A Standup Philosopher
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Shadows and Dust 18
🕑 Added 2025-07-10 15:00:00 +0000 UTCCassandra looked around the Normandy’s briefing room with a faint air of windswept exhaustion, which seemed to be more or less how those filling the rooms seats seemed to feel. Save Wrex, of course, who looked more bored than anything else, but if she was going to be honest the old toad looked like that at least eighty-five percent of the time. Though at least he hadn’t looked bored at her pseudo-induction to the SPECTREs, looking on instead with something that distinctly resembled pride.
Things had evolved quickly after that, of course. She’d quickly found herself put in command of the Normandy, the Alliance intent on making sure their new SPECTRE was as effectively equipped as possible for her efforts to hunt down the people behind this latest assault upon their people. And the most advanced stealth ship in the galaxy was certainly a very potent piece of equipment for the sake of pursuing that goal, especially since it had already been proven to Systems Alliance High Command that the Normandy could evade detection by geth ship-based equipment. The effective demotion and side-lining of Captain Anderson would have infuriated her, if it wasn’t for the fact that he had instead -by the Council’s request- been assigned as the Alliance’s military and intelligence attaché to the Citadel Council.
She hadn’t wasted her new, hmm, power over the Normandy either, nor his new position, promptly using the both of them to get Williams and Bhatia transferred to her command -a dedicated medic and a talented soldier, both of whom had already fought and survived against the geth, would certainly come in handy- before inviting Tali’zorah and Wrex to come along as well.
Actually, if she was going to be more honest, she invited the young quarian to come along and her GrUncle had invited himself without so much as a word of consultation to her, not that she was going to complain either way. Tali was sweet, and would certainly come in handy when it came to both fighting the geth and extracting and further intelligence from them. God knew that she had already proven her bona fides in regards to the later, bringing the evidence needed to get the galaxy on the collective tails of the culprits, and Cassie wasn’t going to turn down that kind of expert knowledge and breathtaking talent without a very, very good reason.
She had been less enthusiastic about accepting the assistance of one Detective Garrus Vakarian from C-Sec, mostly because she didn’t know him in the least and wasn’t entirely sure about his motives. Oh, he had claimed that he wanted to put a stop to the Warmaster -his father, a prominent member of the Turian military, had apparently tangled with the batarian bastard more than once- and bring Saren, who he rightly viewed as a traitor to the Hierarchy and the Council, to justice. His honesty had been painfully apparent even without her ‘gifts’ on that front, but she was sure there was more to it than that. A perusal of his file had shown him to be somewhat of a renegade, prone to bending or breaking the rules outright to stop criminals, but he was also an extraordinarily talented investigator and (apparently) a sniper whose talent ranked equal or superior to several SPECTREs.
She had her misgivings about him, certainly, and she would be keeping a close eye on him, but she couldn’t reject such a talented offer for help. And she certainly couldn’t reject only him, given that he was a turian. With her family’s history with his race, no one would believe for a moment that it hadn’t been due to personal bias. Which it wasn’t, the only people that she genuinely disliked as a group were the batarians, and that had less to do with what she had suffered at their hands and rather more to do with how violently she despised their so-called ‘culture’.
“Alright, ladies and gentlemen, we’re airborne now, heading for Feros. According to Intelligence, geth have been sighted on-world, and the colony there is at risk. We’re going to investigate the sightings and find out what we can learn, while delivering some emergency supplies and defensive equipment to the colony at the same time.” she started the briefing bluntly, leaning forward in her chair and posting her elbows on her knees, hands folded in front of her face. “I’ve forwarded the intel packet to all of you, so make sure to give that a read. We’ll do another briefing right before we make landfall and hash out basic strategy. For now, we need to introduce ourselves. Things are moving quickly and look like they’ll keep doing so, and I want all of us to be at least aware, if not familiar, with each other’s names, voices, and particular talents. Wrex?”
“Shepard.” he grunted in response, his lips quirking up into a smile at the nearly ritualistic exchange, only cutting out the ‘Little’ part due to -presumably- the bare minimum of professionalism. He didn’t bother rising, nor even really changing his posture, as he looked around the room. “I am Wrex, Battlemaster of Clan Urdnot. I have been fighting in wars for nearly two-thousand years and I listen to Shepard, so I don’t want to hear any complaints from you lot about her decisions, unless you’ve got a brain in your head and can prove it. My biotics are powerful, my armor is heavy, and my weapons are close-ranged. Shepard will use me as a linebreaker or a tank. Don’t waste it.”
“Wrex, that’s…thank you, Wrex.” Cassandra sighed, shaking her head at her GrUncle’s blunt and blatant method of introduction, which had far more to do with making sure that the eclectic mix of fighters present in the room knew ‘their place’ while simultaneously impressing upon them that he wasn’t someone to fuck with. What was worse was, it seemed to be working, judging by the looks of mingled awe, respect, and fear that he was receiving from the rest of the room. Sensible, really. “Let it be known that I don’t object, in fact I encourage, people to come with me if they have concerns or need advice, as long as they respect the chain of command. My door is always open to you, alright? Next.”
The rest of the room introduced themselves one by one, listing their specialties and respective talents, and by the end of it Cassandra had to admit that she was rather pleased. The team was well-rounded when it came to talents, from close ranger brawlers like Wrex to surgical snipers like Vakarian and everything in between. Really, the only thing that she was missing was a pure biotic specialist, and if she really had to she could fill that niche rather nicely herself.
Of course, there were a few issues. Vakarian was, if not a loose cannon, than at the very least someone who was prone to acting on his impulses and asking for forgiveness rather than for permission. Not something Cassandra could censure him for without being a hypocrite, given her own proclivities, but she could at least teach him to tame that behavior a bit. He’d live longer. God knew she got away with at least sixty-percent of the crap she pulled off because she essentially cheated, after all.
Likewise, Tali’zorah was incredibly inexperienced when it came to actually fighting. She had some basic training, of course, and by all accounts she’d handled herself well dealing with the mercenaries that had killed the rest of her ship’s crew, but that wasn’t comparable to the sort of situations that she would be finding herself in during the course of their Council-given mission. She was a techie, and one that would have to be very carefully protected until she gained the experience required to defend herself a little more ably than she was currently capable of.
There was also the blatant mistrust that Williams had for the aliens, though to be fair Cassandra knew that she only actively distrusted Vakarian and Tali’zorah. Wrex, it seemed, was someone she considered trust-worthy because of his long-standing relationship with the Shepard family themselves, and her only concern in his direction seemed to be the concern everyone felt in regards to a krogan battlemaster. That was her impression, at any rate, based on the surface-level emotions and physical indicators that the other woman gave off, though she had made mental note to talk to her and find out exactly why she held the issues that she did. She had a strong suspicion, but she wasn’t going to make any assumptions, even to herself, nor was she going to be…unpleasant about things so long as Williams could remain professional.
Finally, Bhatia…well, Cassie wouldn’t be surprised if she had to send the medic home sooner rather than later, or have her permanently ship-side as Chakwas’ assistant/nurse. She was obviously still pretty badly shaken up by the events of Eden Prime and, while she had volunteered alongside Williams to join the crew without so much as a word of request from Cassie herself, she would obviously much rather be back home with her husband. Cassandra could hardly blame her for that, she had little doubt that the Indian woman has signed up with the Frontier Forces specifically in the hopes that she wouldn’t get involved in a heavy combat, and now she had been shoved waist-deep into some very dangerous waters.
“Alright, good. I’ll be in my cabin, going over the intel and coming up with some rough squad tactics. Alenko, I want you to help the new folks get squared away in Marine Country, or what passes for it on this boat. Once he’s done that, I want each and every one of you to go over all the intel we have on the geth, including what Tali has added on, as well as Feros. We were all fighting blind on Eden Prime, and I don’t want to have to write any more letters, understood?”
A chorus of acknowledgments filled the briefing room, though each was subtly different from the others. Williams' response was crisp and professional, almost rigid in a way, while Alenko's carried a slight edge of familiarity. Vakarian's held an edge of eagerness that made her wonder if he truly understood what they were walking into, while Tali's voice was barely more than a whisper that was none-the-less determined and harsh enough that she made a mental note to make sure that the girl didn’t lose her senses in pursuit of killing geth.
“Oh, and there’s one more thing." Cassandra added as she gracefully rose from her seat, looking around at them all. "We're not Alliance, Council, Fleet, or Hierarchy out there, not here and not now. We're a team now, whatever we were before. I don't care what species you are or what uniform you wore yesterday. Watch each other's backs, follow orders, and we'll all make it home. Dismissed."
The team began filing out with the usual mix of purposeful movement and lingering uncertainty that came with new assignments. Cassandra watched them go, cataloging the subtle interactions—how Williams gave Vakarian a wide berth, the way Tali kept her head down but her body language alert, Wrex's passive and nigh-on-apathetic observation of them all as they filed out of the room, leaving the two of them alone at last.
“Well, Little Shepard, your life hasn’t gotten any less boring since I saw you last, has it? Now look at you, SPECTRE in all but name and responsible for hunting down a pair of boogeymen with a rag-tag team.” Wrex finally said after a moment of silence, grunting in laughter at the less-than-pleased look that she shot him in response. Getting to his own feet, the chair he had been sitting on squealing in distress -or, far more likely, relief, a thought that made her smirk faintly in amusement- he trundled over to give her a gentle, for him, pat on the shoulder. “You’ll straighten them out, kid. Just make sure to pick up that little bird of yours sooner rather than later. If these Reapers wiped out the Protheans, you’re right that she’ll come in handy.”
“Wouldn’t be very professional of me to go out of my way to recruit my own girlfriend for my mission, Wrex.” Cassandra pointed out, and he gave a dismissive snort and wave as he turned towards the door, clearly done with the conversation for the time being. Just as clearly, and nonverbally delivered to boot, was his opinion of her statement and, more importantly, his opinion of anyone who would complain about it if she did bring Liara in on this whole thing.
Hmm…
She had told the Council, quite accurately, that Liara was an expert in this field. And she had just been thinking about how she needed a biotic specialist, hadn’t she? And it wouldn’t really be abusing her power or her position if she recruited a subject matter expert, regardless of what relationship they had. In fact, it would be downright irresponsible of her if she didn’t, because she could hardly be doing her duty if she wasn’t being as efficient and resource-conscious as possible…
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“Not the most impressive sight, is it? Kinda drab. Grey. Blocky. You’d have thought that the Protheans would have had better aesthetics for their cities. Just going off the Citadel, you know?” Joker critiqued as the Normandy broke through the clouds and descended towards the ancient city that the colonists of Zhu’s Hope were using as the foundation -literally and metaphorically alike- for their settlement. “Don’t get me wrong, it’s tall and everything, impressive, durable, yada yada yada. I was just hoping for something a little more aesthetically pleasing, you know?”
“If I ever meet a Prothean, Joker, I’ll be sure to let them know that you find their artistic sense to be lacking.” Cassie drawled from her typical place behind him, but her engagement in the banter was an absent one as she stared down at the city below them. He wasn’t wrong, not at all, about the visual differences between the Citadel and the ghost city sprawled out beneath them, and she idly wondered what Liara would have to say about it when she saw the images. But that wasn’t what she really cared about right now.
No, what was holding her attention was the mind that she could sense sprawled out beneath them. A vast and ancient mind, one whose vastness was as much a physical thing as it was spiritual, because she would wager that portions of this mind were spread across most of the city. Weaker in most places, little more than thin, gossamer-like strands, but she could sense what could only be described as ‘nodes’ in certain areas as well. Places where it was larger, stronger, more present…the biggest and most powerful of which seemed to be directly beneath Zhu’s Hope.
Then she bit back a curse, because the mind stirred. It sensed her scrutiny, it sensed the presence of a fellow telepath and was searching for it.
She slammed the walls down around her presence, turning herself into a void as her thoughts started racing. Geth were one thing, but this entity was a complete unknown, and the fact that it was nesting -for want of a better word- beneath the very feet of the colony wasn’t good. Not to mention the fact that it was the first truly telepathic entity that she had ever encountered, seemingly needing no physical connection in the way that asari did with their melding. What’s worse was the fact that they were on final approach, she could hardly take the time to meditate and speak with Jean or one of the other Hosts, which meant she essentially had to confront this situation blind and handle it by the seat of her pants.
Fantastic.
“Alright, Joker. I want you keeping an eye on everything while the team and I are out there, and be ready to take off if needed. If there are geth around here somewhere, that means they arrived on something, and I don’t want it to get the drop on us or the colony.” she finally said, shaking her head and taking a deep but silent breath.
“Aye-aye, Commander. We’ll watch your backsides.” the pilot confirmed with his familiar lack of reverence, and Cassie rolled her eyes as she turned and walked away, choosing not to respond to the innuendo there. She’d never been particularly concerned with his attitude before, as long as he was focused and professional when he needed to be, and she certainly wasn’t going to make an issue out of it now that they were more-or-less outside of the Alliance’s procedures and regulations.
Making her way down to the cargo bay, Cassandra found her team already geared up and waiting. Williams was meticulously checking her assault rifle, movements precise and practiced and rigid. Alenko stood nearby, his omni-tool glowing as he ran a systems check on his amplifier, head tilted slightly to the side as he worked. Vakarian was making final adjustments to his sniper rifle with the practiced ease, and intensely meticulous focus, of someone both intimately familiar with his actions and obsessive about their results. Tali nervously shifted her weight from foot to foot, fingers tapping against her shotgun, while Wrex…Wrex simply looked bored, as if the prospect of facing geth was nothing more than a mild inconvenience in his day. Which, to be honest, it probably was. He’d fought worse in his life, and he’d fought many of those things completely alone and without support, both things he had plenty of today.
“Alright folks, we’re getting ready to touch down now, just outside the colony. We don’t know much about the situation yet, good or bad, so keep your eyes open and pay attention. Preservation of the colony and it’s people comes first, extracting or acquiring intel from the geth second. Tali, how much of a geth needs to be intact for you to do your thing?”
“Just the head, Commander, but I’ll only have thirty-seconds between the unit sustaining critical damage and it’s memory being wiped to recover any data.” the girl answered a bit nervously, but honestly, and several people in the room frowned thoughtfully.
“Is there any way for us to extend that time? Can we cripple one without triggering the wipe somehow?” Williams asked curiously, but Tali shook her head firmly.
“Against a regular mech, maybe, but not against a geth. The minute they determine that their current chasis is combat-ineffective and unable to be retrieved, they start the purge process. They’re machines, so they have no loyalty to an individual body and will leave it as soon as it can no longer perform sufficiently.” she responded, confidently to garner a handful of raised eyebrows and a ghost of a smile from Cassie herself.
“Alright then, thirty seconds it is. We’ll see what we can do.” she confirmed, before looking up as the intercom crackled, Joker informing them that they had landed and there was a representative from the colony itself outside ready and waiting to meet with them. She wondered briefly why they hadn’t responded to any hails nor sent any messages of their own, but shrugged the thought aside as she turned back towards the elevator with a beckoning command to follow towards her team.
Three minutes later, they were stepping out of the airlock and onto the ancient stonework of the docking bay, where a vaguely Arabic-looking man was waiting for them.
“Thank God you’re all here! David Al Talaqani, welcome to Zhu’s Hope. Colony Director Fai Dan needs to speak with you immediately about the attacks against the colony by the geth.” he reached out, grabbing Cassandra’s hand and pumping it eagerly, an expression of wild hope on his face.
“Shepard, Council SPECTREs, and my team.” she nodded, used to that sort of reaction when the military showed up to someplace in desperate need of a little firepower, gesturing for him to show them the way with her free hand. As they started walking, she continued. “What can you tell me about the situation before we arrive?”
“Not much, I’m afraid. The geth first showed up about a week ago, split us off from the Exo-Geni headquarters on planet by taking over the old Prothean Skyway. Radio communications on and off world have been crippled, if you get more than a quarter-mile from the colony hub itself they cut out completely. We’ve been relying on runners of all things too…”
“Get down!”
Williams’ shout had Cassandra throwing David to the ground and lashing out with one hand, biotics leaving a shimmering trail through the air that coalesced into an opaque shield, it’s surface rippling miliseconds later as a fusillade of pseudo-plasma rounds slammed into it. Rounds that would have killed the unshielded civilian for sure, and Cassandra’s hands drew her twin SMGs as a small swarm of geth seemed to pour out of nowhere to attack. A moment later she swore as two bright crimson targeting lasers dropped onto her chest, a pair of thunderclaps filling the small space as the sniper rounds -and they couldn’t be anything else- punched through her somewhat-shoddy barrier to slam into her shields.
“Vakarian, take them out! Williams, Alenko, cover him!” she snapped immediately, the turian already unfolding his sniper rifle and bracing it against one of the crates lining the walkway as everyone scattered into cover. A moment later, Vakarian’s rifle gave a deep thoom of it’s own, sending a dark, armored figure tumbling limply from where it had been hidden in a dark corner of the curved roof.
“Prime and Shock Troopers are charging us!” Tali’s somewhat panicked voice cut through the din as her two fellow humans started rattling off careful bursts from their carbines, protecting the sniper as he went to work, and Casssandra growled as she saw the wedge of geth armed with shotguns and lead by the largest machine she’d ever seen in her life that was coming towards them. Twelve feet tall if it was an inch and built like a brick wall, with shields to match if she was going to guess. Fortunately, she had her own brick wall to solve that problem for her.
“Wrex! Clear the road!” she shouted over her shoulder, getting a rumbling, grunting chuckle of amusement, followed by a tangible pulse of biotic power as he put up a barrier of his own and lined himself up. Then he was thundering past her, gaining momentum with every step, and she grinned at the way the geth stuttered in their advance as they calculated their response to this new threat to their collective metallic hides. “Cover him! Take out their shields! Break cover and advance! Marching fire!”
The geth tried to adjust their tactics to stop the living tank that was barreling down on them, but it was far, far too late for them to strip his barrier and shields both, never mind penetrate his armor and hide. He slammed into them like a freight train, his massive form crashing through their line and sending them reeling as he carried the Prime to the ground. Thunder boomed again as he stuck the barrel of his shotgun in it’s face and pulled the trigger three times. The Shock Troopers pivoted towards him, bringing their weapons around to aim at his (relatively) defenseless flank.
Cassandra didn't hesitate. She followed her own order, vaulting over her cover with both SMGs chattering in her hands as she advanced, the rest of her squad spreading out and doing the same with their own weapons as best as they could given the terrain constraints. The concentrated fire hammered at the quartet of Shock Troopers’ shields, drawing their attention away from Wrex just long enough for the Krogan to get back on his feet and start moving again. Vakarian’s rifle thoomed again, one of the large mechs collapsing like a puppet with cut strings as it’s ‘head’ disintegrated, and a flicker of motion out of the corner of her eye had her barking out orders.
“Movement, right side! Tali, Ash!” she snapped, abandoning last names entirely for speed of communication, the pair spinning and firing at the geth that had just appeared around the corner. A familiar sound to her left had her instinctively flicking out with her telekinesis, redirecting the two rockets that had just been launched in her team’s direction to explode harmlessly against the far wall, leaving dark scorchmarks on the stone.
"Rocket troopers! Garrus, take the left, I've got the right!" Cassandra called, darting forward while peppering the slender, crimson-painted mech in question with gunfire, chipping away at it’s shields and chassis until the bullet-torn carcass finally fell. Likewise, Garrus's rifle round punched through the other rocket trooper's shields and head in a shower of white fluid and mechanical parts. She couldn’t help but shake her head briefly in something approaching awe. The man hadn’t missed a shot yet, and she was pretty sure each of them had been headshots as well. His file had said he was good, very good, but reading it and seeing it actually play out was something else entirely.
The last of the Shock Troopers crumpled under sustained fire from Williams and Tali, and the silence that followed was almost deafening, broken only by their breathing and the sound of Kaiden checking on David, who Cassandra had to admit was looking a bit worse for the wear from how…energetically he had been put on the ground. One by one, voices called out, confirming that there ambushers were dead, and Cassandra smiled grimly. The geth were certainly here, and Zhu’s Hope was most certainly in danger. It was time to meet this ‘Fai Dan’ and figure out what to do moving forward.
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Garrus Vakarian, formerly of C-Sec -though, technically, he was on an extended leave of absence while seconded to SPECTRE Shepard’s team- hadn’t been entirely sure what to expect from one of the most famous humans alive. Martial prowess, obviously, that much went without saying, but beyond that he hadn’t had much information to work off of. Oh, there were stories, of course, statements by people she had served with and interviews with people that she had met, but none of that was any good for really understanding someone, especially not when it came to how they led and operated in the field. That kind of thing could only be experienced personally.
Well, he was starting to do exactly that, and from the looks of things it wouldn’t be anything like his time in C-Sec. Shepard was aggressive but tactical, keeping track of a rapidly shifting battlefield and directing the team as necessary without any apparent hesitation or insecurity that he could see. She barely knew any of them, outside the krogan and the male human, and yet she knew exactly what to tell them to do and when to do it. Which was impressive enough but made sense, given her breadth of experience and the length of her career, but what really stuck out to him was how easily she did it. She didn’t hesitate to reel off the orders, and didn’t seem to have any doubt that they would be followed competently. There was no double-checking that they were being obeyed, no glancing about to make sure that the team had succeeded.
He’d never seen that before, certainly not out of a freshly formed ad-hoc unit like this one, and he couldn’t help but admire it.
“Good work, everyone. Williams, good job spotting them, very well done. Wrex, you good?” she reeled off as the group fell back in once again, forming a small and rough circle in the middle of the walkway. Williams, the other human female, flashed a small smile and stood a bit straighter, while the krogan gave a grunt of laughter for his answer. Looking satisfied, she looked at the local, the colonist, and gave him what he thought was an apologetic smile. “David, sorry about the roughness there, but I didn’t have the time to be gentle about it. You alright to take us to Fai Dan, or do you need a medic?”
“I’m alright, SPECTRE, I’ll have the doctor check me out when we reach the colony. Just…let’s get moving before it happens again? I don’t think I’m cut out for all this excitement.” the man chuckled nervously, wringing his hands a bit, and Shepard gave him a sympathetic look before leading the entire group off again.
As they walked, Garrus kept his eyes roaming the world around them for follow-up attacks and thought. Requesting to join the freshly-minted SPECTREs retinue had been a risk, perhaps not even a good one, but after hearing that a turian was involved in an attack on humanity, he couldn’t let it lie. That it was SPECTRE Saren, and that he was working with both the batarians and the geth to launch the attack, had only made him more determined. Call it patriotism, call it righteous indignation. Hell, even call it pragmatism, wanting to have a turian present on the team assigned to hunt Saren down, but he hadn’t been able to tolerate the idea of doing nothing for even a moment. The fact that Shepard had accepted his offer/request had been a surprise, and a gratifying one (though he couldn’t shake the feeling that she had her own reasons for it, above her stated desire to have a talented sniper on overwatch, something that she didn’t have), and he was determined not to fuck this up.
Not least because his father had, somehow, found out about it before the Normandy had lifted off and given him a call. The old man hadn’t been pleased that Garrus was abandoning his responsibilities to C-Sec, not in the least, but that displeasure had been balanced out by the fact that he understood why Garrus had done it. Besides which, and Garrus winced as he recalled how brutally honest his father had been when the words had been said, the Vakarian patriarch hoped that working alongside a woman of Shepard’s talents and reputation would ‘smooth out his not-inconsiderable rough edges and turn him into the man he was entirely capable of being if properly tempered’.
Not that Garrus had believed he was a perfectly developed man or soldier, but hearing it so bluntly stated by the man he respected the most had been…uncomfortable, to say the least. Which was rather the point, he knew, just as he knew his father would have been distinctly unsympathetic despite the affection and respect that they held for one another. ‘Growth is painful, Garrus’, and all that sort of thing.
Still, all of that aside, he had to admit that it was nice working with genuine professionals again. C-Sec wasn’t bad, necessarily, but it wasn’t anything like being on a proper battlefield, no matter how unpleasant that The Wards could get at times. Out here, there was none of the ambiguity and red tape and procedural crap that had forced him to let people like Doctor Saleon go rather than stopping them from hurting others in the future. He just had to cover his sector and shoot the enemies that presented themselves, and Spirits he had missed being able to do that. It was simpler, and sometimes simple was pretty damn good.
Besides, he thought to himself as they entered the somewhat-ramshackle settlement of Zhu’s Hope, he felt his mandibles flutter slightly at the way the people living here descended on them with smiles and, appropriately enough, hope. Being welcomed with smiles and gratitude is a hell of a lot nicer than being greeted with bullets, curses, and lawsuits.
