Mass Effect 3: Aftermath

Miranda’s biotic glow intensified as she revved her right arm back as a large, pulsating glow began to manifest in her palm. She then grunted as the sphere was tossed with all of her might directly at the pair in front of her. Pushing Shiro aside, Kyo dropped to a knee as to allow for his large, orange digital shield to hit the ground in an attempt to block the attack. “Oh no you don’t, it won’t be that easy!” Miranda’s accent was heavy when frustrated and she moved her arm so that she could control the orb’s direction. Instead of going forward, it now curved to come in at an angle. It was in slow motion for Kyo, who wasn’t fast enough in shifting his weight around and redeploying the barrier. Instead, he could only watch as he wasn’t fast to block the biotic attack that moved at rapid speed in Shiro’s direction.

The dark eyes turned to look at a defenselessly at Shiro’s body, which was going to end up taking the full blunt trauma of the unprovoked attack. Looking up, Shiro’s own green eyes reflected brightly at the oncoming glowing hue of the biotic flare as it rocketed towards him. Strangely enough, they didn’t seem frightened at all. Watching his face, Kyo saw the white eyebrows furrow in annoyance instead as the pupils slightly dilated in the bright light. Slowing putting an arm up, a gloved open palm caught the orb. Naturally, the impact caused it to explode; nearly knocking Kyo over and disrupted the shield he was trying to bring around. The blast of light was brief before there seemed to be lines of light coming from Shiro’s hand.

Miranda’s best attack was being absorbed right before her eyes.

Blue swirls surrounded his body before steadying themselves into a perfect biotic aura. Tightening the fist that caught the blast, the green eyes then redirected their gaze onto the woman who had bothered them with this mess in the first place.  Smirking, the mysterious silent man then hurled the blast back; however, it was multiplied by several times in both speed and power.  If Miranda had sent over a cannon ball for her biotic attack, Shiro just retaliated with the power equal to an AA gun. There was zero time to dodge and the former Cerberus Agent had to shield herself the best she could. Screaming as her powers waned; Miranda’s body was soon hurled against the stone wall with such an impacted that cracked its surface.

Kaidan, Liara and Kyo remained stunned in silence however, Kyo was close enough to notice that the attack had taken its toll on Shiro’s already frail condition. The young man was panting, leaning over from exhaustion before closing his eyes once again to lose consciousness. The Sergeant scrambled to catch him before his fall and looked to Kaidan with concern. The Major, who had never seen such power before, then moved in to check on Miranda. She was out cold, but alive. After lifting her up, he turned to the group. “Let’s get back to the ship and sort this out.”

 Liara nodded in agreement, following as Kyo gathered up his yet again unresponsive friend.  It was on the table in the med bay where Shiro was being examined by Dr. Chakwas. She was taking scans that were no longer being blocked, but still didn’t quite know what to make of the readings. Sitting in a pulled up chair close to the table was Kyo, who was under heavy watch by both Liara and Kaidan. Miranda lay on the opposite bed, stirring around in pain as she regained awareness. “He’s waking up, Major,” the Doctor spoke before moving away from the body as Shiro’s eyes squinted tightly shut before blinking open. He looked to his left, relieved to see Kyo as he managed to sit up while holding his head. He then looked to Kaidan, then Liara, finally at Miranda to which he sighed in disappointment. Over him, Kaidan moved to loom closer while keeping his arms crossed and his hazel eyes narrowly fixated.

“Who are you?” asked the Major. The question was simple enough and was on everyone’s mind, including Kyo’s.  Shiro only looked around the room again as he tried to figure out a way to answer it.

“I…” He paused, having to cough several times to clear the unused throat. He then looked to Kyo before back at Kaidan. “They called me Hunter in Cerberus, but I prefer Shiro. That’s what Kyo has been calling me, but that doesn’t matter. Who I am isn’t of any importance right now.”  The accent was clearly from Europe on Earth, around England from Kaidan’s guess. It had a clear and proper tone with enough deepness to be from a young quiet man in his early 20’s. However, the answer wasn’t at all what Kaidan was looking for.

“Fine, then what are you? Miranda ID’ed you as Ex-Cerberus and the lab we found you in…”

“That doesn’t matter either. You want to know if I can help you find Shepard and the answer is yes.”

“Straight to the punch, huh?” Kaidan uncrossed his arms and leaned over. “If you’re toying with me, I’ll toss you out the airlock first chance I get. Tell me where Shepard is.”

“I can’t.”

“Why not?”

“Because I don’t know, exactly. I just know he’s alive and I can help you find him.” Stirring from her bed, Miranda sat up.

“Don’t…Don’t trust him,” she muttered as she held onto her side in obvious pain. “He wants to kill Shepard. He was…He was used for Project Lazarus.” Looking over, Shiro shot another nasty glare at the injured woman.

“Is that true, Shiro? You want to kill Shepard?” Kaidan asked, but was looked at as Shiro then shook his head.

“No, I want to save him.”

“So, she’s lying then?”

“Misinformed.”

“On?” Sighing, the white haired male realized that short answers weren’t going to stop Kaidan’s insistent line of questioning. Moving to stand, Shiro gratefully used Kyo as a crutch. Despite only knowing each other for all of five minutes, they already seemed to have bonded deeply and trusted one another. It was confusing to watch as Kyo doted over his relatively new friend as Shiro’s guard dropped from deathly stares to a warm sense of acknowledgement and thankful smiles. Once on his own two feet, the ex-Hunter then looked at Kaidan.

“Miranda only knows what the Illusive Man told her and what the databanks she was allowed to see said.” A hand then moved to brushed back the long strands of overgrown sliver hair from the dark-skinned face.  “It’s true that I was the prototype for Project Lazarus. They used my implants as the basis in bringing Shepard back to life. My DNA runs through his veins just enough for the implants that are tailored to my physiology to work but…”

“But?” Kaidan asked while trying to both believe what he was being told as well as process all the new information. Shiro took a moment to gather his thoughts as he looked off to the side before speaking again.

“But I wasn’t forced or captured to do it,” he finally spoke while closing his eyes. “I volunteered.” Kaidan’s eyes widened in disbelief as did Liara’s. In fact, the only one who didn’t seem to be surprised was the Sergeant.

“Why…Why would you do that?” the Major asked, taking a step forward to get a better look at the face which stood nearly as the same height as his own, making Kyo the shortest human male of the group. It took Shiro an even longer moment than before to answer the question.

“The Collectors needed to be stopped and only Shepard could do that. Besides…I…” There was a pause as he looked away for a moment, seemingly lost in thought before he turned the green orbs back to Kaidan. “The Reapers needed to be stopped. That’s all I needed and if you want him back, you’ll have to help me. I can sense that he’s alive but I can’t get a fix on the signal. It’s being blocked. I need something to boost my own in order to pinpoint his current location.” Stepping in Liara, fustratedly began to become part of the conversation.

“And how to you propose we do that? We don’t even know what you are!” Shiro then focused his gaze to the Asari.

“I need to go to Rannoch. I can interface with the Geth technology that’s still on the planet. They have many hubs still there with working signal boosters.”

“But the Geth are dead,” Kyo said as he moved closer to his friend’s side. “That EMP took out all Synthetics, Reapers and the rest.”

“Doesn’t mean that what they built doesn’t still work. The Quarians can help us.” Kaidan continued his strong lingering look of annoyance as his cold expression gave away his feelings of mistrust, however, the sigh that was allowed to escape from his lips was just enough for the black eyebrows to relax. What choice did he have at this point? So far, this entire runaround was to awake this potentially deadly ex-Cerberus agent with biotic powers that were off the charts, who also had the unexplained ability to both sense Shepard’s location and interface directly with VI programs.

“Fine. Joker?”

“Yeah, Kaidan?”

“Set a course for Rannoch. Try to call Tali before we reach the destination.”

“Aye, aye.”

“As for you, Shiro…” Shiro looked away from Kyo just long enough to acknowledge that the Major was speaking to him. While Kaidan did have a lot to say to the young man, the physically biting of his bottom lip held in the wave of ranting that crowded his throat.

“Just…stick with Kyo. Sergeant, don’t let him out of your sight.”

“Sure thing,” Kyo shrugged before giving a smile to his awakened new partner. “Come on, Shiro. I’ll show you to our quarters.”  Turning back to the Singer, Shiro gave a nod and followed behind as he was led out surprisingly by his hand. The soft green eyes met the piercing hazel ones of the Major only briefly in passing before neither one of them could stand looking at each other anymore. This didn’t take more than a few seconds for this to occur. It seemed that everyone had split off into pairs in some way or another. Vega and Cortez remained in the shuttle bay and armory, while the Quarian siblings found a familiar refuge in the engine room. Joker and his bottle of scotch settled in for the long trip toward the Quarian homeworld in the cockpit. The Major himself went to return to his room with Liara following closely behind, while Kyo and Shiro went to the crew quarters.

Inside the bunk-bedded room, Kyo tossed his helmet on a bottom mattress in the far back before starting the process of finally taking off the rest of his armor. It was rather unique looking with mechanically-jointed combat boots, all painted over in a candy shine shade of dark crimson.  Underneath the chest piece, he wore a simple formfitting black t-shirt, which also proved that his body wasn’t mostly made up of bulky material. While slim, he was surprisingly athletic for someone who wasn’t in the military since before the invasion.  A pair of guns were also put down; the first was a scope-modified N7 Paladin pistol which came standard with the N7 Paladin armor set and the second was a modified Reegar Carbine shotgun.  Shiro seemed interested in the scoped pistol, not taking Kyo for a sharpshooter.

“We can head down the armory if you need to be outfitted for combat. I…uh…just sort of threw on you whatever was lying around. Beats you being naked,” Kyo laughed a bit as he sat down to look upon Shiro as if he were inspecting him before taking the ex-Agent’s hand to pull him closer. Shiro stumbled a bit as he walked forward, not really sure what to make of the situation.



“Ah, I don’t wear heavy armor, so something light will work better,” the dark man said as he looked upon the Sergeant.

“Maybe change is good? You don’t really want people to recognize you, right? Though, you have a hard face to forget.” While it sounded cruel, Shiro understood what Kyo meant. Pulling his fingers away, he then tugged at his overgrown long white ponytail.

“Not many people have seen my face since I joined Cerberus…and my hair was shorter. “ Kyo just snickered, moving over as Shiro sat down.

“Well, you’re not WITH Cerberus anymore. Those bastards…”

“Yes, I was linked to the mainframe when they turned as they did. I couldn’t do much to stop it once the Reapers invaded. You really saved my life back there.” Kyo found himself locked on the green eyes before he forced himself to look away and only offering a small shrug.

“It’s not a big deal. Guess we should rest up for Rannoch and you should to. You’re stumbling around like a baby deer still.” Shiro just laughed at that, but gave a nod as Kyo stood up to move his things to the top bunk.

“Rest here. If you need me, I’ll be, you know, up there.” He then gave a playful point upward before scrambling up into the bed. Watching Shiro moved to lay down and stared up while on the top bunk, Kyo had rolled onto one of his side. In the Captain’s quarters, Kaidan seemed to be trying to avoid Liara, who insisted on following him.

“What do you want, T’Soni?” He turned to stop her just outside of the Captain’s quarter’s door with his body blocking the entrance. Surprised, Liara gathered her words carefully.

“I…just want to speak in private. That’s all, Kaidan. I assure you.” She caught that she was being glared at, but the Major seemed too tired to fight her.

“Fine…” There was a grumble from the man in front of her as he shifted his body away from the entryway. As the door closed on its own behind them, she paused for a minute to watch Kaidan remove Shepard’s old jacket and toss it to the sofa. A light snicker arose from her throat as she shook her head.

“You really have picked up his bad habits, haven’t you?”

“And you’re treading on thin ice with memories you shouldn’t have. What do you want?” Looking hurt, Liara sighed.

“Not every memory I have of Shepard came from you, Kaidan.” Another glare was shot in her direction.

“The fact is that you shouldn’t have any of my memories, but we’re not going to talk about that. Again, what do you want?” Liara sighed, looking away as she rubbed her chin in thought.

“I wanted to talk to you about our mysterious guest. I ran some readings that I thought you would like to know about; cross referenced some of my Broker files with the Cerberus agent, Hunter.” Pulling up her omni-tool screen, Liara gave it a few taps. “It looks like it’s a term that has been used for nearly twenty years now. My guess is that there have been several Hunters based on the age of the one we have. Killed in action, maybe? Retired?”

“Yeah, we know how you retire from Cerberus,” Kaidan said as he took a seat at the corner desk in the room to do some work on his own at the terminal there. He was intentional looking for something to occupy both his hands and eyes. Liara remained silent for a moment, taking noticed that she was being isolated before speaking again.

“Yes, it’s possible that the new Hunters would kill the former ones as they are an expert at tracking down Cerberus defectors. Scans show heavy modification on even a genetic level and it seems that his appearance may be due to his biotic nature. Perhaps it’s a form of albinism; Loss of pigmentation in the hair and eyes, yet he retains his natural skin tone. We have similar variations in both Asari and humans, who are the most genetically diverse creatures we’ve encountered. As you know, Humans require heavy modification to even use biotic powers.”

Kaidan looked up, annoyed at her dismissive tone about Human Biotics. “Yeah, I get that he’s a freak, Liara. Is there anything useful?” The Asari then shook her head.

“Sadly, even my data is very incomplete. Hardly anyone who may have seen him is left alive. He’s very close to a male version of the Phantoms we’ve encountered; possibly predating Kai Leng himself. Perhaps they were built to his standard.”

“But the Phantoms were saw were zombies and Kai Leng was a loyal dick, so why leave his mind intact?”

“They only recently did that to their own agents, Kaidan. Otherwise, many were like Miranda; working independently on orders. Also, his ability to interface with machines is…”

“Creepy?”

“I was going to say fascinating.”

“Creepy is a better way to put it and it’s not like he’s offering any sort of explanation. Forcing one out of him might hinder our search.”

“Agreed…” The silence that overcame them was suffocating before Kaidan turned his back towards the woman.

“Well, I’m going to get some shut eye and you should do the same.”

“…Right.” Turning to leave, Liara gave a second chance glace behind herself to see if Kaidan would even hint at wanting her to stay, but to no surprise, he did not. Her hopeful expression faded and she moved out of the doors to leave the Major by himself. Kaidan let out a grateful sigh afterward, removing his own t-shirt and tossed it to the jacket. He really had started to pick up Shepard’s messy habits it seemed as he was the one who was always picking up thrown about datapads, clothing and random empty bottles or food cartons. Resisting the urge to go hang up both the jacket and shirt, he decided to belly flop onto the mattress instead, curling himself around an armful of pillows and blankets to sleep.

The lights dimmed on their own after roughly 30 minute of non-activity from the room. Kaidan had passed out more quickly than usual, his face half buried into a white pillow as he lay on his side while still wearing his pants. Somewhere between lying down and a few hours later, his body subconsciously kicked off the militant boots and wrapped up like a burrito in the middle of the bed.  He didn’t even hear the doors opening and closing as someone else walked in. The messy dark hair shifted as a pair of invisible fingers ran through the locks and down an exposed sideburn. The cheek’s skin was clean-shaven as usual, allowing for the stealthed fingers to easily glide down it.  It was a warm feeling, causing Kaidan to shift in his sleep. The hand pulled away briefly, staying at a distance before hesitantly reaching down again.

Suddenly, Kaidan’s arm shot up, grabbing the unseen wrist and threw the body to the bed. He held it there, pinning it down with both physical and biotic force. The hidden figure struggled at first but stopped as it seemed to stare up at Kaidan.  “Who are you?” There was no answer and only a slight struggle again, but it couldn’t break the hold.

“Answer me!”

“…Kaidan.” The Major froze, recognizing the muffled voice right away. Seizing an opportunity, the figure broke an arm free and put a hand over Kaidan’s face. There was a blinding white flash before Kaidan was able to see again. Still on the bed, he looked down to see Shepard underneath him, clear as day.

“…What the?”

“Can I get up now?” The Commander smirked as Kaidan moved to sit onto his knees  while holding his head in disbelief.

“…Am I dreaming?”

“Probably.”