Author's Note: Hey guys! Yes, I'm still alive and writing. Sorry for the delay. Life got a bit on the crazy side here, and I had a major case of writer's block. It's still lingering like that pesky cold bug, but fear not! I am still here and this story will go on.
Thanks to everyone who has stuck around. It means a lot to me.
Enjoy!
Chapter thirty seven
Shepard dives to the side, narrowly avoiding the oncoming sentinels. Laying on her back she fires her pistol over her legs into the head of the sentinel, hoping to shatter optics, or distract it.
She blasts an overload into it, focusing on its shield generator, then switches her focus. Getting to her feet she tweaks her omnitool sending a dampening pulse to the sentinel, its rifle sparks and crackles, the electronics disrupted. She jumps on this opportunity, and fires her pistol into its head. The face place cracks and shatters under her onslaught, the light soon follows and the hum of electronics, and the geth's strange clicking communication falters and stops. The sentinel freezes up and falls to the side, an empty hunk of metal.
Shepard quickly turns her attention to the second sentinel that is not far behind its partner. Tali helps with this one as they alternate overloads and bullets in tandem, it doesn't take long to fall.
"Well, " Shepard huffs, dusting her hands and releasing the spent thermal clip, injecting a new one. "That was a fine tussle. C'mon, let's get back to the colony, there's nothing left here."
Meeting up with Fai Dan Shepard reports the all clear. "Thank you so much, it's a huge relief."
"Do you know what the Geth are here for? Why they're here?" Shepard looks around the colony. Other than Fai dan and the guards at the gate, the rest of the colony seems entirely unphased by the attack.
Fai dan calls her attention back. "They have focused on the Exo-geni building. I don't know what they want, but they docked their ship there too."
"How do we get there? Sounds like that's where we need to be."
"You can't they've got the sky bridge completely blockaded. You could never get across."
"We're resourceful. Just point us in the right direction."
Fai Dan looks troubled but tells them how to get to the bridge. "We have mako class transports up there. So at least you'll have some firepower."
Once out on the skybridge Shepard understands what Fai Dan meant about not surviving. The entire bridge is crawling with Geth rocket troopers and colossus platforms.
"Keelah, why are there so many?" Tali is in the driver's seat, Garrus holding co-pilot chair, and Wrex standing on in the hold behind Shepard.
"Your guess is as good as mine. There has to be something here Saren wants bad enough for this much force." Shepard is up in the turret seat again blasting her way through the geth. Two geth colossus block the road ahead, a multitude of rocket troopers surrounding them.
Tali brings the mako to a slow halt, "We can't make it through all of them. What do we do?"
Shepard growls and looks around, taking in everything in their surroundings. "Wait, there. Do you see that incline? Up to the upper road? If we hit that fast enough, we can activate the thrusters at the top, that should launch us over the blockade."
"What about when we return?" Tali sounds hesitant and wary.
"Well, we'll deal with that when we come back. Now go." Shepard twists in her harness, trying to see into the cockpit. "Garrus, can you man the thrusters? Activate them when we reach the
top of the incline? Just before we level out on the road."
"Ok Shepard." Garrus agrees. "Has anyone ever told you you're insane?"
"Many a time." Shepard says with a laugh as she straightens in the harness to fire into the blockade to eliminate as many targets as she can.
The mako lurches forward as Tali puts the pedal to the metal, blasting towards the incline just in front of the blockade. Shepard switches to the machine turret to try and force the troops into cover and limit the amount of return fire on them. Just as the mako tilts sideways to the left before leveling to the right, Shepard cries out, "Now!"
Garrus throws the thrusters into full power. They are all thrown hard into their harnesses as the Mako shoots off the incline, blasting over the geth. Garrus adjusts the stabilizing thrusters as they near the edge of the bridge, the mako settles level onto the road as Tali drives it forward full throttle again.
Shepard twists the turret around and fires the cannon into the unprotected rears of the colossus, one explodes, lighting up in flame. the debris blasts outward killing several of the troopers, and chunks crash into the second colossus, sending it toppling over sideways. Before Tali drives them out of range, Shepard fires one more rocket into the fray, it explodes in a cloud of dust, debris and fire.
"That's how it's done!" Se cries out laughing. "Good job Tali, Garrus. Well done."
She can hear Garrus and tali laughing. Wrex stays quiet in the rear. "Let's go. Still have a lot ahead of us."
The last section of the bridge is clear of contacts, thankfully. As they near the bend that will take them to the exo-geni building the radio crackles to life. "help, please...we need..."static interrupts the signal as Tali slows to a stop, Shepard drops from the turret to look over their shoulders at the center console, waiting for the signal to return. "..repeat..we need help...we're employees...escaped..." the message ends abruptly in a crackle of static.
"That had to be a short range transponder." Tali says stepping out of the vehicle. Shepard and Garrus quickly follow, Wrex bringing up the rear.
"How do you know?" Garrus asks Tali as he scans the area.
Shepard answers him as Tali tries to track the signal on her omnitool, "All long range coms are disrupted, blocked. They have to be nearby, to use it in a very short radius."
"Here!" Tali calls out, trotting to a accessway down below the road. "The signal's coming from down there."
Shepard draws her rifle as she nears the ramp down to the underside. "Alright, we'll take it slow, could be a trap." She signals Tali to take point with her, Garrus and Wrex to watch their flanks and the rear. As they near the bottom of the ramp someone calls out to them.
"Halt! We're armed and ready to defend ourselves. Identify yourself, who are you?"
Shepard can't help rolling her eyes, then calls back, "Commander Shepard, Systems Alliance. I and my squad are coming in. Don't fire." They ease down the ramp. weapons pointed to the ground, but ready to aim and fire on a second's notice.
Nearing the bottom of the ramp it levels off and they see a trio of guards kneeling behind a low divider. "That's far enough." One of them calls out. A man comes out from behind the line. "You aren't geth. Who are you? How can we trust you?"
A woman rushes forward and gives him a push. "Lay off. Can't you see they're friends. Help." She turns to Shepard. "Please, we're all that made it out of the building when the geth attacked. We're so afraid we're all that's left."
Shepard ships her rifle, her crew following suit as the guards settle back, lowering their own weapons. "I'm Commander Shepard. Some of the Zhu's Hope colonists survived. They're secure at the docks. Can you tell us what happened?"
The woman extends her hand to shake, "Julianna Baynham. Please, I'm sorry. It all happened so fast. We just ran, tried to get out as fast as possible. My daughter," Juliana pauses a moment, her voice cracked slightly. "My daughter, Lizbeth, she didn't make it out. I'm afraid, she's a smart girl..but,"
Shepard holds her hand up, "I'll keep an eye out for her. We'll do all we can to find her."
Juliana smiles warmly. "Thank you. I don't know how much help we can be. We don't know why the Geth came. There are plenty of experiments we have been working on. Nothing hazardous, nothing dangerous. Mostly botanical studies."
"Botanical?" Shepard asks confused. "There's nothing but ruins here. What is there to study?"
The man from before snaps at them. "Nothing, nothing! We don't need Alliance sniffing around. As soon as we can get through communications, Exogeni will send help. We can handle this ourselves." He glares at both Shepard and Juliana.
"I don't care about anything Exo-geni may be up to. I just need to know what is in there. Something in other brought the beth here. I need to know what you know."
The man scowls and crosses his arms.
Juliana glares at him before turning back to Shepard. "If you stay on the skyway, it will end at the garage, it's the loading docks of the building. That will be the best way in for you. It's on the far side of the building from the ship."
Shepard signals her squad to move out and turns to go herself when Juliana grabs her elbow, "Please, find my Lizzy. Find my baby.."
Shepard pats her hand lightly and steps away. "I will." She quick marches to the Mako and climbs into the turret, Tali is in the driver's seat, Wrex and Garrus braced in the back. "Let's go. We've got a building full of more mystery than I care for."