"Thinking"
"Talking"
"Impactful word"
Location: Serpent Nebula - Widow - Citadel – Presidium - Sha'ira's
Shepard POV
Shepard hadn't even started her investigation properly and things already got awkward.
The moment she thought it would be good to visit famed Sha'ira the Consort. Nelyna – one of the Consort's 'acolytes', gave her more insight into Sha'ira's services. Jane was already creeped out by the blueish-purple asari's made-up smile.
Don't get her wrong, she freely admitted that all asari were fairly attractive with their various skin colouration and prominent feminine features. Of course, she was well aware that not all asari were the same. Not fair to put them all into one bag, right?
Despite that, since speaking with Nelyna her instincts warned her of danger but a different sort of. Not like the one you get while in combat. Sha'ira's was like a siren's nest, acolytes luring with their unique abilities or irresistible beauty and the Consort 'answering her clients' needs' thing. At least they're not 'luring' their clients into their doom. Or maybe Jane was just being paranoid again.
"Huh. It appears the Consort has taken notice of you. She'd like to meet you now." Nelyna announced with mild amazement.
"Wow... that was quick." Shepard raised her eyebrows at Nelyna, she hadn't even gotten to make an appointment, which meant the Consort wanted something from her.
"Where do I go?"
"Just head upstairs. She will be waiting for you." Nelyna answered with that smile plastered on her unblemished face. Without missing a step, Jane and the rest went with her and before they knew it, Jane approached Sha'ira in her room.
"That's close enough, Commander," she suggested, her back turned to Jane. "I've heard a great many things about you since your arrival here on our Citadel."
"You wanted to speak to me?" Shepard cut through the redundant chit-chat and got straight to the point.
She turned around, glossy lips speaking in an elegant manner, "I have a certain problem that could use your expertise."
Shepard reconsidered but indicated for her to continue, "I have a friend, a retired turian general. I won't discuss the details, but he wanted me to be more than I could be. We had a falling out. Now he spends his days in Chora's Den drinking and spreading lies about me," she closed in the distance she had set seconds ago and Jane resisted the urge to take a step backwards.
"If you would speak to him as a fellow soldier, I believe he will listen to you and let the matter be." She moved her arm out to faintly cup Shepard's cheek, and as her tender touch connected with her hide, she tensed up a little, good thing the touch lasted only a couple of seconds.
"What exactly do you want me to tell him?" Sha'ira's arm dropped.
"Appeal to his sense of honour. Remind him of his position as a general." Shepard completely froze when she snuggled her head against hers as if they were lovers. Hell no! Way too intimate.
"It seems asari suffer from the ignore-of-personal-space syndrome." Shepard thought as a strong urge to shove the Consort as far as she could muster tempted her.
"If you can convince him to stop spreading lies about me, I would be very grateful." The Consort backed off in time.
"Now I must ask you to leave. I have many clients waiting to see me." She bid them farewell, but Shepard and her team were already putting as much distance between them and this place.
"Let's get the hell out of here." The urgency in which Shepard said it made both Kaidan and Williams grin like idiots, "I've had enough of asari for one day," Shepard grumbled, hopeful that no one heard that.
Location: Serpent Nebula - Widow - Citadel – Presidium – Huerta Memorial Hospital
The time had come for Akane to realize her escape from the hospital. She thought through her escape routes, how the surveillance systems monitoring each room functioned and how the other patients were at it. She observed everything around her these past two days with the sight the Byakugan offered her.
She shifted in her bed a bit, waiting for the nurse, which was appointed to her, for her last visit. She had created a Kage Bunshin who was hiding in a blind spot, waiting to temporarily shut down the camera with an input of lightning release. All the bright airiness of the day faded, darkness fell over it like a velvet blanket and all that was left was the low emergency lighting that threw long light beams across the polished floor, reflecting on some of the cabinets.
There was not even a breeze to disrupt the paper pamphlets that have been stacked up on the side, but the slightest breath of movement momentarily blocked the light, swirling mist with soft blurred edges seeped through the pores in the wall. It was the sort of movement that'd be seen on the peripherals of vision, the kind that bred rumours of monsters lurking in the dark, dragging the shadows with them like coattails.
The nurse came into the room, her facial features were tired but she seemed content. She spoke about something, which Akane had no chance of understanding since they'd taken away her omni-tool along with her belongings, checking on the monitors of her life support one last time.
Akane tugged inconspicuously from under the sheets at her clothes to get her to make eye contact. When the nurse fell for it, it gave Akane the chance to cast a genjutsu at her again, it was the signal for her Kage Bunshin to disable the camera for five seconds, so the security would think of it as a system malfunction. The real Akane used this time-gap to switch places with the nurse by using the Henge no Jutsu as a form of disguise, all the while putting the unconscious nurse in her stead.
The camera came back online and the disguised Uchiha acted exemplary as any nurse would. She shifted the sheets a bit higher so her cover wouldn't blow right away. Her Kage Bunshin fell back into the shadows and dispersed as Akane made her way out of the room.
She gingerly moved across the hospital, went for the room where her things had been kept safe and once she found them, she secretly put her omni-tool back on her left arm, just in case of communication, then walked casually to the elevator with a random bag she used to hide her things in. She was more than surprised when security hadn't confiscated her weapons, perhaps on the Commander's orders...
... or it had another meaning to it.
She figured the Commander didn't want her to be part of her crew, probably because she was underage; under normal circumstances. If that was the case, she could understand the Commander's line of thought, though she herself knew she quit being a kid the moment she had joined the ranks of shinobi at the age of eight. Well, she considered offering herself to assist the Commander at some point. She had a good feeling about her, from the first moment she met her and besides, what else could she do in a completely unknown world?
She was a shinobi a.k.a kunoichi - tools of war specialized in many arts and in this era, where there was peace, she simply felt out of place or to be honest, she had forgotten what peace really felt like after the seven years of constant war with the sole purpose of survival. Alas, she wasn't educated in anything else than killing. But she pushed these troubling thoughts aside for now as she followed through the second phase of her plan.
It was time to explore the Citadel.
Location: Serpent Nebula - Widow - Citadel – Presidium – Financial District
Shepard POV
Jane was on the verge of admitting that investigating was harder than it sounded; almost. As her next target, she went for Barla Von's office near the Emporium. Hoping that the so-called 'financial genius', or whatever his moniker was, would bring some clarity into their inquest so far. A good start would be if Barla Von wasn't as touchy freely as the Consort.
His office had a simple design and wasn't big, even if the small volus alone was filling the room. The man— volus —in question, was behind his office table like any normal financial adviser. Barla Von's attention was directed at the monitor when Shepard and her team arrived.
"What's this? One of the Earth-clan? Ah, a very famous one, yes? You are the one called Shepard." He sounded surprised by her arrival, even if it was hardly visible when his facial features were obscured by his suit. He seemed decent, unlike a certain Consort, who tested the limits of Shepard's restraint.
Though she was unnerved by how quickly people recognized her simply by appearance no matter the race. Was she a star or something?
"It is a great honour to welcome the hero of the Blitz." he greeted her politely.
"The pleasure is mine, Barla Von." she returned the sentiment in earnest, but couldn't resist her curiosity to ask, "Though I was wondering how you knew about me?"
"Well, I am a financial advisor to many important clients here at the Citadel. When someone as important as yourself arrives at the station, I take notice. It's part of my job." Shepard believing him so far.
Shepard wasn't really a person who would blindly believe any rumour that had been spread around, but in this case, she would have to be transparent and straight to the point to get Barla Von where she needed him.
"I heard you work for the Shadow Broker. Do you have any information about Saren?"
"You're very blunt, Shepard. But you're right. I am an agent for the Shadow Broker. And I do know something about Saren."
Bingo!
"I hear your information can be expensive," Shepard stated, recalling it from her memory.
"Normally, this information would cost a small fortune," he agreed with her, yet didn't drop it at that, "But these are exceptional circumstances. So I'm going to give it to you for free." that sounded too good to be true, "Care to elaborate?"
He sighed, his breath filtering through his suit, then divulged, "The Shadow Broker is quite upset with Saren right now. They used to do a lot of business. Until Saren turned on him."
Jane hid a wicked grin nearly escaping her lips behind her Commander mask, Saren made a mistake - a fatal one. It was dangerous to fiddle with the Shadow Broker from what she had heard and even she labelled the cryptic entity as someone to look out for.
"Saren's turned on a lot of people lately." She knew Barla Von was informed of their political predicament as he was aware of her presence at the Citadel.
"I don't know the details, but the Shadow Broker hired a freelancer to deal with it. A krogan mercenary," he mentioned.
"That's not much to go on," Shepard protested in hopes to get more details from the volus.
"I just told you that the most famous Spectre in the galaxy betrayed the Shadow Broker. Quite a bargain, considering the price," he argued back, drawing the line of their conversation which he was not willing to cross.
"Speak with the krogan if you want to learn more. I heard he was paying a visit to Citadel Security. If you hurry you might catch him before he leaves Academy." The volus slipped in additional information to give Shepard what she wanted.
Satisfied, the Commander exited Barla Von's office not empty-handed.
Location: Somewhere on the Citadel
After the fluent execution of the first phase of her plan, the young Uchiha disappeared into the darkness of the night. She looked up, onyx eyes reflecting the countless stars shinning around. The Citadel was a marvel, and even that was a heavy understatement. It was a place like one out of the many fantasy books she had been drowning in when she was young.
Duh, as if you are that old.
Yeah, she was like that during her early childhood years; a typical bookworm who rather enjoyed the company of books than people. 'A hopeless dreamer' they often used to call her. But above everything else, she loved history.
The history of her people was captivating and a source of endless wonder for her. Studying history to such an extent at such age brought her only benefits, gaining a broader appreciation of what was important.
Learning so much enabled her to understand how events of the past came to happen and when she applied that same understanding into the future, she became concerned about where things were going.
She couldn't recall how often she had dreamed about the legends and myths evolving the Shinobi which went almost extinct past the generations. She was fascinated by chakra and jutsu, yet hadn't been able to use them properly.
She had lived at a distance, observing individuals and ideas without getting directly involved so that she could fully understand them, so many people thought she was shy. She simply hadn't been much of a social person, still wasn't.
Although this approach prevented her from becoming close with many people, it enabled her to think and act without prejudice or preconceptions, evaluating things strictly on their own merits. She remembered clearly the day she had found out that she belonged not to one, but two exceptionally powerful clans of Konohagakure no Sato, which had a heavy impact on the history of the world.
Her father was an Uchiha while her mother was a Hyūga. Distant relatives of course.
Still, she had felt proud, who wouldn't, though, after a couple of sleepless nights, she had come to the conclusion that she had been unworthy of her surname and feared that she would never live up to it no matter how hard she tried.
Akane had been a normal girl after all - if a bit individualistic. Not one out of the ordinary.
Of course, she hadn't been the only Uchiha who hadn't forsaken their name, there were many others, though nobody thought much of it; unlike Akane. Most people who had carried the 'Uchiha' name held no obligation to their respective clan. The opposite of what it used to be. Something like a clan had no longer existed in her generation.
The end of the Daiyoji Ninkai Taisen laid the very foundation of change that would affect future generations - the gradual disappearance of clans was just one example.
Instead of waging war among each other, the Kage of the Five Great Nations that played a significant role in the Daiyoji Ninkai Taisen decided it was time to establish a new era. An era founded on peace and understanding, that brought forth great prosperity and major development in the world's economy.
They'd gotten so far; from strangers meaninglessly killing each other to a shared bright future without pain or suffering.
Even so, all the progress they'd made was crushed by the Reapers in not much of an instance.
For the better, she stopped herself from invoking bad memories to pointlessly foul her mood, taking in appreciation the scenery before her. After all, how many (of her people) could claim to have been amid the stars? The Citadel perfectly personified the power of the Citadel Council, even if they claimed that it was built by the protheans, which was actually not true.
The vision gave her more than just a simple vision as in the Commander's case. It gave her the common knowledge of a prothean; it was engraved in her as if she was once one of them.
She felt the changes in her physique; she saw the world with greater clarity and accuracy, she could smell more fragrances in the air and tell the difference between them.
It was like an unintentional power-up.
And all that without the use of either her Sharingan or Byakugan. Besides that, everything else was normal. No additional limb or what. She was back to full power and ready for anything, though she should really do a tour of the whole Citadel so long as she was still there.
"Well I guess there is no point of wasting time now, is it?" she thought, preparing the hand seals for the Henge no Jutsu.
She couldn't possibly walk freely around the Citadel as she is when C-Sec would begin searching for her as soon as the nurse woke up, so a simple change of appearance should suffice.
She changed into a young fair-skinned man with short jet-black hair. His attire was that typical to the Uchiha clan and included a high-collared, dark-coloured shirt with the clan's symbol on his back, grey pants, bandages around his arms and legs, and black shinobi sandals. If she was, indeed, the last of her kind, then there was no point in worrying that somebody could recognize the clan's crest and even if somebody did, she would most definitely get her or his attention.
"Let's head to the Zakera Ward!" she said out loud enthusiastically, almost like a child on a school trip as she jumped down from one out of the many high skyscrapers on the Citadel.
Words dictionary:
Shinobi 忍 = Ninja
Kunoichi くノ一 = Female ninja
Kage 影 / Shadow - Is a title reserved for the leader of one of the Five Great Shinobi Countries' hidden villages. A Kage oversees the activities of their village, from sending ninja on missions to making the hard decisions regarding the safety of their people. A village's Kage is generally acknowledged as its most powerful ninja. The Kage are renowned as the top shinobi of the continent.
Daiyoji Ninkai Taisen 四次忍界大戦 / The Fourth Shinobi World War - It was a conflict between the Allied Shinobi Forces and Akatsuki. The battle began on the 8th of October and lasted until the 10th, with the complete victory of the Allied Shinobi Forces, the collapse of Akatsuki, and the sealing of the Ten-Tails.
Kage Bunshin no Jutsu 影分身の術 / Shadow Clone Technique - This jutsu allows the user to create one or more copies of themselves. Unlike the basic Clone Technique, shadow clones are physically real. They possess the same clothing, damage, and transformations as the user at the time of their creation. Most tools and weaponry are copied when the shadow clones are created, but complicated technology won't be duplicated. Because they are visually identical and possess the same chakra as the user, shadow clones are indistinguishable from their original, not even by dōjutsu. Once created, shadow clones can serve a number of purposes.
Henge no Jutsu 変化の術 / Transformation Technique - It allows the user to take the appearance of whatever they choose. This technique is most often used to disguise the user as another person, but they can also turn into an animal, plant, or inanimate object. Users will gain the attributes and physical features of whatever they transform into, such as a weapon's sharpness or an animal's fangs. To be able to assume so many different forms makes this technique invaluable for not just combat, but intelligence gathering and diversionary tactics as well.
Author's note:
Hello guys, it's me again! And I have an announcement to make! So in the end, I decided to pair up Akane with Javik, though as Mass Effect fans/players may know, Javik will appear during the events of MS3 so you will have to wait for that romance quite I bit (sorry for that), though the reason I chose not to bring Javik somehow earlier into my story was that Akane is not mentally ready to have a relationship so soon that's why I saved it for later. As for Shepard, I am honestly clueless with whom I should pair her up with (though my best shot would be Thane), so any ideas would be welcomed.