Running As Fast As I Can
Chapter Seven: Call
Kalisee Shepard can breathe again. She can walk without blinding pain shooting through her leg. And her arm has stopped bleeding. She can feel the bracing panic receding into the back of her mind, trying to push forward again as she tries to come to terms with all that is happening.
As she follows her sisters and the doctor through the dim and bloody hallways of what used to be the Alliance base, she tries as hard as she can to not look at anything. At one point she trips over what she knows is a body. But she ignores it. She has to ignore it. If she acknowledges any of her surroundings, she knows she's going to feel her throat close up and her chest tighten. She can feel it trying to creep back.
The panic attack took Kallie by surprise, she admits. She's never had one before. Granted, she's never seen her parents die, her house catch fire, her sisters get attacked by varren, and strange aliens called batarians try to kill them before.
Don't think about that, don't think about that, don't think about that—
Kallie's mind automatically switches off, and she focuses instead on moving steadily forward and keeping up with Doctor Nazim. The doctor has said that Kallie and her sisters can help her. They can't do that if her throat is closed and her pulse is going wild. She needs to keep her calm so she can get her sisters out alive. And then she can go back and look for her brother.
Or her brother's body.
The doctor rounds a corner and hustles her two sisters into a brightly lit room. Kallie follows behind very quickly, not wanting to be left alone in a hallway full of bloodied bodies.
"Okay, boys." Doctor Nazim calls as she enters the room, her hands each gripping one of her sisters' shoulders. Not wanting to be left vulnerable, Kallie stands behind the doctor and pokes her head out nervously. "These are the resources I've found."
Kallie can see two men inside the room they've been led to; one watching the door ardently and the other stuck halfway inside the giant computer on the other side of the room. One of them ignores their entrance, save for a small glance—Kallie thinks he's only checking to make sure they aren't batarians—before turning back to his work. The other whirls around and narrows his eyes at them.
"Ma'am, our only resources against an entire batarian raiding party are a couple of kids?"
Doctor Nazim snorts, and reaches back to pull Kallie along further into the room. "What should I say? The batarians took all of the useful items. I found these three inside the medbay, looking for supplies."
Then the doctor turns to the three girls and points to the suspicious man. His arms are folded and his dark brown eyes inspect the three thoughtfully. "This is Corporal Warner." They receive a nod from the corporal as the doctor turns her finger toward the busy man. "And this is Private Jamison."
Private Jamison raises a hand in greeting before reaching for a different tool. Kallie can see sparks fly out of the console.
"Where is Private Pollard?"
"Here, ma'am!" Kallie gasps loudly and jumps to the side as something brushes past her. Her chest takes the surprised opportunity to constrict again, and her lungs try to seize up.
She closes her eyes and takes a deep breath. She can feel someone's hands on her face, and can hear someone speaking to her. She can't hear them. The thought makes her feel worse. Suddenly, she feels someone forcing her head between her knees and holding her there. It feels oddly better, and her breathing improves. She fills her lungs with at much oxygen as she can before focusing on the voice.
"Can you hear me?" Says the voice. "Take deep breaths and try to calm down. No one here is going to hurt you."
After a minute Kallie thinks she's stamped the panic back down again. She opens her eyes and stands back up. Her sisters look at her with a mixture of concern and horrification in their faces. She can see Satana shaking slightly. Doctor Nazim takes her hands off of the redhead and leans back to inspect her.
"Are you all right?" The doctor asks, looking down at her omnitool and pressing a few buttons. Kallie gets the eerie sensation of being scanned and stands as still as possible.
"I'm fine." Kallie states quietly. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to—"
"Of course not." The doctor replies before Kallie can even finish. "We're all in a tough situation here, and you were just surprised. Nothing to be ashamed of."
That doesn't help. Kallie can still feel her cheeks turning red.
"What's wrong with munchkin number three?" Corporal Warner inquires, staring pointedly at Kallie.
Satana answers before Doctor Nazim can, glaring at the corporal and standing next to her sister protectively. "Nothing a good night's sleep and a shower can't fix."
That gets a laugh out of the man. He finally uncrosses his arms and runs a hand through his dark hair. "I like this one."
Doctor Nazim rolls her eyes. "I'm glad you approve." Then she turns to the newest arrival—a short man with curly black hair—and points him out. "This is Private Pollard."
The private scratches the back of his head and nods apologetically at Kallie. "I'm sorry for scaring you. Are you all right?"
Kallie nods in reply.
"Doctor, you said we could help you?" Jo asks loudly. She steps to the other side of Kallie and places herself in between Private Pollard and her sister.
This seems to animate the doctor. "Yes." She makes her way toward Private Jamison and kicks his foot. "The Private here is trying to fix the communications system, and isn't getting anywhere."
"Hey!" The Private calls from his position underneath the computer. "With all due respect, ma'am, I'm trying my best."
"Yeah?" Doctor Nazim swings a finger around to point squarely at Kallie. "This girl managed to close the front door in the middle of an anxiety attack."
Both Privates and the Corporal freeze and slowly turn to look at Kallie.
She can feel her breathing speed up again under such scrutiny. She resists the urge to flee and instead stares back wearily.
Doctor Nazim crouches down and places a hand on Kallie's shoulder reassuringly. "Miss Shepard, do you think you can help us get our communications back online? If we can call for help, we can save everyone."
Kallie thinks about it. "But… I've never worked on military-grade communications before."
"It's the same thing as civilian tech, really." Private Jamison pipes up. "It's just more expensive and sounds fancier." He holds out his hand to the uncertain teenager and waits. "Any help you can give might be able to help us stop this attack."
Stop the attack? That's what Kallie wanted to do in the first place, before the anxiety attack took hold of her. She still wants to, really. And according to everyone, she's the only one who might remotely know what to do.
She takes a last, deep breath, shoving her rising fear away from her mind and takes the Private's hand.
"Show me what we're looking at."
Doctor Nazim sends Corporal Warner and Private Pollard to do another sweep of the area, in case they'd overlooked someone or something, and leads Kallie over to the console.
Kallie can feel her sisters close behind her, and they settle into place as she is made comfortable in front of the broken computer.
The doctor takes a quick look at Satana, who is still holding the pistol tightly in her hand, and stops.
"I'm going to need your firearm."
The reaction is instant. Kallie recoils in front of her youngest sister, followed by her blonde look-alike. Satana backs up and clutches to her pistol even more.
"Not a chance, ma'am." She snarls.
"This is not up for debate." The doctor sternly replies. She tries to be gentler in her persuasion. "You do not have the training necessary to use that weapon properly. You are more likely to hurt yourself than you are to do damage to anything else."
"That gun is all we have left." Jo answers, keeping in front of Satana. "It only has a few more shots left in it, anyway."
"Three." Kallie mutters. Then she clears her throat and speaks louder. "We can get Satana a holster for it, so she's not constantly gripping it. Then you can show her how to get to it in a hurry if she needs to."
The doctor crosses her arms and frowns in thought. She is considering it.
Satana takes the reigns. "We'd rather be sparsely armed than not armed at all. If we get split up…."
"That won't happen. I promise you that." Doctor Nazim cuts in. "However, if it will make the three of you feel safer, I will allow one of you to keep hold of it. We can find you a holster."
Kallie can feel herself smile in relief, just as she sees Jo relax and Satana slacken her grip on the pistol. "Thank you, ma'am."
XXXXX
Ten minutes in and Kallie knows she's way out of her depth.
None of this looks anything like anything she's ever done. The most communications work she's done is with her security droid, and that poor thing had been disintegrated minutes after being completed. She'd run tests on him before, seeing how far she could be away from him while still getting sensory information from him, but that work was still preliminary, and she certainly hadn't gone far enough to reach space.
Besides, none of this looks too badly messed up.
Well, of course the tech was disrupted; there are wires cut and broken levers, but Kallie's basic knowledge of comm. link systems and Private Jamison's passable tech skills, the two of them were able to mend the console enough to turn the monitor on.
But they still couldn't get a connection to any military ships.
"I don't understand!" Jamison thumps the table with a hand, startling Kallie out of her thoughts. She gasps involuntarily and jerks her head around, looking for any sign of a batarian.
Her two sisters also look around. They are standing very close to their sister, almost protectively close, and look as if they'll snap at anyone who comes close enough. Satana's fingers twitch toward the pistol now strapped to her waist. Jo, on the other hand, is being looked after by Doctor Nazim, who is doing her best to combat the girl's drain on her biotics. She turns and glares at the Private menacingly.
Private Jamison shrugs sheepishly. "Sorry."
"What's the problem?" The doctor asks.
"We've fixed it, ma'am. Everything is working. The computer has checked the Alliance satellites for damage, and they're still in working condition. But we can't get a signal out."
"What?" The doctor raises an eyebrow. "Why not?"
"In all honesty, ma'am, I have no idea. This is not my area of expertise." The Private shakes his head. "I guess, if the satellites were damaged, the Alliance would send out someone immediately to fix them. Maybe they're trying to not attract attention?"
Jo squeezes her sister's shoulder encouragingly. "Kallie? What do you think?"
Kallie thinks that she's being watched much too often. All four sets of eyes have now turned onto her and are watching her intently.
"Umm… I…." She can feel herself start to shake. I'm all right, she tells herself. Just take a good breath and say what you think.
Her second try is more successful. "I think the batarians might be blocking any signals from passing beyond our own satellite links."
"Explain."
Aah, this Kallie could do without fear of repercussion. She opened a screen on her omnitool—a spiffy new application that she'd saved up credits for for months before being able to afford it—and began drawing on her new tablet screen.
"Well, with the droid I was making, the comm. system I set up worked through a series of comm. buoys throughout the colony, kind of like satellites. I could check this system from two ways: inside, via my own omnitool, to check for damage to individual buoys, and outside, via any other system, to see if there was a break in the buoy message circuit."
She drew this out on her omnitool as best as she could, ignoring the tingling feeling coursing through her fingers. She had just lost a lot of blood, and holding her arm still in midair must of course be tiring.
"I think this might—might—be close to the same thing. We can ask the computer to check each satellite used by the colony, but that would be too much work for the Alliance itself, so they can only see random breaks in the system; like if the planet were completely cut off, then there must be something the matter with the comms.
"To keep the Alliance from figuring out that we are under attack, the batarians have left the satellites alone completely. There is not a circuit break, nor is there a faulty machine. They're just blocking our long-range signals."
"But the Alliance can see that, too. They'd know if we couldn't get any word out at all." The Private argues.
"But comms. are always being disrupted on Mindoir. The plant life here grows so quickly and wildly that we can't stop it a lot of the time." Jo cuts in. "So they'll eventually send in a team to fix the problem, but they'll take their time."
"What can we do?" Satana asks. "If we can't get the word out that we're trapped here, what's our next move?"
"We could hack into a satellite and bring it down ourselves. That would bring the Alliance running." Jo suggests. She leans over Kallie's shoulder to inspect the image drawn.
Kallie can't help but laugh at that; her laugh quickly turns into a wheeze. "And who would hack that? Or are you proficient in hacking past military-grade firewalls and omniscramblers?"
"I agree with Kallie." The doctor states. "The damage would not only be extensive, but it would definitely destroy whatever chance we have at gaining someone's attention. We have to try and get the word out that we're in trouble. Even if it's just a short blip on the screen."
Kallie feels her eyebrows rise before she finishes her thought. "A blip?"
"…Yes, a small, nearly insignificant bump in information." The doctor reiterates. "Why? Do you have an idea?"
"I don't know." Kallie shuts off her omnitool, cooling her hand down immensely, and begins to fiddle with the communications console in front of her. "Just a thought. Maybe they didn't think of everything. Maybe they didn't think of a blip."
"What?"
"Just say what you're thinking, Kallie. We'll translate if we need to." Jo encourages. The light-heartedness of the joke manages to release some of the tension in the room.
"They've blocked long-range communications. But what about short-range? There's only the one colony on Mindoir at the moment; we technically have no one close enough to call for help that would classify as short-ranged. Maybe they didn't bother shutting off short-ranged communications."
"And you think those can help us?"
Kallie is gaining confidence in her theory now. "They certainly can't hurt. If we have access, I can maybe amplify the strength of it to send it out to the satellites." She frowns as she remembers her one caveat with this plan. "It wouldn't be able to go farther; it would only be able to bounce back and forth between them. And worse still, it would be a general signal, not Alliance-specific."
"Meaning anyone would be able to pick it up." Satana translates.
"Basically." Kallie tries not to think about it. She knows she's failed when she feels her breath speeding up. "There's a much more likely chance that the signal is picked up by a batarian ship patrolling the outskirts of Mindoir's atmosphere than a passing Alliance vessel. The Alliance ship would have to be in the vicinity in the first place, looking at Mindoir itself, and would have to be scanning the colony at the moment that our signal passes over it."
This doesn't seem like a good idea anymore. "It's too risky. I can think of something else. What if we—"
"No, that is an excellent idea." The doctor interrupts Kallie before she can start on a rambling new idea that everyone knew would head nowhere. Doctor Nazim brushes her dark hair into some semblance of a ponytail and rubs her chin thoughtfully. "And it seems our best bet. How can we get it started?"
"There's another computer on the base that deals with short-range messages." Jamison adds, taking a quick peek out the door and returning when nothing jumps out at him. "It's pretty far from here, but I think we can make it there with minimal damage to anyone."
"Excellent. I will take the girls to it and see what we can do. Private, stay here and keep an eye on this console. When Corporal Warner and Private Pollard return, all of you return to our location." The doctor began packing her medical kit into her bag and cinched it up. Private Jamison salutes his superior and stands guard at the door.
"Shepards, let's go."
Jo grasps at both Kallie's and Satana's hands and drags them back through the Alliance Base.
XXXXX
The trek to the other side of the base is a short one. Doctor Nazim insists on going first, assault rifle at the ready, and leads the three girls through the maze of bodies. Now with a chance to relax and not be terrified of dying with every breath, Kallie finds she can navigate through the hallways without as much trouble. She of course still feels the urge to lose what little she has left in her stomach, but she does not feel the crushing tightness around her chest.
Her arm feels tight, as if she's burned it, but she attributes that to being recently shot and healed. She flexes her arms experimentally, momentarily forgetting that that hand is being held by her sister, and gains a curious expression from her blonde twin.
They reach the other side before Kallie can address what she'd been doing. Doctor Nazim opens the door and checks inside for batarians before letting the girls into the room.
Kallie enters the room and looks around. It is just as large as the last comm. room they'd entered, with a computer that's just as large. This one, however, does not seem to have been touched in the slightest. Kallie ignores the bodies littering the room (she hates the fact that she's getting good at this), and heads straight for the console. It blinks to life.
"This looks promising." Satana mutters beside her.
Kallie ignores her. Her fingers are shaking. If they do this, and the wrong species picks up their cry for help, they're all dead.
"You can do this, Miss Kalisee Shepard." Doctor Nazim says gently from behind her. "You can do it."
Kallie begins typing out instructions.
For a while the process is simple. She's used the short-range comm. system many times before; she's even used it when she shouldn't have to eavesdrop on some conversations best left unheard. However, the range does not want to reach quite as far as the atmospheric satellites. She needs an extra power source.
Well…. It worked once before, didn't it?
Kallie plugs her omnitool into the computer and amplifies the power. Pain shoots through her arm as the console finally decides to follow her instructions. Kallie looks at her arm in shock as the message flies off from the console and into the satellites, bouncing from buoy to buoy.
Doctor Nazim snatches her arm back as the omnitool powers down and inspects it. Kallie's arm is now bright red; small blisters are beginning to form along her arm in the shape of her configurations.
Kallie can only think of one explanation. "I guess my omnitool glitched."
The doctor begins pulling out medigel to try and stave off infection. "How long until something happens?"
"I have no way of knowing that."
Doctor Nazim sends her a sharp look. "Guess, then."
Kallie shrugs. "Anywhere from two minutes to twenty four hours. That's how long it'd take an Alliance vessel to come and see why Mindoir's gone silent."
The doctor does not like that answer. "Then I guess we wait."
XXXXX
One hour they wait. Then two. At the third hour, Kallie begins to doze off. She jerks herself back awake when she hears screaming and fire in her dreams.
When she does so, she sees Doctor Nazim standing and taking her gun.
This puts Kallie instantly on alert. "Where are you going?"
"Privates Pollard and Jamison, as well as Corporal Warren have been away for too long. I need to find them."
Jo sits up and looks horrified. "You're leaving us here?"
"Only long enough for me to sweep the area and try to find the rest of my squad."
"But—but what if someone answers while you're away?" Satana asks.
"Then answer them." Doctor Nazim replies. "You know just as much about the situation as I do." She places a hand on Jo's shoulder and gives it a squeeze. "I'll be back as soon as possible."
It is clear none of the siblings want her to leave. Yet she still pulls her rifle up to her chest and leaves them alone in the control room.
Kallie feels the anxiety starting to creep back up on her. They're alone, in the middle of a raid, inside a building of questionable safety, trying to contact someone who might actually end up being an enemy.
Don't think about that, don't think about that, don't think about that….
She wonders if her brother is all right. He probably isn't. He probably died as soon as they deserted him. They definitely shouldn't have done that. She'd been terrified, and he had offered her a way out by offering himself up as bait.
If Jonathan Shepard is dead, Kallie is never going to forgive herself.
Ten minutes into not thinking about her brother, the computer beeps. All three girls leap up and over to the console.
"What's happening?" Satana asks.
Kallie reads the screen. She can feel herself become cold and pale. "Someone is attempting to make contact."
She only hesitates for a few seconds. This will either save them or kill them. With trembling fingers, Kallie connects with the new signal.
An entire bridge of humans stares out from the screen, their faces inquisitive at first, then horrified as they recognize the horrified expressions of three bloodied girls.
"Oh, thank the gods!" Jo sighs. She rests her head on the table and lets out a sigh. "Humans!"
"Who are you?" The tallest man—the most decorated one, certainly—asks. "State your names and your reasons for hijacking an Alliance satellite."
"You have to help us!" Satana cries out. "We're under attack by batarians. They've set fire to the entire colony!"
"What?" The man standing beside the decorated man looks surprised. "Tell us what is going on."
Jo nudges her little sister to the side. "My name is Josephine Shepard." She starts. "This is my twin sister Kalisee, and our little sister Satana. The colony came under fire about four hours ago. We've been trying to get a signal across to someone—anyone—to find help. Please, please send help."
The man who last spoke seems to examine all three girls individually. Kallie locks eyes with him and holds his gaze. He seems to be searching for any sign that this might be a joke. From his sudden shake of the head, he doesn't find any proof.
XXXXX
It's just as Anderson has feared, then. Damn his instincts. He should have checked up on this as soon as the feeling had come up.
He checks over each of the girls individually, somehow hoping that this might be a twisted joke. It is the child on the far right, the red-headed girl, who convinces him otherwise. Her pupils are dilated to the point where they almost envelope her eyes. She is shaking, but she is making a visible effort to stop, as if she knows it won't do her any good.
This isn't some sort of joke. This is real.
He can't help speaking up. "We're sending troops as soon as possible. I am heading the first away team myself."
The blonde girl in the middle—Josephine, she'd introduced herself as—nods appreciatively. "Thank you, sir. Please hurry."
"Where are you?" Anderson asks.
"Inside the Alliance Base. We were here with Doctor Nazim and her team, but they got separated. We don't know where they are." The dark-haired sister replies.
Captain Einer, however, is not finished. "We're reading that the comm. links aren't functioning. How did you manage to get this signal to work?"
At this the redhead ducks her head down quietly. One of her sisters opens her mouth to speak.
"Kallie amplified a short-range signal to bounce between satellites until someone picked it up."
From somewhere on the bridge, Anderson hears someone mutter, "You can do that?"
The redhead's head ducks even more as all eyes turn to her.
"Um, sir?" The pilot turns in his seat to address Captain Einer. "If they're using a short-range signal, then isn't it a general signal? I mean, it's not attuned strictly to the Alliance."
Anderson feels a chill down his spine. His eyes widen at the same time Captain Einer begins barking orders.
"I want this entire sector swept for batarians! Run a trace on this signal, quickly, see if someone has been listening in." Captain Einer turns to Anderson, and with a snarl that Anderson knows is not intended for him, says, "Lieutenant-Commander Anderson, get down there. Right now."
There is a loud bang! on the outside door. All three girls jump and turn simultaneously.
The visual on the three girls jumps and then shuts off.
Anderson immediately takes off running, vaguely hearing that yes, there had been someone listening into the signal, and there was no way to tell if they had been tracing the signal for long before their ship even picked it up.
XXXXX
I originally wasn't going to post anything Mass Effect related until all of the DLC came out, so I could finish everything off with my head-cannon fitting actual cannon, but I caught the writing bug again. I figured writing on something that can't be canonized totally would be best.
Also, I think I'm going to rewrite the first chapter. It's kind of blasé compared to the others. I'll just spruce it up a bit. It's kind of cringe-worthy.
Don't forget to vote for the Shepard you want to have survive in the end!
Thanks for sticking around, guys! I'm definitely not going to wait another year before posting again.
Amme Moto
