Mass Effect : Shepard's Letters
Chapter Ten– Two Towers and the Mad Knights: Tall Tales and Thresher Maw à la Mode.
Ismar Frontier Cluster, Faia System, Planet Zorya: One and a Half Years Ago.
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"RRRRAAAAAAAAAAAARRRR!"
Zaeed's roar of rage and frustration almost baffles the one his Vindicator is releasing non stop till he has to forcefully pop out its spent thermal clip. His fury not doused the least, he spins pointing his gun against the chest of that goddamn wuss soldier-boy: "You just cost me twenty years of my life!" But to Zaeed's surprise, Shepard has his Sniper Rifle ready and shots!
"What the fuck are you…" It's impossible, the flyer was already five or six miles ahead, but Zaeed turns his head in time to see Vido's escape ship's rear bursting in flames and starting a downward curve against the jungle… Then he is knocked down violently, his spent clip had put fire to the fuel spilled over the landing pad detonating a barrel, the explosion putting Zaeed's legs stuck under a heavy metal girder.
"Gaahh! Son of a bitch! Argh!" He is pinned, the pain is enough to blur his sight, he breathes hard to not faint, the fire was still spreading and soon enough a full blown Inferno could blaze the pad.
Shepard cares shit about it, he rests his weight over his Widow, makes the gesture taping behind his ear to start a comm, just gazing the direction the flyer had crashed after the small hills.
"EDI? Do you copy?"
"Yes, Commander?"
"I've put down an A-61 about ten clicks west my position. Have scans?"
"Affirmative. There's fire spreading near you. Do you need extraction?"
"Not yet. Don't lose the occupants from sight, tamper their comms, and any Blue Suns' transport bound to their position, send word to Joker and Garrus, I want it down, Roger?"
"Wilco, Commander."
Zaeed followed the exchange baffled, staring that blasted rifle. That thing was supposedly an old Geth Rifle they had found at the Collector's Ship. It was Anti-Materiel gunnery Shepard, Vakarian and the Cerberus kid had tinkered over for days. How he could even handle that cannon?! They dubbed it "Widow", "one shot, one widow". Then he saw written under the gun "NCC 1701A"
"From that old vid? They are barking mad!" – The Merc thinks, struggling to free himself, and then he sees Shepard watching him thoughtfully.
"There's always other way, Zaeed, I've told you…"
"Yeah? Screw you! Now come on. Get me off this shithole."
"I'm not sure I need a man like you at my ship."
"If you didn't need me, Cerberus wouldn't have paid my fee. I'll do what I was paid to do. Nothing more, nothing less. Now stop screwing around! Let's go!"
"You've put your vengeance over the mission, the team and the lives of civilians."
"I've survived this long watching my back. No time to worry about anyone else."
"It was like that back at Shanxi?"
"WHAT?!"
"My mother is a Veteran Fleet Officer and I worked with Anderson, of course I've heard the stories. You were a big damn hero back then, and as a Merc you have a reputation of never screwing a job like this."
"Don't think you know me you fucking brat! You don't know what is to lose everything…"
Click
The barrel of the Carniflex was between his eyes before the Merc even blinked.
"Don't I?"
Zaeed Massani swallowed dry, not for the gun, but the eyes. They shone blood-red, as did the scars at Shepard's face, like there was real fire burning under his skin.
He heard rumors but never had seen it. Those implants from when Cerberus' mad butchers went Frankenstein on his bloody corpse! It did really happen, didn't it? But they didn't have that eerie look all the time, when they have it meant…well, murder…
Despite it, Shepard voice was slow and level.
"You've spent twenty years wanting payback on Vido, my bet is he hadn't worried about you the smallest bit of that time. Your hate is messing with your head and believe me, Zaeed, if you allow your enemy to change you this deep, make you do what you wouldn't, you're still giving him victory after all those years."
"I don't know the deal you set with the Illusive Man, and don't care. You were a Marine and you know the drill. Our mission is bigger than me or you, and I must be able to trust you to watch my back as I watch yours not for our survival, but to see the job done. If I don't know you, if you're not that soldier I've always heard you to be, you're useless to me…I don't need you…"
Zaeed closed his eyes waiting for the shot, like that from his best friend's gun at his face two decades ago… When he became expendable also… but it didn't come.
"Hey, take it!"
"What?"
"Oops! My bad, here!" And the heavy pistol spins on his fingers and the hold is offered to Zaeed.
Mouth gapped, the veteran mercenary takes it, and with his free hand Shepard lifts the metal beam and with a grunt throws it aside. He offers a hand and raises Zaeed to his feet like a he was boy.
"Good, you can stand." He nodded to the jungle ahead. "The way that Mantis wobbled, I guess you got the pilot. I've put down its engine so unless one of those two is a mechanic they are grounded until you reach them." He patted Zaeed at the shoulder and started back to the Refinery. "You do what you must, Santiago is a menace if left free anyway. After it's done, I guess you could pick a ride out of this planet with those workers you tried to burn alive when their Company comes for them. For my part, you have one day, and if you do decide to return aboard the Normandy, call EDI and I'll send the pickup. But be sure about it, Massani…" He looks back, his eyes are blue again, but hard and cold. "If you endanger a mission again, if you become a risk to the crew…I'll just put you down myself…"
He turns and disappears into the plant. "But bring back the gun, will'ya? I really like that gun…"
Battle of Earth, two nights before.
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"And he just left?! That's Shepard for you!" Wrex loudly laughs and slaps his knee. "You just had to come back then and he knew it!"
"Wait! Wait! What about Vido?! What happened?" across the heater serving as campfire Grunt was still eager for more.
"You know what happened, you bleeding moron! I've told you a hundred times already!" Being true, Zaeed was amused, the young bloodthirsty Krogan was the best audience he ever had.
"But not for me. Did you nail the fucker?"
"Right, even limping like I was, still found the sod at the Mantis wreck, whimpering, trying to call help from his jammed comms. He got nothing, EDI is a girl who knows her job."
"Shepard was right and the pilot was dead, the ship was down wings broken, and the whole place stank form leaked fuel. Vido should know I would come for him, but he was still there, without armed mooks he had lost all his wit and smugness. When he saw me, he was such a mess I didn't know he would ask for mercy or for antihistamines."
"Mercy, that was… He claimed stabbing me back was simply business, nothing personal, the bastard even had the guts to say that blasting my face off was a favor!"
"Let's not raise this point…" -The old Krogan said with a sly smile. "Did you kill him then?"- Wrex was really not any better than Grunt…
"Almost not, you believe it? That sad son of a bitch was once my best pal, betrayed me and made my life hell for twenty years… But Shepard had a point. When I shot the wreck putting it to fire and frying the fucker to death, I didn't do it for the betrayal or for what his shot had made for my looks…"
"For what then?"
"He looked so small and coward… I've put him down for all the time I've wasted waiting for this payback, for what I had become while hunting him down and he wasn't even worth it. That he was so despicable that vengeance was almost meaningless."
"But you did it, anyway."
"I've said "almost" meaningless."
"Fair enough…" There's not small vengeance among Krogans. They could take place after centuries, but were supposed to age as good wine, as humans say. That this foe appeared as unworthy… It was probably a worse offense then the original one…
Grunt picked another small barrel he used as tankard, and poured rincol down his throat. "So that's how you became loyal to Battlemaster and his mission, right? BUUURP!"
Zaeed made a pause to answer, he was grimacing at the rincol. That Krogan poison smelled just like querosene, but wasn't much worse than the asari's piss they dubbed for beer and he had to put up with.
"Ahn? Loyal to his goddamn mission? Not really… I brought the smug fucker his pistol back as he said, but was still pissed about being put to my place by a brat… That quarian lady of his, she did the trick!"
"Little Tali? What could she have done for you?"
Zaeed pulls up his old Avenger, tenderly caressing the rifle. The two Krogans exchange their version of a "Here it comes…" look.
"That purple girl is a Dame, I tell'yah, finest breed… I don't think Shepard can tell a tale as fine as myself, but he put some good word about me to the lass. By the time I was back at the Normandy, she used some quarian magic of hers and my old Jessie was fine as new. Even better! Swear to God, she can now hold up a thermal to put a Revenant to shame! After all they did for us I came to think them both were alright by my book. Best I've ever said about any Commanding Officer I've served under."
"Hah, 'say the same!" Wrex himself looks like a red dreadnought using his ancient armor. Piece of heirloom lost since the Krogan Rebellions, now back for the most glorious War ever. Shepard's courtesy…
"Hey! The rincol grows warm and the night is young! Another tale! Better! Clan Leader, tell us that thing about putting down the Reapers like Maws! You said you could!"
"I haven't said shit about it, kid. It's just rincol speaking while they're under those shields. If they were down, so…it would be a nice fight!"
"Woah! You two toads may want spend the whole night like this. Me and Jessie gonna get some shut-eye before dawn, see'yah later."- And the Merc settled himself for the night over a mat behind the cover of some crates.
"Zaeed!" Wrex's voice trembles the crates."How will you name the platoon you'll chief tomorrow?"
"Humpf… Lead a bunch of dumb bloodthirsty Krogan to a stroll over old Reaper-infested London… How stupid can it be?" He gazes at his reborn old rifle and smiles."Bosh'tets! That's the name!"
"What?"
"GODAMN'IT! Bosh'tets!"
Wrex blinks twice. "Godamn Bosh'tets? Oookay…"
He turns to the younger Krogan and take a sip from his own small barrel of booze. "Well, back in the time, before the Genofage made short of us, there was too many mouths to feed at Tuchanka. Our colonies were isolated from us by the Turian fleet, and the planet itself was already as wasted and dry as you came to know. We needed a source of protein and the most available were the Thresher Maws. In fact, they surely saw us that way as well."
"You said you used the Tomkahs?"
"Yes, to get a big one, you should go fast. Shepard was a natural, when we met with a Maw at some desert planet, he would round it while shooting, using speed and even jet jumps to dodge the acid and keep ahead of its aim… Shepard's driving was quite an experience…"
"You tell me, Leader? I got also a ride with Shepard at that blasted Hammerhead. It was a worthy test to my nerve."
"The Hover? Kid, he used to drive a M35 Mako!"
"He jet jumped Maw's acid on a Mako?! Ooooh."
Wrex's eyes widens as the memories flow back. "I've always heard fear was not unknown even to the greatest warriors…but I thought I was an exception until enter that Mako…But it was fun too."
"But the thing about those Destroyers is that they are as dumbly built as the Maws. The Reapers may claim being "apex of Galatic Evolution", but look." He pulls his gun and points at some directions, extending his arm and bending his torso, then he shortens his aim, putting the gun next to his face. "See? This is the Maw and the Destroyers. Its acid or their rays are sure deadly but how useful are them if you planted them stuck to your face? The damn thing has to turn fully its big cumbersome body to point at you, and that's a weakness…"
[Present Time: The Reaper Destroyer turns on its axis, but the giant insect-like legs can't do it faster as the mounted Krogans kept racing counterclockwise it. The red energy blasts destroy the buildings and the Reaper's own troops but leaves the Krogan's mostly unscathed. The Reaper gets so focused on its quickly evading pray that fails to get hint on the Tomkahs at its five until it's late. Cannons shot from the Krogan's Vehicles striking the right legs with several automated magnetic hooks. They release Maw's acid as they burrow deeply into the unshielded armored limbs.]
"We would strike at its flanks with hooks embedded with its own acid. It's the best thing. We still have them at the Tomkahs to help the tanks cross the ruined landscape of Tuchanka. Of course the Reaper would have legs that the Maw doesn't, so we would have to find a way to take its hold of the ground off…"
[Present Time: The Destroyer stops and tries to turn right, Wrex shouts the order and other Tanks attack the same way the left back limb. Both fronts of Tomkahs use the same hooks to take deep grip on the ground. Then both the Tanks and the Infantry starts heavy fire not at the Destroyer but at the ground under its rear legs. Under the charges, the ground sinks to the old London structures and tunnels underneath taking down its support from the Reaper.]
"The bulk of the Tanks would then strike its back, gripping it backwards. The beast held down, we just have to come over and chop it."
[Present Time: They had not so many Tomkahs, so had to improvise some other way.
Zaeed curses hard enough his Krogan pilot should be blushing. Tanks weren't supposed to do this, but those Tomkahs gripped those Canary Wharf's skyscrapers and were climbing it vertically! Their hooks dug through walls and abandoned offices, taking advantage of the ultra resistant structure needed for those new miles-high buildings. They were sat as big godamn bloodsucking ticks! They were shooting new grips at the Reaper's back and soon would move over and rappel down quickly as hell to the next downward Tomkah that would give them the ride down ticket. Had to do it before the ground teams detonated the charges he instructed to be set at the buildings' base on the other side.
"Human Leader! Human Leader!"
"It's Massani, Sir, to you, Krogan! What's the matter?" Zaeed and the pilot were hastily getting off their seats to get to the exit hatch.
"We were surrounded! Hundreds of husks and other scum are flooding the streets and the lower floors of the buildings. They came for the Destroyer. You up there get out now! We're compromised, can't leave ourselves! Asking permission to set the charges or the whole attack will fail!"
Those damn Reaper troops-carrier meteors had stopped dropping for some time now. The Reapers had stopped harvesting for some reason, so that kid was right and the destroyer was calling help from around, and they were just in the way…
"FUBAR you mean. What's your name, kid?"
A centuries-old Krogan hesitates before answering. "Urdnot Kellek, Sir!"
"You are alright, soldier! Set them and leave, shoot everything moving and keep your head down! The explosion will take care of them, just make distance enough, roger? You're a Krogan, damn'it! You have tougher fights to cross your own backyard!"
"You bet! And good hunting, Huma...Sir!"
The hatch opens and the pilot ahead gives alarm. "Harvester!"
"Fuck all this! We're sitting ducks up here!" He raises his Jessie and thinks what else could go any wronger…]
"But, Clan Leader, in my trial it took me and two krantt to put down a Maw. What you say sounds fun, but it's not too much work and expenses?"
"Your "krantt" being Shepard and Vakarian it was really kind of overkill. Anyway you burst the damn beast's head from inside! What was really commendable about you, but not if you were there to eat the thing…"
Zaeed tries not to listen but two Krogans talking and laughing under rincol was enough to the ground itself vibrate.
"You see… Doing this way you spoil all the flavor!"
Massani sighs. He really didn't want to hear that. He pats Jessie at his side and feels better. One last round with his old girl… How could anything go wrong?
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Timely Annotations
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Hi, folks! Sorry about the delay from my habitual schedule. Big chapter, and a complex one also.
- Vido's escape at the Paragon ending of Zaeed's loyalty mission left a loose thread. Besides, in cannon, Zaeed does shot the pilot and the flyer really disappears after the hill going down as falling. I don't see why it couldn't be tracked with the Normandy at orbit. So I kinda joined the two possible endings, hope it was cool.
- Lone Survivor: The history of Zaeed Massani by thebluninja, is a great history, you should read.
- Anti-Materiel gunnery, not "Anti-Materia", since it's a thermal-clip gun as most of the others. Materiel concerns transportation or weaponry, as opposed to "Personnel" witch means troops.
- NCC 1701A is the Enterprise's hull denomination, and it DOES, for some reason, appear at the side of the M98-Widow, as it was also supposedly a Geth's rifle and not human, the conclusion is that somebody at the Normandy is a badass trekkie.
- "Goddamn Bosh'tets" is so funny I had to use it. First heard, on different origins, at "And the Meek Shall Inherit the Galaxy", by full paragon. Awesome read.
- Have you liked so far? I wonder...