"And that's when you head butted the krogan?" Pyrrha asked, caught halfway between awe and disbelief as she and Shepard walked around Mother Base.
"Yep." was all the response Shepard gave.
"You headbutted a seven foot tall, two-hundred kilogram alien with… four testicles." Pyrrha shuddered with the final bit of description.
Shepard shrugged. "Krogan society values strength. If I acted polite and placating, I would've been seen as weak. They wouldn't respect me, and I wouldn't have been able to finish my mission."
Pyrrha thought upon the strangeness of alien cultures. She had wanted to know more about Shepard's adventures across the galaxy, and Shepard was currently regaling her with the time she traveled to the Krogan homeworld of Tuchanka to help her companion… finish puberty if she understood correctly.
"Did… did it hurt?" was all Pyrrha could think to ask.
Shepard gave a small laugh. "Of course it did. But I couldn't let them see that."
The two redheads laughed at this, only to be rudely interrupted by the sound of crashing metal by the Legion's training area. Both looked towards the source of the noise, and Shepard only sighed.
"Well, guess we should go figure out what's happening now." Shepard shook her and braced herself for whatever insanity was going on.
Rushing to the training area Shepard saw pretty much what she expected, two super human soldiers currently beating the absolute crap out of each other. The two perpetrators, an unarmored Six and Sarah were currently having the bout of the century. Six was dressed in his black bodysuit which he wore underneath his normal armor, while Sarah was currently sweating through a dirty tank top, orange jumper pants, and a pair of bloody boxing wrist wraps.
Despite Sarah's now aura-enhanced abilities, Six was still the far better hand to hand combatant as he easily dodged her jabs and crosses. After weaving under a straight right, Six shot upward and struck Sarah hard in the solar plexus with a knee. Normally the scientifically-enhanced Spartan-III would never strike a non-Spartan ally like that, but Sarah's aura lessened the strength of the blow to where it didn't break bones or rupture organs, but it still hurt like Hell.
But it didn't hurt enough to stop Sarah from grabbing the underside of Six's legs, and flipping him backwards like a table. Falling with the momentum, Six landed on his back and rolled, quickly standing him back up. Being the veteran fighter that she was though, Sarah wasn't just going to let Six go, and doggedly chased him down. As Six fully stood up Sarah followed up with a jumping double scissor kick, the first strike aimed for his stomach and the second at his face.
A quick parry with both forearms stopped that attack as Six pushed Sarah's legs away. Stepping forward, Six then wrapped his arms around Sarah's torso while she was in mid air and slammed her into the ground with a bodyslam, bringing his full body weight down onto her. Even with aura, the impact drove the air out of Sarah's lungs, stunning her.
Sarah tried to push the spartan off her as they struggled on the ground, but Six slid his hips over her stomach, getting her into a full mount position. Now completely on top of her, Six threw two punches that landed clean on her face, drawing blood. Sarah snarled through the crimson fluid, and tried to buck him off by bridging.
But Six was just as versed in grappling as he was in striking. Instead of being knocked off, he shifted his weight, moving into a side mount, his torso laying on top of her's, perpendicular. From there he gripped onto her left wrist with his right arm and pinned it to the ground, while his left hand snaked underneath her bicep and latched onto his own right. The twisting of limbs resulted in a kimura pin, and using the leverage by raising his left arm, he nearly ripped Sarah's shoulder from its socket.
Gritting her teeth, Sarah focused, fighting through the pain. Feeling the tendons and ligaments in her shoulder tear, she let her aura build up inside over, increasing in pressure until it began to overflow. With a single, violent shockwave, her aura exploded out of her, breaking the pin and sending Six flying out of the ring.
Despite having claimed victory in the spar, Sarah did not seem poised to stop at all. Baring her teeth, she instantly charged him again, one hand grabbing his throat and the other striking him in the face.
"Is that all you got big man?!" Sarah howled as she reared her fist back, ready to pound him into the ground.
Immediately, Six's eyes hardened. Despite being held by the throat there was no sign of fear in his eyes, no sign of friendliness either. This was no longer a spar, but a real fight, and his mind was now ready to kill.
Seeing the situation degrade so quickly, Shepard and Pyrrha moved to intervene. With a quick use of her biotics, Shepard knocked Sarah to the ground while Pyrrha moved between the two, separating them.
"Stand down, both of you!" Shepard barked out. No humor or levity in her voice, just 100% pissed off Commander. "What the Hell is going on here?!"
Both fighters got up and kept their distance. "It's nothing, Shepard." Sarah huffed out first. "Just a friendly spar."
That was probably one of the worst things Sarah could've said to Shepard as her mood went straight from angry to irate. But instead of lashing out, Shepard's eyes only narrowed on the Brotherhood of Steel member as her frown deepened.
"Get yourself cleaned up Lyons, I'll deal with you later." She commanded, with no room left for arguing.
Sarah grimaced, "Yes Commander." she replied as she quickly acquitted herself from the situation.
Shepard's gaze then snapped to Six. "Explain, now." was all she said to him.
Six straightened himself out, wiping the blood off his nose while Pyrrha did her best to become invisible, hoping to avoid the Commander's wrath.
"Earlier, Sarah approached me about getting some training done. She wanted to practice with her aura and wanted to learn new unarmed techniques as well. That's what we were doing, but something snapped in her during the spar." Six dutifully explained. "I have noticed Commander, that Lyons has recently become overly aggressive and confrontational. Ever since the mission to the Archives, she's been acting out, and I believe she may be emotionally compromised."
As Six finished his explanation, Shepard's eyes drilled into him, looking for any hint of a lie. She found none. As such she allowed herself to relax for just a second as she let out a sigh.
"Damnit" Shepard swore under her breath. "I'll figure out what's wrong."
"What do you plan on doing?" Pyrrha asked. Yes, she was a little afraid of Shepard right now, but her desire to help her friend was stronger.
Shepard rubbed her chin. "I'm thinking take her out on a mission, blow some steam off, then figure out what's the cause of the problem. No use talking to her right now if she's too pissed to think."
Pyrrha nodded, "Sounds reasonable. Well count me in, I don't want to leave Sarah alone at a time like this."
Shepard smiled at Pyrrha's loyalty. "Good with me. How about you Six? You in?"
"I think it's best for me to sit this one out, let Lyons cool down." He flatly said. "I'd rather not take a super sledge in the back."
"Fair enough." Shepard shrugged. "Go get suited up Pyrrha, I'll go see Snake for any available missions."
Pyrrha gave an unpracticed salute and the three went off on their separate ways.
Shepard made her way to the one place she knew she'd find Snake, the briefing room. The man had essentially claimed the room as his permanent domicile as he constantly planned the Legion's next move.
Entering the command center, she found 3 figures, Snake, Wynne, and T3 all standing over the holocron from the Archives. Several computers were running decryption algorithms on the data packets thanks to the cipher they were given, but it was a slow and tedious process.
"Shepard." Snake spoke the Commander entered the room.
"Snake." She replied with a small bow.
"Something wrong?" his face continually stoic.
Shepard gave a small shake of the head. "Nothing I can't handle. I was however, hoping you had any missions available that I could take a team on. Preferably something loud."
Snake and Wynne shared a quick gaze, ending with Wynne shrugging and going back to work while Snake moved over to grab some reports.
"I do have one thing. Thane went on a recon mission to Ilos recently, and reported some... concerning information." Snake opened up the folder and inside were polaroid photos of Geth troopers walking through the alien skyline. Shepard thought that the picture didn't seem out of place, until her eyes caught one particular geth shock trooper carrying a large silver and blue rifle she'd never seen before.
"In addition to the fact that the Geth are currently expanding out of Ilos, starting to build outposts within Kabul, Thane reported that they have been seen using weaponry and technology that not only doesn't belong in their universe, but that none of us have seen before." Snake continued. "Take a team, raid one of their bases, and get whatever intel or tech you can."
Shepard snapped a salute. "Roger that Boss."
As Shepard turned to leave, Snake interrupted her. "Why don't you take T3 with you? You of all people should know how important cyberwarfare will be against the Geth."
T3's flashlight head looked up to Shepard and gave an excited bwwom. Shepard smiled, accepting Snake's logic. She realized that she's never actually been on a combat mission with the droid, who was typically delegated to the role of pilot, but as a true AI she knew he had a few tricks up his non-existent sleeves.
"Alright then little guy, on me."
T3 gave a high pitched electronic bweeep as he scurried on after Shepard.
Exiting the command center, Shepard then put two fingers to her ear as she activated her communicator. "Lyons. Get suited up and report to the vehicle bay ASAP. We have a mission."
Thinking on her team's composition, she knew she had enough heavy hitters with herself, Sarah, and Pyrrha, while T3 had the tech side of things under control. Her current squad make up was lacking a ranged/reconnaissance component.
Once again putting her fingers to her ear, she decided to call the Legion's resident hunter. "Sev, gear up. We're going for a hunt."
With her team now set up, Shepard made her way to the armory to prepare for the upcoming battle.
Shepard and her team stood in the vehicle bay fully kitted out. As they weren't expecting this to be a prolonged battle, they only decided to go with their standard equipment. Shepard was packing her usual N7 Crusader Shotgun, Eagle Heavy Pistol, and Hurricane SMG, ready for engagements at all distances. Pyrrha was holstering her lightsaber to her belt with her shield Akoúo̱ and the newly reforged Miló strapped onto her back, while Sarah was packing a minigun and super sledge combo. Sev was using his standard DC17m modular blaster while T3 was equipped with both an ion blaster and a heavy blaster pistol in addition to his droid specific equipment.
"Alright. Now that we're all prettied up, let's get started." Shepard addressed the group. "Now I know you may have fought the Geth previously, but I wanted to go over some important information about them you may not know before we head out."
Her team gave silent and attentive nods, ready to take in what data they were about to receive.
"As you all know, the Geth are a synthetic race native to mine and Thane's universe. However what makes them different to say, our little friend T3 here, is that the Geth are not true AI, but a series of VI created by a race in my universe called the Quarians. However, while they are not true AI, the Quarians designed the geth to operate on a neural network together, creating something of a hive mind. What this means, is that the more Geth there are together, the more processing power they share, and by extension the more intelligence they have, creating what is essentially an AI." Shepard explained.
Sarah seemed to be the first to pick up on the implications of this. "That means the more Geth we take down, the dumber they become?"
Shepard nodded. "Indeed. Take down enough, and the Geth will start to lose their ability for advanced tactics or higher level problem solving. But conversely, the more there are, the more exponentially intelligent and dangerous each individual Geth platform becomes.
"This kind of parallel operating is how they developed their emergent intelligence and awareness. At the time, research on AI was banned in Council space, so when the Quarians realized their mistake, they went to war with the Geth. But the Quarians built billions of Geth for labour and security, and were vastly outnumbered. By the end of the war, the Quarians were forced to flee their homeworld of Rannoch, and the genocide that occured left the total Quarian population at less than one percent of its pre-war population. The Quarians then became a migrant, refugee race forced to travel the stars in search of a new home." Shepard explain matter of factly.
Pyrrha's jaw dropped at the figures while Sarah instantly scowled.
"That's… terrifying." Was all Pyrrha could say. It would be as if the grimm overrun the final bastions of Remnant's defenses, and her people were forced to flee to the stars. If such a thing were even possible on Remnant. The fact that the quarians built the Geth only seemed like an extra ironic kick to the stomach. To be forced to flee from their home to an unknown future, she could only feel sadness and pity for the Quarians.
Sarah all but spat on the ground. "See preventing tragedies like that is exactly what the Brotherhood of Steel was founded for! The humans on my Earth were not responsible enough to control the power of the atom, and the planet died for it. The Quarians were not responsible enough to control the Geth, and they were nearly driven to extinction. Such reckless scientific and technological experimentation will only ever breed abominations that lead to destruction."
Shepard couldn't help but crack a smile at that. "Sarah, you haven't seen technology run amok until you've come face to face with a Reaper. And to be fair, most Geth aren't too bad, a lot of them just wanted to be left alone, but were forced into conflict when the Quarians attacked first."
"You can not be serious! The Geth shouldn't exist in the first place Shepard!" Sarah cried out. "It's a pattern that I know you've seen. The hubris of man, or alien for that matter, superseding their caution and restraint, ending with a giant, fucking tragedy. Only a fool would think otherwise."
"I don't see what you're all getting so worked up for." Sev cut in while sharpening his vibro-wrist blade. "It's been a long time since I got to kill some droids. I'd prefer if you didn't spoil it with all of your whining."
T3 gave an offended cry.
"Shut up you rolling trash can I'm not planning on killing you." Sev snapped at the utility droid.
Shepard stepped forward to reign the conversation in, realizing what Six meant by overly aggressive. "I understand your concerns Sarah, and if you want, we can discuss this in private." Shepard then stood with an authoritative scowl, ready to chastise her subordinate. "But do not disrespect me like that again. Is that understood?"
Sarah grimaced again, realizing her outburst, and stood ramrod straight. "Yes, ma'am, understood ma'am."
"Good." Shepard nodded before turning back to the others to continue. "Thanks to Thane we have the location of the outpost. We'll be driving the Mako there, using it for fire support while the infantry move in. If there's no other questions, mount up and good hunting."
The team saluted and began to make their way to the APC. As they loaded in, Shepard grabbed Sarah's shoulder, separating her from everyone else.
"Before we start Sarah, I need to know. Are you good?" Shepard asked. While this mission was partially for Sarah to cut loose, Shepard didn't need her out there playing wannabe krogan.
"Of course Commander." Sarah firmly replied. "What happened earlier was a one time thing. Won't happen again."
"See that it doesn't." Shepard let go of Sarah as they moved to follow the others.
A/N:
A bit of a shorter, transitional chapter to set up the next one. I considered combining it with the next chapter since it was pretty short, but decided that releasing shorter chapters more consistently would be better than massive chapters that take me weeks to write.
Review Responses:
Slim A Lou Prime: It was good advice lol. But yeah good adventures always have both drama/comedy from human interaction combined with action scenes, and I'm trying to keep a good balance with each chapter. Also it stinks Fanfiction is being weird like that. I know sometimes I don't get notifications for follows and favs for my stories.
TheDoctor1998: I'm going to be honest, despite how much I like star wars, I have yet to see the Mandalorian yet.
Hope you guys enjoyed the chapter and I'll see you in the next one.