Even from Kasumi's high vantage from one of the Valdarines, Bauer and her gang weren't small enough to be ants. Aria probably would've preferred a problem she could fix with her boot, but Omega Central didn't have the vertical space to give her that view.
The years spent honing her craft taught Kasumi that every cityscape had its character. In New York City, rivers divided the blinding splendor of Manhattan from its less impressive sisters. The Citadel's wards were six distinct cities of their own: Tayseri with its asari-style spires, Zakera with its abundance of color. Omega was a mess, but a uniform mess. The station was made of gargantuan steel stalactites built into the eezo-rich asteroid. The urban or commercial or industrial clusters cropped up around them, with starship and skycar traffic weaving in-between. Omega Central was stumpy compared to other districts, with no building save one more than ten stories high.
The batarian "prophet" turned away from Bauer, throwing his arms up. Traces of his proclamation included "end times" and "blight." Nothing new there. Louder was the collective gasp and cheer of the crowd when an Eclipse soldier wound his arm up and clocked the prophet in the back of the head. The prophet fell, but the soldier, plus one more who joined in with a kick, didn't stop.
Bauer said something along the lines of "serves him right."
"Garrus to Kasumi. We have the survivor. Get us a route through this mess."
"On it."
Showtime. The mob below her swelled and shrank, a breathing, massive creature seething with rage. Kasumi looked elsewhere from her vantage point. To get from Afterlife to their skycar, Garrus's group needed to skirt the fringes of the brewing storm: alleys too narrow for any real gathering, guarded territories of small-time crime bosses. As she found each piece, she traced the path on a holographic map.
"It's done," she said a minute later, then sent the route. "Just be ready to change course on a dime."
No response. And the map failed to send. "Garrus?" But the channel was dead, and the blue dots on the radar were gone. She turned around, climbed up to the roof's upper tier, and jumped the narrow gap to the next building. Garrus's group emerged from the entrance to the VIP section, a hair's width away from a portion of the crowd. A helmeted figure in a gray hardsuit accompanied them. Kasumi started her way towards them when a human man, too collected to be part of the mob, opened an omni-tool. Someone's noticed them. Could be making a call.
Then, in an adjoining alley, a flash of yellow: a human Eclipse soldier started climbing a ladder. A large rifle rested on his back. Kasumi scuttled as close as she could from her position and zoomed in on her visor. The gun was an M-98 Widow, a sniper rifle with enough recoil to shatter a normal human's arms.
She looked at the soldier, then at Garrus's group. It won't matter if they have a map or not, or if I warn them. She glanced along the buildings, mapping out a route from one side of the street to the other. Then she started the chase.
"It's done," Kasumi said, "Just be ready to—"
Static.
Tali checked her omni-tool. "Our communications are being jammed. It's not a blanket jammer. Someone's targeting our channel specifically."
"They know we're here," Jack said.
"They could be tracking us." Garrus gestured to the crowd. "We'll try to lose them."
"How long, Omega?" The Eclipse lieutenant's voice came from everywhere, stunning the crowd into silence. Heads looked up and around.
They really set up for this, Garrus thought, but was "they" Eclipse or Scipio?
"How long do I have to wait for Aria to release this one batarian? Is she simply being petty, refusing me out of spite, or is this something bigger? How long have these attacks been happening? How long has she done nothing about them? This is her territory. The 'Queen of Omega' should show more concern.
"And if they don't concern her, why not?"
The mob burst out again. "She's a puppet," "They're paying her off," "Batarian stooge."
Veshan growled. "Aria should put a sniper somewhere. A good slug from a good rifle will shut her up."
"It will," Garrus said, "if she wants people to think there's something to what the LT's saying."
"If she's the Queen of Omega, she shouldn't care. The High Sovereign wouldn't wipe his ass with what the masses think."
Some disdain there, Garrus noted.
"Things are little different outside home," Tali said. "Trust me, I've had to learn that myself."
Jack waved a dismissive hand at the mob. "Doesn't matter anyways. Look at these people. Aria's screwed no matter what she does."
The LT was already spinning Aria's cold shoulder to her favor. If Aria sent out her people to talk things out, the LT would run circles around them. Guns would send her screaming about oppression, and Aria going herself would make too much of a scene. Jack's right. This demonstration was going to cost Aria. The question was: how would she recoup her losses?
Bauer went on. "Take this idiot. Why would Aria tolerate him raving on her doorstep when all it took was a good beating to put him on his knees? One of her batarian guards could've done that any time."
"They're actually eating this bullshit," Jack said.
"They're scared and angry." Some technophobe doomsayers cropped up in the Wards after the geth attack, urging people to discard the "metal maw of modernity." Without any real purpose, however, their newfound followings lasted evaporated in short order. The LT, meanwhile, wielded this mob like a gun. A specific goal, and a specific target.
"Scared and angry or not," Tali said, "let's not underestimate Aria. She's been here for a long time."
"I don't think this LT cares if she can get to her," Garrus said.
They came to the fringe of Afterlife Square. One figure stood on a high platform, waving her arms as she addressed her public, and another knelt beside her. As the group weaved through the crowd they got closer. The kneeler was batarian, battered and bleeding, barely conscious. Behind them rose Afterlife, with a dozen faceless guards baring rifles.
"This is dangerous," Veshan said. The mass of bodies pushed and shoved around them like a tide. "We have to go through here?"
"We don't have much choice," Garrus said, checking the map.
"Gah." Veshan shoved past a large krogan. "All the more reason we hurry."
The doors to Afterlife opened. Anto's armor was recognizable among the small group that emerged, as was Veshan's old guard suit. Two of Aria's thugs dragged the prisoner by the arms.
The LT spun around. "Look what we have here."
Aria's people approached the platform and shoved the prisoner forward. Veshan grumbled with distaste.
Bauer ripped off the prisoner's helmet… and laughed. "Now she's insulting my intelligence. Who's this, some loser who crossed you? I know what the batarian I want looks like. He attacked me. In my own home!"
Did he? Asking Veshan here was dangerous. He did say he wants justice—or revenge—on the people who killed the ambassador.
That gave Garrus pause. Scipio's report described it as an assassination, while Eclipse painted the incident as an attack on them. Veshan was the only person who could say otherwise. His word against Bauer's? People will take hers any day. Even so, she made him the reason for her demonstration. For show? No, otherwise she would've been content with the decoy.
Bauer wanted Veshan specifically, so he'd share his side of the story with nobody. The Eclipse company Archangel fought wasn't so exacting. Scipio, however… The infiltrator at the prison. If he succeeded, Veshan was dead. If not, it was pressure for Aria to move him—
Light, red and orange, sprung from the corner of Garrus's sight. As he looked towards it, the roar hit his ears.
Out in the open.
Smoke and fire poured from a distant rooftop. Debris fell on the streets below. Gasps and screams came from the crowd. Their seething anger melted away—not into a blind charge at Afterlife, but a panicked flight away, towards anywhere else. Garrus ran to match pace. Four dots remained nearby on his visor. "Go!"
They cleared Afterlife Square, still in the thick of everyone and everything. The fear of the crowd pressed in, making forward the only possible direction. I need a route, Garrus thought, forcing his mind into a soldier's calm. A map fell across his visor. A large red dot matched the explosion he'd seen.
Light and thunder and heat burst again, closer this time. Behind him, as quickly as he dared to look, one of the Valdarines fell apart in flames over Afterlife Square.
"Kasumi," Garrus said. It was futile, but he had to try. "Kasumi!"
A blast engulfed part of Afterlife Square, scattering metal and fire. Several streets away, Kasumi dashed through a wall of smoke and leaped to the next rooftop. If the Eclipse with the Widow could cloak, he would've done so by now. The tech wasn't on his armor. She'd tailed him with little effort, but the building between them had to explode. Somewhere in this fiery mess there still had to be a sign of him.
A sniper's perch. That's what he's looking for. The Tohsu Heights, the tallest building in Omega Central, stood not too far away. If it's not about to blow up.
Kasumi made another jump. Below her were screams, a flood of people running through a street meant for a mere steam. Garrus and the others were somewhere in the middle of a pandemonium like this. They'd have to improvise their way. Rubble and fire probably dumped themselves all over the route she'd sent—if it even went through before the jamming.
They'd been through worse. And she tracked down the "Eclipse soldier" once before.
A jump and a landing. Another jump and another landing.
But when she found him… She'd sabotage his gun. Then she just had to dance with him until the batarian reached safety. Should be easy enough. I can cloak, and he can't. Just don't think that too much. Or else it'll turn out that he does have a cloak.
Just before she made another leap, the building in front of her trembled. A fireball erupted from the roof. She caught herself, flung herself right. Rubble peppered where she stepped. A huge chunk of metal hurdled towards her. She lunged and rolled. It crashed right behind her. The impact shook her balance.
She stood. The street below was half-buried in a blanket of metal and smoke. Before she started looking for bodies, she pressed on. I really, really hope your Scipio guys aren't behind this, Shep. But the fact that Scipio seemed to be continuing their assassination attempt was telling.
The escape should be even easier. He couldn't ever follow her. But getting away depended on breaking that jamming, and her programs were still working on that. Well, Shepard was good at what he did.
This might be the first time I ever hope he isn't too good. Hopefully the only time.
One last building separated her from the tower. She made the first of two jumps. There was a balcony halfway up its height… and a yellow-armored figure on it, going inside. She dashed across the roof. Her feet reached the edge.
A tremor and a rumble beneath her feet. A plume of smoke shot up from the street level. The quake repeated, louder and stronger. Her view started to shift… She stepped back. Ran for it. Leaped. An explosion tore through the roof she left behind. The shockwave slammed into her back.
The balcony loomed closer. She reached for it…
Her hand smacked just below the railing. It slipped. Kasumi fell.
A small ledge along the building wall rushed towards her. She shifted, reached, and this time she grabbed on. The black mesh of her glove was visible. The explosion. The nodes on her suit must've been damaged. They were easily replaced, but she'd be in plain sight of the Eclipse.
Her arms protested every effort, but she pulled herself up and up, ledge to ledge. Tohsu wasn't a skyscraper, but there was still a ways to the top.
From the roof, however, a small thing peeked out: metal clutched in two gauntleted arms, out of range of her programs.
On her visor, the word "success" might have been a huge sign, the crackle of static a scream. "He's taking the shot!"
Minutes ago, Omega was a hell of vice and brutality, of excess and poverty. Now the soldier dashed through ruined streets and side alleys, leaping over charred metal and charred bodies. He'd heard his comrades' dying screams on the comm channel, but how many more died when the Valdarine collapsed?
He still had his assignment, but now it was a bit more personal. The persons of interest were still alive, he knew, but where? They vanished as the mob broke after the first explosion. His trackers on the roofs went silent with the second.
They had arrived on a skycar on this street. Beneath a collapsed wall were hints of broken windows and a crushed frame. Did they pass by already? Are they close? He looked around. There was no sign, only pandemonium as people rushed about. Some even tried taking shelter in gaps between rubble.
"What's going on?" "Help me!" Those cries were all around him as he broke into a sprint. They seemed to follow him everywhere.
At the tenth street he checked, a small sob sounded from another skycar's wreckage. A huge metal panel, black at the edges, had flattened its roof and crushed the windows into slits before sliding off and blocking the doors. Still no sign of the marks, but he grasped the corner of the debris and pushed. Three heaves brought it clattering to the ground. His omni-blade cut through the battered door. A salarian lay flat inside. The soldier reached out his hand.
"Thank you." The salarian's voice trembled. "Thank you. Thank you."
He'd helped the salarian out when the POIs came running through the alley. They froze, but not at the sight of him.
Blue light shot up from the ground. It warped into a barrier, stronger than the soldier thought possible in the split-second taken to raise it. If the biotic had more than a split-second, maybe the slug wouldn't have cut through the veil like paper. The batarian grunted, clutching the side of his chest. His knees buckled, but he caught himself on one hand as he fell forward.
The soldier backed away, ducking behind the wrecked skycar.
Garrus knelt beside the batarian in an instant, helping him into a sitting position with his back against a wall. Tali and the biotic took up positions towards both ends of the alley as Garrus applied medigel to the batarian's wound.
The soldier zoomed in with his HUD and opened the medical analysis tool. That the batarian hadn't died instantly was telling enough, but the entry wound was several inches below and left of the target area. Medigel stemmed the blood loss, and the tool said the batarian's hardsuit was loaded with a heavy-duty medical exo.
So when Garrus entered something into his omni-tool, and the batarian's vitals went dark seconds later, the soldier made the connection. "Dammit," Garrus said, lying. "It's no good. He's gone."
The soldier inched away. When he was free he started a message: Target eliminated.