I hope everyone is enjoying the story so far. Feedback is always welcome.

None of the characters are mine, of course.

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Chapter 7

The planet was barren of plant and animal life, as usual. Shepard wistfully looked out of the Hammerhead's windows, wishing just for once that they'd find a planet with trees, before she looked back to her crew. Tali and Garrus looked alertly back at her, both worried about the severity of the mission due to Shepard's dark scowl for the entirety of the drop to the planet. Little did they know that it wasn't the mission she was worried about.

Said scowl was mostly due to the fact that Shepard could in no way start excluding Garrus from missions without tipping him off that something had changed. Which led to her enduring the sound of his voice reverberating off of the metal walls of the Hammerhead. Apparently Turians liked to mutter to themselves in sub-vocal levels before missions. It would be better once they got outside. It HAD to be.

She nodded to them and said crisply: "Alright, the distress signal is coming from a mine. Since we have yet to see a mine that wasn't a pit of death and traps, it's best to assume this is as well. I will take point."

She didn't elaborate further, as she knew this team like the back of her hand. They were the best and she trusted them with her life.

Once they set down and all piled out of the vehicle, her sense of foreboding increased as her boots landed in a puff of red dirt. Just for once, she wished that she could ignore her conscience and obviously fake distress signals. With her luck, the one singular time she did so would be the time it was a real signal, and everyone died due to her negligence. Wouldn't Al Jahani love to report about that? Regardless of her misgivings, she signaled the others to follow her, and headed into the belly of the beast.

The door hack was easy enough (really nothing could stand up to Tali's expertise), but as soon as they reached the largest of the mining areas, the husks hit them, crawling out from behind the crates scattered across the room like a mindless blanket of plague.

Shepard hunkered down behind one of said crates, and pulled her shotgun out, sending massive blasts of incendiary rounds into each husk's chest with almost surgical precision. Her armor took most of the brunt of the kickback from the gun, but not all. She ignored the pain, as it was insignificant in the face of dying by the hands of cyber-zombies. She had no need to watch her six, as she always knew Garrus would cover her, and focused on meeting the enemy head on. She was proud of her team. They were from different worlds, but they worked together like a seamless machine.

They methodically fired for what seemed like ages before the numbers of the enemy seemed to thin. She hated husks, as they tended to get up close and personal, though punching them was satisfying at times. Maybe she should let one or two close so she could work off some tension on their freakish hides. Shepard started to relax from her adrenalin surge that helped her focus through fights with crystal clarity, figuring that this was all but wrapped up. Then she heard it.

Garrus made a sudden surprised ream of sound behind her, as if he was being attacked. Her mind went blank and she whirled with her gun up on instinct, ready to shoot a husk off of him. He startled at her unexpected move, in the middle of changing a round out that had jammed his gun, before he made a harsh flange of sound while looking at something over her shoulder.

That was all the warning she got before a cold and pitiless mouth bit down inhumanly hard into her shoulder, crunching the armor and slicing into her flesh. Within seconds, wires and tubes disengaged from the husk and started worming their way into the meat of her arm, searing her nerves with agony. With a harsh shout, Shepard brought her armored fist around to freight train into its skull, crumpling it with an obscene crack and squelch. Her team mates made it to her side and took care of the remaining husks before crouching down to assess the damage.

Shepard clutched at her arm and muttered curses in as many languages as she could thing of while she eased down to the ground via her back to the crate. Her last coherent thought was that Garrus' worried buzz wasn't so distracting when pieces of alien technology were burrowing into her muscle and bone, feeling like acid covered knives under her skin.

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Garrus was panicking as he watched Shepard lose consciousness. Why had she turned to him and left her flank open? Why hadn't he been able to chamber a round faster to cover her? Why had his spirits-be-damned gun jammed?

He scooped her up, and sub vocalized warningly at Tali as she tried to touch Shepard's shoulder to assess the damage. Despite not being able to hear his warning, she seemed to catch on to his body language, and let her hand fall. "Garrus, we need to get her out of here".

He agreed whole-heartedly, and practically ran up the entry ramps of the mine. He briefly marveled at how light Shepard was, given all the damage he knew she was capable of, but then shook his head at himself. They all knew that she was so much more than her species. So much more than any species. It was hard to remember she was a being of flesh and blood, rather than an idea given mortal form. She always had burned so brightly and fiercely. The idea of that light being snuffed out by a disgusting husk was more than he could bear. His chest tightened to the point where he could barely breathe just at the idea of it.

Once they hit the surface, he slapped him com. "Joker! Pick up ASAP! Let Chakwas know that Shepard needs her."

Joker curtly acknowledged him without a single wisecrack, his tension coming through even on the com. Garrus shifted her to a more secure carry position, and growled at his commander: "Hang on Shepard. Stay with me. Please, just stay with me."