Mass Effect Abridged
Chapter Thirty Five: On To Rift Station
Closing the hatch bought them about thirty seconds, and then Commander Shepard found herself running for her life again as she and Presley darted down the hall. The large insectoid creatures were right on their heels as they ran back into the area where they had first met Mira, and she hit the emergency override button, slamming the door shut in the insect's faces. Then there was a sound behind them, and they turned to see that Kaiden and Liara were also running back into the room.
"Run for your lives!" The Asari yelled as she came through the doorway. "It's invisible ghosts from Old Katsuo!"
Kaiden was right behind her, but so was the nearest insect, so he roundhouse kicked it as it leapt into the air, knocking it into the rest of them so that they all crashed to the floor as he hit the emergency button as well. The door slammed shut just as the creatures were recovering, so they appeared to be safe, until the claws of the insects could be heard striking at the door. This would have been fine, but after a few hits, the doors started to dent inward.
"To the tram station!" Shepard yelled. "Come on!"
They turned and ran through the only remaining door, hitting the override button as they left the VI room in hopes that the door that now slammed down behind them would buy them the time they needed to escape. It didn't appear that the creatures had made it down this way yet, which meant that Garrus and Wrex could've still been working on the tram system, and that they could escape - as long as they had succeeded in fixing it.
Suddenly the door behind them was ripped off its hinges by three of the insects holding it in their mandibles, and the chase resumed. Shepard and the others were armed, so they were able to at least drive them back by shooting backwards as they ran, and with a final push of an override button as they ran through the door marked Tram Station, this was as far as they could go.
"Aw, sweet Jesus!" Presley exclaimed as he turned around.
Shepard turned to see what was going on, and they were met with the carcasses of dozens of the insectoid creatures littered across the snow-covered floor. There was an exposed control panel that had been recently operated by the looks of it, but so far there was no sign of Garrus or Wrex. Suddenly everyone jumped as the creatures started to claw at the door, and everyone aimed their weapons toward it while Liara moved up to the panel.
"Well, let's see." The Asari said as she examined it. "Wow, these controls are so fucked up, that it must've been done on purpose to prevent people from fixing it. But if I just press this button, then - there we go."
"Lockdown overridden." Mira's voice said over the intercom once the button was pressed.
Everyone glared at her as the door slid open, and the Asari just shrugged before it was time to run away again. The only place to escape to was the tram car, even though the tracks still hadn't been aligned, so none of them were sure what to do once they got there. The doors were already open, so they rushed onboard the deeply snow-covered car, and Kaiden helped Shepard push the doors shut. Outside, the insects started to rome around the room, but for some reason did not immediately attack the car.
"Why aren't they attacking?" Shepard asked.
"Leave it to a woman to focus on the wrong issue." Presley replied. "Who cares why they're not attacking, the point is they aren't attacking, so now we can figure out what the hell we're gonna do."
Shepard found herself getting angry again, and was about to say something when she suddenly screamed as something shot out of the snow on the floor and grabbed her ankle. She expected it to be the mandible of one of those creatures, but instead a humanoid arm formed as more and more of it was uncovered until Garrus sat up from under the snow. Wrex then sat up next to him a second later.
"Oh, it's you guys." Garrus said as he stood up. "I thought the bugs had finally, holy shit!"
He dropped back down the moment he saw the insects searching around outside, and Wrex did the same. In fact they were both about to tunnel back under the snow, when they stopped and slowly stood back up as if they were confused.
"Why aren't they attacking?" Garrus asked as he looked out the car's window.
"Good question." Presley replied, making Shepard's jaw drop. "And I've come up with two possibilities: Either they are spooked because of something they don't like, or they're just waiting for the others to arrive before they eat us."
"You son of a bitch." Shepard said angrily. "I just asked you that same question two seconds ago and you flipped out, but now you're all polite just because Garrus asked? What the hell, Presley?"
"Aw, here we fucking go again." Presley replied with annoyance in his voice. "What is it this time, Shepard? You mad because I make thirty cents more an hour than you? Well, consider it a tax for getting men to pay for dinner dates, and you girls getting to get on the lifeboats first when the ship's going down."
Shepard had finally had it with his sexist, chauvinistic bullshit, and if she was going to die there in that car, then she was going to make sure that Presley went first. So she drew her pistol, but Presley had turned away and ducked down to tie his boot at the last second, causing her shot to go wild. Instead of hitting Presley, it went out the window and hit one of the insectoid creatures that was climbing the wall, making it fall onto the control panel.
The console beeped as the dead insect slid to the floor, and then the tramway tracks started to move, stopping once they were aligned. Presley and the others were shocked by this, especially when the car started moving, so Shepard just smiled as she holstered her pistol. Now all she had to do was hide the fact that she had just tried to murder her first officer, and everything would be fine.
"How's that for thirty cents an hour?" She asked. "All you men in the room, but it was me who figured it out how to save our lives from certain doom. And for your information, Presley, I pay half of the bill on my dinner dates."
"Sweet." Garrus replied. "Those can get expensive after a while."
Not much else was said as the tram car made its way across the frozen mountains toward the hot labs at Rift Station, but a plan would be needed, since if Peak 15 was infested with strange insect things, it stood to reason that the rest of the labs would be infested as well. However, the plan that Shepard was forming had to be abandoned once her radio began to pick up comm chatter.
"So, there's people still alive over there, huh?" Presley asked. "Well, that's good, if not for the fact that they're probably insane from recent traumatic events, in which case we need a plan to keep things under control. Wrex, I think you know what I'm talking about."
"Oh yeah, I do." The Krogan replied as he took a small case off his belt. "Quick costume change!"
Wrex then tossed the box up into the air, and the men jumped up toward it as it opened, throwing a new outfit over each of them as if they were transforming into some kind of superheroes. Unfortunately, Shepard did not share their enthusiasm for how this would help them as the car pulled into the tramway at Rift Station. There were people standing around, but they looked nervous and scared, and this was not helped when the doors opened and the men ran out in their red robes and wide-brim hats with wooden crucifixes hanging around their necks.
"Ha-ha!" Presley yelled as they stood before the people. "No one expects The Spanish Inquisition! Now get up against the wall, all of you!"
The startled people weren't sure how to react to the spectacle before them, but suddenly they got the idea once the four of them drew their weapons. A few seconds later the people of Rift Station were against the wall with their hands over their heads as the inquisitors searched them and grilled them for information.
"Have you ever consorted with the prince of darkness?" Presley demanded to a human male. "Have you ever disobeyed your husband?"
"I'm a man." He replied. "I don't have a husband."
"Saints preserve us, you homophobic asswipe!" Kaiden yelled as he came over to the man. "I bet you voted against gay-marriage too, huh? Well, I've got some bad news bears for you, gaybasher, because intolerance will not be tolerated on my watch. To the pit with him!"
The others cheered as they grabbed the man and picked him up over their heads, and Shepard didn't know what they were actually going to do with him, but it was time to stop all this. She did so by drawing her pistol and firing several shots into the air, making everyone stop just as she had planned.
"All right, that's enough." She announced. "You four idiots, put that man down, and then if you haven't frightened these people into hating us completely, maybe one of them can tell us where to find Matriarch Benezia."
"She's in the hot labs." A frightened woman replied immediately. "If it's her you have business with, then do it and leave us alone. You religious types are all the same, but we don't want your shitty God here, so take your propaganda and get the hell out. In fact, boo this chick. Boo!"
No longer afraid, the people began to boo the six of them, and then Shepard let out a startled gasp as a rotten tomato hit her in the face after being tossed from the crowd. More and more vegetables were flung at them to the point of the group needing to run away, so they ducked through the first door they came to, and hit the emergency override button to shut and lock it.
"Good job, Shepard." Presley said sarcastically as they wiped rotten vegetable yuck from themselves. "We had everything under control until you got all girl power on everyone, and look what happened. They tried to run us out of town, that's what, and-
He stopped talking as he noticed something behind Shepard, and she also froze in place for a second as she turned to investigate. The window into the next lab was behind her, but it was not the facility that caused this reaction, but the fact that Matriarch Benezia was standing at the controls of one of the machines.