"This is the spot." Aria's image gestured to an urban area on a populated planet.
Trex' choice of headquarters was unfortunate, but not unexpected. Shepard discarded her daydreams of testing the Normandy's new main gun on his hideout. Without the prohibition on firing mass-accelerator weapons at habitable planets, the galaxy would be unlivable for every species by now; mutually assured destruction on a grand scale. She knew that.
It would have been really satisfying, though.
"Mercer, set a course for these coordinates. Run silent past the relay." Chakwas had sternly told Joker to get all the rest he could, an order Rhi had been happy to reinforce. Let him heal. They'd need his skills soon enough.
She turned back to Aria. "Thank you."
The asari shrugged. "Just get rid of him."
"Oh, my pleasure." Rhi's grin was predatory.
The screen above her desk went black, and Shepard took a deep breath and rolled her shoulders back. She'd felt the almost imperceptible shift in the Normandy's background hum as Mercer obeyed her. After days of useless waiting they were finally underway. Her restless energy would have an outlet – soon. Until then, it wouldn't do to be seen sprinting around the ship. She kept it to an easy jog on her way to the CIC.
–––
"Fifteen minutes out, Commander."
Shepard started towards the cockpit on autopilot before remembering that it was Mercer, not Joker, who'd be at the helm. Miranda Lawson followed two paces behind, waiting for orders. Rather than look indecisive, Shepard continued towards the pilot's chair and had Mercer pull up a visual of their target.
"We sure he's there?"
Miranda nodded. "EDI's had weeks to decipher their communications encryption – they never changed it after the incident with Vanessa. She backed it up with a voice-print, too. That's his place and the owner is home."
Trex had certainly moved up in the world. The four-level building was in a bad neighborhood, but that was the way he'd always liked it. Fewer cops in the slums. Might have to get their hands dirty. She'd lay money that the place was built like a bunker, no matter how ramshackle it looked from the outside. You could fit a lot of cronies in a place that size. Reds HQ as well as home-sweet-home?
Shepard narrowed her eyes. "Simple, then." There was no one to protect this time. No need for subtlety. "Take a small team and go in shooting."
"A small team, Commander?" Miranda's eyes flicked her way. "That's a ridiculous risk. Please remember this is only a distraction from our real mission."
"No, my crew getting hurt by his idiocy is a distraction," Rhi said, "and one I'm about to remove. Never fight on two fronts of you can help it, Lawson." She drummed her fingers on the back of Mercer's chair. "And a small team is the only way to deal with Trex. The minute he thinks he can't win, he'll run. Have to let him think he has a chance."
An odd step-step-clack heralded Joker's arrival, moving with the support of a single crutch. Shepard raised an eyebrow at him.
"Pressure builds bones, Commander. And you'll want Mercer to helm the shuttle."
Rhi could have pointed out that A) Miranda could helm the shuttle and B) He would hardly develop bone faster in the pilot's chair than in bed, but she knew Joker was aware of his own capabilities and limitations. Besides, she'd rather he be on the other end of her radio than Mercer.
Miranda looked ready to dress him down for insubordination, but she took her cue from Shepard and let it slide.
Mercer looked over her shoulder for approval. Rhi nodded and the younger woman slid out of the pilot's chair. Joker settled rather more awkwardly into it, crutch stashed under a console, and stretched his hands. The splinted fingers were an ugly reminder of why she was here. This was necessary… but it was also personal.
She wanted friends at her back, not just team-mates. "Lawson, tell Tali and Garrus to arm up and meet Mercer and I at the shuttle in fifteen."
"Aye aye, Commander."
As they settled into the Kodiak, Shepard felt Vakarian's eyes on her. "Something on your mind, Garrus?"
"Revenge, Shepard?" he asked mildly.
Did he really think she was after the same thing she'd denied him? She shook her head. "Prevention. Can't let him have another chance to try to harm me and mine." She looked him firmly in the eye. "Just taking out the trash, Garrus."
"Surely if you kill the leader, another just rises to his place," Tali pointed out.
"It's not the mafia. No one else has a reason to give a shit about me." Shepard snorted. "Whoever fights their way to the top spot should send me a thank you card." She pulled out her pistol and checked it over one last time as the shuttle started its descent.
Straightforward her plan might be, but that didn't mean they had to go in the front door. The building had multiple entrances, including an air-car deck on the second floor. She asked Mercer to take them in low and smooth. She, Tali, and Garrus lined up for a quick exit.
The shuttle buzzed the landing pad, door open. Shepard jumped, rolled, and came up shooting. The submachine gun kept both the door guards occupied for the seconds it took Garrus and Tali to follow her.
She took down the first guard just as a new man stepped out of the door. He stumbled on the body of his fellow and yelled. Shit. They needed to get inside. There was no cover here for a drawn-out fight. She signaled Garrus to focus on the remaining door guard, switched to her shotgun, and gathered herself.
The mnemonic was little more than a tensing across her chest and shoulders, as if she was pulling her arms back to grapple. She zeroed in on her target, felt the gathering power under her sternum, and charged.
She crossed the landing platform in a split second. Her shoulder crunched into the unarmored man's chest and sent him flying back through the door and across the room. She followed after, riding the wave of giddy adrenaline that always accompanied the maneuver, and unloaded her shotgun into a woman who'd been about to head out the door herself.
There was one more person in the room; she shot him in the leg as he ran for the door.
Shepard walked over to where he lay gasping. "You have a radio?"
Damn, he was a kid – late teens, maybe. Too young and afraid to resist, anyway. With a shaking hand, he dropped his com unit on the floor. She crushed it with her heel.
"I have two pieces of advice for you. Tie that up, and get yourself the hell out of the Reds." Her shot had been crap; bad for her, but good news for the young thug. He'd heal without even a limp. "You should listen to me. I give good advice."
"True," Garrus agreed, drily. The sudden appearance of the armored and scarred turian scared the wounded teen past sense. Garrus shrugged.
Tali had her omni-tool out. "No alarm system on this level. EDI places Trex on the top floor – heading down. The elevator's that way."
"Stairs?"
Tali pointed, and Shepard led the way, leaving the kid in a puddle of his piss.
The stairs were carpeted, muffling the pounding of their boots. Shepard was almost at the landing when a scout rounded the corner and ran right into her.
She reacted faster than he did. He was on the floor, nose and mouth buried in the carpet, before he'd even made a noise. "D'you want to live?"
The man nodded vigorously.
"Then run like hell. I'm not here for you." She let him up and gave him a shove that sent him tumbling down the stairs.
She was almost up the next flight when she heard a shot. "What was that?"
"He tried to use his radio," Garrus answered. "He won't anymore."
"Idiot didn't know how lucky he was." She reached the upper landing. A small area had been set up as a waiting room. The double-doors at the end were sealed. "Tali, deal with this. And send Chiktikka in first."
Shepard took position to the right of the door, leaning against the wall. Tali flattened herself next to her, three-fingered hand dancing over her omni-tool. When Garrus reached the landing he took the position opposite them without a word.
"What's the hold up?"
"Security lock-down," Tali explained. "They had to realize something was wrong eventually. One more code, and… there! Chiktikka!"
Tali's combat drone was the first thing through the opening doors. There was a brief pause, and then a hail of gunfire. Shepard locked eyes with Garrus and mouthed a countdown. On three, they leaned out of cover – and thanks to the attack on the drone, they knew which directions to look for their targets.
Shepard covered the area with fire from the submachine gun and ducked back around the corner. Only then did her brain process what she'd seen beyond sorting it into 'cover' and 'targets'. The room was lined with computers and equipment, with a projection table taking center-stage, surrounded by seating and smaller work-stations. There had to be at least ten people in there. Armed, but only lightly armored. Had one of them had alloy-bright teeth and a sneer?
Trex's voice rang out, shattering her doubt. "Get off your asses, morons! There aren't that many of them!"
"Hold this point, Garrus. Tali, keep their shields down for me." She risked a quick look. There he was – middle of the room. She could take him out, easy, but then she'd be surrounded. No sense being stupid.
She sent a surge of biotic power down her left arm, gathering in her palm, and tossed it down the middle of the room. She followed in the wake of the shock wave, protected by the confusion of falling bodies, and vaulted over a work-bench. The room smelled of burning electronics thanks to her near-random fire earlier. She tried to breathe through her mouth.
"Ah, I know this – playing bowling, right?" Garrus punctuated his quip with a shot from his rifle.
Shepard glanced out of cover, aimed at one of the few people still standing, and shot twice in quick succession. Her target slid down the wall, out of the fight.
The shock wave was little more than a distraction to armored troops, but some of the unprepared Reds had been thrown hard enough to be incapacitated. Had Trex been one of the ones she sent flying? Shepard skirted the bench, looking for her old enemy. Out of the corner of her eye she saw someone crawling for the wall, but before she could aim a woman stepped out in front of her with a gun pointed at her gut.
Shepard dodged on reflex and the point-blank shot glanced off her side, taking down her shields and a layer of ceramic instead of hitting her squarely. She grabbed the woman's gun hand before she could fire again and twisted the weapon out of her grip, kneeing her sharply in the belly as she pulled her over.
A flicker of motion caught her eye, and she looked up over the woman's bent form just in time to see Trex.Fuck! The crawler had been him. He slapped a panel on the seemingly blank wall, opening a concealed door, and ran.
Rhi threw her assailant to the side and ran after him, shouting for her squad to follow. She wasn't going to do this twice.
The door opened on a utility stairwell. Trex's retreating footsteps echoed up the cement shaft. Down. She tore after him, heedless of the alarms, and Garrus and Tali followed. Tali, ever thoughtful, took the time to sabotage the door.
Two flights, three – Shepard grabbed the handrail to spin herself around onto the next – four, five – the place was a damn bunker, they were a story below ground level, now. She rattled down the last flight of stairs, pistol at the ready, searching for her target in the suddenly dim light.
The entire level was open, one big basement. No, she corrected herself, garage. It smelled of oil and dust. A gleaming row of motorcycles was parked in front of a giant door on one end. Trex was astride one, a perfect target, but in the split second it took her eyes to adjust he sped out the open door and into the dimness beyond.
Rhi was sprinting for the bikes before he'd cleared the door. She picked one near the end and looked at the ignition, cracking her helmet seals with one hand. She didn't need an omni-tool for this.
Tali and Garrus skidded to a stop behind her.
"Do those have... wheels?" The turian asked in disbelief.
"'Course," she muttered. She pulled out a hair pin while her other hand followed the ignition wire. She had to bend over to see where it ended in the body of the bike. Bingo.
"Can you drive one?"
She could have suggested single-handedly charging a manned emplacement and he wouldn't have sounded that dubious.
"Ride. Think we could afford eezo crap at home?" She pulled the wire loose and substituted her bent hairpin. When she heard the click of the ignition she turned to the neighboring bike, already fishing for another pin. "When everyone and their dog got an air-car, we still used the streets."
"Shepard, I don't know how –" Tali moaned.
"Behind me." She couldn't fix another bike anyway; she was out of pins. Her hair had fallen down around her face. She wadded it back up and pulled her helmet on, stepped over the bike, and pulled Tali up behind her. "Hang on!"
She twisted the throttle gently and Tali's arms tightened around her in terror. "Shiiiii –" the roar of the engine drowned out the quarian's cry.
The garage opened onto an access tunnel. "EDI! Get me a beacon!" Shepard turned right, following the path of Trex's departing tail-lights. She wasted a few precious seconds getting used to the bike, trying not to think how long it'd been since she'd been on one. EDI programmed a tracer on her HUD; a blinking light in her peripheral vision told her which direction her quarry had gone. Not at full speed, it seemed – does he think he gave us the slip? Probably. The tunnels and alleys under the slums were a warren, and he certainly didn't know about EDI.
You're not getting away, Trex. The bike purred, engine nowhere near its limits. Damn, she'd forgotten how much fun this was. Tali's fear could be a problem, though. She was hanging on for dear life; if Shepard hadn't been in armor she'd probably have arm-shaped bruises.
"You'll be fine, Tal! Just stick to my back. Do exactly what I do."
"Shepaaaard!"
"We'll try it, ready? 3, 2, 1 – " She swerved right around a corner, leaning with the bike, and the quarian did as she asked – though her grip remained as tight as ever. "Good girl, Tal, that's it! Glued to my back. Let's go!"
–––
Joker was uncharacteristically silent, terrified of distracting Shepard. The footage from her helmet cam was frighteningly close to the road surface.
She rounded the corner and straightened up, and he let out his breath. Holy shit. It was funny, how much faster 'fast' felt when you knew that the – the – the contraption – was touching the ground. Wheels. Shit. Reassured for the moment, he flipped to Garrus's feed. It had taken the turian a while to get the hang of the controls and get going, but Joker was still impressed. He's probably reading instructions off his visor, poor guy. His feed showed approaching tail-lights, and then his headlights shone off of Tali's suit.
Shepard shot a glance back, leaned forward, and upped the pace.
Garrus followed gamely, but it was clear from the jerky motion of the vid-feed that he didn't know what he was doing. Shepard on the other hand...
Joker shook his head in wonder. Who knew? There's a vehicle in the galaxy she can actually drive!
–––
Shepard heard it, first; the low rumble of a third engine. The maze of access-routes and alleyways twisted the sound. If she'd had to rely on ears alone, she would never have been able to track it. But EDI's little blinking display was there, telling her where to go.
She rounded a corner, saw the retreating form of Trex, and gunned the engine.
The Reds had never gone in for loud bikes. Noise meant wasted energy; it was what posers did for show. Even when their replacement parts had been re-purposed scrap, they'd kept their machines tuned. The machine Rhi was riding was better than anything they'd managed to cobble together back then.
Still, when the purr rose to a muffled roar, Trex realized his danger, leaned forward and opened his lead.
The real chase was on.
Shepard lowered herself over the bike and poured on the speed.
–––
In the cockpit of the Normandy, a small audience had collected. Jack was leaning over one shoulder, Kasumi the other, eyes glued to the projection.
Joker'd thought they were going fast enough before, but it had been nothing compared to this. The exhaust pipes of Shepard's bike started to discolor with heat, the silver metal becoming an inky blue. Overhead lights flashed by. Suddenly they were in another open area, garage or cargo storage, and Trex was shooting off to the left, swinging wide. Shepard made a tighter turn, bike leaning hard, head terrifyingly close to the ground, and an awful screeching assaulted his ears.
What the – Joker flipped to Garrus's feed. Shepard's armored knee was brushing the road surface. The awful sound was the ceramic burning itself away against the cement. She'll never be able to pull out of that, he thought, but she as she came out of the curve the bike righted itself.
She'd closed the distance between them to ten meters. Then they were out of the open area and back into the tunnels once more.
–––
"Shepard, the target just sent instructions to persons unknown." She could hardly hear EDI's voice over the rush of wind and the growl of the engine. "They will attempt to close a barrier between you and Trex."
"Roger." Just have to get closer, then. After she'd gained on the corner she hadn't been able to gain as much as a foot more… but Trex hadn't been able to pull away, either.
She still hadn't managed to close before the trap was sprung; a metal gate started to rattle down from the ceiling just as Trex passed beneath it and into another brightly lit cavern.
Garrus cursed at losing their quarry, but Shepard wasn't ready to admit defeat. Her eyes narrowed, focused on Trex's retreating form and the shrinking space under the gate.
"SHEPARD!" Tali shrieked. They couldn't get under the gate in time; the bike was giving all it had, and the barrier was too far away. But still she didn't slow.
A familiar bloom of power started to grow in her chest.
"Hang. On," Rhi growled through gritted teeth. Here goes nothing...
A blue nimbus burst into being around her, then slowly, too slowly, it grew, until it encompassed Tali and the bike.
Rhi held it in her mind, in her nerves, an almost uncontrollable amount of power, and fixed all her attention on her enemy.
Then she let go.
It was the same mechanism she used to charge, but now she, Tali, and the bike were one unit, hurtling through a massless space at speeds the mind couldn't comprehend, leaving the closing gate behind them, aimed at one thing. The biotic barrier surrounding them carried their force ahead like a bow wave, former mass and new terrific speed combining into a deadly miracle of inertia as they hit Trex's bike.
Time slowed with the after-effects of the charge.
Impact jarring her limbs, deathly force softened by the barrier.
Trex's mouth opening in a scream.
His bike sliding sideways across the floor.
Tali's hands around her in a death-grip.
The smell of burning rubber.
Shepard nearly dislocated her shoulders keeping her bike upright. Her muscles screamed; so did Tali. The worst was the high-pitched scream of Trex's bike scraping across the floor. Desperate to avoid the same fate, Rhi threw all her weight against the pull of gravity and steered into the skid.
–––
The tense spectators on the Normandy watched through Garrus' cam as Shepard exerted enough power to fling herself, Tali, and a motorcycle at speeds too fast for the human eye. The collision itself was obscured by a blaze of biotic blue and the bars of the gate. Trex's bike was flying sideways, the gang leader half-under it, but Joker's eyes were only for Shepard as she brought her bike to a screeching halt facing her enemy.
Shepard swung off the bike, pulled her pistol, and stalked forward, armor glinting in flickering over-head lights.
Jack's voice was low and breathy. "Shit, sometimes I want to fuck her." She glanced at Joker sideways. "Don't you, flyboy?"
Shit, Jack can tell!
No, wait. That was just Jack being Jack.
Joker didn't say a word.
–––
Trex lay on his back, crushed under the bike, and begged. Never ride more than you can lift off your leg, said a voice from her past.
"Should have remembered your own advice, bastard," she told him.
She stared down at him. His face was as white with shock as Gabby's had been. His leg was bloodier than Matthews with his shoulder full of shrapnel. He was as immobilized as Donnelly.
"Rhi, help me. Help me, I'll stop, I'm sorry, it was stupid. We were kids together, damn it, come on, you remember!"
Her face was impassive, but underneath emotions roiled. She couldn't convince the Alliance that she hadn't defected. She couldn't fight Cerberus, couldn't punch the smug superiority off of the Illusive Man's face, couldn't fill a data pad with all of his crimes and make him eat it.
But Trex… Trex was at her mercy.
"I'll leave you alone, just lift the bike." Tears were running down his face. The alloy teeth weren't smiling anymore. "God, my leg. Please, Rhi! We're the only ones left, doesn't that mean something?" His voice broke in a sob. "Just help me, sweet fucking Christ, please!"
He'd never been a good person.
There was no reason he shouldn't pay.
She flexed her gauntleted fingers.
"Shepard." Joker's voice in her ear piece was so soft she almost didn't hear it. "Remember your own advice? What did you tell Garrus?"
Her eyes flicked sideways. The turian was staring at her, bright eyes cold and unreadable. She hadn't let him revenge himself on Sidonis.
The adrenaline of the chase coursed through her, demanding an outlet. Trex was still begging, still apologizing. He doesn't really mean it. Not yet. She could still make him eat his shiny metal teeth. Her biotics flickered down her arm, around her clenching fist.
"Just trash, Commander?" Garrus asked, dryly.
She took a deep breath. Right. Just trash.
Rhi nodded, once, and put a bullet in Trex's skull.
She started to walk away, then paused and loaded an incendiary round. She buried the slug in his chest and the body went up in flames.
"Tali, see about getting that gate open. EDI, find us a route above ground for shuttle pick-up." She looked around, and added as an afterthought, "Bring the bikes."
–––
Shepard was on deck within moments of the shuttle landing. Joker spun around to stare at her. The left knee of her armor was worn almost to nothing, a thin layer of gray ceramic where there should have been deep blue. There was grime on her right cheekbone and blood on her gauntlet, and she looked... alive. Vibrantly, energetically alive. He could feel the adrenaline coming off of her in waves, barely contained energy finding outlet in sparks of blue biotic power that flickered down her body, eyes on fire, full lips cat-smug.
This wasn't alliance commander Shepard. This was all Rhi.
"Whoaaah." Jack said, quietly.
Shepard grinned, a full, lazy, predatory grin full of white teeth. "I got a bike."
"Yeah." Jack sounded blasé, but it was a shade of blasé that said she was impressed, if you knew how to read her.
Rhi stretched her arms, lifting herself onto her toes. Not her normal athlete's functional stretch, but something altogether more catlike.
Damn, you should not be able to look that sensuous in armor.
She sank back onto the deck plating, letting the last biotics die down. Jack looked her over then met Shepard's smoldering brown eyes with her own half-lidded ones.
"Wanna get high?"
Shepard seemed to come back to herself for a moment, the cool-commander face sliding into place. "You have our next coordinates, Joker? We're all done here."
He nodded. He didn't quite trust his speech.
She acknowledged him then glanced at Jack. "Yeah, okay. Meet you in ten." She chuckled and walked off towards the elevator. "Down in your pit."
Joker watched her go – that saucy sway she never had in her walk suddenly very much in evidence – and clenched his teeth. Shepard. High. With Jack. His poor imagination couldn't decide if it was in heaven or hell, and he swung his chair back 'round before other parts decided for him and became too damn obvious.
Jack leaned over again, lips close to his ear, and fired one parting shot before she returned to her cave: "Stop grinding your teeth, lover-boy. She doesn't dig chicks."
He barely noticed when she stalked back to the elevator.
author's codex: By the early 2100s, due to congestion and fuel scarcity, the motorcycle was one of the most common modes of personal transport in Earth's megopolises. The discovery of mass effect technology in 2148 started a radical shift, however, and in just over a decade flying vehicles became the norm, allowing all but the very poor to rise above the squalor of the ground level streets.
While some companies embraced this development with 'futuristic' styling, others capitalized on the insecurity felt by many humans at the realization that they were not alone in the galaxy. Fear of change lead to nostalgia for various supposed 'golden ages' of humanity, a wave savvy marketers were happy to ride.
In the '50s and early '60s, the most commonly sold motorcycles were 'centenial' models, designed to emulate the styling of the i19/i50s and 60s. Though exponentially more fuel efficient than their forbears, in many ways the bikes were a return to a more simplistic engineering school and practical aesthetic... which was lucky, as the march of progress soon one out over the haze of nostalgia, and all but a handful of manufacturers went out of business or shut down their internal-combustion engine arms, making parts difficult to find.
Motorcycle enthusiasts remained, but real collectors of the classics tended to prefer the actual antiques rather than the copycat centenial models. By 2165, when Shepard first joined the Reds, it was more common to find a centenial in the dump than in a garage.