The Siege of Shanxi

Chapter Twenty Nine:…And Let the Sky Fall

"Yes, we tortured turian prisoners. Extracted information, coerced one into assisting us with our boarding of the Tyreaus. But any turian who wishes to claim moral superiority in these matters is forgetting the methods used by General Desolas Arterius and his chief interrogators to extract vital information on Shanxi from Ensign Clarissa Hobbs." –General Chekova. (Extract from 'Spies under Fire: Intelligence Gathering in a First Contact War' by Matriarch T'Res)

"Primek Tyreaus. One of the greatest generals in turian history. Rose from the ranks, brought peace to a warring people, eventually became the emperor of one of our mightiest pre-spaceflight civilisations. Stabbed in the back at the height of his reign. Rather a fitting name for that dreadnaught." Saren Arterius (Interview given on anniversary of Armistice Day, 2179)

It was a somewhat common practice amongst the different navies of different species that you left several guards on key areas in order to prevent sabotage. The Hierarchy only differed in this practice in that they believed that the best way to protect a sensitive area was to have so many guns on the outside of the ship that no one could get to the sensitive area in the first place.

Failing that, there was one defence that every dreadnaught had for particularly vulnerable points. Defences that by the standards of most other species would be overkill. Turians believed quite strongly in overkill.

When thirty human commandos stormed the main engineering compartment of the Tyreaus, they were met by two turians of the Last Watch.

Formed to combat and kill krogan en mass during the Rebellions, and continuously developed over a thousand years of peacekeeping operations, the Last Watch was the pinnacle of turian soldiery. Each one was the match of a regiment, fully operational.

McDevitt and his team had run into two of them.

The rout was sudden and brutal. Rotary mass driver cannon spooling up in a blur, McDevitt's lead operators were practically sawn in half. Plate and shielding could not stop weapons meant to destroy creatures whose natural hide could rival a light tank.

McDevitt hurled himself under a console, flinching as the deck tore up around him. He managed to grab his rifle and tuck it close. The situation was deteriorating. There was no possibility of breakthrough, not against foes like that, without decent cover or adequate anti-armour weapons. He gave the order.

"Fall back! Fall back! Cover from the door! Pull in from the left!" He grabbed a smoke grenade from his vest and hurled it over his cover. Like as not these things would be able to see through it, but he had to try something to prevent the complete destruction of his force.

Broken and bleeding, the Marines fled back the way they had come, leaving seventeen of their number dead and dying on the floor of the engineering deck.

-TSoS-

With one firefight on the bridge and another in main engineering, it was not exactly surprising that no one aboard the Tyreaus noticed that the central holding area had stopped answering its radio checks.

As with the other breaches the human boarders had executed, it was fast, efficient and committed with trained violence of action. Unlike the other breaches, there was no quick reaction force or walking army to hold them back, just bored rear echelon troops. Caught up in petty gambling or watching action vids, the turians experienced the same shock and awe as the other compartments. Rifles still collapsed, sidearms still in holsters, the turians had been expecting another mind-numblingly dull shift watching the compliant alien prisoners in the pens.

Gurung stepped over the bodies of the felled guards, nodding with satisfaction as he saw his men cracking open the prisoner pens. "Capital work, my lads. Enshaw! Crack open the trunks we brought and get these fellows armed!"

The captured Marines and militia streamed out of pens, eagerly grabbing the rifles and assault vests from the weapons trunks hauled along by Gurung's platoon.

"Colonel Gurung!" A familiar voice sounded behind Ganju, causing him to wheel about in shock.

"Colonel Pressly!" He exclaimed with surprise and heartfelt good cheer. There before him, battered and bruised, but still very much alive, stood Colonel Matthias Pressly. His hair was perhaps a little thinner and whiter than it had been before, and a bloody bandage covered his left hand, but the commander of 14th Reconnaissance Regiment still had a fire in his eyes. "I was completely unaware that our guests were running a nursing home."

For the first time since he had known him, Pressly favoured him with a laugh, before grabbing him in his bearlike arms and squeezing him fiercely.

"If I took the time to tell you how glad I am to see you, I'd just get captured all over again." Pressly lowered him to the ground.

"How the devil did they get you in the first place?"

"Ambush on my regimental headquarters as we were withdrawing. Lost my battle captain and personal signaller, God rest their souls. Situation devolved rapidly, was taken prisoner along with most of the company I had roped together. I had hoped to effect an escape on the surface, but we were shipped up here instead."

"How many men all up?"

"About forty to fifty per pen, and I've counted about eight pens."

Four hundred troops, then. Not as many as the general had hoped for, but still more than enough.

"Not all are Marines, Ganju." Pressly warned him. "About a hundred are civillians. These bastards seem to be identifying our social elite. They're doctors, teachers, community organisers. Most of the troops up here are officers and NCOs from the Fourteenth and First Militia."

In that case, much less than the general had hoped for. "No time to dwell on that now. We need to get you and your best officers and NCOs off this ship in the shuttles we brought. The rest of us are riding out on here on captured enemy transports."

Pressly looked surprised. "You've captured enemy transports?"

"No. We're going to, though."

=Resolute-One this is Resolute-Three.= Ganju's earpiece crackled back to life. =We have been pushed back from target. I say again, we have been pushed back from target. Main engineering is not in our hands.=

Ganju felt his gut tighten as he reached for his throat mike. =Resolute-Three, this is One. The hell do you mean you've been pushed back?=

The radio let out a blaze of static, cutting off some of the more effusive curses coming through it. =…cking walking tanks protecting the damn place. I lost half my men trying to push through, and now one of them is chasing us.=

"Walking tanks…?" Ganju paused. His instinctive reaction was to curse McDevitt for a coward, but he knew the young Marine well enough to acknowledge that he would not have pulled back unless he had no other option. =Three, this is One. Try and engage that pursuer with minimal risk. I will lead a secondary force to engineering and complete the mission.=

=Goddamn suicide mission, One. Bullets just bounce off these things.=

=I'll be very careful then. One, out.= Ganju looked over at Pressly. "Things are going tits-up, Matt. I need to fix the situation in engineering, make sure we can drop this thing out of the sky."

To his credit, Pressly didn't blink. "Blowing up enemy dreadnaughts? Has Joaquim completely lost his marbles?"

"To be fair, he really wanted you and the rest of the prisoners set free."

"Most kind of him to think of that little detail."

"Colonel! Colonel Pressly!"

The two of them wheeled around to see who spoke. Shoving her way through the crowd of prisoners was a short woman with dark hair, clad in a jumpsuit two sizes too big for her.

The familiar look of grandfatherly concern crossed Pressly's face. "Clarissa…"

"Colonel!" The woman came to a sharp halt in front of them. She nodded at Colonel Gurung. "Sir, Ensign Clarissa Hobbes of the SSV Leyte Gulf."

"Leyte…" Gurung looked astonished. "There were survivors?"

"No, sir." Hobbes shook her head. "Just me."

"The Ensign here has been on the receiving end of some very rough treatment." Pressly was grim faced. "They were able to derive a translation matrix from several conversations with her. Some of those conversations were polite, friendly almost. Others were not."

"Their General, Desolas Arterius, he was the worst, sir." Hobbes still had faint bruising on her face, but her demeanour was not that of a beaten woman. On the contrary, she appeared to be focused, clear eyed and level headed. "Once he knew our language, he started forcing me to learn his. I think he intended to use me as some kind of interpreter. His punishments if I failed to learn my lessons were…severe. But I can carry on a conversation reasonably well now. And even read a little."

"Read it…"

"Ganju, don't even think about it…"

"We don't have time to argue." Ganju spun around. "Ensign, are you volunteering to accompany us?"

"Yes, sir." Clarissa clenched her fists. "I've been a prisoner for weeks now. I want to help."

"Ganju, she's clearly suffering from prolonged malnourishment and…"

"Colonel, we're already behind schedule and taking more casualties than we anticipated." Ganju drew his sidearm and handed it to Hobbes. "If we don't blow main engineering now we may not get another chance to do so in the future. Now, I have tactical command of this mission and I intend to carry it out!"

He turned and grabbed one of his subordinates. "Harvey! I want you to assume command of this element. Get Colonel Pressly and all senior officers and NCOs to our landing craft. Staff Sergeant Burke will lead the rest to the other hangar bay designated in orders. We are running out of time!"

His eyes flicked to his watch. "God help us if Mack hasn't captured the bridge."

-TSoS-

For Desolas, his impetuous charge across the bridge was not induced by insanity or by a thirst for glory. When the enemy attempted to seize something you didn't particularly want him seizing, then you counter-attacked and threw him off it. The principle was the same whether you had five men or five hundred. And since Desolas only had five men, then he made do.

His armour was of Cipritine-make, with barriers specifically designed to stop explosive sniper rounds and minimize shock and shrapnel from airstrikes or artillery rounds, all likely threats that a general on the ground could face. A general's life was expensive, compiling decades of training and combat experience into one individual, and the Hierarchy forked out all necessary credits in order to protect that individual.

Desolas had gone outside his species for his sidearms, however. His primary sidearm, a product from Armali Industries, was a Reckoning X, a favourite of the Justicars. Asari loved playing around with shaped plasma, and at close quarters it had never failed Desolas.

A neat little salarian pocket pistol, with a punch that far outstripped its size, was tucked against the small of his back for emergencies. This qualified.

"With me! With me!" Desolas was accustomed to making himself heard over the roar of battle, and today was no different. His voice carried the full weight of his command, even as he let Oraka and three Lancer guards out of the ready room and into the melee on the bridge.

He scanned the room, compiled the data and began to mark targets immediately. His muscles did the work for him, leaving his brain free to analyse the situation. Only five enemy commandoes had gained the room against the withering fire from the other Lancers on the bridge. He could deal with five.

Desolas brought his pistol up, sights tracking the furthest boarder until his finger squeezed the trigger. The asari-made hand cannon sighed and vibrated in his hand, the thick blue bolt smashing through the primitive barriers of his target and melting through his armour like acid through a sheet.

Changing targets on the fly, Desolas dropped the second attacker with a blast to his side. The shaped plasma had much the same effect, burning through plate to soak into precious internal organs.

His right hand dropped and his left hand raised with his secondary pistol. He heard Oraka and the other Lancers fire, and saw another human drop, and yet another stagger backwards as his barriers were hammered with accurate rifle fire. For his part, Desolas took aim at the last soldier and opened fire.

His target flinched at the impact, but the pistol fire did not deter him from opening fire with his own weapon. Desolas felt the rounds strike his barrier and crumple against the powerful energy field. The turian's charge did not cease, three powerful strides carrying across the deck. Desolas struck savagely, the butt of his pistol connecting neatly with the side of the human's head.

A vulnerable spot for the asari, Desolas was pleased to see that it translated across species. The human gave a sharp cry as the blow connected and fell to the ground. Snatching his combat talon, Desolas drove it through the vulnerable point at the throat. His target gurgled, groaned, and then gave his death rattle as his blood flowed over the turian's feet.

With the Lancers now holding the door, Desolas wheeled on the bridge crew. "Activate internal defences!" He snapped with impatience, shaking the blood off his blade. "Track enemy movements, bring all Lancers to stand do and double the protective detail on Admiral Jhirx."

He stalked toward one of the dead Lancers, relieving the turian of his rifle and grenades. "And would someone get my thrice damned brother up here?"

-TSoS-

"Keep running!" McDevitt felt like his lungs were about to jump out his throat as he struggled to outpace the armoured monstrosity behind him. For how much armour it was burdened with, the damn thing moved faster than the devil in velvet.

Twice, McDevitt had tried to stand and fight the thing with grenades and co-ordinated fire. Twice he had lost two men. The nine men left standing now engaged in a furious cat and mouse game with their pursuer.

Out of breath, and rapidly running out of the grenades and flashbangs that were the only way to delay the damn thing, a decision was rapidly approaching McDevitt, one that he wished to avoid. If they could not evade it, was it better to die running from it or facing it down?

"Higgins!" He managed to pant over the inter-team comm. "Are we any closer to the landing bay or Colonel Gurung?"

The lead man was terse. "With this piece of shit diagram that turian prisoner drew for the colonel I could be leading you to the main barracks and not have a fucking clue."

"Then get me a fucking exit, a hiding place. Something!"

"Mate, all I've got in front of me is more fucking corridors, and what looks like a…oh…"

"What in all the bloody hells is an…oh…"

"Yeah?"

"That'll work."

-TSoS

Now accompanied by a squad of Lancers, the Last Watch unit continued its pursuit of the enemy soldiers who had dared board the dreadnaught. Vision was restricted by the ceiling and by corridors that felt cramped and narrow compared to the battlefield. The enemy fell easily enough that the unit did not feel the need to request more backup than already accompanied it.

Once, the unit had possessed a name. A family. A life outside the suit. But it had given all of that up in order to serve. All turians must serve. But some were called to service above and beyond any other skill in the turian profession of arms.

Duty had taken Unit 72 into the heart of the Terminus Systems, into the depths of batarian slaving pins, into the horrors of krogan pirate raids.

Compared to these places, chasing down soft skinned primates that had dared to storm its position was no more difficult than undergoing weekly maintenance.

The chase itself held no new excitement. 72 pulsed its targeting scanner twice every ten seconds, the fleeing targets fruitlessly firing behind them in attempt to slow the unit down. But they were running out of energy, and fast running out of room. Hunter/killer teams of Lancers were sweeping through the corridors of the vessel, setting up blocking positions and sealing off potential avenues of escape. It was a matter of minutes at most.

Turning left, 72 observed a curved corridor, with his internal nav noting that there was an intersection twenty metres beyond it. He pulsed his scanners again. Nine targets remaining. One identifiable as a commander. Priority target. Low grade armour, low grade weapons. Threat? Minimal.

They appeared to be setting an ambush at the intersection. It would take more than nine slow velocity rifles to so much as scratch his plating. 72 would simply walk straight through it.

The primates engaged him with everything they had. Two more grenades were set off in front him, and a weight of fully automatic fire caused the Lancers behind him to break away into more advantageous cover. 72 couldn't fault them. They could not complete their mission if they were killed now. Advancing under fire was dangerous, but was made easier by thick armour and a heavy weapon.

Feet planted firmly on the deck, 72 began to fire. As predicted, the primates scattered as fast as the rotary cannon could fire into them. Analysis of their flight showed two separate groups breaking off down separate tracks. Logic aids assisted in making the decision, but soldier's instinct made 72 decide to turn toward the group fleeing with the commander.

As 72 advanced, audio receptors picked up something screamed by the commander. Translation software kicked in, and an audio stream filtered through to 72.

The words were confusing. 'Blow it. Blow it. Blow it.' What did that…?

Digital optics flicked back to the central point of the intersection. A circular door occupied the space. Above it, printed in neat, orderly script, were the words 'MAINTENANCE AIRLOCK 5'.

72 didn't need a logic sub-routine to figure out what was about to happen.

Wrapped within the layers of the battlesuit, 72 was only mildly shaken by the detonation itself. The explosive decompression, however, was quite difficult to miss. First the inner, then outer airlock erupted as high explosives detonated around the seal.

The hole should not have been large enough for 72 to fit, but the swift and violent egress of two tons of turian and battlesuit was more than enough to widen it. Some of the Lancers were blasted out with him. Those that had helmets would be alright, 72 calculated. Their onboard emergency air would last them till rescue. But those who had chosen a fast entry into the fight above personal security…a spike of pain went through 72 as he witnessed the brave soldiers writhing helplessly in the ether as the decompression blasted them too far away from the ship to hope for any kind of rescue.

72 was in perfect operating condition. The Last Watch was impossibly expensive to produce. Incredibly difficult to destroy. Even so much as volunteering required mental and physical robustness surpassing over ninety percent of the turian profession of arms. Even before augmentation 72 would not have panicked at being blasted out of a dreadnaught. After? It was no more than an inconvenience.

Quietly floating in the ether, Unit 72 reassessed its combat tactics. The use of an airlock to cause an explosive decompression had not been anticipated. A foolish oversight. The next engagement would be more carefully approached.

Angling its thrusters, 72 began to drift back toward the dreadnaught, slowly pulsing its distress beacon for pickup.

-TSoS-

"Son of a bitch, we're getting fucked up here!" Harper ducked back into cover as the weight of fire from the newly arriving security forces increased substantially. "Mack, how much HE do we have left?"

"Two grenades a man, and we're out of gold-tops for the grenade launchers. Casualties?"

"Eight dead, three incapacitated." Harper shook his head. "Mack, I don't think we can do any more here. They've been reinforced, we've lost the initiative."

Mackenzie glanced back before he rattled off another burst that pierced the armour of a charging foe and dropped him in a pile of his own gore. "Gurung said…"

"He said not to worry about casualties. He didn't say to throw our lives away trying to take a target that was beyond our reach."

"There must be some way…"

"Trust me, if I could guarantee these bastards get fragged by strapping C6 to my chest and charging right in, I'd do it. But I can't." Harper paused only to grab a grenade from his chest rig and pitch it toward the enemy. "All we can do is buy more time for the others to complete their objectives, and we'll do that better with a fighting withdrawal rather than allowing ourselves to be fixed, flanked and destroyed."

He knew that retreat came no more easily to the mind of a professional soldier than surrender, but it was the only viable tactical option. Mack was aggressive and hungry for the kill. That had always been his strength. But he was no more willing to dash himself upon an impregnable defensive line than Jack was, not without some chance of success.

"OK. We're going to fall back corridor by corridor." Mack's voice cracked a little as he forced himself away from the firefight. "Three man teams, one fighting, one running, one securing. Harper, you lead. Go now. Now!"

-TSoS-

"They're falling back." Oraka holstered his pistol as he looked at the security feeds. "We've won."

"No, we've set them off balance." Desolas growled. "There is still a heavily armed enemy presence aboard this ship. More than one. I want status reports from all departments. Reorient hunter-killer teams toward hangar bays. I want to know where they landed and where they plan to escape from."

"Sir!" A Third Talon of Lancers looked up from his console. "Unit 68 reports that it has repulsed an attack on main engineering. Unit 72 is reporting that the enemy caused an explosive decompression ten corridors away from main engineering."

"Where is Unit 72 now?"

"He's…floating outside, sir."

Desolas simply sighed. Why his Legion had been denied access to Last Watch units he would never know. A tremendous waste of resources, leaving two of them to guard main engineering. Though perhaps…not such a waste now.

"So main engineering is secure, what else?"

"We're not receiving any reports from the central holding area."

"They're after the prisoners. Of course. Of course!" Desolas cursed himself for not seeing it before. "The attacks on main engineering, on the bridge…they're just diversions. They want those prisoners back."

"They know where our weak spots are. How to get onboard." Oraka pointed to the breaches. "How did they get that information?"

"The same way we did." Desolas lifted his omni-tool. "They took a prisoner, they turned him, they wrung him for information."

"Turians do not…"

"There are thousands of soldiers in this Legion, Colonel. And I would not stake my life on every single one of them having the capability to withstand what the enemy is capable of dishing out."

"Desolas!" A young voice, with an edge of panic to it, sounded as Saren Arterius pushed his way onto the bridge. "Are you alright?"

"Alive and well." Desolas clasped his brother firmly. "Worry not for my life, brother. The blade has not yet been forged with my name inscribed upon it."

"How many commandos are there?" Jhirx was still throwing on a uniform jacket as she was escorted in by her security detail. "How many of these primates have boarded my ship?"

"Excellent to see you as well, Admiral." The general's tone was dry. "Colonel?"

"Looks like fifty to a hundred troopers from what we're reading on the scanners. We've severely decimated their numbers, though. Their troops assaulting the bridge and main engineering have been repulsed. We're confident that we can now isolate and destroy them piecemeal." Oraka had donned a headset, slipping into the role of a security chief without a single pause in his momentum. A further reminder to Desolas of the younger officer's versatility and capability. When this was over, no matter how it ended, Oraka would be receiving a much earned promotion, the General decided then and there. It heartened him that in the middle of a stinking, grubby campaign, the bright lights of talent and competence still managed to shine through.

"We'll break this down into three areas of responsibility." Desolas decided. "I will lead a securing force to main engineering, lock it down in case of a final attack. Oraka, you will pursue the prisoners and re-capture them. See if you can get us a few new ones. Saren?"

"Sir?"

"Pursue these attackers. Take prisoners if you can, if not destroy each and every one of them."

-TSoS-

Ganju hated rushing battle plans. The most detailed battle orders inevitably went to shit in a firefight, let alone new ones made up on the fly. Precision, detail and meticulous preparation had been his career trademark, and he was loathe to take shortcuts in any situation.

That being said, just because he hated them didn't mean he wasn't good at them.

"Initial breach was only through the main door." He barked at his fireteam leaders as they moved. "But there are two other entrances. We will strike all three simultaneously, a diversionary force through the main door, a secondary force will come from a maintenance corridor coming up from the backup power generators."

He grabbed a bandolier of forty millimetre grenades from Michalaske. "The last group will be with me. We will use the upper access corridor to come in on top of the mezzanine. The plan is simple. Hammer the blighter with HE until he either collapses from the stress or dies of old age. Watch your arcs carefully. We want to hit him on three sides with enough firepower to bring down a mountain, not light each other up in the process."

"Sir, we won't be able to get good firing positions until you start hitting him from the rear." Corporal Stoll hefted his machine gun.

"Just get his attention for a few seconds. Let us get the top shot." Ganju prepped his rifle, a mass accelerator with an underslung grenade launcher. H-Hour will be in three minutes. Patch, Bobby, don't be late."

"Sir, what's my part in this?" Clarissa jogged a little to keep up with Ganju's rapid pace. "Can I have a heavier weapon?"

"Do you know how to use a heavier weapon?" Cracking the barrel on the launcher, Ganju slid a High Explosive Dual Purpose round into the breech. The 'gold top' was capable of cutting down infantry or penetrating light armour. Hopefully the effect would be good.

"Give me a soldier's five, sir."

"A soldier's five is useful for a little catching up on navigation, or to give some tips for stowing gear." The laser sight on the launcher winked on as the auto-targeting chip began scanning for targets. "Now is not the time for me to give you a detailed course on a complex weapons systems."

"Sir." The frustration in the Ensign's voice was palpable. "They killed my friends, locked me up, beat the living crap out of me. I want to help."

"Ensign." Ganju turned to face her. "You can help me best by keeping yourself alive. Now, the enemy is enacting counter-penetration measures against us as we speak. I need to blow this ship, and blow it fast. I can't do that unless I have someone who can give me at least a rough idea of what the hell is written on the instructions. Now, do you want to kill these bastards?"

"Of course."

"You staying alive is the difference between killing one of them and getting every last one."

Clarissa was silent.

"Stay back, Cantwell will stay with you to protect you." Ganju's voice brooked no argument. Tucking his rifle under his shoulder he increased his pace to a run. "Charlie Team, single file on me! Let's go, let's go!"

-TSoS-

Stoll was exceptionally slow with his footsteps as he entered into the final corridor leading to the main entrance. His weapon was already cocked, with the safety catch set to fire. The ammunition link was pressed tight against the weapon so it wouldn't clink against it.

Sweat flowed down his face as he pushed himself up next to the door. Behind him, the rest of his team slid into position. All four had prepped grenades and satchel charges. There was enough firepower in his squad to bring down half a platoon.

Unless whatever was in there cut them to pieces first.

Slowly, so slowly as to be almost motionless, he edged himself around the door, slowly gaining a line of sight into the room while keeping himself tucked against cover. The weight of his weapon made it sag up and down in his hands. His finger trembled against the trigger. He forced himself to centralise his thoughts, bringing his stretched nerves under control for just a few seconds longer.

He almost missed it against the background of the engineering deck. It was just standing there, stock still, as if listening to the air. Its eye slits were blank, unreadable. Stoll took in a slow, deep breath, then rested his sights on the monster's neck area. He exhaled, a little too loudly.

The cannon held in the behemoth's arms moved in an instant, now pointing at him.

"OPEN FIRE!" Stoll yanked the trigger, sidestepping across the entrance to allow his teammates space to engage. Bullets punched through the air around him, and he felt a savage sting in his bicep. Adrenaline kicked in and he kept shooting, putting from his mind the sickening feel of his own blood flowing down his arm.

The team opened up in unison, return fire sizzling through the air and cracking against the armoured shell of the guardian.

From behind, an identical stream of automatic fire thudded into the unit. Vulnerable rear joints and servos exposed, the unit immediately dropped the auto-cannon and turned around to engage the flankers with its arm blaster. Firepower split, the unit did not immediately prioritise the squad entering through the upper level and spreading out along the mezzanine.

From three directions, the Marines engaged the unit from less than twenty metres. The violence of firepower momentarily gave the unit pause. Battle logic sub-routines kicked in. Trying to split fire three ways was not working. Alternate tactics would need to be employed.

Swapping targets back to the main entrance, the unit brought up both arm blasters and activated shoulder mounted micro-missiles. Stoll had a brief glimpse of a sheet of fire before he and his squad were liquidated by a flying wall of metal pieces.

Threat one disposed of, the unit swapped targets to the upper level.

Enshaw didn't give it time to fire. Priming the grenade launcher in his hands, he fired dead centre of the monster's throat. The K-Tech made grenade launcher had a priming distance of eighteen to twenty metres to prevent accidental friendly fire in case a round failed to launch properly. Enshaw simply hoped he was outside of twenty metres.

He was. But that didn't save him. The dull puff of flame and black smoke that accompanied the detonation of the round staggered the enemy, but did not stop it from raising its arm blaster and firing a plasma burst into Enshaw's chest. The young corporal froze in midair for a second, then gave a sigh as he slumped to the ground, a hole the size of Gurung's fist punched clear through the man's torso.

Gurung didn't give the creature time to recover. Lifting his own grenade launcher, he aimed directly at Enshaw's first hit and was granted the satisfaction of his target dropping its arms and staggering back, momentarily stunned.

It was now or never. He got a running start and charged.

With a savage cry, Ganju hurled himself from the mezzanine, dropping two metres down onto the monster's back. The damage done by Enshaw's grenade was more obvious up close. There was a gap in the joint now, a hole where the flexible armour mesh met the plate. It seemed the logical place to jam a stick of C6.

He jumped clear even as the beast made to shake him off. He felt a nasty twist in his ankle as he landed, but retained the presence of mind to depress the clacker in his hand. He was deafened by the roar and blinded by the flash and he felt all his organs tremble from the concussions. He vomited violently as he fell to the floor, writhing helplessly as he tried to shake off the shock of the blast.

Blinking like an owl and gaping like a fish, he slowly climbed to his feet. The remaining Marines gazed at him with awe. At another time, Ganju might have been chuffed that he could still impress men twenty years his junior. Half concussed and hurling his guts up was not that time.

"Secure the perimeter." He rasped. "Get Hobbs in here."

-TSoS-

Hobbs blanched slightly as she saw the bodies on the floor, but to her credit her stride did not falter. Sitting down at a computer she began tapping carefully at the console. "I'm bringing up what would be the master reactor board on any Alliance vessel."

"Alright, get me an overload option." Ganju was holding his ribs and limping slightly, but he would not take himself to a medic, nor would he self-administer a painkiller.

In his early days of soldiering, Ganju had been nominated to his battalion's reconnaissance platoon. On one of the final tests before the course began, he was required to take part in a foot attack. Halfway through the battlefield clearance, whilst carrying one of the simulated casualties on his back, he had rolled his ankle on rough ground.

Rather than complain of his injury and be removed from the course (and wait another year for his chance) Ganju simply concealed his injury for a few days during the final stages of the pre-selection. In the week that followed he cossetted his aching joint back into full health and then got on the bus to the course, which he passed with flying colours.

It was an important lesson, which he learned early and well. To endure injury as part of the line of duty was all well and good, but you didn't do it unless you had two things, a damn good reason to endure it, and the knowledge that there was only a few steps to go.

Ganju was ready to take those steps, but he was fast running out of leg space. "Clarissa?"

"It's not..I'm not…there is no overload option. At least…not here." Hobbs tapped in a few more commands. "We design our vessels so that the Chief Engineer can squeeze every last piece of juice out of the reactor if the situation warrants it."

"So either the turians don't give their engineers that kind of power or it's down further than you can reach."

"Basically."

It was not something Ganju had expected specifically, but he could have guessed that more delays would come up.

"What does this say?" Ganju pointed to another part of the layout. Four identical bubbles, two fore and two aft, port and starboard. It was something that seemed vaguely familiar, he was vastly irritated with himself for his lapse in memory.

Hobbs glanced at it. "Those would be the fuel tanks. It's a dreadnaught, it must refit, refuel and resupply hundreds of fighters and transports."

"Could one of those make a big enough bang to bring down the ship?"

The young ensign paused to consider it. "It might. But if this was an Alliance ship there'd be auto-fire suppressors and vents to dump the fuel load so it couldn't damage the ship. It'd be impossible…"

"Ensign." Ganju grabbed her shoulder as she began to ramble. "If this was an Alliance ship, would there be a way to spoof those suppressors?"

"Well…yes. Yes there would be. I could…if I searched around I bet there'd be a diagnostic function. Something to take the safety systems offline for maintenance…but there'd be backups controlled from the bridge…if we did it then they'd just…"

"That's all I need. Stay here, and when I give the word you activate the diagnostic function and not a second before."

"But I haven't even found it yet!"

Gurung gave her a patient smile. "So start looking, Ensign."

-TSOS-

=Mack? Harper? Where are you? We've secured the transports two decks down from where you landed.=

"We're en route, Colonel." Harper snarled through his ragged breathing. "We've got enemy troops right up our ass and we're loaded with wounded, so you'd better have a welcome party for us."

=I'll have a platoon meet you= Pressly promised. =Did you achieve your goals at the bridge?=

"Negative, we caught a brief glimpse of Desolas Arterius, but we were repelled before we could take the fight to him. And we didn't see anyone matching the description of Admiral Jhirx."

=Right. We're going to cut this fella, Lieutenant 'Vyrnnus' loose, as promised then. He's got the ceasefire terms, right?=

"Right. Though I don't think they'll feel like talking after we blow this…"

Harper didn't believe, as Mack did, that you could make an operator out of nothing. Skills could be learned, tactics could be taught, strength could be acquired, but instinct you either had or you didn't. Luck too, couldn't be absorbed out of a book.

The kind of luck that made him trip and the kind of instinct that made him roll just as a turian appeared out of literally fucking nowhere and blasted a stun gun where Jack's chest had been a second earlier.

With his momentum still with him, Jack barrelled into his attacker and tackled him to the ground. With an ease of motion, the turian flipped the mercenary over his head and into a wall like he was tossing a pillow.

The turian kipped back to his feet, only to eat Shepard's fist as the N7 came to Harper's aid. Rolling with the punch, the turian kicked out one of Shepard's legs and hammered his elbow into the side of the human's helmet. Shepard went limp and fell to the floor.

Eva and Hislop attacked in synchronisation, but they might as well have been moving in slow motion. The turian ducked under Eva's kick and casually leaned out of the way of Ben's wild haymaker, then responded with a sweeping leg that sent Eva toppling into Ben.

In seconds, all four humans were sprawled out on the floor, the turian looking down at them with something akin to amusement.

"Over so soon?"

The translator was monotone, but it didn't mask the sneer. Harper dragged Eva back to her feet while Shepard and Ben groggily got back up.

Harper stepped forward. "You're between us and our way out."

"Well then," the turian chirruped casually. "That does make things simple."

Harper went high, Shepard went low. The turian sidestepped them like a pair of charging koalas, pausing only to drop an elbow into Harper's kidney and deliver another kick to Shepard's leg. The armour plate was preventing the full force of the injuries from translating to organs and ligaments, but the strikes were hard enough to cause more than a little stinging and the accompanying loss of mobility.

Eva landed a kick and paid for it with blow to the solar plexus that left her gasping for air. Ben tried to close to grappling range and was punished with a series of punches that left his face looking like a steak.

Wheeling and dealing around each other, the four humans tried to punch, kick, grapple with or draw weapons on the turian. It would have been comical, had not every punch been intended to cripple, every knife thrust intended to maim, every shot that missed intended to kill.

Shepard fell against the wall, blood dripping into his eyes. Unable to wipe it off because of his helmet, he settled for grabbing at his sidearm. It was a fast draw. A fast aim. The turian was still faster, crossing the ground and jabbing his claws into the exposed mesh under Shepard's armpit.

The shock made him drop the pistol…right into arm's reach of Hislop. The bigger man scrambled for the sidearm, causing the turian to seize Shepard and drag him in front of him right as the mercenary fired twice.

"No!" Harper grabbed Ben's gun arm, but the damage was done. Shepard grunted in pain as he went slack in the turian's grip.

Without pause, the turian flung Shepard into Harper, then launched a flying knee into Eva. Ben crashed into it again, the bear like form of the man pushing him back several metres before the turian could brace himself.

"Go!" The mercenary was red in the face as he grappled with the alien. "Get to safety!"

Amongst soldiers there was a special code for moments such as this. 'Leave no one behind' was the expression, with the explicit understanding that nobody would be left alone to fight by themselves.

Amongst mercenaries, that code was taken as more of a helpful phrase than a hard and fast rule. Pausing only to scoop up Mack, Harper beat feet down the hallway, followed closely by Eva. She threw a look over her shoulder to see Ben being beaten to the ground again by his turian opponent. Going back would have been heroic, but one did not become rich and breathing by being heroic.

Ben would have happily agreed if their positions were reversed. Or at least, that was the thought Eva quickly sealed in with the rest of her memories as she followed Jack to the shuttles and what would pass for safety. Ben thought it was fair that he pay the bill this time, that was his decision and she applauded him for it. Under different circumstances, she might have done the same.

Might have.

-TSOS-

The element of surprise was gone. The one thing preventing the suicide attack from actually shuffling off the mortal coil was taken from them. No more tricks, no more surprises. It was down to the old ways. Close quarters shooting, hand to hand combat, teeth and blades where necessary.

Ganju had not seen such a fight in years. It was more terrifying than he remembered.

He had swapped out his mass accelerator for one of the turian's weapons, as had the rest of his team. As of yet, they were fighting their way through mechanics and technicians, but the enemy marines could not be far behind.

The weapon in his hands was truly a joy to handle. More importantly, it punched through the shields of his targets in a way his previous weapon did not.

Through corridor after corridor he fought his way onwards, grimly aware of the men who fell protecting his flanks. The enemy seemed confused by his advance, as if they didn't know what he was fighting toward. Gurung was not about to tell them that he was trying to blow up the aft port fuel reservoir.

The bucking of the rifle was hurting his hands and shoulder, his adrenaline was running dry. His ankle was still screaming with pain. But he would not give in. Not while there was still work to be done.

This was where he belonged.

Nau fell, so did Patch and Bobby. Young men he'd known only so briefly, snuffed out. But he could not stop to render them proper honour, he simply grabbed their grenades and moved on.

Only Stoll and he were still standing when they reached the room Hobbs had directed them to.

"Alright, tell me what I'm looking at, Ensign." Ganju pulled the explosives from his rear pouch.

=It's a pumping station of some kind. The regulators manage the flow to the hangar decks in that sector. You trigger that, the explosion should flow both ways, down to the hangars and up to the main tanks.=

"Sir, we've got hostiles coming up behind us!" Stoll yelled, his gun cutting a swathe through the fast approaching enemy marines. "How long do you need?"

"As long as you can give me!" Ganju yelled back as he grabbed the satchel charges. Crossing over to a series of valves, he began unscrewing them or smashing the glass plates on what he assumed were testing tanks for fuel purity. Fuel spilled onto the floor around him, and he began shoving the charges into the tanks he could, or simply arming them and slinging them around the top of the main pump.

"Sir!"

"Just a few more seconds, Stoll!"

A burst of turian gunfire cut off whatever the Marine was trying to say. Ganju hurled the last satchel charge, and turned just in time to shoot off a burst at the turian rushing his back.

The attacker managed to get off a burst as he fell, a burst that hammered into his armour and pierced his lower ribcage. He fell to his knees, breathing heavily

Ganju looked up. They were coming, tall figures in black armour. His vision was blurring, he couldn't make out the details. No time or energy left for marksmanship. He settled for raising his sidearm and pulling the trigger. It was horrendous shooting, his grandfather would have beaten him back and blue for shooting from the hip, but it served the desired effect. The turians stopped their advance to fire back, he retreated further back into the chamber. He looked back at his watch. Only three minutes left. Right now, the shuttles would be lifting off from the hangar bays.

Pressly would the get the boys and girls to safety. They would get the General the manpower he needed to carry out his plan, get the civilians to safety. They would all live to fight another day.

He checked the magazine. Three shots left. That would not buy him one minute, let alone three. So be it. His ribs screamed and his ankle sobbed, but he did not permit it to hamper his range of movement.

It was easy, so easy, to endure injury when the end was so close.

He unsheathed his khukuri. The folded steel glowed in the strange alien lightning.

A slow tear escaped his eye.

Not of grief…of joy.

This…this was where he belonged.

"Ayo Gorkhali!"

-TSOS-

Septimus Oraka had seen many of the new species die down on their planet. They died in many ways. Some died like salarians, frantically searching for a way out. Some died like asari, breaking down and pleading as they were finally broken. Some died like batarians, with a curse on their lips. Like krogan and vorcha they kicked and bit. But he had yet to see one die like a turian. He had not seen one die because they planned to.

The human who came out of the fuel purification centre had a plan. And courage. It took nothing to surrender to the rage, any animal could do that. But to know with certainty that death was imminent and to be fully in control of yourself despite that…it was a courage Septimus had never seen outside his own species.

Septimus saw the fuel spilling out of an opened sample hatch. He didn't need to order his men to hold their fire, he knew they would do that anyway. The human didn't have the same problem, snapping off a quick two rounds as he closed the distance between himself and the Lancers.

A terrible warcry was on his lips, a scream that made Oraka shiver with something uncomfortably similar to fear. He raised his knife, as did his men.

Kace fell first with a gaping gash in his throat. Wihran followed him as the tiny human neatly lopped off his weapon hand and almost casually drove his blade up through the sergeant's armpit and twisted it into his lung. Marn actually parried the human's first strike, and his second, but missed the peculiar thrust that skated over his raised blade and found its end through his left eye.

And then, as if he hadn't just cut down three battle hardened soldiers like they were volus bankers, the human was upon Septimus. Their knives met, but Oraka had no intention of trying to fence a superior opponent. He had won every fight in his life by using clever tactics to achieve his simple strategy. No reason to change that just because his blood was up.

He gave ground willingly, allowing the human to over-extend himself on what was clearly an injured ankle. And when he struck again, Oraka punished him for it, hooking his free hand in a vicious punch right into the ribcage that the human was protecting just a little too hard.

The human gasped and staggered. Oraka knew he had him then. He lunged this time, the human parried him, but his move was slower than before and Oraka hit him in the ribs again, then lashed a leg right into the bad leg.

The human's eyes took on a strange gleam as he fell against the wall for support. Septimus knew he should call for the men behind him to finish his opponent, but he could not do so. Not when his claw-dagger was in hand.

He feinted high and the human fell for it, just in time for Septimus to sink his blade into the human's shoulder and down into the soft organs in his chest cavity. The curved knife fell from the human's hand as if his fingers had suddenly lost their bones.

The human let out a pained sigh. "Endure." He breathed the word as if it was to himself. "Finish."

"You are done." Septimus felt no rage toward the man as he rested his free hand on his other shoulder. "Surrender with honour."

He felt the human's arm move under his hand. And then he felt something press against his midsection. He had just enough time to curse himself for a fool before the last round in the human's pistol exploded in his gut.

He and the human toppled to the ground together, yellow eyes meeting brown. There was no hatred in their gaze. Merely admiration in the turian's eyes, and a surprising degree of reassurance in the human's.

Red blood mingled with blue on the deck between them, until the Lancers grabbed Oraka and began to drag him away from the impending detonation that they had discovered in the fuel chamber.

"The human!" Oraka snarled through his pain. "Get the human as well!"

His men understood. One did not leave a gallant foe's body to fate. It would anger the Spirits beyond measure.

-TSOS-

Hobbs heard the gunfire in the corridors outside. She heard the heavy boots crash on the deck.

She had little to no business being here, she knew that. Her presence here was an accident, an afterthought of some cosmic joke. Communications ensigns did not win battles. They did not shift the course of wars. That wasn't the way things went.

But maybe…just maybe, she had done both today.

She heard the footsteps stop behind her. Calmly, in full control of herself, she stood up and turned around. Desolas Arterius looked at her with something she had never seen in his eyes in all their sessions, in all his beatings.

A hint of respect.

"I won here." She told him quietly.

He spread his hands. "Yes, you did."

He shot her clean in the head. She barely felt a thing.

-TSOS-

Pressly met Jack as he entered the captured shuttle. His eyes flicked the man cradled in the mercenary's arms. "Medics!"

"Get the ramp up!" Harper yelled as he placed Mack on the deck for the attention of the corpsman.

"What about the others? Where's Colonel Gurung?"

Harper looked at him grimly. "If he's not here by now, he's not coming."

He could see the indecision in Pressly's eyes, the fatal hesitation that would get them all killed. "Sir, if we don't get the fuck out of here then we'll lose what little we've gained!"

"I know, hang you, I know." Pressly's hands shook. "Pilot! Lift off immediately."

"Sir, the air defences…"

"If Colonel Gurung hasn't disabled them by now he never will."

"Harp…Harper…"

Jack felt a hand weakly grabbing at his armour. He looked down, Mackenzie looked up at him helplessly. The medic was working furiously, but the blood was flowing an ugly black colour.

"What is it?" He took Shepard's hand as he felt the deck shuddering underneath them as the engines powered up. "What is it, Mack?"

The man's voice was barely a whisper. "Don't let them win, Harp. Don't let them…beat us…"

The pilot lifted the craft off the pad, the vessel shaking under his uncertain hands. Somehow he managed to stabilise it, then Pressly triggered the remote override on the bay doors. The landing craft blasted out into space, barely dodging a slew of anti-fighter lasers that zeroed in on its position.

"Port engine is down!" The pilot yelled. "We're losing speed. One more hit and…"

The explosion behind them was almost beautiful to a spaceborn observer. Fuel burnt quickly, and in vacuum there was no oxygen to prolong the flame. The aft port quarter of the dreadnaught flared with a gigantic ball o orange flame for a microsecond before the vacuum smothered it.

Too big to be utterly destroyed by the blast, the dreadnaught simply hung in space, like a gigantic beast with a limb bitten off.

Harper didn't bother watching it. He cradled Mack in his arms, his friend's blood drying on him as those energetic grey eyes faded.

-TSOS-

Mack was his closest friend, but he was not Mack's. Their relationship, as lively and fun as it had been, was always based around their work.

Mack hadn't asked him to look after his family. Harper appreciated that. He didn't know Mack's family and they didn't know him. No doubt Mack had other friends who would look after his loved ones. He had entrusted Harper with saving Shanxi. A much more realistic request. One that he would honour.

Eva stared back at the ship. The woman's heart was as mercenary as his own. She would not have been a partner in his business otherwise. But he would allow her some measure of grief for now.

"Was it worth it?"

He amended that thought. She wasn't grieving, just processing. Perhaps he was the one grieving and projecting it onto her? Stranger things had happened.

"Doing nothing would have been worse."

"We could have hidden in the mountains. Mack would be alive. Ben would be here."

"And what? Wait to die? Surrender to be penned in like the men we rescued? This isn't anti-pirate work, Eva, this is war. People die."

"And what about you, Ben and me? We're mercenaries. What's the point in getting paid to fight if you're not alive to spend the money?"

"What's the point in being alive when your credibility is shot because you didn't do the job you were paid for?" Jack shook his head. "Believe me, all our debts are going to be paid, Eva. The ones we're owed…and the ones we've just acquired."

-TSOS-

A/N: Food for thought. Did Saren (yes, I didn't name him in the segment, that was intentional) cause Mack's death? Or did you notice that he didn't employ his own lethal arsenal even after Hislop attempted to kill him? Could it be that Mack's death was just an accident of war? As I've said before, turian and human-wank is equally bad, and I refuse to ascribe intrinsic evil to the actions even of one of the game's villains (whose actions were not motivated by evil intentions anyway).

Truth be told, I always feel a little guilty posting these updates, especially when I promise at the end of each one that the next one will be faster. I felt particularly guilty about how many characters I was killing off in this, but I could just no longer justify the existence of so many in the main storyline. Hobbs was a loose end I was supposed to tie up ages ago, but then the plotline spiralled out of control as I realised I'd completely fucked my timings to the extent that it would require a Halo:First Strike level of Deus Ex Shining Crystal to explain their co-ordination. Hopefully I tied up her storyline here in a way that doesn't make me look like a hack.

Gurung? I was torn over who to kill between him and Pressly. I'd tossed up between them, but in the end I decided that I was already killing off Mack (a character who I haven't developed nearly enough) and it'd just be silly to kill off everyone's ancestors.