Chapter XIX: Arguments

It was hard to keep track of time in a place like this, even with a clock that may or may not have been reliable, it was impossible to tell. Garrus Vakarian sat on the dirty mattress that he had been made to sleep on for the last few nights, his fingers aching from all of the engineering work he had done. On a table nearby lay the mostly completed particle accelerator cannon and Kelias was already fiddling with it, making some last minute adjustments to it in preparation for their escape.

Garrus was somewhat anxious about the whole escape plan he had helped to cook up. It involved a great deal of luck and timing. The particle accelerator cannon would not last long with sustained firing and would drain its power cells quickly, thus Garrus would have to find other weapons on his way out. Between the table, mattress and the rest of the room was a makeshift screen that Kelias had convinced the guards to supply her, claiming that with it she could "get dressed without having to worry about the surveillance camera seeing her". How she had managed to convince the guards was beyond Garrus' knowledge since he had been asleep when she had done it. She had also ordered the means to wash herself, receiving a tub full of lukewarm water and some sponges. Garrus had missed out on whatever show that would have offered, having only just woken up. He had delayed in waking up since today was the big day: today was when they would actually try and escape. In previous days they had timed the arrival of the guards and breakfast had already arrived, leaving their best bet to be when lunch came. Looking at the door, Garrus could see that a cobbled together explosive charge was attached to it. Any moron who opened it from the other side would get a nasty surprise.

Garrus yawned, rubbing his eyes and taking note of how bad he smelt. Regardless, he slowly rose to his feet and stepped over to where Kelias was working. She turned around to face him, smiling slightly but otherwise too into what she was doing to really pay him much attention.

"Is that thing ready?" He asked.

Kelias shook her head. On the table a computer terminal had been hooked up to the device, layers and layers of code rushing down the display.

"It won't be for a few hours yet," Kelias replied, "I'm still having trouble calibrating the kinetic barriers."

Garrus simply nodded. The kinetic barriers, otherwise known as "personal shields" would need to be calibrated to his weight and body shape in order to work to their full effectiveness. He felt a pang of annoyance at the delay, unable to wait to start the escape yet at the same time he was worried. He was worried primarily about Kelias, since the plan dictated that she would not need to use a weapon. Garrus believed otherwise but she seemed quite adamant that she would not kill anyone. It was naivety at its best, since she would definitely need to kill someone on their way out of here. Once they were through the workshop door, every one of Roland's goons would be after them as well as Roland Halverson himself. God only knew how he would react to their escape.

Kelias had packed the "time manipulation" device into the silver suitcase sometime earlier. It was still in no working order but she suggested that they take it with them in order to prevent Roland from getting hold of it. Garrus could already see himself walking around with the heavy particle accelerator on his back and a suitcase in one hand with the particle gun itself in the other. It would make a strange sight but he was hoping it would be a dangerous one. That particle accelerator was a weapon he was quite interested in trying out, if only to see what it did. Kelias had said little about it, not at all sure what to expect from it herself. Garrus found this only slightly amusing, especially since she was the one who had designed it. At best guess, the particle accelerator cannon would blast somebody into "nothing". Whatever that implied, it certainly sounded interesting.

He wondered what Roland was thinking now, watching through the surveillance camera in the corner, suspicious as always and straining to work out what they were doing. Soon enough he would send some guards to investigate, perhaps finally bust the little weapon building operation that the two turians had going. Whatever happened, that bomb on the door would go off at the first instant that somebody tampered with it.

"Looking at you, Garrus, I would never have guessed you'd have a thing for humans," Kelias said, turning around to face him. She wiped her hands on a piece of cloth, getting rid of the grease that had gotten stuck on her talons.

"I don't have a thing for humans," Garrus replied, his gaze narrowing, "I have a thing for Shepard."

"I'm not saying there's anything wrong with that," Kelias added, somewhat defensively, "So don't get all annoyed at me…"

"I wasn't…"

"It sounded like you were," Kelias said. Garrus shrugged. She had been teasing him about it ever since he had told her. If he had known this would have happened he would have kept his mouth shut, even if Kelias' teasing was only in harmless fun.

"Look, could we just get this thing finished?" Garrus asked, nodding towards the particle accelerator on the table, "That way we can get out of here sooner. I'm already sick of this place."

There was a pause. Kelias returned to her work, shaking her head as she did so. Garrus could tell that underneath that gentle exterior of hers, she was annoyed. It was probably directed towards him, mainly because she had expected him to be…available. Maybe, if the situation had been different, he could see himself spending some "quality time" with her. However, with Shepard weighing heavily on his mind it would not happen. Not today, anyway.

Garrus walked over to where breakfast had been left on the table, finding that Kelias had eaten most of it while he had been asleep. He sighed and relegated himself to picking up whatever scraps were left and eating those. He glanced towards the camera in the corner of the ceiling, trying in vain to work out what Roland was thinking. He was watching them, he knew it. And hopefully he had no idea about what they were doing. He may have his suspicions but no solid facts to back them up.

For the next hour Kelias spent most of her time fiddling with the computer terminal, doing her best to provide the correct code to get the machine in proper working order. Garrus was left with nothing much else to do so he sat down on the table near where Kelias was working, watching her with a careful gaze.

"How long?" He asked.

"Not too long now," she said, "I just need to download the last of the code into the particle accelerator. Once that's done, we can get out of here."

Garrus breathed a sigh of relief when he heard this. The waiting had really started to take its toll and with each passing minute he grew anxious with anticipation. He knew it would be difficult to get out of here, especially since he had barely any idea about the layout of the tunnels. There was no doubt in his mind that they were crawling with Roland's goons. And outside was only desert. Even if they survived getting out of the tunnels, they would have to contend with the desert, hence the reason they had horded some supplies in preparation for this part of the journey.

Kelias typed in a sequence on the terminal and a long green bar appeared on the display, slowly filling up. She turned to Garrus, smiling.

"We're on our way," she said simply. Garrus hefted up the particle accelerator's power pack and put it on his back, almost having to hunch over from the weight of it. He gripped the gun itself in his right hand, needing to prop it with both hands since it was just so damn heavy. All he had to do now was wait for the large green bar to fill and everything, including the kinetic barriers, would be in working order.

"How long's this going to take?" Garrus asked, fiddling with the particle gun. He clicked something and the next thing he knew the entire machine had started to hum and vibrate, the transparent ridges on the back of the black metal pack glowing a bright white blue.

"A few minutes," Kelias said. The green bar on the display had not even filled up a quarter of its length yet. Kelias frowned at this and corrected herself: "Well, maybe longer than that."

"We don't have the time to wait," Garrus said, his impatience growing.

"What do you suggest we do, human lover?" Kelias snapped suddenly.

Human lover? Well, that's a new one.

Garrus shrugged.

"I suggest we do something other than stand here and wait," Garrus replied, surprised at Kelias' sudden change in mood. She did seem to calm down a little but otherwise she seemed to be acting quite out of her usual character. There must have been something wrong, maybe the anxiety that came before going into a life threatening situation? She did not seem the soldier type, unlike Garrus who had built a career on it. He doubted she had been put into the military at fifteen, especially if her father had been a scientist. She would have followed in his footsteps, even if it meant she did not require going into the military like most other turians would.

"We could talk…"

"Talk?" Garrus frowned. "Talk about what?"

"Shepard."

Garrus rolled his eyes. "Haven't we been over this?"

Kelias shook her head. She seemed annoyed now and not outright angry. Garrus should have guessed that she would have reacted this way when he told her that his loyalties lay with someone else.

"I don't see how a handsome male like you could possibly be into humans," she said. Out in the hallway, Garrus heard footsteps. There were many of them and they were running, as if they were in a hurry. His heart skipped a beat as he stood near the computer terminal, weighed down by an insanely heavy makeshift weapon while an angry female turian had a go at him. Kelias did not seem to hear the footsteps.

"I helped you, here in this place," Kelias continued, "I haven't met anyone like you before. That was part of the reason why I chose to help you, Garrus: I like you. And yet you repay that by telling me you're in love with a human?" She shook her head, incredulous. Garrus was barely listening and instead was looking at the gradually filling loading bar on the terminal, growing annoyed with how slow it was going. It was just reaching a quarter of its full length and for a moment he thought that some higher power was slowing it down on purpose.

"Why don't you love me, Garrus?" She demanded, her tone getting hostile.

"We barely know each other," Garrus replied. There were shouts coming from the tunnel outside the workshop and a few slams on the door. He could barely make out what the guards were saying but he could tell that they were pissed off. Roland must have realized what they were doing and sent some people to investigate. The turian's gaze went to the bomb attached to the door. He sighed and returned his gaze to Kelias. She did not seem at all worried by what was happening at the door.

"It's typical of my luck to finally meet a man perfect for me, only to find out he's currently tied up with a human, of all things," Kelias continued, "If it was an asari, I wouldn't mind. But a human? Somebody would think you were high or something, Garrus…"

"Uh, Kelias…" Garrus' gaze flitted to the computer terminal. The loading bar was barely halfway across. Why the hell was it taking so long?

"Damn it, Garrus," she said. She leaned forwards, put a hand to the back of his neck and pulled his head forwards so that it was level with hers. Their foreheads met and her tongue found its way into his mouth, if only briefly. Kissing was not something turians could do awfully well, especially without lips. Still, she did trace her tongue down one mandible and she playfully nipped him on the side of the neck. Garrus was taken aback by all of this but the moment was cut short when the door into the workshop finally opened and the bomb on the door finally went off.

There was an earth-shattering roar and a column of smoke and flame erupted forth, spilling a short distance into the workshop. The guards beyond the door were tossed aside like ragdolls, their shouts ending almost as abruptly as they had begun. Kelias pulled out of the embrace, leaving Garrus with many conflicting thoughts on his mind. She started towards the blasted open doorway, taking a look into the tunnel beyond and shaking her head. The smoke around the blast area was still quite thick and reeked immensely but she did not seem to have any issues with this.

"What are you doing?" Garrus shouted. He could hear more shouting coming from further down the tunnel. He looked at the computer terminal again, seeing that the loading bar was just over halfway. He returned his gaze to Kelias and watched as she picked up an assault rifle from a fallen guard. Her expression was a look of absolute bravado and it sent some fear into Garrus, to see her reacting this way. She would get herself killed and the last thing he needed was her death on his conscience. He had enough on his mind already.

"I'm going to buy you some time, Garrus," she said, starting down the tunnel. She disappeared from view, leaving the male turian alone in the workshop. The sounds of weapons fire began a few seconds later. Garrus watched the computer terminal, each passing second sending him further into an anxious frenzy. He did not want Kelias to get killed, not after all that he had been through. It occurred to him that he was having a very bad month, as if some higher power had it in for him. Judging from all that was happening, this seemed the most logical assumption.

Finally, after a few more minutes of waiting, the download bar was full. Unhooking the particle accelerator cannon from the computer terminal, Garrus started towards the blasted open doorway. It occurred to him that Kelias was a somewhat troubled woman, especially with all that talk of her loving him. He could never return the favour, not when his loyalties lay with Shepard…but he could stop Kelias from getting herself killed. He stepped into the tunnel, took a deep breath and followed in the female turian's wake. For someone who had trouble killing people, she had left quite a few bodies in her wake. There were still plenty of Roland's goons around, though. Garrus knew he had his work cut out for him.

Kaslin Kevkas was wide awake, primarily because of the irritating beeping sound that had broken the comfortable silence of the bedroom. He was dressed only in his undergarments and his wife, Lisik, was in a similar position. She had woken up as well, giving a rather annoyed look at her husband with the intention of blaming him for the disturbance. Kaslin sighed and reached over to the bedside table, finding the communications device. He realized that it was Roland calling in, especially since the device in question had been given to him by that very human. Kaslin wondered briefly about the plan he was thinking of setting in motion, the one in which he would gain the advantage of whatever it was that Roland was trying to do. He would weasel his way through it like the expert conman he was and he would get rid of Roland in the process. Kaslin knew when he could take advantage of a situation and now seemed like one of those times, judging by Roland's angered voice. Never had he heard the human so angry…in fact, he doubted he had ever heard Roland angry at all. To him, Roland always seemed so calm and collected and smug. It was as if he had everything planned but judging by his tone, something had gone horribly, horribly wrong.

Kaslin climbed out of bed and stepped towards the window where the first rays of morning sunlight were filtering inside. His wife, Lisik, watched him carefully with a scrutinizing gaze.

"Kaslin…Kaslin, damn it, I need your help! Now, dear boy!" Roland was shouting whilst sounding quite pissed off. Kaslin gave the turian equivalent of a smile. If there was something going on he knew he would be able to take advantage of it…somehow. It would just require some thought. He was good at that.

"Roland, what's going on?" Kaslin asked. He noticed in the corner of his vision that Lisik seemed to sigh and shake her head, letting her head fall back onto her pillow.

"Two of my prisoners are escaping! I need all of your available mercs to get their bloody arses over here and help me stop them!"

That would require some organization. Kaslin decided he would go about it eventually, he just wanted to determine the details about what was happening. He had not even known that Roland had two prisoners: he had known only of the female turian, the one he was making build some sort of device…Roland had left out a lot of the details.

"Why can't your personal goons do that?" Kaslin asked.

"Goddamnit, you bloody turian, just do as you're told! Give me some mercs now, or I swear I'll come over to your place and burn it all down!"

Kaslin sighed again. Roland was certainly angry and as such he would be unpredictable. Kaslin decided to help him out, if only to find out more about what was going on. The two prisoners in question, especially the one building something for him…Kaslin could use them.

"You're a lunatic, Roland," Kaslin said with a smirk, "But I'll send some of my troops regardless. They'll probably be there in twenty minutes…"
"Twenty minutes too long, you lizard-faced bastard! I need them now!" Roland shouted even louder this time, if only to emphasize his point. Kaslin was being reasonable: it would take five minutes to ready some soldiers and another fifteen minutes for their fastest shuttle to take them to Roland's desert hideout.

"And don't you ever call me a lunatic again, do you understand you bloody turian? You ever insult me…"

Kaslin used his empty left hand to pull open the window in front of him, providing him with a rather excellent view of the estate grounds. Without much more thought he tossed the communications device out of the open window, watching it land on the pavement some distance across the estate grounds. Roland's shouting voice was still audible through it even from this distance before it hit the pavement and smashed into several pieces. And once again, silence filled the bedroom.

He turned to his wife, who looked up at him with sleepy eyes from the bed.

"Who was that?" She asked.

Kaslin shrugged.

"Some crazy human asshole," he replied. Moments later he was dressed and left the room to prepare the troops. He doubted they would get to Roland's base of operations in time but hell, he may as well try. And the mention of two escaped captives only intrigued the turian some more. He could use these escaped captives…if Roland wanted them back then they were obviously integral to his plan. If Kaslin got hold of them he might be able to find out more about what Roland was doing. Hell, he was already slowly accumulating the knowledge about Roland's plans. It would only be a matter of time before he knew the whole story. Until then, he could work on getting that information faster.

Kelias Lalitherax had a lot going through her mind as she picked up the assault rifle from the fallen soldier. For one, she was not entirely sure what she was doing. It frightened her, yet at the same time she was so full of bravado that the fear was only minor. She would do whatever was necessary to escape, even if that meant buying Garrus time in a rather dangerous means.

Kelias had never really killed anybody before. It had always occurred to her that she had helped design weapons that had killed many, many people. Some of the weapons she had helped design were the sort that were popular with mercenary groups and other criminals. There was no doubt in her mind that those people used those weapons to kill. Was she responsible for all of those deaths? For once, maybe she might be able to make a difference here, by killing some of Roland's goons. Garrus would be ready to use the particle accelerator cannon son enough but until the algorithms and such were downloaded into the weapon's systems, he would need time. She was the one to give it to him, despite the fact that it was a whole-heartedly risky venture.

Another thing that was on her mind was about Garrus himself. It annoyed her to think that the first handsome turian male she meets in over a month is one who's feelings are already for someone else…This would usually not have annoyed her, save for the fact that the one Garrus had feelings for was not turian. No, apparently his feelings and loyalties lay with that human Spectre, Shepard. Kelias liked Garrus, despite the fact they had only known each other for a few days. It was probably the loneliness that was making her jump on him at a moment's notice but she could see that he was attracted to her in return. He was just too polite to be disloyal to his human lover. As she thought about this, Kelias' grip tightened on the assault rifle. Garrus was shouting at her from behind, standing back in the workshop as he waited for the downloads to the particle cannon's systems to finish. He did not want her to go and get herself killed, so he did care about her. Kelias smiled at this thought. Kelias was used to getting what she wanted, probably because of her wealthy father spoiling his daughter with anything she wanted during her younger years. If she wanted Garrus, which she did, she would get him. It was only a matter of time.

Kelias had handled weapons on numerous occasions during her work in designing them, so working the assault rifle she had now was no trouble. She found the design of it to be somewhat different to the ones she was familiar with and she was familiar with not only turian weaponry but human, batarian, asari…It came with her line of work, having to be knowledgeable about the many different weapons that each species built. The human-built weapons were all for lethality and efficiency, the turian ones were all for precision and perfection, the asari ones were all for looking fancy when you killed someone while the batarians were always trying to push the envelope when it came to weapons technology. Every species had its own distinct design flairs and Kelias knew them all. The assault rifle she had now, on the other hand, was unlike anything she had ever seen: it was almost made out of an insectoid shell, complete with sharpened ridges and an almost organic looking barrel. A jagged blade was underneath the barrel, making the weapon look even more intimidating.

Kelias took up the rifle anyway and started running down the tunnel. Behind her, Garrus had stopped shouting, having given up on talking her out of what she was doing. Garrus needed time and judging by the footsteps coming down the tunnel, they had no time. Kelias started running forwards, the somewhat bulky and definitely strange looking rifle held at the ready.

She took a deep breath and awaited the inevitable shooting to start. A trio of human guards in silver armour suits, left faceless by their tinted visors and breathing apparatuses, came running into view. The three were armed with assault rifles, two with ordinary ones and the third with one of the more peculiar, shell-like cannons. Kelias gritted her teeth as she pulled the trigger, the weapon buckling in her grip as a steady stream of high-powered rounds shot forth, appearing as orange-yellow tracers in the dimness of the tunnel. Kinetic barriers failed and blood sprayed forth as the three guards were cut down, convulsing and spiralling in a variety of means before they hit the ground.

Exhaling, she stopped to admire her handiwork for a moment. The amount of blood was minimal since the armour suits the guards wore prevented much blood from leaking out. Still, Kelias suddenly felt gravely ill just by looking at the corpses. She started walking, stepping over the bodies in an effort to get away from them as fast as she could. She started to run again, following the winding tunnel some distance, aware of the sounds of footsteps and shouts echoing to her from further up the tunnel.

She kept running, catching a glimpse of a few guards heading towards her further up ahead. She started firing wildly in their direction, not really aiming for them but trying to get them to stay away from the workshop. The guards scattered and started falling back as Kelias charged towards them, cutting another down while the others were already running.

For all the bravado she was feeling, it was abruptly killed when she ran into an open room where about two other tunnels joined. Roland Halverson was here, a grenade launcher gripped in his right hand. He was flanked by about a dozen guards, all of them training their rifles on Kelias. Roland smiled as she came to a stop, tilting his head slightly. Kelias looked around, saw the situation she was in and shook her head. She immediately regretted leaving the workshop, and Garrus, behind her.

"Shit," she said simply.

"Ah, Kelias, dear girl," Roland said, taking a few steps forwards. Before the turian had a chance to react, Roland had grabbed her and had pulled the rifle out of her grip. "Guns are dangerous, you of all people should know that."

He tossed the weapon to one side and pulled her towards him. He held her at arm's length while he pressed the grenade launcher into her lower back to coax her along.

"Do you think I would let you get away so easily?" Roland asked, almost mockingly. Kelias summed up her chances of escape and found that they were practically nil. She suddenly felt fear course through her and gradually start to build up. Her heart thumped wildly in her chest as Roland pushed her along, guiding her into an adjoining tunnel.

"You and I are going to wait for Garrus Vakarian," Roland said, "And we're going to try and talk him down from doing what it is he's going to do…unless my men stop him first. Somehow, I doubt they will. For all of the advanced weaponry I get them, they aren't terribly good at their jobs."

Somewhere further down the tunnels behind them, the sounds of weapons fire could be heard. Roland ignored it, his facial features creased with barely contained rage.

"You, I cannot allow to escape," Roland said as they walked, "You are integral to my plan. If Garrus refuses to see reason…" He locked and loaded his grenade launcher. "He'll get a terrible surprise."