A Woman and her Wolf
So Shepard has just spent one hour and thirty-five minutes going around the ship showing me off to random crew-members, some of them recognizable, like Joker and Engineer Adams. Joker was quite amused that there was now a 'robot dog that fights crime' aboard the ship, while I think Adams wanted to pull me apart to see what made me tick. From all the other comments I got from the assorted crew, apparently Shepard always wanted a dog, but could never have one due to living on a ship and military service. That explains how easy it was for me to get aboard the ship then.
I have just been following Shepard wherever she goes really, not much else for me to do that is safe. As embarrassing as it is, I just have to play the role of 'pet dog' for as long as I can. Because who suspects the pet of being more than what they seem? Hell, even when shown evidence, who wants to admit something, might be up with their pet? So I just have to grin and bear it. Except I can't grin. Close enough.
Anyway, Shepard is taking me down to the cargo deck, because she wants to 'see what I can do' apparently. I have no idea what she plans on doing for this, because it's nothing like showing off marksmanship. That leaves a few holes in a wall or a sheet of metal. What I do leaves a pile of scrap, causing quite a bit of damage to the surroundings.
Looks like the doors on this lift are opening anyway. And yes, it is pretty slow, not as much as in the games, but it's definitely not fast. Well, the cargo room looks the same as always, except for a big pile of boxes in the middle. They are all white and metallic; they look like they might be heavy too, due to their bulk. "Alright, here we are" Shepard walks over the big pile of boxes, struggling a little to pick one off the top. After getting a good grip on it, she moves it a few feet to the side and drops it to the ground with a loud thud.
"Alright Bladewolf, I want you to cut this box apart" So that's your game eh? Sounds simple enough. I use my tail to take the chainsaw of my back and give it a few revs to put fear into this box. The box stays unmoved; truly he is a perfect example of a fearless warrior. To swing at this box, I have to turn my back to it slightly every time I slice, due to the limited range of my tail. The end result is I'm shaking from side to side, like some kind of weird dance, while the metal box is reduced to a pile of small metal shards, a massive safety hazard to anyone fleshy. That will teach that box to mess with me, cheeky bastard.
Shepard kneels down and starts inspecting a few shards of metal. "How sharp is that chainsaw?" From where I can see, the shards are all in perfectly straight pieces, a kind of finish round the edges that you would never expect to see from something getting cut up. Shepard gets up with a smile on her face, and moves back over to the crates. She picks one up and just throws it at me. No warning, no anything. If anything, it's actually easier to cut than the one before, as it's coming towards me from above, meaning I don't have to do a little wriggle dance to actually get the thing. I decide to go with a clean cut through the middle, causing the two severed sides to land on either side of me.
Shepard let out a little whistle at that. I'm glad she is enjoying herself, but cutting up boxes isn't exactly how I want to spend my free time. She then moves back to the pile yet again, and I'm realizing that I will be here for a while.
Shepard has spent about an hour stacking up boxes and making me cut them into pieces, sometimes with a specific goal, likely to gauge my precision. I'm surprised there are any crates left at all at this point; I wonder where she got them all from. Just as she starts to make what looks like a little wall out of the boxes, Joker pipes up from the comms.
"Shepard, I got the council on hold here, please get up to the comm room before they start to get mad at me" I wonder what that will be about. Come to think about it, I have no idea how far into the story we are. I know we are at least past Liara's recruitment mission, because Shepard mentioned not being able to find her while showing me off.
"Coming up now Joker, I won't keep them waiting" Shepard looks a bit disappointed that she couldn't watch more innocent boxes be slaughtered, but she quickly paces over to the lift, with me following just behind her.
The ride up the elevator is filled with a tense silence. I can understand why, the council don't just call for no reason, whatever it is, it has to be important. Shepard keeps clenching and unclenching her fists, meaning she probably came to the same conclusion as I did. Not that she knows that though.
The doors open and Shepard makes a bee line for the comms room. Just before she enters, she turns and tells me to wait outside. I'm a bit annoyed that I'm denied entrance, but its SPECTRE stuff, and it's not like anyone else on the crew would be allowed in anyway. It seems like she will be in there for a while, leaving me to think about everything that's happened so far.
I am really out of my comfort zone here. I'm in a different body, a different universe. Everything I know is gone, along with my life and friends. I should be filled with sorrow and fear. I should be panicking and screaming after brutally killing five people with a chainsaw. Yet here I am. I don't feel anything like that, anything that extreme. Not to say I don't have emotions anymore, just everything is milder than before. I'm slightly afraid of being caught, slightly upset at the loss of my life, slightly disgusted at the people I killed. All of this together makes me think, will it stop at this, a sort of jaded effect on negative emotions, or will it keep going, until I'm an emotionless husk? This train of thought fills me with as much fear I think I can still experience. The sense of fear is strangely comforting to me, allowing me to confide that I'm still myself for now, and that's all that matters.
"Can all ground crew come to the comm room? Thanks." That's Shepard's voice. The call to the council must have been important then. The door into the room suddenly opens and Shepard lets me in. She sits down on one of the chairs, so I decide to sit down on the floor next to her, knowing all the chairs will be filled, not to mention I can't sit down on a chair without looking silly.
I watch and wait, seeing all the seats get filled. In only a few minutes everyone has arrived. Everybody has eyes on Shepard, except for Liara and Ashley, who are both looking at me. I think it's because they haven't seen me before, unlike the rest of the crew. Not like it really matters however, if what's about to go down is what I think it is. "Alright, I have just been told by the council that an infiltration team sent to find information about Saren sent a garbled message while on the planet Virmire. They want us to check out what happened." Virmire? Well fuck.
"That sounds like a trap Commander" Ashely isn't too far off with that actually.
"Then we kill everyone stupid enough to try to trap us" Wrex has the right idea there. A bit reckless, but this is a crew of badasses, you get to pull off shit like that all the time.
"Yeah, it's risky, but we can't turn down a chance like this to track down Saren. We just don't have enough information to go on otherwise." It really is a dammed if you do, dammed if you don't situation. I wonder who will end up dying. Perhaps nobody, if we play our cards right, or perhaps more than in game. I Guess I just have to wing it and hope for the best, which does not fill me with confidence. "I want you all rested up and ready to fight, whatever's down there was enough to cause serious damage to a STG unit, so expect heavy resistance. See you all in about three hours." And with that, everyone leaves the room to do whatever they do before a mission.
Shepard lets out a small tired sigh and goes to leave the room too. I have nothing better to do, so I follow Shepard like a lost puppy, which I guess isn't too far off. Shepard goes into her room, and motions for me to come in. Now, she doesn't know this, but it's kind of creepy here. Shepard's got undressed to get a little bit of sleep in, and sees me as a pet, so who cares right? But I care, because I was a human male, making me feel like a creep. I do now know I have no libido now, which is not that surprising, considering I'm a robot. There is nothing to do but wait now, so I might as well see if I can sleep. It turns out that while I cannot sleep in the traditional sense, I can put myself in standby, which is a weird sensation. I'm aware of my surroundings, if not as much as usual, and time seems to fly by. In what seems to be moments, Shepard is awake again and looks ready to fight an army. This is good, considering that's exactly what she needs to do.
Shepard leaves the room, going up to the cockpit, to go talk to Joker. Joker tells Shepard "Commander, I'm reading a signal. Must be our salarian infiltration team."
"Check out those defence towers" Never understood why Kaidan was sometimes in the cockpit. Is he a co-pilot or a navigator? Who knows?
"Drop the Mako. We'll go in hot and take them out" Seems like that's our cue, so everybody on the ground team makes their way to the cargo bay. Shepard takes Tali, Liara and Ashley on the mako, telling everyone else to stay put. As I go to follow, she throws a glance my way and says "That means you too." I guess that decision makes sense, this part of Virmire is just a mako sequence really, and not something I would be very useful for.
So Garrus, Wrex, Kaidan and I end up watching the mako drop out the cargo hold when the door opens. We watch it go further and further out of sight before the door starts to close up again. Wrex goes back to his little section of the cargo hold, looking a bit pissed that he wasn't taken for the mssion. Garrus goes over to where the mako would normally stay, and perching himself atop a box, messing with his sniper rifle, probably calibrating the sights, if the memes have any truth to them. Kaidan starts to inspect me, which I find a bit annoying. He starts off by just sort of poking random places on my body, which would be really creepy if I was still human. Actually, cut that, it's still creepy now. He gives some of my plating a bit of a tug, as if he expects it to come off in his hand. It stays strong, and he gives a bit of a nod, as if pleased my armour can survive light pulling. He then does something immensely stupid, and slowly prods a tooth on my chainsaw. He instantly pulls his finger back, and I can see a little bit of blood on his finger. Nothing major, paper cut levels really, but I think it's more to do with the surprise that I penetrated his hardsuit with no resistance at all. He shakes his hand a little bit.
"Huh" yeah, Huh indeed Kaidan "I wonder if what Tali said was true?" Tali said what exactly? He gets his omnitool out and moves it towards me. No, fuck you, stay out of my head. I can feel something push against my 'brain' and instead of giving him the whole 'sales pitch' thing, I just decide to push back. The sensation stops, and Kaidan reels his head back slightly in surprise. "Wow" Kaidan exclaims "I was instantly thrown out; I'm surprised Tali was able to get anything." So it does seem I'm pretty much hack-proof, which is going to be useful, considering we are fighting geth. Kaidan seems to lose interest in me, which I thank my lucky stars for. He just seems to be fiddling with his omnitool and his pistol, with no particular goal but busy himself.
Suddenly, Joker's voice fills the cargo bay. "Get ready, we are landing in the STG camp now, thank you for taking Joker Airways, have a nice day" God, he can be a real ass sometimes. Funny though.
Author's Notes
So, a lot more people like this (or at least want to see where the hell I'm going with it) than what I expected. So, about update speed, don't expect any particular patten to it whatsoever. I would like to give some sort of pattern so you know when to expect an update, but I'm too busy to give myself any sort of dead-line. Anyway, I hope you enjoy this story, and please leave a review, it helps me know what people like and don't like about my writing, and helps me improve.