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USCSS Calypso, mess hall
"Fascinating creature," Mordin Solus seemed positively delighted by what they were seeing. "Not simply predator. Highly evolved parasite as well. Must wonder, if need for specific host, or cross-species adabtable."
"If it can use other species..." Liara T'Soni began. The young asari had seemed close to fainting once the implictations of the human images had sank in, but, for the moment, she seemed to be holding it together.
"Then we know what is happening to Moryala and the others, right now." Shiana finished grimly. She looked at the human, who seemed to be waiting for some sort of response. Shiana silently cursed the poor conditions under which they had had to make contact. Now, more than ever, she needed to communicate. She thought for a moment, than pointed at the image of the human with the parasite attached to his face. She put both hands together, than pulled them apart, as if separating something. The human moved her head from side to side. She pointed at the same image, then pointed at herself. Then she tapped against the weapon that was attached to her environmental suit. She formed her hand in the shape of a gun and placed it against her own head.
"That seems rather clear, captain."
"Yes, either they cannot separate the parasite from the host, or they simply don't bother to try. Either way, there seems to be little hope."
-o-o-o-
"I hope that was clear."
"So do I," Anderson said softly. "We have to make them understand, that their friends are probably gone. One way, or another, I'm not leaving this ship intact with the xenomorphs on board."
"I understand, lieutenant, but if we destroy the ship with even the possibility of those people still alive and on board, we'll be facing serious problems down the road. Besides, the two near the cargohatch may still be alive. Do we have any idea where the xenomorphs are hiding out? Always assuming, of course, that there are indeed more of them."
"We have to assume that. Anything else is just wishful thinking. My people have searched the crew area from one end to the other and found nothing. Not even a blip on the motion scanners. The only place where they have appeared recently is in that corridor. My guess is that they have settled in the cargo area."
"Can we move recon drones into the cargo area from the overhead passage, perhaps find the bodies?."
"Not from here. All the doors in the passage have manual locks. You need to actually be there to open them and I'm not sending marines down that corridor if I can help it. It's clear that the xenomorphs have access to it and it would be the perfect spot for an ambush. We'd be massacred. "
"Is there any other way to get visuals from inside that area?"
"In theory, there are two entrances to each cargo space: The overhead passage, which also has a secondary crawlspace underneath for the control runs, and the internal doors. These cargo modules are interconnected, but only with each other. There is no direct connection between the most forward cargo module and the crew-compartment, so we cannot access them from here."
Vickers thought for a moment. "What about.., if we go in from the other end. Take one of the shuttles to the cargo hatch. No chance of being ambushed. That way, we can at least check what happened to the other two aliens. If we find them, fine. If not, we'll be able to move directly between the modules, no need to go into that corridor. If the original cargo-manifest is in any way valid, the ship should be mostly empty, so your marines will have a clear field of fire. And we can bring these three with us, show the situation, and take them back to their own shuttle at the same time."
"So, you suggest we move them back to the cargo hold, try to show them what has happened to their people, make them leave, and then destroy the ship?"
"Yes. It's imperfect, but I think it'll give us the best possible outcome."
"It would also involve getting them onto a shuttle. They may balk at that, I know I would in their position; not to mention that we're talking about letting aliens, armed aliens, inside a military vehicle."
"So, what exactly will they learn? That we have shuttles and that those shuttle have an interior? What is it about the inside of a drop ship that is even remotely classified? I've seen recruitment posters for the marines that show as much. And I doubt that they would try to take over the shuttle. They wouldn't know how to fly it."
"Point taken." Anderson considered it for a moment. "Very well, I'm willing to give it a try, if you can convince them to come with us."
"I'll see what I can do. I just hope I have the right images available."
-o-o-o-
The human had turned her device toward herself and was rapidly manipulating its controls. Time seemed to pass by with all the speed of an elcor on sedatives as she worked, while Shiana tried, in vain, to come up with a workable plan. The problem was, that she still lacked crucial data and had no way to verify if the data she had was accurate. The human's gestures seemed clear enough. Anyone infected by the parasite would be killed. Having seen the end product of the creature's development Shiana could sympathize with such harsh measures. Still, somewhere on this ship, there were three of her people, people who had trusted her to bring them safely back. Even if the humans had shown her the absolute truth, she owed it to her crew to at least try to bring them back. There was no way to know if asari or salarians could even be used as hosts. If this creature came from the human's home world, it might not be able to incubate in lifeforms from other worlds. For that matter, the fact that the humans could not remove the parasite did not necessarily mean that it was impossible. From what she had observed so far, human technology seemed to be less advanced than that of most citadel races. The problem was, what to do next. If she was to rescue anyone, she would need support, firepower, far more than she had now, and it seemed unlikely that the humans would allow her to bring anyone else on board. At the very least, she had to find a way to get herself and her companions back to their shuttle. So far the humans seemed reasonably friendly, but there were no guarantees that this wouldn't change.
The human seemed to have finished whatever she had been doing and turned her device around. This time the screen showed a number of images at the same time: the ship itself, with an image of the creature superimposed on the cargo space, a rather poor quality picture of the shuttle that they had taken from the Light of Dawn, and another shuttle craft, presumably the type used by the humans. As the human manipulated various controls, new symbols appeared. A line connected the Light of Dawn's shuttle to the after part of the ship. A second line connected the human shuttle to the front of the ship. The human female pointed at Shiana, then at the human shuttle, then slowly manipulated the image, so that the picture of the human's shuttle moved to the aft section of the ship.
"Captain, I believe, they're offering to transport us back to our own shuttle," Liara T'Soni said.
"Agreed, but what about the others? They may be lost, but I'm not willing to give up on them yet."
The human gestured again. She pointed at herself and the soldiers around her, then pointed again at the shuttle, then traced her hand across the cargo hold of the ship, toward the image of the creature.
"Seems, neither are they. Still, cannot be sure: rescue, or kill." Mordin Solus sounded thoughtful. "Killing understandable. Otherwise, very unpleasant death. Sill, might be premature. Perhaps, other solutions possible."
"Perhaps. Also, how do we know we can trust them to actually take us to our shuttle."
"No way to know, still, seems pointless deception. Have us outnumbered, outgunned. No need for subtlety."
Shiana considered her two remaining team mates. So far the two scientists had held up under the strain much better than she had expected. T'Soni actually seemed to have gained confidence over the past few hours. Still, there was only so much anyone could take before they broke down and there was no way to tell when that would happen. She would feel a lot better if she could get these two back to their own shuttle, or at least close enough that they would have a way to retreat that did not involve fighting their way past either the humans, the creatures in the cargo hold, or both. It looked like the humans were willing to solve at least that part of her dilemma. That left the problem of what to do about her three missing crew members.
Shiana pointed at herself and her crew mates, than pointed at the the image of the ship, moving her hand along the same pattern toward the creature.
-o-o-o-
"It seems they want to come with us when we check the holds." Anderson said sourly.
"Not all that surprising, with at least one, possible three, people missing. Would it be a big problem?"
"That depends. Not if they stay behind us, if they don't try to interfere. A lot of 'ifs' there. My biggest worry is that they will have to pull out those weapons. Possibly use them, if we get jumped. So far, my people seem to be pretty relaxed around them. I guess it helps that they look a bit like us. But, if the shooting starts, that might change. Let me try something."
He leaned forward, pointed at himself, then at the aliens, then at the rearmost cargo module. Then he pointed at himself and pointed at the second to rear-most cargo module. Then he pointed to the aliens and at same cargo module. He waited a moment, then repeated the sequence for the third module.
-o-o-o-
"Wants us to follow. Makes sense, soldiers go first, secure area. We move next. Then repeat."
"Agreed. Levarn, Lucinus. have you been following this?" Confirmation from both came over the open channel."Then you know what is about to happen. We'll let the humans take us back to the cargo hold and try to find out what happened to Donal, V'Rini, and Moryala. I'm not sure what will happen if we don't find them, but at least we'll know more than we do now. Lucinus, I want you to keep the shuttle at the airlock, as long as the humans don't try to approach. If they do, take off, but stay near this ship. So far, these people don't seem hostile, but we cannot afford to have our retreat cut off."
"Captain, what happens when you enter the cargo area?" That was Lucinus' voice. "Whatever attacked V'Rini and DonalI may still be in there. I think you should warn these humans that those creatures might be closer than they think. They might even be at the airlock."
Shiana pointed at the images of the creature, then moved her hand to the back of the ship. There was no way to be sure of the humans understood, but she could not in good conscience let them walk straight into a potential ambush, without even trying to warn them.
-o-o-o-
"I'm not sure what she means. Do you think she means that the xenomorphs are already in the aft cargo, or just that they might move to attack us there?"
Anderson shrugged. "No way to tell. In any case, it hardly matters. One way or another, we have to treat this as a hostile environment." He raised his voice. "Alright people, new plan. We'll split in two groups. Sergeant Zim and his squad will remain here. Sergeant, I want you to secure any and all data from the ship's computers as well as any hard-copy you can find. Then, you evacuate the ship. If the xenomorphs come looking for you before you're done here, you evacuate right away. There is nothing here that is worth the life of even a single marine. Meanwhile, I'll take the second squad, ms. Vickers and those three aliens in the other shuttle. We'll move to the aft cargo hatch, and secure the cargo modules. Remember, there may still be two of these aliens around, so look before you shoot. Once the first module is secure, we'll try to move to the next. Drones first. No-one enters a room, before we've scouted it out. Our only goal here is to find the missing aliens, dead or alive, not to wipe out the xenomorphs. We'll do that the easy way from the Anzio."
"Sir, why not just use the self-destruct?" Zim asked.
"No, sergeant. Self destruct on these old ships is a mess. You have to set it well in advance and once you do it, it quickly becomes irreversible. I don't want to risk anyone getting trapped aboard this ship while it's counting down to oblivion."
Viking dropship
The short trip on the human shuttle craft was both enlightening and uncomfortable. Its interior was lined with seats, each of which came with a heavy crash harness and the humans had insisted that Shiana and her team mates used these. The reason quickly became obvious as the shuttle craft accelerated steeply away from the ship. Either the humans did not have the technology to equip craft of this size with adequate inertial dampers, or they simply didn't feel the need. Either way, the pilot certainly didn't feel the need to take this into account while manouvering and Shiana knew she would emerge from this trip with an interesting collection of bruises. The human soldiers had refastened their face-covering helmets, making it impossible to judge their feelings on the subject, but the female who had done most of the communicating seemed to be as uncomfortable as Shiana felt, if her facial expression was anything to judge by. Uncomfortable or not, the trip was at least accomplished in a minimal amount of time and the shuttle craft landed with a sharp deceleration that was as unpleasant as the take-off had been.
USCSS Calypso, cargo hatch
They had chosen not to land near the Light of Dawn's shuttle, perhaps realizing that such close proximity might cause problems, and used a cargo hatch on the other side of the ship instead. Just as Shiana and her crew had done when they first entered the ship, the humans used the personnel access airlock next to the cargo door. A group of six humans entered first, weapons at the ready. Shiana took a step forward to follow them, but was held back by the female who had been communicating with them. For what seemed like an eternity, they waited outside the airlock with the remaining soldiers. Then some signal seemed to have been passed along and the humans gestured for them to enter.
The cargo hold was empty. No sign of either of her two crew members. As Shiana watched, the human soldiers spread out, covering the entire floor, searching for something.
-o-o-o-
"Sir, we have something here." Corporal Ishmael pointed along the wall. "Looks like some acid got splashed here. And I think these dents are from small arms fire. But they don't match any type of weapon I know."
"So, someone shot a xenomorph here."
"Yes sir, but I don't think they killed it. The acid is pretty localized and it doesn't look like there was a lot of it."
"Not good; definitely not good." Anderson took a deep breath. "Very well. Open up that door at the top of the stairs and deploy a recon drone. Just set it as an observer. I want to know if anything enters the passage. Once that is done, we'll leave four marines here. That should be enough to keep our line of retreat open. That gives us eight, plus the two of us, to search the next module. And, Ishmael, make sure everyone stays sharp. We don't know what we'll find. If it's just a handful of them hiding out in some dark corner, that is one thing. If one of those eggs hatched a queen... Then we have a whole new problem."
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The final confrontation is approaching.
TK: I know Liara is more confident than you would expect under the circumstances. (I've lampshaded it a little bit in this chapter.) That's partially, because I got fed up very quickly with writing her as uncertain and nervous. On the other hand, in ME1 she was always fine during combat. It was only in social situations that she seemed awkward. I try to think of her as someone who is just shy around people, hates speaking in public, etc., but does fine as long as she can focus on whatever she's doing. I suppose I could have spent more time working that out, but character development is hard to do well, and I already have a lot of scenes with people just standing around and talking. She also has less of a social handicap than in the canon version because I'm ditching the 'prejudice against purebloods' thing. It never made much sense to me. Are all the billions of asari on Thessia making journeys off-world to get pregnant? That would be something like the quarian pilgrimage. I could have believed it, maybe, if asari had only a small population, but that doesn't seem to be the case.
A Mountain Sage: Interesting point about the computers. It would create a lot of cross-compatibility (assuming that those species switched to the prothean type after finding their first archive/ruin etc.) But indeed, in my universe there were no ruins on Mars. Humans got their eezo drive system from the space-jockey ship in LV-426, but by that time their own computers were well developed, so there wouldn't be much incentive to switch.
I did consider alternatives to the queen, but it would mean dumping a lot of Alien canon and leave me very little to work with. I intend to go with the approach that was hinted at by e.g. Steve Perry in Earth Hive; that the xenomorphs are actually genetically engineered to be soldiers. In my case: someone wanted to fight the rachni and came up with this bright idea. I plan on a sequel starring Shepard, which will involve some people trying the same thing, with predictable results.
For the moment biotic xenomorphs won't be an issue, because there hasn't been sufficient time for one to incubate and grow to full size. In Shepard's time however ...