"I thought so too."
The Courier said. He would have never guessed for something from his world to come here. Especially not Super Mutants. The Courier looked at the other squadmates just to see how they were reacting to the gore bags or the fact that some of the Super Mutants were not only human but also aliens as well. Garrus was kneeling down next to a Turian Super Mutant, he had anger written all over his face, as if he had seen something like this but nothing on this scale. The Courier then looked at Wrex, he saw that the Krogan was examining the bodies as well but mostly the human ones. Most likely curiosity since he and everyone else have never seen a Super Mutant before. The Courier looked at Liara and Tali next, and he could immediately tell that they looked nauseous. Even when Tali wore that mask, her body language said she would vomit at any moment from the sight, the same with Liara. The Courier called ED-E over and when the eyebot hovered over he motioned for the eyebot to take Tali and Liara outside. ED-E gave a beep as he hovered over to the two and was able to lead the two outside of the building to not see anymore of the sight in front of them. He couldn't blame them for having a reaction like this, even a Wastelander's first time seeing something like this is exactly the same as theirs, the Courier felt the exact same way they did.
The Courier then looked at Shepard who had his hands at his sides, he wasn't calm, his hands gripped and shaking with anger, at what exactly he didn't know but he knew Shepard would want to either report this to the Council or ask the Courier for an answer which he didn't exactly have. Hell he was wishing for an answer right now. The Courier then walked upstairs to find the Asari they had originally come to find. Reaching a door with a green light he pressed it and the door slid open and the Courier saw more gore bags strewn about with no rhyme or reason. Walking into the room the Courier looked to his right and found the Asari… What was left of her anyways. Her upper half was right in front of the desk, her lower half nowhere to be seen, her innards spilling out with some even being chewed or eaten already. The poor Asari had a look of fear as her corpse laid in a pool of her own purple blood. The Courier couldn't help but shake his head and sigh, he has seen something like this too many times in different areas of the Wasteland, where he has tried to help save any captives in a Super Mutant camp only to find their remains.
He then walked to the desk where a computer was and activated it. He wanted to know how Super Mutants of all things had managed to get here. Has someone recreated the deadly FEV that Marcus the Super Mutant had told him about, the same FEV that the Vault Dweller had destroyed all those years ago? The Courier combed through the files, nothing about the Nightkin or Super Mutants, but he saw the the Asari they were supposed to save wasn't innocent, she was a damn slaver and the sister to Nassana. Even then the Courier couldn't help but feel a small bit of sympathy, only a small bit though. Maybe it was karma for the slaver, for all she had done to poor innocents, forced to become one and then to become food for something possibly worse than her or anything in her dreams. The Courier put a hand to his helmeted face and sighed. It could never be so simple could it? Nothing ever was, and he sometimes hated it. He just wished that he could finally have a simple day for once, where he doesn't always have to kill someone and maybe just live his life. Courier had to put that thought away when he heard the door opening and saw that it was everyone else minus Tali, Liara, and ED-E. He looked back at the computer and then at Shepard who stared at the Asari's corpse with sympathy.
"Commander, you'll want to see this."
Shepard nodded and walked slowly around the Asari corpse before looking at the information that the Courier had found. Shepard's eyes looked at the information before narrowing at the information.
"Dammit they are sisters! She wanted us to kill her own sister just so she didn't lose her damn position!"
The Courier nodded. He knew all too well about situations like this. People who would willingly send someone to their death and try to cover it all up. It was like the Mojave chapter of the BoS.
"John who in Spirit's name would actually do something like this?"
Garrus asked. Courier could only shake his head.
"I don't know Garrus, I don't know. It should be basically impossible for someone to know how to make Super Mutants."
No way someone here could have the knowledge or know how. Especially giving them kinetic barriers and then just dumping them out in the middle of nowhere on a planet. No way someone here already had gained access to his files and looked through it. The only information he had put in was only basic stuff, nothing about FEV. He didn't know how to make the stuff, and no one knew what a Super Mutant looked like. Walking out of the room he could see some of the dead Mutants he and ED-E killed on the floor. He grabbed one corpse and with great effort threw it from the second floor onto the first floor. A loud thud was heard from the impact and the Courier then grabbed the second one and was about to lift it but to his surprise Wrex helped him lift the Mutant and threw it onto the one Courier just threw. Garrus and Shepard also helped out as well, gathering the bodies of the Mutant and Nightkin into one big pile on the first floor. After many minutes they had gathered all the Mutants into one pile as the Courier pulled out the Heavy Incinerator and aimed it at the pile. He had expected Shepard or even Garrus to try and stop him but they didn't. He pulled the trigger and the Heavy Incinerator began to shoot flames at the corpses, and began to turn the corpses into ashes. The Courier finally stopped when it clicked signaling that the thing needed to reload. He would do that later as he put away the weapon and looked at the pile of burning flesh, he still had on his helmet but he knew that the smell was terrible.
"...Come on, let's get out of here."
The Courier said as he began to walk away. He needed time to think.
Sitting in his spot of the vehicle bay sat the Courier, back in his Elite Riot Gear, and next to him ED-E. Both were quiet, everyone was. Shepard had to relay the information to the Council about this. It was for the best really. Super Mutants were dangerous in the Wasteland with the only other thing that could or is deadlier than a Super Mutant being a Death Claw. But add on a kinetic barrier? He knew that more people would die if they didn't at least find where they were coming from. Everything came from somewhere. It doesn't matter how old or young it is or was, there is always an origin to it. He needed to find out where they were possibly making the Super Mutants, he needed to know how to-
"*Beeping noises*"
The Courier was brought out of his thoughts as ED-E began to speak. He looked at the eyebot as ED-E continued to speak.
"*Beeping noises*"
ED-E was right. Now wasn't the time to sit around and think. The Courier should at least check on everyone who was there and see how they are doing. The Courier stood up from his spot and walked over towards Wrex who looked at him and turned to face him fully.
"John."
"Wrex."
"So do you need something."
"I just wanted to know what you thought about the whole Super Mutant thing."
"Really? Well you weren't lying about the Super Mutants, they are tough sons of bitches to kill. That one I slammed into? Felt like slamming into a wall, and that was when he had a kinetic barrier. If they were tough now I'm really itching to see how dangerous a Death Claw is."
"Yeah they are. You know if you were in the Wasteland I would have gladly shown you to a place in Westside called The Thorn, pretty fun place to bet caps in. You can fight fire geckos, giant mantises, radscorpions, Night stalkers, cazadores, and Deathclaws."
Wrex chuckled at this and smiled. "Really? Sounds familiar, back on Tuchanka, we got these creatures called Varen, and we put them in a pit and bet on which one would win. But hearing what this Thorn place is like is already putting my worlds to shame."
"It does. But the annoying part is having to get the eggs for the creatures. Lets just say mama Death Claws are very dangerous to deal with especially if you kill all the babies."
"Oh don't just sweeten the deal now John, I'm already thinking on how many Death Claws I can take on."
The Courier chuckled when Wrex had said that. And the Courier was curious how many Death Claws a Krogan like Wrex could take on. It WOULD be an interesting thing to see but seeing Wrex wasn't as affected by what he had seen he said bye to the Krogan and headed to the second member that witnessed what happened. Walking up to Garrus he could see that look in his eyes again, a look that said it reminded him of something but he didn't know what exactly. Garrus faced the Courier when he got close.
"John, is there something you need?"
"I'm just checking on you to see how you're doing, especially after what you just saw must have been…terrible."
Garrus sighed and nodded. "You can say that again. I've seen things back on the Citadel. But that? What those Super Mutants did to those pirates? It was just… you had to deal with that daily back in the Wasteland?"
The Courier nods his head. "Yeah, even back in the Wasteland it was tough living with things that will want to kill you daily. We even felt a small bit bad for raiders that get captured by Super Mutants. And if it's someone you care about? Unless you have a huge group of heavily armed people wearing some of the best armor in the Wasteland then you might as well say goodbye to them."
"They're that dangerous? I'm afraid how powerful one could get if left alone for too long."
"Those were just Masters. If you really want to be afraid of them then wait until you hear about a Behemoth."
Garrus looked at the Courier wide eyed. "A Behemoth? I know it's in the name but how big do they get?"
"20 damn feet. Scariest shit one could face if not prepared. I think they can be mostly found in the Capital part of the Wasteland, which I did go to. Yeah I think rocket launchers and miniguns are the best option to use against them. And that's if they don't have any other Super Mutants around to give them aid."
"Spirits, 20 feet? If you need rocket launchers to take it down then I'm scared what one would look like with a kinetic barrier or armor. Or worse an army."
Now that really was a scary thought. It took him several minutes to just take down ONE Behemoth, but an army with kinetic barriers AND armor? At that point you would need to use multiple Fatmans to take them down. The Courier shuddered at the thought of such a terrible thing.
"Yeah it would be absolute hell on earth. At that point you would probably need nukes to kill all of them."
"Nukes? Are you actually saying you would use nukes against an army of them?"
"Yeah I know nukes are dangerous and how my world was basically turned into one big Wasteland because of it. But I'm just going off of stuff from my world. Every other race could probably fare a whole lot better against an army of them. Especially with all your ships, tanks, Biotics…. Ah fuck I just remebered some of them were Asari."
Garrus then got the Courier was realizing as well and shook his head as he leaned against the Mako.
"Spirits, a Biotic Super Mutant? A truly deadly combination. I'm just glad that they were too dumb to use them, or when they became mutated that they lost the ability to use Biotics?"
"I don't know. The first part sounds likely but so does the last part too."
"Yeah I guess you're right."
Nothing was said between the two before Garrus stopped leaning against the Mako and started to work back on his station and looked at the Courier.
"Thanks for checking on me John, but I'm fine, for now at least. But I think you should be checking on Tali and Liara instead. I think they were the ones most affected by what they saw."
The Courier nodded and left Garrus to calibrate the Mako and walked into the engineering room. Inside the room were all the engineers diligently working to keep the ship running but the Courier could not see Tali anywhere in the room at all. The Courier exited the engine room and thought that she and Liara might be in the medbay the Courier stepped into the elevator with ED-E coming along as well. The elevator dinged as it reached the Quarter deck and the two stepped out and they walked, well for ED-E hovered, their way to medbay. Entering in through the door they saw Tali sitting on the bed with her knees to her chest head resting on her knees. The Courier took off his helmet so Tali wouldn't get scared from the sight of his helmet's eyes and put it down on the bed next to Tali's.
"Hey Tali, I just wanted to check up on you, see how you're doing."
Tali said nothing as she continued to stay in her position. The Courier now knew it REALLY affected her. He didn't know what the Quarian Flotilla prepared Quarians on their Pilgrimages for, but it definitely didn't prepare them for Super Mutants or Gore Bags. He reached out a hand to place on her shoulder but stopped and pulled it back and instead looked at his Pip-Boy and decided to give her something to at least calm her down. After searching for a minute he had found it and pulled it out. It was a green T-Rex doll, or as everyone else knew them by, the Dinky the T-Rex souvenir. He held it in front of Tali and could see a small bit of movement from her head as she looked at Dinky and then slowly at the Courier who nodded and Tali slowly moved her hands to the dinosaur and grabbed it before pulling it close to her, holding it like a child would with their teddy bear.
"...Thank you."
The Courier didn't say anything but just nodded. He knew what she was going through, many Wastelanders did when finding a Super Mutant camp and their Gore Bags. But he also knew Tali had never experienced anything outside of the Flotilla, especially something like this. It would feel like you had stepped into a horror movie or something when seeing Super Mutants up close. Nothing was said between him and Tali, he wanted to see if Tali would want to ask about them or to be left alone so Courier decided to wait. After a couple more minutes of silence Tali had finally spoken.
"...Is that what you had to deal with daily in the Wasteland?"
"...Yeah I did."
Tali slowly looked at the Courier. "...Were you afraid?"
This was a question he wasn't expecting to hear, but in all honesty? Yes. Yes he was afraid at times when dealing with the Wasteland and its terrors. Sure it hardens you but that doesn't mean the fear is removed from you. Sure you can become a terrifying presence in the Wasteland, to become something just as feared in the land but even then there was still fear inside of you. He would be lying to himself if he said he wasn't at least somewhat afraid of the Super Mutants still. God, any other Mutant terror in the Wasteland somehow always found a way to put more fear in him than before with more terrors he had never seen before. There were the Centaurs he found early in his adventure and how it had wrapped its tentacles over him and spat its attacks at him it was damn terrifying. And then Death Claws and how they can easily shred through Power Armor like it was paper.
"Yeah… Yeah I was."
"How did you deal with it? The fear you had?"
How did he? How did the Courier deal with the fear he had? He glanced over to ED-E who was hovering nearby his helmet and the Courier gained a small smile when looking at the eyebot.
"I have good friends to help me through it."
Tali looked at the Courier and while he couldn't see past her visor he could tell that she was somewhat more at ease now as she had finally stopped huddling and laid her legs down over the bed. More silence was all that was heard in the medbay before Tali asked another question.
"Are you still afraid? Of the horrors I mean."
"I am yeah. Back in the Mojave I used to have these nightmares and well I would wake up scared and point my gun at anything that even looked threatening. A lot of birds died that way when around me."
He could hear Tali give a small laugh when he said that and he was glad that Tali at least could smile or laugh still.
"And how did you deal with the nightmares?"
"Well sometimes I usually sleep while holding onto something, like you are with Dinky the T-Rex."
The Courier could hear a more audible giggle now when he had said the T-rex's name.
"Dinky? Is that some kind of name you gave it or is it something from your world as well?"
He couldn't help but chuckle at this as well. "Hey I will gladly let you know that Dinky the T-Rex is a national treasure to all of the Mojave and her residents. I'll let you know I happen to be the owner of 1000 of them."
Tali was now giggling at that. And the Courier couldn't help but have a big smile on his face as well.
"Ah I see," She held up the Dinky the T-Rex in front of her and spoke in an exaggerated apologetic tone. "Forgive me Dinky for I didn't know how treasured you are back in the Mojave."
The Courier laughed at that as Tali joined in on laughing at what she did. The two laughed for a while before slowly stopping but laughed again and louder this time when they looked at Dinky again. After a few minutes of nonstop laughing their laughter had finally died down as they were now in a more comfortable silence. He could tell that Tali was now smiling underneath her visor, and so was he. He was glad that she wasn't so sad anymore, it hurted him when she was like that. After all she and Wrex had essentially become his very first friends in this world so of course he's going to hold them high up.
"Thank you John, for cheering me up."
The Courier nodded and gently patted her on the shoulder. "Hey, what are friends for? If anything, if it was me you or Wrex would have done the exact same thing."
Tali looked at the Courier. "Wrex really?" She asked playfully.
"Okay okay but you still get what I'm trying to say."
"I do."
Tali put down Dinky and hugged John and gave him a squeeze with strength he didn't expect but returned the hug and gave his own little squeeze as well. The two separated and Tali grabbed Dinky and was about to give it back to Courier but he stopped her and pushed it back to her.
"You keep it."
"Are you sure? Won't you miss it?"
"Yeah I'm sure. Besides I have a thousand of them, remember? I'm very sure I won't notice one Dinky gone."
Tali hesitated before nodding and keeping the T-rex close to her. Smiling at that he put back on his helmet as ED-E hovered over to the two and beeped something as the Courier was about to say something Tali had surprisingly beaten him to the punch.
"Yes ED-E I'm fine, thank you."
The Courier just looked at Tali with now his eyes being wide. "You can understand him?"
Tali shook her head. "I think so. I'm not sure but I guess whenever he roams into engineering and talks to me I guess I have been slowly getting the hang of understanding him but I can't fully."
The Courier couldn't help but grin at this underneath his helmet. "Well I'll tell you one thing you seem to be better at it then Shepard is. I'll tell you what that control device back on Therum was easier to fix than trying to teach Shepard how to understand ED-E. So far all he can understand is hi, hello, bye, and goodbye."
"Really? So I guess I beat Shepard in something?"
The Courier gave a chuckle. "I guess so. Hey, would you actually like to understand ED-E? I mean if you don't want to, it's fine I can totally understand if you don't."
Courier thought he could see a smile underneath Tali's visor as she nodded her head. "I would like to. I'm quite curious as to how ED-E sees things in his perspective."
Two people who were willing to learn how to understand ED-E. The Courier was actually happy to hear that as he patted the eyebot.
"That's great to hear! Hear that ED-E?"
"*Beeping noises*"
"WOAH! ED-E who taught you to say something like that?!"
"W-what did he say?"
"*Beeping noises*"
The Courier could only groan when ED-E answered the question. "Let's just say I'm going to have a long talk with our pilot about watching his mouth when ED-E is around."
Tali tilted her head in confusion but nodded anyway. "Well I just want to say thank you again John, for checking on me and for giving me something nice."
"Hey like I said Tali, what are friends for." He patted her on the back and was about to walk away to find Liara when the entrance to the medbay opened and the person the Courier was looking for walked in but he could see that her mood was way better than what he had seen her back on the planet.
"Oh John, Tali, it is nice to see you two here."
"Oh Liara I was actually going to see how you were doing but I see you're already in a good mood. You okay?"
"Yes indeed I'm fine. I know it may seem odd but I talked with the Commander about what I had seen. The Commander was able to at least calm me down enough that even when closing my eyes I won't see… well you know."
So she went to the Commander? The Courier remembered back in the Comm room Liara gave Shepard this look that originally he couldn't really place but with what Liara had said he wondered if the Asari had feelings for the Commander? The Courier decided to not really think about it, if she did then good for her and if he was wrong then on well. He wasn't really good at romance or flirting, heck even when Red Lucy made an advance on him after winning he declined. She wasn't really his type and plus he wasn't ready for something like that.
"Ah I see. Well I think I'll go now. You'll probably want to rest your mind after everything."
"Yes thank you."
The Courier waved bye to Tali who waved bye back as he and ED-E exited the medbay with him hearing Liara asking Tali where she had gotten the T-rex toy.
It was nighttime in the black empty void of space, at least for them it was. There he laid in his sleeping bag on the floor of the vehicle bay in his corner. Sleeping on the cold hard floor as he had many times before back in the Wasteland. There laying in the bag was the Couri- John. Yes that was the name that he had chosen for himself when coming to this world. But to ED-E he didn't mind calling him Courier or John, because to ED-E he was his friend and he would support him and whatever choice of name he chose. ED-E could still remember that fateful day, when he had gone offline in Primm too badly damaged and then to be brought back online staring at the red eyed visors of the Elite Riot Gear that John had worn ever since he had gained them from the place called the Divide.
There they had met before, but not him but another copy of him, one that had willingly sacrificed himself to stop the nukes from launching and bringing more destruction to the Wasteland. John had told ED-E everything about his Divide counterpart, how they met and how they said their final goodbyes. He could still remember the look of joy John had on his face when ED-E had booted back up online. In John's own words "It was like seeing a friend again after years apart".
ED-E then began to wonder how everyone else back in the Mojave was doing. Cass, Lily, Arcade, Raul, Boone, Rex, and Veronica. ED-E had come to know and love them just like he did for John, as friends to the end. He wondered how they were living their lives now and how much time had passed in the Wasteland compared to here. He hoped that they were living good happy lives in the Wasteland. Speaking of companions, ED-E then looked around the somewhat empty vehicle bay. In the morning it was mostly filled with squadmates that Commander Shepard had recruited to help him on his mission, just like how John had companions to help him on his mission.
Thinking of the new friends he made on the Normandy there was Tali, a very nice Quarian who was very good at machines and a good mechanic. She reminded ED-E of Raul from her skills with the pistol and her skills as an engineer. And a bonus was the fact that she could almost understand him, almost. No one could understand him, the only ones who could was John and Commander Shepard, though with him he could only understand when he said hi or bye. Then there was the Krogan Wrex, he was big and strong like Lily and also super old like her. ED-E liked to hover around the Krogan and try to talk with him but Wrex couldn't understand him but did like when ED-E played music whenever bored.
Then there was Garrus who liked to have ED-E around to listen to RALPHIE whenever there weren't as many people around in the vehicle bay. He didn't mind though since he had another person to enjoy RALPHIE with now. Then there was Liara, she liked to have him around to play the more relaxing music he had recorded in him. It always calmed her down, especially whenever she seemed to talk a lot about the Commander and his eyes and body. She would then get embarrassed for some reason and tell ED-E not to tell anyone about what she had said, which the eyebot didn't really understand why she didn't want anyone to know what she thought of the Commander when everything she said about him sounded like compliments but he obliged. Those were the very first non-humans John and ED-E had made friends with, each unique in their own way and fun to hang out with when the Normandy was going through space. He can say the same thing about Shepard, Kaidan, and Ashley as they are the very first human friends in this world. It's not everyday you meet other people from a different universe, especially when one of them was born not on earth but in a colony world.
A rustling noise was heard as ED-E looked down at the sleeping John and could see that he was on his side now. ED-E wished he could sleep too but he was afraid of turning off. He was afraid that if he turned off for the night that he would shut down like he did in Primm, but forever. The sound of footsteps caught the eyebots attention and he quickly turned to see that it was only Tali who was walking out of engineering and into the elevator. He saw her holding the Dinky T-Rex close to her as she walked. He was glad that she was feeling better now compared to earlier. ED-E then turned back to John sleeping form and for a second he felt...odd. Like everything that made him… him was suddenly doubled and all his memories and data was doubled but it quickly went away just as soon as it appeared. He didn't know what happened but it was probably just a small blip in his coding. The sound of the elevator going up seemed to make John turn in his sleep. The eyebot then hovered down lower to John and the man's arms wrapped around the eyebot as he held him close to him, as if letting go would mean he would disappear. He wouldn't of course. He was going nowhere.
A shorter chapter this time.