un·der·state·ment

/ˈəndərˌstātmənt/

noun

noun: understatement; plural noun: understatements

the presentation of something as being smaller, worse, or less important than it actually is.

Less than ideal.

That was what came to mind when I realized the situation I was in. I had pretty much sprung on Saren, out of nowhere, that I pretty much knew he was being indoctrinated, and why he was working for the reapers, and the freaking coward just disconnected his call, leaving me as the centre of attention. With the council, the entire human team - including Shepard - and even the freaking AI all having their eyes on me.

Yeah, less than ideal may be an understatement.

Luckily, Udina and the council went at it, dragging all attention away from me, but I was distracted by Shepard pulling me to the side.

"What was all that about?" she said.

"I was throwing things at the wall to see what stuck," I said. Shepard looked unconvinced, so I tried to elaborate without giving much away. "Look, the guy's probably nuts, and he sounded like he had done some kind of pact-with-the-devil arrangement. I was just trying to play to his paranoia."

"Right," Shepard replied. He still was giving me the 'go on, keep digging' look, but Anderson was calling for her attention. "We'll continue this later."

Awesome, I thought, and I was so not being sarcastic at all. Last time we "continued this later" I ended up getting full bad cop/bad cop treatment from Anderson and her.

The discussion with the council continued, only now everyone was using their native tongue, and I could only follow what the humans were saying. Half the time. Apparently Udina could speak Asari as well – or whatever their language is called – and was using it whenever he addressed Tevos. So I had no idea what was going on, until Anderson announced that the Normandy and her crew were still at the full disposal of the Spectre Nihlus.

So Nihlus was being sent with Shepard to hunt down Saren.

Wait, that means Shepard isn't being made Spectre yet.

Crapses on toast, now that was a fuck-up of galactic proportions. Did that mean Nihlus was in charge?

Actually, that might be a good thing, he may be okay with bringing me along. I saved his life, after all.

Although I was pretty sure I still had to convince Shepard.

Once we were dismissed and the council left, the entire chamber was engulfed with the hubhub of excited conversation. A Spectre going rogue in such a spectacular fashion, with a geth armada at his disposal and having attacked a human colony? Yeah, big news.

"So, now what?" I said to no one in particular, trying to get a feel for what they were planning. I really needed to get a translator.

"Now we get supplies and get ready to chase a rogue Spectre across half the galaxy," Anderson said. He sounded eager, and I knew why. I wondered if his history with Saren had come out yet.

"Yes," Udina said. "Anderson, come with me, we have much to prepare. This has gone far beyond the initial mission parameters."

"Right. I'll see you at the ship, Shepard. Nihlus," he said, nodding at them. They were about to take off when I remembered something.

"Hey Udina, you owe me a million credits," I said, not bothering to hide my smile.

The asshole stopped only enough to give me a cross look, and continued walking without saying anything. Anderson did chuckle, and took off after Udina.

"What was all that about?" Shepard said, while gesturing for us to follow her.

"Oh nothing, just a little wager we had. Don't expect him to follow through, tho."

We made it down the stairs at a more leisurely pace, until we got to the rapid transit terminal. That was an experience I wasn't looking forward to repeating at all.

"So what's the plan Shepard?" I said.

"Get the ship ready. We'll have a few days at the Citadel first, we can't just take off in the blink of an eye. For one thing, we're still running a skeleton crew."

"Right."

"As for you," Shepard said, fixing her bluish-grayish-whatever eyes on me. "If you're really going to come along, I need two things from you."

"Okay?"

"First, we're going to have a conversation about protheans, and what you know."

That didn't sound promising, but I nodded.

"Second, you need training. If we had the time, I'd send you to bootcamp to get you up to speed, but we don't have three months to waste. So." She turned to Ash. "Chief, you're going to grab the FNG, grind him down to a pulp, and remake him into a soldier. You have a week."

"Do I have to walk on water and feed the krogan with two fishes and five loaves of bread too?" Ash replied.

"You can save that for next week," Shepard said, smirking.

"Fine, fine. I'll do what I can."

"Good. You still have your gear, right?" Shepard said, addressing me.

"Yeah, just having it repainted and upgraded down at the shop Nihlus recommended."

"Then that's where you're going. I'll see you at eighteen hundred, the Normandy."

Ash saluted Shepard, the commander returned it, and the three of them – Shepard, Alenko, and Nihlus – left for the lift.

"I've been told to do stupid things in my life, but this one takes the cake," Ash said, looking me up and down.

I didn't answer, although I was starting to get irritated at her constant belittling. I got that she was pissed off at the geth killing everyone, but it wasn't my fucking fault. I didn't particularly enjoy it either.

While I mused, the rapid transit shuttle had arrived, and Ashley gave me a shove towards it. With a sigh, I walked in, strapped myself tight, and prepared for the hellish ride.

"Where to?" Ash said.

"Zakera ward markets," I replied. The words were barely out of my mouth when the shuttle took off, and the crazy contraption started its heart-stopping high speed trip. "I fucking hate you Avina!" I shouted.

The one good thing about the crazy contraption was that it was fast as hell. No matter how sickening or insane the ride was, it was always over in a matter of minutes. The shuttle zigzaged through traffic like a bat out of hell, passed inches away from buildings at least half a dozen times, then finally dropped us unceremoniously on the upper level of the markets.

I could barely stand when I got out, and Ashley wasn't much better. We both stumbled like dunk idiots, me grabbing the nearest handrail, and Ash refusing to do so and just standing as straight as possible (with a noticeable sway), eyes closed and taking several deep breaths.

"Who the hell programmed those things?" I muttered.

"Let me know if you find out, because I'm going to break their legs," Ash replied. And yeah, she sounded like she meant it.

When we finally got our bearings back, we made our way back to Serrus', where the turian greeted me with a very friendly growl – and a switch of his omni-tool to make sure I understood him.

"Here you go, a fine piece if I say so myself," he said, presenting the shotgun to me.

I took the piece, unfolded it, and after making sure it wasn't loaded – by dropping the ammo block onto the counter; on purpose, I know what you were thinking – I put it to my shoulder and aimed it to the side. It felt right, the stock firm onto my shoulder, the gun searching targets even as I moved around. It had been made to measure, modifying the base model I had bought, even changing the length and shape of the gun itself. It was perfect.

"Armor's ready too. You should look less like a juicy target," Serrus said, tapping the pile on the counter.

Even before I could move a muscle, Ash opened the case and looked at it. It wasn't done in haste, or an abrupt manner. She did it smoothly, something she had done a thousand times, but I knew what she was doing. Looking to see what I had done to it.

It looked nothing like it had. With the pieces piled in the case, not even the shape was recognizable. With the paintjob, it was hard to even follow the contour of the different pieces, never mind recognizing them; it was only when Ash took one out and put it against the white backdrop of the wall that it was easy to see them. Very nice.

She grumbled and dropped the piece back in the case. I guessed that was as much approval as I was going to get from her. When she turned to look at me she looked... I couldn't quite put the word to it. She was giving me this look, like she was sizing me up, and I couldn't quite tell whether she was going to punch me in the face, or rip my clothes off.

"Take those off," she finally said, pointing at my chest.

Guess that answers that.

"Excuse me?''

Her thumb pointed at the suit. "Get dressed, we're starting right now." She had what I came to identify as her Gunnery Chief face. As the gunny, she was in charge of keeping her unit's combat readiness top notch, and that included not just the guns they used, but also the people who used them. I didn't learn this until later, however. "You did remember to bring your undersuit this time, didn't you?"

"Uh..." Yeah, real smooth there.

"You have two minutes," she replied, bringing her omni-tool up and setting a countdown. That got an amused chuckle from Serrus, who was looking at the proceedings with great interest.

"That's twice regulation time for the Alliance," he said, making a turian grin, with his mandibles clicking in amusement. Jeez, he was just a shopkeeper, wasn't he? "Changing rooms are that way."

It was enough to get me out of my Trance of Stupidity™ and kick my brain into gear. I grabbed the case, rushed to the back of the shop, and got into one of the stalls. Let me tell you, it was much narrower than the cargo bay of the Normandy, and putting armor on while on the clock? Yeah. I needed a LOT more room. I banged on the stall walls and shook the thing like I was in the toilet of a plane joining the mile high club. By myself.

Yeah, not very dignified.

When I finally made it out, having left my clothes inside the armor case, I was already sweating, with the armor's thermo-regulator whirring into life. But at least the visor of my helmet was showing all green. When I got to the front of the shop, Ash didn't look impressed.

"Four minutes and twenty-three seconds. You owe me one hundred and forty-three push-ups."

"What?" I replied. Apparently, my brain had stalled again.

"His translator is broken," Serrus said.

"No, it's really that bad by design," Ash replied. "His brain, I mean," she added afterwards, making Serrus laugh.

Great.

"One hundred and forty-three. Now!"

I was down on my face before I knew what I was doing, but the worst part was that I couldn't do one hundred and forty-three push-ups in one go. I managed thirty, which given the extra weight from the armor I thought was pretty damn good.

Ash wasn't impressed.

"Don't think you're done, I'll have my push-ups before we're done today."

Dammit.

I only stared at her, but she didn't seem to care. She just kept talking, while I got back to my feet.

"All right Roy, since you seem to have trouble following orders, and since all the commander has given me to work with is you and a week of training, listen up. This is what's going to happen. One point eight three miles from here there's a training range used by the Alliance. We're going to run there, then we're going to run drills for the next ten hours, or until you die of exhaustion, whatever comes first. Any questions?"

"Uh... yes, wh-"

"If you have time for questions," she interrupted me, "then you have time for running. Move it!"

Have you ever been chased by a rabid pitbull? I haven't either, but I can imagine it being a slightly nicer experience than being chased by Ash, while wearing her gunnery chief face. She kept yelling at me, pushing me whenever it looked like I was about to slow down, and even shot me once when I stopped completely – her reasoning was that the only time you stop like that in combat was when a bullet had found its way to you, so I should better get used to the feeling – and altogether made the trip as much a run for my life as she possibly could.

Or so I thought. As I found out later, she made it as close to a run for my life as she could... while in the lawful confines of the Citadel. It turned out that the range was technically Alliance territory, and while they still had to conform to certain galactic agreements regarding the treatment of civilians, she could get away with a lot more.

"That was pathetic!" Ash shouted at me as soon as we arrived, and I pretty much collapsed on my knees. Meanwhile, she wasn't even sweating. "A run of that distance should have taken eight minutes!"

"The freaking armor... is heavy..." I complained between big mouthfuls of air.

"Of course it is! If you weren't wearing it, you should have done it in seven minutes!"

I checked my omni-tool. The run had taken twelve minutes and thirty-four seconds, which I thought was pretty damn good. What the hell did the Alliance put in their marines' weetbix? Radioactive spider juice? I saw that the place we were at looked a bit like a lobby, with only a handful of people milling about, all of them looking at me. There were seats like it was the waiting area of an airport, and several holographic screens showing different courses that reminded me of indoors paintball. Without the slippery paint – or so I hoped.

"Tsk, tsk, put yourself together. I'm going to talk to the range master."

I nodded and watched her leave, her strides strong and purposeful. And call me paranoid (again), but I thought I saw a very noticeable glint in her eye. Not quite enjoyment, or amusement, but something close. Which made me worry.

By the time she was back I had managed to get to my feet, and get my breathing under control. She was sporting a harness, with her pistol holstered on her side and an assault rifle on her back. I knew she had been wearing a shielding harness – Shepard doesn't like anyone in her team venturing out without guns or protection – but that looked more bulky.

"We've got a basic course, which I have tweaked a bit for your benefit," Ash said, and once again I saw that worrying glint in her eye. "You're going to have to learn to walk and run at the same time, so pay attention. Understood?"

"Yes ma'am," I said, standing straight.

"Good, but before that..."

"Huh?"

"Push-ups."

I blinked a couple of times. "What? Now?"

"Right. Now." She emphasized every word, and pointed at the ground. Right in the middle of the lobby too.

With a muttered curse, I got to my face and started again. Twenty-three this time. Shit, the armor was freaking heavy. Luckily, it seemed like an officer ordering someone to do push-ups was a daily occurrence over there, because I didn't get any strange looks.

Once I was done, and couldn't do a single push-up more, Ashley gave me a look of disappointment – again – and just gestured for me to stand up.

"Come on. Follow my lead."

She led me to one of the large doors at the back, and I caught over the corner of my eye how the few people that were hanging out there congregated in front of one of the screens.

Sweet. I'm going to make a fool of myself in front of an audience. More than I already have.

Ash stopped, raised her hand in a fist – in a gesture that could only be for me to stop – and pulled her pistol out. I was about to do the same, but she turned to look at me, shook her head, and pointed at my shotgun.

Without another word, she kicked the door and we both rushed in.

The place looked a lot like an obstacle course, with debris simulating urban warfare terrain, and as soon as we stepped inside, a veritable army of holographic targets sprang to life. They were all just shaped like LOKI mechs, which I suppose is cheaper than using real ones if the people using the range were going to just shoot them.

Which reminded me, we had live ammo in our guns. That was slightly worrying.

Ash found cover in a millisecond, whereas I had a couple of holographic rounds ping off my shield before I really started to move. I sprinted as fast as I could towards what looked like the remains of a Mako, and hid behind them. To my surprise, the two holographic rounds had taken a noticeable chunk off my first layer of shields.

"Sloppy," Ash's voice came through the comms; dry, but less harsh than I had expected. "You don't have time to stand there awestruck when the bullets are flying, kid."

"Sorry."

"If you have time to be sorry, you have time to shoot," Ash replied.

I heard her gun going off as she spoke, with the response from the holographic mechs close behind. I popped out of cover, shotgun in hand, and spent a second taking stock of the situation. Lots of mechs, slowly advancing towards our positions. I chose one close by, and let the shotgun rip. It felt perfect, even better than it had in the range at Serrus'. The spread was narrow, just how I liked it, it tracked targets just perfectly, and the kick was just enough to let me re-target within a fraction of a second.

A second shot, and the hologram flickered and disappeared. I aimed again, then changed target to a closer mech, but after just one shot I was forced back into cover. The bullets had ground through my first layer of shields, and the second took only one shot to nearly shatter.

It was really strange; I felt no feedback from the bullets, but they were chewing through my shield like nobody's business.

Ash landed into cover next to me a moment later.

"Are you even taking this seriously?" she spat out, giving me a sideways look as she kept a lookout.

"Of course I am!"

"Then stop wasting time! When you come out of cover, you need to choose targets fast, have the next ones lined up even before you fire on the first one. Like this!" And in saying that, she popped out of cover and started shooting with her pistol.

She really didn't waste any time. The shooting started so quickly after she popped out that the only reason I saw her assessing the battle was that I had been expecting it. She fired on the first one, and I saw her eyes darting left and right for a tiny fraction of a second a few times. She shot four times, the holographic mech went down, and the fifth shot was straight onto a different one. Damn, she was good.

I jumped out – as my shields were showing a full charge – and tried to follow suit. Shooting quickly at the first target, while trying to find a second. The fact of the matter was that a shotgun gave considerably more leverage when it came to loose aim while looking somewhere else looking for targets, so I chose the next mech pretty fast.

Only to see it disappear in a shower of holographic sparks.

Friggin' hell Ash!

A quick glance at her showed me that, while she was still concentrating on the targets, she was smirking. Smartass. I went for another mech, and after taking it down, my next two targets were scooped by Ash.

I was so caught up by the annoyance, and the fact that Ash seemed to be goading me, that I completely missed how my shields had been going down steadily, and how the last bullet had completely taken the second layer.

Which meant there was nothing between me and the electric round that hit me on the back, and dropped me as ten thousand volts of pain coursed through my body.

Tell you the truth, I had never been tasered before, and I can't imagine it being any more pleasant than that. I blubbered nonsense as I fell to the ground, something between a grunt and a shout, and didn't even hear Ash calling the exercise off. When I was finally done spazing – without any wardrobe malfunctions, I might add – I saw Ash was looking down at me, and the satisfied smile I had been expecting to be on her face simply wasn't there.

She looked pissed. Very pissed.

"You're dead," she deadpanned.

"That... fucking hurt..." I muttered in response. "What the hell is wrong with the Alliance dammit?"

It was as if she hadn't heard me. "Do you still think this is a joke? I'm not going to be wasting my bloody time training some good-for-nothing kid if he's just going to go out and get killed again!" she shouted.

Maybe it was that I wasn't paying attention to the rest of the rant she was shouting at me, or maybe it was my brain finally making a worthwhile connection despite my usual less than stellar performances, but the last word stuck in my head.

"Again?" I said, emphasizing the word.

Ash was thrown off by the question, more so as it looked like she hadn't realized what she had been saying. She recovered quickly, and put her gunnery chief face back on. She grabbed me by the collar of the armor, and in one mighty pull had me back on my feet.

"From the beginning!" she shouted, to me and apparently to the air. She dragged me to the entrance, and the holographic battle reset once more. We lined up by the entrance, she gestured up with her fist, all without her looking at me, and we were off again.

This time I was more careful, keeping a constant eye on my shield gauge. I also realized the shields were not being taken down by the holographic shots, but rather by a system of lasers covering the entire course. Whenever a holographic round hit, they'd take a chunk off my shields with a single pulse. And when the shields were down, they'd shoot the electric round at me to take me down. There was no possible cover from the wall-mounted guns, which kind of was the point.

All this looking around had the unfortunate side effect of being much too slow, and we ended up overwhelmed by the mechs. Ash fought her corner well, but I was mercilessly gunned down.

Which, once again, ended up with me having a fit on the ground.

"What the hell went wrong this time?" Ashley shouted as soon as I was presentable.

"There were too many..." I grumbled.

"Because you weren't shooting them!" She gestured at the now empty battlefield. "You can't just hide and hope they don't find you! You have to go out there and shoot them!" She looked up, and this time I had to get on my feet by myself. "From the beginning!"

Those three words I came to loathe in a very short time.

From the beginning.

It took nearly two hours until we cleared the exercise without me having a spatz, and by then I could barely stand. I though I would at least get a rest, having long given up on seeing any encouragement from Ashley, but instead, what I got was an introduction to the amazing effects of twenty-second century stims. Ash took a pack out of her pocket, slotted it into the medi-gel dispenser of my armor's medical interface, and gave me a jolt.

"Holy shit!" I shouted, I jumped on my feet like someone had stuck a ghost chilly up my rear end, with my heart beating hard against my ribs, full-on flight-or-flight mode engaged like nothing I had ever experienced. Not even while being shot at by the geth. "What the hell did you do?!"

"Manly juice," she replied, flashing a smirk for a moment. "Now, back to the entrance, we ain't done. Not by a long shot. And save your water," she cut right as I was taking a sip with trembling hands. "That's all the water you have till we're done."

"W-What?" I spluttered, coughing up as the single sip went down the wrong way.

"You don't get full catering in a warzone, kid. That's all the water you'll carry during missions. Take a cup of harden the fuck up and let's go."

And so, we took it away. From the beginning.

We had made it into the Citadel pretty early during the day. Well, the "day". Meetings and assorted shopping aside, Ash and I had pretty much spent the whole friggin' day shooting holograms. I had gone through three loads of stims, which apparently was about as much as I could take in one day, and run the gauntlet so many times I had stopped counting.

And so, it was about an hour before we had to go back to the Normandy, and I was just done. I probably could have given myself another jolt of stims, but it was both inadvisable, and unnecessary.

"Well, that was pathetic," Ash said. We were in the locker room, where I was supposed to be taking my armor off, but all I could manage was to sit on the bench and try to put myself together. She, on the other hand, had just finished showering and getting changed, because she had been sweating a little.

Emphasis on little.

What the hell is this woman made of?

"I didn't think I was that bad," I said. "I was getting the hang of it."

"Yeah, if by getting the hang of it you mean finally managed to complete the course, a course, I might add, made to be cleared by a single marine, in a scrappy way and barely avoiding getting killed," she replied sarcastically.

"Again," I added.

She glared at me, and threw her wet towel at my face, which took me completely by surprise. That surprise, plus my lack of energy, ended up with me dropping flat to the ground.

"Make sure you get to the Normandy on time," Ash shot as she walked off.

I pulled the towel just in time to see her disappear out the door. She was definitely walking with a purpose, and an angry one at that. I guessed it was starting to make sense, maybe Shepard was right and she wasn't exactly angry at me, though I seemed to have a knack for pissing her off. I wondered who it was, that kid she had trained and had gotten killed. Someone from the 212, or the militia? I had no idea, and I wasn't inclined to ask.

Well, I had one week to change her mind about me. And I didn't care what she said, I thought I had done pretty good. Despite the apparent sadism of whoever designed that fucking course. Seriously, electric shocks?

I groaned and got to my feet, slowly. I had the nagging feeling I was forgetting something, but I couldn't quite put my finger on what. Well, maybe after a shower I'd be able to think more clearly. I was pretty sure I stank to high heaven under the armor; even though it was supposed to be thermo-regulated, I felt several places where I was soaked in sweat.

All in all, not a bad day. The only weird thing was that I had thrown a wrench into Shepard's nomination to the Spectres. Mostly because Nihlus survived. I had no doubt Shepard would be made a Spectre when all was said and done. Originally, she was supposed to have been made right after Eden Prime, just to throw humanity a bone and to have her go after Saren without any "official" support. Well, in-game it happened after some side questing all through the Citadel, and getting-

My train of thought came to a screeching halt when I realized what it was I had been missing. I'm talking train carts flying, people screaming, rails snapping, the whole nine yards.

Tali.

Shit. SHIT! SHIT!

Author's notes: You did realize what it was I was missing, didn't you? She's only the most popular Mass Effect squad member - well, after Garrus, who, whoops, I forgot about too.

Oh, and it turns out that Ash isn't just a bitch. Who'd have thought?

Mizuki00, thanks! And I should probably say, sorry about the cliffhanger regarding Tali :-O

RandomExplorer, haha! Didn't think of that, maybe Roy should be joining the Blue Suns or something instead! Get an eyepatch and a taste for rum. As far as consequences, there will be consequences to Roy's loose lips. Oh yes there will be.

Archer83, worry not, Roy will keep testing the limits of the AI overlord, don't think he'll be able to get away with much more of this! And thanks :D

In our next episode! Will Garrus show up or not? Will Tali be making an appearance? Will Roy miss another meal? Tune in to My Effect: Convergence to find out! Tell your friends and family, and thank you for reading and/or reviewing! :D