Gunnery Chief Ashley Williams was not a happy camper. She hadn't been one for a while now, but the situation was starting to get to her. She had been benched by the commander, much to her chagrin. It was ridiculous. Sure, the bath of acid she had gotten from that thorian growth thingy hadn't done her any favours, but she could have stayed aboard the Normandy. Chakwas was quite capable of taking care of her. And Felawa too. For God's sake, he only had a dud arm. But Shepard had insisted, they were to stay there and recover. No distractions, no trying to do things while they weren't cleared for it, nothing.
And so, here they were. The Citadel. The place had lost its charm a while ago, but at least they had been released by the hospital. Together with Fredricks; the marine had been benched for far longer than either of them, and while the doctors had wanted him to stay longer to recover, she had promised them she'd make sure he didn't overexert himself.
"Fredricks, you're up! Felawa, cover fire!"
The marines followed her instructions to the letter, the first bolting out of cover to rush to the next station, while the latter made a show of spraying automatic fire with his assault rifle, drawing as much attention as he could. Felawa seemed to have recovered all right, but Fredricks was definitely rusty. His movements were stiff, and his aim all over the place.
Once they cleared the circuit, with all holographic targets taken, she took stock of the situation. Fredricks scores were below pass. Felawa was close to his standard.
"Still needs work, Fredricks," she said, her tone not entirely unkind.
"Yes sir," he replied, huffing as he spoke. "Felt damn good though."
"I bet. All right, that's enough for today, let's go grab some grub." She raised her omni-tool as they stepped out of the training circuit. "Damn, still nothing."
"Chief, you've been looking at that every five minutes all day," Felawa said. "Did your boyfriend stand you up or something?"
"If you must know, I'm expecting a message from Nihlus."
"Ooh, so that's a yes," Fredricks said, to Felawa's amused chuckles.
"Fredricks," Ashley warned him. "He's supposed to be our ticket back to the Normandy, and yet here we are. He- What the hell?"
As they came into the Citadel proper, they were caught by surprise by a flurry of activity. C-Sec was out in force; from their vantage point over the ward they could see agents all over the place, the flashing lights of their shuttles going to and fro, and definitely causing a stir. She wasn't sure why her mind had gone there, but she was quite convinced it had something to do with Nihlus. She brought the contacts up, and dialled for his private omni-tool frequency. He didn't pick up until the third try.
"Chief Williams, this is not a good time," he answered.
"And a good afternoon to you too," Ashley said. Damn, Shepard was rubbing off on her. "What's going on? You've gotten C-Sec in a tizzy, haven't you?"
"... we better discuss this in person. Come by the academy."
He cut the transmission unceremoniously, which really didn't bode well. She gave the two marines a look, they gave her a couple of confused shrugs, and so all they had left to do was find an aircar and get their asses down to the academy. Good thing they were in full gear already, because it sounded like Nihlus was about to give them a whole helping of trouble.
The ride was crazier than usual, as they kept being pushed aside by the C-Sec priority flightpaths. She managed to make it through the whole flight without any incidents, be them of the loose lunch variety, or the type that leaves bruises and embarrassment behind. Which was more than could be said for Felawa when he became untethered.
So many bruises.
She left the two marines to try and recover while she made her way into the academy. As outside, the activity inside the main C-Sec office was frantic, but she found Nihlus easily enough. He was standing with one of the agents behind the screens of the security feeds. They were blinking in and out at such speed she was expecting to have an epileptic seizure any instant. After a few seconds, she noticed that the flashing slowed down whenever there were turians and asari in the same shot, followed by a quick flash of facial recognition before moving on.
"What's going on?" Ashley said.
"Doctor T'Soni has been taken."
"WHAT?!"
Nihlus didn't respond, he just kept his eyes glued on the screens, looking at the flashing images. It was only then that Ashley realized how very tense the Spectre was. He had his hands clasped behind his back, and his whole demeanour was one of barely restrained anger.
"What the hell happened?" Ashely said.
With a grunt of annoyance, Nihlus started to explain. "Liara and I came to the Citadel to meet with the Council. I left her at my apartment while I went to help Shepard with Kahoku. When I came back, she was gone, and the place had been ransacked."
"Admiral Kahoku?" Ashley said. "Okay, start from the beginning, what on Earth have I been missing?"
It was a lot. A lot to take in. After leaving her there, the Normandy had tracked down the geth fleet, caught up with Benezia, and killed her. And not only that, but Liara had been there when she died.
"You think Benezia gave her something?" Ashley said.
"Meld, most likely. We didn't ask her anything, and she hadn't been in the mood to share," Nihlus replied. "Curse the spirits, I should have asked her. I shouldn't have left her alone."
"Too late for that now," Ashley said. "Do we know they're still here?"
"No," Nihlus deapanned.
"Okay. Where do you want us?"
"You?"
She pointed over her shoulder with her thumb. "My boys and I. If it's Saren men, you think C-Sec will be up for the task?"
"Hey!" the officer at the console protested.
I had to admit, planning things is a lot more fun when you have the money to do stuff. And right now, I had a duffel bag full of stuff. I was in the workshop, waiting for Mika to finish her shift, which should be right about...
"Roy!" she squealed in surprise. Damn, it never got old. "Stop scaring me!"
"Scaring you? I was just sitting here," I replied.
She looked me up and down. Yeah, I was in full gear, minus the helmet. I was wearing the hardsuit Serrus had ordered for me, and it was just perfect. For one thing, the crazy shield harness fit exactly where the biotic amplifier would inside the suit, which by itself rose a few questions. For another, it was extremely comfortable. It was somewhat heavy (it qualified as medium armor rating), but the thermoregulation was excellent, and the internal material lining meshed perfectly with the undermesh Serrus had sold me, too. I had taken to wear it at all times - not an uncommon sight in the Citadel - so as to get used to it. I also had my shotgun hanging off my back, though that was it weapons-wise.
"Why are you wearing that anyway?" she said. As she spoke, she took a rag from one of the benches and started wiping her suit. Messy, must have been something nasty in there. I guess I should have been able to smell it, but it always smelled in there anyway.
"I brought you a present," I said, and pointed at the bag.
She froze mid-wipe to look at me, with such wonder in her eyes - all I could see of her face - that I wasn't sure if her translator hadn't glitched or something.
"Me?" she finally said.
"Well yeah?" I said, and gave the bag a nudge with my boot. "Who else could use all this?"
After some hesitation, she put the rag over her shoulder and came to take a look. She unzipped the bag, looked inside, and squealed in surprise when she saw what I had piled in there. A big mess of new parts for her suit, including the shield generator, armored plates, and all manner of bits and bobs. I'll be honest, I didn't have a clue what half the things in there were supposed to do, but she was giggling with uncaring glee with every part she took out.
"Wha- H- How? How did you know..." she trailed off, looking at one of the shield generators. Top of the line, Serrus had claimed.
"I just asked, the shopkeeper was very helpful." And so was the geth buddy of mine that I had scan her suit, but I wasn't going to tell her that. For what Gee was telling me, her suit was one serious incident away from complete and total failure.
It made me irrationally angry. I knew why she was doing it. Instead of taking some of her pay to get the parts she needed, she just put it towards paying off her debt. If only Shala would take my freaking money.
"I can't take this," Mika said, dropping the parts in the bag.
"What? Why?"
"It's too much! I can't- It's too much, how can I take this?"
"Simple. You go through the list of parts that you need to replace, and do it one by one."
"I don't need new plates," she said, pointing at one of the items in the bag.
"Hopefully," I replied. "But when bullets start flying, you'll be glad to have them."
"Bullets?"
"Yeah. Trust me, things are going to get crazy around here."
My omni-tool started flashing, which meant Gee had something important to say. He was itching to talk to Mika, but I had managed to convince him to wait. It was too close to the attack on the Citadel, so I didn't want to risk a bad reaction from her. Gee and I had been exploring the lower levels of the tunnels for the last couple of days, and figuring out where to go when the attack came. Plenty of good places to hide. And plenty of places to put some defenses up. Gee was looking into that too, there had to be a way to get some turrets or some mechs down there. And explosives. Lots of explosives.
I might be a fan of Mythbusters.
"What is it Gee?" I said, right after putting my helmet on.
"C-Sec communication channels have increased consensus building by three hundred and twenty-seven percent."
"What are they doing?"
"Reports indicate an abduction in progress. Description matches Liara-Archeologist. Saren-Prophet agents are primary suspects."
"WHAT?!"
My shout made it through the helmet, even though I was engaged in a private channel. Mika dropped the parts and looked up at me in surprise.
"What's wrong?" she said.
"I have to go," I said, already heading for the ladder. "Friend's in trouble."
"I'll come!" Mika said.
"No!" I snapped, stopping on my tracks. "These are the same people from last time, okay? Just stay here and fix your suit."
I waited, looking at her as she made her mind up. Finally, she nodded, wringing her hands uneasily. Damn, I just kicked a puppy. I'd be back later, but now I had to get Liara. Although I had no idea where I was going.
"Gee, any clue where we're supposed to go?" I said, slipping down the ladder and heading for my room. More guns, that's what I needed.
"We are scanning C-Sec surveillance."
I had guns to choose from. Lots of them. There was the asari commando's guns I had gotten after the last attack, an extra set I had gotten from Serrus, and I even had a second set of body armor. Top of the line Predator; he didn't have the license for the colossus, but he did have everything turian. I picked the geth assault rifle, a Razer pistol I had just bought, and an extra pack of medi-gel ampoules.
"C-Sec are not completely useless. What about looking where they aren't?"
"Morgan-Messenger?"
"They must have come in and go out somehow. And nobody noticed. Smuggled her out. Try that."
"Acknowledged."
I kept strapping guns to my armor, checking the feeds Gee had passed through to me. C-Sec were on a frenzy. For what I could see, they had taken Liara from Nihlus' apartment. And the security feeds had been hacked pretty damn hard. It was showing a re-run of Fleet and Flotilla, and either nobody noticed, or it was an episode they had missed and they had decided to let it roll. Or someone was taking the piss.
"Anything?" I said.
"We have detected six anomalies in the power grid consistent with previous registered smuggling incidents."
"Six? Damn. Forward that to C-Sec, and give me the closest one."
"Acknowledged."
Gee put a marker on my map, and I took off at a run. I hadn't gone three steps when a distorted, awful noise blared out of the helmet speakers, making me skid to a stop.
"What the hell is that!" I snapped.
The noise stopped.
"We have studied Morgan-Messenger's physical performance. It increases by six point eight percent when stimulated by rhythmic sounds."
"Music? That wasn't music."
"Our search through the extranet reveal this is the sound associated with Shepard-Commander when simulating motile programming corruption."
...
It took me a couple of seconds to pierce all that together. That was Shepard dancing. I made a mental note to look up the video Gee was talking about, while trying really, really hard not to fall on the ground laughing.
"Gee, that's just Shepard being terrible at dancing," I said. "As for music, let's try end of the twentieth century rock. Let me see..."
Life in the Fast Lane - Eagles.
"Let's go!"
I took off at a run as the first chords came through, while Gee kept scanning for more clues of Liara. The marker he had given me wasn't too far, although I had to make a few tight squeezes to get past some of the narrower keeper tunnels down there. Damn but the place was a pain. More things to add to the map, which was starting to look like a veritable rat's nest. I was all out of music, and kind of out of breath, when we arrived at the destination.
The place was, what else, a warehouse. It was a quirk of the keepers. Whenever an area wasn't used for a while, they'd re-do the constructions and turn them into these blocky, mostly empty buildings. I supposed it was a generic enough construction that could be used by most anyone, but it still was a pain. It made the least visited parts of the city very difficult to navigate, because they kept changing the layout.
What was interesting about this particular warehouse, however, was the large shuttle on the roof. And the people in armor milling about.
"C-Sec?" I said.
"C-Sec operatives have assigned lower priority to our signals. Estimated twenty minutes before they arrive."
"That's too slow! Dammit." I saw two people on the roof, and they had a big crate between them they were moving. "Too slow."
"Morgan-Messenger?"
"Can you stop that shuttle from leaving?"
"Affirmative."
"Brilliant, do it please." I reached for the regulator on my waist, and turned the shield up. "Time to make our entrance."
Enter Sandman - Metallica.
I looked down at the omni-tool and snorted in amusement. Gee was really getting on with it now. Pulse rifle in hand, I stepped out of my cover, and rushed straight for the entrance. I heard a few shouts, and people started shooting at me, but either their aim sucked, or they weren't used to try and hit a moving target.
This was the first hint that I was in the wrong place. Saren's goons were not amateurs. The turrets along the perimeter started shooting, but a moment later they turned around and fired straight at the shuttle.
That's one way of stopping it.
I stepped through the door with my assault rifle in my hands, and started shooting. I wasn't even trying to get into cover, their weapons were barely making a dent on my shields, and they were in complete chaos. When the first one of them went down, they started to retreat. With the second, they just turned tail and run.
"Get back here!" I shouted.
As if to make the point for me, I caught one of them on the leg, and he fell down like a sack of potatoes, yelling and pleading for the others not to leave him.
"Gee, who are these clowns?" I said.
"Scanning... No known associates in C-Sec databases."
Above my head, I heard a pop as the shuttle gave up, dropping one last time on the roof. The guy was crawling backwards, leaving a trail of blue blood as he did. I stepped on his wounded leg, pressing just enough to get a blood-curling yell, but no fight. Of course, the latter could be the gun I was pointing at him.
"Where is Liara?" I said.
"W-What?"
"And here I thought turians had a quad," I replied. "You're working for Saren."
"No! No, we- AARGH!" He stopped talking when I pressed harder on his leg. "We don't! I swear! Spirits, we're just smugglers!"
"Of course, you are regular saints."
"No, but... Please..."
"Don't move."
I stepped away, rifle held against my shoulder, but according to the radar, everyone had run away really damn fast. The warehouse had quite a few crates, and I opened one of them to find a whole lot of guns in there. I didn't search much more, just enough to make sure they weren't just an incompetent bunch set up to disguise Liara's captors, and on the second try I found a whole lot of explosives. I walked out with a bag full of them.
"C-Sec will be here in fifteen minutes," I said to the wounded turian as I walked out. "Don't go anywhere."
Five more places to check. It was going to be a long day. I just hoped Liara was okay. Dammit all, how had that happened? What was she doing in the Citadel? By herself?
What the hell was Shepard thinking?
What else could possibly happen now?
Tempting fate or not, Shepard didn't much care anymore. Toombs was alive. That was the one thing, the one good thing out of the whole mess. Of course, it also meant he had been trapped for years being experimented on. And she hadn't done a fucking thing about it. Meanwhile, they had found Kahoku dead, and a whole lot of bugs Wrex claimed were rachni, of all things. Rachni. That was just perfect.
And now, now Liara was gone.
"How the hell did this happen?!" Shepard snapped.
"You think I just let this happen?" Nihlus retorted.
They were alone in the comms room of the Normandy. It still smelled of fresh paint, and they had gained two extra crew members on a temporary basis to finish all the repairs. Half the bank of heatsinks were still on the fritz, which seriously diminished the time they could move silently. And while the hull was all sound again, the interior was still a mess. Well, not pretty, but functional. She couldn't wait any longer.
She had the location of the main base Cerberus was using, and she was on a mission to burn it to the ground. And she finally had her team back to full strength.
Or so she had thought.
"Who else knew where you live?"
"It's not exactly a state secret," Nihlus said. "They must have been watching us."
"And C-Sec didn't do anything," Shepard finished. She really had an urge to punch someone.
"We think we found where they took her, but they were long gone. We weren't the only ones looking for them either, we also found three smuggler dens shot up, but not a clue who did it."
Shepard furrowed her brow, thinking. "This is the second time. Remember those guys who were after Roy?"
"Yeah. This time they were a step behind, if it was them. With Roy, they knew exactly where to search."
With a heavy sigh, she sat on one of the chairs, her hands over her head. It was a nightmare. It felt like she was being pulled in twelve different directions, and worse still, that she was about to become undone at the seams. They hadn't wanted to press Liara too much, giving her space to work out the death of her mother. But that might have been a mistake, now Saren had her and who knew what he'd do to get the information out of her.
...
What the hell is wrong with me? She's missing, and the first thing I think about is the information I'm missing.
"We have to find her," Shepard said, her voice barely audible and weary.
"We will," Nihlus replied.
"Commander, we're about to jump to the Voyager cluster," Joker called. "Less than an hour to Nepheron."
"All right, let's get the team in here," Shepard said, sighing and standing up again.
"What's your plan?" Nihlus said.
"Burn the fucking place to the ground and kill anyone who tries to stop us," Shepard replied.
"So you're taking Wrex," Nihlus said with a chuckle.
"We're taking everyone, big guy. Armed to the teeth."
"Roger that," Nihlus said, mandibles clicking in amusement.
The team started to file in less than a minute later. First of all was Williams, followed by the rest of the marines as per usual. Felawa and Grieco looked ready to take on anything. Specially Felawa. Having been benched for so long, and hearing the exploits of his friend while he was away had put him in the mood for it. She made a mental note to tell Williams to keep an eye on him, and another to tell her to keep herself under control, too. She was definitely itching for a fight. Specially after hearing about Roy having been there. She had been positively giddy at hearing how Roy had handled himself during the assault on the geth ship, specially with it coming from Captain Anderson. Shepard was starting to think she had missed her true calling as a Drill Sergeant, the way she was whipping all the wet-behind-the-ears newbies into combat ready marines was extraordinary. She realized she had gotten it right the first time. Leave Roy to Ashley, and just work with her team and her missions. Delegation. Well, too late now.
Next came Alenko. The Lieutenant looked worse for wear, probably coming out of a migraine. Damn, that meant she'd have to bench him. Her team was at full strength already, so she could manage without him, or Fredricks. He was still not mission ready, but it had been a sight for sore eyes to have him back in the ship. Another mental note, get the best bottle of something strong for the medical staff at Huerta Memorial.
Tali. She had expected the quarian to be exhausted, she had put a lot of very long shifts getting the Normandy up to spec, but she was still bouncy and full of energy. She was probably running on stims and tech overload. Best of all, the guys at Arcturus had followed her suggestion about the shields, and incorporated a series of cyclic power banks to distribute the power load. It meant that their peak deflection power was down about ten percent, but they could deflect almost fifty percent more sustained fire. And the most important part, an overload wouldn't mean the core would fry half of the engineering deck. It was a quarian design, for what she had heard, and it was quite the gift. All in exchange for a bit of data recovered from a geth outpost that they really didn't have much use for.
Wrex, of course, was as ready for a fight as anyone else. More, maybe, than even herself. Finding that some terrorist group had resurrected the rachni had really gotten under his skin. He had been the first to say they had to be stopped, and stopped right now.
She had to agree.
Garrus. Yeah, Garrus. Nothing seemed to faze the turian, he was as reliable as he was hotheaded. Equal parts of each. Between Nihlus and her, they seemed to have managed to temper the edge a bit. Nihlus was a good example for him, really. He was unorthodox when the situation called, knew how to work within the rules, and didn't sugarcoat things when someone screwed up. Including himself.
And then, there was the gap where Liara was supposed to be.
One thing at a time.
"All right everyone, let's get started," Shepard said, giving a nod to Captain Anderson. He didn't bother going any further than sidestepping to the left of the entrance. "We're less than an hour away from what we assume is the main base of operations of these Cerberus guys."
"What do we know about them?" Garrus said. There was the C-Sec detective.
"Not a lot. I've gotten in contact with Alliance Intelligence, but they haven't given me much," Shepard said. She glanced at Nihlus.
"We have some information on the Spectre database. Human supremacist terrorist group, connections in high places, but they're almost as secretive as the Shadow Broker."
"There's three more things we can add to the list," Shepard said. "They're the ones who organized Akuze, they killed admiral Kahoku and his men, and they've been trying to resurrect the rachni."
More than surprise, Shepard could see confusion on the faces of the ones who had just joined the party.
"Wait, they're a human supremacist group, and they organized a hit against the Alliance in Akuze?" Williams said. "That doesn't make any sense."
"Not to mention Toombs," Grieco muttered, but a sharp glance from Shepard quickly quieted him down.
"Regardless, we have more than enough reasons to go in there and take them all down. With extreme prejudice. I want you all ready to hit them fast, and hit them hard. Three teams. Garrus, Felawa, and I will be the first ones on the ground, long range cover. Chief, you take Wrex and Grieco. The three of you are going to be hitting them the hardest. Tali, you're with handsome here," Shepard said, pointing at Nihlus with her thumb. "Your primary objective is to recover as much intel as you can. If these Cerberus guys are as well connected as the information we have on them, we need to get as much as possible. Once they realize just who is hammering their base, they might start purging servers and destroying evidence. We'll be right behind you once the second team breaches the perimeter, but I don't want to lose any time getting that data."
She cast a look around, looking at the reactions. Fredricks looked resigned. Alenko, unhappy.
"Alenko, we're thin on the ground as it is, but you don't look ready," Shepard said. "You and Rosie will be backup."
"Yes sir," he said.
"She'll be thrilled," Grieco said, sniggering in amusement. "She'll probably want to come with us."
"No can do," Shepard said. "Don't want to risk you two running off to hump in some dark corner when we're not looking."
The room broke out in laughter, mostly because it really was close enough to reality that they could see it happening. Grieco took it all in stride, with a cocky grin on his face and a fake helpless shrug. She knew for a fact quite a few men and women were looking at him with envious eyes. There was something magnetic about Rosie.
Right now, though, all she had a mind for was the mission ahead. That base was going to burn.
"We're in position," Shepard called over the radio. "Anything?"
"Nothing," Talitha's voice called. "No transmissions, and no changes we can see since we hit the system. Assuming we managed to sneak in, they haven't moved a finger with your landing, commander."
"Good. Chief, are you ready?"
"Ready," Williams said, her response coming through the background noise of the Mako's engine.
"Chief, be gentle with my Mako please."
"Seconded," Garrus said.
There was no need for an answer, really. Shepard and Garrus started marking targets, looking for the most dangerous threats. Four turrets, and about two dozen people. Anti-tank units, and sniper perches with soldiers inside as well.
"This is going to be tricky," Shepard said.
"Divide the turrets?" Garrus offered.
"Best way. Tali, how quickly can you hack those turrets?" Shepard said, already forwarding her the tactical info.
"I might need half a minute or so," the quarian replied.
"Damn. What can you give me in like, five seconds?"
"I... could interfere with their targeting VI. It won't help us a lot, but it would be quick."
"That's the plan then. Chief, come up to the mark," Shepard ordered, and placed a marker on the back of the base. "Aim for the turrets and snipers at the opposite end. Tali, you and Nihlus get out right then and target the near turrets. That leaves the anti-tank units for us."
"Copy that," Williams said.
"Go!"
As soon as she gave the order, the marker for the Mako pushed ahead, coming straight towards the ridge covering their movements. Williams was gunning it hard, just the way Shepard usually did. She marked the closest three anti-tank units as primaries, the next three as secondaries, and gave the order.
Three sniper shots rang through the dense but inert atmosphere of the uncomfortably warm planet, and three targets wend down. She spared only the briefest of thoughts to mentally congratulate Felawa, but she was already looking for the secondary. The Cerberus troopers had to be well trained, because far from falling into panic, they moved instantly into cover, picking the direction where the shots were coming from with ease. On the second round, two of the three secondary targets went down.
"Don't panic," Shepard said when she heard Felawa shoot a second time, failing to find the target. "Move."
The response came in the form of a barrage of fast moving rockets, together with heavy sniper fire trying to drag them out of cover. The corner of her HUD was showing the camera view from the Mako's turret, and Williams' aggressive driving. Grieco started by unloading on the far end sniper perches, his aim perfect. Bodies flew off in a shower of gore with each of his shots, the third already calling the attention of the nearest turrets towards the Mako.
Tali and Nihlus were already out, shooting from the cover of the armored vehicle.
"Felawa, come around!" Shepard ordered. "Garrus, targets!"
The two of them came out, chose a target closer to the Mako, and two perfect shots later, the ground units were down two rocket launchers. The Cerberus troops fell back into cover, and to her surprise, turned their attention towards the Mako. They weren't wrong about it being the bigger threat, but they were severely underestimating who was inside. Wrex had also jumped out of the beast, while Williams was moving around to draw the turret fire away from them. Tali had fogged the nearest turrets, and they were moving like crazy while failing to find a proper target.
"Got it!" Tali announced over the radio.
Good as her word, thirty second and the closest turret turned around, shooting at the next turret, the exchange of fire throwing another layer of chaos into the mix. Shepard came out of cover with Garrus to take another shot, but both of them went down into cover immediately without being able to get a bead on anyone. It didn't matter, because that's what she had wanted. Felawa came out of cover a good hundred meters away from them, and took down two more targets with two perfectly executed shots. Nice, calm, and with enough pause between them that she was sure he had taken his time lining up both shots despite the pressure.
A roar through the comms caught their attention, and Wrex charged right in the middle of the fray, blue biotic energy around him flashing as bullets bounced off his barrier. There are few distractions better than a krogan battlemaster charging in the middle of the battlefield, and everyone in Shepard's teams took the opportunity to come out and do as much damage as possible. The concentrated fire of no less than eight high powered weapons, two of them mounted on a vehicle, did catastrophic damage to the balance of the battle, and soon the Cerberus troops were reduced to three people and two turrets.
"We're moving in," Williams announced over the radio.
"Copy that. Let's go team," Shepard replied, swapping her sniper rifle for her assault one.
The run to the compound was not long, but quite exciting. She had to trust her team that they had the turrets under control, because if they turned to shoot their way, it would end up as a rather painful experience. Shields or not, rocket launchers always hurt, even when impacts were survivable. Nonetheless, they didn't have anything to worry about. The two turrets started to trade shots, and were nothing but smocking wreckage by the time they were in close range.
Tali, in the meantime, had finished breaking into the base, and Williams' team was already inside. The images coming through the headcam of the Chief were not encouraging. There was a lot of resistance in there, and they were well armed.
"Commander," Talitha's voice called through the comms. "We've intercepted a transmission from the surface."
"Anything good?" Shepard said.
"Just a distress call, we think," Talitha replied. "We're intercepting it. It's encoded, but the pattern fits a short and repeated message."
"Try to figure out where it's going, if they have more bases we'll have to smoke them out."
"Yes sir," Talitha replied.
"Tali, talk to me," Shepard said.
"Nothing here Shepard," she said. "The terminals outside are in their own network. There's nothing important."
"Wireless?"
"No signal, it's all in lockdown."
"All right, let's push hard and get Tali in there people. We're coming in right behind you."
The orders were clear, push hard and not worry about covering their backs, because Shepard was coming to clean up house right behind them. The base opened in several directions, but Williams was leading them right to the heart of the complex. It went down in a spiral, stairs digging deeper and deeper into the soil. There was a lift in the middle too, the shaft serving as the centre of the spiral staircase, but Tali had disabled it. Not that it'd take them much of an effort to outrun it up.
"Contacts!" Williams called.
The third floor opened to a wide area, and it was the hardest defended so far. Tali and Nihlus fell back when a barrage of explosives was thrown their way, and the others had to dig in hard to avoid the damage.
"Shit! We're coming!" Shepard said.
There was no chance of them to come to their aid, when a heavy security door fell right in front of them. Shepard cursed loudly as she bounced off it, having been moving too fast for her to stop on time. Automated defense systems popped out behind her, and started shooting without even the slightest warning.
"Dammit! Take cover!"
As far as cover went, there wasn't much to speak of. She squeezed by the lift entrance of that level, and brought her omni-tool up, even as bullets pinged off her shields. There wasn't much time, she knew, but it was enough. She threw an overload out, followed by a sticky grenade, while Garrus and Felawa retreated up the stairs to much better position than she was. The grenade went off, taking down the turret with the angle on her. Of course, that meant she was stuck behind the other one.
"I'll open this in a minute!" Tali called.
"No! We're fine, cover Williams! Shepard replied.
"Commander-" Williams started to respond, but another explosion made Shepard's point for her. "Those freaking... Wrex! Grieco!"
Williams' orders were followed by the bestial roar of Wrex rushing out of cover, and a rather convincing imitation of the same made by Grieco as he rushed out to follow. All Shepard had to go on was the sound, since she was too busy to look at the headcam images from the others, but for what she was hearing, it was absolute carnage out there. She just hoped it was her team dispensing the carnage.
She peeked out of her corner and got a facefull of turret fire, forcing her back into the stupid cover. Felawa and Garrus were hard at work with the reinforcements coming from behind. Had to give it to Cerberus, they had gotten her into a spot of trouble. Dammit. She pre-loaded an overload in her omni-tool, and swapped the rifle for her pistol. On a quick mental three, she crouched, pushed herself out of cover, and slid on the ground as she unloaded on the turret. Her shields burned hard as they bounced off automatic fire, while Shepard unloaded as fast as she could. It was going to be close.
The turret finally exploded, showering her with fragments. She didn't even wait for her depleted shields to start recharging, she shot to her feet and rushed up the steps, running past her team and right into the fray. Without even stopping, she slapped a singularity at the back of the room, catching half her enemies by surprise, and carrying out on inertia to fall into cover right on top of one of the Cerberus troopers.
He didn't even know what hit him. Her head was swimming, but that close she didn't have to think, she could work on instinct. Her pistol found its place right against her foe, and a full load later he stopped moving.
Over her head, the sound of automatic fire redoubled, but less than ten seconds later it went quiet.
"Commander?" Garrus said.
"Give me a second," she muttered.
A pair of three-fingered hands found her, and helped to a sitting position. Garrus lifted the visor and peered inside, making Shepard laugh.
"I'll go get our door open," Garrus said, returning the laughter with a chuckle of his own.
"Good. Just a minute and I'll be right there..."
"There's no need," Williams said, catching Shepard's attention. She brought her headcam view to see a scene of utter destruction in front of her. Grieco was on the ground, while Nihlus worked over him.
"Grieco?"
"I'm fine," he grunted.
"Mostly," Nihlus added. "He seems to forget his inner krogan is missing the regeneration part."
"I have to look into those gene mods," he muttered, which made Wrex laugh. The krogan didn't look particularly messy this time, maybe it was the fact that he had finally gotten the armor painted and fixed the way he liked it. It sure wasn't because he was worried about bullets.
"You do that," Shepard said. "Tali?"
It took a few seconds before she got a response, and it wasn't Tali. "She's busy with the mainframe," Williams said. "And given how quickly she's swearing in quarian, it's not going great."
It wasn't. The mainframe started deleting itself as soon as Tali broke in, which had her fighting a battle on two fronts. One to slow down the deleting processes, throwing filesystem loops and recursive pointers at the VI, and another trying to get the data in the same order it was filed to be deleted. Most of it was encrypted, and she suspected much of it was just junk data to slow down intruders, but nonetheless, Tali had managed to recover enough of it to fill her omni-tool.
Unfortunately, that was all they had gotten. Shepard would have liked to make a few prisoners, but the agents had fought with surprising ferocity. She suspected their attitude spoke volumes about what they could expect if they were captured. The thought was somewhat disturbing, either Cerberus still had substantial assets out there, or whatever they had left had links in the Alliance that could get to any prisoners and dispose of them.
Her pondering was interrupted when her omni-tool chimed. Huh. Incoming transmission, tracing back to...
No trace?
"Who is this?" Shepard said.
"Commander Shepard," a distorted, synthesized voice replied. "I am an agent of the Shadow Broker. I am contacting you in behalf of my employer, with a business proposition."
"I'm not interested," Shepard replied flatly.
"Please, Commander. Don't jump to conclusions. We know you have assaulted one of Cerberus main bases of operation and recovered a great deal of information." He paused, probably waiting for Shepard to ask how he had gotten the information. She wasn't going to bite, of course. "If you forward me a copy of that information, I can arrange for a very profitable exchange. I have-"
"What part of 'I'm not interested' was difficult to understand?" Shepard said.
"... you're making a mistake, commander."
"Not the first, won't be the last," she replied.
For several seconds the line went dead. Shepard was just going to hang up, but she was slightly curios as to whether he'd hang up first.
"Very well commander. But remember, you are the one who chose not to work with us. We will get the information anyway, all you have done is set yourself back."
"Yeah, yeah," Shepard muttered, but not before the line disconnected.
There were things she was willing to do to accomplish her mission, but moonlighting as a double agent for the Shadow Broker wasn't one of them. That was a very dark hole from which there was no turning back. With a sigh, she turned to her cup of coffee, and found to her distaste that it had gone cold. Damn. She stood, emptied it down the sink, and went for a refill.
"Commander?" Joker called over the PA. "I've got a transmission from the council, the captain's in the comms room."
"On my way, what do they want?"
"No idea, they're being all Spectreish on me."
She made her way up the stairs at a good pace, and stepped into the comms room to find Nihlus and Anderson already there.
"Ah, commander," Tevos said. "Just in time."
"What did I miss?" she said.
"STG team investigating Saren," Nihlus said.
"Yes," Valern said, picking up the thread of the conversation. "We currently have several STG teams gathering intel on Saren out in the Traverse. This transmission came from a planet called Virmire."
Nihlus turned to his omni-tool, searching through the codex for information pertaining the planet, while Shepard continued the discussion.
"What did they find?" she said.
"All we got was static," Valern replied. "But it came through a channel reserved for mission critical reports. Whatever it was, it was serious."
"Still worth checking," Shepard said, looking at Anderson.
"I agree," the captain said. "Nihlus?"
"There isn't much on the place. Ideal for colonization, but surrounded by pirates and slavers in every direction. Nice place to hide something important," the turian replied.
"It's up to you, Spectre," Tevos said. "The Council doesn't get involved in the details of how Spectres run their operations. We just want you to have all the information."
"Thank you councilor," Shepard said. The transmission ended, and the three of them shared a few seconds of awkward looks. "So, we have a new target?"
"Seems like it," Nihlus said.
"I'll forward the Cerberus intel to Admiral Hackett," Anderson said. "He'll be able to take it from here."
"All right," Shepard said. "Next stop, Virmire. If Saren has a base there, I just hope that's where he's keeping Liara."
"Assuming she's still alive," Nihlus said.
Shepard didn't answer. There was nothing for her to say, really. Idealism aside, she knew the chances of rescuing the asari were slim. Once Saren got whatever it was he wanted from her, she'd be of no use to the former Spectre. And Liara didn't strike her as the type to be resilient under interrogation. Not to mention the possibility of her simply being indoctrinated, the same way her mother had been.
But there was still a chance.
Author's notes: Wow, the mission went on for a lot longer than I had anticipated. Main quest is almost over, and so far Shepard seems to be on the back foot. On the other hand, she's going in with an extra Spectre, and a complete lack of chewing gum.
Next chapter? Well, obviously Virmire, and maybe a bit more on what Roy's been up to in the Citadel. I'm not doing much about him at the moment, because he's mostly playing the waiting game. Of course, in this reality, it is not always the best idea. We shall see.
Reviews! Almost a full page of reviews last chapter, very awesome. Thanks everyone for the support!
Zeru'Xil: Haha, no kidding. When you think about it, it's almost disturbing how sweetly she does all that :D
Endrius: Thanks! Regarding the in-between, we'll see. There's some development I want to do, so I might need more than a few chapters, but gathering resources to fight the reapers might not be exciting to read in detailed length (spoiler? Hah, not really, what else could it be?).
Selias: Nope, the Conduit! The Citadel's end.
Tahkaullus01: He's still limited by the fact that he's not really allowed to do the one thing he really wants to do, which is tell Shepard everything. Freaking AI :D
LordGhostStriker: Hehe, she sure is. For someone who's gone through all she has, she sure is cheerful!
Toothless is best: Seems like it!
eurodox59: Hm, Tela. Now there's a thought. Thanks!
Uemei: Slippery as an eel, that's me! I haven't been able to find a timeline on Kasumi and Keiji, but considering Kasumi's 22 or 23 at the time of Mass Effect 1, he might still be alive. If the graybox is such a hot item, it's unlikely it'd just sit in a security box for over two years and Kasumi didn't try to steal it before. Nice idea with the Nihlus/Liara pairing, you've given me some food for thought regarding future events :)
bluemarlin: Yah, I'm trying not to have so many cliffhangers, but they keep happening!
general-joseph-dickson: Well, that's the twist this time! :D
FluxBlade: Haha, you're not wrong about Roy and the hug/strangle thing! Roy's caught between a rock and a hard place when it comes to ME2 Shepard. You can bet he'll try to stop it.
BJ Hanssen: Sorry! :( If it helps, I didn't see it coming either. But then when it popped out, I realized it made too much sense given the events aboard the geth shp. If Liara has the info Saren needs, he will get that no matter what.
So, next time? Obviously Virmire, and maybe a sneak peek at the Citadel. But probably just Virmire. Until then, thanks for reading! Ta-ta!