Who Saves the Hero? (Discontinued Version)

by Kudara

Shepard had been brought back from death by Cerberus, but she suspects TIM has manipulated her into working for him and that he has his own hidden agenda. Who can she trust besides Garrus and Tali to help her discern the truth? (Being rewritten)

26. Chapter 26

Who Saves the Hero – Chapter 26

By Kudara

Disclaimer: The Mass Effect universe is the property of Bioware/Electronic Arts. No infringement of these copyrights is intended as this is a not for profit fan fiction work.

Warning: language, violence

Notes: This is inspired by the Beyonce song "Save the Hero," from the album I am…Sasha Fierce. This is an Alternate Universe story. The portrayal of Cerberus in my story is heavily influenced by the contents of the second and third Mass Effect books, Ascension and Retribution.

Rating: Mature

Feedback: Always welcome, feedback is what encourages me to keep writing. Please let me know what you like and what you dislike about the story.

Errors and Corrections: Yes, please let me know about any errors you see so that I can correct them. This is un-beta'ed so it probably has a few.

Ch. 10 - Minor change to make it clear that Rayna was waiting on the Trading Floor for Shepard to get off the Normandy. "I was sent here to give you a message," the strange asari continued, apparently satisfied that no one could overhear them. "It's from a friend you made on Noveria."

Ch. 12 - Change to introduce the concept of órë, which is the same as the asari aura, and the manipulation of it, or bringing into harmony as Lindariel calls it, to initiate a mental connection between the protheans.

Ch. 17 - Modified the Chapter so that Samara recognizes Shepard's use of the biotic charge for what it is and tells her that a few asari know how to do it as well. This is a LoSB inspired change because Tela Vasir uses biotic charge. This actually makes the story easier; as now Shepard can use her charge without everybody flipping out about anything other than how it's possible that a short-lived human has mastered the skill.

Revision History: 10/07/2010

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Tuchanka – Morning of the second day

Shepard, along with Jack and Grunt, stood on a two tiered slab of concrete with a set of stairs leading up to the top level on both the front and left sides; around them were the broken remnants of the last krogan city to fall during the Krogan Rebellions. It was fairly clear they were standing in the remains of what used to be a building, twisted off remains of both functional pillars and what appeared to be decorative pillars provided several places for them to take cover. Shepard didn't like the look of the decorative pillars; they appeared to be little more than piping and sheet metal, nothing she would trust to hold up well under fire. The other pillars, the one's with conduit and piping sticking out from their broken off tops, looked much more substantial. Behind them a mammoth structure rose toward the sky, the heart of the destroyed city the Shaman had informed them, the keystone. A few krogan bodies, the ones who had not survived the Rite of Passage, lay on the raised platform as well. A quick glance into one of the armored helmets showed that only hard bone remained, the flesh having been stripped from them, probably by insects Shepard guessed. A strong wind blew from the direction of the keystone; whipping up dust and anything else light enough for it to carry. Thankfully, up on the platform, the structure of the keystone itself blocked most of the wind. You could look to either side and up and see dust and trash sweeping swiftly by, but on the platform itself Shepard could feel only a steady light breeze.

Even though it was morning, the day was already heating up; making Shepard very pleased she had decided to wear her N7 helmet again today. The hardsuit's built in cooling unit was already working at keeping her from getting overheated and the cooler air on her face was welcome. She looked over at her companions, Grunt was staring around at the ruined city an eager look in his blue eyes as he waited for whatever might happen next. Jack was scowling at the landscape around them. A fine layer of dust coated the ex-convicts bare skin, dulling the colors and lines of her tattoos. The biotic looked like she was already regretting agreeing to come along for this jaunt.

"First the krogan conquered Tuchanka… and mastered a natural world only we are fit to hold," the Shaman's voice boomed out from hidden speakers.

Shepard looked up and watched as the cylinder in the center of the keystone rose up high into the air. At the end of the shaman's speech, the massive cylinder dropped, slamming against its base so forcefully that it not only sent a booming noise though the air that vibrated against Shepard's chest and echoed off the nearby hills, but also caused the ground beneath their feet to shudder. Well if that didn't get something's attention nothing would, Shepard though reaching behind her and drawing her rifle while scanning the landscape around them. She had no idea what to expect, the only advice the Shaman had given them was to adapt and thrive no matter the situation if they wished to survive the Rite. The area around them provided excellent cover for any attackers, with ruined walls and high mounds of rubble lying everywhere. Almost as if to prove her concern prophetic, movement between the piles of rubble drew her eye.

"Varren," Grunt called out, identifying them before Shepard could get a good enough view to do so herself.

Varren were pack hunters with strong jaws, they closed with their prey and dragged it down using their weight and numbers. Given that and the fact that the four legged hunters could come quite close to the platform they were standing upon without her team getting a clear shot at them, their best strategy seemed obvious to Shepard. "Stay back here," she called out sharply, noticing that Jack and Grunt were moving forward. "We need the full width of the platform to fire on them as they're coming up either stairway. Grunt take out the ones coming up the steps to our left and Jack you focus on the steps in front of us, I'll help out wherever it's needed." Both krogan and tattoo covered biotic hesitated and Shepard had to remind herself that they were not marines; they wouldn't just follow her orders without question. "There's too much rubble for them to hide behind and sneak up on us if we move forward, the stairs will force them out into the open and into one area," she explained her reasoning.

"Making it a kill zone," Grunt said as he backed up, immediately comprehending her reasoning. All Shepard got from Jack was a grunt of acknowledgment as the biotic backed up the few steps she had taken and chose a position where she had a good view of the stairs in front of them. Good enough for now Shepard decided, but she needed to take both of them on more missions, there wouldn't always be tine for her to explain the why behind her orders.

"Here they come," Grunt announced just before the first varren charged up the stairs and was met by their combined gunfire. Moments later it slid face first into the concrete, red blood pouring from its many wounds and pooling on the dirty concrete beneath it as it died. More varren followed on its heels. The three of them kept up with the first few and then the varren seemed to smarten up; they started charging up the stairs in small packs instead of separately. Shepard felt Jack forming a mass effect field beside her, moments later, and timed with an angry sounding yell from the tattooed woman, the biotic rhythmic booming of a shockwave knocked back the three varren charging up the stairs in front of them. Not a bad idea, thought Shepard as she helped Jack take out the trio. She really should use this occasion to try out a few of the things she had learned from Thalion's memories last night. Since she went into something very like Mushin during combat, Shepard was already almost in a battle focus. She didn't have time to think too long about where to dive for cover, or over analyze when to rise, aim and fire.

She glanced to her left, two varren were currently charging up the stairs Grunt was covering, she shifted her aim and helped the young krogan finish them off. Before the last one stopped moving she was pivoting to her right, checking the situation with the other stairway. Two more varren were midway across the platform headed for Jack and three more were charging up the stairs. In rapid succession, Shepard drew in a breath, focused her thoughts on what she wanted to occur and then thrust her free hand toward them. The biotic shockwave undulated across the concrete pad, knocking the varren into the air and back. It wasn't the most powerful shockwave she had ever created, but it served its purpose, and more importantly it had only taken her a few seconds to form the mass effect field and form the shockwave instead of several seconds. In combat, a few seconds could make all the difference in turning a bad situation into a survivable one or dying.

It wasn't long after the shockwave passed before the varren were shaking their heads and rolling to their feet, some of them more slowly than the others. Her attack had given Jack the time the tattooed woman needed to unleash her own, more powerful shockwave. Of the five varren that had come up the stairs, only two survived both biotic shockwaves to come charging back towards them and it didn't take long for them to fall as well. Shepard glanced over toward the other stairway seeing that the one in front of them was clear for now. Dark bulbous fish-like eyes staring at her, a broad purple stripped head, and an open slavering mouth with sharp teeth rushing toward her was all Shepard's mind had time to register before without conscious thought she snapped out her arm and sent the attacking varren tumbling literally head over heels away from her, a faint haze of bluish white biotic energy trailing behind it. Shepard actually stared after it for half a second, nonplussed by her reaction, before snapping back to the present, raising her rifle, and killing it with a clean shot between the eyes before it could do more than rise to its feet.

While she had been busy helping Jack, Grunt had moved from his spot near her closer to the staircase he was guarding. Currently the young krogan was being overwhelmed by three varren, who were trying to seize his arms and drag him down to the ground. Two more of the creatures were charging up the stairs toward him. The young krogan was shooting at one, while fending off another with powerful blows of his fist. They were all so close to Grunt that Shepard hesitated to fire her rifle for fear of hitting him.

Remembering her exercises with the globe of Earth last night, Shepard focused her mind on one of the two remaining varren attacking Grunt, he had killed the other varren with his shotgun. She reached out her hand… in response to her will a mass effect field formed around the varren lifting it into the air where it thrashed about in confusion. That lasted only a fraction before Shepard drew back her hand, sending the varren slamming into the concrete and metal barrier behind them. She then snapped her arm forward as if she were throwing a fast ball, propelling the dazed and dying creature forward with her biotics into the other three attacking Grunt, knocking them down and away from her teammate.

That was all the young krogan needed, with a roar he started firing his weapon at the nearest varren struggling to rise while Shepard and Jack fired upon the other two. When the last varren fell, and the last echo of weapons fire died away, the three of them stood watchful and still, straining their senses for any further sign of attack. None came, and after several seconds Shepard relaxed, if there were more varren sulking about out there they had decided to leave them alone.

"Ah ha," Grunt slammed his fists together in excitement. "That was fun, I liked the thing you did with the varren," he swung his arm in the air, enthusiastically mimicking Shepard's biotic mnemonic.

"Yea, nice use of your biotics," complimented Jack offhandedly as she lowered her shotgun.

"Thanks," Shepard replied to them both, smiling at Grunt's enthusiasm and feeling rather good about the unexpected praise from the ex-convict. Jack was more likely to hand out curses and sneering comments than compliments. Using improvised weapons wasn't new to her, Special Forces training encouraged the same type of thinking after all. Thalion however, had been a master at it. Anything that could be lifted with his biotics could be hurled at the enemy, frequently with devastating results if the attack were timed well. The Eclipse Captain Wasea had tried the same thing back on Illium with the canister of Minagen X she had thrown at them. Only the mercenary leader should have pinned them down with gunfire and then thrown the chemical at them when they couldn't move without exposing themselves to the mercenaries' weapons fire instead of using it as an opening attack.

"Take a breather and a drink if you need it," Shepard said suspecting that Jack, even more than she needed a moment to recover from their first round. The day was rapidly getting hotter and she noticed sweat running down the biotic's back, streaking the grayish yellow dust that coated her.

Grunt who had been looking at the ruined landscape around them and up at the keystone abruptly said, "Push the trigger for the keystone, I'm ready for another round." The krogan started toward the control that would raise the cylinder when Shepard didn't immediately move, apparently not paying any attention to the fact that she had just told them to take a moment to rest and drink if they needed it.

"Stop!" she commanded him sternly, her tone was enough to have the young krogan turning toward her with narrowing eyes. She hadn't spoken to him in that way before. She met his gaze evenly, "It's a leader's duty to make sure that everyone is combat ready before making the choice to engage the enemy when you have that option. What is your team's physical condition? Do any of them need medical treatment or an evac? Do they have enough thermal clips for the next engagement? Are there any weapons issues that might impact their fighting ability?"

The young krogan stared at her uncertainly for a moment and then swung around to look at Jack who was calmly pulling out a small canister of water. Undoubtedly, just like Shepard's it was actually an energy drink made especially for biotics to use in the field. She took a drink out of it swished it around in her mouth and then forcefully spat it out on the ground. "This damn dust is for shit," Jack complained, seeing them watching her, "and it's fucking hot." She took a deep drink and then ran a hand irritably over her shaved head, glowering at it when it came away covered with grime. She turned that gaze to Shepard next, "Get off the ship, fight a few things," she parroted the Commander. "Fuck you Shepard, next time I'm checking out the damn environmental data for wherever we're going before I agree to anything."

Shepard had to bark out a laugh at that, "You think this is bad, you should check out the Black Swamp on Cuervo, the Alliance uses it for Special Forces training. It's as hot as this, but humid instead of dry, big leeches," she held up her hand with her forefinger and thumb about two inches apart, "fish that try to eat you, and oh yes poisonous snakes."

Jack looked at Shepard as if she were crazy and shook her head. "You may like that sort of stuff, but I don't," the biotic retorted.

Still smiling, Shepard turned back to Grunt, "If you have a lull in combat, take full advantage of it," she advised him. "Your krantt's level of preparedness may make the difference between them winning or losing the next battle." She looked around at the varren corpses that surrounded them, her smile changing to a grimace, "And while we're at it, let's clear some of these dead varren out of the way or we'll be tripping over them."

When they were done and rested from moving the varren bodies, Shepard walked over to the console and tapped it. "Then the krogan were lifted to the stars to destroy the fears of a galaxy, an enemy only we could chase to their lair." Again the keystone sent a booming vibration through both the air and the land.

The rachni, thought Shepard, but surely there were no rachni here for the krogan to fight. Or maybe what the Shaman said was simply part of the Rite and had nothing to do with whatever the keystone happened to summon on any particular day. She heard something... in the air? Shepard looked up and her eyes widened at the sight of what was flying toward them out of the haze of dust laden winds.

"Noroth vilmaleuca," Shepard said the prothean name for the creature somewhat disbelievingly, as the sight of the creature triggered a veritable flood of information from Thalion's memories. Shepard shook her head and determinedly focused her attention on the here-and-now to keep herself from slipping into the prothean battlemaster's memories. The prothean words literally meant a giant flying worm, which is how it had been described by the first terrified survivor of one of the creature's attacks. The name had stuck even though the animal wasn't a worm, but a massive arthropod. At least twenty-five meters in length, the creature had a long sinuous neck covered with a segmented chitin exoskeleton and viscous looking pincers on either side of its mouth - to Shepard it looked a lot like an enormous flying centipede with only four legs.

"Shit!" Jack swore as she came up beside Shepard. "That's a harvester," the biotic gave a more up-to-date name to the creature as it landed on the ground some distance away from them. "They drop these things called klixen," Jack started to say, but she was interrupted by Grunt's yell.

"Crawlers!" the young krogan shouted, drawing Shepard's attention away from Jack. She looked at where he was pointing, there were two nárëonna, or crawlers, or klixen, depending on which name she wanted to call them, making their slow but steady approach to the platform.

"Klixen," Jack snapped the correction at him. "They breathe fire and as for using incendiary ammo you might as well not bother."

"Whatever you want to call them," Grunt growled back at her, "Ammo piercing rounds will break through their shells." He informed them as he switched the ammo setting on his massive shotgun. He was right, Shepard thought as she followed suit, armor piercing ammunition would work well to hammer through the thick chitin that covered the klixen.

"Biotics are good to keep them back" Jack said, her eyes sharp on the approaching pair of klixen. "We need to kill them before they get close to us because they explode when they die."

"I'm familiar with them," Shepard informed her briefly. Crawlers or klixen were large insectoid creatures with a thick reddish colored chitinous exoskeleton and two large spikes projecting from their backs. Their abdomens contained bladders filled with different chemicals that when mixed and then exposed to oxygen burned. This flaming breath was their main attack, the second danger they posed wasn't an attack, but a natural result of their deaths. When they died the chemicals that they combined to produce their flame attack mixed, as soon as air came into contact with that mixture in their gullets they exploded in a mess of sharp chitinous shards and burning organic matter. Shepard glanced at Jack's bare skin, being near an exploding klixen would not be very pleasant experience for the biotic. That reminded Shepard she needed to broach the subject of the ex-convict wearing something more protective than a few leather straps sometime soon.

"So, how do you know about harvesters and klixen Shepard? They're not that common," Jack questioned as all three of them moved closer to the staircase and raised their weapons. They would withdraw as the klixen got closer. If necessary, they had the entire width of the platform to retreat as needed to keep away from the insects flaming breath attack.

"I've heard about them from other people. This is the first time I've actually seen one though," Shepard replied vaguely. For once she was actually happy that Dragaran Berioelir had been so proud of his team's battle with one of the rare noroth vilmaleuca and the nárëonna that it dropped that he insisted on telling every new person about what they had done in excruciating and rather graphic detail. She must have heard the tale at least fifteen… Shepard's thoughts trailed off, those were Thalion's memories not her own, she forcefully reminded herself. Sometimes remembering as if she were the person was disconcerting, especially when she thought about the fact that everything she remembered had happened well over fifty thousand years ago. In any case, now was definitely not the time to be caught up in the prothean warrior's memories. Shepard looked for where the approaching insects would have to break cover to come up to the platform and aimed for where she thought they would appear.

"Uh," was Jacks comment on that just before any possibility of conversation was drowned out by the noise of their weapon's firing as the two reddish colored insects finally came fully into view heading toward the stairs on the left side of the platform.

The insect's exoskeletons were indeed as tough as Thalion's memories indicated; it took from the time the lead klixen appeared until it was almost to the stairway for their concentrated fire to shatter the hard chitinous exterior enough to kill the creature. The second klixen was at the bottom of the stairs and starting up them when the first died. Now was the time to see if Dragaran Berioelir had been exaggerating. Shepard started counting, "One," she reached out and with her bioitcs lifted the live klixen. Jack and Grunt stopped firing on the oversized insect, watching what she was doing curiously instead. "Two," with a gentle movement of her hand thrust it backwards, "Three," to land on top of its dead companion. A second later the dead klixen exploded with the live one still struggling to get back down to the ground. The creature screeched in agony as its less armored underside was shredded.

"Damn. Good idea," Jack said, sounding impressed as the wounded klixen finally struggled to its feet and began coming up the stairs toward them. Shepard felt a powerful biotic surge from Jack just as she raised her rifle again and then the insect was sailing back down the steps to land a few feet away from them.

Shepard started firing on it before it even rose to its feet, "Concussive shot to its side Grunt," she yelled, Hopefully a round from the krogan's powerful shotgun would knock the klixen over. The young krogan let out a yell of enthusiasm as he caught on to what she wanted. He stepped forward while changing his ammunition, aimed carefully and then fired. "Good shot," Shepard congratulated him as the concussive shot knocked the klixen over on its side revealing its shredded and oozing abdomen. She shifted her aim immediately and began firing in controlled bursts at the deepest looking wound, Jack following suit from beside her. The rifle was not as accurate as her usual pistol, but it had a much larger clip, meaning that she didn't need to reload as often. Of course, when you did need to reload it was often at the worst possible moment...such as now. Shepard cursed underneath her breath as she brought the rifle down from her shoulder to quickly eject the thermal clip and put in a new one.

Thankfully, the klixen was having a hard time getting back on its feet with both Grunt and Jack using shotguns, the force of their shots kept knocking it back on its side. The thermal clip changed out, Shepard raised her rifle only to hear over the noise of the shotgun blasts the beating of wings. The harvester was returning, probably to drop off another pair of klixen. Depending on Grunt and Jack to kill the wounded one, Shepard turned her attention to the skies around the keystone, the direction from which she could hear the creature. Abruptly the harvester appeared from out of the dust laden haze and swooped in low over the platform to land on the opposite side. The massive arthropod had landed much closer than the first time and Shepard kept her rifle trained on its centipede like head as she watched the creature warily.

From Thalion's memories, noroth vilmaleuca or harvesters were omnivores. They preferred fruits and tubers, which was probably where they got their current name, but they wouldn't pass up carrion or a live creature if they thought they could easily kill it. For something so big, they were oddly disinclined to attack anything directly themselves. Perhaps it was due to the fact that, because they needed to be light enough to fly, they had a thinner exoskeleton than most other arthropods. It made them relatively vulnerable to attacks. The Protheans hadn't known exactly how intelligent the creatures were, they had only made guesses based on the fact that they were intelligent enough to purposefully use the klixen as weapons. Obviously this harvester was familiar with two legged creatures that carried weapons, and knew they were not the easy prey they might otherwise appear, which was why it hadn't attacked them itself and was instead flying back and forth bringing the klixen.

Shepard didn't take her eyes off of the harvester even when the sound of Grunt and Jack's shotguns firing ceased and then there was the muffled sound of the klixen exploding. A few seconds later she heard the sound of their boots crunching on the rubble as they came over to join her.

"Big," was Grunt's simple and to the point comment as he stared up at the harvester. Shepard glanced over at him and grinned a little. He had a thoughtful expression on his young face. Considering that one of the more common things Grunt put a lot of thought into was killing, she suspected he was wondering if they could take the creature. It wasn't easy, from what she knew they had a tendency to retreat as soon as they were wounded.

"Yes it is," Shepard agreed with him. Movement drew her eye, the two klixen that the harvester had just brought were making their way toward them. With a loud screech, the harvester sprang back into the air, its wings beating furiously as it struggled to gain altitude. It flew past the keystone structure and disappeared, most likely to get more klixen, Shepard suspected. She turned her attention back to the two who were already here and raised her rifle to her shoulder. They were within firing range for her, Jack and Grunt would need to wait for them to get closer before their shotguns would have any effect. She began firing at the lead klixen's head, a few seconds later the forceful booms of the two shotguns punctuated the steady bursts of fire from her weapon.

Shepard waited for the two klixen to close to about ten meters away before she lowered her rifle and concentrated on forming a mass effect field. She had never attempted to do this before and she wanted to make sure she did it right. She raised her hand and focused her mind, shaping the mass effect field into the very specific composition and form that she needed. A dense sphere of swirling dark energy formed above her hand. As soon as Shepard was satisfied with it, she propelled it toward the two approaching klixen with a sharp gesture. Beside her, she noticed Jack pause for a moment in her firing as the biotic saw what she was doing. When the dark energy sphere reached the two klixen, it collapsed in on itself, forming a point of near infinite mass which in turn created an intense gravitational field that drew the klixen upward into the air where they struggled helplessly.

While she recovered from the momentary feeling of fatigue brought on by her creation of the singularity, Shepard snapped her rifle back up to her shoulder and took the opportunity to briefly fire a few shots at one of the insects abdomen's as it hung twisting in the air. A few seconds later, feeling recovered, she concentrated again summoning another mass effect field. Instead of a dense sphere of dark energy however, she formed a more diffuse cloud inside which the mass effect fields fluctuated rapidly between increasing mass and decreasing mass. She lifted her free hand and thrust it toward the suspended klixen, sending the dark energy she had just formed in their direction. As soon as the warp field came into contact with the singularity the rapidly fluctuating mass effect energy destabilized the subatomic point of near infinite mass at its center, causing it to rapidly expand. In other words, to forcefully explode, exactly as Shepard remembered from the times Liara had combined these two different types of biotic effects.

First affected by the fluctuating mass effect fields of the warp field and then thrown several feet backward by the force of the detonation, the two klixen had not fared well. One of them was pulling itself forward primarily by its front legs, its left rear limb twisted and useless. The second klixen was better off, it still had the use of all of its limbs, but it appeared dazed and uncoordinated as it staggered toward them.

Jack and Grunt had both stopped firing when the two mass effect fields had combined and exploded. Out of the corner of her eye, Shepard noticed the biotic look over at her sharply, a slight surprised expression on the tattooed woman's face. Little wonder, they had only been on one other mission together and Shepard had barely used her biotics at all that day. Grunt was the first to start firing once again followed quickly by Shepard and then Jack. All three of them focused their fire on the klixen in the lead, who seemed to be recovering from whatever had affected it. Over their gunfire, she heard the sound of wings and a feeling of foreboding touched her, the harvester was returning, and they hadn't killed off the first two klixen yet.

The sound of the harvester's wing beats got louder, and closer. Concerned, Shepard risked a glance over her shoulder. Her eyes widened in alarm, the giant arthropod was flying very low, much lower than either time before. As it swooped overhead, low enough to have to avoid the metal towers and make Grunt and Jack both reflexively duck, and dropped the two klixen it was carrying on top of the platform with them. Shepard whirled around to face the new threat. She moved forward toward the two newly arrived klixen, leaving Jack and Grunt to deal with the other two. As soon as she was close enough, Shepard thrust out her hand and sent the nearest reddish colored insect tumbling backward and off the far side of the platform with a forceful biotic push.

With a thump that echoed through the concrete underneath their feet, the harvester landed on the lower level of the raised platform upon which they were standing. The massive creature was close enough to attack, something Shepard was acutely aware of even as the second klixen that it had dropped on top of the platform turned towards her. It was close enough to attack as well. Shepard held out her hand and with a biotic lift raised it off the concrete hoping that would distract the insect enough to keep it from attacking her.

"Fuck," she heard Jack curse behind her.

"Stay on the other two, we're in deeper trouble if they get up here too," she ordered Jack and Grunt without looking away from the massive winged arthropod in front of her. Its head was easily over two meters wide, more than large enough to swallow her whole. Most of its neck was smooth segmented chitin, except for the lower part which had short, dark brown spikes on each segment. It towered over her, its head easily eight meters or so in the air. It reared its head back, opened its mouth wide and with an almost deafening screech snapped its head down and toward her. That was what Shepard had been waiting for, she quickly swung her arm forward and with a biotic push directed the suspended klixen into the wide open, whitish-colored maw coming toward her and then leapt as far as she could to the side. Shepard put all of her strength into it, not really registering in the urgency of the moment that she was utilizing her biotics to lighten her mass. She heard a loud snap behind her as the harvester's mouth closed on thin air where she had just been. She landed first on her left foot, and continuing forward stepped wide onto her right. Bleeding off her momentum, she pivoted with bended knee on the ball of her right foot, spinning with her left leg extended in a move that was more akin to a low leg sweep than anything else to see the results of her action.

She was only two meters away from the brownish colored massive head, close enough see its eye pit and the structure of the mandible on the side of its mouth. She was certainly close enough to clearly hear the sound of the klixen exploding in its mouth. She rose from her crouch and started backpedaling away from it, unaware of the shimmer of biotic energy that formed protectively around her as she subconsciously created her first biotic barrier in response to the threat. The harvester screeched again, this time in pain as the remains of the klixen as well as the creatures on blood spewed from its mouth. Then it swung its head toward her. Shepard desperately threw herself backward. At the same time, more on instinct than anything else, she dropped her rifle, thrust both of her hands forward, and in a swirl of bluish-white dark energy used a biotic push to force the creature's head up and over her supine body.

The brownish colored head passed only feet above her, and she could have sworn that one of its mandibles had just clipped her helmet. The summoning of so much biotic energy at one time her feeling as drained as if she had just completed a long march with a heavy pack, but Shepard knew she was not safe yet. Shepard grabbed her rifle, and forced her body to roll over so she could stagger to her feet. Reason told her the harvester would attack again. She glanced over toward Grunt and Jack, right at the moment they were both looking back at her. Jack's eyes were almost comically wide for the normally 'I don't give a fuck about anyone else besides myself' woman. Past them the klixen with only three legs was dragging itself up the stairs, they must have killed the other one Shepard realized. She reached out her hand towards the reddish insect, forcing her tired body to respond, lifted it and then twisted around, causing the wounded klixen to sail past a startled Jack and Grunt and into the open maw of the harvester headed rapidly toward her. The attack that both instinct and logic had told her would occur. Shepard once again leapt out of its way and then sprinted forward for a few steps to get a bit more distance between her and the creature. For a second time the harvester got a mouthful of klixen instead of Spectre.

There was a dull thumping noise from inside the massive head as the insect in its mouth exploded. Shepard spun around looking back at the creature; she knew it had to be hurting by now. The harvester jerked its head back and then screeched even louder than before spraying a gruesome mixture of klixen shell shards, shredded flesh and organs, and bloody viscous fluid. Only this time Jack and Grunt were standing almost directly in front of it. The krogan and biotic sprang apart dodging the remains, blood and spittle, and then with uneerily similar snarls of anger, both began firing upon the harvester with their shotguns. Shepard stared at them for a moment and then lifted her rifle and began firing at the creature's eye. The harvester screeched, drew back its head and once again tried to attack them, snapping at Jack this time. The biotic hurriedly backpedaled out of range while the harvester plowed its head into the concrete. The massive arthropod raised its head, blood dripping from the sides of its jaws and lunged forward snapping a second time at Jack who simply kept retreating as she fired on it. By now the harvester appeared to be enraged, the option of retreating didn't seem to be in its mind at all.

Shepard stopped firing long enough to raise her hand and focus on creating her second ever warp field. She gestured and propelled the dark energy mass toward the harvester's head. Almost at the same time, Jack snarled at the harvester, "I will hurt you!" Biotic energy swirled around the tattooed woman and then she thrust her hand forward.

The two bluish-white dark energy fields met at their target, merged together and then imploded. The harvester's centipede-like head whipped high in the air as it screeched at the sky and then fell back toward them. Shepard turned and ran as did Jack and Grunt. A second later the harvester's head slammed into the concrete of the platform. Shepard stopped, and turned to look at the creature. The massive arthropod didn't move. Shepard's eyes traced along the segmented neck to the rest of its body, the harvester's wings and legs were limp, and it didn't appear to be breathing. Just to be certain she activated her omni-tool and scanned the centipede like head, the omni-tools sensors didn't detect signs of life. The harvester was dead. Shepard let out the breath she had just taken in pure relief and let herself relax a little, that had been a hard battle and one very close call for her. She was very thankful now that she had forged on last night and found Thalion's memories.

"Yea! I am krogan!" roared Grunt in triumph it sunk in they had won. Shepard had to grin at the excited young male; it was obvious he was still feeling the effects of the adrenaline rush from the battle. So was she, she was just more used to it, and time and experience had taught her to not to let it make her reckless.

Suddenly remembering the last klixen, the one she had pushed off the platform with her biotics, Shepard hurried over toward the left edge of the platform. Looking quickly back and forth and scanning the area she didn't immediately see it. Shepard frowned, where could it be? Then she spotted it…or rather the remains of it. There were two distinct areas where klixen shell shards and remains were splattered across the concrete from where the insects had exploded, at the base of the stairs where they had killed the first two, and then a single smaller area a several feet away. She stared at the second set of remains in bemusement, had the harvester stepped on it perhaps?

"Hey were did that last one go?" Jack questioned, apparently noticing that they hadn't accounted for one klixen as well.

Shepard pointed at the remains, "I think the harvester stepped on it."

"Haha," Grunt responded to that bit of news with amusement.

Jack's shoulders slumped as the tattooed woman finally relaxed. "Shit," the biotic commented, looking at the dead harvester, "And krogan have to live through this to become adults?"

"I don't think the harvester attacking is usually part of it," Shepard responded, "They're reputed to not like endangering themselves. I suspect the young krogan undergoing their Rite usually fire at it, and the fact that we didn't caused it to think we were easy prey."

"We were not, as it learned," Grunt said as he swung around to glare at the dead harvester.

Both Shepard and Jack continued watching the krogan for a moment before the biotic turned back to face her. "I wasn't aware you were that good with your biotics," Jack said with a narrow-eyed look, "You even used them to help you jump out of the way when it was trying to eat you."

She had? Shepard stared at the other biotic bemused for a few seconds before her mind started going over those two instances when she had escaped the arthropod's jaws. Both times the harvester had been aiming dead center for her; to have jumped as far as she did when she turned around to look back at the creature meant that she had leapt at least three meters if not more in full armor and with a full weapon's load-out on her back. She was much stronger now, but not that strong, which meant that she had lightened herself, exactly as Samara had when she jumped out of the window after the Eclipse Lieutenant.

"I haven't seen you use them much before," Jack continued, interrupting Shepard's thoughts.

"I'm trying to get in the habit of using them more instead of relying on my weapons," Shepard replied truthfully. She looked over at Jack, weighing whether or not to tell the other woman about the biotic upgrades that had done. Finally she said, "Cerberus did a few things while they were patching me up, one of which increased my biotics ability by quite a lot. I'm still getting used to it." She was still getting used to a lot of things, Shepard thought to herself.

"Is that what you've been doing with the asari?" Jack asked after a moment.

Shepard eyed her, so the biotic wasn't as unaware of what went on in the ship as she would have thought given her near recluse status. She nodded, "Among other things such as meditating together," she replied evasively. She was not going to tell Jack about the prothean memories floating around in her brain.

She reached down to one of the cargo pouches on the utility belt around her waist and pulled out an energy drink, after that biotic push she was definitely feeling the need for it. If things continued in the same vein, she could only guess what might be in store for them next. Hell for all she knew it would be a thresher maw… her hand stopped in the process of lifting the drink in her hand. Her eyes narrowed as her mind raced, that would fit only too well. She looked over at the nearest krogan body, examining their armor would tell her if she was right, nothing could dissolve armor quite like thresher maw acid. First things first though, she needed to find out if there were even thresher maws here, "Grunt, does Tuchanka have thresher maws?"

"Yes," the young krogan replied staring at her curiously.

"Start examining their armor," she pointed at the dead krogan. "Look for deep pitting or holes that look like something dissolved the material of the armor."

"Damn it," Jack swore forcefully and then strode angrily over to the nearest body, Grunt followed her. Shepard sucked down her energy drink quickly, stored the empty pouch with the first and then crossed over to a different still form. She stood over the dead krogan examining what she could see of its armor to try and determine how it had died. The corpse was laying on its front; she could see nothing wrong with the back or side of its armor. Bending over, she grabbed a shoulder pad and heaved it over onto its back. A deep rent across the chest piece that tore through it as if it were tissue paper told its own story. Only a few things had the strength and ability to tear through thick armor like this, a thresher maw was one of them.

"Whoa," Shepard heard Jack exclaim just before Grunt called out her name, drawing her attention away from the body she was examining.

She walked over to where the young krogan and biotic were staring down at one of the dead krogans. As she had done, they had rolled the heavily armored body over on its back to reveal the cause of death. The krogan's armored chest piece was almost entirely dissolved away, instead of thick armor plating and shield generators there was a large circular hole with irregular edges. Whatever had destroyed the young krogan's armor had eaten though the krogan's entire body and even into the back armor. Shepard looked at the rough irregular edges of the hole, noticed other places where the armor had been deeply pitted. "Thresher maw acid," she said grimly, "Nothing else I know of can eat through armor and a body like this."

She drew in a deep breath looking at the two of them, she'd bet she was the only one of them with any experience in taking down the dangerous worms. "Jack do you have any experience fighting thresher maws?" she asked, hoping that despite her suspicion the biotic would answer in the affirmative.

The biotic shook her head, her expression serious, "No, do you?"

Shepard nodded, "If I'm right, this will be the sixth one of them that I've killed, but only my third on foot. We killed the other three in a Mako. Quite a bit safer and easier… well as safe and easy as going up against a thresher maw can be," Shepard corrected herself.

"Only your third one on foot?" Jack echoed disbelievingly, it was obvious the biotic wasn't certain she was telling the truth.

Shepard smiled wryly, "Three in the Mako, two on foot, so yes if we get a thresher maw it will be my third kill on foot." Seeing the frown on Jack's face she explained, "We had to buy our own equipment when we were chasing down Saren too; one of the ways we did that was by turning in the location of significant mineral deposits to the Alliance for a discovery fee. Usually that meant going down in the Mako to an uncharted planet or moon and physically checking out the site and placing a survey marker nearby. Between a few missions we went on for the Alliance and that, we ended up running into a few of them. Funnily enough," Shepard commented, "it was Wrex who taught me what signs to watch out for that indicated a nest and how to fight them on foot and survive." That drew Grunt's attention, Shepard noticed, as the young krogan ceased his restless scanning of their surroundings to eye her with increased interest.

"Want to share that information with us?" Jack asked irritably.

Shepard nodded, deciding it was probably best to just let the other biotics attitude go unremarked upon. If she had known it was going to be this interesting, she would have probably asked Garrus to accompany them instead of Jack, he at least already knew how to fight the huge worms. Then again, she had the feeling that she was gaining Jacks respect in a way that she hadn't before, so perhaps things were working out for the best…provided she could keep everyone alive through their next engagement of course. "Thresher maws like to come up underneath you if possible, either killing you outright, or right after as you're trying to escape. If you're within striking distance, a thresher maw can strike as quickly as any snake on earth. Don't let their size deceive you; they're extremely quick and those claws near its head can tear into any known armor. Even a Mako can only survive one direct strike and that one usually disables it so you can't escape the second." She noticed that both Grunt and Jack were giving her their complete attention. "A general rule of thumb is to stay at least two thirds of the thresher maws height above ground away from it to keep it from trying that attack."

"If you're not close enough for it to strike at directly, the thresher will spit acid at you," Shepard continued her briefing. "They're extremely accurate," she nodded toward the dead krogan at their feet who had been probably been hit exactly where the thresher maw had been aiming. "So you have to wait until they're just about to spit at you to start moving and then you need to move as fast as possible because you need at least two meters of space between where you were when the acid hits to avoid being splashed by it. Just as Wrex did for me, I'll call out when to move for this one if we don't have any cover to get behind."

Shepard paused for a second thinking about what she had covered so far, and what else she still needed to tell them. "Just as you don't want to get close enough for it to strike at you; you also don't want to get so far away from the maw that it can't spit at you. If you do, it will go underground and attempt to burrow up underneath you once again. So two thirds its above ground length one way and four above ground lengths the other way is your zone for keeping it stationary and only attacking by spitting at you. Also, don't underestimate how fast they can move underground. A thresher maw is easily able to overtake a runner or moving Mako." She stopped speaking to look around at the area, "It doesn't appear as if we have to worry about that here. If we did, this concrete slab we are on would be demolished already so it's thick enough that the thresher maw can't get through it. I'd guess we are safe on this tier or the lower one, anything past that I wouldn't bet on."

"I won't lie to you," Shepard stated quite seriously, "This is probably one of the most deadly creatures you will ever come up against. Thresher Maws are quick, strong, and if any of its attacks succeeded, barring a miracle, you are dead." The corpse at their feet gave mute testimony to that fact.

Grunt growled at that but nodded, "So we make sure they don't," he said and slammed his armored fists together for emphasis.

Shepard's lips twitched at his behavior, "That about sums it up," she agreed. "As I said, I have killed five of these and survived. Their most vulnerable spots are the four sensory organs on their heads; the rest of their body is covered with an exoskeleton with a high mineral and metal content. You can chip through it with enough time, but it's better to concentrate your fire on their eyes if possible." She paused for a second and then added for completeness. "The inside of their mouths is also vulnerable, but I'm sure I don't have to elaborate on the dangers of standing around and firing at it while it's mouth is open and it's spitting acid at you," she said in a dry tone. Shepard knew she could get off one or two shots, but she didn't want either of them trying it during their first time. When it came to a thresher maw, timing and managing your distance from it was everything.

She glanced around them and pointed at one of the decorative looking pillars, "I don't think those will hold up well against a maw's acid attack but," she twisted around and indicated one of the other pillars, one of the ones with conduits and piping sticking out, "those should. We just need to make sure the thresher maw can't get close enough to them to attack us if we're standing behind them. I'll take the left, Jack you take the front and Grunt you check the right. Use your omni-tool sensors to check how far from the front of the pillars the foundations extend."

Ten minutes later they had both verified that the foundations of the destroyed building should extend far enough for them to be safe on the lower levels as well as work out a plan of attack. "Ready?" Shepard asked, standing over by the console. At Jack and Grunt's nods, she taped out the commands to begin the last challenge in the Rite of Passage.

"Now all krogan bear the genophage, our reward, our curse. It is a fight where the only goal is survival!" the Shaman's voice rang out again as the massive cylinder at the center of the keystone structure rose high into the air. For a third time it fell, slamming into its base and sending its summons through the air and land.

The vibrations from the keystone echoed back from the hills around them before dying away, leaving only the incessant sound of the wind blowing across the shattered landscape. For several seconds nothing happened and then Shepard began to feel the faintest hint of a vibration in the concrete underneath her feet. As the vibration grew steadily in strength, Shepard kept a sharp eye out for the tell-tale ripple of an approaching maw, but saw nothing. She frowned, that was unexpected and worrisome. In her experience, given the way the concrete underneath her feet was shaking, she should see some sign of the thresher maw that was causing it.

Shepard heard a muffled sounding roaring screech above the wind and then the thick concrete underneath their feet shuddered as if the keystone had been struck once again. "Feel that?" Grunt said, looking around them. "Everything is…shaking. I am ready!" Shepard had felt it alright, had the thresher maw come in further underground than normal and slammed into the foundation of the platform?

At that moment two thick aqua blue colored tentacles shot up out of the ground, one on either side of the tunnel entrance where they had been dropped off to start the Rite. Shepard had seen a thresher do this only once before. At the time she had been standing on an old prothean beacon site, the beacon long since gone, and the thresher maw had been searching for them. She knew then the giant worm had to be right below them, underneath the foundations of the ruined building upon which they were standing.

"What the hell is that?" Jack turned midway and growled the question at her.

Shepard shot her a narrow eyed look in response even as she replied in a clipped tone, "Feelers from the thresher maw."

"It's out there?" the other woman pointed towards the front of the platform.

"Part of it," Shepard answered truthfully.

"Part of it," Jack repeated, her dark eyes narrowing, "Where the hell is the rest of it?"

Shepard pointed straight down.

"Shit!" the biotic swore and turned to face toward the two tentacles once again. Somehow Shepard got the idea that, despite the fact she had told them the creatures grew to be eighty or more meters long, Jack was just now comprehending exactly how big thresher maws were and that they made the harvester they had just killed look mid-sized.

"I'll let it know where we are," Grunt declared as he raised his shotgun and fired at the nearest tentacle.

"Grunt, normally one's commander makes the choice of when to engage the enemy," Shepard informed him in a crisply clear command voice that had him instantly turning his head to look at her. Whatever expression was on her face, it was enough to cut off any defense of his actions that he wanted to make and simply nod.

That was all she had time for because in the next moment the ground of the hillside in front of them developed a moving ripple that drew her full attention. "Thresher," she yelled pointing toward it while simultaneously reaching over her back and pulling the Collector particle beam weapon they had found on Horizon from where it was secured on her weapons pack. "Take your positions," at her command, both Grunt and Jack took off for different pillars. Grunt on the first tier of the platform, and Jack behind one of the two pillars along the front side of the second tier. Shepard stood her ground in the middle, it was her job to attract the thresher maw's attention and give them time to get in position since she had the most experience evading the creature's acid attack. Jack was standing by her pillar and Grunt had almost made it to his when rubble and dirt sprayed high into the air and with a roaring screech the thresher maw erupted from the ground. Buff-colored, stone like chitin segments covered its body and armored its head except around its mouth area and the four light blue sensory organs or eyes.

"Holy…" Shepard's voice trailed off as she saw the width of the creature's head, and then the massive worm just kept rising out of the ground. "Fuck!" she exclaimed, "What the hell do they feed the thresher maws here?" Shepard yelled to Grunt, who had just ducked into cover behind his pillar, as she raised the Collector weapon to her shoulder. It had to be the largest thresher maw she had ever seen, easily thirty-five or more meters tall, and that was just the part that was above ground. The thing was probably more than a hundred meters in length overall.

"Krogan," yelled Jack before Grunt could reply. Shepard snorted in amusement at the biotics answer even though she knew it wasn't something they shouldn't joke about considering how likely it was that the thresher maw had eaten several krogan.

"Then they were weak!" Grunt retorted as he stepped out from behind the pillar and began firing at the thresher maw. Shepard joined in, aiming the Collector weapon at the giant worm's faintly glowing lower right eye. The thresher maw screeched in pain as the particle beam cut into it, reared back its head and promptly spat a large glob of viscous acid at her. Shepard started moving as soon as she saw the thresher actually spit; at that point it was committed to a specific trajectory. She sprinted forward and to the left, holding her weapon at the ready, and stopping only after she was certain there was enough room between her and where the acid would land.

She raised her weapon, aimed at the same eye and fired again. This time, instead of spitting at her, the thresher withdrew back into the ground. Along with Jack and Grunt, Shepard kept her weapon raised as she watched the hillside and waited. Would it come back up again in the same spot or move? She saw the ripple start at the same time as she felt the ground beneath her feet start vibrating once again. It was moving; Shepard lowered her weapon and started jogging along with the creature. In the next second, the thresher maw rose from the ground again, this time near the pillar Grunt was taking cover behind.

Shepard snapped her weapon up and began firing as soon as she targeted the same sensory organ on the thresher maw's head that she had wounded before. From their respective places, Jack and Grunt leaned out of cover and began firing at the creature as well. Again the thresher maw reared back and spat its deadly acid at her, this time she sprinted right. She hadn't really been paying attention to the fact that she had stopped near one of the decorative appearing towers until the acid hit it. Whether it was the force with which the thick fluid hit or just the flimsiness of its construction, Shepard wasn't sure, but it was enough to knock the pillar down. Pipes and metal sheeting fell towards her at the same time as the thresher reared back to spit at her once again.

A slight pivot to face the falling debris, while snapping the Collector weapon into position for a defensive block, was enough for Shepard to send a strong enough biotic push in the direction of the falling metal and poles to keep them from landing on her. She then dove forward planting her weapon on the ground as she rolled over it, keeping her knees bent and ending in a kneeling crouch as the large globule of acid passed above and to the right of her. Shepard was firing at the thresher maw as soon as she raised her weapon to her shoulder. Once again the giant worm screeched in pain and withdrew swiftly back below the surface. Shepard took the opportunity to rise to her feet even as she glanced quickly around her to place in her mind the location of both the debris from the one pillar and the placement of the others. She didn't want to find herself in the same situation a second time.

Catching everyone by surprise, the thresher maw erupted from the earth in the same area at it had before, only closer to the pillar Grunt was taking cover behind. A frown turned down the edges of Shepard's mouth as she took note of the giant buff-colored worm's location, the thing had to be right up against the foundations of the building to get that close to the young krogan. She looked at the size and length of the pincers on either size of the thresher maw's head, measured with her eyes the distance between the worm and Grunt's location. The pillar the young krogan was standing behind was the only solid pillar on the first tier, far to the right of where they had entered and close to the edge of the ruined building. Shepard had been thinking of the thresher maws she had fought before when they had measured the distance between it and the edge of the foundation and she declared it safe. This maw however was far larger and longer than any she had fought before and was a good ten meters farther out of the ground than what she had been expecting. That particular fact, Shepard realized with a rush of sharp concern, put Grunt's location within attack range. Shepard fired at the thresher maw, she needed it focused on her and not on the fact that the young krogan was within its striking distance. The particle beam had no more than struck the creature's wounded eye than it retreated once again, withdrawing swiftly into the protective embrace of the ground below.

She ran over to the stairway that was nearest the krogan's location. "Grunt," she had time to yell to him before the thresher maw rose once again in exactly the same place. "Vá," she shouted in denial as she reached out her hand, she knew what was going to happen next. Grunt was only five meters away from her, the glow of her biotics surrounded the young krogan and she drew back her hand, pulling him desperately towards her just as the thresher maw lunged forward as quickly as any striking snake. Its pincers swept swiftly in from both sides, fast enough that the sound of their passing could be heard above the wind. They wrapped around the pillar and then separated with a vicious slicing motion that left two deep gashes in the thick metal as the thresher maw withdrew. If Grunt had still been there, he would have been severed in two despite his armor. Instead he was sprawled on the ground at the base of the stairs.

She raised the Collector weapon, aimed at the same eye she had every time before and fired, by now the creature's eye was badly damaged and oozing a thick clear substance mixed in with dark orange blood. The thick, rock like armor around the eye was deeply pitted and scored from all three of them firing at the same place. The thresher maw began drawing its head back, "Move Grunt! Spit!" Shepard commanded the young krogan who was just now getting to his feet. He didn't stop or hesitate, no doubt his wide field of vision allowed him to see what she was seeing, he charged forward just as the thresher maw spit at him. The deadly acid landed where the krogan had been a moment later, but Grunt was far enough away by then to not even be splashed by it.

Her face set in determined lines, Shepard aimed and started firing again; this thresher maw was going down. Whether it was the fact that its size indicated it was older or the fact that it was used to hunting krogan, it seemed slightly more intelligent than the other thresher maws she had killed. Once again, the giant worm screeched and retreated back underground to escape their concentrated fire. Shepard ceased firing with an angry snarl as it disappeared; this one was definitely smarter than the other five she had killed. None of them had ever had the sense to retreat once they were injured.

The stone surface upon which she was standing shook once, and then again. This time there was no doubt in Shepard's mind that the thresher had just slammed into the foundations of the destroyed building. The vibrations hadn't even died away before the thresher maw burst from the rubble covered ground. Now it was midway along the right side of the platform and just a few feet away from the low stone edging and pipe that marked where walls had once stood. The giant worm spat acid at Shepard as soon as it possibly could, forcing her to dodge of the way instead joining Grunt and Jack's renewed attack.

This time Shepard had moved swiftly forward and to the left to avoid the thresher maw's attack. As soon as she felt she was clear, she raised the Collector weapon to her shoulder and fired on giant worm, adding her weapon's fire to Jack and Grunt's. Then the thresher maw did something she had never seen one do before, it lunged forward over the pipe and low stone border, digging it's pincers into the large flagstone surface of the lower tier and pulled itself up onto the stone surface. Shepard's light grey eyes widened in pure shock even as she heard Jack yell at her, "What the fuck, I though you said it would stay out there!"

Shepard didn't stop firing at the ruined and weeping eye even as she answered, "We seem to have gotten one that took an extranet course in how to kill tiny, but annoying, bipeds."

She heard Grunt laugh at that even as Jack retorted, "So you're saying that besides being big it's also smart? Lucky us."

The thresher maw raised itself up, its mouth opened wide and the bluish proboscis snapped forward. Shepard dove to the side to avoid the acid globule it had just spat at her. She did an awkward one-handed side somersault and ended up crouched on the balls of her feet and knees with one hand on the ground and the other holding the Collector weapon against her chest. Again the thresher maw raised itself up. Shepard tensed; expecting another acid attack, but the thresher maw lunged forward with its pincers instead and pulled itself further onto the lower level. Now it was only a meter or so away from the edge of the upper level of the platform.

Shepard rose to her feet, raised the Collector weapon to her shoulder, aimed at the same eye and fired. What had been a bluish colored sensory organ was now a pulpy looking crater in the creature's head that oozed and bled. Shepard knew they had to be close to killing the creature; they just needed to succeed before it succeeded in killing them. She started backing up across the upper level, firing steadily at the ruin of the thresher's eye. She was keeping a mental note of where she was and devoutly hoping that she wasn't about to step in one of the many puddles of acid that she knew were splattered all over the area behind her. In addition to that hazard, she was also well aware of that fact that the corpse of the harvester was blocking the stairway behind her. She didn't think the thresher maw would come that far out of the ground though; the more of it there was above the ground the harder it would be for it to move…at least she hoped that was the case.

Again the thresher maw reared back its head and opened wide it's mouth, again the bluish proboscis shot forward and the giant worm spat its deadly, corrosive acid at her. Shepard dove forward and toward the right, she didn't want to go left and risk crossing Jack and Grunt's line of fire. Using her outstretched left hand and forearm to keep enough distance from the ground so her weapons pack cleared, Shepard rolled on top of it and then to a kneeling position. No sooner had she done that than the thresher maw reared up again, but this time without opening its mouth.

"Sh..", Shepard pushed off with all the strength in her legs from her kneeling position in a desperate lunge forward, knowing without looking that the maw's pincer was descending towards her. She ducked her head and somersault over her hands at the same time as she heard the thresher maw's pincer slam down into the shattered stone of the upper pier immediately behind her. She swore she felt some rock shards hit her armor its strike was so close. She landed on her feet, had to take a long step forward to keep from falling on her face, and then whirled around in time to see the thresher maw lift its massive body up and forward in a move that tore and bent the metal railing along the sides of the second level as it came across and then down upon it. Suddenly the giant worm was up on the platform with them and way too close to her.

Shepard stared for a second at the jagged-edged narrow claw looming above her; if she had been a tad bit slower the thresher maw would have succeeded in spearing her. Her light grey eyes narrowed, she had moved quickly enough however, and it was time to end this battle. Her gaze shifted to the shattered surface of the platform searching for the Collector weapon. She had let it fall from her hands that last move, knowing she would need both hands free to tumble correctly and not break her neck. It was easy to spot; unfortunately it was also next to the thresher maw's pincer. She was hardly going over there to get it; instead she reached out and with a motion of her hand pulled it toward her with her biotics, catching it as it flew through the air at her.

She tucked it securely against her side and held it there with one hand while focusing her mind on generating a powerful mass effect field. Then, her entire body glowing with a thick haze of bluish white energy, Shepard darted underneath the thresher maw's pincer and ran toward its head. When she got to within a few meters of the giant worm, Shepard skidded to a stop, raised her free hand and shaped the dark energy she had just generated into a darkly glowing cloud of rapidly shifting mass effect forces. She then thrust her hand forward and sent the mass of dark energy soaring toward the creature. The warp field seemed to wrap itself around the front of the thresher maw's head, creating a thin nimbus of dark bluish energy around its mouth and eyes. The thresher maw raised its head and screeching in pain, sending Shepard backing quickly away from it with a wince, her ears ringing.

She heard Grunt roar, "I am krogan!" The next thing she knew the young male came into her view from her left, charging at the thresher maw, ramming his shoulder into the fleshy tentacles around its mouth hard enough to make the creature's entire head shudder. Considering that the thresher maws head was easily three meters wide and just as tall that was no mean feat. The young krogan shoved his massive Claymore shotgun as far into the thresher maw's mouth as his arm could reach and then began firing it point blank into the vulnerable flesh. The thresher maw screeched again and flailed at krogan both with the fleshy mandibles around its mouth and with its bluish proboscis. Grunt grabbed onto the ring of muscle that encircled the thresher maws mouth to anchor himself, settled deeper into his combat stance, and kept firing, ignoring the maws efforts to dislodge him.

Seeing how ineffectual and weak the thresher maw's efforts were to get rid of him, Shepard realized that the creature was finally dying. She still wanted to yell at him for being so reckless, but she knew it was her own attack that had stirred him up. This was Grunt's Rite of Passage and so far she and Jack had been doing the majority of the killing with his assistance. If it was at all possible, and it didn't endanger his life, Shepard knew she should let him finish off the thresher maw. She didn't need the respect of Wrex's clan. Grunt however, did need it, and killing this monster would help him gain that respect.

Meanwhile Grunt had continued firing round after round into the thresher maw, literally shredding the inside of the creature's mouth with the powerful blasts from the weapon. Shepard frowned; realizing that the giant worm wasn't reacting to the damage Grunt was doing nor trying to knock him away. She took a few more steps back, staring at the body of the thresher maw. It wasn't moving, either her warp or Grunt's point blank shotgun blasts or a combination of the two had killed it. Jack stopped firing and then Grunt finally noticed that it was dead and stopped firing as well.

The young krogan backed away from the thresher maw, and looked at it in silence for a few seconds. He straightened and looked down at his Claymore, used his hand to wipe off some of the gore around its muzzle before holstering it on the weapons pack on his back. He looked at the dead thresher maw again and this time he made a satisfied sounding growl and slammed his fists together forcefully before turning towards them, "A good fight against a worthy enemy," he declared, "Today we proved that we were stronger!"

Shepard's thoughts went back to the day he had spoken of being built for strength, but not earning it. She suspected that today had gone a long way toward making him feel as if he was worthy of that strength. "That we did Grunt, that we did," she agreed firmly.

Jack walked over, "Do things usually try so hard to kill you Shepard?" the tattooed biotic asked her sardonically.

Shepard raised one eyebrow at the question, and then she snorted in wry amusement. "Actually…yes they do," she had to admit with a shake of her head and a smirk. Saren and Sovereign had certainly tried hard enough.

The tattooed biotic stared at her for a moment and then started laughing, "I guess it's a good thing you seem to be better at killing them than they are at killing you then."

Her mirth took bit of a sour dive, "I guess so," Shepard responded lightly, managing to keep her smile. As far as she knew neither Jack nor Grunt knew the true extent of Project Lazarus, most people seemed to assume she had still been alive, if very badly injured, when Cerberus found her instead of dead. She turned to Grunt, her expression growing more serious, "Sorry about misjudging the distance it could reach," she apologized, her gaze went to the dead creature behind him. Shepard shook her head, taking in the massive size of the creature with a measure of awe now that it was dead. " I didn't even realize thresher maws could get that big," she admitted. "It's at least thirty meters longer than any I've seen before."

Grunt turned to look back at the thresher maw. "We lived and it did not," was all that he said in reply when he turned back around.

Shepard stared at him for a moment and then nodded; she remembered that Wrex had never been overly interested in analyzing a battle afterward either. The most he had ever said was "We survived, do better next time." Letting the matter drop, she asked, "So, do you feel like your worthy of joining Clan Urdnot?"

"You'd better fucking feel like it or the next thing that shows up I'm tossing you at it," Jack informed him. The tattooed woman was trying for irritated, but it was fairly clear she was feeling a bit of a rush at having survived two very close and difficult battles. A small smile curved her lips, and there was a gleam in her dark eyes.

Grunt stared at the tattooed woman for a second, and then his lips curled in amusement, "Ha! You can try!" Before things could escalate between them, a shuttle appeared out of the haze. It passed over them and landed to the left of their location, past the massive corpse of the harvester. "We have company," Grunt said staring after it. "Good. I want more."

Due to the body of the harvester blocking the stairway, the three of them had to jump down off the upper platform to make their way over to where the shuttle had landed. Gatatog Uvenk and some of his clan members were waiting for them.

The green-crested krogan stared at them from where he stood on top of a low wall. "You live," he finally spoke, "and you brought down both the harvester and thresher maw. Our history tells that some of our greatest warriors killed both during their Rites of Passage, but no one in living memory has achieved the same," Shepard was pleased to detect a hint of respectful wariness in his tone. "No one has killed a thresher maw in generations; the last one to do so was Urdnot Wrex."

Grunt replied, "My krantt gave me strength beyond my genes. Which are damn good."

The krogan's gaze moved from the young krogan in front of him to the two humans standing beside him. Shepard met it unflinchingly; so far nothing about this krogan that impressed her. Uvenk's gaze returned to Grunt, he jumped down from the wall. "Hmm, this will cause discussion. I wonder… you say you are pure? No alien meddling in your construction? Just the warlord Okeer?"

"Now that you've seen for yourself how powerful Grunt is your ready to rethink your position?" Shepard couldn't help but shake her head a little, this krogan and Udina would get along well. "You're sounding a lot like a politician, what are you after Gatatog Uvenk?"

Uvenk gave her a hard stare, but he did answer, "Grunt will command much respect now. His strength may be artificial, but it is a tolerable loophole."

Grunt shook his head, "A what?"

"A reason to accept you," Uvenk responded, "You are a mistake, but your potential could tip the current balance of the clans."

"You spit on my father's name!" Grunt responded angrily. "On Shepard's name!" he glanced momentarily over at her. "But now you stop ranting because I am strong?"

His anger didn't even seem to register with Gatatog Uvenk, "With restrictions," the green-crested krogan continued blithely, "You could not breed of course, or serve on an alien ship, but you'd be clan in name." Shepard could only stare at the krogan in offended disbelief, what arrogance and gall Uvenk had to insult Grunt with such an offer when the young krogan had just won the right to be a full member of Wrex's clan.

"You just want to use him, you're not offering him shit," Jack took a step toward the green-crested krogan and snarled, her hands in tight fists.

Shepard could only agree with the other woman, "Clan in name only," she repeated Uvenk's insulting words frostily. "Why should Grunt accept your honorless, empty offer when he's already proven himself worthy of joining Clan Urdnot?"

Uvenk glared at her and then turned back to Grunt and said with a sneer, "You claim to be krogan, but let these humans speak for you?"

"My krantt speaks the truth," Grunt growled back, "your offer is an insult." With that, Grunt lowered his head and charged the older krogan, knocking Uvenk to the ground.

Shepard had been keeping an eye on the clansmen Uvenk had brought along with him during the conversation. As soon as Grunt charged their clan leader, they raised and readied their weapons. Several meters back, next to their shuttle, one of them brought what looked like a grenade launcher up to his shoulder and fired. Shepard reacted...somewhat instinctively. Reaching out with her biotics, lifting an object, and then propelling that object on an intercept course with the grenade was instinctive. Making the choice for that object to be the Gatatog Uvenk, who had been struggling to his feet, was not so instinctive, as was indicated by the smirk on her lips as she sent the bellowing krogan on his way with a motion of her hand and will.

She didn't wait to see if she had judged things correctly, because there were three other krogan firing at them by then. Instead she joined Grunt in darting back to the low wall behind them, vaulting over it and then ducking down behind it. The sound of an explosion and a roar of pain and anger behind her as she was jumping over the low wall answered the question of whether or not Uvenk had intercepted the grenade. Shepard doubted that the krogan had been seriously injured by it, but the explosion had probably damaged his armor.

She reached over her shoulder to retrieve her rifle; she would have thought Uvenk would be smart enough to just let them be after their performance in Grunt's Rite, but apparently he was not. Shepard straightened just long enough to take a quick glance over the wall and then ducked back into cover. It took her only a moment to recall what she had seen and pick a target; she rose again and started firing as soon as her rifle cleared the wall. This was one aspect of her drell-like memories that Shepard definitely appreciated - perfect short term recall. It was proving rather handy to have during moments like these. In a foolhardy move, the krogan she was firing at attempted to rush her position. He made it half-way across the open space between them before his shields were gone and her rounds penetrated through his armor, killing him. Seconds later the krogan Grunt and Jack had been firing at died as well. Now there was just Uvenk and two more of his clan members.

Shepard grinned as she spotted Uvenk about twenty meters away standing behind a pillar, there was large dent in the chest piece of the krogan's heavy armor and it generally looked a lot less shiny than it had earlier. As she had thought, the grenade hadn't really hurt him, but it had certainly done a number on his armor. Her gaze went from Uvenk's position to his two remaining warriors who were well forward of him. Her amused grin changed to a sneer of disdain; it appeared as if he was quite content to let his clan members fight for him while he hid in the back.

One of the two remaining warriors moved forward from his position by their shuttle to get a better firing angle on them. Jack stood up, dark energy swirling around her body and with a yell unleashed a powerful shockwave that sent the krogan several feet into the air and backwards to slam into a wall. The ex-convict took the opportunity to move forward to the next low wall, closing the distance between herself and the three remaining krogan.

Shepard cursed quietly to herself for a moment and then accepted it; she had known that maintaining control would be an issue with these two. She just needed to keep Grunt from following Jack, "Maintain this position," she took a moment to say to him, "watch for flanking attempts." It was what she would do if she were going up against a biotic, force them to divide their attention between attackers and take them down. Moments later when the one krogan managed to shake off both the shockwave and his impact with the wall that's exactly what the two krogan did, proving that they did have at least some tactical sense.

"You take left, I'll take the right," she directed Grunt, shifting her aim to the right most krogan that was rushing forward towards the wall Jack was crouched behind. She started firing in steady bursts at the krogan who was headed for Jack, counting on Grunt to keep the other krogan busy and pinned down with his shots. Movement caught her eye, Gatatog Uvenk had finally decided to move forward and take advantage of the developing situation. For now Shepard ignored him, at this moment it was more important to stop the krogan who was almost within charging distance of Jack than it was to worry about Uvenk. The krogan they were firing at obviously had much better armor than the one Shepard had first killed because he was still alive and still coming directly at the tattooed biotic. He even managed to make it around the end of the wall Jack was hiding behind before their combined fire finally tore through his thick armor and took him down.

Shepard turned her attention to the two remaining krogan coming up on their left. While Jack and she had been busy with the one on the right, Uvenk had joined his one remaining clan member and together they were keeping Grunt pinned down. "Jack on your left," Shepard called out the warning, a little bit more and they would have a clear shot at the tattooed biotic. The other woman spun around, and seeing her danger, started moving backward toward the end of the wall.

Shepard shifted her attention back toward the two krogan, focusing in on Uvenk; she aimed her rifle at him. That was when she noticed a bluish white haze forming around the Gatatog clan leader...he was a biotic. As the krogan raised his hand and the dark energy began to take on a distinctive shape and appearance, Shepard's eyes narrowed in recognition. She stood up and thrust out her hand sending a strong biotic wave his direction. Uvenk had just pushed his hand forward, sending his warp field towards Jack, when her mass effect wave intersected with it. The resulting biotic explosion knocked Uvenk back and to the ground.

That was all Shepard had time to notice because the other Gatatog krogan was now firing at her and her shields were about to drop. She ducked back down behind the wall to give her shields a chance to recharge. As she did, a thought crossed her mind and she felt like thwacking her own self upside the head for forgetting she could do this now. A thin blue nimbus of dark energy formed around her body as she called up a biotic barrier as another layer of defense in addition to her shields. She rose and started firing; it didn't take long at all for their combined weapons fire to take the Gatatog warrior down.

Now there was only Uvenk left, Shepard looked around, at some point after he had been knocked to the ground he had disappeared. There weren't that many places to hide, just a few stacked storage containers and pillars that had probably supported a second floor of the building at some point in the distant past.

"Where's the idiot krogan who started this?" Jack growled as she looked around for Uvenk.

Shepard shook her head, rising and jumping over the low wall she had taken cover behind for the entire fight and advancing forward carefully. She motioned silently for Jack and Grunt to spread out a little as they searched for the clan leader.

Motion by one of the pillars in front of her drew Shepard's attention. Roaring, "Die human!" Gatatog Uvenk came charging from behind it directly toward her. She knew she was blocking Grunt's line of fire and Jack couldn't see Uvenk yet from where the tattooed biotic was standing. She was facing a full adult krogan in the prime of his strength and berserker infuriated with her for destroying his plans and dooming his clan to their likely destruction.

For a fraction of a second, Shepard almost dove out of the way. Before finding Thalion's memories last night, that would have been exactly what she would have done. Today wasn't yesterday however; instead of diving out of the way in that moment her mind calmed…she was the still pond, body and mind prepared to act as needed. She stood motionless, straight and tall as she watched the krogan charging her. Thalion's instincts and his centuries of combat experience told her when she needed to act. Close...dark energy wreathed her body in a striking display of biotic power. Closer…she stepped aggressively forward in a strong, determined motion, raising her arm to meet him, dark energy surrounding it in an intense bluish white corona as she created a biotic shield and like two rams contesting their strength they slammed together. Her biotics pulsed in a single powerful wave and Uvenk went flying back through the air to slam forcefully into the wall several feet away.

Shepard stalked toward him with long, swift strides, closing the distance between them before he could recover. The green-crested krogan had time to look up and register the fact that her rifle was in his face before she rested the barrel just underneath the protective head plate and pulled the trigger. His body jerked as the rounds entered his brain and then he went still. Shepard stopped firing; she looked down at him for a moment before shaking her head at his stupidity and holstered her rifle. She turned around to face her two team members, Jack was eyeing her; the expression on the biotics face was an interesting mixture of wariness and curiosity. Shepard could guess what was going on in the woman's mind; Jack was probably wondering how she had learned how to use her new biotic abilities so well in such a short time. Samara teaching her how to use her biotics was one thing; displaying such a level of proficiency in such a short time period was another thing entirely.

As for Grunt, the young krogan was staring at her in a way that somehow reminded her of their first meeting when he was deciding whether or not to accept her offer of joining the crew under her command. He blinked and then looked down at the dead Gatatog clan leader. "Uvenk is meat," he said, "Let's signal at the keystone that we are ready to go and leave him to rot."

Honestly, Shepard could only agree with that sentiment. It had been a long, hard day; even Grunt seemed to be finally ready for a bit of rest. They started back toward where they would meet up with the Tomkah that would take them back to the Urdnot compound.

As they were walking Grunt turned around and regarded Jack steadily, "You look like you are weak, but you are not. I am glad that Shepard chose you to be the other member of my krantt today."

Jack stared back at him, her expression guarded and then a smile curved her lips, "Yea, you weren't so bad yourself krogan, it was a good fight."

Shepard kept her eyes on their goal and a smile of satisfaction off her lips, the last thing these two needed to figure out was that part of the reason she had invited Jack was in the hope that the ex-convict and young krogan would discover that they could get along with one another. She needed to form these people into a cohesive fighting unit, to do that she needed them to see they could count on one another. Jack was probably her toughest sell on that idea, but today had given her the first chink in the tattooed woman's attitude.

She noticed that Grunt was walking a little straighter, a little more confidently, or perhaps it was more there was a level of surety to his confidence that hadn't been there before, Shepard mused watching him with a small smile. The tank-grown krogan had known he was strong, but hadn't felt as though he had earned it, that had changed for him today. Before they entered the tunnel for their trip back to the Urdnot camp, she turned around to take one last look at the keystone and the bodies of the harvester and thresher maw before they left. Clansmen from Urdnot were beginning to swarm around them, cutting into them and carving out edible meat to feed their people.

After killing both the harvester and maw, and defeating Gatatog Uvenk and his clansmen Shepard too felt a little more confident and clear headed than she had last night or this morning. She remembered how conflicted she had been feeling all last week, how she had felt last night while talking to Samara. Part of her still felt a little that way, but a larger part of her didn't anymore. They were headed to the Citadel next; she would see Anderson and get the paperwork started for her resign her commission in the Alliance. It was past time for her to have done it already, she needed to be free to do what she needed to do to save the galaxy from the Reapers, and that didn't include the Alliance thinking they were either entitled or able to order her around.

It wouldn't of course be that simple, Shepard suspected she would still have moments of doubt and maybe even regret or two in the future. They wouldn't last though, because she knew this was the right decision for her. The reality was that the Alliance was part of her old life from before she had died, but now she had a new life. She wasn't going to turn her back on her past or forget what she believed in, but it was time for her to accept that things had irrecoverably changed, that she had changed and would probably continue to change. Her body, her mind, her life…they were never going to return to the way they had been before her death.

Perhaps more than just Grunt had needed a Rite of Passage to acknowledge that they had moved on from one stage of their life and entered another, Shepard mused to herself as she turned to follow Jack and Grunt down the tunnel to where the Tomkah waited.