Commander Bailey opened the comm channel, rolling his shoulders. "Bailey." C-Sec was scrambling again, and this time they were doing it shorthanded. Apparently a bunch of crazies with a lot of weapons and a lot of rage had started shooting up some restaurant in an affluent part of town. He didn't need that. Didn't they know there was a war on? Couldn't they save it for the Reapers? Seriously.
It left him feeling nauseous. Police agencies were always overworked and understaffed. Thanks to Cerberus it was even worse than usual, and C-Sec didn't dare run the kind of recruitment drive they needed. Too much risk of taking in more infiltrators.
His guts seethed with acidic resentment. 'Humanity first' his ass. He'd love to get their head honcho into an interrogation cell for just five minutes…
"This is EDI with the SSV Normandy."
He didn't want to know how Shepard's pet AI got his internal C-Sec communications band. The AI creeped him out. Then again, the geth were apparently onboard with the organics…
Same side or not, it didn't make them any less creepy, he decided. He'd just keep his opinion to himself in the spirit of cooperation. It was still weird, thinking about the geth of all things pitching into this war with everyone else. The only thing he'd ever really heard about the geth was that mess with Saren.
"A C-Sec presence is required at the Ryuusei—"
"I know, I just sent—wait." Shepard's synthetic contacting him about a restaurant being shot up by crazies? An unpleasant sneaking sensation caused Bailey to slowly get out of his chair.
"A medical unit would also be much appreciated."
"How many she leave alive?" he sighed. At least Shepard could take care of herself. If someone started shooting, she'd shoot them right back, keep the collateral damage to a min—
"The unit is for Shepard, Commander, although a medic for Lt. Moreau would be appreciated."
Bailey stopped mid-step. For Shepard? She'd been getting into shit-fights on the Citadel for years and never been hurt before. It made his blood run cold, the realization that she could be injured badly enough to need real medical attention. The ideas of what it would take to actually do it weren't pleasant to contemplate. "Is she okay?"
"Unknown. She is breathing, however, and Maj. Alenko is diverting to see if he can get to her location. The probability is high that she will require medical attention. She was…" The synthetic seemed to stick on the words, or take a moment to process the thought behind them. Could synthetics worry or feel distress? Because if she'd been an organic, he'd have called that a distressed pause. "…she fell through the restaurant's floor."
Bailey sped up. "Hang on, I need to switch channels." Without waiting, he did so. "Mace? Bailey. I need a medical response unit. Put them on standby, I'm not sure where I need them just yet." He was glad scrambling a response was familiar, something he could do without really having to think about it.
Someone tried dropping Shepard in order to kill her? It sounded like a good way to go about it. You couldn't really fight something like gravity, and the Citadel's structure had all kinds of long falls. "I've scrambled a full response team," he announced, switching back to the synthetic.
"It would be much appreciated."
-J-
Bailey wasn't sure what to expect, so he had no preconceived notions when he arrived at Ryuusei after setting a speed record to get there.
The C-Sec officers were already present, offering basic medical aid or performing the numerous duties surrounding a situation like this. The agitation in the onlookers had not yet begun to abate; he doubted it would anytime soon. And assault like this wasn't a daily occurrence in Ryuusei's neighborhood.
The plastiglass floor, both panes of it, had a big, gaping hole in the middle of it.
He found the synthetic kneeling beyond a flipped-over table riddled with gunshots, peering down at a man he assumed was Lt. Moreau. The lieutenant lay on the floor, expression drawn into pained lines.
"Commander Bailey," the synthetic nodded. "We are in contact with Shepard. She is injured, but mobile. For the moment."
"Casualties?"
"The assailants only," the synthetic responded, glancing at the lieutenant. "Injuries are…"
"Minimal," the lieutenant growled, his expression hardening. "Seriously? Through the floor?" he demanded, making Bailey wonder how much of the parchment color of his skin was pain and how much was anger.
"It's a long fall," Bailey said grimly, edging towards the hole.
"Commander, the plastiglass will not support your weight if you get any closer," the synthetic warned.
Bailey stopped his progress, regarding the multitude of cracks in the plastiglass. It was hard to break the stuff, but when it did break…
They had to be using specialty ammunition to break up a plastiglass tank like this one. Or, at least, to damage the first layer to the point of collapse. Whatever they'd been using must have been potent stuff, since the bottom of the tank should have stopped Shepard's fall. Since it hadn't, the plastiglass of the second layer had been compromised enough that Shepard's mass being dropped against it coupled with the volume of the water was too much for the strained material to take.
It was a long way down.
He looked up when he heard his name. "—face."
"I have snapped a holo for later," EDI declared.
"Shepard?" both the synthetic and Moreau demanded. Moreau, wincing, forced himself into a sitting position.
A moment later, Moreau's face relaxed. "A lapse in contact," EDI explained. "She remains mobile. Maj. Alenko is set to intercept. He can perform triage and administer basic treatment. They are currently hoping to converge at Cision Motors."
Bailey nodded, turning to face the hole in the floor again. "Mace? Bailey. That med-unit I had you put on standby—send it down to the Cision Motors dealership closest to the Ryuusei restaurant."
