I don't own Mass Effect, nor will I profit from this story.

Chapter 10: The Mistake

The skycar had barely hit the ground before Ghai and I had popped our doors. Nynsi was a half moment behind, making sure that the vehicle actually stopped and remained running. After all, it would be pretty awkward for us if the communications jammer shut down because the car noticed nobody was inside of it and switched off.

"Sharpshooters in place." Re'hat growled, "Half a dozen guards on the roof, figure as many at the main door."

"None at the side entrances, looks like they've kept them locked for us." Marn chuckled darkly, "I'm sending a runner to keep them that way."

"Good, everyone move up on the main doors!"

The first gunshots began to crack through the air as we ran. I glanced up in time to see a figure collapse in a spray of red mist three stories above me. There was maybe ten or so more rounds, intermixed with a very high pitched scream, before they ran out of targets.

"Roof clear, shifting to clear the main entrance."

I slowed a bit as we neared the corner, my armored boots almost skidding across the pavement as I shoved my back against the wall. Ghai hit next to me a moment later, closer to the edge than I was, her pistol casually held in both hands.

Nynsi, her scoped pistol drawn, stayed about a half step away, covering the turn. "Ghai, give us a count."

The armored Asari nodded, slid the foot to her right, then jerked her head just barely around before whipping back. "Nine. Open."

"Confirmed." Our sharpshooter, whose name I hadn't caught, sounded amused. "I'll start on the far side. Asari, human, keep them from getting to cover. Go in five."

I barely had time to wrap my head around that before Ghai nodded once, her body starting to glow with biotic light, and hurled herself around the edge. I might have hesitated for a moment, but not long enough for Nynsi to have to say or do anything, before pressing my feet down and sprinting after her.

The first of the True Sons died even before they noticed us emerge, a human woman with abominable fashion sense dropping limply as a round tore into her chest.

"JEN!" Another human, a male this time, actually dropped his bloody weapon and moved to run to the fallen woman's side. He made it about two steps before an accelerated grain of sand entered his left temple and exited the right. Most of the rest of the idiots around finally started to get the idea that they were under attack, just in time for Ghai and I to get involved.

She moved first, a blue blur rocketing from her hands to catch a Salarian trying to duck back inside. The little alien yelped as the pull hurled him back into the open, he was still trying to get back to his feat when our sniper put him down.

I didn't bother with my gun, there was no way I could shoot it accurately on the move. No point to an overload either, if these guys were anything like the other True Sons I'd seen, their shields were civilian level, crap civilian level at that.

Which left one option really.

My right fingers flicked, starting up my omni-tool, and then I jerked them into the proper command combination and gestured straight at a pair of Turians standing a bit too close together. The tiny little tech mine, glowing balefully red, shot out from its launcher and whipped through the air. It curved slightly, following the tracking information my omni-tool was feeding it, reached the leftmost of the pair, and exploded into a low level incinerate.

I'm pretty sure the guy I hit died instantly, though that was mostly because he wasn't screaming like his partner as he burned. Ghai put him out of his, and our, misery with a single smooth shot, not even breaking stride.

"Dammit. There goes fifty credits." Apparently that wasn't just chump change to our cover guy, because he quickly took out two more gang members, both Salarian, even as they belatedly drew their pistols and tried to figure out who to shoot.

I felt my mouth tug slightly as more moans and bitching filled the com channel before Trena tersely told everyone to shut the hell up and get their asses up to support us.

The last two standing were a Batarian and a Turian, though they were less standing and more actively running for their lives. A sharp crack from behind me indicated Nynsi involving herself, the Batarian dropping limply as her scoped hand cannon destroyed something important in his back. The Turian might have made it if Ghai hadn't cocked her hand and hurled another blur after him, the pull reversing his momentum entirely as he flew screaming through the air. Our sharpshooter finally missed a shot, understandably so since his target was bouncing rapidly along the ground by that point, sending pieces of pavement flying as he cursed darkly.

I'd slowed to a walk at this point, and carefully shifted my gun from my left hand into my right, making sure to keep my left on it as a brace. Though it was pretty much just overkill when I started to pull the trigger, both of my squad mates firing their own weapons at around the same moment.

"Chen, you see movement inside?" Nynsi jogged past, slapping me on the shoulder as she did. "T'laria, we've cleared the entrance. Gang members only."

"We're here." Trena emerged from around the other corner, her pistol low in a two handed grip, Re'hat's short team following her. They settled against the massive, mostly shut hanger door on their side, as we slid into place on the other. "Good job. Marn, time?"

"Twenty seconds. Confirmed all the doors sealed on our side, my girl added extra encryptions to the locks, she's joining the sharpshooter on that side."

"Good thinking. All right, as soon as she gets here, Re'hat, covering fire. Anything in the open I want it dead. My team to the left, Marn to the right." She regarded me for a long moment, "You got one ape?"

"Incinerate to the chest." I shook my head, thankful that my helmet was stopping the stench of scorched flesh from reaching me. I'd read about how bad it was, and no desire to find out first hand if I could help it. "These idiots must have picked up their shields from pawn shops."

"Or garbage dumps." Our sharpshooter, Chen apparently, sounded amused. "This thing isn't exactly a Mantis or a Widow. If we hit them they dropped."

"Good to know." Re'hat chuckled, checking over his assault rifle. "Even if I did already lose twenty credits thanks to you Chen. You had to tell him to get involved."

"I didn't expect him to have damned incinerate mines! I thought he'd just overload their already crappy shields or something."

Trena cut in before anyone else could start up,"Enough bitching about that, I told you not to underestimate the ape."

I rolled my eyes, trying to keep my breathing slow and normal. "Thanks scales." Though I'd appreciate it if Marn would hurry the fuck up so I can stop thinking about what just happened. Thankfully I wasn't in shock like the first time, or even shaking like I'd started to at Forever.. but if it was all the same, I'd rather get on with it. The nine bodies decorating the ground with blood of various colors wasn't doing much for my concentration, and I shoved that awareness firmly down.

"Re'hat, if they try and leave by shuttle or truck or whatever the hell they've hauled those people in here with, close the damn doors before they can get out."

"Not a problem." His sharp teeth gleamed through the transparent portion of his helmet, "We'll keep them bottled up for you."

Marn, wearing even heavier armor than Nynsi, emerged from the same corner we'd come from, her team hard on her heels. Trena gave them a long moment to get collect themselves before nodding once.

"Move your asses!"

Re'hat was around the corner first, opening up almost at once as he saw something to his left. Short, controlled bursts were followed up by screams and a barrage of inaccurate counter-fire. He hardly seemed concerned about the occasional round ricocheting off of his barriers, moving deeper as his three squad members followed him. Their fire was less controlled than his, but was likely no less deadly.

A fact which I confirmed when Trena motioned for us to move in, and I felt my eyes go wide at the sight of what was happening.

Our first team had killed easily three times their number already, settling in behind our opponent's own parked vehicles as they happily continued to murder any of them stupid enough to try and fight back. Even with the dozen or so already dead, plus the fifteen we'd killed outside, there still seemed to be plenty of True Sons still running around, screaming, and occasionally shooting. Most of the warehouse was empty, and only the nearest section had anything of note.

Of course, the things of note were a few dozen battered looking skycars, and three massive trucks that probably contained the people we were here to retrieve... all of which left our opponents with plenty of cover. But just because they had it, didn't mean that they were bothering to use it intelligently. As far as I could tell from the bodies, it looked like they'd actually tried to rush Re'hat as soon as he'd moved in, and gotten slaughtered for it.

"How fucking many of them are there?" I snapped as I raced after Trena, whipping my hand to send another Incinerate to drive a trio of Salarians out of cover.

"Just keep killing them ape!" Her own body glowed as a singularity popped into existence, irresistibly pulling the screaming gang members up and into the air. Ghai hurled her own power up, and I got to experience a biotic combination in real life when the warp hit.

It was... loud.

I couldn't help but yelp and stagger back at the explosion of blue and purple light damn near blinded me. A hand grabbed me firmly by the shoulder, pushing me ahead as we kept going.

"Keep going, we are going to set up to flank them." Nynsi's voice was steady as my vision cleared and the ringing stopped, "I am sorry about that, we should have made sure your helmet was properly adjusted."

"Don't worry about it." I shook my head to clear the last of the dancing lights, "Warn me next time scales!"

"Suck it up ape!" Her pistol barked several times, "And get your ass over here and burn those fuckers out!"

"Athame's tits." I moved past Ghai, feeling strangely invulnerable as several weak shots rebounded off of my shields, hardly even budging the bar on my helmet's read-out. "What the hell kind of guns are these morons even using?"

"Cobbled together pieces of crap. Right there, behind that car."

"I see them." My fingers danced again as my arm swung, the omni-tool locking onto my target as the mine careened away from the launcher. Another muted flash of orange light followed a handful of seconds later. Two targets leaped away from the blast, dieing almost at once as Marn's team set up behind several cars opposite us and gunned them down. The last figure looked as if he'd taken the direct hit, his badly burned form crawling slowly along the ground. Nynsi stood up beside me, taking careful aim through her scope before putting a round through his skull.

Trena started to get up, snarled, and then shouted, "Re'hat! The trucks!"

"I see them! Shutting the doors now!"

The massive trucks had started to shift, their rumbling engines barely audible over the gunfire and shouting. In front, the lead truck was already a good few feat off the ground, its heavy form slowly spinning towards the barely open hanger door. It apparently had begun to respond to an open signal from whoever was driving, because it had slid better than a yard open before one of Re'hat people had managed to find the manual override.

I half-rose, prepping a new tech mine before tossing it down range with a small grin on my face... which faded when the overload exploded against a thick shield surrounding the cab.

"What the fuck?" I dropped back into cover, double checking my settings. "Who the hell puts barriers around a truck? That's not a gang level expense."

"No," Nynsi growled, swapping her overheated scoped weapon for her short range model before resuming fire, "Keep hitting it!"

I did, hurling more overloads down range as quickly as my launcher could recharge itself and the omni-tool could configure the next mine. Between me draining the shields, and whoever was on the door finally managing to get it sliding towards closing entirely, the driver panicked.

We had a few moments warning before they accelerated, trying to build up speed to simply ram their way free. Which might have worked if they'd had more space to get some velocity, or if the massive hanger door hadn't been built as sturdily as it had apparently been.

"Re'hat! Move your ass!"

"Get the fuck clear!" Four Batarians bolted just before the cab impacted. And here I thought the biotic explosion had been loud, this was easily twice as bad. Metal squealed and screeched as the truck rebounded slightly, the barriers finally failing entirely as the driver floored his abused powerplant, apparently just trying to force his way through.

I didn't wait for the order before priming another mine and sending it straight for the engine. Apparently they'd thought the shielding was enough, or if there had been armor around it it had been breached by the impact, because when the little mine burst into electrical tendrils the rumbling coughed and rattled to a halt. Thankfully I was pretty sure all of our own people were out from under it before the multi-ton vehicle's mass effect fields failed, dropping it straight onto several cars in a titanic explosion of noise.

Another dozen or so True Sons, probably most of what was left, died around then, darting out of cover to try and get away from the crash. Most of them hadn't even been really threatened by it, and I winced even as I returned my gun to both hands and fired off a few bursts.

Fucking kids really... kids with crap guns and crap shields.

"Good overload human, got them blocked in nicely." Marn praised me as the other two trucks engine's cut out, their bulky frames settling back down. "Let's figure out who these... by the pillars.."

One of the cabs had opened up, a slim form dropping out before darting into cover. That wouldn't have been enough for Marn to curse though, not even when two more figures quickly dropped out to move after the first. I was pretty sure the cursing was because of the dark blue armor with a white logo prominently displayed on the shoulders.

"Athame's sacred ass... this just got complicated." Trena breathed out slowly, "Marn! Suppressing fire! Keep those assholes in cover. Re'hat, get your fucking team in order and clear out these gang fucks. You three with me!"

She was up and moving even before she was done, the three of us jumping up to run after her. The other truck finished settling, three more figures jumping from the doors and darting into the cover provided by a pair of cars. Well, the wreckage of cars really, Marn and her people were pumping enough rounds into them to ensure that they wouldn't fly again.

Trena went into a long soccer slide, crouching firmly behind a massive toolbox. It wasn't much, but we were far enough back from the veritable car park that there weren't really many options. I slid in next to her, while Nynsi and Ghai crouched behind a nearby tooling station."Ape, these guys will actually have shields and guns worth a damn. I need overloads on command, and I need you to stay in cover, got it?"

"Got it." I managed to get out through my panting. Panting? When the hell had I gotten so winded? I shook that off and manged to check my omni-tool, confirming that I already had an overload ready.

"We've almost got them flanked, so expect a lot of fire our way as soon as we open up. I'll handle the barrier, Ghai, Shaaryak, focus on whoever the ape shorts out." The pair of women nodded firmly, fingering their pistols. "Right.. now!"

The four of us jerked up, my right arm and fingers already moving. The nearest Blue Sun mercenary was a Turian, who caught the motion in the corner of his eye. The time it took him to swing his long carbine around was enough for the tech mine to cross the distance between us, sparks flying as his shields took the hit. He jerked heavily a moment later, snarling in pain as pistol rounds blew into his armor. To my horror though, he didn't drop like I expected, instead firing off a pair of quick shots directly at Trena and I before ducking back into cover.

Both of his shots missed, screeching past us, but I still dropped firmly back behind the metal box frantically watching the tiny indicator on my omni-tool detailing the recharge rate on my launcher. Pistol rounds continued to bark from our side, Trena swearing as she threw up a barrier just in time for a carnage round to slam into it, making her wince visibly in pain.

"Hurry up you little piece of shit." I could barely hear my own mutters over the gunfire.

The moment it blinked green I was back up, my eyes snapping to the next target as the barrier dropped. The Turian was down, slumped over the car's trunk with his helmet and skull shattered. I held my fingers above the glowing launch command until a tall humanoid form rose up next to the body, a truly monstrous shotgun clutched in his hands. The overload was away the moment he'd even started to show up, and I could feel my heart hammering as he swung the barrel in our direction. He fired about when my tech power hit, his shields shorting out at the same time as a pillow swung by a giant hit me in the chest. My shields-low alarm started shrieking as I fell on my ass from the impact.

"You all right ape!?" Trena glowed as she put a new barrier, cursing each time something hammered at it."Athame's ass... fuck!"

"I'm..." I coughed, shook my head, and double checked that I wasn't bleeding. "I'm good." Holy fuck.. my shields aren't bad but he dropped them in one go, and left a good amount of dents on my chest. Without those barrier upgrades we bought I'd probably be dead.

"Down to three of them." Re'hat's satisfied voice came just after a feminine scream of pain, "Want to rush them?"

"Ape, stay here and cover us. Re'hat, I want your fucking weapons glowing! Marn, go in three!"

Scrambling to my knees, I braced my gun in both hands as I tried to catch my breath. Naturally there wasn't time for me to really recover before Trena, Ghai, and Nynsi all vaulted from cover, and Re'hat's team opened up on full auto. My shields were barely recovered, and it took an effort of will to make myself rise up enough to lay out my arms and gun along the top of the box. Blowing out a breath and making sure I wasn't aiming too close to my friends, I joined in, firing controlled bursts to maximize how long my little gun could keep shooting.

The three of them, plus five Batarians running in from the opposite side, closed the short distance quickly enough. One of the Blue Suns must have figured out what was happening, because a thick voice shouted something that I couldn't make out over our gunfire. Whatever the order was, it was too late.

Trena, Ghai, and Marn skipped the effort of moving around the cars, opting instead to simply vault them. I couldn't quite follow the confused melee that followed, especially after everyone else arrived and join in, but at the end of it there were three dead mercs and Marn was cradling one of her arms.

The silence that followed was practically deafening. I was in the middle of glancing around when my eyes found the crashed truck still draped over several cars near the entrance. Except now the driver's side door was wide open.

That first truck... "Chen! Did anyone try and get out of here?"

"Not a soul, human."

"What is it ape?"

I kept my gun up, "Where's the driver of that one?"

"Spread out and head back." Trena suited action to word, carefully clambering back over a shot to hell skycar, "Re'hat, get your team checking out the trucks for the cargo. Everyone else, if they aren't in uniform I want them alive... we need some fucking answers as to what these assholes are even doing on planet."

No shit... this is Eclipse territory.

I'd looked up a bit of information on the three major merc groups not long after the attack on the shop. By and large they were just like what you expected from the games, but even more antagonistic to each other than I'd originally thought. It made Garrus pissing them all off enough to work together to kill him even more impressive really. Still, while they might fight a bit on Omega, they each had their own enclaves that were considered more or less inviolate. And Illium, where Sederis herself had her headquarters, was very much the Eclipse's sanctum.

And I highly doubt that the only Blue Suns here were those six... what the fuck did we just walk into?

There was a concerned rumble of agreement before we all started slowly heading back. Now that things had calmed down, a bit, I got a better look at all of the bodies. Batarian, Human, Salarian, Turian, all young... and most were very much dead. Occasionally one or two would twitch or moan in pain, only to be quickly finished off by one of our Batarian comrades.

Nynsi had quickly gotten back to me, carefully staying close as we moved. She handled the few we found without a comment. I hid to fight down a bit of bile when a human kid, Asian, he couldn't have been older than sixteen, started begging as he tried to hold his stomach shut. Her pistol interrupted him before he could finish, and his eyes glazed over as his heart stopped.

Welcome to your new life Cieran... welcome to the shit. That kid would have executed you to make his 'friends' happy.

"Found her!" Marn growled, "Asari bitch."

We quickly converged on where the heavily armored form was holding a pistol with her good arm, covering a trembling Asari who'd apparently been trying to force open one of the side doors that we'd sealed to prevent anyone from fleeing. She was trembling violently as the rest of us moved up, and it only got worse when she saw Trena push her way to the front.

"T'laria, we've got the slaves. Figure forty of them in each truck.. not in the best of shape. Mixed species."

I couldn't read her face through the helmet, but the fact that her entire body started glowing was a pretty good indicator of how pissed she was.

"By the goddess you will explain this to me, or I will fucking ship you to Thessia and hand you over to the Justicars." Trena's voice was harder than I'd ever heard, and I had to fight not to take a step back. Several of our squad members did shuffle a few steps away as it was.

"Oh goddess... goddess..." the Matron whimpered, pressing herself against the door as firmly as she could. "I don't know... I just signed the forms... please... goddess.."

"Do a better job than that bitch." A slim hand drew her hand cannon, pointedly lowering it so that our prisoner would have the best view down the barrel possible. "I'm sure you can."

"They... they... they needed someone to make the paperwork. To transfer them! I don't know where they bring them in... or what they do... I swear! I just bring the forms!"

"To sell them into legal slavery."

"It's.. goddess, please.." A stain slowly appeared around her crotch as she lost control of herself, "Please... just the forms... I d-don't know anything!"

"Pity." I didn't jump when she pulled the trigger, blue blood spraying across the doorway as the twitching body collapsed. Her armored visage stared at the corpse as she started to give us orders,"Re'hat, detail your drivers to get the trucks out of here. If you have to, get everyone out of the first one and push it out of the way once the door is open. Marn, collect the mercs bodies and get them back to Xerol's place. I want their omni-tools stripped for everything they've got."

The two squad leaders nodded quickly, obviously glad to get away from the cold fury of our leader. She didn't even swear once..

"Little Shaaryak. I need Ghai here to watch my back. Take Cieran, go to his place and mine, pack everything up that we'd need for an extended stay with your uncle. Com him on the way and tell him to send a team to pick everything up from my shop." She took a long breath, "And see if he can get a hold of Aethyta. I don't think the Suns will be pleased that we just wrecked one of their operations, and she might not be expecting them."

We both nodded once before quietly backing away, though I hardly dared to breath until we'd gone a dozen paces.

"I am starting to regret signing up for this." Nynsi murmured as we headed for the exit.

"I'm..." I started to agree, but stopped when I saw two of Re'hat's people guiding prisoners out of the wrecked truck.

They were... were...

I suddenly had a whole new appreciation for the GI's and Russians who had found the concentration camps in Europe, and I no longer felt bad in the slightest for the people we'd killed. The worst was a naked little Asari girl, she couldn't have even passed her first decade, who had to be helped along by an equally emaciated Turian female. "Not. Not anymore."

She'd stopped as well, her helmet following them before she nodded slowly. "It... gets worse than that, my noble human. I have seen far, far worse."

"Then I'm glad we're doing something about it." I shook my head, forcing myself to turn away "Let's go."

Looking back on it later, I'd be glad for the anger. It might have already been after sunset, but the day was long from over.

Next up is Chapter 11: The Night

Well, this basically turned out to be entirely action, but it was fun in its own way. I'd thought about making the True-Sons / Blue-Suns connection a bit less obvious in the names, but thought it went well as an obvious-in-hindsight bit. Plus there's a bit more to the name that is indicated at first glance, which we'll find out about moving forwards.

So.. gang members die easily. Actual mercenaries not so much, I suppose that's a good lesson as any to take from this chapter. Things are going to continue to be interesting in the next chapter, and things will tone down only slightly in the final chapter in the arc after that (yes, act 1 will be 12 chapters long).

Please read and review, criticism is welcome, flames not so much, as usual. Reviews are my lifeblood as a writer.. every-time my email goes off with a review it makes me want to write more, so please take the time to leave one. Guests can leave them as well, and it only takes a minute, so please. Even if it's as simple as "I enjoyed it, please continue."

Thanks, Kat

Random Facts from the Author:

Illium: Illium was chosen as the arrival planet because of the dichotomy of it. As civilized as the citadel but at the same time as lawless as Omega. It provides plenty of opportunity for stories, chaos, etc without having to provide a ship to gallivant across the galaxy in.

Review Responses:

Ari989 – It came to fifty exactly this week, not including last Sunday where I also ended up working. And i'm writing because it's keeping me sane as I have to deal with a dozen deadlines and co-workers begging me to make their tasks my priority and... ugh, don't get me started.

The Blocked Writer – Sorry about that.. it's a habitual problem of mine. Will try and take the time to re-read each chapter more extensively before I post, but I honestly have a hard time reading my own work right after I've written it.