-43 Mag Rifle lay on the floor beside it. The weapon looked like it hadn't been properly cleaned in weeks. A large table had been set up along one wall, and the remains of several field ration packs carelessly littered its surface
Much of the walls were covered in pinups of scantily clad women, several of which were blatantly pornographic. A large poster also caught her eye, showing an armored boot smashing a Hiver skull with the phrase 'Stomp the Bugs! Join SolForce today!' in large letters beneath it. It was placed next to another poster, featuring a soldier in combat armor dragging a dead Tarka by the tail and holding up a combat knife (an improperly rendered one, Ashley noted). The caption to this poster read 'Join the Ground Forces and Bag Yourself a Croc!'
She recognized both instantly. They were part of a series of digital recruitment images that had been discontinued by the personal orders of Director MacKenzie following the Hiver Armistace in 2434. He had apparently hated them so much he not only cancelled the image line, but had the files deleted from the Mars Archives themselves. Ashley could see why. They were disgustingly racist and brutally violent, designed more to put an end to any thoughts of peaceful coexistence with aliens as they were to actually increase recruitment.
"I see you're checking out my prized possessions," crowed the man with an ugly smirk. "They're originals. I've got a guy on Isis whose going to hook me up with the rest of the set soon, but if that's your sort of thing, babe, I've got some other stuff I could show you in a more…personal setting."
"They can't be originals," Jacob said, his face twisted into a frown of disapproval. On this, Ashley could completely agree. The man was a pig. "SolForce doesn't make physical printouts of their PR material. It's a waste of resources. Something you would know, Harkin, if you bother to do any research at all."
"They've got Humans killing aliens. Why would I need to know anything else?" the man said dismissively, before sitting up in recognition. "And, Jacob Taylor, as I live and breathe. Last time we met, you made some rather creative threats about what you'd like to do to me. It must be so humiliating to know that someone who thinks so highly of himself constantly has to come crawling back to me for help."
"Lieutenant Williams, this sewer rat is Harkin," announced Jacob with a heavy sigh. "Formerly of SolForce, where he was dishonorably discharged for conduct unbecoming. He applied to the Blue Suns, but even they wouldn't take him. So now he's in charge of one of their off-the-books 'associate' groups."
"The Blue Suns didn't refuse me," Harkin snapped angrily. "They decided my talents were better suited toward management and covert operations. I picked this job. Better pay, much safer, and lots of…perks, if you catch my drift."
"He runs drugs," explained Shepard flatly, coming down the stairs.
"Who the hell are you?" Harkin asked, eyes slowly scanning Shepard up and down. "I was expecting Miranda."
"She sent me instead. Apparently, she's tired of you staring at her breasts every time she tries to talk to you," Shepard replied with disinterest. "The hatch is secure and I've covered it back up. I trust you have another way out?"
"I'm not an idiot," drawled the man dismissively. "And if that tease didn't want me looking, she should put on some actual clothes."
"Ash, Jacob, we'll take off as soon as the crates are unloaded," said the Commander, completely ignoring Harkin. "Leave the sled, we don't need it anymore."
"Ash?" the grotesque man asked as they began picking up boxes and stacking them on the floor. "As in 'Ashely'? Ashely Williams, my god. Oh, they're never going to believe this. The granddaughter of the legendary General Williams, Hero of Humanity, reduced to drug running like common street scum? This is priceless."
"Drug running?" Ashely asked, pausing in confusion.
"Really? They didn't even tell you what was in these?" Harkin smirk in a way that just made her want to hit him.
"I didn't ask," she snapped defensively.
"Of course not. You're a good little solder. You'd never question orders."
He walked over to one of the crates, but his foul grin vanished when he found himself staring down the length of Shepard's pistol. The Commander's eyes narrowed darkly.
"This isn't a gift. You don't touch the merchandise until after you hand over the data."
"Take the stick out," said Harkin dismissively. "You think I've never done this before? SIC doesn't get shit until after I've inspected the goods."
"Fine." Shepard kicked the nearest container open, spilling shimmering purple dust onto the floor. "It's all there."
"Ever see this before, sweetheart?" the man crooned at Ashley, scooping up a handful of the powder and offering it to her.
"Powdered Egoline-27. Glamour dust," she replied, keeping her tone flat as she gave the drug's more common name. "Morrigi boil it and inhale the steam for a mild psychic boost and hallucinogenic effect. It's harmless to Humans."
"It's harmless to BASELINE Humans. Glowy freaks like Taylor over there aren't so lucky." Harkin leered, and Ashley had to stop herself from kicking him just on principle. "And that cloudsurfing the Morrigi do is for pussies. People round here just snort the stuff. Gets more into your system faster."
She continued trying to ignore him as the pile of cases slowly dwindled, but he seemed to confuse her cold shoulder with an invitation to continue his ramble.
"Yeah, Asari can't get enough of this crap. One line and they start turning every color of the rainbow. Two and it's off down the rabbit hole they go. Do three, and Wonderland starts coming to you, baby." Though she tried to keep her confusion off her face, Harkin still somehow noticed. "That's why they call it glamour dust, toots. Jacks up psychic glamour to the point where you stop seeing colors and start making 'em. It's real popular in the brothels round here. I can vouch first-hand, screwing a bitch that's smashed out of her mind on g-dust is the wildest sex you're ever going to get."
"Didn't think someone like you'd actually stoop to sleeping with aliens anyway, Harkin," Jacob stated, his voice full of disgust.
"Hey, I've got needs too, and it's not like I want to marry 'em. Turn out the lights and a blue whore feels the same as any other color." He laughed.
"Commander, request permission to beat him until he stops twitching," she growled, patience finally snapping. Harkin wasn't just a disgrace to Humanity, he was a disgrace to life in general. Much to her disappointment, Shepard raised a hand to wave her off. Harkin grinned once again.
"Don't you look down on me, Williams. I'm providing a valuable community service! It's not like they wouldn't be doing it either way. You know what Asari are like. They'll do anything with a pulse."
"I'd think that even they'd make an exception for something like you," she spat back, throwing the last crate to the ground with a crash. "I'm starting to see why even the psychos in the Blue Suns didn't want to hang around someone like you. Even xenophobic assholes have to have standards."
"Hey, I've got standards! It's not like I'm kidnapping people off the streets like the Eclipse and Bloodpack are," protested the bald man. "I tell you, if I switched from drug dealing to slave trading, I could make enough off this planet to retire. Slaves are going for a mint out in the Terminus now that the Hegemony's history, and Asari kids are worth their weight in platinum."
Shepard's gun flashed out again, and the safety light visibly blinked from green to lethal red.
"I'm sick of your stalling. You've inspected the product," growled Shepard. "I want the data. Now."
"Fine, fine," Harkin muttered, pulling up his omnitool and pressing a few keys. "There. Happy?"
"No," replied Shepard simply, but the pistol began compressing itself into storage mode again. The Commander nodded toward Ashley and Jacob. "We should go."
"Always nice doing business with SIC," drawled Harkin sarcastically. "I'll be seeing you."
"No. You won't."
Shepard led the others out of the filthy room into the dusty remnats of the Asari structure. It had probably been an apartment building of some kind, with sweeping, artistic halls and smooth walls that looked like they were made of glass. The visual effect was ruined by the damage the building had suffered. The glossy walls were threaded with cracks, the domed lights built into the ceiling burnt and shattered. The ceiling had collapsed in several areas, and the first set of stairs they passed had been buried when a huge section of the wall blew in.
"Commander. Permission to speak freely?" Ashley asked as they walked.
"Granted."
"What the hell was that?" she snapped, her suppressed frustrations boiling out of her. "We're smuggling drugs now? And to scum like that? This wasn't part of the plan. Whatever this data is, I'm sure we could have just taken it by force. Miranda's a tech empath, after all, and I could have always beaten it out of him."
"He's more than earned it," Jacob agreed. "I'm just glad I'm no good at telepathy or empathy. It's no wonder the Asari are throwing things at him."
"The data is worthless," stated Shepard calmly, shoving open a door that had long-since been jammed shut when a support beam was thrown through it. "Everything he gave me Black Section learned weeks ago."
"What?" Ashley asked, her temper building again. "You're saying we just handed a small fortune of illegal drugs over to a man like Harkin for nothing?"
"It's called Operation Mary Jane," Jacob said with a heavy sigh. "Blue Section's been dumping drugs like glamour dust into alien space for the better part of a decade now. It's supposed to weaken their economies and cause civil unrest."
"I don't believe this!" She smashed her fist into a nearby wall in frustration, and had to snap her mouth shut to avoid a pained yell. The glass-like surface was surprisingly solid, and without her armor the impact really hurt. Forcing the throbbing away, she continued. "We're SolForce, damn it! When the hell did the shepherds of Humanity become petty bullies and drug dealers?"
"Look, I don't like it any more than you do," replied the psion. "But peace is more complicated than war. If the Council's Spectres are busy hunting down filth like Harkin in their own territory, they won't be causing trouble in Human space."
"I'm no fan of aliens shoving us around either, but that doesn't justify giving drugs-"
"The drugs weren't the point either," Shepard interrupted. "The sled was bugged."
"What?" asked Ashley and Jacob simultaneously.
"Those drugs are never going to reach circulation. Harkin is just the bait. As we speak, Mirada is leaking the bug's tracking frequency to our real target. She'll take him down, then back track the drugs to his last customers. We'll ambush her there."
"So we're really going through with this?" Ashely asked cautiously. "Tela Vasir's a Spectre."
"This is still a Council homeworld," reminded Jacob. "If we get caught attacking a Spectre here, it'll almost certainly mean war with the Council. Are you sure it's worth the risk?"
"It's a big galaxy, Lieutenant." Shepard frowned darkly. "The Council may be the least of our problems."
