The Convict

Chapter 5: The Convict

"Attention on deck!" came the voice of the Space Momma as I leaned back and lifted my visor to check some weld work. 

I could practically hear Engineer Kenneth Donnelly's sphincter clench in reactionary fear. I get it bro. Used to feel the same way whenever I spotted the cops. Now that I'm a giant space lizard man addicted to violence and the pursuit of its greater application, I'm more afraid for those poor officers encountering me than of them. 

"Shepard." I greeted the intensely staring redhead and paused my work flow. 

"Ma'am." Donnelley came to attention, his lips quivering like a good kid with caught red handed. 

"EDI, check yourself for latency issues. At some point during this un-approved restock and retrofit, you'd think an AI would have noticed and alerted me." Shepard addressed the AI like a disappointed parent fixing her green eyed gaze on me. 

Ha! Good luck. My face is thicker than any Young Master's. Your scorn rolls off me like water of a duck's back faster than the sparking of flint on steel. 

"Don't get your panties in a twist." I waved off her concern, "EDI's smart enough to know better than to stop a guy when he's killing two Turians with one Volus." 

"Macabre, and out of line." Commander Shepard denied flatly, "This may not be an Alliance vessel, but my position as commanding officer remains. This is my ship, and my approval is required for any changes made to it. There are procedures to these things for a reason, and everyone on this ship will follow them." 

"The Turian had his hands on the main guns before you even knew he was out of the med bay, and if you believed in everyone following procedures, you'd have never followed Seren to Illos." I countered, wax on wax off hypocriticism style, "Sides, the cargo bay, like all ships based on Turian design, was pretty much an afterthought and a gaping vulnerability for the Normandy. Structural bracing that serves as the framework for vertical storage." I knocked my fist on the steel strut I'd been grinding my welding game on most recently, "Frees up the space I need to service my needs." 

"The Normandy is already fitted for taking care of the needs of the crew, Krogan included." Shepard explained patiently, "We planned on recruiting Okeer for this mission from the start." 

"Yeah, well, I handed that cook you got from Cerberus my dietary needs and Chef Dickhead told me to fuck off." I informed her and gestured to the huge refrigerator freight box hogging up space in the cargo bay, "I am a very thoughtful krogan, so I secured my own food needs instead of ripping the bastard's spine out his ass. I figured this would be easier to forgive than that."

"I'll be speaking to Mess Sergeant Gardner about this, but you did a whole lot more than that, and have taken a quarter of the Cargo Bay without approval." Commander Shepard said with a frown on that perfect face of hers.

"I noticed a glaring lack of exercise facilities on this ship." I growled out "I fixed that oversight, and will soon raise up a temple of iron in which to forge my body of twisted steel and sex appeal. Got a set up for gunsmithing too. Jacob's 'armory' was little more than a showroom. Once I get all that set up, I can add more gun on your gun, and more chest to my chest while we are between missions."

Shepard looked around at everything I'd piled into the cargo bay and frowned, "How the hell did you get all that?" 

"The meme that all successful business people are lizards is true!" Zaeed called out across the engineering deck, the man tucked away in his little recycling station hidey hole setting up all his mementos of a life lived running the edge, "Kid wheeled and dealed with the scum of the galaxy like they were all old friends. Fucker could sell a fur coat to a lion." 

"I've just got that energy." I smiled, the expression feeling natural, and from what I could tell last time I looked at a recording from my omnitool, looked natural too. 

"And you EDI, what do you have to say for yourself." Shepard switched verbal battle fields.

"Krogan psychological evaluations show a strong trend of territorialism and need for independence." EDI's smooth voice played out from a nearby speaker, "By allowing Grunt to make improvements to a section of the ship that he correctly described as an 'afterthought and a vulnerability' that you would likely approve of without express permission, he could channel his natural tendencies in a positive direction and form a stronger connection to the ship and the mission."

Egad! Did the ship cancer just call me a basic bitch? Good thing I have multiple hearts because touché, bitch. I live to plot revenge another day. 

"EDI, run judgment calls dealing with squad mates by me from now on." Shepard ordered the shackled AI, "As for what's being done on this level, send me a White Paper that explains everything proposed and how it will impact the usefulness of the cargo bay."

"I have documentation ready." EDI answered. 

"If you're having heartburn, just take me out on the next mission." I assured the Commander while rolling one of my shoulders, "I'll show you that all this is worth it." 

"Next op isn't combat oriented." Shepard shook her head, "Illusive Man has us picking up the next recruit from the Purgatory Space Station. All the legwork is already done."

"Hahaha." I laughed, "So we'll be blowing up a space station next. I really might be in love with you, Space Mamma."

"I need to go." the Commander hit me with her tried and true line. 

I went back to work with Donnelly, happily keeping busy. Idle hands are the devil's playthings. With my strength and his eye for detail we knocked out a good section of the bay and used a floating loader to stack and lock crates of resources, supplies, and equipment along a layout organized by EDI. It freed up a substantial amount of space in the previously poorly optimized storage space. I'd soon have more than just my kitchen set up, and I can barely wait.

I didn't plan to simply grow into my mature strength, I want gains and I know the way. I'm entering puberty, a period of rapid growth and powerful hormones not just for human's, but for Krogan too. With proper diet and exercise I can put on an extra lean kilo of muscle mass a week easily. Giant space lizard man muscle is some powerful shit. The amount of horsepower per kilo gained is nigh best in class for the setting, if not the best. I have every intention of settling that debate once and for all in the future. Fisticuffs style. 

The Commander's order to suit up came twenty minutes before estimated docking time at the super max space station known as Purgatory. The Blue Suns mercenary company repurposed an agricultural ark ship used for mass transport of animals into a prison facility. They get paid top dollar too, as their security forces send captured violent criminals to the station and then threaten to release them in undisclosed locations at undisclosed times should their homeworlds not pay up, while also providing housing for political prisoners. They'd maximized the already profitable private prison system and I hate them for it. For profit incarceration is evil. This reckoning shall be biblical. 

I loaded up my bitch breaker shotgun, and an M-96 Mattock rifle I'd picked up from my Quarian buddy's shop. A colonial favorite, the heavy rifle just needed a little tinkering with the trigger and safety to be turned full auto and a muzzle break to reduce climb. I'd thrown on a second under-barrel grip because Mass Effect guns are thicker than Snickers and you can't clamp down for proper precision firing. After sighting in the range finding scope taken from my Mantis rifle, I walked away with a much better long range system. Swapping the Predator pistol for the beefy boy Carnifex required no extra work to serve as an upgrade, but we'd get there as soon as time permitted. 

Purgatory only allowed us a three man visitors permit, so Shepard and I teamed up with the facially wrecked Turian, Garrus Vakarian, his neck still sporting a thick compression bandage, but his face mostly recovered, at least, what was left of his face. Guy was always ugly anyways. Slapped some blue war paint on and I could hardly tell the difference. 

The trouble started at go with a security team demanding we hand over our weapons right out of the airlock. The Turian door man flinched when the Commander pulled her pistol and offered to relinquish a bullet wherever he wanted it. The prison warden arrived, another Turian, this one without a helmet, or warpaint, subjecting us to the full Turian facial horror show and hitting us with the 'Standard Procedure' dog and pony show. Up yours, corpo stooge. The only thing I cared about was the red stock sticking out over his shoulder. A M-76 Revenant machine gun. Man has taste to make up for his lacking good sense. 

"I'm not surrendering my guns. Period." The Commander calmly informed him and the Turian lowered his gaze, contemplating. 

"Let them proceed." He tilted his head back towards the hallway, "Our facility is more than secure enough to handle three armed guests. We're bringing Jack out of cryo. As soon as the funds clear, you can be on your way. If you'll follow me to Out-processing for the pick up, Commander." 

"Let's go." Shepard agreed and got the procession moving. 

I grinned under my helmet at the Turian leading the door team. 

"Be seeing you soon, boy." I nodded to him, and knocked him on his ass with my shoulder, causing everyone to stop and stare at me, tension thick, "Hehehe." I chuckled darkly.

"Keep your Krogan on a tight leash Commander, there's no need to make this transaction go poorly." Warden Kuril cautioned falsely. 

"Keep things civil, Grunt." Shepard stared me down for a moment then moved on.

"Fucking asshole." the scumbag I'd knocked over growled as he got back to his feet behind us. 

The Warden narrated our path through the facility, explaining the means and methods of the Purgatory and answering Shepard's questions as we watched large robotic arms shifting the small individual cells around, sending some back into isolation, while bringing others out for recreation, or for a beat down from the guards. I admired the man's efficiency despite my contrary philosophy. Criminal correction is a legitimate task of government, not business, but that doesn't mean there aren't pros and cons. 

"Jack is the meanest handful of violence and hate I've ever encountered." Warden Kuril answered when questioned about the woman we came to recruit, "Dangerous, crazy, and very powerful. You'll see soon enough."

"Just the kind of woman we need." I tagged on at the end. 

Shepard nodded then told the Turian to keep moving. 

Kuril separated from us claiming to need to check that the funds cleared and indicating to the Out-processing office just down the hall. 

"Reminds me of my days back with C-Sec." Garrus commented on a Turian in one of the cells that were moved during our walk over, furiously beating a human prisoner while another Turian guard watched on. 

"This degrades you as much as him." Shepard persuaded after commenting on the inexcusable nature of beating unarmed prisoners. 

Within just a few verbal exchanges she had the onlooker radio for the attacker to stop, for now. 

The human in the next cell over called out to us, begging for us to buy him until he found out we were here for Jack. He kindly explained that the guy getting the ass whooping offed someone in the showers the day prior, and we left him to his business standing in an empty metal box. We passed by another prisoner, the last in the hallway, the Human happy to talk with just the voices in his head, sparing us any more of the Commander's curiosity. We crossed through a sterile grey room with eight large desks and a man working a terminal just passed the door telling us to go through the door at the far side of the room, which opened to reveal a cell. 

"Hehehe." I chuckled again at the reveal of the double cross, my armor activating foucault current Fortification and projecting my orange holographic Tech Armor.

"Maybe I can change your mind." Shepard offered Kuril after he explained our value as prisoners.

"Activate sytems!" Kuril shouted and the Blue Suns stormed the room armed and ready, or so they thought. 

Not ready for us, but then who is? We are a legendary crew in the making, capable of fighting off the worst odds in the galaxy again and again. These brave warriors are just fresh glory to us. I raised my hand and a trio of electrical surges blasted out of the armor of three of the four mercenaries that came in shooting, popping their shields and shocking their nervous systems. They spasmed helplessly and Garrus and Shepard didn't miss the chance to end them, both putting three round bursts into heads with M-15 Vindicator rifles. My smart choke compensated for the distance, and the Turian squad leader fell to the floor in two burning pieces, his entire belly blown away by the full explosive incendiary payload of my souped up Claymore shotgun. The last guy went down in another shot, full shields popped, armor rent, and flesh destroyed in one pull of the trigger. I charged across the room and laughed as I stabbed the next Blue Suns Turian through the door with my bayonet over and over. 

"Not combat oriented!" I barked out as I turned my gun and put down another Human with one shot, "Legwork already done!"

"Who could have predicted that the slaver scumbag running this prison would betray us?" Garrus chuckled as he reloaded his rifle.

"Just keep yucking it up." Shepard grumbled as she blew the head plate through the ass end of a FENRIS mech, a dog like robot with a powerful taser in the round head unit, "You two should start a traveling comedy show. You're so funny."

"Thanks!" I called out as I stomped a second unit underfoot and dropped another triple Overload on the Mercs trying to take down my shield with assault rifle fire and Overloads of their own. 

"You didn't bring enough men!" I shouted in triumph as the three of us put them down in a brief application of precision shooting. 

The Blue Suns kept coming out of the facility, but the simply hallway structure of the station gave them no option ot flank us, running head on into a series of shoot out with us. Warden Kuril made a big mistake when he tried to capture Lord Death of Murder Mountain and his friends. We'd ripped and teared our way through this place almost as fast as a Doom Slayer through a hell horde despite the limit of only bringing three people aboard the station. I had yet to drop shields as I constantly pressed forward basking in the warm orange glow of my tech armor and incendiary ammunition, the dying screams of man and xenos playing out again and again with each new corridor. Shepard and Garrus walked behind me in the garden of my turbulence.

"Let's just get Jack out of cryo and get off this damn station." Shepard gruffed as she stepped over the body of a white garbed technician and worked the console to free Jack in next room viewable below from an observation deck. 

"Gonna release all the prisoners at once." Garrus commented as she hacked her way through the security.

"Good." I grinned under my helmet, stoked about the way my day has gone so far and eager for more. 

I'll admit the slow and elaborate release of Jack into the open was pretty neat, and I could feel Rick Sanchez making fun of me for enjoying it. Too bad I now lacked the fingers required to hold up the peace between worlds sign for him. The ultimate human biotic rose up from the floor locked into to a restraining system, and rapidly defrosted. The bald woman wearing little more than tattoos and pasties up top started tearing the security restraints right off her and immediately launching a furious assault of flashing blue mass effect bending power at the trio of emergency YMIR mechs in the room. She hit the mechs like the cannons of a frigate, blowing them apart in an awesome showing of personal might. 

"A thousand credits says she never spikes this high again." I offered as we looked down on her blowing through the walls of the station to continue her rampage.

"Fool's bet." Garrus declined, "She is riding high on a supreme level of adrenaline after getting taken off ice. Still damn impressive even if she is only half as powerful in normal circumstances."

"We have to follow her." Shepard ordered the squad as she headed for the door, "We can't afford her killing herself by biting off more than she can chew."

"Looks like she can chew a lot." I commented as we followed in the wake of her destruction, twisted metal and fire everywear she passed. 

The station VI kept us updated on the deaths of thousands of prisoners as sections of the space prison tore open and depressurized. Warden Kuril tried to get some semblance of order going on the intercom, but he was out of his mind thinking he could put down a prison riot and our mission at once. Hell, we could have fought our way out of here without the riot.

Then I saw the riot.

The game did not prepare me for the wonderland of hundreds of psychotic criminals trying to overpower the Blue Suns guards. The YMIR mech at the end of the room was turning them into hamburger meat with heavy machinegun fire and they still kept coming forward, picking up the guns dropped by their dead comrades like a line of Russians in WW2. We started taking pot shots at the mech while it went to work, and clearing this area was simultaneously easier and far nastier than it had been in the game. We didn't have nearly as intense a fight despite the increased numbers involved, but I had to thank God for the improvements to footwear traction made in the hundred and sixty years between my death and rebirth. The blood in the room was up to my ankles, and if I had to navigate this space tomb in my crocs I'd end up taking a dip in the drink. I'd never been into gorenography, but I'm sure this scene could go up with the worst of it. My lizard brain just made me hungry. That was a lot of red meat we were trekking through. My salivating tongue didn't stop me from nabbing a quick 1,500 credits from a dead merc with an unlocked chit while Shepard cracked a wall safe for even more.

We opened the door leaving the slaughter house behind only to jump right into a charnel house as Warden Kuril himself sporting a weakly glowing blue Tech Armor gunned down some convicts with a precision hosing of high velocity slugs from his M-76 Revenant. One handed. The man had obviously paid for all the bells and whistles as the gun vastly outperformed the one Shepard would pick up on the Collector Ship, and the less said about the hot garbage she would find in ME3 the better. Few guns could make me feel envious while I carry my custom M-300 Claymore. Kuril's gun was one of them. I'd soon be fixing that.

Kuril and his men stood on an elevated walkway with full cover railing, giving them the high ground and a hard position, supported by three heavy shield pylons in the center of the room providing shield amplification and rapid recharge to the Blue Suns mercenaries. Kuril supported his men with suppressing fire that rapidly tore down my shields. 

"Get some!" I yelled as I sent a triple Overload to the towers and started blasting, not with my shotgun or rifle, but with an Elenus Risk Control M-100 Grenade Launcher. Automatic fire at a hundred rounds a minute, I bombarded the Blue Suns for twelve seconds, throwing them around despite the excessive shielding while Shepard and Garrus hit the pylons with rocket launchers. 

Glorious carnage filled my vision, fire and explosions, screams and gunfire. I charged the ramp to my enemies in a red haze of rage, Kuril directing a stream of fire from his gun that failed to bring me down as I cleared another thermal clip through my Claymore. I shoulder slammed the heavily armored Turian into the wall striking him with a windmill of lefts and rights to keep him there. The wily bastard ignited an omni-blade on his right hand, something that had fallen out of use prior to the swarms of husks in ME3, and tried to sink it into me. Even in the grips of the blood rage I saw it coming and caught his wrist in the steel vice of my grip, forcing the razor sharp glowing hot blade against the metal wall of the station, driving the Turian back with a headbutt. He struggled feebly against my massive strength as I continued the punches till his shields broke. As soon as they came down, I lit up my own omni-blade and showed him exactly why you always wear a helmet in combat. All that impressive armor he wore to keep himself safe, and he left his head exposed. Better luck in your next life, chump. A razor sharp superheated point rammed right through his temple, and out the other side, instant kill. 

I didn't have the time to hack the guy's likely loaded credit chit as the Purgatory Space Station exploded around us, so I grabbed his expensive gun and threw him over my shoulder, leading the charge back to our ship where we found Jack having a freak out about the Cerberus logo on it. The bald woman with her prison jumpsuit worn down around her waist paced back and forth, seething, and Shepard shot a Batarian charging the distracted woman who apparently didn't know enough about combat to turn on his shield generator. Kuril had my respect for leading these morons as effectively as he did.

"What the hell do you want?" the near topless tattooed woman growled.

"You're in a bad situation. We're here to get you out of it." Shepard answered calmly. 

"Shit, you sound like a pussy." Jack countered and resumed her pacing. 

I stopped them right there by walking forward.

"I got this, Space Momma." I renegade interrupted, "I speak prison bitch."

"The fuck you just say!" Jack shouted while flaring her eyes at me with blue biotic power. 

Pretty hot.

"I like you. I want you. I am going to have you. We can do this the easy way or the hard way. The choice is yours, but the answer is yes." I quoted the scariest mother fucker ever to grace the Kentucky prison system.

"Fuck you!" Jack answered while she swung a glowing blue punch that took a solid chunk of my shields down.

Too bad for her she was in arm's reach and I had her up and over my other shoulder faster than she could react, a firm grasp on that delicious booty.

"Let's go!" I shouted as she put up token resistance, the power dynamic established, "Don't worry, we aren't a Cerberus team, fucking obviously." I explained to the psychotic biotic, "They just crew our ship and pay us to fight Humanity's war against the Collectors. They'll be paying you too, but if you don't want that dirty Cerberus money your new Lizard Daddy is happy to take it for you."

As we pulled into the air lock of the Normandy, Jack looked at the Commander and said something that would make me smile even years later.

"You gonna watch while your pet Krogan rails me, or are you getting in on this too?"

"Grunt, isn't going to be railing you." Shepard denied while the airlock opened to let us back onto the ship, "Non-consensual sexual activity will not be tolerated on my ship."

"Whatever girl scout," Jack flippantly insulted one of the most badass women in space while I carried her to the elevator, "I'm off to get fucked like a real woman."

I am pretty sure I heard the pilot, Joker, snap a vertebrae doing a spit take.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Thus renews the greatest pairing in fanfiction history. 

I'm considering a return to GoT, specifically HotD, after reading some GothicJedi content and others that have recently cropped up with the restored interest in the wake of Season 2. Send my your thoughts. 

You can support me and my family at 

ko-fi.com/jmanm