Chapter 2:
Just a Routine Mission
The dropship took Alex Shepard to the SSV Indiana, a N8 frigate. The N8 program was created after the end of the Reaper War. It was a military counterpart to the Spectres and included members of every race and species. When he came on board, he was greeted by one of the first turians to join the N8 program, though it was mostly to escape the paperwork brought on by his previous position.
The Admiral walked to the turian commander and saluted, saying, "Permission to come aboard, Commander Vakarien?"
Commander Garrus Vakarien saluted in response, "Granted, Admiral. Welcome aboard."
The two smiled and shook hands, "It's good to know you're on this mission, Garrus. I was worried I'd have to do all the work myself!"
"Yeah, now I'll to do all of it, granted it'll probably be a lot easier and classier for me than you," Garrus said with playful arrogance.
Shepard laughed, "So, do you know our mission?"
"Yeah, we're to investigate the colony of Alpha Centauri and find out why they have gone dark."
A deep voice shouted from Shepard's left, "I just hope there'll be something that needs killing!"
Shepard looked at the krogan, "Hey, Grunt, it's been a while."
"Hey, Shepard, if the Council sent you, there must be a hell of a fight coming!"
"Sorry, Grunt, but I think they just wanted the 'Savior of the Galaxy' to be involved with helping one of the first interracial colonies," Shepard said apologetically.
"Uh, Shepard, maybe you don't remember, but trouble tends to follow you."
"Yeah, but hopefully this will be and exception and only be a routine mission," Shepard said, not mentioning the last 'routine mission' he was a part of was Eden Prime, "So, what's our crew?"
"Well, we've got a quarian and geth tag team in charge of engineering, a human serving as the ship's pilot, a batarian for the shuttle pilot, and a salarian doctor for our medical professional. As for the ground team, there's the three of us, an asari named Valir T'Mori, a human named Lisa Howard, and a drell named Khan Talvor. That's about it," Garrus said.
"Commander!" a voice called over the intercom, "We'll be coming on the mass relay in a few moments. ETA for Alpha Centauri: 20 minutes."
"Roger, lieutenant," Garrus said.
The team spent the time waiting for the ship to reach the silent planet by prepping their equipment.
Once they reached Alpha Centauri, the pilot came over the intercom, "Commander, Admiral, we've reached the planet, but they still aren't answering our hails. I can't figure out why, though."
"Can you tell whether or not the comms are being jammed?" Garrus asked.
"I'm afraid not, Commander," the pilot said.
"Short-range comm. systems are on a different network than long-range ones, so if the long-range systems were malfunctioning, the short-range systems should still work. Since they aren't, it shows either someone's jamming them or something is seriously wrong," Shepard said, his arms crossed.
"Uh, what does that mean, Admiral?" the pilot asked.
"It means Grunt's probably going to get his wish for a fight," Garrus said, "Tell Marak to get the shuttle ready. The ground team's going down."
"Yes, commander!" the pilot said.
With that, the ground team, including Shepard and his two old friends, headed for the shuttle. Sergeant T'Mori was obviously a former commando, Shepard could tell just from the way she carried herself. She was about his height. She had a turquoise coloring. She carried an assault rifle and a heavy pistol. Captain Howard was a short woman, measuring only about 5'. She had darkly tanned skin and short brown hair tied into a bun. She carried a shotgun and a submachine pistol. Sergeant Talvor was roughly the same height as T'Mori. He had dark green skin and was preparing a submachine gun and an assault rifle. When Shepard and his two companions walked into the room, the rest of the ground team saluted them.
"Alright, team, get on the shuttle, we're moving out," Shepard said.
"Yes, sir!" the three said before boarding the shuttle.
After the shuttle took off, Shepard called to the pilot, "Marak, fly over the colony and open one of the side doors so we can get a look at the colony."
"Yes, Admiral," the batarian pilot replied.
When he followed the order, Shepard used his visor to zoom in on the colony below. He saw what looked like damage from shots of various calibers and explosions. There was broken glass and he could just barely make out dark red puddles. None of it boded well for fate of the colonists.
"Admiral, I'm not reading any life signs coming from the colony, also no weapons signatures are present and the generators appear to be working."
"Great," Shepard sighed, "Take us to the cargo ship landing pad. We'll head into the colony from there."
"Yes, sir!"
When they disembarked the shuttle, Shepard told Marak to wait there in case they found survivors. The landing pad had crates strewn everywhere. The team spread out to see if they could find any dockworkers that survived from whatever happened. Judging from the large amount of blood that they found, this was unlikely.
At least until Captain Howard shouted, "Sirs! I've-I've found something. It's a little…gruesome." She sounded like she was going to be sick to her stomach.
The team moved to her position and found her trying to avoid looking at what she'd found, while simultaneously trying to keep down what she last ate. Her discovery was a corpse that was so mangled that it took Shepard a few moments to realize that it was a quarian corpse. It looked like it had been devoured by a pack of…something. There was barely any flesh or organs left on the body, it was little better than a skeleton. Shepard used his omni-tool to examine the body. It told him that there were traces of an unknown virus on the body, but it wasn't contagious. Also, explained that the teeth marks had been those of various sentient races. One last piece of information was found: the quarian had been alive when he'd been eaten.
"Alright, team, there's nothing we can do for this guy. We should go into the colony, hopefully, we'll find some survivors that can explain what happened," Shepard said as he moved into the direction of the colony, he passed an opened crate. The insignia on the sight looked like the top of a red and white umbrella.
An umbrella? The corporation that my ancestors worked against was called Umbrella. Could it be a coincidence or is there a connection? Shepard thought to himself.
The team moved into the colony and found it in roughly the same shape as the loading dock. There was a lot of blood all over the place and bullet holes all over the place, but no bodies to be found.
"What do you think did this, Shepard?" Garrus asked over the comm. as the team moved from building to building in hopes of finding either survivors or answers, "Slavers? Raiders? Some kind of science experiment gone wrong, like on Feros? You know there's another Gentek facility nearby."
"I don't think so. The company took a big hit after that little fiasco. There's no way they'd be stupid enough to allow something like that again," Shepard said, "Also, I've never heard of slavers or raiders eating people alive."
"Well, whatever did this, I just wish they come out of hiding! I want something to kill!" Grunt said, making Garrus and Shepard smile.
Dr. Wesker had been watching the team since their ship entered the planet's orbit. He couldn't believe his luck! Not only had they sent soldiers to investigate, but they sent N8 soldiers. As a believer in human's supremacy, he despised the N8 program as it made humans fight alongside those that should be bowing before them! Now, not only could he see how his subjects dealt with armed and well-trained opponents, he would get to see N8 soldiers be torn apart! Just when he though his luck couldn't get any better though, Lady Luck didn't just smile on him, she started riding him like a stallion! He saw two soldiers that he recognized instantly: that arrogant turian Garrus Vakarian and the 'pure-krogan' barbarian, Urdnot Grunt. For the pièce de résistance, he saw the one person he hated more than anyone, the one person that was responsible for Humanity being held back from their rightful place: Alexander fucking Shepard. Wesker was going to particularly enjoy watching him get torn apart. On second thought, he hoped Shepard only got infected so he could be sent to Rannoch to try and infect that Quarian whore of a wife of his. That would be such poetic justice on that traitor! Pushing those thoughts out of his mind, Dr. Wesker looked back to the screen to watch the fun, wishing he had a bag of popcorn, but settled for his notes.
The team had been investigating the buildings for ten minutes, when T'Mori called over the comm., "I've found a survivor!"
The team ran to the asari's location and found her kneeling next to a bleeding batarian. Howard, the squad's field medic, rushed to the injured man, pulling her gloves off so she could work. She examined him to find a grievous bite wound on his shoulder. He was coughing up blood and was bleeding profusely.
After she felt for his pulse, the batarian spoke weakly, "Please. Please, kill me. Kill me now. I don't-" his pleading was interrupted by his hacking up more blood, "I don't want to become one of them!"
"Don't worry," Howard said, "I've got medi-gel. You'll be fine," she said as she moved to apply it, only to be stopped by the Batarian.
"Don't bother. Others tried that too. Didn't help. I'm dead already. Just please, kill me before I turn," the batarian pleaded.
Shepard kneeled to look at him in the eye, "What do you mean? What happened here? Who did this?"
"I-it was-" the batarian started only continue hacking, this time spasming as well until he eventually passed into unconsciousness.
Howard checked his pulse and adopted a grim look. She put her hand to his mouth to check if he was breathing, "He's dead," she said looking back at the team.
"Shit," Shepard said, "I was hoping to at least get some answers."
After she examined the body with her omni-tool, Howard turned back toward her commanding officers, grabbing her gloves, "Sir, he had the same virus as that body we found. I still can't tell how it's transmitted, but it appears to not be airborne, though I can't tell for sure.."
"Uh, not to disagree with the squad medic or nothing," T'Mori said, "but I don't think that guy's dead. He just twitched."
The team looked back and, sure enough, he was twitching. Howard kneeled down to look him in the face and gently shook his shoulder, "Hey. Hey, are you alright?" she asked.
The batarian's only response was a mix between a groan and a moan as his eyelids fluttered. Suddenly, his eyelids shot open and he took a deep bite out of her hand, making her scream in pain. She pushed the batarian back as she fell back, losing a chunk of her flesh in the process. The team pulled back away from him and pulled their guns to aim at the flesh-eater, who got to his feet in an awkward fashion, standing like he couldn't stand up straight.
He shambled toward the team, "Stop there," Shepard ordered, which the batarian ignored, "Stop there or we will shoot," Shepard continued.
The batarian continued to walk at the soldiers, "Shit," Shepard said before shooting the batarian in the leg, which only stopped him for a second before he hissed and started moving again.
"What the hell?" Shepard said before he shot him in his other leg, which again only stopped him for a second.
The batarian only continued to walk at the team, forcing the team to open fire on the batarian, finally getting him to drop once a headshot was made.
"What was with that guy?" Garrus asked.
"I don't know," Shepard said before turning to Howard, "Well, Howard, how's that wound of yours?"
"I'm, I'm fin-" she was interrupted by a fit of hacking up blood and collapsing to her knees.
"Shit, everyone back to the shuttle. Don't worry, Howard, we'll get you some help," Shepard said.
T'Mori put the wounded Howard's arm over her shoulder and dragged her out. After the team was all out of the building, Shepard started leading them back towards the shuttle. They got about ten feet before a familiar sounding moan resonated through the silent town. They looked back the way they came and saw a female human walk out from between two buildings thirty feet from the team. She was walking just like the batarian had, as well as moaning in the same way. Then, quarian walked out from between another alley. Then, a salarian and a turian appeared. The numbers continued to grow with each passing second.
"Looks like we've stirred up the hornet's nest," Shepard said, "Back to the shuttle, double time!"
The team moved as quickly as they could toward the loading bay, though their retreat was slowed by the injured Captain Howard growing weaker with each step they took. A few of the strange colonists appeared between the team and their destination, but they were quickly taken down.
When the team got to the shuttle, they put Howard into one of the seats.
Shepard shouted to the batarian pilot, "Marak, get the captain out of here! We need to check out the emergency shelter!"
"Yes, sir!" he shouted in response, "What about the survivors? There appears to be a whole bunch of them behind you!"
Shepard looked back at the path leading to the town and saw what must have been the entire colony slowly shambling its way towards them and they looked hungry.
"Shit! Take off now!" Shepard screamed as he and the team moved back to allow for his take off.
The shuttle took off, but when it was about twenty feet off of the ground, it had to pass a building and Shepard saw…something jump onto the shuttle.
It must have found a way inside because he heard Marak over the comm., "What is that thing!? Get it off of me! Someone help me! Aaarrrggggghhhh!"
Shepard watched in horror as the shuttle turned and began a very steep descent. It crashed into the horde and exploded.
"Damn it!" Shepard exclaimed, "Move to the shelter! Now!"
The team ran down the path leading to the shelter, leaving the burning corpses of their allies and the infected colonists behind. The shelter's door was easy to open, though it took a while, but the creatures were slow to follow, giving the team a moment's rest.
"What were those things, Shepard? Any idea? They kinda look like husks," Garrus asked.
"Not sure. They match the description of zombies, a type of monster of myth and legend on Earth."
"'Myth and legend?' Like the Reapers were?" Garrus said, humorously.
"Fair enough," Shepard said, "According to the legends, they're the corpses of the deceased come back to life to feast on the flesh of the living."
"What do the legends say causes them?" Talvor asked.
"Well, that's the thing. It differs with each story. Some say they're caused by demons, others by magic, and still others say it was by voodoo."
"Well, they're tough to kill! That makes them a challenge!" Grunt said with sadistic glee.
"Sir?" T'Mori started, "If you don't mind me asking, why did you have us visit the town first when you knew about the shelter?"
"Because anyone in the shelter would be safe, whereas those still in the town would be in danger. Also, it was a good place to look for answers," Shepard said.
The asari sergeant seem satisfied with the answer. The door opened and when the team entered, they found the main lights off and emergency lights bathing the halls with dark red light.
"Well, this doesn't bode well," Garrus said as the door sealed behind the team, blocking the sounds of the approaching horde's moans.