Mass Effect - Reaper Invasion
50,000 years ago the Prothean Empire ruled the Galaxy, however, a race of sentient machines known only as Reapers came from Dark Space, over the course of 200 years the Prothean Empire was destroyed by the Reapers. Then they mysteriously disappeared, leaving only the Mass Relays behind. Now as the races of the galaxy have advanced to the apex of their civilizations the Reapers have returned, to harvest all advance life forms. And to begin the cycle again, anew.
Chapter One -
LT. Praxton sat lazily on his chair, watching a news report on some stupid show called "Battle Space". The reporter went on about the recent attack on the Batarian Home world. "Citadel Council's official report says that the attack was Geth related, but they did not comment on how Geth made it so far outside of the Veil without being noticed."
"Geth? Their blind." Ensign Chellesy said as she wrapped her arms around Praxton's neck. She was Praxton's Ex lover, but she always acted like they still had a thing. Praxton had called off the relation after she was accepted into the N7 program. She was staying at Praxton's apartment in the Cape while the N7 higher echelons approved her graduation.
"Personally I'm glad the Batarians got hit. I want to thank whom ever did it."
"Come on, you don't mean that, what if that happened to Earth?"
Praxton looked back at the vid screen. "...the death toll is reported to be in the bill-" the screen suddenly flickered into static. Then a message appeared on screen. Lost connection to extra net.
"That is weird." Chellesy said. A few seconds later, Praxton's desk communicator chirped. He lazily walked over to his desk, sat down, and pressed the button. The voice of his commanding officer came blaring over the speaker.
"Mr. Praxton! We are under attack! Unknown hostile invaders! I need you back on the S.S.V. Peru ASAP! The enemy has -" the message cut off. Chellesy looked at Praxton.
"We should go." Praxton said, while looking at her. She nodded in agreement, and the two walked to the door. "We are going to get off Earth and join the fleet in orbit." Praxton said as they exited his 5th floor apartment. The elevators were tied up, so the two took the stairs down. While descending Praxton went on with his plan. "There is a nearby space port, we'll get a transport there."
The two arrived on the first floor after a few minutes of silence. They sprinted to the front doors of the building. Passing through the threshold was like entering utter chaos. The street was packed full of people all running like a giant wave towards the space port a few miles away. Those who owned personal transports were in the air flying in the port's direction. "Jesus." Chellesy said. Praxton grabbed Chellesy's hand and the two joined the wave of scared people.
"Why is everyone running?" Praxton asked a person near him.
"All over the public access! Reapers! They are telling everyone to get the hell out of the cities, and off world if possible!"
"Reapers!" Chellesy yelled. "Aren't they just some myth?" It was true that the Citadel Council disregarded the Reapers as a myth, but to other races of the galaxy they were more then a myth. To the Geth they were the "Old Machines" for example. It was said that the Reapers are the cause of the Prothean's mysterious disappearance. But to Praxton he knew better then to believe in 'Reapers are a Myth'. Nearly 3 years ago the Rouge Spectre Saren attempted to take control of the Citadel using a Geth Dreadnought called Sovereign. The council claimed it was Geth construct. But the people involved even the Geth themselves claimed that Sovereign was a Reaper. Even the Council said that Sovereign was more advance then anything the Geth or any other race in the galaxy had.
Praxton's thoughts were interrupted by the sight of thousands of balls of fire falling from the sky. They impacted into the ground with a loud explosion. Fire and rock swarmed around their impact site. Some impacted into the walls of nearby sky scrappers, raining glass down onto the wave of people below. Others landed right in the street behind them. Several people died instantly. The mass of screams and cry's from the crowd was almost enough to make Praxton go deaf. The real danger of these fire balls soon became apparent. They were Reaper drop pods for Reaper Forces. Soon the street was swarming with Husks. Praxton recognized the Husks from reports of the attack on Eden Prime, and the Citadel. Humans tainted by the Reapers. Their skin was changed, darkened, and the blue glowing Reaper Tech shinned threw their darkened skin. They made a deep roar and started chasing the wave of people. Jumping on the unlucky, tearing them to shreds, others just dragged humans off. A large number of Husks climbed the sky scrappers, using them like trees, crawling on the walls. Periodically one would jump down and land on a helpless human.
The Husks were not alone, a new kinda of Reaper called Cannibals, laid down a wave of red laser like weapons fire from weapons grafted onto their arm. They were larger and fatter then the Husks, and had a twisted Batarian face, with what looked like a entire human corpse for a arm. They weren't as nimble as their Husk brothers, but their weapons mowed down hundreds of humans. Dead or alive, the Cannibals and Husks dragged off the humans. We're out in the open here, all of us are going to be slaughtered. Praxton thought to himself. He grasped Chellesy's wrist tight and saw his chance for escape. A side alley that look abandoned enough. He dragged her down the alley, at a fast pace. A few other humans followed them. They weren't as fast as the military pair, but they ran anyways. Praxton looked over his shoulder and examined his followers, a man, women, and a child. Probably a family.
The alley dead ended into a 10 foot high chain link fence. "We gotta climb!" Chellesy said. Praxton let go of her wrist, and the pair started to climb the fence. Praxton was at the top when he took a second to check on the family. They were a few yards away when a Husk jumped at them from a nearby building. For a second it looked like the Husk had missed his target, but as it flew past the women, it reached out and grab a fist full of her hair. The Husk and woman fell onto the ground a pile. The woman screamed as the Husk started to bite, and claw at the flesh of bare skin. The man tried to beat it off of her, and the child just stood there crying.
"Come on Praxton! We gotta go!" Chellesy screamed from the ground bellow. She was watching Praxton, and trying to ignore the horrific sight on the other side of the fence. Praxton jumped the rest of the distance down landing on his feet. The two ran down another alley and into a court yard like area. An Alliance UT-47 Kodiak Shuttle was hovering roughly a yard off the ground, its door open with a female solider about to close it. She saw the two, and waved to the pilot to wait. Praxton and Chellesy ran to it. When they reached it the solider helped them in. She closed the door, and removed her helmet.
"Shit, we almost left without you guys." She said, walking towards the cockpit. The passenger area was jammed full of people. Roughly 15-18 men, women, and children stuffed into a space big enough for only 6. "Just find any seat and get ready." the solider said in a forced laugh. Praxton followed her into the cockpit.
"What is the hold up? Get us into orbit!" Praxton shouted at the pilot.
"That is a great idea..." he said as he worked the controls "just one problem!" The three soldiers looked out the window, as a loud deep rumble echoed across the city. A Reaper, a full Sovereign Class Reaper, landed right in front of them. It used its massive finger like struts as legs. Its eyes glowing a bright red. The distinct shell fish like body glistened in the sun light. "Holy shit!" the pilot screamed, working the controls. The shuttle pitched up starting to fly over the Reaper. But the monster wouldn't let them escape. It raised one of its finger like struts, and smacked the small shuttle. The blow was enough to cause the entire engine to explode. Sending flames and shrapnel across the sky. Alarms screamed to life in the cockpit and the shuttle began a downward spiral towards the Earth. Praxton braced himself up against the wall of the shuttle. A few seconds later it impacted into the city street. Debris and flames rained on the rubble of what used to be a small house. The last thing Praxton saw was the female soldiers body ramming into his from the impact, all went black. Chellesy, was jammed up in the large group of people, bones snapped and body's were pierced with shrapnel and debris.
Praxton came to a few minutes later. Chellesy was dragging his body out of the flaming wreckage. She sat him up against a piece of wall from a nearby building. She sat down next to him. "I thought we were done for." she said.
"Any other survivors?"
"No. Just us. Well, that female solider survived the impact, I found her body on top of yours. Her chest and arms were mangled, pieces of shrapnel sticking out of her. Blood was oozing from her mouth, and she was coughing up blood. She begged for me to kill her, but I just watched. Watched as the life left her eyes. I suppose she had saved you. The Kinetic Barriers of her combat armor more like it." she sighed.
"Wheres big bad Reaper?"
"It moved on after he swatted us out of the sky. Walked down the road. Blasting buildings, and making a bunch of noise." she pointed down a path of destruction clearly caused by the Reaper.
Praxton heard the shuffling of footsteps behind them, he instinctively ducked down and looked. He soon discovered the source of the footsteps. Not husks, something far more scary. Alliance Marines. "Holy shit! Survivors!" one of them said as he ran up to Praxton and Chellesy. "I'm Private Marlo of the 102nd. My sergeant is hold up a few hundred yards north. We are attempting to secure exit for civilians out of the city. Follow me and I'll help you guys get out."
"Actually we are soldiers as well. I'm Lt. Praxton, and this is Ensign Chellesy. Shes with the N7 Program."
"N7 eh? We need all the help we can get, and a N7 officer right now is like a living super solider, so lets go see the Sergeant, sir." Chellesy blushed a little.
We followed Private Marlo in a fast run. She leaned over to Praxton and whispered "I'm not finished with the program yet."
"Your close enough."
Roughly five minutes later the Praxton, Chellesy, and Marlo arrived to a make shift military base. The "base" was just a old police headquarters. The three ran inside, taking shelter from the loud booming Reaper roars in the distance. The old Police station was a mess. Data pads were thrown about everywhere. Soldiers were running all over the place. Wound soldiers screamed in agony from the holding cells. The cells were converted into a make shift triage clinic. Private Marlo lead the two into a small room. The room was only lit by flashlights, dust fell from the roof after every time a explosion was heard in the distance. In the center of the room was a table with the Sergeant. He was giving orders to his men over his Omni-Tool.
"Sir, I found these two at the Wreck of Shuttle-47. They claim to be Alliance." Marlo said.
"Alliance eh?" The Sergeant looked up from his Omni-Tool, looking the two over. "Name, Rank."
"LT. Praxton, S.S.V. Peru."
"Ensign Chellesy, N7."
"N7? Finally some soldiers that know what they are doing." the Sergeant said under his breath.
"What is the situation Sergeant?" Praxton asked.
"Well sir, the Reapers hit us with almost no warning. They destroyed all fleets in orbit-" he pressed a button on his Omni-Tool and a holographic image of Earth appeared above it. "-all orbiting ships in orbit have been destroyed, I'm sorry to say Lt. but the Peru was among the list of destroyed cruisers."
"Its alright sergeant. Please carry on." Praxton said, shoving the anger and pain of losing everyone of his crew mates, his friends, into the very back of his mind.
"Yes, sir. After they destroyed our fleets in orbit they hit all our communication satellites. Then our stations. Only one ship, the S.S.V. Normandy managed to escape orbit. After the Normandy hit the Charon Relay, the Reapers spread out to the other planets in the Sol System. First Mars, then Jupiter."
"Wait, I don't understand. In order to go through the Charon Relay, you have to go through Arcturus Station." Chellesy asked.
"Yea..." the Sergeant hit some more buttons on his Omni-Tool, and the image of Earth changed to a debris field orbiting a large star, Arcturus. "... the Reapers came in, and destroyed it. We lost several Fleets. But last I heard Admiral Hackett escaped. I've been trying to contact anyone on Earth, I even tried the Citadel. But comms offworld is jammed, or down. Only way of communication is QEC, and the nearest QEC Communicator is in Miami." Suddenly a radio transmission came over the Sergeants Omni-Tool. The image of what used to be Arcturus station dissolved. He raised the tool up to his ear.
"We are being over ran at the barricade! We need help!" the message said.
"Shit! Ok you two I need your help." he pressed some more buttons and a local map appeared. "Are orders were to hold this street and cut off Reaper forces while the civilians fled the city by the old interstate roads. We set up a make shift barricade, and manned it with any body that could point and shoot a gun. If the Reapers take out that barricade, its over for the civis. Can you get out there and help them?"
"Hell yeah." Praxton and Chellesy said together. The sergeant handed Chellesy and Praxton two pistols. He gave a M-3 Predator to Praxton, and a M-6 Carnifex to Chellesy. They were in their packed state. Praxton hit a button on his pistol and it unpacked itself. Chellesy followed suit.
"Now these guns do not have those fancy dandy thermal sink clips like modern weapons. So watch your over heat gauge. Marlo, show these two to the barricade."
"Yes Sir!" he said saluting the sergeant. "Sir, ma'am if you would follow me." he said, the two officers nodded, and Marlo took off at a fast run.