Ch 12: A Lesson in Physics, Biochemistry, Xenobiology, and Humility
The water erupted up and outward with the force of a bomb blast, white and angry. It sent flying flora and fauna who had only ever swam, who had only ever known a cool liquid embrace. Launched into this gaseous new world, the slippery projectiles shot along their parabolic path: up, away, down … but their trajectories differed. Some gratefully reentered the water, streamlined bodies hardly causing a ripple; other poor sods slammed into the stony beach, the first of their kind to know solid ground beneath their fins and air rushing uselessly past their gills, before knowing death.
For eons, these primeval waters had been home to a variety of creatures, evolving with the time. Never had its surface been disturbed by an alien metal box, an unnatural creation. But neither did it particularly care, for just as quickly as the shuttle had appeared above the dark lake, it had disappeared below, to be lost and forgotten.
The blast became splashes, the splashes ripples … the ripples disappeared, leaving a calm, black stillness over the water...
But some dared break the lake's featureless face. Hungry for air, they burst from the depths, greedily sucking in the oxygen that was lifeblood for their species. Spotting land, they desperately doggie-paddled away, hands and legs churning to defy the weight of their armor – armor that, normally lifesaving, now threatened to pull them back down to a watery grave. Finally, chests heaving with exertion, they dragged themselves onto the beach, slippery blue-grey stones rolling under their knees and palms. Neither moved for a few moments, content to simply lie upon the blessed ground. Before long, though, their breathing had slowed enough for speech.
"... My bad, Lola."
Shepard and James looked at each other, then back out over the water where they guessed the shuttle had entered … and above which it was currently sleeping nose-first in the lake bed.
"Vega …" Shepard gasped, "that was … shittin' … awesome!"
Grinning, James pulled himself up with a grunt to lean against a nearby rock. "Yeah. Kinda was... Guess we won' be back for Tony Tiger, huh?"
"Screw cereal! You pull another stunt like that... I will personally get you into the N7 program." Joining his underling against the rock, Shepard yanked off his boots to empty out the murky water.
James blinked his muscled eyelids. "Heh. You cou' do tha'?"
"I'm Commander Shepard. I can do whatever the hell I – aww, crap!" Following Shepard's gaze, James saw the cause for his Commander's consternation: hundreds of mibbles floated face-down, little bumps on the lake's smooth surface, small with water-soaked fur, and still with death. "Well, that was fucking pointless."
"Huh."
Bored, the two men scanned their surroundings for inspiration. Shepard sighed. There wasn't much to see; the filtered light that actually reached the ground was so dim, the planet never experienced total day. Horizon to horizon was white; the thick cloud through which they had plummeted seemed to blanket the world. Whatever hole their descending shuttle had punched through the cloud layer had quickly sealed behind them.
Out of the corner of his eyes, Shepard noticed a small something riding the water's current, teasingly trailing the shore before catching on some stones. A curious James returned with a sac of wet burritos. They shared a grin and settled back for a well-deserved meal.
From somewhere behind and to their left, an animal screeched mournfully. Scraggly foliage rustled as a soft breeze started up, pushing the mibbles a few feet across the water before dying down again. The still air was pleasantly cool, humid and salty. Along the beach lay an assortment of aquatic creatures, all dead. Some fish-thing with five eyes, tiny eels, a blue squid – an odd sensation squirmed within Shepard's gut, but he quashed it with another swallow of burrito – dark kelp, crustaceans …
Killing time, they chucked pebble after pebble toward the water. Neither succeeded in making their stones skip, so instead they dug through slippery moss to get to the larger stones, just as happy to make big splashes.
"So, Commander," James began, leaning restfully back with one hand behind his head. "You thin' Pooh Bear's a-okay?"
Shepard stopped in mid-throw. "'Pooh Bear...?'"
"I dunno," he shrugged. "'Cause his head's got all these spikes, kinda like a hedgehog. An' hedgehogs' needles are sharp, like a bee's stinger, y'know? Bees like honey, an' so does Pooh. So, I call Garrus –"
The stone slipped from between Shepard's fingers. "Son of a bitch!"
The mibble's beady eyes snapped open. All it saw was darkness. All it felt was wet. With an overwhelming panic that clutched at its three little hearts, it realized it could not breathe. Its short arms struggled desperately as it tried to swim to safety, but no luck; it was sinking, sinking... Moments later, its soft bottom touched down on the lake bed, hardly disturbing the sediment.
Cold. Tired. Instinctively the mibble tried again to suck in air, but all it got for its effort was a lungful of water. Again; its lungs, and now its entire body, were expanding with liquid. Again; it grew round as a balloon. But its eyes were closing; its tiny feet refused to flap against the water …
Three talons dug into its side.
Pain! The sharp sensation broke through the numbness of near-death. Propelled into its fight-or-flight response, it opened its butt-flap, releasing the inhaled water with such force that the mibble shot up, up, up toward the light –
It burst out of the water and into the air – air! The mibble sucked in deeply, felt itself lightening as the water was replaced, felt revitalized as oxygen spread throughout its body. It launched into the sky, farting out that wonderful air at a tremendous velocity.
Still, the heavy weight clung tightly. Something in the mibble's brain chemistry abruptly switched on; the familiar, frantic bloodlust overcame it …
Mouth stretched open to bare sharp teeth, it hissed in the high-frequency range that would call even its unconscious comrades to arms.
"Sexy Matriarch of Mercy!" Shepard swore, and for good reason.
At least one hundred mibbles, each expanded to the size of a small shuttlecar, were zooming toward the beach … and James and Shepard. Tiny fangs glinted in the dim sun against a rainbow of colour – the white, black, and hundred types of brown of the creatures' fur, stained at the mouth by film and froth. Neither soldier knew what the hell the fluffballs were up to; however, their shared policy of shoot first, ask questions never determined their response. James aimed with his assault rifle, ready to do what he did best, but the mibbles' jerky flying, their sudden acceleration and stops, made keeping any in his scope nigh impossible. He shot anyway, hoping to reduce their number before they hit the beach, and his stream of rapid fire took down a dozen. With a single bullet through their fluffy hide, the air-expanded creatures exploded into a mess of fur and guts.
But above the satisfactory sounds of pop-pop-pop!, one mibble was shouting: "No! Stop!" James could barely make out the words over the mad chattering and hissing of the incoming mibble swarm.
"Huh. Didn' know they talk. Guess you learn somethin' new every day," the recruit wisely mused.
It was hard to tell over the commotion, but the voice seemed to be coming from the nearest mibble, the one leading the charge. Their squad leader? If so, they had a sad leader; the slowest and lowest of the advancing group, its speedy followers would soon overtake it. As it came closer, James could see that it was struggling with a burden: not the burden of leadership, but of some rather heavy cargo. "Don't shoot!" the cargo pleaded again.
"What was that?" Shepard, who had been concentrating fire on another area of the fast-approaching mibbles, spun around – and spotted the struggling mibble, and the struggling turian clutching on for dear life. "Did you hear something, Vega?" he shouted, cupping a hand to his ear. 'Shoot'?"
James thought there had been a 'don't' somewhere in there, but he figured Shepard was a pretty smart guy. The Commander took a couple shots experimentally at the mibble. It zoomed up and away from the fire, but continued its relentless charge, now nearly over land.
"Agh! What does 'don't shoot' mean to you, you bare-faced bastard –"
"Well, if you say so!"
Shepard had used up three heat sinks before Garrus was finally free from the mibble. The Commander had never hit the mibble; he didn't have to. There simply came a point when too many bullets had whizzed by the turian's good ear, and the best option seemed to be to just let go…
But in the grip of chest-pounding fear and excitement, none of them had foreseen the necessary consequence of that action: the laws of gravity were universal, callous, and cruelly fatal from a fifty-foot drop, rendering every organic body as delicate as green spring growth.
"Tha's gonna make one mean mess, eh, Lola?"
Fortunately, a second law of physics – that of time distortion slow-down during awesome, dangerous, and otherwise epically cool moments – gave the valiant Commander precious extra seconds to act.
"Goott iit!" Shepard shouted, voice deepened and words lengthened by the time deceleration effect. Taking long strides, boots kicking up stones, he sped in slow motion toward the plummeting turian, arms reaching out, and … Garrus slammed into Shepard's shields from above. They softened his impact, and the turian bounced off safely to the ground. Life saved, time returned to relative normal.
"Shields down!" Shepard announced, as blue currents flashed around him, then winked out.
Sitting up cautiously on the pebble beach, Garrus experimentally tested a few joints and muscles; he checked that all his limbs were attached tight; his head was still screwed on and his carapace hadn't even cracked. The awe on the turian's face was superseded only by the surprise in his voice. "I'm alive … Shepard, you …"
A pause; neither of them knew how to navigate this uncharted territory.
Looking away, the Commander shifted from foot to foot. "Hell, if you get all touchy-feely on me, I'm gonna throw you back to the mibbles."
Garrus quickly cleared his throat. "Of course, this was all your fault in the first place…"
After poking Shepard's shoulder to get his attention, James motioned with the butt of his rifle toward the water. The wave of mibbles had just swept over the beach.
Shepard lowered the visor of his helmet. "Looks like we've got company."
"… Right behind you, Shepard."
