The Equalizer
Chapter Two
"To acquire power, one needs power. To acquire knowledge, one needs knowledge. No street rat will ever rise further up the social ladder without some solid grasp to at least the first bar. You can't climb a wall without some support, no matter its form. My first support was of steel and synthetic fibers. My second held three heads. My third had a crest and a burning desire of revenge. The fourth one, instead, sung of peace.
In the end though, I had enough knowledge that it already formed the ladder towards the final steps.
That taught me one simple thing: knowledge is never to be underestimated." Shadenight123
Jane Shepard grumbled as she bit down on the nutrient paste. She didn't dislike the thing, even though it tasted like carton. She didn't even feel sick at the usual sweet taste of the coffee, which seemed more like some sort of toffee candy melted down and stirred into liquid form than actual brand-made caffeine.
She could see through the infirmary's glass panels Lieutenant Alenko talking with Doctor Chawkas. She suspected the Lieutenant's amps had flared again. The L2 biotic interfaces were always prone to trouble. She was thankful to her father she had never had to wear one in all her life. Her father had made them leave Earth for Mindoir, passing through enough systems that by the time they had reached the colony nobody knew of her latent biotic potential.
She wasn't brought to the Ascension program because of that, even if the Alliance Officers had come for her brother too.
He would have been a wonderful Fleet Admiral. She knew that…
If only the Batarians hadn't come.
She clenched the plastic-ceramic weave of a cup with her fist, crunching the empty container.
The lieutenant left the infirmary and moved towards the food-dispenser, grabbing a tube of paste and sitting down a bit further down the table. What was she, scary?
She grinned to herself a moment later. Damn right she was scary!
Better to be scary than to be scared after all.
"Lieutenant?" she began with a smile on her lips. "Everything's all right?"
Kaidan furrowed his brows for a moment, before curtly nodding back.
"Yes ma'am."
"Good to hear that. We're landing on Therum soon. I want you ready for ground team. We don't know if Liara T'soni is with Saren or not, and since she's a biotic one fights fire with fire, right?"
"I suppose so, ma'am," always the diplomatic answers. It slightly unnerved her. If he didn't like being referred to as some sort of 'fire' then he'd better speak up. The way he always skirted around issues and troubles truly irked her.
"Well then, see you in the hangar bay." She stood up a moment later, and headed off to get the Krogan. Better safe than sorry, they tended to say.
Wrex was in the hangar, shadowboxing. He had a feral and appreciative smile on his face as he spun around to meet her gaze. "Shepard."
"Wrex. You ready for going down?"
"I thought you'd never ask. Can't wait to fight some Geth," he grinned like a kid in a candy store.
She frowned.
"Geth?"
Wrex just cocked his head to the side, before grinning even more and nudging with his head towards John. "Had a nice talk with him moments ago. There are Geth on the colony…"
Jane moved, her fists clenched to her sides as she angrily stomped her feet all the way towards the Shadow Broker operative. "You! Explain!"
He appeared unperturbed, but considering his armor she didn't doubt she had managed to at least make him flinch.
"Shepard," he drawled out. "I was expecting you sooner," he tapped on his Omni-Tool. "Do you even check your Omni-Tool mail?"
She gritted her teeth and then brought up her left arm. There was a beeping light of red that flashed, telling her that she had a message in her mail.
Jane flicked it open a moment later, and read the brief message with an underlying growl in her throat.
Therum operatives have detected Geth presence,
Sincerely John.
"Sincerely?" she snorted. "That's as hypocritical as it can go from a Shadow Broker operative."
"You made your Extranet search?" he queried back. "I suppose you read through at least a dozen of conspiracies forums."
"Yes," she gritted. "And none have good words for your superior. They range from Super-Spy to Mad Illuminati King. They also claim you have ties with Cerberus and are active in the Terminus System as terrorists."
"And about cloning unicorns for war?" he retorted. "Did you read that article too? Because I assure you, war-unicorns are really effective."
She slammed her fist against his chest, wincing as she felt the kinetic barriers repulse her attack. "Shut the fuck up! When I want your opinion I'll let you know about it! Now, I want info on expected hostiles and the precise location of Liara T'soni!"
He flexed his right leg slightly, before bringing up his Omni-Tool again. There it was again with that dark hue that was eerily familiar to her. She couldn't place it, but she detested every second of it.
"A small mercenary band has passed through one of our checkpoints with enough heat and synthetic signals to identify them as a full complement of Geth and a Krogan Battlemaster. There also were a few signatures of still alive miners on the surface a few hours ago, but they all pinged back dead recently. We can expect Geth Dropships and Armatures, coupled with basic Geth infantry."
"The Shadow Broker seems awfully informed on Geth armaments," she mumbled as her Omni-Tool pinged with the specifics of the Geth enemies. "And why wasn't this information shared with the Alliance?"
"They refused to pay," he shrugged. "The Salarians, the Asari and the Turians all paid up when asked. The Alliance refuted on the basis that 'they did not deal with black market organizations'."
Jane's right fist clenched even more tightly, as small bursts of blue flashed across the back of her hand.
"Those bastards," she muttered, shaking her head.
"We could have avoided the slaughter of Eden Prime," she whispered. "We lost thousands. They passed through our defenses and tore apart entire cities before we could scramble back a fleet."
"If it is of any consolation," John remarked. "The casualties were not as high as the Thessia Terrorism Action done by Cerberus two years ago."
"You mean when they destroyed the Athame temple?" she snorted. "That made the Alliance do double rounds to try and contain Cerberus, but we did crack down on them pretty hard."
"You couldn't execute their leader though," he pointed out. "You barely made a dent in their organization too, depending on which side of the Propaganda machine you hear it from."
She raised an eyebrow. "You a Cerberus fanatic?"
John shrugged. "I don't care about politics. I do my job as an information broker. Propaganda gets in the way no matter who is spewing it. If one side claims 'overwhelming victory' and the other claims 'pyrrhic win' I don't care. I care if one side remains with a fleet of twenty cruisers or two, and then I sell that info to the highest bidder who might be interested in knowing the truth."
"That's cynic," Jane muttered shaking her head. "I can understand why people don't like the Shadow Broker."
John shrugged. "Everything has a price, Jane. The sooner the world comes to term with it, the better it will become in the long run."
"Some things don't have prices! Honor and loyalty aren't things you can buy!" she snapped back at him, her right index finger pointed. "And I'll show you!"
"Uh?"
She smiled. "By the end of this mission you'll be off the Shadow Broker's team and on mine."
He chuckled, shaking his head. "You're mad."
"Maybe, but I know that you'd be a pretty useful addition to Humanity when the Reapers will come," she muttered. "And if you can guide us to the Shadow Broker, we could use his intel for our purposes."
"Ah…" John sighed. "This is the Commander Jane Shepard I knew of… waste nothing, right?"
She smiled. "Right."
Therum
The mako landed hard against the volcanic grounds with streams of molten lava flowing around it. The machine with six tires began its relentless march, the thrusters positioned beneath it making it fly for long marches across the ashen crust of the planet in question.
In the far off distance, a ruin the form of a pyramid stood with clear-cut Prothean designs, its location right next to an active volcano.
The heat was bearable even though Kaidan's dry comment on 'at least it's dry heat' didn't help her mood. She hated getting filthy and she hated getting sweaty. She knew it was a paradox: military training didn't leave any cadet smelling like roses, but that didn't mean she had to suddenly become a man-pig. She pushed on the acceleration as she drove through a few seemingly still Geth Armatures, crashing hard against them as she went by.
It was satisfying hearing them explode as the turret fired upon them, Wrex having the time of his life shooting the things down.
They didn't even appear to be firing back as they sped past them with all the speed they could afford. The springiness of the Mako seemed even better than what she was used to, and she couldn't help but comment on it out loud.
"The Turian did good work on the mako!"
"Dully noted, Commander," Alenko muttered back. She smiled to herself. The Lieutenant was barely holding himself from hurling from the sound of it, and apart from Wrex being his usual trigger-happy self she didn't think anyone else would have handled themselves any differently. Maybe John would have even puked in his suit.
It would have been funny to watch.
She laughed as she spun the wheel tight, avoiding a dropped down Armature from the sky.
"Joker! What the hell! Don't we have the skies!?"
"Commander, I can't seem to locate their drop ships from space," the voice of Moreau shot back. "I'll see what I can do."
"Don't fire blind!" she warned.
"Wouldn't dream of it," the pilot with vrolik syndrome remarked dryly.
She turned her gaze forward, to where the Prothean ruin was now coming closer, when giant rocks that she had dismissed as natural formations suddenly split apart to reveal triple-barreled turrets. The next instant thick laser beams shot through the kinetic barriers of the Mako, making it spin wildly in mid-air before crash-landing on its side.
Jane bit back a curse as she hastily unclipped the safety belt.
Her head pounced and her breath hitched. She found herself deafened by the alarm that rung across the Mako's driving post, signaling to her that the wheels had been busted and the situation was critical. The reactor was reaching detonation point, and she could only barely throw her feet against the door to crash it open, before jumping out and falling down on the ashen ground.
She breathed unevenly the thin and charred atmosphere, before the breather in her suit popped up completely covering her vision with her suit's hud.
Her breaths slowed down as she held her shotgun to her chest, moving slowly to the back of the Mako and pushing her Omni-Tool near it to open the thing. The Turrets weren't firing on them, probably having lost their lock because of the cloud of dust and ash they had lifted…which wouldn't last much longer, she supposed.
The turret on the Mako spun wildly a moment longer, before a snap sound was heard soon followed by bolts of mass driver crashing against metal. The top detonated outwards and Wrex emerged clad in a barrier from within, falling down behind her.
She gestured for him to help and with his brute force they both managed to slam down the metal back exit. The Lieutenant had been torn from the safety belt, his body slamming against the other side of the vehicle with tremendous strength. She doubted the man was still operational, but she wasn't going to leave him there.
This situation reminded her of Torfan too much.
"Commander? We've got your signal still. Did the Mako break?"
"Joker, we need medical Evac right now!" she snapped back to the flight lieutenant, her hands grabbing the wounded Alliance soldier and bringing him to the back of the vehicle. How long till it would explode and give away their cover?
"Alenko's down, I don't know how long he might survive without medical attention," her Omni-Tool flashed orange a moment longer, the simple Alliance program to check on injuries by connecting with the hard suit worn told her all that she needed to know on his conditions –and those were critical.
"We're coming to pick you up at your coordinates!"
"Negative! They've got Gardian Systems operative, you'd be shot down and we're too close for a run through. We'll proceed on foot to the ruins."
She bit her lip through her visor. She and Wrex could probably make it, but carrying Alenko too?
She clenched her fists.
Sacrifices were to be made for the mission.
"Wrex, we're moving!" she snapped curtly. "Can you lift a dust storm with your biotics!?"
"I can certainly try, Shepard!" Wrex laughed, his biotics flaring a green hue as he roared before charging forward. She lingered just a second more on the prone form of Alenko, before finally starting to run behind the Krogan switching to her assault rifle.
The laser beams fired again through the powder clouds breaking chunks of the ground as they connected with the dirt and the ash. They were firing blind thankfully, because no matter what laser beams were unstoppable by the Kinetic barriers or the Biotic barriers. A beam passed a few inches away from her face, forcing her to drop down on the ground and fling a grenade in that direction. She waited for the explosion before moving once more.
The roars of Wrex were just a few more meters ahead of her in the midst of the cloud of ashes.
"Shepard! I've got the grounds charted, follow the signal!" the voice that shot through her speakers was that of John, as her hud began to glow a light reddish tint. Was that a red dot at the side of her vision?
"Wrex, move to the right, follow the line!" John barked once more. "Get beneath the tower; they can't fire from that close!"
Those were her lines. Was John trying to relieve her from command?
No. He was probably saving their lives. She found herself cursing him all the same as she followed the directions that came from the Shadow Broker operative, ending up emerging from the dust clouds with a crevice just a few inches away from her. She ended up with her back against the surfaced rocky formation, as laser shots nearly beheaded her when she stilled for a second.
"Wrex, fire on the tower near you! Attract its attention and then duck!"
She heard the rifling of the turret's barrels before a loud explosion made her narrow her eyes. "Jeff? Can you take out a measly anti-air turret from orbit?"
"That I can," the flight Lieutenant returned the banter through her coms, while she kept on slightly growling. This was her operation. She knew that her life had just been saved, but she would have come up with the same plan, so why was he getting ahead of her!?
"Can you land nearby?"
"No, but we can send the shuttle and get Alenko to safety," a loud explosion forced Jane to get her head down as the turret nearest to her exploded.
"And the anti-air is gone! Normandy one, Geth team zero."
Something felt wrong in Jane's mouth, and it wasn't the blood or the taste of ashes. She swallowed nervously as she moved her head beyond the natural cover, just in time to see the Mako's engine starting to burn up.
"You'd better be quick, because he's—" and then the Mako exploded.
The dust that rose was second only to the feeling deep in the pit of her stomach that told her that no, Alenko couldn't have possibly survived a point-blank explosion of the Mako.
Her first mission to hunt Saren. They hadn't even completed it and…and Alenko was dead.
"The shuttle won't be needed," she snarled curtly in the com. "Alenko's dead. Send down Vakarian and Tali, Smith? You and I on private com, right fucking now!"
There was silence for a second.
"Affirmative, Commander," Jeff closed coms a moment after.
A new communication channel opened an instant later. "Shepard?" John's voice was all that she needed to begin her tirade.
"You god-damn motherfucker of a fucking bastard! You hacked my suit!"
"You were in dire straits."
"I was perfectly fine!" she snarled. "You will remove whatever shitty Trojan or what not you have placed on my suit this instant, and I don't care what the fuck you think you are doing, the next time I hear a single word from you while I'm leading the Ground Team and I'll kick your fucking ass all the way out of the airlock and towards the closest black hole. Have I made myself clear, Smith!?"
Silence.
A small beep on her hard-suit.
"Affirmative, Shepard."
"Good!" she snapped back, exhaling loudly. "You try this shit again, on any other member of the ground team, and the same rule applies! You even try and get your Omni-Tool anywhere near the Normandy and I'll put a bullet through your brain before I even fucking decide what to do with your corpse! Have I made myself clear!?"
Silence again.
"Crystalline," was his curt reply through the coms.
She closed off the channel, before heading straight off to where Wrex was standing. He was still smiling, the oversized dinosaur.
"Wrex? You head back up. Team wasn't suited for this. We need long range and the Geth expert for this type of shit."
"What? Why can't I tag along all the same?" Wrex snarled back. She grabbed him by the hem of the armor and slammed her visor-head against his own face. The pain was good –it cleaned her thoughts.
"Because I said so! You've got a problem with that!?"
The Krogan growled for a moment, before shaking his head and chuckling. "Fine, Shepard. You've got a quad on you…but next time, I'll stick through no matter what."
The shuttle landed with a strong thundering noise, its side hatch opening to admit out the marine complement. She stared for just a second more at the marine with the dark pony-tail, before shrugging it off as just a coincidence. She should be talking to her crew one day.
The Turian and the Quarian descended within moments, as Wrex instead huffed himself aboard. She gestured for the marines towards the Mako's remains. Maybe they'd find a bone or a limb of Alenko.
"Good," she grunted. "We have Geth presence here, and they're entrenched deeply. I want you," she pointed to Garrus, "to be our overwatch. You instead," turning to Tali, "try and get us the Geth frequencies, we need to know where the hell they are."
"Yes ma'am," Garrus nodded.
"It will be done Captain," Tali added quickly, her omni-tool flashing briefly.
She snorted and turned her back on her squad, before starting to carefully walk slightly crouched.
Garrus' sniper rifle unfolded as the Turian took point in the crater that once housed the laser turret. "I see two armatures behind a rock formation to the North-East. They aren't moving."
"I'm picking up a radio signal," Tali muttered. "It might be survivors."
"Patch it through," Jane retorted as she turned her gaze West, towards a volcanic lake. She could probably time it well and manage to pass through the hardened black crusts, but she doubted the rest of the team could. The rocky formations and the Armatures reeked of trap, just like this one.
Going through the middle meant a no-man's land charge.
"Welcome madam and monsieur! Welcome to Radio Geth! The only radio-activity you'll need, thirty-six hours a day! Today, with your powerful Deejay Prime-Unit Organic, we will be talking about life. And death. And I think I'm speaking for everyone around here when I say that life and death are quite difficult concepts to tackle on…"
"Keelah," Tali muttered. "The Geth listen to radios?"
"No," Jane grumbled back. "Someone however does like to talk."
"Now that hurts me, Commander Shepard, right here in my synthetic heart," the voice pouted through the radio.
That froze Shepard.
"Who are you?" she hissed. "Identify yourself! You've hacked into a secure channel and by the protocol of the Alliance navy you are—"
"Now that's boring! Enough of it, Shepard. We're going to get T'soni before you, and nothing you can say or do will change it. Understood? Comprehende? We are superior. We are Geth. No longer servants, no longer enslaved! We are Geth! Our will is our command! Our command is our will! Or whatever, really. We were expecting you, Miss Shepard. Fun thing: you can take out the heat from a Mass Driver core, but you can't hide electricity from a Geth. Funny, huh?"
"Why are you working for Saren?! What does he want with Benezia's daughter?"
"Now that would be telling. Well, as long as you stay put there will be no problem. Should you try and move however…"
"Done," Tali piped in. Suddenly the rock formations broke apart, as the laser turrets began to randomly fire against the Armatures before off-shooting one another. "Hacked while he was busy rambling."
Jane turned to look at the Quarian with a new light, and smiled. "Well done. Keep com chatter to a minimum, Geth can track it."
"Commander," Joker remarked a few seconds later, as they were finally descending. "There are Geth cruisers running around us, I think we're overstaying our welcome. I can hold off, but time is of the essence here!"
"We'll have to make do with it, Moreau. Head to the Prothean temple when I ask for evac." She snapped up tight and gestured for both of the aliens to follow her. "We break into a run people! Get to it!"
She began to sprint, Garrus and Tali following her as fast as they could as they dashed across the ashen landscape. Her heart began to beat as she could feel the noise of Geth drop-ships coming over their heads, the entrance of the Prothean pyramid in sight.
"We will not be ignored!" a voice shrieked through her com, a detonation erupting right next to her. She was propelled backwards by the blast, landing roughly on the ground. "You are but a sack of flesh made manifest, Shepard! We are the apex of creation! We are the future!"
She felt the hands of the Turian, Garrus, lift her back up on her feet. Her visor had cracked slightly, but she nodded back to the alien and managed to wobble back on her own two feet. She closed with her Omni-Tool the cracks, before opening fire with her assault rifle on the closest armature.
"You think a team of three might stop us? An army would, a fleet would, but you are alone Shepard! And alone…people tend to die." The Geth opened fire. Bullets tore through her kinetic shields as she heard a scream-filled 'Keelah'.
She felt the strength of another blast, and then her back hit against a strong surface. Arms grabbed her and brought her inside, just as her vision began to blur. Medi-Gel was applied to her wounds —she'd recognize the soothing feeling anywhere— and her vision cleared. The doors that led into the Prothean dig site had been closed, but they had managed to enter. Tali was holding the side of her suit and muttering prayers as her Omni-Tool worked on it.
The Turian was breathing deeply, beads of sweat falling down his skin as his eyes darted around them.
The loud sound of explosives ramming against the doors of the dig site wasn't inspiring, but for the moment…for the moment they would hold.
"So you've escaped the Geth outside…a pity the true monster lies within the temple."
"Where the hell are you!?" Garrus snapped —the sniper rifle in his arms as he looked around, the only way to go downwards. Jane stood up heavily breathing.
"Tali?"
"I'm all right," she buzzed. "My suit…was punctured but I managed to apply anti-biotics. I should be fine as long as I receive medical aid on the Normandy."
"Garrus?"
"I hate being toyed with," Garrus remarked. "Reminds me of a bad case," he added.
"Likewise," she muttered back. Her eyes roamed over the surface of the temple's walls. "We don't have time to rest. We move."
"Aye, Commander."
"Call me Shepard," she quipped back. "Both of you probably saved my life."
"Anytime," Garrus acknowledged.
The descent was uneventful. If the still painful wounds on her entire body weren't hurting her, and if her muscles weren't tense and ready to fight, she might have perhaps admired the images etched on the walls. Still, as it was, she hoisted her assault rifle and kept on moving. They reached the end of the descent with barely a moment to catch their breaths.
"Lure the prey, lure the prey, lure the prey to hell…sing a song, sing a song, sing a song in hell."
The rhythmical notes sung in the air as she carefully moved her head past the corner. Standing facing a blue force field was a humanoid shape with thick white cables and synthetic muscles, twin orbs of lights placed on his shoulders and a sort of cerulean interweaving that made him every bit as 'synthetic' as it could possibly be.
The figure turned around and smiled. His face was made of thinner carbon fibers and his eyes were red dots. He didn't have any hair, but what looked like the upper side of a helmet was sort of his scalp. In his arms stood a Geth Plasma Rifle, and he was apparently tapping his right foot on the ground.
He looked alone. He seemed alone.
She wasn't at all sure he actually was.
Behind him, within the cerulean Mass Effect field, an Asari was standing with her arms folded over her chest while rocking back and forth.
"Goddess," she whispered. "Goddess, please…"
"Ashley isn't here?" the white armored figure mock-pouted. "Is she betraying me with someone else already, Shepard?" the thing added with a mocking tone. "I gave her my heart on the battlefield; you know…she refused it."
He feigned drying a tear. "I'm so sad now."
"Keelah, what are you?" Tali muttered. "Are you…Geth?"
"Yes, no, maybe," the figure shrugged. "I am Synthetic. My name is Prime Unit Organic. My Will is that of the Geth, and the Geth are my Will."
"Prime? Is that a new Geth definition?" Jane hazarded. "Why do you talk?"
"Not shooting first?" the figure cocked his head to the side. "Ah, yes. You're gesturing for your pet Turian and Quarian to prepare an Overload. Well…good luck with that," he nodded sagely.
Purple flares surrounded his figures.
"I'm a biotic, after all," and then the white armored figure laughed raucously as a Barrier settled over him. "Let us fight our worst nightmares!"
The twin Overload did nothing as it clashed against the barrier, the shields relentlessly bleeding out the effect as the white armored freak opened fire on Tali first. The concentrated burst of fire sailed in the air inches close to the Quarian's visor, forcing the alien to retreat while firing behind her back.
Garrus' sniper bullets drove through Prime's shields, their strength of impact enough when coupled with Jane's own bursts, to cripple the Geth's defenses enough.
The red haired Commander Shepard charged with a battle cry, slamming her armor's reinforced elbow joint against the enemy Get, before tackling him. The creature just laughed as he grabbed her by the neck and lifted her, before throwing her backwards with enough strength to probably shatter her ribcage. She flew in mid-air before landing against the other side of the wall.
"With my head bloodied, yet I still stand. Undefeated and unyielding, my soul is mine." The Geth remarked. "I'm tearing apart poetry to suit my needs, but it is fine for the question is answered at last!" the figure chuckled.
"Does this unit have a soul?" Garrus was lifted from the ground, before the strength of the biotics slammed him back against the wall, near Shepard. The Prime unit moved forward, its red eyes settled on Shepard. "And the answer is…"
A discharge of electricity, a shotgun shot until the barrel overheated, and then there was silence. Behind Prime, Tali stood huffing with her weapon bleeding off heat. "Keelah, you talk too much!"
"I like her," Jane muttered as her suit applied what little medi-gel remained in her reserves. Her breathing returned somewhat normal, as she slowly brought herself back up.
"You're not Geth, right?" the Asari's voice cut through the silence of the room with a tone of frailty, as the scared scientist looked at them with slightly widened eyes.
"No, last I checked no," Jane grumbled back as she helped Garrus on his feet. "You Liara?"
"Dr. Liara T'soni," the Asari quipped back, mostly because of instinct. "I'm sorry. It's just…he didn't stop talking to me and…I think he was trying to drive me mad."
"Psychological warfare is new to the Geth," Tali muttered. "They never fought like this, and they certainly never had biotics in the war that drove us off our planet."
"So you're saying they evolved?" Garrus asked as he began to fidget with his Omni-Tool.
"I'm saying that we don't know. Keelah, if the Geth evolved…they might wage war on all organic life."
"He called himself Prime Unit Organic," Jane muttered as she gave a hesitant kick to the beheaded corpse. "There isn't any flesh though. Delusional machines?"
"It could be anything. I should analyze bits of the synthetic carapace though, they might yield—" Tali's words came together with a long resounding beep from the corpse.
The unison decision when dealing with such a thing was clear: they all jumped away as the corpse detonated, tearing apart a chunk of stone wide enough to let them crawl through and towards a Prothean control panel on the other side.
"Keelah," Tali coughed through her helmet. "This is smart."
"Machines are smarter than humans," Jane retorted.
"No," Tali shook her head. "Machines are stupid. Machines are programmed and are thus as good as their programs allow. This…this trickery, this contingency plan, psychological warfare…it's smart. Geth were cheap labor forces. Simple codes. A 'Geth' is a collective ensemble of small lines of codes that somehow 'fit' one with the other to form a walking platform. This acting, this cadence and movement…it didn't use the 'We'. It spoke with an 'I'. I am a biotic. The thing…He, It, it's…" Tali failed to find the correct words. "Keelah, it felt alive."
"That's the problem with Ais, they tell me," Garrus commented as he crawled through first.
"No! An Ai works on codes and lines. An Ai wouldn't be quoting strange verses or faking being a radio program. An Ai would destroy organics because 'they increase entropy' or 'the organic cannot rule themselves' or another logical fallacy of the sorts. There wasn't logic in the Geth's actions, yet they ambushed and attacked and…"
The doors of stone of the Prothean dig site detonated, in the far off distance.
"And we're going to have company soon!" Jane yelled. "Get the doctor out of that force field, now!"
She crawled in last, before holding point with her shotgun. "Working on it!" the reply came from Garrus. "But I don't know any Prothean!"
"Try and look for a swirling tilde!" Liara exclaimed as she turned to look at the Turian. "No! Not that one!" the sphere had doubled in size after a wrong button had been pushed. "Try with the fourth one from your right," the sphere lost height. "I said right! It's clear that one was…"
Jane fired the first shot as a headlight emerged from the hole. The pellets tore the head off cleanly, passing through the overloaded kinetic barriers. The second one had its chest 'aired' while the third found itself on the receiving end of the shotgun's barrel side.
"Move it!" she snarled. Thankfully adrenaline was holding her from feeling pain, as a mass driver bullet hit her in the ankle. It still hurt like hell, but at least it was survivable. A grenade rolled in, which she hastily kicked out.
"I can keep this up all day!" she yelled back.
"Done!" Garrus' exclamation came in the same moment as the field disappeared.
Both fields.
"There's an elevator in the back," Liara weakly muttered.
"Run for it!" Jane's screech came just as Tali conjured forth a drone, soon followed by a few shotgun rounds fired blindly. The Human Spectre emptied her grenade belt, flinging it at the incoming horde of Geths as they staved off the advancing synthetics.
They reached the elevator just in time to climb aboard, the lift going up and leaving behind the masses of Geth.
"Now Shepard," a voice cracked into her coms. A voice that she recognized instantly. "I can't let you do that, you understand?"
"How are you still alive!?" she snarled back.
"Do not confuse the Geth with the Platform. Do not confuse the weak with the strong. We are beings of pure thought. We are superior. And now that I've done my nice egocentric and half-crazy piece, please enjoy the fireworks."
The ruins began to rumble.
"He set off explosives!?" Tali turned around to stare, as a wide crack appeared on the stone as the elevator finally reached the last floor.
"Joker, we need evac right now!" Jane's scream probably tore through the Flight Lieutenant's headset, but there wasn't another choice.
"Coming down hot Commander! Be ready to jump!" the reply was quick and to the point, Jane could hear the stress in the cracked voice of the flight lieutenant. "What? You can do that? Do it then!" were the last words she heard before the coms were interrupted again.
"Thank you for having chosen Prothean Lifts Commander, last floor of Prothean Temple: lava, crumbling artifacts, psychopathic Krogan battlemaster and Geths!"
Jane's eyes widened as she recalled John's words. Krogan.
There had been a Krogan.
And there he was, with a smirk on his face and flaring his biotics.
Surrounded by what looked like Geth with missile launchers.
"Shit," she cursed. "The temple is falling! Can't we talk about this on another day!?"
"This is what makes it exciting!" the Krogan roared as it charged her.
At the same time, Tali opened an Overload straight into the closest Rocket Trooper, who was wracked in spasms as the second one was quick-scoped by Garrus. The Turian breathed slowly as he redirected the second shot on the spasm-filled Geth.
The bursts of bullets from the nearby Geth forced Liara behind the console as an impromptu barricade. Her right hand waved forward a pulse of Biotic energy that slammed away the synthetic, sending it to crash against another. The Krogan's charge wasn't interrupted even when Jane's shotgun fired away at the beast's head, but just as she was pushed back by the charge that sent her against the console, there was a flash of light.
The Krogan stood angling in mid-air, floating a sphere of Mass Effect as it snarled insults. "Shut up!" Tali fired together with Garrus, filling with holes the beast before it fell on the ground, unmoving.
Jane closed her eyes shut as she took a deep breath. Every bone in her body hurt.
"Commander! Coming in hot, where the hell are you!?"
"Ah, so you think you have won," the voice crackled in her helmet as she stood up. "I will let you believe it. After all…to err is to be human."
The coms shut down finally, letting her start to wobble towards the rest of her team. "Can you stand?" the Asari asked as she neared her, before helping her by lending her shoulder.
"I'm fine," she grumbled, coughing blood. "This is nothing a few medi-gel applications can't fix."
"Let's move! Double Time!" she added then quickly. "We don't have time, Normandy's incoming!"
She wobbled as fast as she could, following behind the running Garrus and Tali. The exit of the temple was in front of them, the light of the planet's sun made Jane wince as they found themselves on a circular platform just outside.
"Where's the Normandy?" Garrus' question was left unanswered as the Normandy came down fast, spinning wildly and opening the hangar doors. Two marines stood clasped to the sides of the hangar, their assault rifles firing randomly.
At least, she believed it was random until she was hoisted up and turned around. Strange Geth like creatures were crawling all over the walls of the temple, hopping every now and then as they lunged from the hangar's doors.
One of the hoppers managed to land one foot away from her, aiming its gun at her.
She stared back.
An Omni-Tool blade cleaved the flashlight's head neatly. The marine with the Pony-Tail returned to his covering fire a moment later.
Jane looked numbly, before grinning like the Chesire cat.
She definitively had to meet the crew now.
Maybe it was the painkillers speaking though, considering Chawkas was already fussing over her. Hadn't she been in the hangar a moment before? And where was the shuttle? She hadn't seen that or the Mako.
Well, as the lights went out and she fell asleep, she couldn't help but feel that she was missing a very important point.
She'd think about it the next day.
Author's notes
Insanity is the new Easy Mode.
We bring Insanity to new levels.
Nobody is safe, all can die.