Chapter 36: Stolen Memories.

The barrier was down. The DNA and Voice lock were a snap to bust into once the samples were properly activated. As for the surveillance, Kasumi practically scoffed at cameras as she wiped their memory and hacked into their CPUs giving them false readings that all was clear.

In the mean time, Shepard let out a sigh of relief as she shed the tight little black dress and pulled on the formfitting underlay of her hardsuit. Adjusting each piece of her armor was a welcome respite, it felt like home. The Spectre was never more glad to be in the armor than she was at that very moment. Once all her weapons were in place she even relaxed a little which made the thief chuckle in bemusement.

Shepard tossed the dress and heels into the vacant cavity of the statue and waited while Kasumi slipped on her own armor. "Sorry to see this stuff go." She said placing her own 'costume' along side the Commander's. "Cost a pretty penny to get that custom needle work."

"Just nick something else in that vault and sell it to 'your people' and have another one made."

The Japanese woman stared at the Spectre with a dumbfounded expression. "Wait you'd let me openly steal something?"

Taking back Keiji's stolen memories didn't count as theft in the Spectre's books or even in Samara's Justicar Code as they belonged legitimately to Kasumi in the first place. After all she was Keiji's 'next-of-kin' and they were his memories. Taking anything else from Hock however was true theft, even if he was a charismatic dirt bag. Besides they had already taken several thousand credits in the chits they found in sofas and safes, taking anything else wasn't going to compound the crime any further. Well as long as it was small or so the Spectre told herself. Not that she had room to talk; Shepard had after all stolen the SR-2 from Cerberus, slapped a new coat of paint on it and called it hers.

"Call it 'reclaiming contraband that somehow got lost in the line of custody.' Just don't do it with anything on the Normandy and if you have... you're going to give it back." Shepard shrugged indifferently.

The vault doors opened, both Kasumi and Shepard whistled at the vast cavern of treasure before them. There had to be a dozen different statues from all over the galaxy from practically every race. Double that number of priceless artefacts tucked away in display cases. For a brief moment the Normandy women just stared.

"So this is Hock's vault? Very nice!" Kasumi was near breathless. Shepard would have joked at her companion's expense that Kasumi was having theftgasms if she wasn't feeling so giddy herself. This was going to be fun. "I've got a scanner that will home in on the graybox. It's not far."

Shepard nodded as a slight beeping began. Like any standard issue app on an Omni-tool the closer the proximity to the item in question the faster the beeps came. Still it didn't hurt to have a look around.

They came first to a very well known historical statue of a young Hebrew shepherd king. Its cracked and broken body stood tall and proud like a shattered sentinel at the doors right and yet it was still stunning to be hold.

"Michelangelo's David?!" Kasumi gasped. "Wow! Just wow! Think we could get this out through the door?"

Shepard chuckled. "I wish. Imagine the fanfare if we returned it."

"Fanfare? Oh no no no. Not the way to go if you want to stay off the grid Shep. Hey! There we go The Good Shepherd for the good Shepard."

"That was bad, Kas even for your punning."

"Hey...it was right there."

"Yeah, yeah. Come-on I want to see what else this bastard has squirreled away." The Spectre ignored the beeping and the thief as she turned to David's right. Almost immediately she recognized the iconic Ilosian art

"Creepy..." Kasumi looked at the 'Pilot' which was seat in its chair looking half organic as its long fingers melded into its 'throne'

"That had to put him back." The Commander shook her head. "It's from Ilos. They were all over the place. Liara could tell you more. They were some sort of Paragon of the Protheans. Sages of some kind, I'm with you. The rest of just called them Space Jockeys. I always found them creepy."

"Is that what the Protheans looked like with those...those...tentacle things coming out of their mouths?"

"No." Shepard shook her head. "Not if the faces I got from the Vinculum can be true. The Protheans sorta look like the Collectors, only not so buggy." She looked at the statue. "Maybe he's wearing some sort of helmet or head gear that interfaces with the pilot's chair / throne thing he's sitting in."

"What like VR?"

The Spectre shrugged. "Could be. The Protheans had a lot of stock in VR avatars. We found a whole storehouse on Ilos that had similar chairs that slaved whole squadrons of attack drones, that we dubbed Darts. Could be these Space Jockeys locked themselves into the devices and those tentacle mouth things are I don't know life support.

"The technology is worth looking into. Imagine you have a squadron of fighter pilots safely tucked away in a bunker and each of those pilots are commanding their own squadrons of Darts. Be hell of a way to take on the Reapers, minimal loss of life on our end at least. Alliance R and D are looking into it."

The Spectre frowned as a thought suddenly occurred to her. Hock had a statue of one of the Pilot / Sage Paragons so it was reasonable to assume he had his hands on black-market research on the Darts as surely as Cerberus had. And just like everything else they stole and tried to recreate or backwards engineer it would go horribly wrong. And it would be left to Shepard to search them out and hunt them down and put an end to it, just like every other time, Cerberus experiments went amok.

Kasumi had passed Mr. Creepy to a very large head of some Ancient Egyptian pharaoh. "I used to make a lot of money on things like that. Even outside the Alliance. Asari go nuts for this sort of thing."

Shepard sniggered. "Yeah I can see Liara fan-girling stuff like that." she shook her head fondly as she imagined her bondmate squealing in delight if she came home with some pharaoh's head on Janise Eve, or even Valentine's Day.

Shepard ignored the middle isle of display cases for the moment and went towards the back to the other statues. The first one was a large version of the sphere in the common room back at the party. To the Spectre it looked like some kind of Star Map of a galaxy not of their own, a place very far far away.

"This is nice," Kasumi came up behind the taller woman. "Oddly relaxing."

The next statue they came up to both women exclaiming their wonder. It was a gigantic horned beast, his frozen stone mouth open in a silent roar of rage. It was so full of movement and life, as if it had been turned the stone by some enchantment just at the moment of attack. Shepard almost imagined spittle lining upper and lower jaws and spraying out of its mouth like a rampaging bull on the charge.

"WOW! Imagine that thing coming at you in a dark alley." Kasumi took tentative step forward almost as if her very presence would break the enchantment and the beast...this ogre would snatch her up and break her in two.

"Worse than a bloodlusted krogan Battlemaster," Shepard agreed.

"Hey if Tentacle-face was a real guy, think this ogre thing was real or is it out of some artist's imagination."

"I hope the latter. If the former I don't think I want to know which blighted world a creature like that calls home."

"Says a woman who hunted down a lot of thresher maws when she was hunting a rogue Spectre."

"Pft, that was easy. Maws are mindless beasts that move on instinct alone and the Mako has cannons. Just move just out of their range of acidic spit preferably on some rocky ledge above them so it can't come up under you and let lose with a volley of cannonfire. One dead worm. This...this... ogre thing is semi-intelligent. Intelligent enough to fashion clothing. Look its wearing boots and some semblance of armour. With ham-fisted paws like that and its size it doesn't need weapons, bet you anything its commander or masters had them. Still if you hit in the face with a biotic shockwave or a singularity or three it'd give your team a chance to flank it and strike the more vulnerable areas with concentrated volleys of grenade or better yet rocket launchers. The Avalanche heavy weapons and flamethrowers could some serious damage. Then when it's stomping around, swing those apish arms in a blind dead rage you take a blade and slam it deep into the spinal column, severing the vertebras."

"You know you think too much like a soldier." Kasumi pouted.

"Hah. I AM a soldier."

"I know I know a one of them special N7s. Remind me never to watch a scary movie with you. You're the type that yells battle tactics at the protagonists on the screen, aren't you?"

Shepard had the decency to blush a little. "Guilty as charged. You think that is bad? Never watch a historical movie with Li... ugh she points out all the historical anachronisms portrayed. She treats it like a personal affront if the movie makers don't get their facts right and simply go for the romance of the era or historical character. She's even now starting to do it with human history. To tell you the truth, I like my romantic legends versus the real life dirty truth of them."

"And what will future generations say of the Great Commander Shepard?"

"That the dumbass people in charge should have listened to her about the Reapers, that she wasn't some madwoman clucking about the sky falling down. Hell with my luck they'll bill me as some guy with a shaved head that looks like every other jarhead."

"Or they'll keep you as a woman but never get your look right. You'll be bouncing between being a -redhead or maybe even blonde back to redheaded forgetting you're a brunette. Long hair-short hair... freckles no freckles, to a brunette with freaky but gorgeous blue eyes and a blood swipe scar across the bridge of your nose."

"Probably." Shepard shook her head and dismissed the topic with a self-deprecating chuckle.

By this time they had moved on to a model of a ship that was obviously of turian design. Almost immediately Kasumi explained what was as if she were some Museum curator.

"Model of the Kara. It's like a turian Titanic or so I've heard."

"With just as many romantic and tragic stories, I assume?"

The thief nodded. "I have a copy of one of the best stories of it on it back on the Normandy if you want to read it."

"Turian tragic romances? I'll pass. But bet you I know two who would like to borrow it, though."

"Hmm... Garrus and his lady love Tali. Heard she loves Fleet and Flotilla. She might even warm up a bit more if I do. Thanks."

"Yeah how's that going anyway?"

"Not bad, better than it was when I first got on board. Just trying to make sure Miss vas Normandy knows I'm not here to step on her toes or get in her territory. We sorta worked really well together at the Armax. Heh better than Jack and Miranda, but if you ask me...I think there is something stewing there and it ain't all cat-spitting." the Thief chuckled. "Okay maybe a little hissing, the sort that slams another up against the wall—all biting hair-pulling steamy and hot. Oohh rivalmance!"

"Rivalmance? That's not even a word."

"Sure it is. Romance of rivals. They enjoy each other's company between the sheets but detest each other out of them. That's just the sort of thing that will happen to Jack and Miranda."

"You can be very odd sometimes, Kas." Shepard's dark eyebrow rose at that bit of supposed scuttlebutt. She'd have to keep her eyes open it there was any truth to it. The Commander wasn't one to slam down hard on fraternization like other COs. If the people involved did their jobs and didn't let it get out of hand she had no issue with intership personal relationships regardless of regulations. Case-in-point her Chief Engineer and her XO were now married you couldn't get more fraternized than that. Of course Tali and Garrus were not Alliance military...still they were her people under her command.

If Jack and Miranda fell into this 'rivalmance' Shepard wasn't about to nix it, unless they started tearing up the bulkheads. So far she didn't see it happening. Then again Kasumi was an ardent romantic; no doubt she was as they say already 'shipping' the rest of the crew. Next it will be Zaeed with Samara and oh yes the biggy... Joker with EDI. Pft. Not bloody likely. The Commander dismissed the entire notion of it all as ludicrous.

Kasumi didn't say anything more about it, what could be said? She turned away and walked to one of the other display cases. It was a sculpture of sorts of three metallic curves that to Shepard's mind looked like they had been peeled off a ship's hull or an orange.

"It doesn't look like much. But this might be one of the most valuable pieces here."

"You're kidding me." While the Spectre enjoyed art these 'orange peelings' as her hindmind dubbed them, she didn't get.

"Turian art is rare outside Palaven. For good reason I say." Kasumi commented to the aside.

"Yeah no kidding. Garrus would go apeshit if he knew this was here. Probably as iconic as David or Lady Liberty is to us." even if it was important to her 'archangel's culture she still didn't get it. Right next to it was another turian statue that was all angles and jagged lines. It almost looked like some giant hand had crumpled up a paper airplane only it was made out of tin.

"That's...impressive. Not sure what it is though." Kasumi said.

Shepard looked over her shoulder at another statue a depiction of a rachni queen directly across from the metal construct. "My guess Shelob over there has a metallic counterpart; it's why they're adjacent from each other."

"Could be" she had a teasing tone. "Juxtaposed from each other? Pick that up from your wife."

"I can have ideas of my own." A sheepish shrug soon followed her declaration. "But yeah walking around museums with her you pick up on stuff like that."

The thief didn't bother to suppress a shudder when she looked upon the massive stone spider; she was never big on arachnids sentient or otherwise. In fact she hated them. All their little eyes, their hairy bodies... "Ugh...rachni queen. I guess everything is valuable to someone Still Hock has good tastes, I'll give him that."

Kasumi easily distracted herself from the statuary with the object within the next case. In fact her face was pressed so close her breath steaming up the glass. "This looks like quarian script. This has got to be old. When was the last time quarian's wrote on stone?"

"Have to ask Tali, but probably around the same time we did. So...what do you think? Quarian ten commandments?"

The thief chuckled then took a holopic of it. "Only way to find out. Though if we leave here without it Tali might be a tad upset. Exactly the sort of thing I want to avoid."

"We'll catalogue it with the other stolen artefacts and antiquities; eventually it will get back to the Flotilla." Shepard said.

"Pft you're hopeful. It will be sealed a way in a box with red tape marked 'Evidence' and eventually it will collect so much dust no one will be able to tell what it is anymore."

"Good thing I know someone that can recover such a lost relic and make sure it gets to the right people. That someone will be paid a very handsome price should their services be needed."

Kasumi playfully hit the Spectre on the shoulder. "You sure know how to woo a girl."

"I do my best."

The thief moved on, by now the sensor was bleeping loudly. They were almost on top of Keiji's graybox. But for a moment something drew their collective attention.

"That's the Kassa Locust." she uttered as she spotted the twin antique submachine guns on display. She then scanned it on a hunch. When the serial number popped up her whole countenance changed. "NO! It's the Kassa Locust! The gun that killed two Presidents." The infamous legacy of the Kassa Fabrications Model 12a Locust. Many gun enthusiasts bought replicas of the SMG for that very reason.

Shepard reached in and took hold of one of the ivory-handled Locusts. She had always wanted one and now…here were two of them. Better yet her trained eye spotted that both weapons had been modified to take thermal clips. How utterly convenient. Her wolfish grin grew wider.

"Gorgeous." Kasumi said as she watched an enthralled Spectre turn the gun over and over in her hand. "It even comes with a perfect copy. I'm sure Hock won't mind if we borrow these."

Shepard was still smirking gleefully. She put the original on her weapon's pack the other she tossed to Kasumi. The thief was correct, the gun was gorgeous. The Locust was originally created for the Systems Alliance, who wanted a lightweight weapon for high-gravity worlds, the Locust was designed to overcome the limitations of traditional submachine guns at long range. It even had a scope mounted on an optics railing along the top of the SMG.

Shepard peered through the scope. "Auto zoom, nice."

With the bullet velocity of modern weapons already pushed to the limit, the Locust's designers sought a way to improve accuracy through reducing weapon kick. They created an internal "floating bed" that absorbs the gun's recoil with a minimal jarring of the gun frame itself. The barrel, magazine, chamber, and operating mechanism all move within this bed, which absorbs shock with springs and buffers. This creates a platform stable enough that the Locust can use auto-targeting software usually reserved for match-grade weapons.

Shepard appreciated not only the craftsmanship of the weapon but its sheer elegance. Now more than ever the Locust's lethality on shielded targets would definitely come in handy against the Collectors. Hock was even good enough to conveniently place a detachable data drive in the lining of the box, containing omni-tool specifications for fabricating copies. Those on board the Normandy that preferred SGMS like Miranda, Jack and Mordin would certainly appreciate the opportunity to wield a Locust in the next firefight. The armory and research lab could use omni-gel to fabricate more

Inside the same case was what they had come here for, what all the trouble of disguises face accents and deceptions had been for.

"Oh my God!" Kasumi's words were a disbelieving gasp. "There it is!" She activated her Omni tool and began scanning her treasure. Amber hued screens popped up, scrolling data faster than Shepard or Kasumi could read it.

Almost immediately they were interrupted by the voice of Donavon Hock. "Don't bother Miss Goto, it's code locked." His face appeared before them opposite of Lady Liberty's and just as massive. A great holographic projection reminiscent of a particular charlatan of a land called Oz. "I had a feeling that was you at the door. I knew that if it was really you, you'd get through anyway."

Kasumi sauntered up to the projection cocky as ever. "You know me. I don't like to disappoint."

"I need what's in your graybox Kasumi." the man demanded. "You know I'm willing to kill you for it."

Shepard moved away towards an urn. Very valuable, no doubt priceless. Let's see if we can get the man to step out from behind the curtain... She raised her new toy, pointed it to the turquoise jar...

"I'll admit your skills are impressive." Hock went on as if his threat and complaint were the same thing. "You got into my vault after as if I left it open. But you're still going to die screaming..."

...and pulled the trigger.

"NO!" boomed Hock.

"Have I got your attention?" the Spectre scoffed. Why did bad guys feel the urge to monolog their threats?

Hock's looming face transformed into a demonic visage of pure hate.

Kasumi was laughing, "That got him to shut up." Her Omni-tool bleeped, she had broken the code-lock.

"KILL THEM!" Hock screamed.

The outburst gave just enough warning for the women to dive for cover behind the display plinths, each taking opposite sides of the room. Shepard's body flared with a cloak of cyan fire. Seconds only seconds granted to her. She tossed a singularity at the door just below Hock's now deactivated hologram. It took root just as it opened spewing out like the hordes of hell a band of yellow and black armored Eclipse mercs.

Shepard didn't wait for the enemy to open fire before she attacked. The screams of those caught in the in the singularity, opened a window. The Spectre tossed a handful of lift-grenades en-masse.

Their power was equal to a biotic slam. More than that lift grenades did an admirable amount of damage, but also made weak enemies who are not killed outright float helplessly in the air (similar to a weak Pull). This could be used to not only kill enemies, but disrupt tightly clustered weaker enemies, or stubborn enemies behind cover. The lifting effect of the grenade could be detonated by other powers if they didn't out right explode if they made a direct hit on an enemy. Lift Grenades inflict greater damage against biotic barriers; they worked perfectly with the Locust's power to fire through kinetic shielding.

As soon as the grenades hit the force of the singularity they exploded into a cascade of magnificent fireballs. The screams of the dead and dying rose like a cacophonous crescendo of destruction and dismemberment. Not all died.

So much for doing things the 'thief way.'

The distinctive shirrriikkk-hiss of the cloak coming online warned Shepard to hold her fire even before Kasumi's verbal warning. "Cloaking!" She rushed into the melee, like she had with the guards in the security room. Her blade found its mark in the back of the man's neck, delivering a devastating sneak attack.

Her sudden appearance shook the enemy's attention when they turned to the new distraction. Shepard took the opening and used a biotic pull on one of the men, sending him spiraling haplessly in the air the SMG took care of the rest.

"Let's see if they burn!" one of the mercs called out.

Only the highly modified shields on Shepard's hardsuit stopped her from joining the dead. She could feel the heat of the immolation rounds the Eclipse were using. A shoulder roll backwards gave the Spectre more cover behind the krogan statue.

Another merc belted out "Deploying combat drone."

'Frack! I hate those things.' Shepard targeted the orb and opened fire just as the thief cut in.

"I got it.!" Kasumi voiced almost as if she had heard the Spectre's thoughts then went silent. She may not be as good as Tali in hacking AI or VIs but she could override their CPUs easily enough and crack their cores and shut them down.

"Kas watch your three!" the Commander warned. The remaining mercs used the distraction of the drone to take flanking positions around the statuary.

"I'm pinned!" The thief called out. The mercs had her cornered between the Rachni Queen and the Orange Peel. If she moved one way or the other they'd nail her.

Shepard flared her biotics, sprinted across the vault using the eezo acceleration of a charge to go 'through' statues, plinths and the half glass wall where one of the merc bunked down. She slammed into the body so hard the woman in the yellow armor was sent spiraling head over ass. Shepard spun around delivering one butterfly kick after the other into the torso of her enemy. She followed up with a flurry of short, quick biotically enhanced kicks and punches, deftly blocking and redirecting the woman's ham-fisted counterattacks. The power of her blows concaved the merc's ribcage even through her hardsuit. Their mutual cries of attack and death knells blended as one.

No longer pinned down Kasumi seized the opportunity opened to her, engaged her cloak and dodged out of the kill zone. She had to move fast, the salarian merc was trying to line up a clean shot on the Commander. He didn't see the shadow descending upon him until it was too late. The knife slammed into the side of his head, snapping it back, He was dead before his body hit the floor.

Shepard was breathing heavily not from exertion but the adrenaline of the kill. Her body was still shimmering in dark energy.

"Tapping into the main security computer." Kasumi said, her attention drawn to her omni-tool. "I've got the blueprints. There's a landing pad to the east. We can get out of here."

"Roger that." The Spectre engaged her radio. "Joker, bring in the shuttle now! Expect a hot LZ. Don't come in until I give the all clear."

* Aye aye, Commander. ETA four minutes.*

Kasumi set their omni-tools to guide them to the path they needed to take to reach the designated rendezvous point. The women double timed it along the corridors, taking corners sharply. Hock had to be monitoring outgoing transmissions, he'd know about the call to the Normandy. If Chief Roe wasn't lying dead in the vault floor she'd surely be deployed with the next squadron of Eclipse.

The corridor opened up into the motor-pool. There were M35 and M45 Makos, industrial transports and recreational rovers, crates and cylinders of cargo, tyres stacked four- five high. It was a veritable haven of cover.

Shepard and Kasumi darted back and forth between the containers, constantly changing direction; they had to get to the LZ. T-Minus three minutes five seconds. Shepard spotted the first Eclipse team fire at them from cover positions behind a pile of containers on the upper landing overlooking the garage floor, and another fire team newly arrived shooting at them from behind the tyre stacks near a black M45 Mako.

The two teams coordinated their attacks, never giving the Normandy crew a clear opening to retaliate. But that didn't stop the Spectre from popping her head out and firing back. Her hardsuit's kinetic shields and natural ability to generate a biotic barrier took the brunt of the assault but they wouldn't hold out long.

With Shepard occupying the majority of the mercs, that left only two for Kasumi to deal with. Unfortunately pinpointing her enemy was proving most difficult, every time she tried to break cover she ran into a spray of lethal assault-rifle fire.

She could use the cloak easily enough but it didn't have an indefinite charge. She recalled the way Shepard took care of the gunship when she assaulted the Eclipse Sister's brace back on Ilos. Shepard had those powerful lift grenades and right by her feet a very handy-dandy tool box.

"Shep I think I got one of your ideas!" she said over the radio and laid out her plan of filling the tool box with the remaining twelve grenades and using them as Jack might say as one great cluster-fuck.

*It'll make one hell of a mortar round that's for sure. Good thinking Kas.* True the Spectre had a rocker launcher but not very many rounds three at most. If Hock had heavy weapons fire on the LZ or even a gunship which the veteran N7 highly suspected they would need their own heavy weapons to counter it.

From her vantage point Kasumi spotted the Spectre taking one of the tool-kits near her and filling it with the small explosives; she left inside the tools, and added two small containers of turpentine. Kasumi activated the cloaking shield and sprinted from cover to cover, all the while laying down suppressive fire in order to distract and confuse the bunkered down mercs. They could hear various orders being issued from the enemies as they took ground and cover, their weapons locked and loaded.

Shepard had the box just about set, tossing into it into the thick of the opposition wasn't the issue, her biotics would see to that. What she needed was where it would be most effective at doing the most damage. Over head crates were being shipped back and forth. Without knowing what was in them if she deployed the make-shift mortar into it and it exploded there was a risk that whatever was inside was highly explosive. Good for taking out the baddies, bad if it also took out her and Kasumi.

Then she saw it…tanks of fuel just behind the thickest area of enemy incursion. If she could blow them…it would not only take out the enemy forces it would blow a nice hole in the wall…

Kas was doing her part; from where the mercs were concentrating the majority of their firing power the thief had taken to the industrial works above their heads. Probably flitting between the moving cargo as easily as a squirrel bounces from one tree limb to another in the forest. Good thing The Spectre decided to not chance blowing the rig.

Crouch-springing Shepard almost felt as if she had velcro on her ass the way she stuck to the low cover. Her body humming with biotic life, her every nerve ending swimming in dark energy, partially fueling her barriers the other into toolbox cum missile.

"Kas, fire in the hole!" she said over their private channel.

Like an Olympic discus-thrower Shepard spun around gaining power and momentum, then hurled the box into the fray. It whirled overhead. It caught the attention of the mercs

"What the hell?"

"Incoming!"

"Frack m…."

Shepard summoned the full magnitude of her biotics and sent a shockwave into the toolbox detaining the grenades. She hit the deck, hard. It impact was glorious! The explosive power of twelve lift-grenades, two bottles of turpentine and a handful of tools became a rose bloom of shrapnel and burning rain shredding muscles, tendons and armor. Fist sized chucks of wall pelted anyone not in cover.

Their screams of agony pitched yellows and black burring bodies forward. Others were in the air slamming into one another at gruesome angles. The explosion set of a chain reaction in the fuel tanks. The second explosion was no less impressive nor deadly as the first. If any of the enemy forces lingered they were now dead in the wake of the mushrooming fireball.

It'd take thirty to forty seconds before Shepard recovered enough to use her biotics again….time they just bought themselves. Shepard rendezvoused with Kasumi and both swiftly made it through the massive hole in the wall to the rooms beyond. The NAV marker on their Omni-tools bleeped at intermitting levels getting slightly louder as they neared their exit point.

Over the emergency klaxons, petering fragment explosions, Hocks voice boomed over the audio controls. *What the hell are you people doing down there? Kill Allison Gunn and bring the girl to me!*

"Hear that he wants the hoodie alive!"

"Fuck him man, Fuck him!" a voice wailed someone off to the left. "My leg man… is all shot to hell! Oh God!"

There was a shot.

"Your leg aint bothering you now, Samuels."

Shepard and Kasumi continued to work through the warehouses' labyrinthine corridors. That's what all cavernous rooms had to be the warehouses of Hock's smuggling operation. Only now much of it was going up in flames. Florescent lights flickered from dim to bright to dark back to light. The smoke becoming cloying if not for the hardsuit's internal respiration. Made relying on sight a bitch and with all the flames there was no way to use infra-red.

"Someone's coming." Kasumi warned needlessly. Her voice slightly tinny behind her rebreather. With her choice of armored catsuit there was no way for her to wear a hardsuit helmet. She was however wearing wrap around specs like those Shepard had bought for Jack back on the Citadel.

"With that last trick back there I'm fresh out of grenades." Shepard said, turning her head to insure there was no one on their six.

"I still have a few flashbangs."

"Good. Take the right flank; use those and your shadow strike as often as possible. Get to cover."

"Understood, Shep."

"Go!"

The thief vanished.

Shepard took the left, dodging from one I-beam to another taking cover behind crates of what she did not know. She only hoped they weren't explosive. Then she heard the klank-kluunk of a YMIR heavy mech.

She dared to peek around the corner, sure enough there it was, the HUD in her helmet ran a quick schematic, kinetics barriers, heavy shielding and tech armor. Slamming a new clip into the Locust, Shepard zeroed in on her targets prayed to whoever was listening the infamous Kassa SMG's reputation for slicing though enhanced shielding was not trumped up hype and opened fire.

The YMIR's right shoulder spun back as the brute force of molten slugs tore into joints in a merciless barrage. Shepard fell back behind her cover, slapped a fresh thermo clip into the SMG and continued to fire. Rinse and repeat. Rinse and repeat.

"Target locked." boomed the bass metallic words of the droid.

Damn it! The armour was down, just a few more shots and the thing was done for. Shepard broke cover, if she was the faster…

Blinding white-hot plasma charges struck the Spectre's shields and splashed over her chest. Shepard's shields were drained completely. The overpressure forced her to take a step backwards.

She snarled out her pained filled rage. The clanker was now on her.

* I can't get to you* Kasumi sounded worried.

POP-Bang to the left, the thief was dealing her with own death's hand.

Shepard locked on; only four rounds left in the clip. It was more then enough. It raised its arm, locked and loaded with a cobra missile. A little overkill her mind would tell her later. She pulled the trigger on the Locust. Smoke pillared over its head a breath later the inertial self-destruct imploded the thing sending shrapnel in all direction. Shepard's shields cycled through just time.

The Spectre wasted no time; she darted from her now useless cover to the long corridor ahead. It was a bottleneck-she and Kasumi were at the wrong end of it. No cover, four—no five hostiles, heavily armed. It was the only way out. The Eclipse had the advantage. Not that she hadn't been in this situation before. She was an N7 Fury. A Spectre

Omni-blade in one hand, monofilament sword in the other, her body awash in cyan glow. "Kasumi as soon as I move toss flashbangs into the corridor, override their shields."

"But you'll be caught in friendly fire."

"NO. I won't." Her body glowed brighter. There seemed to be a malevolent field of dark tendrils cradling around her like heat waves off the desert sands. "But if you don't stay back you will be."

Dark Energy accelerated her body into a white blue blur. Kasumi did as ordered. She didn't dare hesitate. "I've got a present for you!" she cried out over the din of weapons fire. She ducked as stark-white flares rippled down the corridors. The only thing she heard now were screams. The flashbangs made it nearly impossible for even the HUD of her wraparounds to get a fix on what was going on. Then it was over.

"Clear!" Shepard called out.

Kasumi popped her head out from cover and saw a vision of a woman walk out of the white haze of smoke as some phantom heroic samurai of yore. There was a second breath as the N7 sheathed her blades with the same reverence as the warriors of Kasumi's homeland.

"So…that was cool."

The Commander smiled behind her faceplate. "There are some benefits to having a squadron of asari huntress on board. Annihilation field, biotic charge and the Echo Game. and a little trick I learned from a fellow Spectre. Tala Vasir. Thought I think she only showed me because she expected me to fail."

"What did she show you?" Kasumi said still astounded Shepard had torn through the enemy so swiftly and efficiently.

"How to see with my biotics." Shepard said nonchalantly.

"See with biotics. You can do that?"

"Typically only asari are able to do it. Something to do with their third eyelid. They have this transparent membrane they can slide over their eyes and still see. They do this when they go underwater, like swimming goggles. Lets them see clearly. But the gestalt…it changed Liara and me. Some parts of me are more asari than human and vice-versa."

Kasumi was staring at the taller women in renewed awe.

"We have to go." Shepard ordered. "Before their friends come looking for them."

"Right behind you Shep."

Right on queue: *Don't fight me on this Kasumi! You know what happened to your boy toy when he fought back.*

"Don't talk about Keiji like that! Murderer!" Kasumi cried out.

His words were meant to distract and enrage. A distinct asari command called out the Normandy crew's positions. They were five meters ahead of the companions taking bunkering positions along the bed a skytruck and several shipping crates alongside it. What cover there was for Shepard and Kasumi wasn't much but it was enough.

*Keep them busy. I'll take care of this myself.* Hock ordered.

Both armed with the Locusts, they took their time, the auto zoom scope doing the heavy lifting Hock was using them as a deterrent for whatever he had planned on the LZ. Only one of the mercs had a heavy weapon: a rocket launcher, the others had only the shielding of their hardsuits, nothing stronger. It took less than a minute for the Spectre and thief to pop these recruits off.

To Hock their deaths meant nothing. They had been sent into the meat grinder as a delaying tactic. A couple of them must had figured that out as they fell back, abandoning their posts. Smart.

The rooms secure Shepard made a quick sweep of the bodies pocketing thermo clips and medi-gel packs as she went. A step behind her Kasumi was doing the same. The thief even recovered a bit of data on one of the bodies that once researched properly in the Normandy's lab would undoubtedly upgrade any tech-damage. Handy for those that used offensive omni-tool attacks like overloads and hacking. Another thing they picked up were cryo rounds for the SMGs.

"He's got something big out there waiting for us." Shepard said. "You ready for it?" She was a little more than concerned. Hock knew how to push all of Kasumi's buttons. Not that she blamed the thief for her anger, her frustration, the rage boiling in her veins. She had felt it too the day her wife had been shot and they had lost Sparrow.

"I'll stay frosty, Shep. Don't worry." Kasumi responded, levelly. She must have heard the concern in the Spectre s words. "You have your tricks and I have mine. More than a few up my sleeve you haven't seen yet."

Shepard smiled at the near playful tone. "Good to hear. Okay let's do this."

The massive cargo door of the garage opened up to Hocks private LZ. It wasn't the posh sort one might have expected but like the warehouse behind the compound it has an industrial functionality to it. With industry of shipping illegal goods came heavy cargo units. Perfectly ideal to take cover.

Overhead the woooppp-wooooop of gunship engines. Something big indeed. And no helmet with grenades either. Fortunately Shepard had saved her rocket launcher for just such an emergency. She had only six initial shots but with the three rounds she took off the dead merc it brought her total up to nine.

woooppp-wooooop

*We could have done this the easy way, Goto!*

Good he was monologging. Precisely what Shepard needed to get a fix on the damned ship.

Beyond the woooppp-wooooop woooppp-wooooop of the gunship was a barely audible shrrok-slickkk of metallic doors opening up somewhere to the west, directly below their feet. Damn, Hock had reserves.

*Allow me to show you the hard way!* He was warming up his railguns. The mercs were harder than the last the smuggler had tossed at the Companions. There was no grandstanding, no showboating. They moved in precise military fashion. These were the elite vets who knew what they were doing, for they had been doing it for a long time. Chief Roe had to with this bunch.

Overhead, the gunship like a cobra weaved back and forth laying down suppressive fire while the Eclipse maneuvered and circled like scorpion pinchers.

Shepard popped out of cover aimed at the gunship and managed to fire two of the smart AA missiles before she had to duck. The ground troops for now were left to Kasumi to neutralize.

Kasumi wasn't trained for heavy fire fights. She was no N7, as far from a Spectre as you could get but she had her ways. While cloaked the motion trackers on the HUDs of the enemy contacts wouldn't register her. At least not until she was right up in their faces or so to speak. More like she was right up on their backsides.

She snapped a flash back in front of pair of Eclipse snipers, one shooter, one spotter. Using both the brilliant light and darkness to hide she slammed her blade into the micro fusion pack on the back of one merc causing his body to go into arrest from the massive energy feedback. The second turned to see what happened to his partner and found something hot and sharp bite his neck. No not bite. As he fell onto of the body of his comrade he realized too late he had been stabbed in the throat.

Behind her she could hear the rapid fire of the gunship's rail gun tearing into the deck. It had Shepard pinned down. If the Spectre broke cover it'd dice her up like mincemeat. The damn thing had cyclonic shielding. As soon as they were broken they self-repaired in nanoseconds. Shepard was wasting ammo if she took another shot with the launcher.

Kasumi snapped up one of the sniper rifles, and for a small moment, she thought of Garrus and Zaeed, both would know instantly what sort of weapon it was. The thief saw only a big-ass gun with a long barrel. Like the Locusts it was modified with an auto zoom scope. It also had a laser pointer. Handy. She was no good at this but she could make it work in a pinch.

She looked though the scope. Five meters, ten, fifteen. There! There was another team. They hadn't seen her yet. They were targeting Shepard.

The gunship dipped below the LZ's ramparts like the shark it resembled dipping below the waves. Shepard was wasting ammo if she took another shot with the launcher. The heavy weapon only had four shots left. One of which she had used on a small nest of Eclipse. There had to be a better way to bring that bird down.

POP! POP!

Shepard looked over to her one o'clock and saw two yellow bodies slump. Their chests exploded. How the hell? Her eight o'clock showed a tiny hooded woman duck behind a stack of shipping crates several meters high. If she hadn't seen the telltale sign of Kasumi's hood she would have wondered who in blazes was the shooter? Kas was no sniper. No talent for it, but with the right mods, and an auto-targeting interlink it could be done. Especially if she went for the center of mass. The trick wouldn't work a second time.

Four more commandos.

Four seconds before the Eclipse regrouped for another wave. All the time in the world. Shepard blurred into motion. She sprinted from the crates and-before the commandos could adjust their aim—landed in their midst. She spun, omni-blade in hand taking the head of the salarian lieutenant. The annihilation field swirling around her body broke into what remained of their shielding. Her biotically amped up body the human seemed to be moving in slow motion.

Shepard brutally yanked the assault rifle from the merc. There was a loud cracking sound as the asari's shoulder dislocated. The wounded trooper stumbled forward, off balance. The Spectre spun the rifle and slammed the butt of it into the woman's side. The asari exhaled explosively as her ribs cracked. She grunted, and fell unceremoniously to the floor unconscious.

Shepard span to face the right-flank gunner; she lashed out with the rifle again. The trooper's head snapped back from the sudden, powerful blow. He flipped head over tail and slammed into the ground.

The fourth opened fire. The three round burst ricocheted off the Spectre's hardsuit's energy shield. The shield's recharge bar flickered a hairbreadth. Before the trooper could react, Shepard sidestepped and slammed him with a warp-field so heavy it broke his spine before his body hit the deck.

*Look to the left!* Kasumi cried out spiraling into cover. "We got more coming in."

Shepard ducked from her new position. Her HUD showed nearly ten red triangles closing in on their position. That's when she saw it; one of the mercs had a strange configuration on her omni-tool. Curious she activated it, like her omni-blade it was a weapon, a crossbow! She had heard about them but never saw one. It fired five bolts either in a wide spread or auto-track on a single target.

The secondary weapon was the Cain trip mines. Perfect for setting up traps for enemies at chokepoints, best deployed on walls, so that the beam reaches out from the wall rather than straight up into the ceiling or the sky if in open air. They were first created by the turian military, but a fair number made their way into the hands of merc guilds. Hock was no doubt moving them en-masse into the black market.

She fired three of the mines directly towards the secondary access point. No sooner had she laid them then they went off BAM! BAM! BAM! Four of the nine vanguard were blown to bits. Two more were frozen solid by the cryo rounds. Their bodies clanged to the deck like icicles knocked from the roof. Somewhere off to her left flack Kasumi's Locust was tearing into enemy ground keeping them bunched up.

woooppp-wooooop. woooppp-wooooop

The damn gunship was back.

"We can't shoot though that, but if I can get to the ship I can take down the shields." Kasumi said crawling up to Shepard.

"Do it." came the order.

Kas winked out sight. Shepard laid down suppressing fire against the remaining mercs in a combination of SMG, shockwaves, and Cain trip mines. With the gunship at twelve, the mercs at nine, she was dead in the middle of a kill zone. The only way to stay alive was to keep ahead of the assault. To play the rabbit-biotic charges—drop trip wires-singularities-shockwaves—slams—cryo rounds—lifts-flares-. Keep moving. Keep the barriers up.

Hock continued his taunting, blathering about his own successes and Kasumi's inevitable doom.

Kasumi ignored him, his accusations of that she got her friend Gunn into a great deal of trouble. She saw the trouble the Commander was in; two YMIR heavy mechs were drawing down on Shep, Hock was concentrating all his attention on the tenacious Spectre.

Now was her chance the ship was in perfect position. Champion free-runner, Kas sprinted up the shipping crates, salmon leapt onto the pipe works. Deftly as a cat she dashed across the pipes, launched herself off into the air like a frog jumping from lilypad to lilypad. She landed on the windscreen of the gunship holding onto the hull with dire desperation, the new sudden weight lurched the ship hard to port; Hock's thumb still on the trigger of the railgun tore into the mechs.

Hock snapped his head around, his eyes glaring in pure hatred. Kasumi mocking saluted him through the canopy then plunged her Omni-tool into the ship's drive. Showers of sparks blossomed.

"Shields down! Now let's tear that thing apart!" Kas flipped backwards landing directly next to the Spectre.

Shepard flashed a cocky half smirk, raised the rocket launcher and pulled the trigger. She emptied the entire magazine into the gunship. At her side, Kas did same with her stolen Locust, emptying one clip then another.

The air grew still and thickened. Metal glowed and melted. The cobra missiles absorbed into the hull. The metal blistered, bubbled and boiled. The armour finally gave—the ship exploded. A thousand fragments hurled past them, cooling from white to orange to red then disappearing into the deck. If there was anything left of Hock he could be served up as varren-chow.