#mantis-scope

@mantis-scope​​ sent: 🤕 gimme shakarian babeyyyy

The last time she’d seen action, barring her escape from Earth’s siege, was six months ago. Practice was never the same as the real thing. There was no way to replicate the stress and adrenaline of facing death. Did it make her feel alive? Not really. It used to. Now it just made her tired, but at least it gave her a reason to get up.

The Reapers were brutal. The Brutes they had to deal with were... brutal, really. A fitting name. Probably not what they were meant to be called, but the Reapers were probably not interested in giving them the proper information. She’d thought getting body checked by a Krogan was probably the worst thing next to getting hit by a speeding truck, but a hulking beast part Krogan and Turian was even worse.

Nothing was broken, thankfully, but from the way Shepard struggled to reach around her waist to undress from her armor had her sure something was at least sprained. The Commander bit back her wince.

“Garrus?” She asked, and she realized she didn’t really know how to ask for help from people who weren’t her therapist. She’d never done so before. Shepard stalled. The way he stared at her made her feel small. Maybe that was just her, “You alright, Big Guy?”

             THE PRESENCE OF MUTED NEON LIGHTS and an overwhelming stench of liquor is the closest she has felt to her home planet in months. Omega functions in ways she’s used to: a battleground free-for-all for the greedy. Yet the promise of a lawless land has presented a unique opportunity, one she could never afford on Contraxia --- and an offer she cannot refuse. Retribution on names she recalls from the ring runners, the high rollers, the frequent show-offs; not even a possible problem with the Archangel himself could deter her from stalking out the contacts at Afterlife offering credits for kills. 

Echo slips past the crowds of people for a spot towards the corner of the flashy circular bar. Two asaris, a salarian -- no turian. She’s fairly certain the intel broker she’s looking for is turian, but so far? No dice. In the meantime she waves a finger towards the bartender, pointing to whatever drink is sat unattended ( I’ll have that ) before sucking in a sharp breath.

Deep breath in and hold. 

Hands pressed into the mat, Allie slowly and shakily bends forward to pick her feet up off the floor. Crow pose, they called it. She currently called it the reason she was going to shoot someone. It used to take no effort at all to do it, whipping it out with the ease of a seasoned individual. Now even running up a hill too fast was a struggle and she HATED it.  Top of the N7 class, first human Spectre, ‘Saviour of the Galaxy’ meant fuck all when your body was broken. Those titles were just words, pointless and useless like an empty pistol. And frankly, the more she thought about it, so was she. How good was a colorblind painter? A surgeon with shaky hands? A soldier who was broken? Deep, deep down there was even the thought that maybe they should have just let her die.

       ❝   hell yeah, now we’re talkin’. ❞   her lips pull into a daring grin, hands swiping against each other as she eyes the scope.  ❝  y’know. . . . i’ve always wanted to try it out --  wonder what it felt like shooting the shit outta something a thousand feet away ‘n watching it drop dead to the ground.  ❞

@mantis-scope

The former YOHRA headquarters looked quite a bit like it had before, but with some notable differences. For one, there was a great deal more personal touches. Someone had taped up a bunch of photographs along a stretch of wall, along with paper stars and hearts. Someone else had painted a mural of the night sky between their doors.

Some doors had little name cards beneath the unit numbers. Some doors had ‘empty’ signs hung on them, while others had unit numbers added on.

It looked less like the housing for a professional android security group, and more like a college dorm. Including the small group of panicked androids gathered around outside Eve’s door, knocking in a panic.

“Commander, 2O and 17O haven’t gotten back from their break yet!”

“There was a break in and the Operators don’t know who to deploy! Your orders, ma’am?”

“Commander, ma’am, some units brought back another criminal, we need you to sign off on it--!”

“Commander, what are your orders?”

The conflict and guilt meant she’d done the right thing. It always had.

Yet the next morning, Six didn’t slip into her usual work attire of a fitted skirt and button up blouse. Her hair stayed down instead of in a professional bun. And instead of driving to her office job in the Doru District, she took a familiar route to the hideout where Garrus and his men lived. Maybe the Moscato was still in her system. Maybe it was because it felt good to do, no conflict churning in her stomach in the slightest.

She was uniformed for the job, her pistol strapped to her outer thigh as she slipped into the base thanks to being a familiar face. Everyone seemed surprised. The way she smiled at them challenged them to say nothing about it one way or another. It wasn’t until Six saw Garrus that she spoke, casually as she could. The butterflies in her stomach were only felt.

“You’re going to need someone with a little more finesse on the ground,” she explained, “The Blue Suns are going to be looking for armed men.”

Garrus,

This will probably never get sent to you. I’m not saying it to be fatalistic, but I’m talking with exactly three people at any given point in time. A guy named James Vega, Kaidan, and my lawyer. Sometimes it’s Hackett or Anderson, but it’s in their best interests to not at the moment. Batarian space and the whole Council is keeping a very, very sharp eye on them. I just need some place to put my thoughts, disjointed as they are, and the only person I want to talk to about them is you. It’s the only place that feels safe to. My therapist says journaling can be helpful, so... here I am. I’d count m this holopad as company, too, but I’m pretty sure it’s being surveillance, so fuck you Alliance for reading my innermost thoughts. I’m not Cerberus. I didn’t want to blow up the fucking Relay.

Golly Gee, I sure hope Jimmy takes me to the prom.

Part of my arrest is not checking out any inter-Galactic news. I’m not sure if that’s protocol, or just Anderson not wanting me to stress myself into a second grave prematurely. Though I’m not sure how you’re doing, it keeps me sane to think you’re currently rubbing elbows with the Primarch and building a super canon to blast the bastards as soon as they hit Turian space.

There’s not much else to do, really. I’m left trying to come up with my own distractions. I’m prepping best I can. At best, we have another year, maybe two. It’s still not enough time and will never be. My reaction times are getting better. I’m more fit than I’ve ever been, and yet I look at myself in a mirror and I look dead already.

Sometimes I wonder if it was worth all the money it took to bring me back. There’s more than just questions about the Alpha relay. There’s questions about Cerberus, stuff I can’t entirely answer. Kaidan looks at me in a way that makes me feel entirely inhuman. I don’t think he’s wrong to, though.

I wonder if that feels like a failed project to Miranda or the Illusive Man, and I guess it makes me feel a little warm and fuzzy to know I absolutely made a comfortable dent in his pocket book. Guess I’m not a complete failure in that regard. I bought a motorcycle again, even though I can’t really ride it anywhere but around the block. Put in new suspension and break rods. I needed an excuse to get out of bed that went beyond we could die at any moment. They kept my fucking hamster when we landed back on Earth. I hope Joker took him in.

There’s a lot of things I should have said to you while I had the chance. I’m proud of you, that you can do a whole lot better than a two-bit war hero passed her expiration date. That I can’t tell you how much I appreciate you giving me a part of you at all. I miss the hell out of you. That I love you and I wish I could give you all you wanted and deserved. I wonder how your dad is doing, how happy he was to see you again. I think he was. I hear parents show worry and relief on occasion by being upset. I hope your sister is okay. I hope you’re being strong.

I know that you are.