Garrus Vakarian

And…there. If my calibrations are correct, the accuracy of the Thanix have improved by 3.17%. I grab the collar of my armor and roll my neck to alleviate the stiffness and ache that had started to make its presence known. How long have I been working on this algorithm? Too long, I'd say. I check the time, it's 7:04, so I've been standing here all through the night cycle. I'd say I deserve a meal break, not that it's something to look forward to. The dextro-rations Cerberus was kind enough to provide for me, though providing the necessary nourishment I need, leaves something to be desired in flavor.

When I walk down the walkway from the Battery, I notice some of the Cerberus crew crowding around the table, gambling maybe? Engineer Donnelly regularly organizes Skillian- five poker games and lost 500 credits to Shepard in one of them. I've been invited to join in before, Donnelly seemed genuine in his offer but I could tell the other Cerberus officers were less keen to have me around. They were polite enough to pretend they wanted me to join as well, so to spare them any discomfort I declined.

"Play another one!" I heard someone say, probably goading a friend to raise the stakes.

"Ah, okay, just one more." I perk up at the sound of her voice. She's playing poker? Everything this girl does is a surprise. First coming out of the ice, punching Shepard, beating Jack, and pulling a hat trick on Miranda during their sparring match… I've got to see how she'll surprise us all next and when I push through the crowd, I'm not disappointed. In her delicate five-fingered hands she held a homemade looking wooden object with strings that looked similar to an aulos, a string instrument from Palavan.

"This is a song from a TV show Jupiter and I would watch and we could really relate to it so we only had to change a few parts." She smiled wistfully as she looked back at the memory.

"If you're evil and you're on the rise,
you can count on the five of us, taking you down.
Cuz' we're good and evil never beats us,
we'll win the fight, and then go out for pizzas!

We are the Sailor Scouts,
we'll always save the day.
And if you think we can't, we'll,
always find a way. That's why the people,
Of. This. World, believe in:

Mercury, Venus, Mars… Jupiter and Sailor Moon!

If you could only know
what we really are.
When we arrived on Earth,
from out beyond your star.
We were amazed to find
your beauty and your worth,
and we will protect your kind, and we will protect your Earth.
And we will protect your Earth!
And we will protect you!

I will fight for the place where I'm free.
To live together and exist as me.
I will fight in the name of the Moon Kingdom!
And everything that I believe in.
I will fight for the world I was born in!
The Earth is everything I've ever known.

The odds are against us,
it won't be easy, but
we're not gonna do it alone!

We, are the Sailor Scouts!
We'll always save the day!
And if you think we can't, we'll,
always find a way.
That's why the people, of, this, world,
believe in:

Mercury, Venus, Mars,.. Jupiter and Sailor Moon."

She smiled when she was done but it didn't reach her eyes which had begun to shine with emotion. The Cerberus Crew didn't seem to notice as they clapped when she finished singing her song of friends long lost. Maybe I'm the only one who can see it because I've seen it so often in my own reflection since Omega. I see the faces of Erash, Monteague, Mierin, Grundan Krul, Melanis, Ripper, Sensat, Vortash, Butler, and Weaver in my head. I see their slaughtered bodies strewn about the room, blood of orange, red, blue… of all differing species mingling together... Then I see Sidonis' face… I take a deep breath to calm myself before my rage threatens those standing, oblivious, around me. His time will come, he can't hide forever.

"So there are four others like you?" Engineer Daniels' voice brings me out of revenge fueled reverie.

"Actually there are 13 in the Solar System. Sailors Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter and I protect the Earth and inner system from threats within the system. Sailors Ceres, Pallas, Juno, and Vesta guard the middle of the system along the asteroid belt and Uranus, Neptune, Saturn, and Pluto protect the system from threats outside our system. There's also Sailors from beyond our system and, I assume, they have a similar structure in protecting their own home worlds.

Within each of us is a Star Seed that grants us the powers of our native planets but we don't fully realize our powers until around puberty… well, puberty plus a traumatic experience actually, as if normal puberty wasn't traumatic enough. Jupiter would joke that we were X-Men because… you guys don't know what X-Men are, do you? Never mind. Anyway, so if or when we die and our star seed is still within us, then we are reborn and the process starts again."

"Wow, I can't believe no one knows about any of this! You'd think someone would have discovered you guys by now." Daniels said incredulous.

"If your kind is supposed to protect us from threats outside the Sol System, then where were your friends during the First Contact War?" A Cerberus officer shot at Lucy.

She looked stunned at first by the accusatory tone and then seemed to deflate a little. "It's my fault…" she said in almost a whisper. "I'm the leader of the Solar System Sailors, er, I was the leader. After our last mission, I should have been more careful, when I got trapped in the ice… I…I abandoned them. I don't know what's happened to them, if they were able to finish it without me, if they were hurt or killed… If or when they were reborn, they may not have come together to form the team or may not have awakened at all. I don't know, but it's my fault and I'm sorry. I know that although it wasn't a long war with high casualties that a lot of people still lost loved ones because of me. I can't change what I've done but hopefully I can start to make it up to those I've hurt by helping fight the Collectors. I'm going to fight for them and all the friends I've lost, I owe it to them. Even if it means my life, then it's a life well spent because I know that someday I'll meet them again in our next life, when the Collectors are nothing more than an old scary story. I swear I will."

He voice grew stronger as she spoke, by the time she got to the end, her tone conveyed such absolute conviction and authority that it made you want believe in her, her words, in the mission. It made you want to believe that success was nothing less than what we'd achieve. If she and Shepard got together delivered this kind of speech then we'd have half the galaxy following them into hell. I wonder what would have happened if she had lead my team on Omega. I have often thought about what would have happened if Shepard had led them, what he would have done differently, but no matter what he would have done, they would still be alive. He's Shepard after all, savior of the Citadel and I'm just a failed C-Sec officer who couldn't keep 12 people alive.

Officer Vakarian and Lucy, Shepard has requested that you come up to the bridge.

Looks like I won't be eating my rations today. I make my way to the elevator and the Cerberus crowd clears to let Lucy pass to follow me. Once the doors shut in the elevator, I realize we're alone… in silence.

"Ah," I begin "I would ask about your people's history but ah, I think I've already heard good bit about it."

She gives a breathy laugh "Ha yeah, before things got a little personal. Sorry about that." She smiles apologetically.

"hmm, no need. I can ah, empathize with your situation. It's difficult for me to keep my own ah, emotions in check sometimes. I can get a bit… aggressive..." To tell her, as Joker puts it, I "pulled the stick out of my ass and beat people to death with it", might scare her.

When she doesn't say anything, I notice she still has the instrument clutched in her hands. "So where did you get that ah,…" I gesture to it, not sure what to call it in human terms. She looks down at it as if just realizing she had it.

"Oh this? It's a Ukulele, I made it. I found the parts with EDI's help… and uh, Grunt's."

"Grunt? Who is that?"

"Please don't tell Shepard, but It's the tank baby Krogan. Personally I could think of at least 5 more appropriate names…"

"You went to see the Krogan alone?" I interrupted her, shocked. How the hell did she manage to survive that encounter? When Shepard came out after he released it, he said it tried to kill him moments later. "Did he hurt you? How did you even..?" I trailed off, not sure how this even happened.

"No, he didn't hurt me! Grunt is just scared and confused I think. He was technically born yesterday, all he really knows is about killing and whatever else was imprinted on him, and I doubt any of it included Shepard, you, me, this ship… He needs time to adjust. To figure out who he is and who he wants to be."

"Krogan are not known for being that profound."

"That's stereotyping." She frowns "Stereotyping can be hurtful and is only useful for marketing. Everyone is unique and shouldn't be judged based on appearances. We're talking about Grunt here, an individual. An individual who enjoys music, I might add."

"Is that so? That is unusual for a Krogan however I still disagree. A stereotype is formed because it's something generally acknowledged about a person based on past experiences."

"How would you stereotype me?" She challenged.

I looked down at her and thought about it for a moment. She's a human from before the First Contact War yet hasn't shown fear or prejudice against the aliens she's encountered. She wears an outfit with a short skirt, bows, and delicate, little shoes with heels… just everything about her appearance isn't something you'd expect an experienced fighter to wear yet she's fought Shepard, Jack and Miranda and won. I've got it.

"You're a stereotype of a non-stereotype." I say and my mandibles flare in the equivalent of a smile.

She laughs "Touché, Bonnie. Touché."

Just then the elevator doors to the CIC open and we find Shepard at the galaxy map.

"Shepard." I say and he turns to us.

"We've been doing mineral scans and found an anomaly on Capek. EDI discovered a distress signal from the Hahne-Kedar facility and she thinks it's the possible source of a VI virus that caused the MSV Corsica to crash and led Jarrahe Station's internal VI to kill the scientists aboard. I want bring Lucy on this mission and see how she does. Garrus, I'm not expecting a firefight but you know how it usually goes so I need you there too. I know I've been working you a lot lately but I would feel better if I had you there with us to watch our six."

I'm exhausted after being up all night calibrating but Shepard's trust means everything to me so I agree to join the mission. I've gone on missions in worse conditions, I think as I touch the scars on the right side of my face.

"One second!" Lucy shouts as she runs through the doors to the tech room. I only hear the first door hiss open and close so she must be in the small hallway. While she's gone, Jack walks out of the armory happily examining her new hand-cannon. "You guys going on a mission now? Who else is going?" She asks.

As if on cue, the doors hiss open and Lucy comes out wearing the outfit we found her in, though no longer scorched. The torso is white with translucent layered short sleeves that almost look like feathers. In the center of her chest is a large, translucent, icy, blue-green bow pinned with gold brooch adorned with a large, yellow stone in the center. A collar in the same icy colors as the bow flows over her shoulders and forms a v, connecting in the front, behind the brooch as well.

A gold V band frames her waistline and then flares out in a pleated skirt that is white at the top then fades to gold and from gold to icy blue-green. In the back of the skirt is another bow, similar to the one on her chest but with long ribbons streaming down to the backs of her knees. She wears gloves that go up to her wrists and are trimmed in gold. Around her neck is a gold choker with a crescent moon that matches the ones she wears as earrings and the crescent in center of her forehead on a delicate gold tiara. How did she change so quickly?

"Jesus… and I called Miranda the Cheerleader. You're not actually wearing that out on the mission." Said Jack.

"Yes, it's what I always wear." Sailor Moon shrugs.

"Tights?" Jack laughs.

"I wear the required uniform."

"Tights."

"That's enough," Shepard cut them off. "We have a mission to do and a limited amount of time to do it. There's a sandstorm coming in. Sailor Moon, what kind of gun do you usually use?" He asks as he sorts through the gun rack.

"Gun?" She asks confused. "Do finger guns count?" She extends the pointer fingers on both her hands and bends her thumbs, then waves them up and down imitating firing guns. "Pah-pow, safest guns in the galaxy." She smiles.

Jack groans and Shepard frowns, clearly not amused by the joke. "You insist on wearing that outfit instead of using armor and you don't use any firearms. What use are you going to be if you can't defend yourself. I'm starting to have second thoughts about this whole thing."

She opens her mouth to respond but I jump in before she gets the chance to. "Shepard, let's just trust that she knows what she's doing, she's handled everything better than expected so far. I say we see what she can do in the field."

"Either I prove I'm capable or I get killed and I'm no longer your problem. It's a win-win scenario for you, Commander Shepard. Mark Cuban would be jumping at this kind of deal."

Shepard thinks over everything and after a few moments, he nods. "Noted."

…

We find the burning wreckage on Capek, just as the AI had reported. The surface is dry rocky wasteland covered in debris from the crash. When we disembark from the Kodiak, the shuttle VI gives us a status report.

A sandstorm is approaching from the Northwest. Proceed with caution.

We follow Shepard's lead and explore the crash site, looking for clues. Among the debris we find a datapad with the system status reports. Shepard scans through them then moves on. After 15 minutes of combing through the rubble, we made our way to the burning ship. Once there we find a shipping manifest.

"Be on the lookout for any LOKI or YMIR mechs. It seems they had been self-activating on the ship and detonating." Shepard warns.

Hostiles powering up at your location. Recommend immediate extraction.

"Take cover." Shepard commands.

We hunker down behind a stack of crates as LOKI mechs begin to approach.

"Subdue and suppress…Hostiles detected." Their automated voices call out as they begin to fire on us.

Sailor Moon was peeking out from over the crate when Shepard yanked her down. "Get down!" he growls.

I begin picking off mechs with my sniper but they keep coming. "Dropped one!"

"Stay down. Don't get out of cover without my order. Garrus and I will take care of the mechs."

"So… you just want me to sit here and do nothing?" Sailor Moon questions as Shepard picks off two mechs with his pistol.

Together Shepard and I continue to lay on the pressure, leaving the field littered in mech parts but they just keep coming. As I stop to reload I see Sailor Moon is looking out over the crate again, her lips pursed and eyebrows scrunched together. Then she looks down at Shepard as he shoots from the side of the crate. After a moment she seems to make a decision.

I'm reloaded but as I pull up my rifle, a blur of white vaults over the crate. "SHEPARD!" I call out when I realize she's walking, out in the open, toward the firing mechs.

"WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING?" He yells out at her but she doesn't stop.

As she nears the mechs, they continue to fire at us. Wait… they're firing at just us, why aren't they firing at her? A few bullets that get too close to her on their way to us sprinkle on the ground at her feet. She continues to press forward. I peer through my scope, ready to off the mech closest to her, the automatic targeting on my visor locking onto the heat signature. Something is off though. I see her and the mech through my scope but I'm only picking up thermal readings on the mech not… her…It's starting to make sense now! This is why EDI couldn't find her in the vents and just as she did when she was trapped in Miranda's stasis field, she's freezing the air around her. She's created her own kind of kinetic barrier while also cloaking herself from non-organics who can only use thermal readings to see! Clever girl.

She swings her arms around, tiny flakes of snow and ice follow her hands forming a sword in each hand. Casually, she twirls them in her hands as she approaches two mechs, her mouth moving as if she were saying something but my translator doesn't quite pick it all up. She swipes the swords across their necks, "…nonstop pop pop of stainless steel…" she turns and buries one of the swords into the chest of another mech "…I got such a good heart…" she charges at another group of mechs and slashes her swords, sending parts flying. "…I am light so I gots ta win..." She turns around and slices a mech vertically in half "…no matter how many cats I break with, I break who you sending me."

I turn to Shepard, "is she singing?" he looks as confused as I am.

"No, I think she's… rapping?"

"…said FREEZE!..." She continues as she shoves both swords into the torso of another mech with enough force to lift it off the ground. Spinning around with her swords tearing away at the mechs within her reach he bops her head to the beat of her song. "…First we gonna rock, then we gonna.. roll!" A mech head rolls across the ground "…X gon give it to ya, he gon give it to ya…" She kicks another mech back, sending it stumbling "…you against me, me against you, whateva whateva…" She charges back at it swiping her swords up, cleanly removing it's arms "…you wanna fight this?" She kicks it again and knocks it over backwards. When its on the ground she stomps the head in "…fight these tears."

"I'm fine with this, I was kind of tired anyway." I tell Shepard.

He says nothing but continues to watch where the mechs are pouring in from.

"YMIR inbound!" he yells out to her pulling up his assault rifle.

The heavy-duty mech lumbers in, its optics facing our direction, oblivious to Sailor Moon a few meters away from it. She charges toward it as it raises his rocket launcher, locking onto our location.

-FWOOSH-

Ice shoots up beneath her feet, launching her 10 feet in the air, over the hulking mech. She drives the blade straight down through its head and flips back, tucking and rolling as she lands on the ground. "...where my Sailors at?" It would seem I now have to compete to be the most stylish killer. Damn.

The mech jerks and crackles as it begins to short circuit. "You guys going to sit there and do nothing or are we leaving before the storm hits?" she calls out to us. Shepard and I glance at each other then jump out of cover and make a run for the shuttle. The YMIR mech detonates behind us as we jump on the Kodiak where Sailor Moon is waiting.

Once we've lifted off Shepard turns to Sailor Moon. "What the hell was that? We're you trying to get killed?"

"No, I wasn't. But I wasn't going to just sit there and do nothing the whole time!"

"When I give an order, you are to follow it."

"If I had followed your order, then I would have just sat there the whole time and you never would have been able to see that I'm capable of handling myself. You'd never stop babying me and I'd never be of any use to you or the mission!" She countered.

They're both right, in their own way. She should listen to orders but with the short leash Shepard has her on, we would never move past this uncertainty in how she handles what we're up against. Now we know. She's just as worthy of being on the squad as the rest of us.

"Fine. As long as you follow orders from now on, I promise to treat you as an equal member of the squad." Shepard extended his hand to her. She takes it and they shake hands in agreement. "That's all I ask."

Whew! Long chapter! We got some light-hearted fun, a little bit of emotion, the usual sprinkle of humor, and some sword swinging action! What more could you want? Seriously, what more do you want? Message me, write a review. There's approximately 25 of you that decided this story wasn't complete garbage and kept reading past chapter 1. (5x the number of you reading this now didn't feel the same way, I assume this decision was made within the last 2 sentences of chapter 1). I started writing this for me because I just had all these ideas that I thought could be incorporated into ME and I wanted to write them out so I wouldn't forget them, I didn't necessarily care how well it was written just as long as the idea was conveyed for my personal use. Now, because of you and your beautiful soul, I want to make sure that I am doing the story and the characters justice and that my writing conveys my ideas so that they are understood by someone who is not me and has a different perspective. I won't nag you about this anymore (as of 03.14.16 12:23am) because I know it gets annoying fast, so think about it, consider it, and thanks for reading through my rant!

As promised, another Steven Universe song! Fun fact, a lot of Rebecca Sugar's inspiration for SU came from Sailor Moon so there's a lot of connections drawn between them so it's only fitting it play a small role in our story. Plus those songs are just so good.

Also in case you were wondering, the rap she was singing was "X Gone Give It To Ya" by DMX because sometimes when you don't have cool music playing in the background of an action scene, you have to make your own.

An iconic fist-pump in the air as Bender walks across the football field if you caught my Breakfast Club reference. Four for you Glen Coco, you go Glen Coco.