Garrus and I hustled our asses towards Chora's Den. We couldn't waste another minute. I tried hailing Shepard but she didn't answer. Hilariously enough, there is actually prompts for voice messages just like in the 21st century... but that's not important now.
"I hope this will be the end of this madness." I said this out loud mostly to myself.
"This coming from a guy who volunteered to help, by my count, three people shortly after arriving on the Citadel. You love this." I scowled, keeping my focus forward as we moved. "I mean, with your abilities, who wouldn't enjoy them. Also, look at you. You're keeping up with me, a turian. Generally we are faster then your kind, though I'm definitely not in a full sprint. Good luck keeping up with me then."
Honestly, his claim didn't surprise me. I had already surmised based on how they were built, turians were built for speed and agility more then brute force. As for me, I was faster then humans, not as fast as I was at full power though not much slower, so I was amused by the turians speed. At some point I'd have to see how good he was at climbing.
"You know what urban exploration is?" He laughed.
"Yes, I'm familiar. A concept human's use as an excuse to do stupid things like fall from buildings." I laughed.
"Hey, not all of us are uncoordinated, lack depth-perception or are completely devoid of spatial awareness. I was damn good at using buildings as a jungle gym, even before I coul- hold up." Our banter ended as we got to the area behind the markets.
I saw them first so I kept Garrus from stepping out from the corner we were rounding. Down the way, probably 10 ft from where I was, was the alley leading to the path to Chora's Den. It was being guarded by three mercs. They looked better equipped then Fist's men, and honestly, they didn't look like common thugs.
Knowing my luck these fuckers work for Saren.
I dipped back around the corner before the mercs noticed me and spoke in a whisper.
"Well, those guys definitely work for Saren." Garrus groaned as he looked around the corner for split second before leaning back. Looking him in the eye, his other being covered by his... targeting visor? Either way I was pretty certain of how I wanted to approach the situation but I wanted to get my cohort's inp-
"You say you're good at climbing. At the very least I know you can jump." Looks like he was already on the ball. Good, that's useful.
"Can confirm both those things are accurate." I nodded while peaking around the corner to double check that no movement had been made yet.
"How about you climb up and do recon. When we have a better handle on what's happening we can act accordingly." I nodded.
"Exactly what I was thinking." I plug my omni-tool's earpiece for private convo into my ear and open comms with Garrus, then begin climbing the building right next to us.
Didn't even take half a minute to get to the top. Climbing this new architecture is a little odd, but I've got the experience and instinct to adapt and overcome. Upon reaching the top, I give myself space to get a running start. I take off at a full sprint, spacing my footfalls accordingly, the last step I take near the edge before hurtling myself through the air, the rush, even though I had powers now, still got to me. One misstep, even as a conduit, and I'd tumble off the side and land unceremoniously in front of those mercs, even if the landing didn't cripple or kill me it would have been embarrassing after talking all that game. Of course I make it, landing with a roll and popping back up on my feet, though I stay low as to not make myself obvious.
Creeping up to the ledge to take a peak, I see our quarian speaking to a turian, who is back by a few salarians and humans, a hidden asari, and the turians that are covering the exit points. I curse under my breath.
"How's it lookin, MacGrath?" I hear the C-Sec agents voice over the comms. I relay the details of the situation.
"Even if I was the one caught in the middle of this obvious ambush, I'd be a little nervous. If it wasn't for her positioning, I could drop in, using my powers to make an electromagnetic shock wave that blows everybody away. I call it thunder drop." Garrus snorts.
"Seriously? You name your attacks? You sound like one of those shows one of our agents watch. They are hand drawn, I think called cartoons." I rolled my eyes, would have laughed but the situation was pretty drastic. I am both amazed and not surprised all at once. Of course even a turian has the slightest inkling of what anime is.
"I believe you are referring to anime."
"Yeah, that's it."
"Honestly, my friend Zeke used to name them. Some were terrible so I took it upon myself to name the ones he missed the mark on. Now's not the time to talk about this though. I'm going to go in, but probably avoid the thunder drop unless she can get clear." The turian had started feeling up the girl. Of course he'd use a tactic like that to try and intimidate her.
"If you like, I can start popping mercs to make them scatter? Give you a better shot at disorienting them with your flashy move." I frowned.
"It's not- uh oh." The quarian clearly was not fond of the turian merc feeling her up. She just slapped his hand away. I could barely hear their conversation but her voice was slightly raised now saying 'the deal was off' or something like that.
"What is it?" She takes a step away from the turian and looks behind her, only just realizing that the alley is surrounded. The two salarians that had flanked her reacted.
"I think their about to-" They lift a gun and I'm going to move but I see her react by throwing something at the two. "What is-" BOOM
Okay, the quarian has some hidden tricks in case of emergencies. That's good. I hear Garrus confirming if the quarian is alive, but I don't have time to answer before I can hear him shooting. I just jump off the building.
"Never seen anything like that before." Wrex seems somewhat impressed and definitely intrigued when he sees Cole fall out of the sky, wreathed in golden-yellow lightning, and hits the ground with what I could only call a low thunderclap. The attack causing a shock wave that originates from his landing spot and flowing out like a ripple in a pond. Only it's not water, but electricity, or lightning or whatever, and it knocks everybody in the alley, save for the quarian who had taken cover, on their asses and into walls and stacked up crates. After landing he immediately went to work shooting bolts of electricity out of his hands. Another previously unknown ability. I decide then that after this he's going to tell me the extent of his powers or we'll have problems.
Even though we are all trained, hardened by battle, and ready to fight for this proof, it was a spectacle to watch Cole. Don't get me wrong, biotics are practically capable of doing similar things, in fact, save for the arc restraints and draining electrical devices for healing and power up purposes, a lot of what we biotics can do are basically the same. We can use biotics to enhance our physical capabilities, we can attack from afar, and if we are unarmed we are still considered highly dangerous. Except every biotic shared in these abilities, even if it was at varying degrees. This guy was the only conduit alive, and the only person I've seen shoot lightning out of his hands.
He had taken out a lot of the mercs, some got back up while others remained unconscious. Things were tossed around and the quarian herself was kind of stunned when she noticed him. The electrokinetic man from history was alternating between hands firing in either direction of the alley. He apparently was even capable of throwing electrically charged balls of energy, which exploded like grenades. In the time he had dropped and opened fire was probably only 10 seconds, and he had taken out probably a quarter of the mercs, before gunfire from the other side of the alley and two more mercs dropping caught our attention. Looking over I saw... was that Garrus Vakarian? Of course. He had taken MacGrath in for questioning. Why was he here?
It was time for us to get involved, and not a moment to soon, because an asari had popped out from behind a hiding place and attacked our conduit relic and seemed to take all of his attention. As much as I wanted to watch that fight, the three of us had already engaged the mercs on our end of the alley.
Kaiden and I raise our weapons while Wrex uses a biotic charge to flatten one of the mercs diagonally across from him against the nearest wall. He takes a step back and fires once into the turians gut, killing him instantly before getting in the middle of the fray in the alley. Kaiden warps one of the other mercs and lights him up, while I follow the krogan's lead. Firing at the other merc who is now disoriented due to the krogan wrecking ball and the conduit light show, I get in close just as his shields go down and form an omni-blade to stab the bastard in the throat. Blue blood steaming from the heat of the blade splatters up my arm as I pull away, the wound quickly cauterizing. It doesn't matter though. The turian is dead, and so is his companion, both hitting the ground simultaneously.
Kaiden and I move in, taking cover on either side of the quarian while firing into the crowd of mercs. They really wanted this girl badly. There was no way I was going to let that bastard Saren get what he wanted.
"Who are you?!" The girl sounded young. Probably early 20's. Quarians have similar life spans to humans so her arrogance in coming here alone is at least explained now.
"I'm Commander Shepard of-" Lightning and biotics were being thrown every where and I could hear Wrex laughing like a maniac. "-Introductions later! Just kill them!"
I feel that same feeling I get from Cole, the one that made me return to the med-bay, and I wonder what he's doing. That ability never felt like an offensive one. I do hear that sound made when Cole is recharging his power, and know that he's getting ready for round another round.
"Yes, ma'am!" Kaiden shouted as he stood up and fired at some of the other mercs. I noticed since he used his powers at the entrance he was focusing on his tech abilities. Wondered briefly if he was intending on reserving his biotics for the asari in case Cole couldn't beat her.
I popped up and kept my focus on targets I could cleanly hit. Popping a few who had be unfortunate enough to catch stray bolts and have their shields disrupted by their asari compatriot. They didn't look to happy with how they were being screwed by friendly fire. Honestly wasn't sure how difficult this would be without the aliens and the conduit on our side.
Then I saw Wrex get tossed in our direction. The cover we were behind was an illegally parked vehicle, but my instincts told me to move, so I grabbed the girl and dove out of the way.
"MOVE!" Kaiden saw it to, using his biotics to supplement his movements he jumped over the car, clearing it as Wrex collided with the thing having it skid across the alley a few feet as the krogan laughed.
"This is fun." Of course he would say that.
Kaiden went on, tossing an orb out to leave a merc helplessly floating in the air as he dealt with his buddies. I couldn't focus on that however as my pistol was kicked out of my hand by a turian. He tried stabbing me with a lengthy knife, but I form a biotic barrier around myself. The knife can't make it through all the way as I grab his arm by the wrist and slam my other palm into his elbow, using my abilities to increase my mass thus enhancing the weight of the blow. His arm snaps and bends the wrong way, which he basically ignores. He tries kicking me but I block it with my shin, then I reach up, forming another omni-blade and ram it through his chest. He slumps pretty quickly as I drop him to the ground.
I feel a tap on my shoulder and I spin around, intending to clobber whoever it is. I quickly see that it's the quarian, and she flinches, away from me.
"It's ME! I didn't mean to scare you! Here!" She sticks out her hand, she had picked up my weapon. I look at her and nod as I take my weapon back.
"Thank you." She nods back and we turn around to get involved once more, but I had a feeling the fight was over when I noticed there were no more gunshots.
Turning around and raising my weapon just in case, I see that all the mercs are dead. Scorch marks, bullet holes, and blood, and some teeth of various species, were all over the alley. Wrex is crushing the asari's head with his boot, Kaiden looks to be leaning against a wall, wounded, and Garrus is leaning over an unconscious MacGrath.
"Fuck me."
Well, luckily the quarian had taken cover after she tossed that explosive.
Now that I was freed up to bring the thunder, I did so. Technically not having done this since I was in New Marais and I relish in it. Yes, I like my powers. The powers themselves can be fun. The problems that follow them are not. Not usually anyway.
This fight was high stakes, and normally whenever that was the case something stupid would happen. I was just waiting for the other shoe to drop.
I feel the tingling sensation of my powers as I channel a high level of volts into my hands and feet. When I land I release it on impact, sending out the way that I can feel as it spreads across the alley. Many of the people working this hit job get thrown into walls, crates, parked vehicles and what have you. Some start to get back up as my arms remain lit up and I start firing arc bolts like their ki blasts from DBZ.
I manage to get one shock grenade off and take out a few mercs in the span of 10 seconds from my landing until I feel something hit me with the force of a truck and I get taken for a ride into a wall. It actually hurt a hell of a lot, and my body felt very odd, like my weight was lighter for a second before made heavy upon impact, causing my eyes to close when I wince in pain. There's also a familiar feeling as I'm then pulled, an immense force tugging at me, dragging me back into the centre of the alley.
When I open my eyes I'm back in Empire City for the briefest of moments. John, The Beast, is dragging me towards him to try and kill me. Muscle memory has me turning on my static thrusters to try and escape his pull. I blink and I'm back in the alley and it's the asari, glowing blue, with this weird field around her and her hand outstretched to me.
I am dumbfounded by what I just saw, to the point where I nearly stop resisting her and she winds up to hit me with something. Not sure what it is and not interested in finding out.
So I reorient myself, throwing a shock grenade which sticks to her body. She freaks out, releasing what she had in store for me and tries to grab the grenade to pull it off but it shocks her. Just as she starts to glow again, probably attempting to use her powers to remove it, it goes off, and because I'm so close, the force pushes us away from each other. Although, I take no damage from my own abilities.
When she and I land on our feet on opposite ends of the alley, I see that gunfire is being exchanged between Garrus, the mercs and... a krogan? The one from Chora's Den apparently is here to.
"Introductions later! Just kill them!" I hear Shepard's voice coming from the right of the asari, she was behind a car. I sent out a radar pulse just to check if the quarian and my allies were still alive and they were all accounted for. The asari had been looking in her direction when I sent out the radar pulse, which revealed the quarian energy signature and the two weird human ones that could only be Shepard and Kaiden, but almost immediately snapped her head towards me. I wasn't sure what caught her attention but I figured I should act quick.
Powering up my next shot, I ad as many volts to it as I can, my arm sparking and flaring much brighter and more chaotic then before. Her eyes widen as I lift my hand and fire, hoping for the megawatt hammer, but only get a stronger arc bolt. Damn it. Not good to be finding out what I do and don't have available to me during fights. Regardless, I hold on to the charge and keep firing. A few bolts hit the asari, which she clearly doesn't like, so she forms a type of barrier around her, but she's shocked to see that it's being chipped away. I don't know why, but she gives me a look of shock, no pun intended, before she growls in frustration and starts throwing orbs of her own.
We spend a few minutes dodging and weaving, avoiding each others attacks before we get interrupted.
The big, red, and yellow, krogan rushes in, apparently wanting a piece of the action. Yelling a battle-cry at the top of his lungs he moves a lot faster then I thought he could, and takes a wide swing at the blue woman. She weaves under his attack, placing her hands on the ground spinning around him, leading into a low side-kick to the back of his knee. Her body was glowing blue, and I could only assume she was using her own powers to enhance her strength. Whatever she was doing was enough, as the krogan's leg buckled underneath his weight, however instead of falling to a knee, he decides to throw his weight backwards. I start running at the woman as she avoids being crushed by covering krogan in that blue shit she's been using, and tossing him away from her.
Luckily, this gives me an opening and go to bring down my foot on her ribs, which connects. The surprised look on her face tells me she wasn't expecting the force of the blow and how I empowered the kick with an ample amount of voltage, but it doesn't slow her down as much as I hoped as she does a capoeira like move and sweeps my legs from under me. I let go of my blades, using my hands to catch myself and push into a somersault away from her.
Just as I get back to my feet she's already continuing her assault. I duck under a left hook, but get caught in the face with a knee strike, as I come up she goes for another strike to my throat but I block with my left go to punch her in the gut. She leans away from it so I try to follow up with an elbow to the face, which she blocks by delivering a push kick with her left foot to slow my momentum forward. She tries to follow with a right leg kick but I lift my left leg to block with my shin, then follow through with a right jumping roundhouse kick to her head. She lifts her arms up in time to block but she's still off balance from her leg kick so she ends up off balance, stumbling over herself, nearly falling as I land and continue my advance.
Eventually, the asari gives into gravity, planting her hands on the ground and doing a mule kick. This time I anticipate her and flip over her attack, firing two high voltage arc bolts into her back as I soar over her. Upon landing, she is already trying to stand, but by the time she lifts her head to look at her opponent, I was on her, my fingers digging into the sides an back of her head, palms flat against either side of her face. She reaches up to grab my arms and I can feel her drawing her power to try and force me to let go, her hands getting heavy, but I just start drawing her neuro-electrical energy and drawing it into me.
The Asari merc begins to fry and convulse, her eyes rolling into the back of her head as a scream is caught in her throat. Whatever concentration she needed to generate her powers was broken, and even though I told myself I wouldn't do it, I stole her memories from her.
May as well find out what Saren is up to if at all possible.
"Eden Prime was a victory! The beacon has brought us one step closer to the conduit."
The words were almost a sludge. Everything around me felt like it had been drastically slowed down. As if I was in the Matrix during the bullet time scenes. I'd never felt this before. Not when obtaining the memories of the dead, not when Kessler burned his doomed timeline into my brain, and not when I stole the memories from Fist's grunt at the clinic.
All of this was wrong. I felt like I could move around freely, which I exercised by swivelling my head around to take in my surroundings. It appeared we were on a ship, Geth were every where, but so were a mixed batch of aliens. Probably Saren's goons. One of which was an asari woman, wearing a black dress and some gothic looking crown... or head piece, maybe religious in nature? Not sure. All I knew is she seemed to be second in command, given she was standing on the same elevated platform as him while he was giving his slurred, slow, speech. Standing to his right and slightly back, watching him. I studied her, a bit longer then I had intended, and she seemed... mixed up. Frustrated, but also, elated? Entranced, even.
Did her eyes just shift to me?
I swear she had just moved her eyes and only her eyes from Saren to me and locked onto my stare.
"Wh-what... are you... do-doing... to me?!" The voice, to my immense relief, did not come from Matriarch Benezia... how did I know her name? Oh, it was probably-
"Get OUT!" I felt a pressure, similar to what it felt like when Sasha was trying to force her thoughts into my mind. Trying to brainwash me and tempt me into joining her, after I took the sludge she had polluted the water supply of the city with to the face.
Only difference was this felt much stronger then what Sasha was capable of. Probably because she was an unhinged, delusional, maniac. This however...
"Sorry, can't. Gotta figure out what's goin-"
"It hurts! PLEASE! Get out! You're... you're stealing... me..." This voice definitely belonged to the asari I was fighting. It was the only thing that made sense. Benezia's eyes were definitely looking at me though. I never looked away from her. Not even when the psychic force trying to push me out hit me. Her head had turned towards me.
"He doesn't want you here!"
"What? Who doesn't want me here? Why is your memory of this Benezia chick able to..."
"Who are you?" My vision went red. From every direction, sounding like it came from the infinite void itself and just was the universe, was a booming, mechanical, voice, that sounded like it was made of hydraulic systems and code. It synced up with Benezia's mouth... and Saren's. Looking around, everything in the room was looking at me. The lights on the Geth were red, Saren's cybernetics were red, and Benezia's skin had turned crimson.
I can't lie, I was probably going to piss myself. I had never... ever heard or felt anything like I just did when those three words were uttered by this... thing. Whatever it was.
"Please get out. He's hurting me to make you leave. Can't you feel it?" The woman was pleading, sobbing, and groaning in pain in between sentences. Honestly, yeah. Initially, I think it was just her trying to make me leave, but now it felt like my head was splitting open.
"Aaargh." I fruitlessly tried to stay standing, my blue hands planting themselves on the floor as I collapse. They glitch out and faze from being feminine blue hands to masculine tan ones. Shaking my head I started charging up, trying to pull a Majin Vegeta and just force this thing out of my mind, but none of my power came. I looked around, my now blurred, crimson vision, catching the sight of Saren and Benezia, with a few Geth, standing right over me. The ship was gone, and behind them was just a black void. The edge of space... but it wasn't empty.
I couldn't clearly see it, but I could feel it back there. It wasn't even far away. Then I saw the void move, and I knew whatever it was...
...It was already here
My eyes felt a sharp pain as I opened my eyes to look almost directly into the light of the room I was in. Immediately I shut them again as a migraine set in. Reaching my hand up I mutter a 'get out of the way', in case anybody is around and drain the thing of it's energy. I can see through my lids that the light flickers off as the only light source for the briefest of moments was the electricity arcing around my arms. After it dissipated, and I took a few moments for my healing to take affect, I opened my eyes again.
"Still hurts, but not as bad." I sit up to look around and notice that I'm in what looks to be a hospital bed. Even better, to my right is one Dr. Karin Chakwas, sleeping in a chair set next to the bed. I smile as I reach over and tap her shoulder.
"Hmm? Oh! C-" She's interrupted by her own yawn as she stretches. When she's done she continues her thought. "Cole. It's good to see you're awake." She gave me a soft smile and immediately stood up to examine me. I scooted to the end of the bed, let some energy back into the light fixture, and followed whatever she asked of me to complete her check up.
"You're a heavy sleeper." I stated as she put on her stethoscope.
"Not normally. I just didn't get much sleep while monitoring you and Shepard after your arrival on Eden Prime." I chuckled.
"Explains why I was able to drain this light without waking you. Needed to catch up on your beauty sleep." She laughed this time as she pulled the stethoscope away from my chest.
"I figured that's what you did when I woke up to a dark room." She raised her arm and activated her omni-tool. Before she could speak into it I put my hand on her other arm and gave her the most apologetic look I could muster.
"I'm-"
"Don't worry about it Cole." She give me a reassuring pat on the cheek before speaking again. "Commander. He's awake."
Within seconds, Garrus, and Shepard walked into the room. Garrus looked pretty happy. Shepard was harder to read, despite having the more familiar facial muscles of a human. The one thing I could tell was she wasn't pleased about something, but she didn't seem as annoyed about everything as she was when I first met her.
"How long was I out?" I looked between all of them, directing the question to nobody in particular.
"Maybe 45 minutes? I opted to move you before C-Sec showed up. Wrex offered to bring you and Lt. Alenko to the clinic to deal with any injuries, allowing me to stay to vouch for Shepard and Tali, given they were involved in a fire fight with people associated with a spectre. Luckily, Tali has proof of his guilt." Yeah, I could hear the glee in his voice. "As for Dr. Chakwas here, Shepard gave her a call and she rushed over to check up on her people, as well as provide help wherever she could. Lucky to have her on the Normandy in my opinion... I'm glad you're okay MacGrath. Couldn't of done this without you." Shepard scoffed at Garrus's claim and I just smirked at her.
"What's the matter Shepard? Don't like sharing the glory?" She glared daggers at me.
"You caused more collateral damage then was necessary. Drew too much attention to yourself and-"
"Oh stop it! The both of you! What's important is we are still together, and intact. We survived, made new allies and have what we need to take down Saren. Now stop bickering." Karin was stern, reminded me of my aunt, mom's older sister, whenever my cousins, brother, and I would get too rowdy at her house.
A twinge of home sickness I had never felt before hit me for a brief moment before I refocused on the task at hand.
"Right, so this quarian..."
"...Tali..." Garrus making the connection of the new name and the person we were protecting clear, I nodded.
"...Right, Tali. So she has proof that Saren and Matriarch Benezia were at Eden Prime?" Garrus and Shepard looked at me like I had grown a second head.
"So that's what you did to her." Shepard said in an accusing tone. I frowned.
"I wasn't going to chance that a stray bullet clipped Tali in the head, or any other thing going wrong with the evidence we needed. Even if we couldn't tell the council how I figured it out, it would give us the ability to look for him. Or at least that's what I hoped." The memory of what happened in that asari's head flashed for a moment and my headache got a little worse.
"Uh, does somebody want to fill me in, or is this a 'humans only' discussion." Garrus leaned against the wall, intending on staying regardless of what our answer was. Shepard just glared at him now. This woman needed to get better at interacting with people.
"It's fine Commander. He knows I'm... different." Glare shifts again to me, before Shepard looks to Karin who just shrugs. This causes a groan to escape Shepard's lips before she takes a seat, gesturing for me to continue.
I go on to explain to Garrus how I can draw memories from the dead, and how I had done it to that Fist merc and the Asari. I don't tell him about what conduits are, nor do I explain even half the shit I told the Normandy crew that were present in the conference room of said ship. I just tell him I'm an experiment, the last one alive, and that I was called a conduit. He seemed to follow everything and just let me be when it was hinted that I wouldn't go further into detail.
"Interesting. That explains the light show you put on in fights. Also, that memory thing can be useful." I shook my head.
"Not really. I think doing it to the living is risky, and I seem to be incapable of doing it without killing my target. Not to mention this last time felt so different to me." I raise my hands to rub my temples, attempting to massage my headache away while sighing.
"How do you mean? Did it not work?" Karin asked.
"No... well, sorta. It worked in the sense that I was getting a memory, but unlike before, I felt like I was going through sludge. Everything was slowed down and muffled. The woman was fighting against me." I opted not to mention the bigger problem. I wasn't sure what it was yet and I didn't think there was any reason to worry them about it yet. I barely could understand it myself.
"How does it normally feel?" Garrus asked.
"Well, when I was... back at home. I came across a dead man, after I got my powers. When I touched him, I involuntarily absorbed his last few memories leading to his death. It wasn't pleasant by any stretch of the imagination, but it was all at normal speed, and I was more a passenger rather then being them, feeling what they did. I was able to disassociate myself from any feelings 'I' had when viewing their memories, realizing it was their feelings being forced on me as I absorbed their memories." Garrus nodded, following along, Shepard and Karin listening intently.
"There was this guy... I won't get into the details, but he was an electrokinetic like me. He wanted to show me a possible future that haunted him and shared his memories with me. That was a lot hard to disassociate from, for a number of reasons. Still, I was able to somewhat tell the difference between him and myself while going through that process." I took a deep breath before continuing the next part.
"For a number of years I quit using that power. I didn't like it, and after awhile it was pointless. I was going to deal with those that harmed the people of my cit- Colony one way or another. I didn't want to suffer through their final moments any more. After I woke up on the Normandy however, I saw Nihlus. The first turian I ever encountered. Given what was happening to my colony, I figured maybe he had some answers and I attempted reading the mind of a dead alien for the first time." The memories of Saren meeting Nihlus and killing him in cold blood washed over me again.
"Whenever I watch him live for most of that day, getting familiar with the Alliance crew, the ship, discussing plans with Captain Anderson, briefing Shepard on the real mission at Eden Prime, making land fall, fighting geth, and finding Saren at a spaceport, only to be warned by a hiding dock worker right before accepting his fate and being shot in the back of the head. I think about this memory like I lived it. No disassociation at all. I was Nihlus, when I relive the end of his life." I shake my head, unsure of what to make of the development. Maybe my powers just evolved, but I wasn't sure what the use of being the person I was reading did. Maybe it was the universes sick joke of putting me into somebody's shoes, so I can see how they thought, felt, lived, and then died. I hated it.
"That sounds awful, MacGrath. I'm sorry." He paused a moment as I nodded my appreciation for his condolences. "Do you think it was because he wasn't human that you had that reaction?" I shook my head.
"No. I thought so at first, but after I drained that merc earlier, his memories came through the same way." I left out the part about watching myself drain him at the end. Kind of thing they probably could figure out on their own, but if nobody was going to address it I wasn't going to. "As for the Asari, I have no idea."
"It's likely due to the fact they have latent psychic abilities themselves. It's not like they actively go around reading every bodies minds, or at least I don't think they do, but they do have a mind melding technique they use to... well... to do a lot of things with. Usually they don't do any of that without consent, but there are definitely those who have managed to do so and have no problem with it. Maybe her abilities gave her a better time of defending against your mental attack?" Garrus and his apt assessment gave me a decent excuse to avoid mentioning whatever the hell that other presence was, but I wasn't sure how that all worked, having not attempted it in such a manner before.
"That probably makes the most sense. At least as much sense as you can get out of what I am and how a psychic alien and I had a brief psychic battle." Karin chuckled a bit as Garrus got up off the wall. Shepard stood as well.
"Well, let's go see if Tali's got the evidence we need." With that, the four of us stood up and headed out the door.
It didn't take us long to get to the Presidium. Wrex and Garrus opted to come with us, invested in the Saren business at this point, while Kaiden headed back with Ashley and Karin to the Normandy. He wasn't too injured, but he took a bullet to the leg. If it had been a couple inches to the left he would have had an artery hit and would have bled out. The omni-blade that another merc caught him with merely left a giant gash in his side that I hear will heal up in a day or to with medi-gel and rest. These wounds would have taken much longer in the 21st century, so to say I was amazed is an understatement. Given that my healing was unheard of for anybody.
Tali upon seeing me in the clinic thanked me for helping her, and introduced herself as Tali'Zorah nar Rayya. She explained that she didn't want to risk being down in the wards anymore, despite being surrounded by seasoned fighters from many different walks of life, and opted to hold out on us until we got to the human embassy. Now we all stand in front of that asshole Udina and Captain Anderson.
Upon playing the recording, I recognize the words of Saren from the asari's memory. We also hear Matriarch Benezia speak, only knowing that for certain because the asari knew her voice, being her disciple. I don't mention this however, and Shepard gives me a questioning look. I just shake my head, not wanting to let Udina in on what I can do. Besides, the council wouldn't believe me anyway.
Satisfied with their evidence, Udina scheduled another council hearing to present the evidence found. Unfortunately, we wouldn't be able to see the council for nearly 3 weeks, stating they had other hearings and meetings filling the time between now and then. Telling us we were lucky they were willing to address it so soon, given they have an entire galactic civilization to manage, it should be months until we readdress this problem. None of us liked that, so Udina chirped about getting the hearing bumped up in the queue one way or another. Tired of his prattling, and honestly wanting to relax after a long day, I decided to head over to the consorts. I had a reward waiting for me that I intended fully on using. Garrus stopped me before I left.
"MacGrath." I looked over at, what I considered now, a new friend.
"What's up?" He extended his hand towards me as he got close.
"It was fun. If you stick around, or if you want a job, I can help you get into C-Sec." I took his hand a shook it with a smile.
"Thanks Garrus but I need to figure things out. It's likely that I'm not escaping the clutches of the Alliance any time soon, given my special circumstances. Maybe I should listen to Karin and just enlist like she suggested." Garrus nodded as he let go.
"Well, whatever you decide, if you ever need help with anything just let me know. You've earned a turian as an ally today." I nodded.
"Thanks Garrus. Same goes for you." Of course, befriending a C-Sec officer was going to probably land me in more conflict then I'd like. Then again, even before my powers, getting into trouble seemed to be my favourite pass time.
Garrus informed me that Jenna was released as Chellick promised, and went back to working at Flux. He was going to follow up on Chorban and Jahleed as well to make sure they followed through with what I told them to do. We said our goodbyes, and he walked off towards a transit terminal. I walked out, ignoring Shepard as she tried to demand I head back to the Normandy. Anderson told her to leave me be, seeing as how I hadn't run off and just helped them out, he probably knew I wasn't going far.
Stepping outside I saw that the sky had darkened considerably. According to my omni-tool it was getting late. The wards looked almost perpetually dark, probably due to the fact they were basically 'underground', but I wasn't sure about how this sky worked. There were no oceans to make the sky blue, and... ah forget it.
My thoughts drifted to earlier in the afternoon, when I yelled at Karin. I knew she was right. That's why I was so mad. I said it myself after Kessler. The gift of my powers will be my burden until the day I die. Here I am, alive, nearly 200 years in the future and... however many Light-years away from Earth, still breathing.
Reaching the Consorts didn't take to long, given it's close proximity to the embassy. Smart move really. If your clients are all going to be high-profile, might as well make sure diplomats and ambassadors don't have to travel far for your services.
I was almost immediately ushered into Sha'ira's room, the door closing behind me as the woman, who was now wearing a sheer... something, on her... okay she was basically naked wearing a see through piece of fabric.
"Cole. It's wonderful to see you. Especially after the long day you've had." Her voice was as silky smooth as I remembered, but she was a little more sultry in her tone now. She was clearly in the mood for something and I was eager to indulge, but I frowned at the mention of me being watched.
"I really don't appreciate being spied on Sha'ira." She smiled as she picked something up off her counter, and started walking over to me, swaying her hips, walking with a bounce in her step which made her breasts bounce a bit.
"I'm sorry. I just wanted to make sure you would be okay. Chora's Den is... well you know. Turns out I was wrong to worry, seeing as how you are quite capable of handling yourself." She leaned in and put her hand on my chest, placing whatever was in her hand against me.
"Great, another one knows my secret." The consort giggled a bit.
"As you know, I keep secrets, Cole. It's safe with me, and the one that was watching you will never speak of it to anybody else." She leaned her head against my shoulder, putting her other hand on my back, beginning to rub circles as we stood their in the one-sided embrace.
I could feel the weight of the day being sapped from me, my nerves relaxing and my body feeling lighter. She smelled unlike anything I'd ever experienced, and her skin was smooth and soft. I wasn't sure any human could feel as smooth and soft as her.
"As for this trinket, consider it a token of my gratitude. I'm sure you'll find out it's use, I've never been able to." I took the object from her hand and inspected it briefly.
It was small, almost as small as a USB stick. It was a cuboid shape, with small intricate designs that I did not recognize. Not that I thought I would, given this was a gift from an alien.
"What is it?" I asked, my free arm wrapping around her waist to pull her closer. She smiles as she looks up at me, and pulls my gaze back to hers. My eyes meeting her deep blues, before scanning her purple lips. I wanted to kiss her.
"I don't know. I've never been able to figure out what it's for, but I do know it's old. An old lover, human, had left it with me before she passed. That was nearly a decade ago. Apparently it was a family heirloom and she had no family left to give it to. Now, it's back in human hands. Where it belongs." I raised my brow, barely being able to look away from the beautiful creature pressed against me.
The thing didn't look familiar, but I wasn't an expert in ancient history so maybe I'd have a better time of getting some anthropologist or historian look at it. Deciding to focus on that later, I separate, briefly, from the consort as I place the object in my bag, and then proceed to discard my clothing. Sha'ira has been giving me the fuck me eyes since I walked in, and I intended on enjoying this after the day I had.
My first alien woman. First of many hopefully.
A/N: Nice ending yeah? Don't worry, for those pervs that want to read Cole getting it on with an asari the next chapter will be a short smut chapter. EDIT: Yeah so I'm havin trouble focusing on the smut. I really want to just continue writing the story, so I might give some detail then fade to black kind of thing, then continue the chapter as normal. If I get the inspiration for writing smut, I'll probably post it separately or something. Sorry to those that were looking forward to it.
Well, it took nearly 8 chapters but the crew is coming together and they are almost done with the citadel. I might have a few chapters where the Normandy has to leave before visiting the council again, I have a few ideas for all of that stuff. I want the relationships to build a bit and have some things happen so that there is actual passage of time, rather then having the video game experience of everybody just being awake for what was probably at least two weeks of work (if you include all the time spent doing the side stuff. It could easily have been longer).
Anyway, I hope you all continue to enjoy this story, I'm having fun writing it. Please leave a Review if you have anything you'd like to say about the story. I appreciate the feedback.
Peace.