Chapter 1
Davin breathed in, tasting the dusty air and resisting the urge to cough. He breathed out and lifted his head, looking out from the rock he was using as cover to see if anyone was coming. No one so far. He ducked his head back behind cover, growing impatient, kneeling there until his legs started to ache.
"He's taking too damn long." One of his lieutenants, Adam, complained. They had been kneeling there for nearly an hour now, waiting for Han, their scout, to return. He was taking longer than usual, which means he met an obstacle.
"Nothing we can do, and your bitching isn't helping." Debra, a tall woman with a buzz cut replied. She had it worse than them, since her armor was much thicker and heavier than the rest. Adam grunted at her, his long, sweaty brown bangs getting in his eyes and making him hiss. It wouldn't have been as bad if it wasn't so damn hot on this planet. Davin looked back at them. "Shut up, both of you. You never know if an enemy is within earshot."
They both said, "Yes commander." though Adam looked like he wanted to reply. He was always a pain in the ass, but at least he can listen to a command. Davin opened up his omni-tool, the small see-through screen lighting up, to check if he had anything from Han, but he saw nothing. He was just about to go looking for him when they heard a sound behind them.
They all whipped around, aiming towards the sound, and relaxed as they saw Han walk towards them. He was a small man, only 5 feet and 4 inches, which made him perfect for scouting. The only reason they heard him was because he wanted them too. He was silent when he wanted to be, and almost impossible to see, earning him the nickname the Chameleon.
"Holy shit Han, I almost shot you." Adam said, standing up. The rest of them followed suit, stretching their legs as Davin walked up to meet Han. "Report, what did you find?" Davin asked.
Han smiled. "Exactly what we were looking for. The emergency Transmission came from what looks like a lab, except instead of scientists I saw a group of mercenaries there. Their armor identified them as the Blue Suns. Most of the scientists are dead, but I heard them yelling and beating someone, so some must still be alive."
Davin said "Good report, as always." and shook his head. The Blue Suns were a well known mercenary group, and were well trained. But what did they want with a science lab? "How many did you count?"
"About 20, maybe a few more inside." Han replied instantly. Davin nodded. He couldn't have asked for a better scout; Han always got results. "Alright Han, lead us there." Davin said, turning to the rest of his team and gesturing them to move out.
They soon realized what took Han so long; the terrain was terrible, making traveling it slow and hot. They had to move slower than Han did, so it took them about an hour to get to their destination. Han suddenly held his hand up, making them stop. "It's right behind this hill." Han said, pointing to the rock wall next to them. "There are two soldiers guarding the front entrance, and another on the roof. The rest are inside, looking for something it seemed like to me."
Davin nodded and turned to Jacob, his marksmen. "Jacob, find a clear vantage point and eliminate them. By the sound of it, the survivors won't last too much longer." Jacob nodded and started climbing up the hill. They waited for a few minutes, and then heard a whistling sound 3 times. Jacob descended from the hill and nodded at Davin, indicating they were taken care off.
"Alright team, I want a wedge formation. If you don't have a silencer, don't shoot until we get inside. I want to surprise them. Han ands Jacob will take care of any poor bastards who happen to wander outside. Let's go." He heard the whole team say "Yes Commander" And they went forward, Davin himself at the front of the wedge. The two guards at the entrance were now on the ground, half their heads missing. "Did they have shields at all?" Davin whispered to Jacob on his left. Jacob said simply "No.".
Right as they were almost there, the door opened and a merc walked out. He froze when he saw them, which was his mistake, as Han shot him in the head and the merc fell. They quickly closed the gap and Davin Knelt next to the merc, making sure he was dead. He turned to his team. "Alright, I want Deb and Levie up front. Adam and Erik, watch our rear. I want only them to be surprised, not us." Deb and Levie, the two females of the group, moved forward next to him, while Adam and Erik moved to the back, with Erik giving him a thumb up. Davin nodded and pressed his hand against the hologram circle on the front of the door, opening it with a quiet hiss. They all went inside, slowly and quietly.
The main hallway was empty, but Davin could hear them rummaging around and heard someone yelling. As they got to the end of then hallway he could make out what the person was saying.
"WHERE IS IT, YOU STUPID SUIT RAT?" Davin Heard no reply, then a thump which sounded like whoever was being interrogated just got hit, hard. Davin had only heard Quarians called suit rats. Davin peeked out the corner. The left hallway was empty, and the sound was coming from the right. He pointed at Bennie, his crazy explosive expert, and Han, gesturing them to go to the left and check it out. They nodded, and went left while the rest of them crept towards the right, staying low until they got beneath the window of the room where the yelling was coming from. He signaled for them to stop, and peeked through the window.
He saw 8 mercs inside, definitely wearing Blue Suns armor. They were grouped around 2 figures in the middle, laughing. The Quarian was in the ground. Judging by her body shape, she was a female. The merc standing above her was still yelling, kicking and stomping on her. Davin felt a flicker of anger. He couldn't stand any man who beat a woman. He pulled out a flash grenade and signaled his team to fire on his go. He got up as Debra broke the window, throwing the flash grenade inside. They all ducked and heard a loud bang, followed by screaming and groaning. He roared, leaping up and firing his assault rifle while his team followed suit. They mowed down the blind and deaf mercs easily, seeing blood spray the walls. He held up his hand, and they all ceased fire. He leapt over the window, keeping his rifle raised just in case. Sure enough, the Quarian survived, but so did the merc who was beating her, and he quickly grabbed her and pulled her in front of him, putting a gun to her head and using her as a shield.
"Step back! One more step forward and I blow this bitches brains all over the wall." The rest of his team came into the room, and guns aimed at the surviving merc. They heard gunshots coming from the other direction, and then an explosion, letting him know that Han and Bennie ran into the rest of the mercs. He heard Erik say "Bud, you are in a pretty shitty situation here. If you want to live, I suggest you let her go. I have no problem putting a bullet between your eyes."
The merc was obviously not listening. "Put your weapons down! Now, or I will shoot her!" Davin was running out of patience, but then he saw the Quarian reaching for a knife she had strapped to her upper thigh. She had courage, and he was going to give her all the distraction she needed.
"Alright, I'll lower my weapon." Davin said, holding his assault rifle away from his body. His team didn't follow suit, also seeing the Quarian move for her knife. The merc had all of his attention on Davin, and was oblivious to the Quarian he was holding hostage. "Alright, good. You're smart. Now for the rest of you to-"
He never got to finish. The quarian pulled her knife out and stabbed the merc in the leg, between his armor. He roared, letting go of her. She dived, and Davin's team fired, and Davin felt blood splatter on his face and armor as the bullets tore the merc apart, killing him. They ceased firing, and Davin sighed, glad that was over. He walked over to the Quarian, holding out his hand. "Are you alright? You weren't hit or any-"
She hit his hand away. "I'm fine, human." She hissed at him. Standing up, she wiped herself off and glared at them. She was tall, almost 6 foot by the looks of it. "Who are you guys? How'd you get here?" she asked, though it was more like demanding.
Davin stood up straight, surprised by her hostility. "I am Davin, Commander in the Alliance Navy. We were on our way home when we got an emergency transmission from this location, asking for help."
She looked down, thinking. "That means Hane was able to get the transmission out. Did anyone else survive?"
Davin shrugged. "I saw plenty of blood, but no bodies. Maybe they were taken to a diff-"
"They are all dead." He heard Han say, surprising him and making the Quarian jump. Davin turned towards Han. "We found the rest of the scientists." Han continued. "They were all dragged to a room at the end of the hall. We caught the rest of the mercs while they were searching the rooms. Took care of them, though Bennie threw a damn grenade at the last one. Poor bastard."
Davin raised an eyebrow at Bennie, who only smiled. Bennie was known for being a bit…unstable. Before Davin could say anything, the Quarian gasped. "A grenade? The research!" and with that she ran out the room, ignoring Davin's protests. Davin cursed to himself. The woman was already more of a handful than the mercs. He followed her, the rest of the team leaving with him.
They arrived in the room Han described, and Davin had to take off his helmet. He looked around at the horrific view before him, smelling the smell of the dead. They had thrown all of the dead Quarian scientists into a big pile in the center of the room; there had to be at least 15 of them. He looked around, seeing equipment he did not comprehend, blood all over the place, the bodies of the fallen mercs splayed out everywhere, the scorch mark on the wall and what was left of the merc hit by the grenade…and the Quarian, looking through cabinets and equipment frantically. He debated going over there to help her, but Adam interrupted his thoughts by doing what he does best.
"Quarian, what the hell is in here that's so fucking important that the sight of your dead colleagues doesn't faze you in the slightest?" Adam demanded, glaring at her. She whipped her head around, and even though he couldn't see her face, Davin bet she was glaring right back.
"Something a human wouldn't understand. This research is not only vital to us, but also none of your damn business." With that, she went back to searching. Adam wasn't done yet though. "Fuck that bullshit; we just saved your ass. That merc would have beaten you to death if not for us. You owe us some infor-"
"Stand down Adam." Davin said. Adam glared at him. "What do you mean stand down? She just-"
"I said stand down soldier. Not another word." Davin said, and Adam shut up, though he continued to glare at the Quarian. Davin felt someone tap his shoulder, and he turned to find Han. "What is it Han?" Davin asked.
Han coughed to clear his throat. "Commander, something isn't right here. These guys are wearing Blue Suns armor, but the armor looks old and unkempt. To make matters worse, everyone I've seen so far is human, and there are multiple races in the Blue Suns. They don't have any units made solely of humans. They had no shields, which Blue Suns do, and their weapons are old and out of date. These are not Blue Sun mercs."
Davin absorbed everything he just heard. "No, but someone wanted us to think that they were Blue Suns. Why?" Davin turned to his team. "Search the mercs. I want anything that could identify who they really belong too. Something is off here."
"Yes Commander." He heard, and they spread out. Hans nodded and went to join them. Davin sighed, deciding to try and get more information out of the Quarian. He walked over to her, where she was on a computer. It looked like she was downloading the information on it to her omni-tool. Davin waited a bit, and then spoke up."What is your name?"
She turned to look at him. "Why do you ask, human?"
"So I have something to call you beside girl and Quarian." Davin replied, wishing she could be a little more understanding. "If I gave you my name, would that help? Do you want my full name?"
She shook her head and sighed. "No, your full name is unnecessary. My name is Vara."
Davin raised his eyebrow. "Vara? Don't Quarians include the name of their ship in their name?"
She grunted. "At least you're not totally ignorant. Yes, but I'm a special case. I left the fleet in order to do research. I no longer have a ship."
He nodded, understanding. "I see. Well, do you know who these guys are?"
She shook her head. "I thought they were just humans who hated Quarians, until they started asking for our research. When we didn't comply, they started killing us."
Davin bowed his head. "I'm sorry this happened." She grunted. "Don't act like you care about us human."
Davin grabbed her shoulders, swinging her around and surprising her. He got closer so she could see his expression. "Don't assume all humans are the same. I didn't go calling you a suit rat or any dumb racist shit like that; at least give me the same respect."
She didn't reply, and he couldn't read anything from her mask. He let go of her, hoping he got his point across. "Now, is there anything I can do to help?"
She stayed silent for awhile, and he was about to turn and leave when she said, "It seems Hane moved it so they wouldn't find it. I'm trying to see if he left a clue where he put it for me."
He nodded. "So look for something that looks like a message or a clue. Got it." And he started helping her. They were looking for about five minutes when Davin found 1 of the drawers had a strange symbol carved into it. "Vara, I think I found something." She stopped what she was doing and went over to where he was. "Look at this." He said, pointing at the strange carving. It looked kind of like a bird…
Vara looked at it, and then stood straight up, shaking her head. "I can't believe I didn't think of that first!" She walked over to the other side of the room, where there were a bunch of lockers. She went to his, tapped a few keys, and it slid open, revealing a container. She pulled it out slowly, as if it were as fragile as glass, and sighed heavily. "Thank you Hane."
"I'm going to go ahead and guess that's what you were looking for." Adam said, making Davin and Vara look at him. The team all came over. "You guys find anything?" Davin asked.
They didn't answer at first, looking at each other. Davin didn't like the look on their faces. "Well?" He demanded. Han stepped forward.
"Commander…only one had any identifying marks…and it was a Cerberus tattoo."
"Of course it had to be Cerberus." Davin said. Cerberus always claimed that everything they did was in the best interest of humans, but all he ever saw them do was expand their own ambitions. And kill anyone who got in their way. "To make it worse, they were going to frame the Blue Suns for it."
"Bosh'tets." Vara said, and Davin assumed it didn't mean anything nice.
"It's evil, despicable…and smart." Erik said, surprising them. "If you want to do something illegal and not get caught, framing a popular mercenary group is smart." Erik saw them all glaring at him, and he raised his hands defensively. "Hey, I'm not saying I agree with it. But this was well thought out; they really wanted what was here."
"But why?" Vara said. "This research is all towards Quarians. Nothing here really benefits humans at all, unless you have very weak immune systems and I didn't know about it."
They all shook their heads. "Nope, none of this makes sense." Davin said. "But for now we need to leave. Who knows if there is more on the way. And I need to inform Anderson about this." They all nodded and started walking towards the exit, guns raised just in case. Davin looked at Vara. "It's probably better if you come with us."
She sighed. "Not much choice." Davin almost smiled, but he never really smiled. "You want me to carry that for you?"
She shook her head. "No, you human's legs are too straight. I don't know how you don't fall over whenever you walk."
Davin shrugged. "Practice I guess."
She grunted, and they walked out of the building, having no clue what was in store for them.