After Garrus left, Andromeda found herself nuzzling his side of the pillow, taking in his scent. Her fingertips gently stroked the satin sheet cover up and down as she stared into nothingness. "He won't come back…" The voice in the back of her mind spoke up. "How are you going to go on without him?"
"He took down the Geth, He'll make it." Andromeda countered stubbornly as she raised her body slowly up into a sitting position on the head of the bed. She glanced across the room to her terminal which was located right before the door that led to the small economy size bathroom. Most of the apartments on her block of the Wards contained the standard medium size living room, hallway that led back to the bedroom with the adjoining bathroom. The upper Wards had some of the larger facilities: two or three bedrooms, however, those were for the diplomats or wealthy entrepreneurs. Cracking a smile as the idea was to send a message to Jenna, Andromeda made her way in the dark over to the terminal, keeping the sheet from falling off her naked body as best as she could. A part of her wanted to wait and tell Jenna the news in person to see the look on her face, but the temptation to tell her right away by any means necessary was too great! Tapping the screen to turn it on, she fumbled to peck the letters on the illuminated keypad to log in.
The chime of her security system granting access and the sound of the front door sliding open made her way freeze in place. Her fingertips hovered over the keypad as she slowly turned her head to look back into the dimly lit living room.
Kai Leng stepped into the apartment and paused briefly at the entrance. He quickly noted that all the rooms were dark, and a twisted smile appeared briefly on his face for just a second. "She's asleep." He noted as he slipped out the hand held tranquilizer from his pocket and took a few more steps forward. Pausing, he did a slow scan for any surprise attacks. A rookie would have rushed in and easily could have fallen into a trap set by a well alarmed prey. Kai Leng, on the other hand, was no rookie.
Satisfied that the living room was clean, he proceeded onward. This was no simple job, none of his assignments were; they were planned. During his surveillance, he managed to download the schematics for the apartment's layout to his omni tool. The apartment's front door opened up to the barely spacious living room and further back was the bedroom, shifted to the right, followed by the bathroom that was on the other side of the bedroom. The bedroom and the bathroom gave Kai a disadvantage: He did not have a complete visual on the bedroom from the living room and the bathroom was completely out of his sight. Keeping his gun poised upwards by his shoulder, he took slow steps making sure that Andromeda wasn't waiting for him on the other side.
Narrowing his eyes, he hesitated at the bedroom door and rolled his fingertips along the holster of the gun, before jumping through the door frame and aiming the gun to the hidden right. The bed was empty…he looked up to see a light coming through the crack that was between the bathroom door and the base of the floor. "She's in the bathroom….." He relaxed his fingers on the gun….just a bit. His charcoal colored eyes gave the bed one more glance and a look of disgust filled his face. The pillows were meshed down by the weight of two heads that were on them presently, and the cover was tossed to the one side. "He was in the bed with her…." Kai Leng glared hard on the insulting sight. He loathed aliens…more importantly he loathed interrelations with the alien species. The thought of a human submitting themselves to the disgusting and lowly creatures burned him up inside which was another reason why working with Cerberus appealed to him. Plus his brutal acts against aliens while in the Alliance earned the attention of the Illusive Man.
Looking away from the bed, he moved closer to the bathroom as his adrenaline began to pick up. The sound of the shower inside lowered his alert levels. "Easy picking…she's cornered now."
Andromeda slowed down her breathing as she stood still in the linen closet next to the shower. She fussed silently realizing that by the fear of an unknown person in her apartment led her fleeing to the bathroom to take shelter and leaving her loaded hand held pistol in her night dresser. Now she was cornered, unarmed, and practically naked except for the bed sheet still wrapped around her body. She turned the shower on in hopes that it would diver t the stranger's attention, giving her just enough time to escape the apartment. Due to the shower's proximity and the fact that her assailant was blocking the bathroom door way, she would just have seconds to make her run.
The closet door didn't have way to look through so she just had to listen and pray that the stranger would decide to check the shower instead of coming to the conclusion it was a trick and check the closet first. Listening, she heard the unknown being getting closer and closer to her location…just barely. Whoever it was, they were mainly interested in the apartment's occupants and not the items because nothing was being ransacked. There was no talking so Andromeda assumed it was just one of them. The only problem was who was it? More importantly what was it? A Salarian? A Turian? A Krogan? An Asari? A Human? A sickening knot formed on her stomach as she began to wonder if it was one of the agents of the Shadow Broker looking for her just like Garrus feared…
Hearing the bathroom door slide open, she held her breath…
Steam was filling up in the bathroom when Kei Leng entered. The shower door was designed to not reveal the occupant's body but he was sure she was there. It all made sense to him, after their…."encounter" the Turian left to go back to Shepard's ship no doubt and the woman went to clean up. He really hoped that he would be able to be the one to interrogate her if it was necessary. Any human that had sex with an alien was a traitor to their species in his book and he would love to torture her for her sin. Unlike the God in one of Earth's Religions, there would be no salvation for her. He would damn her himself to the fires of hell.
He slowly reached out with his left hand to tap the shower door's button as his right hand fingers rested firmly on the gun's trigger. Just as he hit the button, he noticed in his peripheral vision that the closet door to his left slid open. A barely covered female lunged out at him and her fist struck hard in his face before he had a chance to pivot on his feet. Due to being off balance and the force of the blow, Kai Leng was stumbling back towards the bathroom's counter and he was slightly dazed. He turned his head to see the blur of the sheet end racing away from him as Andromeda sprinted out of the bathroom back into the bedroom.
Despite the blood oozing from his now broken nose, Kai Leng bolted out, quickly gaining on her. Instead of raising his weapon to take the easy shot, he grabbed the sheet with his left and gave it a firm yank. The cloth freed itself from Andromeda's grip and it became tangled up in her legs. Gravity and the inertia took its toll on the now naked form and she fell head first into the coffee table just as she entered the living room.
Her semi-conscious body laid on the floor now, face down, the sound of her groaning from the pain made Kei Leng aware that she was still alive. Walking towards her slowly, like an animal stalking its meal, taking the time to clean the blood from his face with the back of his hand, he watched on as she tried to push herself back up. Aiming the barrel of the gun downwards, Kai Leng took two shots at point blank range. The darts found their mark in the mid section of her lumbar and Andromeda's body went limp. With her still, he noticed the large abrasions to her back. The abrasions were long and ragged almost like claw marks….which caused him to spit in disgust. He concluded that the Turian in a sadistic nature clawed her like the beast he was.
Walking back to the bathroom to cleanse and nurse his wound, he touched his ear piece comm link. "Target secured. Ready for transport."
Less than a minute later, two men wearing C-Sec uniforms walked into the apartment carrying a long cargo box labeled "Fragile" on both sides. Kai Leng joined them in a neater appearance. "I need to get off this station immediately." He barked as he looked on while the two men wrapped Andromeda in the sheet then placed her down into the shipping container.
"Dock E Seven has a ship ready." One of the officers spoke up.
"Good. I expect you to be down there in fifteen minutes with the cargo." Kai Leng moved towards the entrance of the unit. "Once I'm clear, I want you both back here to do a sweep. Remove any hair, prints, blood stains and fibers. I want it clean. Understand?"
"It will be done." The second saluted to the commanding Cerberus officer.
Hours later, Kai Leng took few sips from his Sake dish as he logged into the ship's terminal. After his departure, he manually hacked into the mainframe to delete the ship's manifest prior to arriving and entering the Citadel to prevent any traces. He also changed the ship's route and identification tag. For any spacer, they were to assume that his vessel was a simple barter ship making its rounds. To C-Sec thanks to Cerberus' slippery tentacles into the organization, there was no trace of the ship's existence including his. The man to them known as Nylan Sou no longer existed in their databases and recording devices.
There was only one person who truly knew the ship's intended destination and pilot and that was the Illusive Man. The older gentleman sat in his usual chair as his face filled the computer's video messaging system. "Do you have her?" He asked with little doubt. Kai Leng was one of his best agents, he always completed his missions and was loyal to the cause.
"Affirmative." Kai Leng replied.
"Good to hear," The Illusive Man took a sip of his brandy that was poured prior to their conference. "Any trouble?"
"None. I'm in route as instructed. Shall I begin the interrogations?" He tried to hide the eagerness that filled him ever since he left the station.
"Go to the outpost first…I will contact you again." The video connection closed on the Illusive Man's end abruptly making Kei Leng give a look of displeasure back towards the ship's cargo hold.
"Understood…" He growled as he tapped over on the ship's navigation console to set in the automatic pilot. Moving out of the cockpit, he made his way to the back of the ship to check on his carry on.
"Garrus!" Andromeda's voice cried out to him in the bombardment of ammunition throughout the foggy city.
"Andromeda!" Garrus' could hear his voice strain as he dodged incoming fire from an unknown enemy. He shot blindly with his assault weapon and then took cover behind a piece of a collapsed structure. Panting, he discharged his weapon and slipped in another clip to prevent his gun from overheating.
"We have two coming our way! Get to the point!" Shepard yelled at him through the barrage of incoming fire that made hearing difficult. The sounds of explosions and screams filled the air. For some reason Garrus couldn't recall where he was, but all he knew was that hell was being unleashed by a foe he never encountered before.
Suddenly the streets were filled with husks, the vile mixture of Reaper technology and flesh like the kind he and Shepard encountered on Eden Prime. The husks were humanoid and they moaned in a sickening manner as they clawed their way through the rubble to get to Shepard and his team. "Garrus!" Andromeda's voice called out again. The voice appeared to be closer and just past the husks!
Bolting out, Garrus opened up a spray of bullets that tore through the husks' decaying flesh as he sprinted to get to her. He had to find her.
The smoke cleared up ahead and a brutal sight of a female humanoid husk running closer with a piercing yet familiar cry. Garrus stopped dead in his tracks as he realized that this husk used to be Andromeda. "Garrus!" The husk called out to him desperately as it came running at him with kill intent.
"Noooooooo!" The Turian screamed.
Awakening from his nightmare, Garrus sat straight up quickly trying to get his bearings as he looked around panting to catch his breath. His talons had torn into the bed sheets in his quarters, ripping the material to pieces. Cupping his face, he desperately tried to block out the image in his mind of seeing Andromeda turned to a husk. Quickly the image switched over to when he and she were on Ilium and when they first kissed….the scene brought slight peace but he still couldn't get passed the fear over what he may have to endure in the fight ahead. He saw what brutal mutilations the Reapers and the Geth did to humans on Eden Prime and on the Derelict Reaper vessel days ago. He then remembered it had been over a week since he left Andromeda again on the Citadel.
The room's internal alarm system began to beep indicating the preset time he programmed just twenty minutes before the Omega 4 Relay run. Grabbing his armor, he slid up from the bed and began to get dressed. Unfortunately with the Normandy's crew except for Shepard's team and Joker being captured by the Collectors, Garrus was unable to send a message out to Andromeda to say his goodbyes just in case. Of course, he could have logged into the private terminal himself to see if he could find a comm buoy to bounce a message off, but there was no time. Forcing him to push Andromeda out of his head to remain focused for the battle ahead, he maneuvered out of the crew quarters over to the the Forward Battery to do one more diagnostic.
"Everyone check in." Shepard's voice echoed out from the PA system minutes after Garrus finished the diagnostic.
"Ready." Garrus complied with the others.
"Let's go give the Collectors hell!"
End of Mass Effect 2: Andromeda Series
To be concluded in Mass Effect 3: Andromeda Series Coming 2012