AN: This chapter ended up being an absolute monster! Usually, my chapters end up being ~8 pgs each, but this was over 3x that! So, I broke it up into two parts. Hence the weird titles for these next two chapters. (Sorry about that, but it's for the best.) I am putting them both up at once, though, since they were initially meant to be read together. Pt 1 doesn't divert from canon much at all, really - mostly just retells Virmire from Ash's POV - so I didn't feel right making anybody wait btw installments.
V. Virmire I
After disabling the AA towers to let Normandy land, the shore party had gotten word from Joker to meet at the salarian camp. Commander Shepard was occupied looking over the Mako for any damage it may have sustained during the run. By the time she approached the shoreline, Williams and Alenko were already deep in conversation with the salarian captain.
"So, what are we supposed to do now?" asked Williams.
"Stay put until we can come up with a plan," the captain answered.
"What's going on?" Shepard asked, "I need a status update. Are you in charge here?"
"I am. Captain Kirrahe." The salarian introduced himself and nodded several times. "You and your crew have just landed in the middle of a hot zone. Every AA gun within ten miles has been alerted to your presence."
"You've got to be kidding me!" Williams said, earning her a quick jab in the ribs from Lt. Alenko.
"What are we supposed to do in the meantime?" he asked.
"Stay put until the council sends the reinforcements we requested."
"We are the reinforcements."
"What? You're all they sent? I told the council to send a fleet!"
"The message was garbled," said Shepard, "We couldn't understand your transmission. I was sent to investigate."
"That is a repetition of our task," Kirrahe said, sounding irritated as he crossed his arms over his chest. "I've already lost half my men 'investigating' this place."
"What have you found?"
"Saren's base of operations. He's set up a research facility here, but its crawling with geth and heavily fortified."
"What's he researching?"
"He's using the facility to breed an army of krogan."
"How is that possible?" Ashley started at the voice over her shoulder and turned to see Wrex stalking up to the group.
"Apparently," said the salarian, seemingly unfazed by the hulking, krogan mercenary, "Saren has discovered a cure for the genophage."
"Things just keep getting better and better," Ashley heard herself say.
Shepard's expression turned grim. "With a Krogan army, Saren would be nearly unstoppable."
"Precisely," agreed Kirrahe, "We must ensure that this facility and its secrets are destroyed."
"'Destroyed'?" Wrex took a step closer and glowered down at the salarian, "I don't think so. My people are dying. This cure can save them."
"If the cure should leave this planet," said Kirrahe, unflinching, "the krogan will overrun the galaxy. We cannot make the same mistake twice."
"We are not a mistake!" Wrex growled. He pointed an angry finger at the captain, who cooly stared him down. After several tense seconds, the krogan broke first, and grumbled under his breath as he lumbers off into the surf.
"Is he going to be a problem?" Captain Kirrahe asked, turning to Shepard as Wrex took out his shotgun and began firing into the air. "We already have enough unstable krogan to deal with."
"He'll be fine. I'll talk to him." Shepard said, already motioning for her team to follow her away a few paces to speak in private.
"I would appreciate that, commander."
Once safely out of earshot of both the salarian and Wrex, Alenko crossed his arms and shook his head. "Looks like things are a bit of a mess here."
"Yeah," Williams said, "I wouldn't be so worries if it wasn't for Wrex. He looks like he's about to blow a gasket."
"I'll talk to him," Shepard said. She curbed the gunnery chief's protestations before she's even had a chance to voice them, raising a hand just as Williams opened her mouth. "I'll be careful, chief. But be ready, just in case."
"I'm always ready," Williams muttered as she watched the commander walk off.
She stood next to Alenko and watched as Shepard approached Wrex, still firing his gun at nothing. There was a tense moment, some dialogue exchanged, and then both he and the commander drew their firearms.
"Shit!" said Ashley, reaching for her assault rifle to unfold from its place against her back.
"Hang on a minute, Ash," Kaidan said, quickly jumping in to place his hand over hers and force the barrel of the gun to face the ground.
"Are you crazy?" the gunnery chief asked, incredulously, "The commander is—!"
"Is handling it," said Alenko. "Look." He pointed with his free hand to where Shepard and Wrex were already beginning to relax their positions, stances loosening as Shepard lowered her gun. After another tense beat, Ashley saw Wrex do the same.
She watched the two exchange words for a few minutes longer, and while it was hard to read the krogan's lips, she was reasonably certain she saw him say "I trust you," somewhere in the mix.
The gunnery chief stared on, dumbfounded, as Shepard nodded and the two parted ways. As the commander headed back over to the salarian captain, Williams heard footsteps approach her from behind and turned to see Tali, Garrus, and Liara come over from where they'd all, apparently, been watching from the other side of the camp.
"I can't believe she was able to calm Wrex down," said Vakarian.
Liara nodded her head in agreement. "The commander's persuasive talents are indeed impressive."
"I'll say," Ashley said as she returned her rifle somewhat sheepishly to its holster. "I wasn't sure anything would cool him off."
"I knew she'd do it," said Kaidan, with more than just admiration in his eyes as he watched the commander approach. "Nice work there, Shepard."
"Thank you one and all for your generous support," the commander replies, line canned and tone sarcastic. "Now then, Kirrahe and his men are working on forming a new plan to take down Saren's base without Citadel reinforcements. We're regrouping in half an hour. Everybody be back here and ready by then."
The time passed slowly. Williams ended up biding hers in one of the tents along the shoreline, standing with Tali and Garrus as slowly the rest of Shepard's squadmates wandered over.
"Normally I wouldn't think much of salarians in a fire fight," the turian said towards the end, "but these soldiers seem well trained."
"They do seem pretty tough," Alenko agreed, approaching from where he'd been haggling with Commander Rentola, the salarian requisitions officer. From the looks of it, he'd just finished installing some new program into his omnitool. "I just hope they hold up under pressure."
"They better." said Ashley.
Tali nodded, extending onto her tiptoes to peer at Kaidan's interface, and he lowered it for her to examine beside him. She had seemed somewhat reticent since their arrival on the planet's surface, and admitted as much. "I hope it's enough. The thought of the upcoming battle frightens me. But... these salarians are willing to die to stop Saren, and so am I."
A few months ago, Ashley wasn't sure if she would have believed that statement, coming from an alien. What had it been that Shepard said to her during one of their first conversations following her reassignment to the Normandy? 'Standing up for ourselves doesn't mean standing alone.' She hadn't believed the commander at the time. But now, listening to the group as they readied themselves for the upcoming battle, Williams could think of a no other crew she trusted more or would rather fight alongside.
"It won't be an easy fight," she said, "But we're ready whenever they are."
"That's what I like to hear!" Shepard's voice cut through the small group as she walked up and clapped her hands together. "Alenko, Williams — you're with me. Let's see what Kirrahe's come up with."
"I'm afraid our options are very limited, Commander," said the captain.
Shepard crossed her arms. "I assume this means you've got a plan?"
"Of sorts. We can convert our ship's drive system into a twenty-kiloton ordnance. Crude, but effective."
"Nice," Williams piped in, "Drop that nuke from orbit and Saren can kiss his turian ass goodbye."
"Unfortunately, that will not be an option," Kirrahe responded, "Saren's facility is too well fortified for an orbital strike. We will need to place the bomb at a precise location on the far side of the facility. Your ship can drop it off, but we'll need to infiltrate the base, disable the AA guns, and pacify any ground forces first."
"You want us to go in on foot?" Alenko said, sounding almost outraged, "That's suicide! We don't have enough men!"
"It does sound pretty risky." Shepard ran her palm across the back of her neck and frowned. "There's no way we'd be able to meet their forces head on."
"Definitely not," said Kirrahe, "We will need to divide our forces. I will divide my men into three groups to hit the front of the facility, while you will take a 'shadow' team to sneak in through the back."
"It's a good idea, strategically, but your people are going to get slaughtered."
"We're tougher than we look, Commander. But its true. I don't expect many of us will make it out alive. And that makes what I'm about to ask even more difficult." Kirrahe motioned over Shepard's shoulder to her squad behind her. "I will need one of your men to accompany me. To help coordinate the teams."
"That's a bold ask," said Shepard, whose face pinched in as she considered the request.
"We are all soldiers by trade. If your people are not prepared to face such a risk, would you really want them by your side?"
"He's right, commander," said Kaidan, "We'll never pull this off without both teams at their best. I volunteer."
"Not so fast, LT," Williams cut in, "Commander Shepard will need you to arm the nuke. I'll go with the salarians."
"With all due respect, gunnery chief," Alenko replied, "you're just as qualified to arm it as I am. And it's not your place to decide."
Williams felt herself scowl and bit her inside cheek as she replied, "Why is it that whenever someone says 'with all due respect,' what they really mean is 'kiss my ass'?"
"Cool it, both of you," said Shepard, turning towards her team. "Alenko, you're with the captain. Williams, you and Tali will go with me to form the shadow team. The rest of the crew will stay onboard the Normandy and act as a contingency unit," She looks back over at Kaidan. "Keep it simple, lieutenant, understood?"
"Aye, aye, commander."
"Good," said Kirrahe, "I will have the ordnance loaded onto the Normandy and brief your crew on its detonation sequencing. Once you have the bomb, you will need to place it next to the geothermal taps, then get out before it detonates."
"Alright," said Shepard, "I'm ready when you are, Captain."
"Excellent. Then if you'll excuse me, I need to prepare my men."
"Likewise," said the commander, as the captain walked away.
The salarians huddled up and began to listen to some rousing speech by their commanding officer. Shepard turned around and addressed her squad.
"Well, this is it," Alenko said, "Don't do anything foolish while I'm gone, Ash. That goes for you too, commander."
"We'll be fine, LT."
"Yeah, I just… good luck."
"Something you want to say, Kaidan?" Shepard asked. They shared a look, and Ashley wondered briefly if she should find an excuse to wander off.
But before she could even come up with a viable excuse to duck out of the conversation, the lieutenant shook his head. "No, commander. It's just weird going under someone else's command. I've gotten used to working with you… all of you."
"Don't worry so much," Williams told him. "We'll see you on the other side."
"I know. I, ah… I just want to say it's been an honor serving with you," his eyes fell back to Shepard, "Commander."
"It doesn't matter if we're not on the same unit," Shepard said, taking a step closer and placing a hand on each of their shoulders, "We're still a team. Watch each other's backs, keep your eyes open, and fight like I know you both can. Do that, and we'll all come out of this in one piece."
"You bet, Commander," said Kaidan. But his smile didn't meet his eyes.
As the teams began a last once-over on all their weapons and armor, Garrus walked up to where Tali, Shepard, and Williams were standing.
"T'Soni and I were just talking," he said, With all those defenses, Saren must be hiding something big in there. I wish I was going with you, Commander. I can't stand just waiting around."
"I know," Shepard said, and sounded like she genuinely meant it, "But I need you here, ready onboard the Normandy and watching the remaining crew. Remember what we talked about. It's not just about not letting the bad guy get away, but saving as many of the good guys as you can."
Garrus looked at Shepard briefly and his mandibles flexed a few times. Ashley could only guess as to what human expression that might've been the equivalent. A frown, perhaps? Or maybe a raised eyebrow?
"Yeah, I guess you're right," he said. "Just be careful out there. All of you."
"We will be," said Tali.
In the distance, thunder cracked ominously. Williams watched a few spidery bolts of lightning strike unseen targets out in the distance on the open water. Others briefly lit up the heavy storm clouds in the sky, highlighting the silhouette of several roaming geth drop ships. By the shore, Kirrahe's teams were loading up the Normandy. As Williams watched Kaidan and Wrex help some salarians haul their rewired drive system into the Normandy's main hold, Williams could not quiet the persistent voice in the back of her head. I've got a bad feeling about this, it said.
Finally, they boarded the ship and Williams watched as one by one the salarian teams were dropped off in front of the base before Joker deposited herself, Shepard, and Tali at the back of the facility. She hoped that, despite the young quarian's fears, Tali would be of use. Not just against the geth, but also in disarming the security around the base and keeping the comm lines open between them, Kaidan, and the salarian teams.
"Comm check. Do you read me, Commander?"
"Loud and clear, Captain." Shepard signaled her team to start making their way through the defenses around back. All the while, Williams could hear Kirrahe in her eye as he directed Alenko and his men.
Surf crashed against the rocks they scrambled behind for cover, and Williams was surprised at first when at the satellite uplink tower they were charged at by a krogan in addition to the expected geth troops. Looks like they're further along with that research than we thought, she told herself.
She watched through her sniper scope as Shepard charged across the bridge at the krogan, hitting him with a biotic throw when he jumped out from behind some large shipping containers. He dropped like a ton of bricks and the commander emptied the rest of her clip into him. Never even breaking stride. As the weapon overheated, Shepard threw up her barrier, holstered her pistol, and reached around for her assault rifle. She may not have received specialized training with that particular weapon, but for simple and straightforward charges Williams had seen the commander make do.
Tali and Williams could barely keep pace with the commander as she flung herself at every enemy force. A geth shock trooper got off a few shots as she rounded the corner, but failed to pierce Shepard's biotic barrier. She hit it with a warp and the unit crumpled to the ground. She shot a few rounds into it for good measure then was already charging down the skyway to the next junction. Ashley had never seen anyone fight so hard. Shepard cut through the battlefield like she'd foreseen every move, anticipated every enemy. And every time they heard Alenko over the radio, her movements grew that much more impassioned, that much more deadly — as if fueled by the sound of his voice, alone.
Once they breached the compound, they came upon a command console where Tali was able to gain access to some of the base's surveillance systems.
"We've got access to base security. I should be able to cut the alarms from here. I might even be able to trigger alarms on the far side of the base. It would clear guards out for us, but they might be too much for Lt. Alenko and the salarians to handle."
"They've got enough trouble," Shepard told her, "Just disable the alarms. We can handle any guards inside."
Though Williams said nothing, a small part of her wondered if Shepard was being truly objective with that call.
Once inside, the shadow team was swarmed by shock troopers, a couple of geth destroyers, and a hoard of indoctrinated salarians
"Did you see that?" Tali said once the last one dropped, "They were indoctrinated! What's going on in this place?"
"Captain Kirrahe did say something about losing some men," offered Williams.
"Then we just did them a favor," the commander replied, callously, before heading up a set of stairs. Awaiting them at the top was a geth juggernaut that Shepard approached too quickly after taking it down, and a few seconds later when the platform overloaded, she was thrown clear off her feet by the blast and slammed bodily into several large storage units stacked up by the elevator. Tali ran over to the aid station on the wall to grab a first aid kit as the gunnery chief helped her commanding officer to her feet.
"You okay, Commander?" Williams asked her.
"That was stupid," Shepard muttered, chastising herself through grit teeth, "Sloppy."
She brushed off Tali's offer of medigel, claiming that the injury had soundedfar worse than it actually was.
"Come on," said the gunnery chief, clapping the commander on the shoulder, "Let's clear this place out."
Over the radio, the team could hear Lieutenant Alenko as they continued through the base. He sounded almost as if he were talking to himself. "Okay, hold them here. Fill those holes! … Come on, Shepard. Make it soon."
They heard a voice as they came into the next room. Entering onto a catwalk overlooking a row of cells on the level below, the team could make out that each unit held several salarian commandos inside. "Hello?" one called out to them. "Is someone out there?"
Shepard holstered her gun and approached.
"You're not geth," he said. "And you're not wearing a lab coat. I guess I'm glad to see you. Lieutenant Ganto Imness of the Third Infiltration Regiment, captured during recon. I assume the fleet was called in to destroy the base?"
Shepard was hesitant to give the man any information.
"I see," said the lieutenant, taking the other soldiers' silence as answer enough. "Then you must be the infiltration team. I know the captain. He will want this facility destroyed. My team was altered, indoctrinated. Captain Kirrahe knew about the breeding grounds, but the indoctrination is the greater threat, and far more horrifying."
"How does it work?" Tali asked him.
"I couldn't say," the commando answered, "I only know that I watched good people reduced to mindless husks. There wasn't anything left. Others died during the experiments. I… I envied them. Saren's people were studying the indoctrination. Symptoms, progress. Saren uses it to control his people, but I don't think fully understands it. I don't know much else. I just saw what it did to the others. I can't end up like that. Please – let me out!"
"How do I know you won't just attack me if I let you out of there?" Shepard asked him.
"It's obvious I'm not crazed or drooling like the others. Let me out and I'll stay out of your way. Please, don't leave me in here!"
"Why did Saren do this?" Williams asked, peering into the next cell where a group of five or so salarians loitered, aimlessly. Some wobbling on the spot. A couple were sat in the far corner. All muttering to themselves.
"It calls, and I must follow."
"The voice is always with me. Whispering."
"Every word is the void. It is all I can hear."
"This place is an abomination," said Tali. "Saren's research must be destroyed."
"I'm opening your cell," Shepard finally decided, standing back with her gun raised as Tali worked to unlock the door mechanism with her omnitool, "but then you're on your own."
"Don't look back and hope to outrun the blast, hm? A better chance than I had before you showed up. Thank you, human. And good luck. You'll need it."
True to his word, Imness ran back the way he'd seen the team come in by, hardly giving his saviors so much as a backwards glance. Shepard and her squad continued into the base, taking a set of stairs leading up to the next level. There, they came upon a second cell block. Another commando made eye contact with Shepard and flagged her down. He identified himself as Private Menos Avot of the same STG regiment as Imness, but seemed jumpier and unstable than the last. Even Tali muttered her misgivings.
"Something's not right here, Shepard."
"I need out," the private begged, "This room is too small, and it keeps talking! I need to get out! Let me out, please! Let me out!"
"I'm sorry, soldier," Shepard told him, "I can't take that chance."
Avot flew into a mad rage. He raised his hands above his head, rushed the door, all the while shouting: "Let me out! Let me out! Let me out! Let me out!"
He collided fruitlessly against the glass over and over again, until finally he slumped over in exhaustion. Shepard motioned for the team to move on. As they passed him, Williams could still hear the private muttering to himself. "Can't take the chance. No chance. No choice. Have to do what it says. Have to. Whispers and poking and cutting and screaming. Let me out. Let me out. Let me out."
Williams felt a chill go down her spine as they moved deeper into the base and having to knock off several more indoctrinated salarians as they went. Several were without armor, and went down with a single, well-placed shot. Williams noticed Tali hesitating slightly with her shotgun against these waves. Poor kid, she thought, It's a lot easier shooting nameless geth drones than actual people, even if they are armed and indoctrinated.
The gunnery chief moved to pull her trigger a little faster after that, taking out her own targets as well as several she saw Tali lining up. At first, the quarian seemed alarmed by this, casting secondary glances in Williams' direction. But eventually she starts to fall into the pattern, letting the Alliance soldiers take the brunt of the fight and devoting herself to using her omnitool in an auxiliary capacity, overloading enemy weapons and shorting out their kinetic shields – both tasks she seemed far more comfortable with.
They summoned an elevator and moved through the second part of the facility, towards the research labs. Inside, they killed a krogan scientist and a number of husks Shepard accidentally released from their stasis chambers. Towards the passcode-protected door at the back of the security office, they found an asari scientist cowering under a desk. Something about the introduction reminded the gunnery chief ever so slightly of Liara.
"Get out from under there!" Shepard called to the maiden, her pistol trailed on her.
"Don't shoot!" She scrambled out from beneath the workstation and raised her hands above her head. "Please, I'm unarmed. I just want to get out of here before it's too late."
The scientist identified herself as a neurospecialist – whatever the hell that was – by the name of Rana Thanoptis. She quickly spilled her guts to the commander, telling her all she knew about Saren's ruthless efforts to understand the indoctrination process, as well as her subsequent lack of loyalty towards him.
"You think indoctrination only affects prisoners? Sooner or later, Saren will want to dissect my brain, too!" Rana told them. "It happens to everyone at the facility. My first test subject was the man I replaced. Now I just want to get out of here before it happens to me."
"You should have thought about that before you started working for a mad rogue spectre," Williams said, glaring at her and pointedly not lowering her rifle. She had little sympathy for people like Rana: those only interested in repenting when it was their head on the chopping block next.
Thanoptis gave them all she knew about the facility. She even opened the door behind her to Saren's private lab and gave Shepard full access to all of the encrypted files on her computer terminal. "So are we good now? Can I go?"
Shepard fixed her with a look. "I'm going to blow this place to hell and gone. If you want to make it out alive, you'd better start running."
"What? You can't-! But I'll never-! Ahh!"
Williams chuckled softly as the asari took off running. "I enjoyed that," she told the commander, who offered her a brief and self-congratulatory smirk before leading the team onwards and into the genophage labs. Then to another elevator to the communications tower. Once inside, Ashley spotted a familiar looking artifact down the ramp in the far corner of the room.
"Look, Commander, over here: it's another beacon! Like the one on Eden Prime."
Shepard motioned for both Tali and Williams to take a step back and guard the entrance while she went to examine the artifact further. You don't have to tell me twice, Williams thought, I've had enough of those things to last a lifetime.
But as Shepard stood in front of the thing, she failed in any efforts to get it operational.
"Any luck, Commander?" Tali called after another round of overheard, panicked commands given through the radio as one of the salarian teams took heavy damage outside.
"I can't get it to activate or respond," Shepard answered, "It seems dormant."
"Ash," Tali said, looking over towards her, "It might work for you. You've already been marked by the one on Eden Prime."
Ashley hesitated, briefly, and the sound of gunfire continued through their earpieces.
"The salarians are counting on us," Tali urged, "We can't let them down."
The marine swallowed hard then gave a nod. She turned towards the mouth of the ramp. "Commander!" she called and reached behind her to stow her rifle as she approached the prothean obelisk. Shepard yielded to her and stepped aside, bringing back out her own firearm and going to join Tali by the entryway. Carefully, Williams reached her hand out as the beacon began to glow. She was bathed in a sickly, green light as she felt the floor start to wobble underneath her feet and that familiar, alien pulse reached out and raised her off the ground. She was soon grabbed up in another vision – assaulted by waves of colors and sounds and smells and images – before being dropped unceremoniously back onto the floor.
"Oof!" she moaned as she clambered to her feet. "Shit. Fuck."
"You alright, Chief?"
"Will be, Commander."
"Copy that. Let's get out of here!"
They moved back towards the exit. But as they turned to go, the interface in front of them turned red and a new, large, strange-looking hologram appeared on the display. It spoke in a deep, deafening tone—
"You are not Saren."
"What is that?" asked Tali, "Some kind of VI interface?
"Rudementary creatures of blood and flesh. You touch my mind, fumbling in ignorance, incapable of understanding."
"I don't think this is a VI..." Williams breathed beside her.
As they made a break for the breeding facility for Joker to pick them up and arm the nuke, Ashley was still reeling from the conversation in the communications tower. For once, she could almost sympathize with the Council back on the Citadel. If she hadn't witnessed it herself, she was not sure she would have believed it. A Reaper! Sovereign was a real-life, honest to goodness reaper. Not a derelict ship or some kind of AI program left behind by the reapers, but a reaper itself. An enormous, monstrous, mechanical lifeform, thousands if not billions of years old. Malevolent and callous, and intent on the harvest and annihilation of their feeble, organic lives.
If she stopped to think about it too long, Williams feared she might be sick.
Luckily, that wasn't an issue she was going to have to face any time soon, as they were given absolutely no time to try and digest what they'd just heard and witnessed. Joker had come in over the radio the instant Soveriegn cut the feed to warn them the enormous ship was coming their way. They were now making a mad dash back for the breeding facility to set the nuke in time to get out before the geth overrun the salarian ground forces and turn their attention to the Normandy.
They could hear Alenko over the radio shouting orders and trying to keep the remaining teams afloat. "The geth are turning! Shepard must be nearing the target. Jaeto, keep them here! Circle around! ... Now it gets fun!"
Ashley thought she'd heard the lieutenant say that line before, while out on other missions together. Maybe taking down a thresher maw or combing down a geth ambush. She admired how he seemed to be keeping a cool head through all this, treating it like any other mission. So this is what being on an A-team is like, she told herself, remembering thinking something similar to back on the first real mission she'd had with the lieutenant and commander on Therum. Level-headed, even in a crisis.
She wondered if any part of Saren's facility reminded the lieutenant of a bathroom tiling.
A group of three krogan were out on the platform towards the breeding facility. As they charged the ground team, Shepard managed to catch all three in one singularity, taking them out as they hung in the air and she charged forward that same, indomitable look in her eyes. The pack of geth ghosts and rocket drones proved not so easy to cut down. They were guarding a large turret that could make quick work of the Normandy should it attempt a landing.
When they finally took both the geth and the turret down, Kaidan came in over the radio: "Good work on that gun, Commander. We're beginning our assault on the other one."
Shepard incapacitated a group of shock troopers attempting to ambush them in the elevator by raising another singularity and chucking a grenade in. She detonated it right as Tali hit the call button and slammed shut the elevator doors. The shadow heard the salarians setting the charges as they cleared out the carnage from the elevator, took it down a level, and moved through the breeding trenches. Williams tried not to think of the possible purpose for the waist deep water as they waded through it, taking out a pair of geth ghosts as Tali fiddled with the door controls onto the landing site.
And then Joker was there, coming in over the radio and telling Shepard that he'd bring the Normandy as close to the site as possible. Williams had run up the cargo bay doors and was helping carry the makeshift ordnance.
"Bomb is in position," she told the commander, "We're almost set he—"
"Commander, do you read me?"
"The nuke is almost ready, Lieutenant." Shepard said as she raised her hand to her earpiece and shouted to Alenko through the line. "Get to the rendezvous point!"
"Negative, Commander. The geth have us pinned down on the AA tower. We're taking heavy casualties. Captain Kirrahe is dead. We'll never make it to the rendezvous point in time."
Williams watched helplessly as the commander began to scramble.
"Joker! Get them out of there, now!"
"Negative. It's too hot! You can't risk it. We'll hold them off as long as we can—!"
"It's okay, Commander," Ashley said, stopping to grab Shepard by the shoulder, "I need a couple of minutes to finish arming the nuke. Go get them and meet me back here."
For a split second, Williams thought the commander hadn't heard her, but then Shepard locked eyes with her, gave a nod, and pounced into action.
"Keep that nuke safe, Williams – Vakarian! I could use your tech skills. You and Tali are with me."
"Yes, Commander."
Shepard spared one last look behind her at the bomb site as she led her team back towards the breeding trenches.
A few minutes later, an enormous shadow passed over the bomb site, and Chief Williams looked up in time to see a geth troop ship touch down.