Mass Effect: Denial
"Even an officially dismissed threat sometimes needs addressing." – An STG saying
Chapter 1: Arrival
Four months of hard travel through FTL was finally going to be complete. Steven Hadmir leaned back in his chair and grunted softly. The blue tinged universe around the Tinghar, the turian settlement ship, turned back to black as the stars became visible once again. The unfamiliar stars were in the right alignment and there had been no major malfunctions during the journey.
"Don't look so pleased, human," said Yirank. Steven grimaced as the turian's voice grated against his eardrums. "We still have to wait for confirmation from the sensors that the relay is still in the system."
Steven grunted a little more deeply this time. He was an Alliance Marine that had been stationed with the crew as "security" for this mission. Raised as a spacer kid he had been exposed to many different alien species and cultures for his entire life. He had to admit though, that turians never agreed with him. It wasn't that he was racist, it was just he never could seem to make friends with one. He snorted to himself silently. He had always wondered how the famed Commander Shepard had managed to make that Garrus Valkarian so loyal.
"That look is screwing up your face paint Yirank, you should go reapply it during the lull," said Steven as he made a cursory glance towards his instrumentation. The turian hissed quietly in response and snapped his head back at his own station. Perhaps the friend thing wasn't all the turians' fault…
Steven shuddered in surprise as his comm beeped in his ear three times in rapid succession. He hadn't expected that code to be used at all on this journey. He tapped back against his ears four times slowly and listened.
"The equipment is picking up the profiles of several vessels in low orbit around the second planet. The ships are registering under ancient rachni profiles. Get down to the cargo deck, we need to regroup to decide whether protocol omega comes into play." Steven sighed inwardly as Boost's husky voice halted. He had never met an asari like her before and he hoped he never would again. Then again, she was the Spectre on this trip…
"Roger that, I'm on my way," said Steven as he stood up and walked off the bridge. Yirank looked at the human's back with a sideways glance but didn't say anything. He was administration and Steven was security. He was needed here to make sure the new colony plans were going forward smoothly.
Just a few more days and he would be the administrator of a brand new turian colony. After all of his years of service and upward momentum he would be content to wait a few more years. Perhaps one day his grandchildren would live in a city named after him.
Boost fingered the safety of her classic HMWSG X and checked that it was synched up to her optical implants for the fifth time. It was an older model shotgun but the finest available to Spectres in her own modest opinion. She had plenty of auxiliary weapons on her that had the new replaceable heat-sink system installed. The newer models tended to be smaller as since they didn't devote any space to expensive cooling units… Though she never had completely trusted them.
As a Spectre she had gotten into many long shootouts over the years. While the newer line of replaceable heatsink models could potentially give you many more shots over a short period you tended to be screwed when you ran out of the heatsinks. Whereas her HMWSG X could keep firing almost indefinitely if you timed its fire correctly. That had saved her ass on at least four missions over the past couple of years and she would rather cut off her own arm than leave it back home.
She looked up from her work as the airlock to the cargo deck opened with a whooshing noise. The human, Hadmir, had finally gotten to the meeting. She suppressed her natural stern expression on seeing him and left her face blank. These N7 trained marines the humans had tended to be quite capable soldiers but their personalities seemed to leave much to be desired. She had hated being assigned to this mission and this human in particular but she couldn't avoid the duty. There was a general mandate for more humans to enter the ranks of the Spectres. And Hadmir had an impressive amount of commendations and missions to his dossier. Perhaps once they were done with this mission she would be done with the trainee and be able to go solo as she preferred.
"So we have a Rachni problem, huh?" he said as he gave her a slow, sloppy salute. He tried to smile at her disarmingly but gave up when she let her natural expression out. "Weren't they supposed to be extinct?"
"Reports have been coming through the intelligence networks of ships with their profiles being seen through the Terminus system and some Council territories. Commander Shepard encountered them a few years back. There are also reports that Cerberus might have been doing some sort of experimentation on live Rachni. Either way they are here and according to Council policy we should consider them to be a threat."
"Have they spotted us yet?"
"No. No sign they know we are here. Could be sensor error on their part or atmospheric interference. We should know soon," said Yit hurriedly. The Salarian pushed off the cargo crate he had been sitting on while never taking his eyes off his omni-tool. His underling Unipon landed right next to him and blinked at Steven.
"Captain Yit, always a pleasure… I'm sure you're running odds on how long it will take the Rachni to detect our-"
"97.6 percent chance of detection within 35 minutes."
"-ship," said Steven with a frown.
This was going to be a problem and Yirank was going to be pissed way sooner than he should have been. He still thought this was supposed to be a colonization effort sponsored by the Council. It was really a covert operation that was headed jointly by the Alliance and the STG with limited oversight from the Council by Boost.
"We have very limited armaments on this vessel…" said Steven as he leaned against a cargo container.
"According to database Rachni ship to ship armaments are not top grade. Mostly known for infantry tactics. Quite likely boarding will be attempted. No doubt will want to study us, find out purpose of our visit."
"How many guns do we have on this ship, Boost?" said Steven with more than a little despair in his tone.
"Roughly two dozen. Most of those are primarily side-arms from the six security officers on the ship, then the non-lethal electricity based weapons that were supposed to be for colonial defense. That isn't counting yours, Yit's, Unipon's, and my own."
Steven frowned. "Really? You guys went to the effort of packing non-lethal weapons? Lieutenant Unipon, you know this isn't really a colony mission, right?"
Unipon twitched slightly and rubbed the pistol strapped to his side. "Was necessary. Statesman Yirank notorious for inspections. Checked several cargo containers. Even included mechs for perceived colony security system."
Steven smiled and his eyebrows went up. "How many mechs are we talking about here?"
Unipon looked down at the floor. "Eight cargo containers full of 72 LOKI Mechs and 2 YMIR Mechs…"
Steven laughed. "Alright! We have a chance-!"
"Only 12 LOKI mechs and 1 YMIR mech operational. The rest just shells for show," said Unipon as he finished his report lamely.
Steven deflated slightly and his breathing became shallow. "This just isn't our day, is it?"
Boost chose this moment to slap a heatsink into her M-98 Widow and check the sights. "Average enough situation for a Spectre, human. You have to learn how to deal with bad odds. Not up to the job?"
The human shrugged. "We have 6 security officers with some training, 30 civilian workers, 12 LOKI mechs, a single YMIR unit, 2 STG operatives, 1 Spectre, and then myself."
Steven took a step back in surprise as Boost put fear into his heart by smiling. "See? Not bad odds at all. Now do your best and take charge otherwise I'll have to do things my way."
Steven nodded and jogged out of the cargo bay. Behind him the two Salarians began to unbox the working mechs and Boost began to ready the rest of her gear. It was time to tell the administrator he was out of a job and that the Tinghar was about to go to war.
