[color=lightgray]”Oh, don’t worry about me, Anderson. I’ll do my part, I always do.”[/color] Rykarn replied, crossing his arms as the Spectre made his way down the list of people who arrived; it begged to question if anyone didn’t show up. Even if it was an oddball assortment that was already running into friction, it was still a small team as far as most operations went. That sentiment was only further cemented when the briefing was underway, elaborating that somewhere in the metro was some kind of Cerberus holdout; he’d never fought them himself, but Rykarn knew enough that the group was a big enough threat to the galaxy that they almost entirely sabotaged the war effort against the Reapers and managed to take the Citadel. It would be a good fight.

[color=lightgray][i]Ah, Cerberus. It must have been too much to ask for them to all politely die on Cronos Station, wasn’t it?[/i][/color] Rykarn thought as Anderson went through the briefing, reflecting on the Terra Firma loving pyjak who made his feelings towards aliens well known not half an hour prior via beer bottle. Civilians complicated matters; they always did, but it wouldn’t be the first time they’d been in the line of fire. It mainly came down to shooting the assholes with guns and detaining the ones who didn’t; most people didn’t argue when a krogan was bearing down on them. 

The words, ‘cause a ruckus’ prompted a grin from Rykarn. That was something he was very, very good at. It wouldn’t be a totally boring and delicate job after all. He was assigned to Partinax’s group, which was fine. The krogan knew he worked well with turian Spectres from firsthand experience, provided Partinax wasn’t a total pain in the ass. The rest of the team was rounded out; the fellow krogan, whom Rykarn suspected was more experienced than everyone else in the room combined, Ellis, who had apparently wormed his way into this secret gathering and was suddenly under the crosshairs, the drell who had seemingly missed everything so the krogan barely made note of him until he figured out who the hell ‘Giles’ was, the perpetually 5 years-at-heart asari that was the primary reason for the Specters being annoyed beyond words, and the turian who tried to buddy up to Rykarn from the get-go who apparently wanted lung cancer. [color=lightgray][I]This should be a clusterfuck.[/I][/color] the krogan thought, slowly taking in his team and trying to figure out exactly what made most of them worth notice. He’d find out, soon enough. 

Similarly gathering was Anderson’s team, and the batarian Ja’Far was chatting up the geth like it was an old friend. Rykarn found it rather pointless; geth weren’t people, they were programs that simply followed what whatever made them dictated they should do. The only difference between a VI and an AI was that AI were allowed to think on their own, but that didn’t mean they weren’t machines. They simply were more useful ones that learned on their own. It was part of why Rykarn didn’t hold a grudge against the geth for siding with Sovereign and the Reapers on a pair of notable occasions; they were simply doing tools that another master dictated. Now they traded in deep space monsters for physiologically frail aliens that couldn’t even put down an uprising of appliances and had to become a series of galactic vermin until Commander Shepard convinced them both their war was stupid. The fact it took a human to sort out three hundred years of animosity was almost embarrassing.

Then again, the exact same Shepard was the one who managed to create peace between the turians and the krogan. The salarians, however, could continue being spineless little toadies. Sometimes, the galaxy just didn’t make any goddamn sense. 

Aegon lined out additional mission parameters, the no explosive rule ruling out his use of the Striker; although small and contained, a missed shot might destroy valuable intel via explosive charge. He appreciated the Spectre being pragmatic; the team came first, and if a civvie got caught up in a crossfire, tough shit. They were associating with the wrong people. After what Cerberus did, anyone who supported them were guilty by association. 

When prompted for further questions, Rykarn shook his head. [color=lightgray]”Won’t know until we get there. What do we do about people who surrender? We can’t exactly march out of there with two dozen personnel . Are we just going to detain them and call the local authorities to collect them when we’re done?”[/color]