Chapter 2: Full of Holes

The last farm was quite a distance away from their position. It took them more than an hour to reach it. It was, however, much closer to the main colony than the other two. Shepard could get a good view of the damage in the main colony from its position.

As the squad approached it from the rear, they didn't see any signs of what could have occurred. When McNeil, Carmine, and Thomas cleared the prefab, McNeil said something disconcerting.

"Lieutenant, you should come take a look at this."

"What is it, McNeil?" Shepard asked as he went into the house to find him.

"It's a hole, sir."

Shepard was confused on why a hole would be so intriguing that he would need to be called to check it out. When he found McNeil, Shepard understood why he had called him.

The hole was in the corner of the prefab that faced the main colony. It was about 4 meters in diameter with rough edges. Part of the roof was gone, and the hole reached almost to the floor. The most interesting characteristic was that the structure appeared to have been eaten away instead of blasted. Smaller holes dotted just outside the large opening.

Thomas and Carmine joined the two men.

"What the hell could have done that?" Carmine asked.

"It wasn't an explosive. There are no burn marks anywhere," Thomas pointed out.

Shepard looked at the floor under the hole, looking for any signs of what could have done the damage. He spotted more, smaller holes directly underneath the larger hole in the ceiling. He knew what had caused this.

"It was acid, a very powerful acid," he said.

"How can you tell?" Thomas asked.

"Look at the floor. Those little holes are from the acid that was able to eat through the prefab and landed here. And, like you said, there are no burn marks from plasma or molten material. But who would use acid? There are easier ways to get into buildings."

"Got blood here."

Shepard turned to see McNeil crouching down in the corner on the other side of the room.

"Carmine, you and Garza scout the surrounding area. We're going to be camping here tonight," Shepard commanding as he walked over to inspect the blood.

Carmine quickly left to get Garza as Shepard knelt down next to McNeil.

"It's old, really old by blood standards. I'm guessing the body must have been here a while before it moved though."

"Why do you say that, sir?" Thomas asked

"There is no blood trail leading away from this spot. Blood gets everywhere when you're moving a fresh body. All of it probably coagulated before this person was moved. That must have been hours later."

"Who would wait hours to move a body?"

"I have no idea, Corporal. This place just isn't making any sense."

Garza spoke over the com, braking his train of thought. "Sir, I have a crater here, about 4 meters in diameter."

"Where are you?" Shepard replied.

"Southwest part of the house."

Shepard realized that that was close to where the damage was. He peered out the hole and saw Garza and Carmine looking at a crater about 50 meters from the house.

Shepard turned to McNeil and Thomas. "You two search the rest of the house. Maybe there will be something, anything to help us figure out what is going on in this colony." He then jumped out the hole and walked toward the other two.

As Shepard closed, Carmine spoke up. "It looks like an impact crater, sir. I can't find anything that could have caused it though."

"That's not an impact crater. See how the ground is? It's loose and shifting. Impact craters make the ground hard and compacting from the force. This was a hole that got filled in."

"HA! I knew it. You owe me 50 credits," Garza said, punching Carmine in the shoulder.

"Damn it. I thought for sure it was an impact crater. But what could have made this?"

"No idea, Private. This is place is just one big mystery. Maybe Lt. Diaz will know more. Come on. We are going to set up for the night in the prefab."

When they made it back to the home, Thomas and McNeil reported that there was no evidence of anything that happened besides the room where they found the blood and hole in the wall. Shepard nodded at the two and said that everyone should find a comfortable place to bunker down for the night. He then went outside to contact Staff Lieutenant Diaz.

"Staff Lieutenant Diaz, come in."

"What do you want, First?" Diaz did not try to hide his disgust at the interruption.

"Sir, my squad has finished searching our designated areas. We found something interesting in one of the houses. It appears as though acid ate through the ceiling of the prefab."

"We saw some damage here too. Any evidence on the missing pioneer team's whereabouts?"

"No, sir. We did find a blood pool, but the body was gone. I have a bad feeling about this, sir. Who would use acid to eat into a house, and who would take bodies hours after they have died?"

"I don't give a damn what these monster's motivations were. I just want to find out what the hell happened. Diaz out."

Shepard was taken aback by the indifference of their commanding officer. Any information was better than absolutely no information. He didn't like how Diaz was running the show. It was going to get them all killed.

Shepard knew all he could do was keep his own squad alive long enough to get off this rock in one piece. He was going to do everything possible to make that a reality. Shepard walked back into the prefab and found most of his team lounging in the family room with their helmets off. McNeil was standing vigilant next to a window.

"Lieutenant, can you order McStiff over here to take a load off and relax?" Garza asked.

"Someone has to remain on watch," McNeil replied.

"He's right, Garza, but we will work that out into shifts. When you're time is up, you need to relax a little bit, McNeil. You can only stay alert so long before your senses start to dull."

"Yes, sir," McNeil replied.

Shepard placed his sniper rifle against the wall and sank into one of the open chairs. A soft hiss came from his neck as he released his seals on his helmet and placed it on the table with the rest of his squad, save McNeil's. Shepard then opened his omnitool to look for any reports from the other squads or any signals that could be picked up. He found nothing worth noting.

"LT, what happened on Mindoir?"

Shepard looked up to find Carmine staring at him closely, waiting for an answer. Before he could give one, Thomas jumped in.

"What the hell do you think you're asking, Private? That's none of your goddamn business."

"It's okay, Corporal. I don't mind answering questions about my past. On the shuttle, I just didn't want Toombs to make everyone worry about how fit I am for duty for this mission just before we landed. Now that we got some downtime, I can clear the air."

Shepard turned toward Carmine. "How old are you?"

"Twenty, sir."

"I can understand why you wouldn't know about it then; you were only seven at the time. Thirteen years ago, batarian slavers attacked the colony of Mindoir in the Attican Traverse. Out of the 3,000 people that lived in or around the colony, only a hundred lived after the attack. I was one of those 100."

"How did you make it?" Garza chimed in.

"With a lot of luck," was his only reply.

"What happened?" Carmine finally asked.

Shepard saw that Carmine, Garza, and Thomas were watching him intently, waiting for the answer. He even noticed McNeil glancing at him from time to time, eager to hear his response as well.

Shepard continued. "I was on the outskirts of the colony with a friend, my girlfriend, and my sister. We saw the attack on the colony, so we headed back to our house because it had a bunker we could hide in. We went through a forest to keep ourselves hidden from the shuttles that were heading to the farms.

"When we got to the edge of the forest, I left the rest of my group to clear the house. When I got back, my friend was dead, my sister was gone, and my girlfriend was bleeding out. As I was patching her up, she told me about how the batarians found them, and how my friend died trying to protect them. They took my sister to a house nearby. After I made sure she was all right, I went to go get my sister."

Shepard took a moment to hold back the tears that were forming at his eyes. He hadn't really talked about what happened on Mindoir much after the attack. It brought back memories of seeing Scott clutching at his neck, Daily getting her neck slashed, and Amanda bleeding from her wounded shoulder.

He soldiered on. "Shortly after I got there, my sister started attacking her captors with her biotics. While she was attacking one on the ground, the leader caught her by surprise and slit her throat. I stopped them from doing anything else to anyone else."

He let the meaning sink into his squad before continuing. "As I was leaving, a shuttle caught sight of me and followed me back to my girlfriend's position. I was able to stop them before they got too close. When I finally met up with my girlfriend hiding in the woods, I found that her wound reopened. She died in my arms. Half an hour later, the Alliance showed up to investigate the shuttle. They found me in the process."

Shepard saw awe and sympathy in their eyes. It's why he didn't like sharing his past.

"Did any of your family make it?" Garza asked.

"No," he said flatly.

"How old were you?" Thomas asked.

"Sixteen."

"Damn, sir. You did all that, and you were only 16? I would have folded up and cried if that kinda stuff happened to me," Carmine said.

"The slavers took enough from me that day. I wasn't about to give them the satisfaction of destroying me emotionally even though I survived physically. I wasn't about to let what happened define me. I owe too much to my friends and family to wallow in self-pity."

"You were right to stop Cpl. Toombs, sir. If I had heard this story before we landed, I would have questioned your ability to lead through this assignment. Now that I have heard you talk about it, I would prefer you leading this group than Diaz," Thomas said.

"Thanks for the vote of confidence, Thomas, but enough about me. I want to get to know about my squad. Carmine, you're up."

"Why am I first?" Carmine whined.

"Because you started this whole thing," Shepard answered with a smile that didn't quite reach his eyes.

"Fine, fine. Well I grew up-"

It was two hours before the squad had to move out as Shepard started his watch. He saw Carmine lay down on the couch where he was to get some last bit of shut eye before the sun came up. Shepard stretched to let his cramped muscles uncoil and relax. He looked at his squad, glad that he got to meet such a fine group of marines.

Carmine grew up on Eden Prime, one of the first colonies that the humans had founded outside of the Sol system. The agrarian lifestyle didn't suit him as he wanted adventure and excitement. He enlisted in the Alliance as soon as he was able. In his two years of the service, he hadn't seen much action. It is why he volunteered for the Akuze trip, hoping to encounter something.

Garza was born on Earth, in one of the poorer parts of Mexico City. She had a difficult childhood, running with gangs and being sent to juvenile detention multiple times. When she was 17, she got caught stealing food from an Alliance base by three marines. In the fight that followed, she broke the nose of one and cracked multiple ribs of another before they were able to subdue her. The commanding officer saw her potential and offered her a choice, either serve in the Alliance after she turned 18 or go to jail for 20 years for stealing from the government. She chose to join and found her niche in the galaxy.

Thomas and McNeil both came from military families. After a lot of coaxing, McNeil finally told the squad that he grew up on a base in the Traverse which explained his calm and gruff personality. He was used to the discipline the military required so it was only fitting that he join when he was of age.

Thomas grew up on ships his entire life, being a son of a captain in the Second Fleet. He explained that his father was upset when he enlisted instead of going through the Academy, but Thomas didn't want to live under his shadow. Plus, he didn't believe that he had it in him to be a commissioned officer. Shepard told him otherwise.

Shepard found that he had lucked into a great squad. With more time to get to know each marine's presence in combat situations, he believed this squad could work as an effective team. Carmine's enthusiasm was balanced by McNeil's discipline, and Garza's boldness was a counterpoint to Thomas' leadership. Each attribute was needed to make a good team.

Shepard looked out the window toward the colony and brought up his omnitool to scan for anything that could shed some light on the situation. Finding nothing, he decided to tweak with his omnitool to pass the time. Shepard had just received an upgrade on it and hasn't been able to change the settings to his liking. Even though it was military hardware and software, he always found a way to make it work that much better.

After an hour and half, Shepard was able to reduce the recharge time of his tech abilities by 10% and reduce his shield recharge time by 14%. As he was looking over his improvements, a voice startled him.

"What's that in your hand, sir?"

Shepard looked over to see Thomas walking up to him. He then looked down to see his free hand playing with his dog tags and the wool braid.

"It's a present my sister gave to me. It was made from our family's sheep. I didn't want it to break as I went through training so I slathered it with omnigel to make a harden exterior and attached it to my dog tags."

"Omnigel. That stuff will do anything."

"Why are you awake, Thomas? We don't have to leave for little over half an hour."

"Too much sleep makes me groggy. I got enough. Any more insight into what is going on here, sir?"

"Not a clue. You?"

"I got nothing either."

"Hopefully, we'll find out when we get to the colony," Shepard said as he turned back toward the window.

"I've got a bad feeling about this…"

"Noted, Corporal."