Mass Effect – Brothers in Arms
Chapter 1 – Ambush on Tuntau
It had been several weeks since the Geth attack on Eden Prime. We all heard what happened, of course, but it had been relatively quiet since then. Commander Shepard became a Spectre and he was hunting down the rogue Spectre Saren for his crimes against the galaxy. But in the meantime, the more 'normal' marines had other things to worry about.
My name is Zack Johnson. Me and my friend, Cale Damon, have been training all our lives to join the Alliance Marines. After our normal training was over, we were assigned to Pinnacle Station, for special training, though they never mentioned why we got this training.
And it wasn't long before we had something else to do, too. Exactly two weeks after the Geth attacked Eden Prime, Pinnacle Station received a message: 'This is Tuntau Outpost Z-06, we are under heavy fire, I repeat, heavy fire! We need immediate reinforcements!' After that, the audio was cut off, but not before a massive explosion could be heard.
Right after that, another message came up on the holoscreens. It was our Commander. He said: 'There are no Alliance ships in the vicinity right now, so we need our best marines on this. I want Zack Johnson and Cale Damon to report to me right away!'
I looked at Cale. 'You think this is gonna be difficult?' I asked. Cale just grinned. 'We're the two best marines on this entire damn station, surely we can handle a few Geth!' We started heading for the Commander's office.
Once there, we saluted and saluted our superior. 'Commander,' we greeted him in unison. 'Johnson. Damon,' he replied. 'I know you two are dying for some real action, since even our hardest training programs have become easy for you two. And I'm not saying this lightly, as we train only the elite here.'
Cale and I exchanged worried looks. If he needed top-notch soldiers, then things down on Tuntau were worse than we thought they were. 'What exactly do you need us to do down there, sir?' Cale asked. 'I'll give you two a Mako to move around in and your very own weapons to use. What you two need to do is go to that outpost, see if there is anyone still alive and then secure the area. Once you've secured it, I'll send another team down to take it over from you two.' We saluted at the same time. 'Yes, sir!' we said.
On the way to the armory, Cale sighed. 'What's wrong?' I asked. He shook his head. 'Nothing. I'm just thinking… I'm more of a sniper, Zack. Since you're the assault rifle guy, you should head in first, and I'll back you up from a distance, ok?' I gave him a heavy pat on the back, which made him lose his breath a little. 'I'm always up for a bit of straight-up action, Cale!' I replied. We laughed all the way to the armory.
Once there, we were greeted by the Commander's face on the holoscreen. He said: 'Look to your left. I prepared two lockers for you which will contain your gear. Put it on and then step inside the shuttle in the hangar. The Mako is already inside it. I'll remotely fly you two there, so step inside the Mako once you get into the shuttle. Any Geth sighted are to be destroyed on sight. Good luck.'
Cale was the first one to open his gear, and he was delighted to see his equipment. 'Medium armor, and… Wow, look at this!' He triumphantly held up a Mantis Sniper Rifle. 'This baby is gonna do just fine!' he said. I rolled my eyes. 'I'm just happy with my Lancer, man. It feels light and stiff, so I think they revved this thing up a little bit just for me!' Cale shrugged. 'As long as it works for you, it's good!'
About five minutes later we were already inside the Mako. We then felt the shuttle taking off, taking us with it. 'You look a bit nervous, Zack!' Cale shouted over the noise. I shook my head. 'I just hate all this shaking around. Makes me wanna puke!' Cale's grin disappeared. 'Don't even think about it!' he yelled. Then we touched down.
'I'll drive, you shoot,' I said. Cale nodded and took the gun controls while I sat down in the front with the driving controls for the Mako. I drove it out of the shuttle slowly and then went full speed for the source of the distress signal.
About a kilometer before we'd get there, Cale hissed: 'Wait, stop!' I stopped the Mako and looked back at him with a frown. 'What is it?' I asked. He pointed towards where we were heading. 'There's Geth over there, I spotted some. If you want, I can take 'em out, but it'll have to be quick. The Mako is armored, but it won't survive a full-on assault!'
I took the controls again and drove it towards the Geth slowly. As we got closer, Cale's breathing got heavier. And then, at around 600 meters distance, I started hearing explosions and machine gun fire; Cale started attacking.
I reacted immediately by speeding up the Mako and ramming one of the Geth Armatures. I crushed its head with the Mako's wheels. Behind me I could hear Cale roar: 'Take that, you Geth bitches!' I grinned, that Cale would never change…
Two more Armatures and about ten Juggernauts attacked us, but due to Cale's near-perfect aiming skills, they were taken care of soon. However, when I looked back to check on the distress signal, it was gone from the sensors.
'Cale, get back in here and take a look at this!' I yelled. Cale came down and looked towards where I pointed at. 'What the… Where's the signal?' he said. 'That's just it – it's gone!' I replied. Cale scratched his chin. 'Okay, we better get to that location ASAP. Maybe we'll see what happened.' I nodded and restarted the Mako's engine, resuming our course to the source of the signal.
When we got to the signal location, the first thing I saw on visuals was dead bodies. I narrowed my eyes, something was terribly wrong, here. I stopped the Mako and Cale and I got out. I pointed at a nearby hill. 'Cale, take up position there, get your sniper out and scan the area. Make sure I don't get ambushed.' He nodded shortly and headed for the hill.
I started advancing to the emergency beacon, which was turned off, by the looks of it. I grabbed my assault rifle and held it close. As I looked around further, I saw that I was nearing a ledge. I looked over and saw what I thought I would: a crashed ship. Then I nearly shot at the ship, because I heard sounds coming from it.
Through the radio, I said: 'Cale, get over here. There's a crashed ship, might be some survivors. I'm going in, back me up.' 'Got it, heading – Wait, something's coming!' he answered. I looked behind me quickly, only to see a Geth ship drop off Geth Troopers. 'Shit, shoot to kill!' I yelled. I ran to the nearest rock formation, ducked behind them and got ready to shoot.
I heard sniper shots and Geth parts flying around. 'Nice aim, now let's have a killing contest!' I said. I got up and shot down five Geth in quick succession. Then I ducked back to dodge the incoming fire. 'Crap… We can't hold out here forever!' I said. Cale replied: 'That's what you think, watch this!'
Suddenly, I heard the sniper sounds louder and much, much faster. I looked up and all the Geth had lost their heads. 'You cheater, when the hell did you modify your Mantis?!' I yelled. I could hear Cale laughing from the hill.
But then, our day got a lot worse. First I heard a growl, then a rumble in the ground. I heard Cale cursing through the comm. 'Shit, it's a Thresher Maw, get the hell out of there!' he yelled. I started running just in time, because the Thresher Maw came out of the ground exactly at the place where I stood a few moments ago.
The roar it let out was deafening, and I could smell its breath – it smelled like rotting meat and vomit, combined with the smell of a pile of shit in a bucket of water, left in the sun for three weeks.
I pointed my rifle at the Thresher Maw and I started shooting at its head. I must have hit its eye, because it started shaking its head spastically and it spat venom all over the place. Then it ducked underground again.
When I looked over to Cale's location, I noticed earth being moved in his location. 'Cale, it's coming your way!' I yelled. Too late. The Thresher Maw ducked up out of the hill, launching Cale up into the air. But then, Cale did something I thought I'd never see.
While in the air, he spun around and threw a grenade into the Thresher's mouth. Then he used his sniper rifle to propel himself forward just a bit, so he wouldn't end up in its mouth. The Thresher Maw exploded right as he fell down to the ground. I heard him yell out in pain and the sound of breaking bones.
'Damn it, my leg!' he roared. I ran over to him as fast as I could and kneeled down next to him. 'That was awesome, but you need a med evac!' He grabbed my shoulder. 'I gotta tell this to the Krogan, pretty sure they'd like me!' he said. Then he passed out. I grinned, Cale always liked the Krogan, the warrior species from Tuchanka. He respected them greatly.
I changed comm channel to contact Pinnacle Station: 'Mission success, we found out what's going on here. A ship was shot down, no survivors. We need a med evac, my squadmate broke his leg. It's an open bone fracture, get down here now!'
I stayed with Cale until the shuttle came down, and I carried him into the shuttle personally. I put him down on a seat slowly and then sat down myself and removed my helmet. One of the soldiers looked at me. 'Did you two fight a Thresher Maw, or something? You're covered in some weird-lookin' blood!'
I raised an eyebrow, observed my own armor and then I laughed out loud. He was right, my armor was painted green with Thresher blood. 'Well yeah, we did fight a Thresher Maw. It exploded when he threw a grenade in its mouth,' I said, and I pointed at Cale.
The soldier grinned. 'Nice action. I got orders from Command. You get shore leave, Cale goes to the med bay. You did a good job, man. I'll bring the CO up to speed to let him know you killed a Thresher Maw.' I nodded in thanks and leaned back. It was gonna be a long ride back to Pinnacle Station…
That's the end of chapter 1. I'm working on this with another fan fic writer, a friend of mine, so uploading won't happen regularly. Anyway, thank you for reading, hope you enjoyed. Please leave a review as it really helps me out and, as always, have an awesome day!