A/N: I'm going to start off by admitting something. I cannot read the last two pages of Ghosts of Onyx without tearing up. I can't get through the final segment of The Pillar of Autumn without having to resist the urge to stand and honor Noble Six's sacrifice. And Jorge. Poor, brave Jorge. And Kat. Carter. Emile. Will. Holly. Dante. Joshua. Samuel. All the rest.
All of those valiant, unflinching men and women. To me, they serve as a reminder of all of the REAL people who have laid down their lives, willingly and knowingly, that others may live. So this is for them, for the men and women, soldier and civilian alike, who aren't here today. I may not be the greatest writer in history, but I'll give this my very best. It's the least I can do. Don't expect this to be all maudlin, though - I don't do maudlin. I do snark, I do character development, and I do lots and LOTS of crap blowing up.
More to the point, I've been reading too many Halo/Mass Effect crossovers recently. If that's possible. And I had a Thought. Not a thought - a Thought. So many of those crossovers focus on MCPO John-117. Yes, I've seen others, most notably The Fighting Spirit, which features Jorge-052. But most focus on 117. We're all used to seeing a single SPARTAN end up in Mass Effect, with all the angst that entails. But what about a full team instead? What happens then? I have no idea, honestly. But let's find out.
Also, the Halo: Reach OST is tremendous fun to listen to while writing this. I recommend 'Tip of the Spear' and the remix of 'Both Ways' for most of this chapter. Also, hop back to the past for Halo 3's glorious 'This Is The Hour.' You'll know when to play it, I promise.
Alicia Shepard, Hero of the Alliance and the first Human Spectre, absently brushed her unruly red hair out of her eyes and scowled. She had a pounding headache, which the Cerberus agent - Miranda, that was her name - assured her was just a temporary side effect of being brought back from the dead, and her face still felt stiff and wooden. Not that she could really complain; a headache and some uncooperative muscles were eminently preferable to being... Well. Dead. What she could complain about was the fact that she was stuck on a shuttle to the Human colony of Freedom's Progress with a pair of operatives from a shadowy, not-quite-terrorist organization, on a mission at the behest of said organization's leader. Who also happened to be responsible for her revival.
"We've reached the colony, Shepard." Alicia turned in her seat to watch Jacob Taylor, the Cerberus biotic who'd accompanied her since she found him pinned down by rogue security mechs, manipulate the viewscreen and scanner suite. "Getting some weird readings, though. Some kind of gravitational anomaly on the far side of the colony."
Miranda walked up to peer over his shoulder. "That certainly is unusual. Any chance we could be looking at what caused this?"
"That's a negative, Ma'am." Jacob shook his head. "Whatever this is, it only appeared a few seconds ago." He turned back to the screen, blinked, and adjusted the sensor controls. "And, uh. Now it's gone."
"Gone?" Alicia cocked her head. "Might be worth investigating, once we've secured any survivors."
Jacob nodded, keeping his eyes firmly on the this time. "My thoughts exactly. Even if it's not what caused this, it could still be related."
Miranda looked pensive. "No signs of an active power source in the area, though. So whatever it was, nothing on the colony caused it."
Alicia shrugged and unslung her assault rifle. "Well, we'll deal with that once we're finished securing the colony. We're approaching the DZ now. Gear up."
Jacob moved to the door beside Shepard, unfolding a combat shotgun, while Miranda slotted a fresh thermal clip into her compact sub-machine gun. The gullwing door popped open, and the trio dropped several meters to the catwalk below, the two Cerberus operatives landing somewhat more lightly than the heavily-armored Spectre. They moved swiftly and efficiently through the colony, clearing building after empty building. As they approached yet another, Alicia heard muted sounds coming from inside. She jerked her clenched fist to head level, the universal 'freeze' signal, and her team stopped in their tracks. She motioned them forward, and they stacked up behind her as she palmed the door lock, then moved into the room, rifle raised, as it opened.
The masked, hooded aliens on the other side of the room responded with the speed and precision of professional soldiers, and Shepard found herself staring down the muzzles of three assault rifles. Then she saw the fourth member of the new force, and relaxed slightly. "Tali! Good to see you."
The slim alien girl recoiled slightly. "Sh...Shepard?" She asked wonderingly. "How...how are you...you're dead."
Alicia lowered her rifle - Miranda and Jacob kept their weapons up and ready, as did the remainder of the Quarian fireteam - and grinned. "Reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated, et cetera."
"Evidently." Tali recovered quickly from her initial shock. "It's good to see you again, Shepard."
"Likewise. Anyway. What brings you here?"
"One of ou-"
"That's none of your business, Cerberus!" the quarian squad leader spat abruptly, cutting Tali off.
Alicia blinked. "What?"
"You. Cerberus. Don't think I don't recognize that insignia!" The Quarian Marine gestured angrily at Jacob and Miranda, both of whom had the Cerberus symbol on their suits.
"You...work for Cerberus now?" Tali sounded uncertain.
Alicia sighed, exasperated. "No. We share a common goal, at the moment. Human colonies are disappearing. I want to find out why. So does the Illusive Man."
Tali thought for a moment. "All right, Shepard. I trust you." She turned to the squad leader. "Stand down."
He bristled. "But-"
"Now."
The Marine didn't move for a moment, then grudgingly lowered his weapon. The squad followed suit, as did Jacob and Miranda.
"As I was saying," Tali continued, "One of our people was here when the colony went dark. His name is Veetor - he was here on his Pilgrimage."
Alicia crossed her arms. "All right. We'll keep an eye out for him."
The marine stepped forward again. "No! Absolutely not. He is our responsibility, and you will not interfere!"
"Oh, Keelah." Tali sighed, then rounded on the larger alien. "Sergeant, if you are going to make an issue out of this, I will have no choice but to order you back to the ship. Is that clear?"
"But-"
"No buts, Sergeant. You may not trust Cerberus, but I trust Shepard. She can take care of it. We stay here."
"...Understood, Ma'am."
Alicia watched the exchange with a cocked eyebrow. "Wow, Tali. You're much more...forceful than you used to be."
"A lot of things changed after you died, Shepard," Tali said bitterly. "I'm not just a teenager fresh off my Pilgrimage anymore."
Alicia winced slightly. "I'm sorry."
The smaller woman shook her head violently. "It's not your fault. Anyway, you should get moving. We need to find Veetor."
The Spectre nodded. "Of course. If we find him, we'll contact you."
"Stay safe, Shepard. Keelah se'lai."
"You too, Tali." Alicia stepped past the quarians and out the door, followed by Jacob and Miranda. Jacob seemed pensive, Miranda slightly annoyed. Both elected to stay silent, though, so she continued moving deeper into the colony.
It was Jacob who eventually broke the silence. "Shepard. That anomaly's back. Stronger, too."
"Any sign of a source? Something generating it?" Miranda again peered over Jacob's shoulder at the readout.
The biotic shook his head. "Nothing's coming up on the scanner." His brow furrowed. "Long-range motion tracker has sporadic movement, though."
"All right, then. We've got company, then." Alicia flicked her safety off. "If it moves, you shoot it, unless it's Human or Quarian."
No sooner had the words left her mouth then a pair of LOKI mechs unfolded themselves from behind a low wall and opened fire. Shepard ducked behind a crate, swearing as rounds sparked off her shields.
"These bastards are playing for keeps!" A low ping! told her her shields were recharged, and she leaned out to fire a long burst into one of the mechs, popping its kinetic barrier and riddling it with holes.
A nimbus of blue light surrounded Jacob's hands, and he stood up and made a pulling motion with both arms. The remaining mech was jerked into the air, where Miranda casually blew its head off with her little SMG.
"I didn't think they were supposed to do that." Shepard raised an eyebrow.
"They're not." Miranda frowned grimly. "The only reason they'd shoot to kill is if someone had overridden their normal programming."
Jacob nodded. "And to do that, they'd have to be at the drone control center. Which is...here." A waypoint appeared on Alicia's HUD.
"Well, that's our destination for the moment, then. Let's move."
As they rounded a corner, Shepard's team came out onto a catwalk overlooking a large plaza, a pair of massive blast doors dominating the far side. That wasn't what caught their attention, however. Shepard signaled 'Stop' and 'Go to ground,' and the trio slipped behind a group of crates as they surveyed the scene below.
A dozen or more LOKI guard mechs patrolled the courtyard, while missile-armed aerial drones flitted back and forth above. In the center of the drone shell stood three YMIR heavy mechs, 8-foot, heavily armored behemoths armed with missiles and a vicious autocannon.
"That'll be the control center." Jacob pointed to the blast doors. He put a hand to his earpiece, then grimaced. "Sounds like the landing pad's overrun with mechs, Shepard. Our evac can't come in until we take them out.
"Got a plan to get around those mechs, Shepard?" Miranda was testing her. No mistaking that tone of voice. "We're essentially surrounded."
"Thought I'd try shooting my way out - mix things up a little." The Spectre grinned and compacted her rifle, stowed it in place on her back, and drew a heavy grenade launcher.
Miranda looked dubious, but simply shrugged and slid in a fresh thermal clip.
"All right. Jacob, take the LOKIs. Miranda, you've got drones. On my mark. Three...two...one...mark!" The trio rose out of cover, Miranda and Jacob already firing.
The mechs reacted quickly, LOKIs going to ground, while the drones flew complicated evasion patterns to throw off incoming fire. The three YMIRs spread out, plodding steadily towards the trio on the catwalk. Jacob's pistol barked, and a LOKI went down, its arm blown away. It stood shakily, only for the second shot to catch it squarely in the head, and it went down again. Miranda's little SMG sounded more like a power saw than a firearm, laying down a withering stream of bullets that knocked drones from the sky like a giant flyswatter.
Alicia braced the grenade launcher against the railing, and put two rounds into the nearest YMIR. The big mech staggered, then recovered, none the worse for wear. Shepard muttered a curse, and fired two more grenades. The first popped the mech's kinetic shielding, and the second detonated squarely on its chassis, blasting a hole in it. She tore her pistol from its holster and fired three rounds through the hole, and the YMIR went down with a mechanical roar of protest. She quickly repeated the same process with the second YMIR, and it detonated as its power cell went critical. She paused, to reload and get a sense of the overall situation. It wasn't good.
Even with Miranda and Jacob knocking mechs out as quickly as they were, the tide was rapidly turning against them as more and more robots arrived from around the colony. As Alicia finished her reload, a clank from behind her was the only warning she got before bullets pinged off her shields. She dove to the catwalk and rolled, pulling her shotgun as she did. The LOKI mechs who'd snuck up behind them tracked her, and her shields broke under the sustained barrage. She bit down on a yelp of pain as projectiles pierced her armor. One hit her right arm, and her shotgun went skittering away to drop off the catwalk.
"Shepard!" Jacob broke cover, sprinting toward the downed Spectre. He nearly made it, before the third, forgotten YMIR opened fire from almost directly below him. Jacob's shields flared and failed as the heavy cannon rounds tore at him, and he went down, bleeding badly but mercifully unconscious. Miranda, too, broke cover, but the YMIR chose that moment to launch a missile, destroying the catwalk and dumping her, Shepard, and the unconscious Jacob to the ground meters below.
Shepard crashed to the ground, letting out a pained gasp as she felt ribs snap. Miranda landed on her feet, shield flaring as it absorbed the impact, only to be shot from behind by a LOKI with a heavy pistol. She went down, coughing blood, and the YMIR rumbled into view, tearing itself free of the wreckage of the erstwhile catwalk. It levelled its autocannon at Shepard, preparing to make the killing shot.
There was a flat, sharp crack! The heavy mech's head exploded.
Shepard blinked, and turned painfully to look for the source of the unfamiliar noise. Far across the courtyard, atop a huge column, a figure in dull green armor knelt, a long rifle held to its shoulder. Another crack, and a pair of LOKI mechs were torn in half.
The somewhat overwhelmed Spectre was just beginning to process this when another LOKI went flying from the ruined catwalk overhead. Another figure, this time in blue armor, jumped down after it, landing on the mech's torso and crushing it. The figure drew an archaic-looking rifle from his back and fired several bursts, each blowing the head cleanly off a LOKI. A YMIR dropped from the wall, pounding toward the blue...whatever it was. It emptied its rifle into the charging mech, then rolled aside as the YMIR thundered past.
The mech turned, autocannon spinning up, when a third figure, armored in white, appeared in the courtyard. It crossed the several-hundred-foot space in a heartbeat, and took a tremendous flying leap toward the mech. Its arm snaked out as it passed, and clamped a blue, glowing sphere to the YMIR's head. The big robot turned to track this new target, but the sphere detonated in a thunderclap, neatly vaporizing its torso. Several other, smaller figures flickered into being as what Shepard could only assume was cloaking disengaged, adding yet more guns to the fight.
The unfolding tableau seemed to Shepard to have taken minutes to unfold before herd in her adrenaline-and-combat-stimulant-heightened state, but her armor's automated Medi-Gel dispenser kicking in told her it had taken a mere handful of seconds. Breath hissed from between her clenched teeth as the pain of her wounds abated, and she propped herself up on a nearby wall and dragged her rifle out, firing crisp, precise bursts that cut a swath through the guard mechs in her field of view. Every burst sent agony screaming through her chest, confirming her suspicions about her broken ribs. It didn't matter. She kept firing.
It was over in seconds. The plaza was strewn with smouldering robots, pieces of robots, and pieces of building. And one Alicia Shepard, slightly used.
The blue figure paused for a moment, and the others suddenly fanned out to cover the plaza. Satisfied, the figure turned and walked toward Shepard, stopping directly in front of her.
Fred-104, Lieutenant Junior Grade and acting CO of Blue Team, looked down at the armored woman braced against the wall. Normal height, mildly augmented, judging from her muscle density. No visible scars - she was either very, very green or very, very good. As he took in the extent of her injuries, and the oddly-shaped rifle cradled in her arms despite her injuries, he was inclined to believe she was very, very good.
"Courtyard's clear, Fred." Kelly's voice chirped in his ear.
"No signs of activity on the perimeter either." Linda's quiet, steady contralto added.
"Good. Maintain your overwatch, Linda. Kelly, get Mendez and the doctor under cover. Ash, you and Mark are on perimeter security. Olivia, you're our eyes outside this plaza. I need to know what else is here. Tom, Lucy, you're our rapid reaction. Stay loose and ready to move." Seven lights blinked green on Fred's HUD, and his Spartans fanned out.
All of this took maybe two seconds, and Fred returned his attention to the wounded soldier before him.
"Y-you a-" Shepard descended into a fit of coughing. Blood spattered the ground, and the figure's boots.
"Don't talk, Ma'am." Shepard stared in mute shock at the quiet, baritone voice emanating from the suit - that's what it was, she realized, a suit, not a mech. "From the look of it, you've got a punctured lung. We need to get you out of here."
Shepard nodded slowly, before pointing to Jacob and Miranda. The man cocked his head, and two of his soldiers - both smaller than him, Jesus Christ he was huge - trotted over and lifted the two Cerberus operatives without apparent effort propping them sitting upright against the wall.
The man removed his helmet, revealing black hair and a very young face. Shepard blinked. A very young face.
"I'm Lieutenant Sierra-104, Ma'am, UNSC. We'll take this from here."
Shepard nodded weakly, and crimped her left hand, activating her Omni-Tool. The Medi-Gel reserves in her suit were nearly dry, so she carefully pulled a canister of extra gel from its container on her belt and jammed it into her suit's torso injector. She took a deep, relieved breath as the pain abated and her wounds began to close. She took the Lieutenant's offered hand and levered herself carefully upright.
"Commander Alicia Shepard, Systems Alliance. Thanks for the assist, Lieutenant."
The man's brow furrowed momentarily at her mention of the Alliance, but he smiled nonetheless, the expression odd, as if he rarely used it. "Earth and all her colonies, ma'am." He said it as if quoting something. When Shepard simply gave him a blank look, he frowned. "Ma'am, you do know what the UNSC is, don't you?"
Alicia shook her head.
"The Covenant?"
Headshake.
"Reach?" If he was any less controlled, she'd have said he sounded desperate.
"I'm afraid not, Lieutenant." She realized that his squad had slowly gravitated towards the two of them, and were listening mutely. She sighed. "Where are you based, Lieutenant?"
"Onyx. Well. We were based there. Now? I have no idea."
"Well, then. I think it'd be best if you came with me for the time being. At least until we figure out what's going on."
The Lieutenant pulled his helmet back on, and stood silently for a moment. Judging from the body language of the others, they were talking on a private channel. The Lieutenant refocused on Alicia. "Agreed. My squad could use some time to recover, and our armor is in need of repair."
"We'll see what we can do, Lieutenant." She looked over to where Miranda had just managed to stand. "Miranda. Tell the Illusive Man we're gonna need some more shuttles."
Miranda, for once obeyed without snarking off first, which was a miracle in and of itself. Jacob shook his head and roused himself slowly, blinking. He froze for an instant at the sight of the unknown soldiers standing over him, and immediately went for his shotgun - only to stop a beat later, as he realized he suddenly had five guns trained on him.
"Stand down, Jacob. They're friendly. I do need you to go find Tali, though. Get her in here to extract Veetor. Make sure she knows to send me anything pertinant they come up with." Alicia gave the wounded Cerberus biotic a quick visual once-over, then, satisfied he wasn't going to bleed out, turned back to the youthful Lieutenant. "Any of your team wounded?"
"Nothing they can't handle, Commander."
A extremely unladylike snort came from Shepard's right, and she turned to see a graying, older woman in a lab coat and a man in fatigues and a duty cap, escorted by the white-armored soldier, who Shepard saw had '087' painted on its chest. The older woman stepped forward.
"Bullshit. You've all been in near-constant combat for days, and I can see all of your vitals." She turned to Alicia. "We need to get them somewhere secure, preferably with a hospital. Or at least a well-stocked medical lab."
"Doctor, that's not nece-"
"The hell it's not. Don't argue with me, Fred. The lot of you will let me treat you, or so help me I will personally hit every last one of you over the head with a brick and keep you in a medically-induced coma for a week!"
The Lieutenant - Fred - paused, then raised one hand in a gesture of surrender. "Yes, Ma'am."
The woman rolled her eyes theatrically, walking briskly over to where Alicia stood. "They're good kids, but so damnably stubborn sometimes..." She stuck out a hand, and shook Alicia's firmly. "Doctor Catherine Halsey. ONI Section Three. You haven't heard of me, don't bother trying. These," she waved one hand, indicating the armored soldiers, a glint of pride in her eyes, "are my Spartans." She scowled. "Well, mostly mine. That ass Ackerson had a few of them, but not anymore."
"Commander Alicia Shepard, Systems Alliance. And a Council Spectre."
"Doctor, I really don't think you should be passing out classified information like party favors." Under the iron control, Alicia could practically feel Fred's teeth grinding.
"It hardly matters anymore." Halsey pushed her glasses up with a gesture so natural she probably didn't even realize she'd done it. She gestured around her at the colony. "Wherever we are, it's clearly not where we were intended to be. In fact-" She snatched Alicia's rifle and, before the Spectre could protest, had it halfway disassembled on the ground.
"Aha. As I suspected." She reassembled it with casual ease and handed it back to Alicia, who took it with an air of mild bemusement. Halsey again straightened her glasses, and smiled triumphantly. "Completely different weapons technology. And unless my sensors are terribly mistaken, that's a Dark Energy reactor powering your armor, isn't it?"
"Essentially, yes, but what-"
"Excellent. These things are an absolute chore to reset." Halsey neatly cut Alicia off. "I was afraid the transition had thrown them off."
"Transition, Doctor?"
"Catherine, please. I despise formality - it just gets in the way."
"Transition, Catherine?" Alicia asked gamely.
"We activated a piece of Forerunner tech to escape an invading army. Unless I'm mistaken - which isn't often - it was supposed to transport us into a Dyson Sphere. Instead, it dropped us here."
Fred shifted slightly. "You're saying that a piece of Forerunner tech didn't work properly?"
Halsey gave him a flat look. "Of course it didn't work properly. You wouldn't work properly either, if you took a direct hit from a Fuel Rod Cannon. And you're considerably more robust than that pylon was."
The Spartan folded his arms. "So, assuming you're correct, where are we?"
Halsey shrugged. "I haven't the faintest idea. Judging by the tech and architecture here, though..." She rounded on Shepard. "What year is it?"
"2185. Why?"
There was a pregnant pause, and then Halsey sighed, deflating slightly. "Well, that confirms it, then." She turned back to Fred. "To hazard a guess, I'd say we got thrown into another dimension."
Fred said nothing for almost a full ten seconds, then spoke very carefully. "Doctor. Are you certain you're all right? It sounded like you said-"
"You know perfectly well what I said, Spartan," Halsey snapped. "Stop looking at me like I have two heads."
Despite the helmet's reflective visor, the Spartan somehow managed to look slightly guilty. "I know what you said, Ma'am, just not why. The Multiverse Theory is called a theory for a reason."
Halsey shook her head. "Is it really that hard to believe? The Shaw-Fujikawa drive, after all, tears a hole in space-time and allows travel through another dimension. And it's a proven fact that Forerunner Slipspace devices are orders of magnitude stronger than our best drives."
"But, for it to be that far off..."
Halsey again shook her head. "It doesn't take much. I mean, just for a normal Shaw-Fujikawa engine, trying to end up in the right system in an uncalculated, blind jump is like...like trying to hit a bullet, with a smaller bullet, whilst wearing a blindfold, riding a horse. For something similar - which this was - with a Forerunner device? That's like trying to jump out of a moving Warthog, off a bridge, into a shot glass. I'm not the least bit surprised, honestly."
"Sorry to cut into the discussion, Doctor, Lieutenant, but our evac's here." Alicia pointed to a trio of Cerberus shuttles touching down nearby. "We can continue this later."
Halsey nodded. "Of course, Commander. The sooner my Spartans get treatment, the better." Fred nodded, and moments later, he and the other Spartans, along with Miranda and the newly-arrived Jacob, were piling into the shuttles. Shepard caught sight of several of them loading large, cylindrical shapes into the shuttles as well, but put that off for later. Halsey started to follow, but Alicia caught her arm and leaned close to her ear, counting on the engine blast from the shuttles to keep her from being overheard.
"Catherine. Don't let the Cerberus doctors get their hands on the Spartans. Or the techs, for that matter. I'll find a way to get them treatment, but trust me, Cerberus does not need to get their hands on soldiers like these."
Halsey gazed at Alicia's face searchingly, then nodded. "Very well, Commander. I'll defer to your knowledge of this 'Cerberus.'"
"That's probably for the best. Now. Shall we?"
Halsey nodded, and the Spectre and the surgeon climbed into the last shuttle. The door closed, and the shuttles began their journey back to the station, leaving the colony empty. The quarians had already recovered the hysterical Veetor, and all that remained on the surface was dust and echoes.
A/N: Thus endeth Chapter 1. Finally. Someone please remind me to never attempt to type something this long on my iPad again.
Some brief notes: Yes, this chapter occurs directly after the events of Ghosts of Onyx, and will involve the surviving SPARTAN-IIs and SPARTAN-IIIs of Blue Team (Minus Holly, Dante, and Will), as well as Mendez and Halsey. Shepard's still the protagonist, but she's not going to be quite so alone in the limelight as she is in the games. The canon squadmates WILL be part of the story as well, and I can't wait to see how they interact with the Spartans. And I'm mostly doing away with the whole 'two squadmates only' rule, because (1) it's bullshit and there only because of game mechanics, and (2) what's the fun of having a team of eight Spartans when I can only use two at a time?
I honestly have no idea how this is going to pan out, so trust me when I say that I'm just as much in the dark as you all are. I'm mostly playing this by ear - I know how and when I want to end it, but only the vaguest idea of how I'm getting there.
Finally, yes I did muck with canon the tiniest bit. There were a LOT more mechs than in the game, but I needed a threat big enough to actually do some damage to Shepard. After all, where's the fun in writing a dramatic rescue scene when the rescuee isn't in trouble? And for those of you wondering why the Spartans' weapons chewed up even the heavy mechs like they were tissue paper, don't worry, I'll cover that soon.
Until next time, Readers mine.