Brown.
The world seemed… colorless. No, maybe not colorless, but… brown. Brown grass was dead grass. Brown was the color of decay… but Andie found it hard to care about anything much anymore. Everyone said that it would pass, that she would feel better with time. But when she thought about the future, it seemed a never-ending nightmare of misery. Why would anyone want to feel this way all the time?
Sometimes she didn't want to… but those kinds of thoughts had gotten better with the medication. The meds didn't make the brown feeling go away completely, but they made her feel that she could fight again, at least one more day. Today, though… Andie scuffed her shoes down the sidewalk. Scott was a huge city, much bigger than Toscani, but it was sufficiently different enough from Mindoir that she felt less panicky, less prone to flashbacks when she was outside. Here everything was steel and concrete. No fields, no prefab colonial houses—
Stop that, she told herself as her heart started to beat in a sickly quick rhythm that signaled the onset of a panic attack. She inhaled deeply, concentrating on the sounds around her and not her memories, and the worst of the feeling faded. Controlling the panic attacks was a hit or miss talent, but she supposed that considering what had driven her onto the streets, that she'd been able to avoid at least one was good.
Merta, her turian aunt, was former military. She'd been trying to get Andie to try new things. Dr. Hadrawar, her therapist, had recommended that she not stay in the house all day, brooding. New experiences might help distract her, and exercise would help her depression. So Merta had offered to teach her some hand-to-hand combat. It was strange, learning from a turian who was so much taller than she was, but Merta was a patient teacher. She proved skillful at not noticing Andie's frequent mistakes and was adept at accommodating her slower human movements. And it did seem to help a little. When she was concentrating on blocking incoming punches and kicks, it was easier to forget what had occupied her waking hours for weeks on end.
Today, however, when Andie joined Merta, the turian had taken her not to the gym where they usually sparred, but to a shooting range. Andie hadn't felt any misgivings until Merta pulled a shotgun free of the case she'd brought with her. And then memories, flashbacks of the slaver attack had rushed on her like a smothering cloud of smoke. Somehow, she'd made it out of the building without going completely berserk, fumbling with her protective gear, and running out of the range area. Merta had followed, apologetic, but confused, and Andie didn't have the stomach to enlighten her on what exactly had happened.
So she was walking the streets, wondering if there would ever be a day if she felt normal again.
No, she thought, thinking of the five coffins at the funeral, nothing will ever be normal again. Her chest felt tight.
She rounded the corner of the block and stopped. Three ground cars sat twisted and crunched on the street. One was half on the sidewalk. A crowd was gathering at the car and behind the people was a woman screaming hysterically. Andie hesitated, part of her wanting to turn back in case of triggering another attack, but the closest route back home was down this street. She cautiously kept walking, only stopping when she glanced over and saw a pair of legs underneath the car that was on the sidewalk. Someone was trapped underneath!
A man in the crowd was trying to gather people to lift the car, but before he could, a purple-hued asari pushed her way through the people and with a wave of her arms, wreathed the car in a blue, distorted corona. Andie felt the tug of gravity being altered and the car lifted into the air like a bizarre parade float. Most of the crowd was gawking at the asari, but a few had the presence of mind to approach the man trapped beneath the car.
"Don't move him!" A man in an Alliance uniform said, shoving his way through. "His back could be hurt." He leaned down over him, saying something in a low voice and then glanced up at the asari. "Ambulance is on the way, but how long can you hold that up?"
"A few minutes more," she replied, voice sounding a little strained. "But I can set it down in the street if necessary."
Andie faded into the crowd as the medics came and got the man trapped under the car onto a stretcher. The asari released her biotic hold on the car and lowered it back to the ground with a sigh. The Alliance man helped corral the crowd away from the medics so they could work. Everyone gave him a respectful berth like they did the asari, who was answering questions from a police officer who'd arrived with the squad car.
A faint something pierced the cloud of numbness that had enveloped her since the funeral. These people… the Alliance soldier and the asari. They hadn't hesitated to help. They had been useful. They wouldn't have walked by like Andie had planned to. They stopped and helped however they could.
A memory came again: a drell moving a crate, her stylus rolling across the table on its own, and her father's voice telling her she could be a biotic if she wanted to. If she'd had an implant, if she'd had the training that had been offered to her… could she have saved her family instead of freezing like a lump of useless garbage?
Back at her uncle's house, Andie searched the extranet for the name of the company who had sent researchers to her house. Had it only been a few weeks? Hesitatingly, she wrote them an email, reminding them of their visit, of her biotic potential, and their offer of the free surgery and training.
Finger trembling over the button, she reread the email, and, before she could think again, hit "send."