MFV Lynia, March 15, 2170
Over Mindoir
"But why can't I go?! John is my brother and he's down there!" Jane screamed.
"Jane, I let you come with me to space before because I knew no one would shoot at us." Hannah sighed "This is different. We don't know if the colony is under attack too and I am not putting you in danger again. Stay. here."
"But-"
"No buts." Hannah knelt down and squeezed Jane's shoulder "Look, we will go down there first. If we don't get shot at, we will contact the next shuttle and you can get on it. But not yet."
Jane looked down and had trouble talking. Eventually she mustered the courage to agree.
"Okay..."
Hannah nodded and walked out of the room that Captain Himel'Jullt had given her as they prepared in case of resistance on Mindoir.
The attack on the Einstein had been bad. Only 15 crew members along with Hannah and Jane remained, they had lost communications, and for all they knew, only the quarians would provide help as of now.
Walking through the halls of the Lynia was annoying to Hannah. What quarians considered normal, the cramped spaces, and small hallways was not in the slightest comfortable for any human.
Eventually, Hannah reached the shuttle where some volunteers from the Einstein's crew -Including Zabaleta- and quarian marines were waiting for her to arrive.
"Captain Shepard?" A voice asked, causing Hannah to turn around.
The voice had come from Captain Himel'Jullt, the quarian that had agreed to help them just a day before.
"Yes?" Hannah asked.
"Do you have all the equipment you may find necessary down there?"
"Yeah." After the attack on the Einstein, the equipment they once had was gone. Instead, they had to make due with whatever the quarians had, which due to their lack of resources was not much.
"Very good." The captain nodded "Oh and, please take this." Himel extended his hand in which a small device was in which Hannah took, albeit confused.
"What is it?" Hannah asked.
"A communicator."
"But the transport already has one."
"Yes, but it is more in the scenario that something goes wrong." The captain said "If you encounter hostile forces down there, please do not hesitate to contact us and we will head down as soon as we can."
Hannah nodded and the captain left. She walked back to the transport and got inside where several quarian marines mixed with humans sat waiting for her.
Once the door to the transport closed, they began moving very shakily, only stopped from bouncing by the safety harness.
"Didn't think our week would end like this..." Hannah heard from right next to her, where Zabaleta was gripping his harness tightly.
"Me neither... I just hope what we find down there isn't bad." Hannah said.
"Yeah well, I mean at least we got some badass suited aliens with weird legs coming with us."
"Oh? We have the weird legs?" The quarian in front of them said.
"Yeah. No offense but... like... how do you walk with those?" He said pointing at them.
"I could ask you the same question. How do you not fall over with yours?" Another quarian joined the conversation.
"Because ours are normal." He said with pride.
"Yeah, you and asari have those knees. But does anyone else?" The quarian next to Zabaleta said.
"..."
"..."
"...Batarians..."
"Heh, yeah... I don't think evolution likes you." Another quarian joined in.
"Mhmm, sure you can say that but you and turians are the only dextros in this galaxy." Zabaleta countered.
"..."
"Bosh'tet."
"Everything would be so much easier if we all could just be almost the same, but noooo... The universe loves diversity..."
The Quarians and Zabaleta continued their banter for several minutes. Although to someone else it would seem like friendly -albeit somewhat racist- banter, it was still obvious to Hannah that they were nervous at what they would find down on Mindoir.
They all sat with the banter continuing for several minutes now with almost everyone in the transport having joined it. Even Hannah was surprised at how everyone, even humans, went against Zabaleta.
Hannah enjoyed the banter from the crew, at least until she got a message through her comms from the pilot. "Captain Shepard? Could you please come up here?"
She removed her harness and had to squeeze her way to the cockpit hoping that she would only need to provide authorization to land at the colony.
As the door opened though, she got a prefect view at the distant colony. A colony on fire.
"Oh dear god..." Was all she could muster as her thoughts raced to John and if he was even alive down there.
"Keelah. I am so sorry captain." The pilot said as Hannah's hands came up to cover her mouth.
Hannah stood there for a while until she let her hands drop and ordered the pilot to land in the trees to avoid attention. She made her way towards the crew as the banter had finally ended.
"Alright, we are going to land on the plains..." Hannah began to speak before she was interrupted.
"Wait. Why not the colony?" One of the humans asked.
"The colony..." Hannah tried to speak as she felt her throat swell at the thought "The colony is gone. It has been attacked."
"Keelah..." One of the quarians spoke as everyone's eyes widened.
"Yeah... We are going to land very soon. If we find Batarians I want stealth. No reason to alert them yet. If it all goes to hell, I'll contact Captain Himel." Everyone agreed and began preparing their weapons in case they needed them.
They all waited for several minutes until the shuttle landed with a hard thud nearly causing Hannah to fall. Once it stabilized, they began exiting the shuttle one-by-one.
Once everyone was out, Hannah looked back at everyone. Although the humans were not in the slightest moved by everything around them, the quarians were amazed. If it wasn't for the fact that she could see the smoke of the colony in the distance, she would also be amazed by the scenery, barely having time to be on a planet these days.
"Alright everyone, let's move." Hannah ordered.
As they began moving through the forest they had landed in, they moved carefully as to not attract unwanted attention.
But the scenery eventually changed. In contrast to the peaceful looking landing spot, further ahead were trees on fire, dead wildlife... and dead humans.
Hannah decided to get a closer look at the humans, what she saw though made her want to puke.
In front of her was a family laying on the ground, two adults and a child. Their bodies were burnt, but she could make out where rounds had struck them, all of them shot in the chest, clearly having died a while after being shot. Not even the children were spared from whatever had happened here. She could only hope that John had indeed survived the onslaught.
Closing her eyes at the scene, she heard several gasps from both quarians and humans as they saw the scene. But what interested her more, was the unknown voices in front. At least, it would have been unknown, if it wasn't for the fact that Hannah had heard that same language and tone on the Einstein.
She made her way towards them and signaled everyone to take cover. Looking behind the tree she took cover in she could see the ones the voices belonged to. Two Batarians, all alone, and looking away; easy prey.
Trying to make as little noise as possible, she strode over towards the crew and signaled to ask who had a knife by pulling out her own. One of the quarians responded by pulling his out and nodding.
Hannah tried to stay as low and quiet as possible -With her armor not helping- while the quarian had no problems with getting to one quietly.
Once behind them, Hannah counted with her fingers and once she closed her fist, both quickly grabbed them by the mouths and put their knives to their throats right before cutting them.
As the Batarians struggles as they lost blood, their mouths remained covered as to not allow them to scream.
Hannah looked down at the Batarian as it's eyes began to deepen and struggled for several seconds before finally dying.
Soon, the two Batarians had died and everyone made their way to the colony as they left their bodies behind, the only sign of their previous existence being the blood on Hannah's and the quarians gloves.
Their walk over there had ended up being way too smooth for anyone's liking. Still, Hannah could only assume that it either meant the previous ones were leftovers. Or that they had already finished with the colony.
Unfortunately, the latter had proved to be the case as entering it she could see so many dead bodies. Men, women, children, it didn't matter, they were all dead. So many with their bodies burnt or just shot so many times.
Mindoir wasn't a weak colony though. They had so many defenses and communications. So how had Batarians managed to win in just one day?
Her thoughts were interrupted as she heard more of the same voices as before to her left -and faint cries.
Turning to face it, she saw five Batarians. But the cries didn't belong to them. They belonged to humans. Human prisoners.
"What are they doing?" Zabaleta asked in a whisper beside Hannah.
Hannah gulped as she realized who these were "Slavers... Sons of bitches..."
"Shit..." Zabaleta closed his eyes and inhaled deeply "What do we do ma'am?"
Hannah knew that killing them with knives was suicide. Instead she came upon a generator next to them. And water below them. Excellent. Let's hurt these bastards...
She quickly formulated a plan and gave orders to everyone. Instead of using weapons, Hannah found the tech expert and told him what to do. As he pulled out his Omni-Tool, he began running some programs and waited until the humans were outside of the kill-zone.
Once the Batarians had put them out of it, the quarian overloaded the generator causing electricity to hit the water. The Batarians still there began making erratic movements as they were electrocuted.
The ones that were outside of it realized too late to help them, but turning around had been a fatal mistake as the humans got behind them and killed them; some by snapping their necks, and some by slitting their throats and leaving them to bleed out.
The prisoners barely had any time to process the sudden shift in their predicament as they were already being freed by the other humans.
"What- who- who are you?" One of the prisoners asked.
While everyone else worked on freeing the other prisoners, Hannah and Zabaleta made their way towards them and Hannah answered first "I'm Commander Hannah Shepard, this is Lieutenant Zabaleta."
Hannah looked around to see if there was a chance that her son was with them to no avail.
"You're Alliance?" They asked to which Hannah nodded. The prisoner then pointed behind them at the suited aliens "Then who are they?"
Hannah looked back and answered "They are the Quarians. Our vessel was attacked and they came to our rescue. Now they are here to help against the Batarians."
"You're joking right?" Another one of the prisoners said "You can't trust those things! They will betray you when it benefits them! Or steal from us!"
"Shut the fuck up Mike." The first prisoner said with almost a hiss in his voice and looked back at Hannah "Sorry. He's not very... fond of aliens."
"I'm only not fond of suit-rats like them!" He said "They will betray you eventually just wa-"
He was interrupted by another one of the prisoners smacking him on the head "Yeah?! And those 'suit-rats'" The prisoner used her fingers for emphasis on the word "Just helped in saving us! You want to let your racism get in the way of survival? Then just stay here and let them capture you again!" She finished almost shouting.
Despite the bout of racism from Mike, the quarians looked completely unmoved by it which made Hannah groan as she realized this must be common for them.
Hannah turned to look at the first prisoner and asked "What happened here?"
He hesitated in responding "It... it was just so... fast. We didn't even get a chance to fight back... not one of the air defenses fired a single shot before everyone started dying... Oh dear god..." The prisoner fell to their knees and started sobbing, Hannah kneeled and squeezed their shoulder to calm them down.
"Commander?" Zabaleta asked behind her.
"Yes Lieutenant?"
"What do we do with them?" He nodded at the prisoners "We can't just leave them here, and they are definitely not combatants."
Hannah pondered at the information. Taking them along with them would definitely get them killed. But leaving them here would as well.
To reinforce her fears, one of the Batarians radios crackled open and from it came a voice no one could understand. But Hannah knew very well that it was likely to check on the group they had just killed.
Shit...
Hannah decided that this was it. Things were definitely about to go to hell anyways. She opened her comms and spoke "Captain Himel, do you read me?"
There was a few seconds of silence before the comm opened again "I hear you Captain Shepard. What is your status?" He asked.
"Batarian presence has been confirmed on the surface of the planet. We haven't drawn their attention yet but we will likely be spotted soon." Hannah said.
"Do you need reinforcements?"
"Very likely yes. Get them ready. If we manage to get past undete-" Before Hannah could finish, several Batarians rounded the corner of the street they were in and spotted them. "Nevermind, send them ASAP."
"Copy that."
The comm shut off and Hannah pulled out her assault rifle as everyone took cover from the incoming fire.
They knew that now it was a race against time with the Batarians having definitely contacted the others. Thankfully, the joint effort of Humans and Quarians was greatly beneficial in obliterating the Batarian forces.
Once all the Batarians had fallen to the ground as they were riddled with bullets, Hannah heard more distant cries from what she assumed was other prisoners. She hid the non-combatants in a dark alley to keep them hidden and forwarded their coordinates to the incoming Quarian shuttles. Meanwhile, the ones who had combat experience grabbed weapons and joined the fight to kick the Batarians out of Mindoir.
As they made their way towards the distant cries, they all rounded the corners and killed any Batarians they found. It became far simpler than she thought it would be as even the amount of Batarian forces was no match for the joint effort.
Once they found the other prisoners, they quickly opened fire and killed all the slavers. Unfortunately, in the cross-fire there had been some wounded prisoners and some that had been more unlucky to have died by it. Even so, they couldn't waste time as the slavers could try to escape; as much as it pained Hannah, she knew that there would definitely be many more deaths from the inevitable cross-fire.
Once the newly freed prisoners either hid or joined the small army, they heard the distant sound of engines. Hannah knew that those sounds could only mean that the slavers were trying to escape from the nigh-unstoppable army. And if one of those shuttles had John in it...
No. No you will not take him too...
Hannah was filled with rage as she mercilessly shot any and all Batarians freeing the enslaved humans and having an even bigger army as the Quarian reinforcements were still nowhere in sight.
Walking through the debris filled streets, she continuously shuddered at the possibility that John could have joined the corpses that riddled them as well. At this point though, she began not caring about the bodies, she had seen so many of them that it wasn't fazing her as much as it should have. The same couldn't be said for some Quarians and the majority of the Humans -including Zabaleta- who were now almost ready to throw up.
All Hannah cared about was finding John, and make sure that any Batarian who had dared even try to touch her son would die an agonizing and painful death.
However, any thoughts about John she had were broken as a shot flew through the air and hit her leg causing her to fall down. Everyone ran into cover as Zabaleta dragged Hannah to a safe position, receiving a shot in the arm as a reward causing him to drop his weapon.
Unfortunately, no one in the little army they had created had any experience in taking out snipers that they didn't even know where they were. Hannah signaled for one of the covered groups to go through the alley behind them and try to surround, or at least flank the sniper.
That however, ended up horribly as they were ambushed themselves by salvers that were hiding and waiting who were just barely killed by the last remaining person of that group. At this point, Hannah knew this fight would end up with several losses. The sniper did not help their case either.
But suddenly, it sounded like the sniper had stopped completely. Either to let their weapon cool down, or to trick them out of hiding. Hannah decided to take one for the team and extended her hand out. To her surprise though, nothing happened. Instead she wanted to take a bigger risk by poking her head out, but before she could, Zabaleta pushed her down and did it himself to not risk her life. Once again, nothing.
Everyone got out of cover and tried to find why the sniper had stopped. During the time the shots had stopped and now would have been long enough for their weapon to cool down and fire again, but there was nothing.
Hannah looked around to find where the sniper may have taken cover and see why they had stopped, knowing there had been no shots fired. She eventually did find where the Batarian had hidden, only because of the almost purple flashes coming from one of the buildings at the end of the street.
As she got closer though, the Batarian was suddenly flung out of the window and fell at least from 5 stories on its back, rendering the slaver immobile as its spine broke on impact with the street. She saw as an unknown figure was encased in an almost purple aura around their body and went back towards the stairs of the building. But what surprised her more was that whoever this was, was young. Very young
As the figure finally exited the building, they walked closer to the whimpering Batarian. And as they stepped closer, Hannah could make out more of their details: Young, but almost her height, dark hair that only went to their ears but had blood dripping from their top-left from a long cut, they practically showered in blood, and what Hannah could just make out to be... blue eyes...
John?!
The boy finally reached their Batarian, and in a flash had his biotic fist coming down on its head, killing it immediately.
Hannah covered her mouth at the brutality of the boy, a boy she was sure was John. Her son.
The boy looked up and saw the small army of both Quarians and Humans, all staring at him. But what interested him more was the front figure who was now limping her way towards him, once she was closer though, he let his biotics drop and his eyes went wide "Mom?!"
Hannah wasn't sure if to cry from fear from what John had been forced to do to survive that he was not shaken by murdering the slaver in that manner, or happiness that he was alive and semi-well. Instead, she opted to get closer to him as he also began going to her. Once they were in arms reach, Hannah dropped to her knees and took John in a very tight embrace causing him to hiss from pain, but still return the hug.
Both were crying in each other's arms for a while as everyone else remained on guard for any ambushes the slavers could try to execute. After the crying subsided after a while from both of them Hannah was the first to speak "What- what happened?"
John looked scared, he gulped and tried to speak, but found no words coming from him.
"John?" Hannah asked concerned.
Even though he wanted to tell her what he had gone through for the past day, he still couldn't speak and simply shook his head to tell her he simply couldn't talk about it yet. Thankfully for him, she caught the hint and dropped the subject. Unfortunately as silence ensued, it was quickly removed as more Batarians came around the corner For the love of... How many more are there?!
To make matters worse, several shuttles were now visible heading towards them. This was definitely going to-
Instead, the Batarian shuttles were blown up all of a sudden. Took them long enough Hannah thought as she looked behind her to see the Lynia and several other Migrant Fleet Vessels in orbit as they dropped several shuttles all filled with reinforcements.
"What in the world?" John asked as he looked to see the ships obliterating the Batarian forces.
Hannah smiled as the colony was being rid of Batarians slowly but surely with the help of the Quarians who also freed any prisoners they could find who subsequently joined the fight.
Unfortunately, some of the slaver ships did indeed manage to escape with humans in them, much to Hannah's and John's displeasure, but had it not been for the help they were getting, there would be more ships leaving than there were now. But worrying about the ships leaving ended up being another priority as Captain Himel contacted Hannah "Uh, Captain Shepard?"
"Yes?" Hannah responded.
"We've got a problem. We just got a transmission from the fleet that the relay to this system was just activated several times." Himel said with worry in in his voice.
"More Batarians?" she asked.
"No. It's the Alliance."
Hannah grinned at the thought that at this point this battle was definitely won "And that's a problem how?" she asked.
"Because they are trying to communicate with the colony and they know that WE are in orbit. They have just marked us as possible threats. They think we are the Batarians." he said anxiously.
Shit... Hannah's grin dropped at the realization that the Alliance vessels would open fire on the Quarians if they were not alerted soon to not fire "Alright, we'll try to handle it."
"Please hurry." Himel said as he cut the comms.
SSV Rainier
The captain looked at his galaxy map thoroughly. They were heading towards the colony of Mindoir after receiving a distress call from the SSV Einstein about Batarians.
"Clearing the relay in 30 seconds captain." A voice spoke in front of him.
"Very good, get me a full report on the situation and I'll inform Admiral Hackett." The captain said.
"Yes sir."
After clearing the relay and entering the system, the ship was followed by over 15 more ships ranging from dreadnoughts and cruisers. They quickly attempted to make contact with the colony to no avail. Instead, they tried to access the satellites in orbit of the colony and saw several ships in orbit of the colony. The captain made his way towards the comm room of the ship and contacted Hackett. He waited until Hackett's figure appeared in the screen in front of him and the Admiral spoke.
"Anderson, what is the status on the Einstein?" Hackett asked.
"We don't know admiral. We just arrived at the system and tried to hail the Einstein and Mindoir. Neither answered." Anderson responded.
"Hmm. Have you gotten a visual of the enemy?"
"We believe so admiral," Anderson nodded "We got visuals from the satellites in orbit of ships in orbit with enough firepower to probably destroy the colony."
"Batarian ships?"
"They certainly don't look like it. At least no Batarian ships I've ever seen."
Hackett stroked his chin as he contemplated and quickly came upon a possibility "Anderson, mark them as potential hostiles but do not fire unless they hail a request of communication from you, or the colony tells you they aren't hostiles."
Anderson looked confused for a moment "Any reason for that?"
Hackett nodded "We recently had contact with the Quarians. It is possible that they may have stayed in the system for a while and that they are now providing support."
"And if they are the attackers?"
"The distress call mentioned the attacker was Batarians, not the Quarians. I'm not saying to trust them, simply mark them as potential threats. You are clear to fire if they fire at you, or show any sign of being the attackers."
Anderson saluted Hackett "Yes sir."
"Hackett out." The communication was cut and Anderson opened a comm channel to speak with his pilot.
Mindoir
Hannah quickly made her way towards the colonists and asked them where the nearest comm center was. They told her where it was, but it had been damaged during the initial attack and would likely require a long reparation time. Much longer than what they had. But maybe with not only a Quarian tech expert, but also John, maybe they could do what none of them though would be possible. Of course, it would mean putting John in danger again, but they really didn't have the time to come up with something else.
Reluctantly, Hannah told everyone the plan which everyone, including John agreed to.
The plan went along smoothly, but horrifyingly as Hannah got a good look at just how little remorse John had for any of the Batarians as he threw them unto walls and killed them with biotic punches, even crushing ones neck and leaving them to die a slow death like that. What worried her more though was how John was seemingly getting extremely tired, not only was he still just 11 years old, but the way he was using his biotics would likely leave him with serious brain damage if he kept pushing himself this way. But the constant pleas from Hannah for him to rest fell on deaf ears as he kept going and began bleeding from his nose and a little from his mouth.
Eventually they reached the communication center, and just as Hannah had thought, it was filled with Batarians guarding it. She told John to let them do the work and that he needed to rest despite his objections which were quickly shut down by Hannah reminding him they needed him to fix the communication hub to make him finally relent.
While the fight went along well enough, the Batarians still didn't relent and managed to get a few kills themselves.
The fighting allowed a group that guarded John and the quarian tech expert to get into the building without being noticed by sneaking in behind enemy lines. Hannah saw them successfully enter and ordered everyone to distract the Batarians as long as they could.
Inside, the communication hub was badly damaged. It was missing several essential components, but nothing that neither John or the quarian beside him knew how to handle.
As they worked together to fix comms, John couldn't help but get glances at the quarian and think of Tali. Her bubbly personality, nervousness, and excellent hacking skills came to his mind. It confused him why he couldn't stop thinking about her though. He had only known her for a few hours and yet he felt like she was the only true friend he had ever made. But was that all? No, anytime he thought of her he had to hide the fact that he was slightly blushing, so what was it about her that made him do that?
His thoughts were interrupted by the quarian giving him an 'ahem' when he realized he had gotten distracted. He welcomed the interruption as he got to work on a system that he quite honestly didn't know, but could figure out given the time.
As they continued to work for several minutes, they heard one of the guards yell "Grenade!" followed by an explosion and very pissed off Batarians. He could still hear the gunshots outside, giving him hope that his mother was still alive, but for now, he had to focus on the task at hand for as long as possible.
He could hear the gunshots coming from behind him as the guards tried their best to defend against the onslaught but were still deftly defeated in the closed quarters.
The quarian beside him also realized that they had been beaten and gave John a quick look and told him some very precise directions to fix the comms which only required some fine precision to work again. The quarian grabbed his assault rifle and went towards the Batarians to shield John as he worked on tuning the systems before him.
He could hear the gunfire behind him grow and the quarian get hit several times as he gasped in pain. If the quarian died, then it would be John's turn next. His mind raced to finish his task as soon as possible, but it was still interrupted by the thoughts of everyone he was leaving behind if he died too: Jane; the sister that, although he sometimes fought with, he still couldn't have asked for a better sister. Hannah; the best mother he could have possibly gotten, one who never gave up on him despite all his mishaps. And... Tali; The young quarian he barely knew for a few hours, yet she had made such an impact on him, and who had managed to be the last person he had thought of... why? Why her and not Jane or his mom?
Without even realizing it, the communication hub began running automatic diagnostics as everything was tuned correctly to allow for short-range communications. He didn't even know how he had managed to do it, but if it worked then at the very least the quarians in orbit wouldn't be blown to bits.
As John stood up and tried looking behind him, he received a shot on his left arm causing him to scream in pain as he grabbed it only to receive another shot in his right leg causing him to fall to the ground. He saw what must have been 17 Batarians now closing in on him and the quarian he had worked with was filled with bullets and suit-breaches rendering him as good as dead.
John heard the several Batarians growled what he assumed to be orders through his cries of pain. He could still hear gunfire outside which he knew meant that there would be no one to come help him. Once again the images of Jane, and Hannah flashed on his mind as one of the Batarians raised its gun to fire at him. John gritted his teeth and closed his eyes, remembering his entire life, the constant pranks he pulled on his oblivious sister, the amount of trouble he got into that made his mom reprimand him, and going on that little adventure through the ship with the young quarian.
As those thoughts came to his mind, his body began to glow and his fists closed up as he let out a powerful yell while he released a powerful energy wave that knocked back every Batarian in the room. John stood up despite the pain as the Batarians went to grab their weapons which John quickly pulled away from each of them. Without weapons, the Batarians pulled out knives and the like to charge at the biotic boy who was now filled with rage.
One of the Batarians charged at him only for John to dodge him a little too late and get a large cut on his arm, but he returned the favor by grabbing the knife from the staggered Batarian and shoving it on the back of its throat. Two more charged at the same time as others tried to head towards the weapons, but John used his biotics to grab a small piece of the broken wall and threw it at one of the two attackers to make him lose his balance and fall onto John's knife as it went through its right eyes. John quickly pulled it out and stabbed the second attacker in its stomach over five times before pulling the knife out and stabbing where John was sure its heart was and pulled it out to scan what to do about the 14 Batarians that were left.
He saw a perfect opportunity as one of them managed to grab a weapon and began aiming it at the boy, only to be slightly pushed biotically as the slaver opened fire accidentally hitting three more Batarians with the weapon. John was beginning to lose his ability to think as he began experiencing the worst headache he had ever felt, but he pushed past it to deal with the now 11 slavers.
John saw that the wall next to five of the Batarians was nearly falling, and he mustered up as much power as he could to drag it down, crushing and killing three of the five, but leaving the other two immobile as the wall fell on them. Down to six. John saw some of them reach out for other weapons but he remembered the devices he had used to distract the guards when he and Tali went towards the engineering room. John tuned the device as high as he could and threw it at the Batarians activating it to a loud screech that left all of them holding their ears in pain while John worked through it to make his way towards the six remaining Batarians and used his now biotic-powered fist to hit one of them so hard they were flung into the wall with a force that killed the Batarian on impact.
John deactivated the device as it was beginning to hurt him too and used the Batarian's confusion to quickly use the knife and slit the throat of one of them before turning and stabbing another one in the eyes, this time leaving the knife in. John used his biotics and charged at the last three slavers punching one so hard in the face that one of its eyes popped out of its socket. However, his burning ears and confusion from the mounting headache he had, allowed one of the Batarians to get a gun and shoot John on the stomach. While he did not feel the pain from the adrenaline in his body which allowed him to make his way to the Batarian in front of him as he lifted a chair to throw at the slaver from behind which caused it to fall over and John used that to crush its head with his foot. Soon though, he felt a sharp rising pain in his stomach and coupled with the burning headache, his body finally gave out and he fell, unable to move.
The last Batarian strode over towards John as he gasped for breath that he found hard to get as his whole body was in the worst pain he had every felt. As he just barely heard the Batarian pull his gun up, John closed his eyes, now accepting the inevitable. But just as the shot came out, he knew he was still alive. Did the Batarian manage to miss a static boy that was only a few feet in front of him? Or had someone saved him?
His question was answered as he felt a sharp pain run through his body as his body was forcefully turn. His eyes could barely make out the figure in front of him, and his ears were ringing so loud that he couldn't hear them either. He willed himself to focus on the figure and made out the features of them to recognize her mother standing over his body. She was yelling something at him, but he couldn't make out what. He tried to rise, but found his body unwilling to move at all, only his eyes obeyed his commands.
John felt as Hannah sat him against the wall as he struggled for breath and his vision began to darken.
Hannah scanned her son, she could tell from how he was acting that he had overused his biotics, and now his brain was paying for it. She barely made out John looking at the communication hub to realize that it was fixed and running diagnostics. She ordered Zabaleta to take care of John as she made her way to the console and waited for the diagnostics to end.
Hannah stood there for several seconds before Himel contacted her again "Captain Shepard? What is your status?" he asked nervously.
"I'm still okay, we have reached the communications center, I am just waiting for this piece of shit to finish its diagnostics so I can tell the Alliance to not fire at you." She responded.
"Ah Keelah... Well they are pointing their weapons at us and we are preparing to fire if we must, please hurry so we don't have to." Himel said.
"Damn it... okay I'll try to get the message out when this dumb thing finishes running some dumb diagnostics!" She screamed.
There was some silence for a few seconds but she could hear several quarians grow impatient of the slow machine and begging to the ancestors that it hurried up.
Come on you stupid no-good piece of crap machine... work!
As if on cue, the communication hub lit up and Hannah was quick to open comms with the Alliance vessels.
"This is Commander Hannah Shepard! Service number 2165-CL-9672. I am broadcasting from the colony of Mindoir. The vessels in orbit of the planet are not hostiles! I repeat, they are not hostiles! Do not fire at them!"
SSV Rainier
"We are in range of the unidentified vessels captain." The pilot told Anderson.
"Good, prepare weapons in case they fire at us." Anderson responded.
The pilot looked at his screens and saw that the other ship's weapons were shifting to point right at them. "Uh, and what about them pointing at us?"
"What?"
"They are pointing at us captain!" The pilot yelled.
"Damn," Anderson opened the comms with the other ships that Hackett had given him charge of to go to Mindoir "All ships prepare to fire."
"It looks like they are preparing to fire captain." The pilot said anxiously.
Anderson sighed and spoke into the comms "All ships op-"
Before Anderson could finish the order, communications with the colony were reestablished and a voice yelled from the terminal "This is Command... Shepard! Service numb... 2165-CL-9672... The vessels in orbit of the planet are... repeat, they are not hostiles!..."
While the broadcast was garbled and filled with static, it was enough to give Anderson the heads up on who the ships belonged to "All ships hold your fire! I repeat, do not fire!"
The ships' weapons dropped and not a single shot was exchanged between either side to everyone's relief.
Suddenly, another communication came on, but this time it wasn't from Hannah, but from one of the ship's in orbit of Mindoir.
Anderson opened the channel and spoke first "This is Captain Anderson of the Systems Alliance. Who are you?"
There was silence for a few seconds before an almost robotic voice spoke "This is Captain Himel'Jullt vas Lynia of the Heavy Fleet..."
Mindoir
Hannah could only wait and hope that the signal had been received by the Alliance ships now in orbit of Mindoir.
She waited for Captain Himel to tell her about the situation for about a minute, making her anxious. Then again, she couldn't hear any shots being fired from the ships or falling ships so that was good right?
Suddenly, her comms finally opened, but instead of the Quarian captain, she got someone else "Hannah? Are you there?" The voice spoke.
"Anderson? What... what are you doing here?" She spoke surprised.
"We heard your distress call. Nearly shot the ship's in orbit before we heard your broadcast. How are you doing down there?" He asked.
"Not good, we need medical support, we have many injured, and John..." Hannah stopped as she looked back to see her son struggling to stay awake.
"What about John?" Hannah knew that even Anderson was scared of his condition. Anderson had known John and Jane since they were barely a month old and he had acted almost like a father to them ever since.
"He... h-he overused his biotics and was shot in the chest..." Hannah managed to get out as she walked over to John trying to hold back tears.
"Shit. Give me your location. I'll send someone to pick you up ASAP." Anderson spoke hurriedly.
Hannah gave her current location to Anderson and true to his word a shuttle landed there only five minutes later.
John's body ached in the worst pain he had ever felt as he was loaded onto a stretcher and got hauled back to the shuttle.
He could see his mother next to him trying to hold back tears at her son's condition. Once the shuttle moved out of the planet, he was shaken the whole ride and wanted to scream from the pain he was feeling. But all he could do was taste the iron on his mouth when he tried to speak.
The ride was not in the slightest graceful, but when they finally got onto the dreadnought that Anderson commanded, he saw the moving lights on top of him as he was hurried to a medical room.
The room he was hauled into was almost like a hospital room, white walls and heavy lighting that he felt was blinding him.
Soon, several doctors stationed on the ship entered the room, and used their tools at their disposal to stabilize John. He felt as the needle entered and exited his body. He had never been fond of them, but right now he was glad at what it was doing to him.
John began feeling drowsy as his eyes fought and failed to stay open, and the last things he saw in his vision was his mother looking down at him, followed by Jane who had been transferred over and was crying at the sight of her brother.
John's body finally gave in, and he felt himself delve deeper into a peaceful sleep with the last images, being that of his family.
