Finish Line
The tram soared along the track, the countryside little more than a burning blur to its occupants as the spaceport gradually came into focus. Metallic surfaces were marred from the explosions that had kissed them earlier. Bullet holes cut into the faces of the walls like pock marks on a plague victim. Denser craters of damage along the paneling were the closest indicators of thickened fighting between attackers and defenders.
A slow rumble stirred the air as a dark shape began to ascend. Even at this distance Shepard could make out the familiar cut of a Hegemony dropship. It gained altitude slowly, hovering in the air a moment before its engines flared white. Shepard paid little heed to its soaring form; his focus was on their rapidly approaching destination.
"Were naked out here," said Shepard, as his cracked visor brought into focus the figures moving on the second level and first. "Kaiden, throw a barrier over our section, as soon as were in range they'll start firing." He turned to Quayd and pointed to a nest of crates as the other biotic threw a shimmering shield of blue over their car. "Stay low and don't come out without my say so."
"Sure! Ok!" said the nodding batarian, which looked if not relieved, less nervous as he hid himself amongst the cover of the trams goods. Lastly he looked to the sergeant, whom was removing the sniper rifle from her back and eyed him expectantly. "Hang back until we divert their attention, after that find some ground and start shooting." Ashley nodded and Shepard turned around to eye the looming structures. Subconsciously he flared the amp in his brain, his skull tickled but it didn't feel like a hole was being burned through it anymore.
Satisfied, he pulled out his shotgun a moment before a light hail began to patter on their protective dome. First it was a few gunmen gauging the distance, but soon enough it grew into a deadly rain, as the tram slowed. Each marine marked where the flashes of light in the artificial storm came from, along with an unfamiliar wink of blue that came from guns of synthetic creation: Geth rounds splashed against their bubble, whereas the batarians made it ripple. Shepard felt a blossom of concern as a grenade launcher on the second floor began to wash the air around them with fire and shrapnel.
With a flash of light Alenko vanished. Shepard threw out palm and lifted the nearest pair of hostiles waiting near the docking tram. Both geth soared into the air from the cover of a winding ramp before the commander crushed them both with a clenched fist. A flash of blue and white followed a thunderous discharge: a rain of flailing aliens bounced off of railing and landed with crunching finality on the levels near the still tram.
"Aim high," said the marine, before his eyes glowed purple and vanished in a haze.
Williams ran to the nearest ramp only when there was a lull in gunfire. Both marines were hitting hard with their biotics and keeping the aliens disoriented with their speed; while the higs were concerned with trying to pin down the vanishing pair, the sergeant half crawled-half crouched her way to the first level, cycling the mod on her rifle as she made ground.
As she rounded the corner at the top of the path, she bumped into a long grey cylinder of metal. It was lying across in front of her and offered little cover, but it was better than what the distracted batarians had: without the boon of high ground and the crates blocking the gaps in the railing, they were practically defenseless from her position. She lay prone behind it and zoomed through her scope, the remaining adrenaline in her suit flowing into her bloodstream as she sighted and fired.
Everything before her eyes slowed to a crawl, the world moving inch by painful inch as she breathed out and felt the weapon kick against her shoulder. Her first victim was a batarian with his back to her: her disruptor rounds overloaded his shields and sent him backward. As electricity arced through the holes in his suit and sent his heart into arrest, she pumped another few rounds into his distant companion.
The higs skull exploded outwards in a red mist as a round entered a left eye and took off the other half his face. Static seemed to crackle between the fountaning blood as he began to dip over the railing. Her last rounds were emptied into the upper torso of another batarian, the alien died mid turn and seemed to fall like a tree with lighting flowing through its trunk.
The heat sink of her weapon popped with a glowing hiss of orange. The barrel of her rifle shifted to the pair of synthetics rising from another grey cylinder of metal. Shields popped, sparks erupted from bullet wounds, and white fluid flowed from their forms. She registered their metallic whines as her artificial high ended, their cyclopean eyes fluttered before they collapsed on top of one another.
Suspiciously she held her position a few moments more, tempting more targets to come out and die. When none did, she rose to a crouch and got another look at her own cover. The pair of geth she killed was hunched over a cylinder identical to her own, and Williams didn't believe for a moment that the machines were fiddling with it out of curiosity.
The sergeant leaned over the metal and the thick bundles of black fibers at the ends. She put a hand to the pad and saw the blue glow from the display case and the numbers on its form. The script was batarian, that she could read it meant that the language lessons from basic had taken hold. Williams had braved much death on this day: she had seen plenty of men and women and children die horribly at the hands of monsters. She had killed her fair share of them with her weapon and even more with her own two hands. All the same though, she felt like pissing herself when she realized what she had just used as cover in a firefight.
A clatter of bullets cut into her shock and she moved once again huddled low. She reached for her micro bead and spoke a single word to her team.
"NUKES!"
The word came out in a rush in Shepards helmet, panic mingling with a hint of disbelief as the sergeant shouted, "TWO-." She got no further, as the commander charged through material with his biotics. His form phasing through scarred cover as easily as the omni-blade on his left hand cleaved through the neck of a hiding batarian.
The dead man's skull twisted to regard him as it bounced off its body, the momentum carrying it forward as his gun clattered. Shepard bent a knee and turned with his shotgun to blast a synthetic apart at the knees. He rolled towards its falling form as bullets stitched into his shield and the cover of a wall.
Shepard finished the moving half of the geth with a blast that tore through the armor of its back. He reloaded a heat sink and rose to his feet. Looking from where he came he saw Kaiden crouching over one of the metal cylinders with a biotic barrier protecting them both. The lieutenant's omnitool glowed as he hacked his way through the devices software and tore out the wiring of its hardware with a free hand.
Between the both of them they had cleared out their half of the first level in good-albeit destructive-time. However they were deadlocked halfway through the second; even with the barrier the commander tossed up, the amount of gunfire pouring in gave him second thoughts of crawling out of it. His most immediate form of backup was busy trying to keep them all from being vaporized. The possibility of more nukes made the situation worse: calling for caution to prevent them from detonating.
Not so for their enemies, they seemed to understand that all they really needed to do was stall for time. They were dug in well enough, and their concentration of fire made a frontal assault a question of suicide. Every second they delayed in ending this meant less time to deactivate the bombs or worse: some would-be martyr would take it upon themselves to speed up the process and scatter their ashes halfway across the continent.
Shepard brought a hand to his helmet and quipped, "Ashley?"
"Yes sir?"
"I'm midway through the second level opposite of you. I've got," he rounded a corner and counted, "seven x-ray's, I'll pull 'em up, you'll put 'em down," he clicked off his comm. and turned the corner. He flared his amp and threw a shimmering hand out to lock everything in his immediate line of sight in a biotic grip. With a flourish he ripped a fist backwards and tore everything that wasn't nailed down hurling into the air.
Drunkenly and slowly they floated, like water in zero gee. The commander walked out of his bubble and darted to the nearest cover. Over he aimed, and blew out the pearly intestines of an automaton with two barks of his weapon. He began firing into another that seemed to dance on invisible strings.
By the time it was little more than a ruined mess held together in a debris field, the sergeant had found herself a vantage point. Lonely bullets soon found new company with hearts and lungs, in processors and circuitry. A handful of shots ricocheted off of the crates that were cover, intercepting the sergeant's weapon but never more than a handful. When the mass effect field dissipated their forms fell with boneless finality, unto metal and over railing.
Shepard proceeded forward and rounded a corner: beholding a dead end of material that held a lone batarian and a pair of geth. A throw caved the higs chest inward and sent him backward to knock down a synthetic before it could fire. One did manage to squeeze off a burst from its weapon but Shepard was close enough to end the affair before it could do more than pop his shields. He fired until his barrel glowed red and whined a warning.
A sudden silence surrounded him as soon as he was finished. Eyeing his now functioning radar he spoke with index and middle finger touching the side of his helmet, "Status?"
Kaiden spoke first through the radio, "Ash's making her way toward you. First is finished and the second is…done. Gonna take a look at the third, be done in a minute or so."
"I hope it takes less time than that Alenko" said Shepard, as he clicked on his omnitool and did a scan.
"Hope, grease and some omnigel" said Alenko.
"Found a fourth one behind some crates. Have Ashley do a scan and a sweep, if there are any more presents left for us I'd like to find them."
"Aye aye"
The commander clicked off his comm. and went to work on the nukes detonator.
"Last one?" grunted Kaiden, as he tore out the paneling and rummaged through the devices wiring. They were back on the first level; the sergeant was standing behind him and kept her weapon ready to provide him cover. The lieutenant appreciated the gesture but didn't think it was necessary, the now functioning radar in his helmet read only one hostile, and upon inspection it was their VIP looking over his cover.
Regardless, he would risk a peek at the little display every now and again, if the geth showed up then the thing would jam, he was sure of that, it happened too often to be a coincidence. Ashley answered him by the time that thought finished its track, "I searched top and bottom and every crook in between. "Other than the one the commanders fiddling with, the scans are showing zip on the boxes and zilch in the immediate area."
"Immediate area," said Kaiden, grunting the key word as he cut through wiring and examined the readings on his omnitool,
"Do you think they have a fifth one outside of range sir?"
"I hope to fuck not Williams. Four seems appropriate enough for overkill. But on the other hand…do you think God loves us sergeant?"
Ashley was taken back with the question, "Body and soul sir," she answered back in certain tones.
"Well hold onto that feeling, because if I'm wrong than were about to meet him in about…oh I don't know…a minute or so," said Kaiden as he rose to his feet. The timer was frozen on the bomb but not on his omnitool. He rose on his feet and charged himself towards the commanders spot.
He rounded a corner and saw a dead bat and two broken toasters. The black armor of the N7 was hunched in a ball over the nukes cylinder. Kaiden walked around him to eye his progress, but the action proved unnecessary. Shepard clicked off his omnitool when the device's timer ceased, he looked a question at Alenko.
"Forty five seconds."
Kaiden turned back around and saw the sergeant sprinting towards their position, climbing staircases and running across the walkways. By the time she approached both men could hear her petitioning the Almighty under her breath,"…He shall give his angels charge over thee, to keep thee in all thy ways. They shall bear thee up in their hands lest thou dash thy foot against a stone…"
"Twenty seconds."
Williams sucked in a long breath and held it, and held it…and held it…as the timer clicked to zero.
The wind whistled in their ears as Shepard made his way back to the railing. He glanced left, then right and waited for the world to explode. When it didn't he turned back to his marines.
Williams dared to breath and Alenko exhaled softly through his nose as they approached. A smile on Shepard's face threatened to break out, but he kept it hidden to a low smirk. A hint of relief was in his voice as he said simply, "Thank you Jesus."
Kaiden's grin fit his face like a glove. As Shepard hugged the wall once more and proceeded down to its end with a pistol in hand, he turned to look back to the sergeant "Score one for the home team."
Ashley's snort held relief as Kaiden laughed. Shepard turned a corner and Alenko was about to follow when something caught his eye. His shadow seemed to leap and dance to an angle that it had no business being at.
Ashley saw the flash where the LT didn't; it reflected off his left shoulder followed by another that illuminated the world in front of her. She didn't look up, if she did she might glimpse another light as it formed and go blind. In her mind's eye she saw them for what they were: godlike toadstools of fire and ash rising into a crimson sky, seeding the planet with poisonous spores that would seep deep and could never be rooted out.
Quayd she thought. She went to the railing and shouted down to the tram below, "Quayd! Don't look at the-",
Too late.
From her vantage point she could see Quayd huddled in a fetal position. The batarian had enough sense not to scream and give away his hiding spot, but from the way he was clutching at his eyes and shaking the poor bastard probably glimpsed one of nukes going off in the distance.
"Is he alive?"
The sergeant turned and saw the commander staring at her with a neutral expression. "Yes sir," she said.
"Good," he replied, before spinning on a heel. He walked back to an open platform of metal and crates.
"Sir," said Alenko, who fell into step behind him "the-"
"I know," the commander sounded subdued. He touched a hand to his ear and walked onwards, "Normandy this is Shepard, were at a spaceport and have located the beacon," both of his fellow marines snapped out of their dismay and focused on the commanders back, "transferring coordinates, will hold location until pick up."
All three marines beheld the mushroom clouds shifting by the wind. Beyond a field of bright orange and the stench of burned glass all four clouds were dissipating, only to have a fifth one flash to their far right and join its companions.
Than further out than that a sixth.
With a grunt Shepard brought their attention back to him, as he uprooted a section of the platform that held the familiar spikes of dead men. They hurled-still attached to their devices-to their second deaths far below. Williams and Alenko registered the commander's actions peripherally as they saw the tall glowing artifact that lay in the middle of their sight.
The Prothean Beacon was unmarred neither by time nor by the hands of the primitives which hauled it out of the earth. It stood oblivious to the devastation around it and the hell that was being added to the world around them. Alenko sigh was tired as he said something about a "consolation prize." Ashley paid him little heed as he turned to talk with his CO. It wasn't glowing when they dug it out thought the sergeant. Curious, she approached the device to get a better look.
Shepard brought a hand down from his ear and eyed the approaching lieutenant, "Progress?" he asked. Shepard nodded, "Established contact with Pressly, they're coming down from orbit for pick up."
"Orbit?"
"They've been busy."
Kaiden nodded and was about to reply, but a deep thrumming shook through them and cut him off. He couldn't see the source which shook the air around them, but Shepard could: the beacon flared a bright green as the noise rose to a grinding pitch. The reason for that became apparent when the sergeant held her hands in front of her to protect herself, her feet was skidding forward as she struggled to move backwards out of the devices hold over her.
Without conscious thought Shepard shoved past Kaiden, and in three long strides he collided into the woman. He hooked his arms around her waist and pivoted on his own, sending her sprawling away from him and towards the lieutenant.
With a flare of biotics he tried to will himself away but to no avail: invisible hands dragged him forwards and off his feet into the air. He felt his muscles spasm as an alien presence invaded his mind. He gritted his teeth at the intrusion and the army of images it forced their way into his brain. Helpless he floated, incapable of nothing but a strangled breath between clenched teeth.
Williams cried, "Commander!" as she scrambled back up, only to have an armored glove grab her by the waist and drag her back. "No!" she yelled.
"Too fucking dangerous!" yelled Kaiden as he saw the device glowed brighter with a luminescent green.
He had enough time to drag her back a few steps before the 50,000 year old beacon exploded.
The commander flew backward several meters, landing hard on his ass before rolling over a shoulder and landing on his chest. Kaiden released Ashley and activated the radio in his helmet. He spoke urgently into the comm. as the sergeant turned over the N7 and shook him.
"Shepard!"
The commander remained unresponsive, his eyes white beneath half closed lids. Kaiden jogged over to them both and glanced skyward as he heard the roar of familiar engines. The Normandy gradually began to take shape as it fell from the heavens, an angel of blue and white metal that descended to to the irradiated hell of what was humanity's pride and joy. Down it came to claim one of its fallen protectors and those charges whom failed with him.
By the time they had loaded the commander and Quayd into the belly of the ship, the light had at last faded from the paradise they had fought, bled and died for. The only light that remained in the coming shadow were the plumes of nuclear clouds, of scorched fields, and burning cities. Upward it went into the shadow of the stars above, to mourn the second loss of Eden and to plan its revenge on those that had damned it once more.
