Nate POV
When we arrived at the school it was already buzzing. Everyone seemed so damn chipper and happy to be back, or enthusiastic about starting a new year. It was sickening. These were the same people bitching and complaining about how hard it was last year and that they will never come back but always did. What I like about this institute is that the teachers actually enjoy their work. All of them are fairly cool and know what their doing.
I will be the first to admit this school looks NICE. It was a series of 5 buildings all looking new as if they were built yesterday, adorned with trees so that there is at least the idea that we get fresh air is put into our heads. Footpaths made out of 7 inch glass and framed by some sort of metal alloy. A prominent feature was a fountain, with a multitude of statues, one from each council race, a human, quarian, krogan, Turian, salarian and asari each standing proud.
When we reached reception to receive our timetables for the year we saw a few people we had never met before, the one at the front of the line was a quarian; to be honest to me they all look the same, I can't tell you who it is until I hear their voice, or they have custom suits. This one and high-tech, the hood had a black and grey Persian pattern, a pink face visor and a yellow, black and purple body design, this suit was distinct and easy to remember.
The girl behind her is human judging from her height and posture but it is hard to actually tell because she has a hood covering the majority of her face.
A drell, but he looked familiar, his face is emotionless but his body language suggested a cold confidence. He looked tired as though he had hardly slept, he was probably talking to someone or playing a game.
The next few were some familiar faces, Liara an asari whose biotic abilities are off the charts, she was as powerful as those 10 times her age, she's only 70 years old. She's a looker but she is awkward to talk to and every time I try to talk to her she starts babbling or says something like 'It's hard to take humanity seriously'.
Kelly and Samantha were with her talking animatedly, they were best friends had the same sort of dress sense. Kelly was hot! I won't lie I do enjoy flirting with her and she is fun to talk to, but she's too happy-go lucky and that is really annoying and plus I know she gets around from personal experience
Samantha was like Liara only shy and awkward which was a bad combination. Until a few years ago she couldn't speak to me or my friends except for Garrus. I got to know her and found out she's cool. Regardless she was the butt of quite a few jokes and was clearly uncomfortable about it considering she used to look sad around us. I could understand why she was hurt since she thought that Garrus and I were her friends. Garrus, James, Jacob and I defend her because we have actually spoken to her but the others haven't so they kept going, after a while we just stopped talking to those assholes
At the back was someone I knew I would see; the bald, girl with the loud mouth. She was impatiently tapping her foot on the ground and wore a scowl on her face, arms folded but it wasn't below her ribs it was high up her chest, it looked like she was making an attempt to conceal something maybe the Cerberus logo, I know I would.
"I actually thought there would be more people" Rylee commented looking around to see if there were any more people coming
"Nah it's cuz we're late everyone's probably going through orientation right now" I responded. I looked at the time. We were almost 40 minutes late.
"In that case I'm glad we're late. Orientations are always so boring. A representative from each race talking up a storm for their species and saying their awful jokes" Garrus added
We joined the back of the line and patiently waited for the line to grow smaller. I learnt that the Quarian was called Tali Zorah, The hooded girl Kasumi Goto, and the drell Thane Krios. Thane had been in my form for a while but I had never noticed him. I should really talk to the others more
"Name" the receptionist commanded in a completely disinterested tone.
"Jack" the bald girl replied. The receptionist made a hand gesture as though to urge her to say more
"I need a last name too"
I can literally see the vein popping out of her head; it is taking a lot of restraint to not laugh right now because when this girl explodes the look on the receptionists face will be freaking hilarious
"Fine then it's Nought as in zero, nothing, empty you happy now you ugly ass bitch" she yelled with her anger clear as day on her face. As for the receptionist I'm pretty sure she's scared but she's doing her best to look unaffected by the insult
"Um… O-Ok go t-to room 72 Dr Wilson" she was doing so well until the stutter.
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Rylee POV
Wow that was… something
That girl has some serious problems, I mean no matter how bad a mood you are in you never have the right to yell at someone for just doing their job. When she stuttered it almost broke my heart, that girl Jack really must have gotten to her.
"That was hilarious" Nate whispered to me, I promptly punched him in the arm
"Ow… what was that for"
"Simple you're an asshole"
"So what is I am doesn't change the fact it was pretty funny"
"How would you feel if that was you in that ladies'position"
"I would have said something about her head or the fact that she looks like a punk wannabe"
"Um… just a thought but can we get our schedules and get to our form rooms" Garrus interrupted, he was obviously feeling uncomfortable at our argument. I proceeded towards the receptionist who had a vacant look.
"Miss, can we have our timetables please" I asked in as polite a manor as she could muster.
"What are your full names?" she asked learning from her mistakes with Jack
"Nathan Shepard"
"Rylee Shepard"
"Garrus Vakarian"
She searched our names on the system "Nathan and Garrus you're both in Room 23 Urdnot Wrex's room as for you Rylee you are in room 52 with Dr. Chakwas" she said never looking up from the screen.
"Excuse me but I don't know where my room is or any room for that matter" I asked cautiously, this women was either going to snap at me or break down crying, Jack must have hit a real sensitive spot.
"Come back at break time and I will have someone guide you for the next few weeks" she responded
"Nate can't you take me, I'd rather have you than some stranger" I almost begged
"No way, I have better things to do than drag you around school" man my brother is the biggest prick on in the damned verse; he knows if the roles were reversed I'd do it for him and he still won't help me.
"I'd be happy to escort you around Rylee" Garrus offered. I blushed a little at this. Maybe he's finally taking a hint after 6 years.
"Mr Vakarian and Shepard you have both been assigned someone to guide" the receptionist interrupted. Dammit how can she pick now of all times to get back her nerve?
"But we DIDN'T VOLUNTEER", Nate really needs to learn to control his anger before he gets into a fight.
"Neither did the other 6998 second years so your names were put into a random draw against new students" she stated and with that we were on our way. I'm just following them since they are taking me to my form.
"You're lucky Rylee. Dr Chakwas is a great form tutor and pretty easy to talk to" Garrus said, he flashed me a Turian grin which was really cute.
"That's good to know, at least I won't have some bitch" I said
"Well were here good luck Ry" Nate said before looking around, noticing there isn't anyone around he gives me a quick hug. No matter how big an ass he is I know he really does care. I entered my form.
The first thing I noticed was Dr Chakwas, she is tall, well at least taller than me. She looks like she's in her early 50s but I can only tell that by her hair her skin looks like that of someone in her late 30s.
"Sorry I'm late Miss but the line at reception was pretty long" I apologised half expecting her to yell at me.
"It's Okay Miss?" She replied
"Oh, um… Shepard, Rylee" I responded
"Shepard? Would Nathan be your brother by any chance" I gave a quick nod and a smile graced her face. This was unexpected from the reports I read I'm surprised any teacher actually likes teaching him.
"Take the empty seat around table 4"
When I looked towards table 4 and noticed that they could not all be my age.
Some were from the line at the office but some were new faces. They each introduced themselves to me
"We met in the line at reception" the quarian said in a cheery tone
"Kaidan Alenko". Why was Kaidan being so informal, we already know each other? Maybe he doesn't remember me. It had been 4 years since we last talked
"Kelly Chambers"
"Samantha Traynor" she introduced in a British accent. She probably gets hit on a lot.
"Hey Ry" said Jacob, I already knew Jacob, he's one of Nate's close friends along with James, Garrus and Grunt
"I'm Rylee" They all seem pretty nice especially Kelly. I knew that these were people I could trust. Kelly and Samantha seemed really friendly. And I've seen Tali around before but we've never actually had the chance to talk.
"So what courses do you take" asked Kaidan
"I doing Soldier and Infiltrator training, Biology and History" at this I got some strange looks. Nate told me that it was unusual to have a mix of physical and academic subjects.
I found out that Jacob takes also takes Soldier training along with biotics, PE and Weapons which is basically merc training, it teaches you about different weapons, strengths, weaknesses, how to mod them and how to use them.
Kaidan takes Soldier, Biotics, PE and History.
Tali takes Engineering, Weapons, PE and Biology.
Sam takes Computing, Engineering, Information Technology and History.
Kelly takes Psychology, Computing, History and Biology.
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Nate POV
"We've got Wrex again, Garrus do you think he actually asks for us to be in his form" Nate asked looking at Garrus
"Probably the big Krogan bastard probably misses us when we're not around"
"Who else would he have to shoot at when we don't listen?"
When we reached our form room we both took a deep breath and walked in. We saw a lot of old faces, looks like Wrex asked for the exact same form.
"Shepard, Garrus nice of you to join us" The giant Krogan asked
"Don't blame me it was all Nate's fault" Garrus said
"This little pyjack still can't wake up to an alarm", at this most of the class started laughing "Take a seat"
There are a few old faces here like Javik, Aria, James, Miranda, Liara, Grunt and more. I walked over to my usual table and sat.
"Loco late as always can't you just show up on time for once" James asked with a smirk on his face
"Nah if I did no one would believe it's me, they'd think a clone was taking over my life" I joked.
"Wouldn't be surprised. You're one crazy SOB"
"And what…. You're perfectly sane?" I quipped
"I don't intentionally piss off Krogan"
"Wrex is harmless" I joked
"I heard that" the Battlemaster interjected "And just for that we're going to meet up in the Battle arena" he laughed "Be prepared Shepard".
I groaned, facing Wrex is challenging and sure as hell isn't fun. This guy is one of the best fighters I've ever seen. Experience and power have served him well for the past Millennia. Everyone here is combat oriented so as an initiation we've each had to last 20 minutes in the combat sim with Wrex. No one has survived more than 10 minutes before he got to you.
"Haha" James laughed
James is one of my best friends, he's easy to talk to, pretty funny and he has a hell of a lot more morals than me, he may make fun of people but he is normally the first to point out when someone doesn't deserve what they are getting.
"If I were the krogan I would strung you up a flagpole and had the entire class throw rocks at you" Javik said. He has always been so damn cheery and arrogant because he's Prothean. Liara found him and council team reactivated him a year ago. He sometimes bragging about how the Protheans beat some race of sapient space machines called Reapers after a cycle that lasted eons. He told the council that.
"Aah Javik always the voice of reason and compassion" I responded sarcasm dripping off my voice
"Why are primitives always stupid, their flaws aren't stomped out but instead are compensated for?" The prothean complained, in spite of how smug he is I consider him a friend because he is quite an honourable person, and he is pretty funny.
"I am so glad that you aren't in charge" I joked
"If I were the stupidity of this form would have been purged"
"Come on Javik please can we not argue this early in the morning" Liara begged, holding her hand to her forehead.
"Debates are the foundation for a successful society Asari" Javik countered
"Yes but not at 8:30 in the morning" Liara responded. I wonder what's up with her.
The rest of form time was pretty uneventful. We caught up with each other.
My thoughts wondered to that girl Jack. She was pretty feisty and I find that sexy. She was skinny but not anorexic, I imagined what it would be like to feel her tanned skin on my body, what her smile would look like, what her tattoos meant and why she had so many. What those pouty red lips would fe-. Whoa, why am I thinking about her, and why can't she just get out of my head, I only met her once. I looked to the watch and it was 9:00, I just spent the past 20 minutes thinking about a girl who told me to fuck off. That's just pathetic.
Whereas Rylee is an infiltrator, I'm a vanguard. Not to brag but this means I am the perfect melding of a soldiers physique and training with biotics. This also means to maintain my physical prowess I have to take more subjects than others. I have to take Soldier training, Biotics, weapons and PE.
I also take advanced biotics. This is only available to those with the highest biotic readings in the whole Institute so there are only a few people in the class, last year there was only me, Liara, Aria, Miranda, Javik, Morinth and Kai Leng. It is intense, we have to with stand simulated heavy weapons fire, controlled biotic bursts, we get our amps pushed to its limits and even how to use moves as safely as possible once our amps get worn out, if you do it wrong it shorts out and we can enter a coma. I'm surprised that some people aren't part of the course like Kaidan Alenko, his biotics are insane, apart from me he's probably the best human biotic alive, not the most powerful but damn sure one of the best.
Garrus takes Weapons, Infiltrator, PE and Soldier training.
James Takes weapons, soldier and PE
Javik takes history, advanced biotics, biotics and soldier training.
Liara does History, Advanced Biotics, Biology and Computing
Grunt does weapons, PE and Soldier Training.
Miranda takes History, Advanced Biotics, Biology, Psychology and PE.
Miranda is a complicated person even though the rest of the school thought of her as a cold hearted bitch I knew that Miri was actually a good person but because of her perfectionist nature and lack of tolerance for mistakes she has developed a reputation for being unapproachable. She told me there are only two people she considers friends, me and Jacob. She also happens to be in my opinion and that of many guys the hottest girl in the whole school, which makes her all the more difficult to approach. The only ones that do ask her out are arrogant jocks who think they're the best thing to ever happen to the galaxy and act like a total ass. She deals with the pretty quickly. Unfortunately for her the good guys are too scared to ask
Grunt is one of my two favourite Krogan in the freaking verse. He is taller than me but he shows me a level of respect he shows few people including Garrus, Wrex and Kaidan. Given that he stays with Wrex that's understandable. As for me, Garrus and Miranda we helped him out, Uvenk this smug Krogan bastard is jealous of Grunts strength due to being a Tankbred and picked on him for it. Grunt didn't respond because he didn't think Uvenk was worth his time which I honestly believed even though Uvenk is a pretty big krogan, but we got sick of it and stood up to him. That was the first time I head-butted a Krogan, it hurt like hell but Grunt seemed impressed by it. He backed down and since he refers to me as his battlemaster.
I strolled over to Miranda who was staring out of the window. "Hello Nate" she greeted before I could say anything. She had this sixth sense for knowing whenever I'm around
"You know I hate it when you do that" I stated. She turned around and smiled at me. Damn she's beautiful
"How was your summer?"
"Nothing much happened. I trained up my biotics, read up on some Alien literature nothing unusual"
"Shepard I just received a message you are to report to Andersons office along with Vakarian" Wrex bellowed, with a sigh I got up and made my way to the Principals Office.
"Maybe Anderson is giving me medal for being the best sniper in the galaxy" at this Garrus turned to look at me as if I had two heads.
"Are you on red sand Nate you couldn't possibly think that you are as good as me"
"Garrus I am twice as good as you 1 hand tied behind my back"
"Blasphemy!" the Turian yelled, I burst into a fit of laughter. That was one of the funniest things I had ever heard in my life.
"I'm only telling the truth" I teased
"It's okay Shepard we can get you help, we'll check you into Rehab and we'll kick this red sand addiction" Garrus said with a straight face, tapping my back in a reassuring manor, this only made me laugh harder.
I walked into Anderson's office with tears in my eyes from laughter but any joy I had was immediately evacuated when I saw the very same bald girl, an unwelcomed guest in my mind who refused to leave, along with Rylee, the drell, Jacob, the hooded girl and the Quarian Tali.
"As you know there are few admissions at the start of the year there are only a handful of students with the potential to make it here, new students will require a guide for the first few weeks" Anderson started
"Because of this this four of you have been assigned a new student". The four of us but there are only 3 students from last year.
"Vakarian you have been assigned Tali Zorah vas Neema" at this Tali waved at Garrus
"Hi Tali you can follow me" Garrus instructed with a grin on his face. I couldn't hear what it was they were talking about but I could already hear Tali laughing
"Taylor you have Kasumi Goto" Anderson said, Jacob was looking around the room trying to find her when a hand touched his back, out of reflex Jacob grabbed her hand and twisted it behind her back.
"Ow, Ow, Ow I think you broke my wrist" Kasumi groaned holding her wrist looking down. Wide eyed and filled with regret Jacob took her hand to examine it. Kasumi looked up and a blushed stained her cheeks and I could tell that she liked what she saw.
"I am so sorry, but you shouldn't have snuck up behind me like that" Jacob defended
"I guess your first trip is to Dr Michels room" Anderson guessed, and they left the room.
"Krios you are to take Rylee Shepard" Anderson commanded
"Hello Miss Shepard my name is Thane please follow me" the drell said in a deep voice, he breathed out his words, making it clear as to what he was saying, I looked to Rylee and she looked stunned for a second and a smile was tugging at the corners of her lips.
"Ry" I shouted, this seemed to snap her out of her trance
"Oh, I'm sorry I guess I zoned out a little" she replied and followed the drell out of the room
"And Miss Jacqueline, you will follow Nate Shepard, Rylee's brother" Anderson ordered and turned to leave.
We were both alone for a few minutes in uncomfortable silence. I could tell she was checking me out, but I guess she doesn't like what she sees considering the sneer she's giving
"You're the little shit that bitched at me a the Hyper train" she spat
"And you the little bitch that has never heard of the word sorry" I replied
"Yeah, Yeah that's nice just take me to my class and leave me alone."
"As much as I enjoy the company of a foul mouthed psycho" I said sardonically, a sentiment she clearly didn't appreciate since she looks like she's about to attack me "But I would rather not spend more time with you than I have to" I retorted with an annoying smirk.
She growled like a dog "I have advanced biotics now." She gritted through her teeth me. When she said this I chuckled a bit at the irony of the situation we both want to get away from each other but we have the same class.
"What's so funny?"
"Unfortunately for the both of us I have advanced biotics now too" I told her but instead of a complaint I got a blank expression.
"Isn't this fun" that was the last straw for her and she tagged me on the jaw. It didn't really hurt, once you live the Alliance lifestyle your body parts are strengthened so that didn't really hurt
She stormed off in the same direction Thane went with Rylee "YOU'RE GOING THE WRONG WAY" I called out but she kept going. I chased after her. "That way" I ordered pointing the opposite direction which she was going
She stood to her full height which was substantially shorter than mine "Nobody tells me what to do Shepard"
"Fine then! Wonder aimlessly around the school, I'm headed for AB" I yelled once again letting my temper get the best of me before stomping off towards the Biotics wing.
"HUUURGH" she groaned before falling in line
By the end of my time as her guide I'll likely have killed her or she'll have killed me. Who the hell chose these pairs? HE'S A FUCKING ASSHOLE