A/N: Ok Chapter 4 here we come, the Citadel, Jon's first time seeing aliens… well ALIVE aliens, We'll also pick up Garrus, Tali, and Wrex, we'll meet some ignorant asses.. er I mean idiots.. No uhm incompetents? No OH! Politicians yes that's the one.
And is has come to my attention that I forgot to mention I am using thermal clips right off, always found that an odd inconsistency between ME 1 and ME 2, sorry bout that.
Anywho chapter away!
Chapter 4: The Citadel… of DOOM and stuff
After talking with Ash I decided to head down to engineering, I wanted to see the Tantalus drive in person. I Stepped onto the elevator and hit the button. It begins slowly creeping down towards engineering. "Danm it's just as slow as it was in the game."
I step off the elevator and am greeted by the Mako.
"Oh that will be fun later…" I gloomily think to myself walking over to the door to engineering. Thought s of the Mako instantly gone as soon as I see the drive core.
"Wow" I stare at the core for several moments just admiring it.
"Never ceases to amaze does it?" I startle slightly when Engineer Adams suddenly speaks up next to me.
"No, I can't imagine it does my names Jonathon Knight." I say offering my hand, he shakes it.
"Chief engineer Adams, you're the one that the commander landed on right?" I groan and rub my face with my hand.
"Yeah, that's me." I reply gloomily thinking that's what I'll be remembered for.
"Hehe, well the captain said you have free roam of the ship, so stick around if you want just don't get in the way, alright?" He asks rather politely.
"Yeah, no problem." I say walking over to the railing leaning against it and looking to the core as I think.
"Kaidan thought me and Ash were a couple? I've never been in a relationship before, asked a girl out once but found out she was taken, haven't met another person worth asking yet." I continue to ponder. "New Galaxy, new opportunities right? Maybe I'll find someone here, everyone's got someone somewhere, maybe I was just looking in the wrong dimension?" I chuckle slightly. "Were headed to the Citadel now, this will be the first time I see other races… well besides Nhilus but he was dead, so I couldn't really meet him, We'll also be picking up Garrus, Tali, and probably Wrex, Oh god I'm gunna have to meet Udina too, ass." I push off the railing heading back out into the cargo bay and decide to call Vic and check in with him.
"Jon? Is that you?" He asks once the call picks up.
"Yeah, I'm on the Normandy, Ash called you right?"
"Yeah, she said you were unconscious because someone landed on you, what's that all about?" The old armory master sounds confused and slightly concerned.
"Oh boy, I'm fine its ah… a long story, in short there was an explosion that sent the commander flying and I was behind him, but anyway I'm not sure what's going on here, but how are you?"
We continue to talk just checking up on each other, and shortly after I finish the call Joker comes on over the PA announcing we'll be pulling in to the Citadel soon, so I head back up and walk into the cockpit. Jokers hears me walk up and glances over his shoulder.
"You the one-"
"Yes I'm the one the Commander landed on." I say just sighing and shaking my head. "Here we go"
"Man that sucks! He's got to weigh like 400 pounds!" The pilot says excitedly.
"You calling me fat Joker?" The Commander says walking up with Ash behind him.
"Oh, uh no I mean that armor weighs allot right? That I uh Oh look the Citadel!" I shake my head as Joker quickly contacts the tower.
Ash chuckles and looks out the window. "That ship is huge!"
"You know size isn't everything." Joker replies.
"It certainly sounded like it was important when you were talking to Knight here." Joker stutters before just slinking down in his chair and bringing us into to dock.
Shepard tells us to gear up and head back up to the airlock. I have no complaints, my armor is custom fit, so it's comfortable to wear and I feel better with armor on and weapons ready, being around Shepard is dangerous.
I'm back up in the airlock where Shepard and Anderson are talking. Anderson gives me an appraising look, presumably examining my armor.
Shepard turns to him. "I told you custom made, he's pretty good at what he does from what I've heard and seen, he is also a capable combatant."
Anderson nods with a hand on his chin still examining me. "Were gunna need good people if were gunna take down Saren, how would you feel about serving on the Normandy? Were prepared to offer you the same contract you had on Eden Prime."
Shepard speaks up. "Ashley has already accepted."
"I'd be honored to serve with you, of course I'll join." I say looking to Anderson then Shepard.
"Welcome aboard then, we can get you set up in the cargo hold when we get back." He says shaking my hand.
"That was easier than expected, and Shepard was vouching for me! I guess something I did impressed him." Ash and Kaidan join us after a few moments and we go through the airlock out onto the Citadel.
So we headed over to Udina's office and I'm leaning on the railing overlooking the presidium lake. This place is beautiful, no TV screen can do it justice, but then Udina is done talking to the council.
"Did you bring your entire crew?" Really? One more person is the whole crew, not just half?
"Just the ground team from Eden Prime, in case you had any questions." Anderson says gesturing over in our general direction.
"I have the mission reports, I assume they're accurate?" Udina's an ass, I just sort of float thought the conversation, until he addresses me.
"And who's this?" Hey, I'm right here, could've just asked me.
I turn around and fold my arms over my chest. "I'm Jonathon Knight, I worked on Eden Prime."
I swear he almost says 'I wasn't talking to you' but he just turns his gaze on me. "So why are you here instead of there?"
"I helped Shepard fight the Geth and got knocked out, so they brought me onboard the Normandy."
"And I've hired him on as a crew member of the Normandy." Anderson says, with a pointed look at Udina.
"It's not important we need to head up to the council chambers, I'll make sure you have clearance." Asshole.
So, we head over to the presidium tower and get in the elevator, dam these are slow, but when we get out there's Garrus arguing with Pallin.
"Just give me more time, stall them!" Yup, all the same as I remember.
"Stall the council? Your investigations over Garrus." Pallin, walks off and Garrus turns to us.
"Commander Shepard? Garrus Vakarian, I was the C-sec officer investigating Saren." I get my first good look at the Turian, his mandatory blue armor seems flimsier than it's ME2 counterpart.
"Find anything I should know about?" Shepard asks, "Ha fat chance Shepard, its never that simple."
"He's a Specter everything he touches is classified, I couldn't find anything solid." "Well you tried Garrus, you'll help more later."
"I think the council's ready to see us know." There's Kaidan with his standard line. "Really it just like playing the game sometimes except its not, I just contradicted myself, moving on."
Well the council meeting went as expected, I kept my mouth shut and concentrated on giving the Turian councilor evil glares, and now were headed over to Choras Den, to talk to an idiot, I mean Harkin, no I was right the first time.
We walk through the doors where those two assassins are, and well Shepard put one down fast with his pistol and Kaidan pulls one over the ledge before my pistol is all the way up. "Danm"
I slowly re-holster my pistol and look up to the big sign of the asari. "I HATE night clubs."
We head in and are greeted by a general hubbub of drunken people and strippers, Joy. On our way over to Harkin we hear Wrex and that other krogan arguing, Wrex storms off after a second, and we get the info out of a drunken Harkin. Over to Dr. Michelle's office, I ready myself to grab my gun as soon as we open the door, and there they are. The crooks talking to Dr. Michelle then looks over at us-
BOOM HEADSHOT!
I've got my pistol out a second later and start plugging rounds into one of the thugs while everyone else does the same. "I'm getting better at this stuff." We start walking in and I look down at one of the thugs.
"Holy shit, I just killed that guy, that's the first real living person I've killed, I didn't even hesitate." I just stare in morbid fascination for another moment, Shepard reprimands Garrus for the risk I barely register it though. "What does that say about my personality? I just gunned that man down, no hesitation… now is not the time to think about that FOCUS." I bring myself back to the conversation just as Garrus asks to join the team, Shepard agrees and shakes his hand. We move out back to Choras Den. Shepard stops us just as we enter the area though.
"So many of us won't be able to fight effectively in confined quarters, Knight and Ash, look around here, she might be somewhere close by, I'll radio you when we find something." Shepard nods to me and Ash then readies his weapon.
"Gotcha Commander." I say and pull out my pistol, as Shepard, Garrus and Kaidan walk towards the club.
I look around and see the alley where I know Tali is. "Should we split up?" I ask.
"Yeah, I'll look over here, why don't you check that alley back there?" Ash says motioning towards the aforementioned alley.
"Ok, I'll radio if I find anything." I move over towards the alley cautiously as Ash moves off in the other direction. "If I find something, sure."
I stick to the wall and move slowly into the alley, and there she is pacing around and wringing her hands. I move out into the light a bit and she sees me, I walk over gun lowered, she pulls her shotgun.
"Who are you? Are you with Fist?" she says glancing around nervously.
"No, I'm with Commander Shepard." She lowers her shotgun a bit. "Fist is working for Saren; we need that evidence to implicate Saren." I say quickly looking around.
"Oh Keelah, Fist's men will be here any second! What should we do?" She asks, eyes widening a little.
I glance around ok shadows, boxes, 3 unsuspecting mooks, Ambush. "I'll hide in the shadows when they come distract them, I'll get the jump on em', ok?" I ask, cocking my pistol.
"Ok, thank you I could have been in allot of trouble." She says putting her shotgun on her back so she doesn't look suspicious.
I nod slipping into the shadows and readying my pistol, a minute later I hear footsteps coming down the stairs.
"Who are you? Where's the Shadow Broker?" Tali seems a little more confident than she does in the game, I suppose she has a reason to though.
The Turian walks up to Tali and the two Salarians move to the side right next to me. Tali glances in my direction, and I come out of the shadows. I grab one Salarian around the neck from behind and blow the other ones head off point blank with my pistol, Tali drops her mine and dives for cover, the Turian turns in my direction, slightly stunned and start firing his assault rifle killing his own guy, I fire a few pistol shots at him and Tali finishes him off with a shotgun blast to the back, I drop the meat shield and walk over to her.
"That's another I've killed" I think looking back to the Salarian with a hole in his head.
"Whew, your good at fighting." Tali, says shotgun lowered.
"I guess, I'm actually fairly inexperienced, allot more theory than practice." I say reloading my pistol.
"Well they weren't very intelligent either, that probably helped." She looks down at the Turian for a long moment.
"You ever killed someone before?" I ask her placing a comforting hand on her shoulder.
"N-no… I didn't hesitate either…" She seems to be contemplating.
"That's the second person I've killed." I say taking my hand from her shoulder and looking right into her mask.
"What was the first time like? Killing someone I mean." She asks, almost a whisper.
"He was one of Fist's thugs, we came in on them while they were threatening Dr. Michelle, and I just pulled my pistol and shot the guy four times. It wasn't till after that it really registered what I'd done." I respond slowly, were pretty similar, she and I. First time out of our comfort zone, first time in a real warzone, kill or be killed.
We stand in silence for a few moments before Shepard radios me.
"Ash? Knight? We've got the quarians location she's meeting in an alley nearby." Shepard says, sounds of running coming through the mic.
I bring my hand up to the mic button. "Yeah, I've found her, she's fine." I say as Shepard comes down into the alley weapons ready. Shepard surveys the area quickly.
"You two ok?" he asks, ever the Paragon.
"Yeah, we're ok." I say glancing over to Tali for conformation, she nods to me and I stand up a little straighter and holster my gun.
"Good work, do you have the evidence miss-"
"Tali'Zorah nar Raya, and yes I've got the data you need." She replies, I almost expected her to say 'Vas Normandy', but we're not there yet. "You must be Commander Shepard, correct?"
"Yes, I'm glad you're ok." Definitely Paragon.
"We need to go somewhere safe." The engineer says shifting nervously.
"We should head up to Udina's office he'll want to hear this anyway." Kaidan pipes up helpfully.
As we move off I fall in next to Tali.
"My names Jonathon Knight, but just Jon is fine." I say giving her a friendly smile.
"Thank you again for helping me back there." The machinist, nods briefly.
"No problem, I would have helped information or not." I respond shrugging.
She turns to look at me. "Really?"
"Yeah, why wouldn't I?" well I guess I do know why.
"Most people don't like quarians, were thieves and vagrants to most." She responds a hint of venom in her voice.
"I'm not most people, I really could care less what race someone is, they're personality is what defines them as a person." I say honestly.
"You know its nice to see there are still people like you in the galaxy." She says.
"I'll leave racism and bigotry to the politicians, they seem to enjoy it." I say smirking.
She chuckles and we move on. I take this opportunity to really take a look at her, She's in her green and gray ME 1 gear with the metal plates and tubes. It looks allot better in real life, and I always liked the look of this one, seemed more practical than her ME 2 suit.
Well we arrive at the ambassadors' office, and Udina is still an ass. Big surprise there. Now Shepard is going to head over to become a Spectre, he doesn't know that but I do.
"Knight, Can you take Garrus and Tali back to the Normandy? I'll tell Presley to get all of you settled in." Shepard asks.
"Yeah, we'll be ready when you get back." I say moving away and motioning for our new alien crew members to follow.
Garrus comes up beside me.
"So, what do you do?" He asks casually.
"I'm a weapons tech, upgrades, customization, and experimentation." I reply. "I'm also a pretty good shot with a rifle."
"A sniper? Me too, think we could talk customization sometime soon?" He asks looking rather excited.
"Yeah, once I get setup in the cargo bay we can customize anything you got." I look over to Tali. "You too, just tell me what ya want and I'll see what I can do."
Tali just nods and I and Garrus start discussing rifles. When we get to the Normandy Presley shows us to the crew deck, something they didn't mention in the first game. It's comprised of several small rooms with a bunk bed, lockers, and two small desks, in each. Most are empty but I and Garrus decide room together anyway, Tali chooses the unoccupied room next to us.
After that I call Vic and ask him to send me and Ash's stuff over to the Citadel since its still on Eden Prime, he says it should arrive tomorrow sometime. I head down to the cargo bay and setup my workbench and begin checking over all my weapons, Tali is in engineering gushing over the Tantalus drive, and Garrus is admiring the Mako, but wanders over to me after a while.
I'm listening to 'The sound of Madness' by Shinedown, killer song. I'm cleaning my M-92 when he walks up.
"M-92 Mantis, that's a pretty good rifle." He says.
"Yeah, it a nice weapon, what've you got." I ask still checking the barrel.
"I've got a Volkov IX." I let out a long low whistle.
"Nice weapon, may I scan it?" I ask, he nods and hands the rifle over to me. I place it on the table and the workbench scans it automatically, a few compatible parts appear, and I set it to make a few replacements for my own rifle.
"Something you wanted done specifically, better power accuracy, grip customization?" I ask, still shifting through parts, I've kept up on my studies.
"Yeah a few things." We go on for around half an hour fitting parts and going over the rifle before Garrus walks off with his newly upgraded weapon, optimized for power and accuracy.
I start fitting a few new parts onto my sniper, when the Commander comes down.
"So what's the plan boss?" I ask turning to face him.
"Well the council made me a Spectre and we're going after Saren, so were going to Therum to get an Asari archeologist to help figure out what the 'conduit' is."
I nod "Congrats you deserve to be a Spectre, and I'm all setup here so if you want some customizations I can do that."
"Hold that thought I've got access to the Spectre arsenal now so we're getting some new gear tomorrow, we don't have a ton of money to requisition new gear but we'll see tomorrow." The Spectre grins at my apparent anticipation.
"Alright, everyone's settled in, and I sent for a buddy of mine to ship me and Ash's stuff over here, should be here tomorrow." I say leaning against the workbench.
"Ok, but how are you holding up? I noticed that look back at the clinic that was the first time you killed someone right?" Attentive as ever, I nod.
"Yeah, he was scum, threatening innocents I'll be ok, but thanks Shepard." He nods and then walks over to Garrus at the Mako. I decide to go see Tali. As I come into engineering, she glances back and sees me so I walk over.
"Amazing isn't it?" I say looking up to the core.
"It's incredible we don't have anything near this advanced on the fleet!" She's happily looking over readouts and lines of code.
I chuckle a bit. "You're really excited about this aren't you?"
"It comes with being a Quarian, ships are our most valuable resource, I've also had a somewhat gifted education, for a Quarian anyway." She says, voice tinged with sadness.
"Mmm ships aren't my specialty, I like guns and explosions, but I still know a bit about engines." I say.
"It's good to know a bit of everything, but I've never received allot of training with small arms, only marines really get that training." The engineer replies still absorbed in her work.
"Are you holding up ok, you know after what's happened?" I ask sincerely.
"Y-Yeah, I'm ok, he was a threat, and it was the only thing I could do right?" She asks a little nervously.
"Yes, sometimes there's only one way to solve a problem. We don't have to like, but there it is." I reply resolutely.
"But you're a weapons tech, shouldn't you like fighting?" She stops her work to look at me.
"I enjoyed the skirmishes we had on Eden Prime, used special ammo that wouldn't hurt to get shot with. And I won't deny that there's a certain thrill to real combat, but I won't let it master me, I make weapons so that, when we do have to fight we'll have better chances." I reply, standing firm.
"Good." Is her only response, I nod back and walk back to my workstation.
After grabbing something for dinner I head to my new quarters and lay down to sleep, Garrus comes in soon after and does the same. My first night on the Normandy, exhaustion both physical and mental whisk me off to sleep.
Up, in the morning breakfast suit up and meet Shepard in the airlock. I'm the third person there, Shepard and Kaidan are talking as I walk up. I give a nod to both, and lean up against the wall. Everyone else trickles over shortly and we head out, for the C-sec armory.
As we get off Wrex gets Shepard's attention.
"You guys go ahead, start looking at stuff, I'll be there soon." He says turning to Wrex.
When we get down there Kaidan tells the quartermaster that were Shepard's crew and he opens up the stock for us. I look through a few things before something catches my eye.
"What's this?" I ask the quartermaster.
"That's an M-12 assault shotgun, not many people liked them because they weren't very powerful even if they had a high rate of fire, and most people were thrown off by its strange mechanics." He replies.
I look it over and check the stats, High rate of semiautomatic fire, 7 rounds per clip with 4 clips in the feed tube, tightly clustering shots, but generally weaker than other shotguns. And I can see what he means by strange mechanics, it has an action almost behind the pistol grip instead of a pump, and the feed tube is on the top of the weapon, it is also the first shotgun I have seen with a stock.
"Oh thank the Maker, hey waitaminute."
"I'll take it." I say looking over the weapon.
"Thank you that's the last one I had to get rid of, and because of that I'll give you a discount, for a total of 3,000 credits." The turian quartermaster says sighing slightly with relief.
"Sweet, thats quite a bit cheaper than any of the other shotguns worth getting." I smile and start looking over composite armor materials and shield generators.
Shepard walks over to me as I'm examining some electronics.
"So what have you found?" He asks.
"A shotgun, some armor material, a shield generator, and some electronics." I reply bringing up the new shotgun.
"I've heard of that shotgun, are you sure you want th-"
"It's only three grand."
"How much does everything else cost?" He asks.
"Everything else is another 1,125 creds, raw materials are pretty cheap." I reply.
So Shepard pays for everything picking up a new assault rifle himself, our newest addition Wrex doesn't pick up anything just waits then we head back to the Normandy.
I'm just upgrading my weapons and armor when Tali walks over.
"Hey uh are you busy?" She asks a little timidly.
"No, you need something?" I ask turning to face her.
"Yeah, could you check over my weapons? I'd like to get more power from my pistol, and"
We go over exactly what she wants and I start making parts.
"That's allot of electronic parts, are you making something?" She asks motioning towards the clutter of parts on the table.
"Yes, I'm trying to make some explosive charges, could come in handy during a mission." I reply.
"Why didn't you just buy charges from the armory?" She asks confused.
"I looked over them and just bought raw materials, as a tech it's cheaper to make them, and I can resupply them between missions instead of buying more from the citadel." I reply bringing forward one that I've finished and show it to her.
"That makes sense but you'll still need to buy more material right?" She asks.
"Not necessarily, we've picked up a bunch of junk from fallen enemies, mods, weapons, armor, ect… that we don't need." I motion to a small container full of random bits of things. "I can salvage materials from this junk and use it to make things, explosives, modifications, and other stuff, I've got a few ideas of things I want to make."
"That's thinking like a Quarian, here I've got some salvage functions on my Omni tool I can give you." She says bringing up her Omni tool.
Her parts finish and I upgrade her weapons, she gives thanks and returns to engineering. Shepard comes down a while later.
"You finished upgrading everyone's stuff?" He asks, coming up beside me.
"Just waiting for a few more parts, all your stuff is done though its in your locker." I say nodding my head toward the lockers.
"Alright, I heard you had something you made ready." He asks curiously. I smirk and grab one of the charges.
"I looked over the blasting charges they had at the armory." I say.
"I really wanted some of those but they were really expensive." Shepard says, frowning.
"I don't understand why, I mean the only rare part is the explosives, the electronics are simple." I say holding up the explosive and turning it over slowly.
"You made one?" He says slightly shocked.
"You kidding me? I made four." I say grinning like an idiot.
"That will come in handy, what did you make them from?" He asks grinning.
"I was able to make them from salvage from all this stuff." I say shaking the container, much emptier now. "As long as we keep finding junk I can keep making stuff." I reply.
"Alright, I was going to sell some of the junk we found, but if we're just going to use the money to buy guns, it's probably more economical to just make them." He says holding his chin and nodding. "Alright, we'll be hitting Therum in two hours ready up."
"Alright lets kick some ass!"
A/N: Alright, next stop Therum. After that will be Feros, Noveria, and then Virmire, There will probably be a chapter in between each mission and I'm thinking I'm gunna do a non-plot mission before Noveria. Just a heads up on the order there, next chapter will probably be next weekend, not sure how the holidays are gunna go but since I'm off school till the middle of January you can probably expect an extra chapter or two, dunno yet though might be too absorbed in Christmas presents.
Til' next time, ROCK ON!