#ruthless shepard

[dalekofchaos]

Fixing Kai Leng

The problem with Kai Leng is Mac Walters desperately tried to convince us that Leng was Shepard's ultimate equal when he could barely hold his own against an aged Anderson and a Drell with terminal cancer and in the end he was a tryhard egdelord that would make Kylo Ren embarrassed.

The solution to this is make Leng deeply connected to Shepard's personal history. Making him be a ghost from Shepard's past with a personal connection would have made this character much better. His backstory could change with whatever your selections are for Shepard.

If you are Earthborn, you are both members of the 10th Street Reds

If you are a Spacer, Leng and Shepard's families served together and Shepard and Leng were childhood friends

If you are a Colonist, Leng was Shepard's childhood friend and was in the rubble with Shepard

If you are a War Hero, Leng was wounded as Shepard held off the Batarians during Elysium. Leng's survival and stand against the Batarians attack on Elysium caught Cerberus' interest.

If you are Sole Survivor, you both survived an ambush on Akuze. Only Leng wasn't taken to be experimented on. Leng was recruited into joining Cerberus for his survival. Cerberus convinces Leng that the Alliance left him for dead and so did Shepard. Leng's sense of betrayal and human supremacy leads him to joining Cerberus

If you are Ruthless, you and Leng slaughtered the Batarians on Torfan without mercy, The sense of ruthlessness inspired Leng's cold hearted exterior and human supremacist beliefs and led him to Cerberus.

Where do we go from here? Replace Jacob with Kai Leng. And the books would be his ventures with Cerberus(but less as a cringe tryhard) Jacob ultimately added to nothing. He's so fucking boring and unlikable and turns into the stereotypical black guy who cheats on you.

Kai Leng's motivation when it comes to Cerberus would be this. I would say he was a young man who wanted to serve the human race and the alliance but when he saw that the politics of the Alliance kept holding him back from doing the right thing or the greater good,  he saw that Cerberus was the only ones helping humanity.

Remove the cyber ninja aesthetic and combine Soldier, Adapt and Engineer to make him a Cerberus super soldier.

As for Kai Leng. A Leng who has personal history with Shepard has potential, plus Leng being indoctrinated with Cerberus human supremacist beliefs, but also somebody with a moral conscience when it comes to the missing human colonists, somebody emotional that you could agree with or understand, contrasting Miranda as a starting squadmate.

Through the course of ME2, he would grow on you as the rest of the squadmates of ME2 did. His loyalty mission would be centered around our background. If we're a War hero, we hunt down the Batarians who survived Elysium. If we are Sole Survivor, we hunt down the Alliance officer who led their squad to Akuze. If we're Ruthless, we deal with Batarians who want revenge for Torfan who plan on giving human hostages to the Collectors. Throughout their talks, Shepard can convince Leng that Cerberus is wrong and eventually Leng's loyalty with Cerberus begins to wavers, especially after TIM sends them to be ambushed in the Collector ship.

Leng started completely loyal to Cerberus, but when he works with Shepard he sees that Cerberus is wrong, but stayed loyal, but also loyal to Shepard. When The Illusive Man asks Shepard to give the base over and when he/she refuses, he asks Leng to force it. This is where Kai Leng finally stands up to Cerberus. Kai Leng all his life, all he wanted to do is serve and protect humanity. He sees that the humans of the Terminus Systems were proceed into becoming a human Reaper and was horrified and when the man he looked up to for years says we should use what killed the humans, he gets the message we should sacrifice humanity and the costs of uplifting humanity. Kai Leng has had enough. He sees through the illusion of Cerberus and with Miranda tells TIM to fuck off and he stays loyal to Shepard.

Between the events of ME2 and ME3, when Shepard betrays Cerberus, they realize that Kai Leng is probably the strongest link between Shepard and themselves, and try to use him against Shepard. Not as lucky as Miranda, TIM does not want to lose Leng so he captures and indoctrinates Leng, making him an agent, and reprogramming his mind to become somebody he was not before, working mindlessly for TIM, as his first lieutenant in combat, much like Bucky Barnes, we have an emotional connection to Kai Leng before seeing him as a villain in ME3.

The first time we'd see Leng in ME3 is on Earth. We see this lead Cerberus Phantom in a unique mask stalking you and Anderson. And as we're leaving Earth, we see Kai Leng killing Anderson. With Shepard swearing revenge.

Throughout ME3, Leng would be stalking Shepard. Causing trouble as we encounter Cerberus. Trying to kill Eve, activating the bomb on Tuchunka and the attempt on the Council.

He would become the same Kai Leng that we all know and hate but we would be able to sympathize with him more.

When we finally confront him in Priority Citadel, we face him and omni-slash his mask off. We get the reveal. Shepard is shocked, Leng hesitates after hearing Shepard utter his name. Maybe in the Cerberus coup on the Citadel, if his loyalty mission was completed in ME2, he would not kill Thane, out of respect of a former squadmate, and regain conscious thought again for a brief moment to spare him. 

It would also help to explain his inexplicable plot armor. Rather than surviving against the onslaught of Shepard due to plot reasons, he would not be killed, as Shepard still sympathizes with him, and doesn't want to kill him, sparing him and letting him escape, or not being able to fully focus, hoping there's a little bit of the real Kai Leng still in there.

Of course this would lead to multiple outcomes towards the end of the game. He could either be recruited back or un-indoctrinated somehow, but for a good plot he would only be able to turn good again and rejoin the squad way too late in the game, maybe in the last third of the game, like Legion in ME2. Bonus points if you can romance him as Femshep, would still make a better romance carrying on to ME3 than Jacob.

Otherwise, he would have to be killed and could not be saved. I don't think that convincing him to commit suicide like Saren or TIM would work, because it would be too similar to the TIM suicide not too long, and would lose impact because of it. He would have to be fought and killed one last time in combat, and have a tragic end most likely.

If we saved Kai Leng, he would've been transported on the beam. Depending on your reputation and war readiness, Leng can break through the indoctrination and kill The Illusive Man or Leng kills himself, which distracts TIM and Shepard shoots The Illusive Man. If Leng broke through and killed TIM, he apologizes for killing Anderson and being unable to control himself. If you were just friends they hug, if they were LI, they kiss. Leng's fate would be either being aboard the Normandy to put Shepard's plaque on the memorial or finding Shepard's body and bringing him back and then we'd get Shepard putting Anderson's plaque on the Normandy.

SO that's how I would've handled Kai Leng. Making him more connected to Shepard and less of a tryhard edgelord that they made him to be in canon.

[membrayne]

me1 rayne </33

[lonesurvivorao3]

Shenko Snippets - Alchera

They’re a hundred feet away from the next escape pod when an explosion rips through the bridge below, shattering it into pieces and violently shaking them.

It’s not about winning.

Kaidan is ahead of her, but he knows she’s stopped running, so he does, too, and turns. Impossibly large chunks of the hull float through the vacuum of space, isolating Joker from any rescue effort. If he’s still alive, and there’s no way to know that.

It’s about being decent.

What’s left of the SR1 strains and keens beneath their feet. Without hesitating, she orders him to go, get himself and the others to safety. Of course she’s going to try and save him.

More importantly, its kind.

An acrid taste fills his mouth, but he nods, mirroring the swift and decisive actions of his wife. It’s the least he can do.

It’s the only thing I can allow myself to be.

After sealing the door, he programmes the navigation system, removes his helmet, staring fixedly through the small round window along with the other six crew members.

Maybe there’s no point to it.

He knows where the closest escape pods are, thinking she’d made all the right moves during the last few months, becoming someone who would no longer be a terrible disappointment to her grandmother, just a few more good moves in the next few minutes.

But this is who I am now.

He sees the strange ship swing back around.

I will stand here, fighting to be kind until I fall.

He sees the beam aiming at the skeleton of the SR1 a second time, in the vicinity of his wife and their pilot.

Until it kills me.

The acrid taste spills from his mouth and onto the grilled floor.

[corpocyborg]

[queen-scribbles]

When the fires, when the fires are consumin' you, and your sacred stars won't be guiding you, I've got blood, I've got blood on my name --- A lovely Lisa Shepard; survivor of Mindoir, scourge of Reapers and batarians, and a damn good shot with a sniper rifle, courtesy of @commander-sarahs-art She looks so~ innocent~ for all the Rage lurking inside her 😇😇

[clericofshadows]

REGIS SHEPARD - 15/??? "Well, what about Shepard? He's a spacer. Lived aboard starships most of his life." "Military service runs in the family. Both his parents were in the navy." "He got most of his unit killed on Torfan." "He gets the job done. No matter what the cost." "Is that the kind of person we want protecting the galaxy?"

[favoriteblogonthecitadel]

WIP Wednesday!

Haven’t posted any writing in a while, but I was sitting through some old docs and found a lonely little snippet that gave me young!Xiomara feels.

Less of a story and more of a character exploration drabble, but still :)

When she was sixteen, her teacher told her she wouldn’t live past twenty-five. The statement was a cheap repeat of the age-old speeches meant to keep teenagers out of gangs. He screamed it on a day she ran his patience thin, and she could see it in his eyes that it was meant to make her hurt. But all she could do was stare, because to her, it was obvious. She had known from the first time she had shot someone on the street: you sign into that life with someone else’s blood, and know that someday, someone might claim yours in turn.

Hearing it from him only made her feel powerful. It showed her that he felt the need to knock her down a notch. She saw him for the small man that he was, someone who could not control her any more than he could step out and challenge someone his own age. She leaned back in her chair, feeling herself grow drunk with immunity. Feeling like nobody could touch her. Wearing the pride of knowing that she chose to live quickly at the end of a gun barrel, rather than rot slowly in front of a dirty classboard.

She threw one hell of a twenty-sixth party. She took every shot she was handed and privately toasted to her teacher. Here’s to staying alive on spite and a paycheck.

Two months later, she led forty marines to their deaths.

[persephoneggsy]

drew out my canon shepard, Circe, and her journey from Mass Effect 1, 2, and 3.

ME1: Basically the default femshep model, bc i love her design. She has a tattoo of cosmos along her neck. There’s no deeper meaning to it; she just thinks they’re pretty, and everyone else in her gang had a tattoo, so...

ME2: After being resurrected, Circe found that her hair had grown out, and she just never found the time to chop it off. Of course, as a renegade, her scars got worse. And with her re-grown body, her tattoo was gone.

ME3: Bored out of her mind in Alliance confinement, she finally cut off her hair with a pair of scissors. She also gets a new tattoo, and this one does have meaning: it’s reminiscent of her lover, Thane’s, markings.

[vulpixelates]

anaya has such femme dyke swagger

[gabriellerudessa]

Things my present F!Shepard would've said:

At meeting Jack in ME3: "welcome to the mother hen club, now you know how I always felt with all of you" 🙃

Dalatrassa, Renegade Interrupt, about "being a bully": "I'm only a bully with people being fucking stupid"

At the Asari saying they won't be present at the summit: "bitch. Don't forget to apologise once the Reapers reach Thessia"

She totally calls Grunt "son", all serious, and if anyone asks Yep That's her krogan son and don't you dare question you will be punched

She is a Thane romancer and would totally slip and call Kolyat stepson or even son after reconnecting with Thane. One of the few times she actually gets flustered, since her relationship with Thane is not by the books like this yet lol (Thane just sighs fondly at both this and her calling Grunt son)

She sighs and pinches her nose and asks God to strike her down LOUDLY everytime the Council or other political leader is being Very Stupid in ME3

"I never trusted Cerberus. They were a means to an end"

Illusive Man "you surpassed your usefulness" in ME3: "Oh how funny you too, Motherfucker"

At the end of ME2 after destroying collector base to the Illusive Man: "KISS MY ASS"

[shadowglens]

i’m replaying me3 with lance and am getting caught up in my feelings about him and miranda

[lonesurvivorao3]

I’m sorry, my loves

Brain worms keep taking me back to this scene, where Hackett is indoctrinated and in the crucible rather than Anderson, and Eris chooses destroy. So I guess we’re going for round two of this, huh?

“That looks awfully painful,” said Eris, tipping his shoulder with her foot as he writhed on the floor.

Looking at her now, the indoctrinated Admiral didn’t doubt she was callous enough to leave him here to what would be a grisly end. “You wouldn’t let your only living parent, your dear old Dad, die, would you?”

She crouched and ripped his dog tags off. ���Whilst I have occasionally cared about certain things, this is not one of those times, and you are not one of those things.”

The core was almost at lethal capacity, and with no way up, back, or out, she tapped on her OmniTool.

The blurry video feed finally loaded, showing only her tired husband. “Where’s Odette?”

He grinned. “I left her in the basement playing with some of your Spectre grenades.”

Eris laughed against a sharp sting of tears. The view panned to the chubby, sleeping, barely a-year-old baby with a thick shock of dark hair sleeping in the crook of Kaidan’s elbow.

He knew something was off and reminded her that she was his kind of stupid.

“I tried, I… I’m sorry, my loves.”

[corpocyborg]

[husband-steve-cortez]

One of my early and what was once my "definitive" mass effect 3 only John Shepard was a paragon but I viewed him as being very fake and manipulative about it and just about every relationship he had with his crew mates was kind of feigned except for with Steve which he originally pursued just to make sure his shuttle pilot wasn't going to burn out on him but ended up being a special thing just for him. The only real thing.