After the previous chapter, I have decided that this story is going to be a little rushed in that it requires some sort of way to reach important points in its development faster. The story will not be changed and the characters will not be effected either. I merely wish for a means to accelerate the progression slightly. With that being said, please enjoy, everyone…
Chapter 4: Pandoran Nights. Begin.
Shepard lifted herself from her bed sluggishly, forcing herself up and into a shuffle toward her shower as her sweat pooled in her pores and began to leave an uncomfortable, dirty feeling within her flesh. She then showered away the remnants of her bodily exploits, enjoying the sensation of feeling free of both her seemingly inescapable lust and pressures of her life as a dead woman. When she stepped out of her restroom, she was buffeted by EDI's calling of her name, trying to gain her attention.
"Yes, EDI? What is it?" Shepard asked, rubbing her neck softly, still drying her hair to look and feel better later.
"Commander, we may possess a problem; the very instant that Zero became aware that we were coming to Pandora , he began to grow emotional and irrational. He destroyed several boxes and old machines out of sheer frustration and may still pose a danger to other crew. I would not advise bringing him along on this mission, commander…" EDI replied, gaining Shepard's attention completely.
"Yeah… that sounds like the best course of action… Alert the others that we will be dropping in 5 and that they should be geared up and ready to go…" Shepard said softly, waving EDI off as to get dressed.
Several moments pass as Shepard readies herself for the mission; putting on her armor, selecting her weapons, and the like. She soon steps out of her quarters, adjusting her comms and calling up the other members of her squad that she was going to bring with her. After careful consideration, she decides that before she or her team embarks, she will talk to Zero and see if she can learn anything about the assassin before he starts tearing chunks out of the ship and sends Miranda into a nuclear meltdown of unbridled rage and tries to confront him.
"EDI? I'm going to check up on Zero to make sure he's not going to endanger anyone on the ship… I'll pick the members of my team when I return… And DON"T let anyone down into the hanger until I return, and if I don't, open the hanger door and lock down all other doors and leave this planet. Quickly." Shepard said in a slowly darkening tone, turning to face EDI's projected face.
"Yes, Commander… And please, do not make any sudden moves around him, he seems to be very irritable." EDI replied as her hologram flickered away.
Shepard then made her way to the elevator, soon hearing a strange noise that alerted her to take a step back; just as she did so, a blue blade flew by where her head previously was, leaving a fine, precise slice in the metal of the elevator frame. She turned around to see Zero looming over her, he stood silently, his body just as inhumanly refined as usual. He straightened himself to his full height, putting away his blade and looking down at Shepard as she struggled to regain her breath.
"You should have told me/ That was your only warning/ Not to leave me out…" he said slowly before walking silently off to the debriefing room. Small talk could be heard in the room and quickly fell silent as he walked in and the doors slid shut. Shepard shrugged, sighing as she looked to EDI's terminal, activating her interface.
"Should I be worried about him?" she asked the AI, crossing her arms and leaning on her hip.
"I do not foresee a problem, though Zero has a past record of being exceedingly hostile and quick to act… In his case, the fact that he is predictable makes him unpredictable… If we try to understand his actions, he will start doing things that we would perceive as out of character, hence creating a character for him that is, by definition, unpredictable…" EDI replied in a slow, seemingly relaxed voice. Shepard again sighed, removing her helmet and walking over to the door to the briefing room and holding back a grin at the sight before her. Zero was sitting in the far corner of the room with Yeoman Chambers droning around him like a horny school girl. Seemingly, when she had seen Zero up close in all his glory, she realized that he was actually very desirable, aside from his indiscernible face or emotional standings. Just as Shepard had been the previous several hours, she was enthralled by his anonymity and felt a strange attraction to him in the same way that Shepard had felt as well.
Shepard walked through the door and raised a hand as the door closed again.
"Okay, so… here's what we have… As far as I can tell, we're here on a search and rescue mission, looking for the person that had used EDI as a direct link to the Normandy… Understood?" she said in a stern voice, earning affirmation from each of her crew. Zero nodded, turning back to his rifle and polishing it slowly, cleaning the blade that had been stained from all of the enemies that had fallen by his hand. Miranda made a heavy sigh and shifted on her hips, when a signal from the opposite side of the planet shown on the Holotable. Shepard leaned forward and inspected the signal. "EDI, what is that? See if you can clear it up…" she asked, her eyes tightening into a squint as the signal flickered and produced a humming, droning noise.
EDI soon appeared at one of her terminals, saying "Commander, that signal is a distress beacon with the same signature as the message that we received earlier. If you so choose, we can begin our search there."
"Do it, EDI. Everyone get suited up; Samara, Zero, with me. Let's get ready to move people!" Shepard replied, activating her HUD as her helmet was donned. Zero pulled out his favored sniper rifle, a Hawk Eye Rifle. Everyone looked over at him with a confused look as he holstered the rifle and nodded to the commander. "Uh… You're not going to use that old tech on the mission, are you?" she asked with a belittling tone. Silently, Zero again nodded, pulling the rifle out and loading a new clip. He then turned to the door, leading the others to the hanger elevator. He pressed the button and brought them to the hanger, where he proved to them his skills.
"Now please watch closely/ My honor's been offended/ I'll now prove myself…" he said, donning his rifle and pointing to the one inch button on the far side of the hanger, nearly 80 feet away. Without using both arms, he fired, hitting the button and causing the doors to open; he then stepped over to the precipice and readied his weapon for accuracy, peering through the scope. Shepard looked out aside him, seeing what appeared to be Collectors walking about the outskirts of the seemingly shoddy town. Zero fired one round at a target that Garrus could barely see through his weapon. A yellow and black splatter appeared off in the distance as one of the Collector drones fell to the ground. Zero turned back to the others and reloaded his weapon before nodding and falling back at the edge, falling from the hanger door and onto the ground nearly 60 feet below. Shepard was speechless at the sight that had transpired before her eyes; he just picked a target that was more than a mile away and from a moving vehicle, took its head off with a single shot and then jumped out of a moving vessel that was more than 50 feet off of the ground and landed in a group of more enemies. "Joker! Take us…" she started to shout, cutting herself off as she watched Zero kill off about ten Collectors on his own, taking no damage in the process.
"Commander? What were you saying? Commander?" Joker asked, confused and slightly worried.
"Nothing. Take us down in a few minutes, I think Zero needs some time to cool off…" she remarked with a smirk under her helmet.
Several moments passed as the Normandy touched down and reunited with Zero, who was patiently waiting on a stoop that used to be a bus stop. Shepard and her team, consisting of Samara, Garrus, and Jacob, looked around and noticed a sign that read 'Fyrestone' and was seemingly in tatters. He then pointed behind him with his thumb to a seemingly abandoned building that looked to have been destroyed and rebuilt from its original parts. She led the two others to the entrance of the building and stepped inside, seeing no one inside. Then, in the corner of her eye, she caught a glimpse of some sort of motion. She readied her weapon and crouched, stepping slowly toward the moving object. It was a tarp that covered what seemed to be a box of some kind. When she removed the tarp, she saw a woman huddled up in the box, her hair parted to the side with two small pieces of metal connected to her temple. Her eyes glowed a bright white and on her left arm were tattoos the likes of which Shepard could now recognize. The young woman lifted her hand and everyone's devices seemed to spark and illuminate with white energy before closing down into their compressed state; Zero's weapon still functioning, he took a few more steps toward the girl before an exclamation point shown from his helm. He froze in his current position and stared at the helpless young woman as she stared at him. Her eyes opened wider and she lurched forward into the assassin's chest, hugging him tightly as she began to cry.
"Zero… I'm so happy you're here! I… I can't find John… And I can't locate my protector! I was so scared!"
What happened next was so surprising to Shepard that she will never look at the seemingly aloof assassin the same way again.
"It's alright, Angel…/ I am here to protect you…/ And we will find John." Zero replied, hugging the girl tightly and rubbing her back consolingly. His arms still around her shoulders, Zero hoisted the girl, now known as Angel, from the ground and gestured to Samara. The Justicar nodded and addressed the young girl.
"Come with me, child… I'll take you to a safe place…" Angel sniffled slightly, taking the Asari's hand and allowing her to lead her to the ship. No one said a word as they waited for Samara to return as they knew that Zero would likely react with hostility. The Justicar soon reunited with the others and nodded to Zero silently, letting him know that Angel was safe. Zero returned the gesture, turning to Shepard and awaiting her word.
"What? Obviously, you have the most experience with this planet, you can assume command of this mission… Just don't get used to it…" she said slowly. Zero again nodded, pointing to the members of his small squad; Jacob and Miranda, leaving Shepard with Garrus and Samara. The two teams followed Zero's orders, going wearily into the shanty town as to assure that there were no other hidden people or Collector drones or other hostiles. Zero raised a hand, alerting the others that they were to stop and they did so without hesitation. He lifted his rifle and released a single round that traveled perfectly straight and dropped three Collector drones instantly. He then waved the groups forward and gestured toward several pieces of cover. The three pieces of steel and other metal sheets were to act as cover to the others as Zero took point, retrieving his blade and holstering his Hawk Eye Rifle. Soon, several other Collector drones marched into the open door, swiftly being dispatched by Zero as he killed them all in one swing each, reappearing several feet from his position as his invisibility wore off.
"We must move…" he said simply, pulling his rifle once again. They silently made their way through the abandoned town, and on their way through the open exit, found a small group of Collectors in their path. The collectors were paying them no mind as they were preoccupied with attempting to open a locked door, the likes of which was echoing shouts of terror and cries from a man. Zero did not hesitate to sprint forward and used his stealth and ambushed three of the group, killing them all with a single swing of his blade, immediately following up his third kill with throwing several handfuls of exploding Kunai that destroyed the large piece of equipment that they were using to drill and break the door. His Deception wore off and he was then assaulted by the remaining three Collector Drones, but they never even scratched the massive shield that he had equipped for use with his sniper rifle. Mass Accelerator Slugs caused huge ripples in his shield and threatened to push him to the ground when he used his Deception again, disappearing and switching his damaged shield for his smaller, stronger shield. In the several weeks that he was onboard the Normandy, he'd referred to his weapons several times, naming his shield the 'Order' and pulled out an old magnum that looked positively ancient but still functioned almost as well as a Mass Accelerator Carnifax Cannon. He darted toward the distracted Collectors and sliced one of them down, chucking a handful of Kunai into the second and slicing the third in twain. The second fell to the ground, it's body catching fire and simultaneously turning to liquid under the powerful acid that was injected into its veins by another Kunai. He then walked over to the door and proceeded to cut into it with his blade, burning a solid hole in the metal and cutting a door in the seemingly impregnable wall of metal. The man inside was crying out in unintelligible screams of terror when Zero opened the wall and stepped in. He then pulled out a tall, thin man that was wearing a long sleeved shirt with the sleeves rolled up at the elbows and long, tasseling back over-hangings that were seemingly too long for even a dress shirt. He wore a vest with a pocket watch in it and very fancy shoes; he was obviously accustomed to a wealthy life style. Zero dragged him out and dropped him onto the ground, looming over him silently.
"Wha… what are you… Go-going to do to me?" the man asked Zero as he continued to glare down at him.
"Angel is safe, John/ Stop all your spineless crying/ Go be her father…" he replied, gesturing to Samara for her to lead the man to his daughter.
Shepard called Joker, telling him to send down a shuttle for them to leave. He shuttle was there in less than a minute to take the group up to the Normandy for debriefing.
"Where are you taking me?!" John cried, his eyes red from tears and fearful panic.
"Sir, calm down… we're going up to my ship so you can meet your daughter again… Pease, just try to relax…" Shepard said in a soothing voice.
"This is all your fault, you monster! I hired you to protect my baby girl! Instead, you just up and leave?! And you left her with a machine? Who do you think you are!? She was nearly killed back there because you shirked off on your duties! You make me sick!" John shouted, spitting intentionally on the assassin's face plate. In a hollow, synthesized grumble, Zero grabbed John by the color and lifted him out of his seat and pulled him effortlessly toward him.
"I could not stay, John…/ No like she wanted me to…/ She was far too young…" Zero said softly, his actions seemingly not reflecting the emotions behind his words.
"She just had a crush on you! She would have gotten over you if you put her down…" John replied, his rage fading as well.
"She asked me to make love to her, John…" Zero said almost silently, ensuring that only John had heard him, despite the cramped transport. John's eyes widened.
"She… Wha-…?" he asked, struck hard by the assassin's words.
"She wanted me to be her lover…" Zero said quietly, once again breaking his normal form of speech. John just stared at the masked man, still knocked far away from forming any sort of coherent thought. The door to the shuttle opened and the group stepped out and walked to the elevator and moved to the briefing room for a chat.
End Chapter 4: Pandoran Nights.
Sorry for this chapter being so short, guys… I was getting too far behind in all my stories and was not going to let it get out of hand… After this chapter, I'm going to start work on A New Life. So to anyone reading this that has read that story as well, just hold out for a little while yet, it'll be out in a few days…