Ares takes a deep breath from the cigarette designed for his plated mouth and exhales slowly, watching it drift before it gets taken away by the heavy, cold winds of the Nos Astra skyline. Unlike any other turian, he finds peace and comfort in the chill, it's only fault the howling it creates when it tunnels through the towering buildings.
Despite the noise raging in his sensitive ears, he has found something to occupy his time until he deems it time to move on. In these dead hours between night and dawn, he can relax and do the closest thing to a 'break' he can think of, browse the extranet and be what everyone calls 'a menace'.
He won't lie, he enjoys it more than he should.
He flicks off ash as far as he can away from himself, not wanting to feel even a hint of its heat on his scarred plates and hide, and opens his tool, opening a forum site he gets too much enjoyment out of, 'Assassins Unveiled'. He chuckles just thinking about the ridiculous things people can think up, just to ease their fears with the explanation of 'assassin'.
The site spanned from utterly insane ramblings to legitimate sightings - which were always removed by either the one in question themselves or their handlers. It's what he'd do if he ever found himself on the pages of the conspiracy forum, but how easily would someone recognize him when he wore artificial face plates and a new colony pattern every job?
'Hiding in plain sight' was something his CO once told him in Blackwatch so many years ago and what better way to do that than to not let anyone know that the half scarred turian walking around was really the flawless assassin caught on camera? Maybe not how Trassik meant it, but it's what works for Ares. After all, as far as the Hierarchy is officially concerned, the man he once was known as is dead.
He doesn't even remember the name he was given when he was born on Palaven, having had too many since then. Ares is merely one he uses in his own mind, to collect his thoughts and feel like an individual on those rare moments he isn't on a job. Jobs that either come from a Hierarchy that refuses to acknowledge his existence beyond what use they can get from him or the ones he finds freelancing.
He even once had true facial markings that connected him to his home, his family, but those, too, are gone. Gone in the resulting fire of his worst mission along with half his face, half his sight, and entire front half of his torso.
Scratching the jagged scarring on his chest, a mindless action that never really eases the itch of the taught tissue left behind, Ares rumbles with a smirk as he jokes around with some user to see how far they plan this particular conversation. His username is known to the site as the menace, the one that has nothing to add, but it gives him the perfect chance to be actively present, but also silently observant.
As proven by the users 'YouDon'tKnow' and "TellMeNow360', he is nothing more than a 'troll'. Whatever that really was - perhaps a human term - he knows enough from their exasperation and irritation that he is seen as insignificant and juvenile. Suits him fine, really, since it also comes with the benefit of relaxing enough, enjoying himself enough, to feel 'normal'.
One particular thread that grabbed his attention is one marked 'Turian Hierarchy Trains All Turians to be Assassins'. Once again, it is a paranoid post laced with a hint of poisonous truth. The Hierarchy actually possessing assassins? Sure, what species doesn't? Is there a turian assassin on the site? Why, yes, that is also correct, but positioning people in order to retaliate against humanity? No, not even something that is on the Hierarchy's mind.
He snorts and moves to type in something to insult the poster - leave it to humans to be delusional enough to think the entire galaxy is out to get them - but a soft ping of his Tool calls him away from it. Putting the cigarette, small as it is, in his mouth to free his hand, he hits the communication's 'accept'.
"Yeah?" He says gruffly, his voice permanently gravelly and hoarse since the fire, and waits for the answer from the only one that knows this address.
"Do you have to continuously insist on bringing attention to yourself?"
He knows the voice, knows it as one of his contacts for freelance work. It belongs to a beast of a Matriarch, more fit for varren pit fighting than the information broker she really is. Still, her size and attitude don't phase him much as he answers. "Yes."
"You're going to get yourself killed one of these days. Then who would I have to send contracts through to?"
"I'll send you the link to a site," he says as he takes a long drag. "I'm still listening for what you have to say. I doubt you wanted to hear my voice."
"No. I don't," she responds as his Omni-Tool chimes once again. "Look over it and get it done. Know this, they want it to be a show stopper."
She closes the call without hearing from him and it's as he's expected. Neither is one for talk as it is, less so when they are setting up a contract. Stabbing out his smoke on the railing of the balcony, he opens the dossier.
His target is a turian actor, set to perform here in Nos Astra within the day, named Korik Vivon. Not much time to track down and shadow the man, but Ares understands well enough what is expected of him.
Show stopper, indeed, he thinks as he steps back into the small apartment and grabs his hooded jacket and walking around the bed where there sleeps last night's 'entertainment'. They will never remember what had happened, who he was, or that he was even here. Not with how drunk they were last night or how they could barely remember their own name. He liked it that way because of the promise of not having to deal with the silicon facial pieces or fake paints to hide his identity. Strong drinks had the same effect and he didn't even have to work at it, just let his host treat themselves before inviting him home.
Stopping by the safe house he had found for the previous night, Ares grabs his things. Still holding to his training, his personal effects border on the verge between utilitarian and absent. He does not carry more than a crate of what he needs, weapons, disguises, an extra set of clothes, and a suit of thin armor just in case he is given a dirtier kind of job.
Forgoing the need for a disguise given how he'll be taking to the sky, he grabs his rifle, his touch delicate and tender. Said rifle has been with him since his training, through his death, and into his new life. Granted, it took just as much damage during the fire, but it saved his life. So, in return, he rebuilt her by hand, modified her into a one of a kind piece of art. From body, to sinks, to even the munition, he has built everything by hand, plate, and blood.
From the gun's crate, he removes the magazine of handmade heat sinks and snaps it into place on the weapon's underside, checking its fit to be sure. Next, he slides back the bolt handle to feel, hear, and watch the first sink slide into place, ready to be fired. Sighting down the scope, he hums as he adjusts the sights before collapsing the weapon and sliding it onto his back and beneath his jacket.
Set, he pulls up his hood and closes the door of the long abandoned shipping crate where the last remaining items of his belongings lay. Whether he returns to this spot or not, he has everything of value on his back.
He walks the streets until he comes within eyeshot of the amphitheater in which the performance will take place. Already, staff clean the chairs and tend to the decorations that span from the street to the seating areas. Whatever show this is, it's already proving to be a grand occasion, most likely for the highest tiered individuals of the city, if not area.
With destination of his target in mind, Ares travels further down the streets, deeper into the city and towards the higher buildings. Close to three kilometers from the amphitheater, he spots a building that just calls to him, as if the Spirits he no longer believes in are guiding him.
Getting in does not prove difficult. It's a doctor's complex, full of guests and workers alike mulling about without rhyme or reason. He's never been one to like hospitals of any sort, but his choice to not disguise his scars proves useful when he finds a burn unit and therapy division on the directories board. Seen or not, he will just be another poor soul looking for help coming to terms with their new visage.
Climbing the darkened stairwell, one that ascends near countless floors and one that no one seems to be willing to set foot in when the elevators prove so much more appealing, Ares thinks of just what a burn unit like the one labeled would have been like. Perhaps if he had found himself in one after the fire, he wouldn't be as he is now, but he has never been one to willingly let a doctor of any kind near him. It's one thing about his past he remembers, though not the reason why.
The fire was both the best and worst thing that ever happened to him. Strange as it sounds, even to him, he credits it for getting him out of the official rosters of Blackwatch, freed him from both recognition and the binds that kept him from freelancing. The Hierarchy still calls on him for tasks they never want traced back to him, but even they don't know the irony of the fact that he once was associated with them and they had no qualms.
Yet, despite the good it did his career and solitude, it also left him with scars, both obvious and not. His left eye was useless, white and colorless, and the flames licked his hide and skin from crest to groin. The only thing that saved the other side of his face was the angle he fell into the burning pitch, but such couldn't be said about his chest and belly. Still, that wasn't as bad as the nightmares, the fear of the flame but need to taunt it every time he lit up, or the pitying looks he'd get when not in disguise. Disgust, hate, and even curiosity, he could stand, but the last thing he ever wanted was sympathy.
The fire hadn't even been his fault. Try, it happened on one of his missions, but he was betrayed by one of his own, and he's the only one that knows that.
As he reaches the roof, rough from the gravel tiles they use to keep workers from slipping on the usually smooth metal, he climbs to the east ledge. Laying down and pulling his weapon before his good eye, he lines up with the stage in the distance just as a rehearsal of the play begins. Watching will give him both the time to think as well as do a rehearsal of his own.
His mission was one of the few that he was not given to do alone. In fact, it was Trassik's newest member, a transfer from recon, that was beside him. Their mission wasn't at all stealthy and didn't really have much to do with assassination, but it called for their ability to remain undetected and unaccountable. Blackwatch was the best for that.
Their target was information on a mining facility, enough to back false accusations of misconduct enough to run the owning company out of business. Without their ownership, the Hierarchy had to step in and tend to the facilities while another buyer could be found.
It all sounded easy.
That is, until his supposed 'partner', a kid named Cameric, went against what Ares thought were their orders. When they split, the man's task was to sabotage the facility, not just collect and plant evidence. Said sabotage, Ares assumes, was to further prove the original company - Faerha-something is all he remembers - was operating under dangerous conditions and a danger to their employees.
The only one that ended up in danger was him when he heard the alarms going up all over the facility. With workers rushes through all paths out, he was forced to double back and make a longer, more roundabout exit. It was a decision that made him question if he should have just let eyes see him for it only trapped him in the processing plant, where the machines were still running without direction or control.
His only shot had been forward, towards their original target, but, as he arrived, he learned all too late that he was set to be the scapegoat, the lone mercenary sent by unknown sources who unintendedly destroyed the plant in his attempt to sabotage it. That relaxation came from a combat knife in his back from the man he had been willing to lead out of the dying facility and a fall into the overflow of whatever's burning substance they were mining.
Sometimes he wonders why he still takes money from the people who betrayed him, but, now that he sits here watching the audience slowly flow into their seats, he remembers. Credits. He does it for credits. There is nothing else besides that.
As he watches the show proceed, he knows when he'll strike, when the opportune moment is. From what he saw of the rehearsal, Vivon will have a moment of a long monologue, trying to whip up the crowd with flaunting hands and bellowing voice. If that isn't the 'show stopper' the client is asking for, Ares doesn't know what is.
Growling when he sees the man walk out for his first scene, he rolls his left shoulder. The damn thing always gets rigid when he stays in positions like these long, but he has come to use it as a timekeeper. One ache and Vivon is on stage, speaking with an asari in a flowing red dress. Another and he is offstage preparing for his next scene. Two more and he leaves once again to change clothes. One and he's back. Then, it's only one more before he steps to the crowd and addresses them in the final moments of his life.
Eye focused on the scope as it's been for the past four hours, Ares waits until the previous asari, a small child, and Vivon stand in what looks like an image of a room, laughing boisterous laughs that have their heads back and hands on their chests or bellies. He sees the crowd, too, join in and flicks his mandibles, clicking in time with the heaves of his target's chest.
Finally, he watches Vivon step forward and turn completely to the crowd for the first time in the entire show. Raises his arms, he begins to speak. Though, what he says, Ares will never know at this distance.
Still, he knows when the best time to let a bullet slice through his target it, and he waits for the signs of it. Vivon will point to the crowd, span them, then be handed a glass from one of the cast members. When he raises it, Ares will strike.
The man's mandibles and mouth move in time with Ares' timekeeping vocals until, just as he knew would happen, the asari actress steps forward and hands him a glass. Vivon nods in thanks before raising it to the crowd in, to him, a silent toast.
Taking a calming breath, Ares lets out and lays pressure on the trigger, sending Vivon's death striking through the air. Bullet shielded for maximum piercing capacity, he watches as his target's head explodes into nothing but a fine, blue spray. He actually allows himself to chuckle as the crowd along the front rows scream. He can see that well enough through the scope, even if he can't hear them.