"How many siblings do you even have?" Mevea questions.
Arcane smirks as he walks alongside her, Dadea already having gotten off. "I officially lost count and the only one who keeps count for consensus reasons is my mother."
"How many moms do you have then?" Mevea asks.
Arcane smirks even more now. "By my count, a lot. Besides my own mother, my dad went for like fifteen of them."
"Twenty-one," Dadea corrects.
"It's amazing that you kept a better count than me…wait. How do you know that?" Arcane asks, turning to her curiously.
"Social media accounts," Dadea informs.
Arcane's ears droop down and frown. "Why am I not surprised?"
"Because your father is very famous and one of the leading people in the mercenary field to the point he rents out entire fleets and your birth mom is a diplomat at the Citadel," Dadea informs.
Arcane raises an eyebrow to her and she shrugs. "You know what…let's just get this over with and not look at social media accounts."
"Is this you as a little kid wearing his sunglasses?" Dadea teases as she looks at the photo and Mevea snarks.
"Don't look at that!" Arcane yells while he pounces at her and rushes to turn off her omnitool.
"Oh, who is the stuffed camel?" Dadea asks, trying to hold him back.
Arcane screams out as he slams on her arm and shuts it off. "I need to tell my mothers to take those two photos off media. Mr. Sandy is not to be…" he stops as he notices the smirks of the two. "Shut up. Not…a word," he orders, pointing a hoof to them.
"Tell us about Mr. Sandy," Mevea says smirking.
"Not…a word!" Arcane repeats, bit ticked off and considering wanting to call his mothers right now to take off the photo.
Dadea giggles while she turns off the omnitool. "Aye aye…captain," she snickers at the end and Arcane gives an annoyed frown. "Come on. It's harmless fun," she jests as she wraps an arm around his neck. "Be happy. You look cute back then and now you're a big softy badass," she points out, giving a few hard pats to his chest.
Arcane raises an eyebrow as he gives a dry look. "Softy?"
Dadea grins. "Well…yeah. You are soft…and cuddly to the touch…" she offers, giving a shrug.
Arcane sighs and hangs his head. "I just know, one of these days, I will give up on you calling me cute and cuddly and just let you pet me."
"I'll take that bet. Lots of good material to work with," Mevea butts in and Arcane snorts while glaring at her.
Arcane groans before walking ahead of them. "Let's just get this over with. It can't be too hard to find some assholes using their name."
Dadea still gives some snickers. "How do you want to play it?"
Arcane stops and he turns his head to the two, holding an evil grin that unnerves them slightly.
"Humiliating…" Mevea whispers, leaning against the small stall counter with Dadea holding her own frown as she stocks the stall's shelves.
"Thanks for this by the way," Arcane whispers to the owner as they wait in the small storage room. "And perfect payback too. A few minutes, right?"
The owner nods while peeking past his wings, watching his two comrades work the place before some men walk up in armor and some guns on their hips. Mevea gives a bored sigh while lifting her head up. "Welcome to Liquid Rock. How can I help you?" she asks tiredly, but she momentarily eyes their weapons and notes where each is for a moment.
"The protection. Time to pay up," the lead one says, slamming a hand on the counter and making her jump back.
Mevea gives a fake scared expression. "L…Let me get the owner and…" she stutters as she points shakily behind her.
"Better hurry your ass up," he spouts annoyed.
Mevea slowly turns and goes to the door where Arcane and the owner is hiding behind. The owner then passes off a credit chip between the door crack and she walks back without wasting too much time to piss these guys off. As she hands over the chip, Dadea moves up behind them and drops something from her pocket and quickly goes back to looking like she is working. The clattering making the group turn towards the noise and her with their guns raised and Dadea to back off with a fearful expression.
"Whoa…I just dropped something…okay?" she offers while stepping away and Mevea taking one step back from behind the counter after seeing how much of a distance away she is.
The one holding the credits scoffs and they pocket their guns and start to walk away. "Better watch yourself. Cause I might…"
At that moment, Arcane presses a signal on his omnitool and the device whirs to life, opening up some slots before electrical arcs come out and dance across the men's bodies. All of them screaming out in pain as Dadea smirks and takes out the pistol she was hiding with Mevea grabbing the shotgun from under the counter. Arcane chuckles as he comes out of the supply closet while the machine does its job and then quits. Which allows the men to drop to the ground either knocked out or completely dazed.
"Great first test," Arcane compliments to Dadea who smiles at him.
Mevea spins the shotgun around before bonking him on the head with the hilt. "Still humiliating you made us do this."
Arcane groans and rubs his head with a hoof. "Hey. Females look more vulnerable. You can't deny that."
Mevea scoffs at him while the owner, a volus, comes out and looks over the change and damages. "Hey. Be happy we aren't charging you for this. Hope that excuses the damage we did," she says placing the shotgun back under the counter.
Arcane smiles at the two. "Either way, we got a couple of these guys…five. So five more to go. Let's hunt them down," he says happily before seeing Dadea already grabbing their omnitools and downloading their last bits of data and locations. "Where we headed?"
Dadea slowly smirks. "You won't believe this cap."
Arcane leans over before smirking as well. "Oh…this will be fun."
The krogan grunts quietly as he looks to see the door opening and the three mercenaries he just hired walk on in. Five bodies being dragged behind them in a biotic-like aura as he sees the fluffy leader's horn glowing in the same color. "Five bodies, hold the weapons," Arcane jokes while dropping the five in front of him and making them kneel before the krogan.
The krogan growls in a low tone before turning around and grabbing the handle of his shotgun on the table. A slow small grinding noise sounds out as he pulls the gun to himself and steps up to the first in line. The guy only had a second to look up before being blasted and leaving a stump where his head used to be. The other guys now waking up and each one was blasted as the krogan walks the line. Not even bothering to look as he pulls the trigger four more times. Loud bangs echoing throughout the room before it ends.
"Five heads, five thousand. Think you can find the rest?" he asks, reaching into a pocket of his armor and takes out five credit chips.
Arcane smiles while Dadea takes the five pieces and sends them to their account. "Oh. We know where they are," he says before smirking to Mevea who nods and walks into the middle of the room.
"Where? And what is she doing?" the krogan questions, eyeing the turian as she takes out something from her small bag hanging on her hip and throws it to the ground. A simple walk back shows a smirking expression. "…you must be joking!" he yells in pure rage, realizing the location now.
Dadea activities the bomb and blows up the section of the floor, showing another room under it that lead to a crowded apartment full of boxes and supplies, but also five more guys looking quite stunned and dazed from the explosion on the ground.
The krogan yells out in a rage as he charges and jumps down the hole. "You fucking pyjaks!" they hear before loud banging from the shotgun sounds out along with clattering of boxes, and furniture being tossed from the hole back into the mercenary room. "Right under our tails?! You have…the nerve…to cross…us!" Each break in the last line separated by the shotgun shooting each round into possibly a kill shot.
Heavy panting sounds as the krogan comes back up and gives a growling huff. "Pansies. Clean it up!" he orders to his men who jump down into the home after coming out of their hiding places. The krogan grumbles as he grabs some stuff from his other pocket and tosses them a few chips. "There. Five thousand. Figured that's fair for letting me handle them…and ten more for keeping this quiet," he growls, tossing a ten grand chip towards Dadea who catches that as well.
Arcane smiles gently. "Wouldn't have it any other way. Now…about this other mission?"
The krogan grumbles one last time as he goes back to sitting on the table before huffing. "Here's the lowdown. All the groups on this station were contracted by Aria to clean up a possible killer group down in the water treatment center. We already lost twenty people to them so each sent a group of ten down there. We never heard back. Ten more were sent and they never reported either. You need to head down there and figure out what happened. Pay is twenty to thirty depending on what you find."
Arcane smiles broadly. "Fair to me. Fair to you two?" he asks, looking to the two beside him.
Dadea smiles. "Yeah. Fine here."
Mevea sighs. "Yeah. Good with that."
"We will bring another along for this one," Arcane adds on with a wave of his hoof. "No problem."
"I don't care. Aria wants to know what happened. So get down there and find out," the krogan orders and the three turn and walk off.
"Jaix?" Dadea asks once they were far enough away. "Maybe with some supplies and guns?"
"Fully loaded. They took down sixty guys no problem. Which means we need to prepare for more than that," Arcane points out. "I don't want to be caught down there and face like a hundred of them with just one spare blaster pack."
Dadea nods before calling Jaix and walking to the side to get some better volume. Mevea, however, looks to see Arcane now having a slight frown on his face. "What are you thinking?"
Arcane slowly looks to her with a questioning look. "Thirty guys each time…and none of them told what was going on. Normally you would hear screams or a distress signal and call."
Mevea now crosses her arms and frowns. "You are thinking trap."
Arcane nods. "Something might be jamming us down there and we might not find it. So lets at least be prepared to shout and everything. And any ambush."
Mevea slowly nods. "I'll bring the lightsaber."
"And that spare battery they gave us. You might need it if its an EMP and not a jammer," Arcane adds on while thinking with a hoof to his chin.
Dadea hums as she inputs the code to the spillway door. A rather short and simple one. Mevea right behind her in her sith armor and blaster in hand, her lightsaber hanging from her belt. The turian's keen eyes looking around the spillway corridor and even looking down into the waterway below the catwalk to see if there is anything in the slow-moving and very shallow water. Jaix right behind them all and having an assault rifle in hand, his eyes scanning the connecting catwalks and crisscrossing waterways behind them. And overseeing it all is Arcane in the middle of all of them. His large form keeping oversight of everything as he cranes his head around and even peers down towards the bottom of the door.
"Any loss in pressure?" Arcane asks, remembering the map that showed doors leading to another venting area that would lead to outside space beyond that room.
Dadea hums as she reads off the small interface. "Nope. The readings are fine. Good pressure, oxygen, and nitrogen."
Arcane takes a deep breath. "Then open it and let's see the damage."
Dadea nods before activating the door, the large metal wall clanking with a loud thudding start. All of their heads turning to the lower area and watch as murky water spills out and fills the waterway a little. But then their eyes narrow as a very faint red stream starts to pour through and back into the waterways. Arcane opens his wings and jumps up to the catwalk, his horn lighting up as the door kept opening till they see the source of the red liquid. A hand drops down into view once the door slides past and they all see the body and pile it is on top of.
About fifteen bodies, in various states of dismemberment, different armor types from the three groups, and almost caked in dried and wet blood. And the smell. What doesn't help is the strong stench coming from the pile as they hold a hand or hoof to their nose.
"Aw…geez. What the heck in…" Arcane stops in his questioning as the door fully opens and they all gaze beyond to see bodies scattered everywhere in the same conditions.
All of them slowly walk into the large collection room. An outcropping rising up from the center hosting some current placements of a flamethrower and machine guns stood facing a larger door on the far end. Two bodies seemingly trapped and cut in half under it. One body with a hand on the controls near the door, possibly making a last-second closing. Two rocket launchers placed on the catwalks near the main door aimed down towards the entrance of the larger airlock door.
"Spread out. Search every one of them," Arcane orders and everyone either jumps down and looks at the bodies or walks around to see if anything else is amiss. Arcane then brings up his omnitool and tries to hail Aria and the krogan. "This is AH!" he yells as he heard the loudest screech from the radio and holds a hoof to his ear. "Ow…" he groans, rubbing at them. "Dadea…what's the status on coms?" he calls over to the girl as she checks on the controls.
Dadea gives a concerned look to him before switching tasks and checking the signal. "Blame the place, sir. It's fucking thick. Can't even get a regular radio broadcast in here," she mutters frowning before returning to check on the controls. Her hand slowly taking the dead arm off of it and looking closely to make sure there is no damage.
Arcane groans. "No wonder they didn't find out anything. And this is the perfect place for an ambush."
Jaix hums as he looks over a ripped open corpse. The armor being shredded apart and gashes in the body. "This was no person. It was an animal. Too many sharp claws…and teeth marks," he notes, pulling some cloth away to see the large bite marks. "I say…around a foot of muzzle. But I can't do much else without a footprint at least. And this water isn't helping," he informs, taking a quick look around at how much the flowing water is wiping away the blood and any potential marks.
Mevea huffs as she looks over the knocked over mounted machine guns and frowns. "Half the ammo is gone. They went down with a fight. I bet the other ones are around half as well," she says, looking at the flamethrower and takes out the canister to weigh it.
"I got the launcher up here with two missiles missing," Arcane calls down, looking over the locked down rocket launcher and notes the ones still there. "Got three left so maybe they didn't want to blow the place up that much."
"Considering that there is one more door beyond this one that leads to space, very bloody likely," Dadea jokes and shakes her head at. "Reading about half the normal atmosphere though. Should I equalize and open it?"
"Hold…" Arcane stops her as he takes a quick look around. "Jaix, Mevea, set up the guns again. Dadea, get ready to equalize and open by remote. I need you up here. We are going to man the launchers," he orders. The two down low quickly picking up and locking down the turrets once again, aiming them towards the door. Dadea setting up a link to her omnitool before rushing back to the other side of Arcane, grabbing and aiming the launcher. "Alright. We ready?" Arcane asks them, using his magic to aim the launcher.
"Set," Jaix hisses.
"Clear," Mevea replies.
"Say the word," Dadea says, holding a finger above her omnitool.
"Alright…" Arcane takes a deep breath. "Open it."
Dadea presses the button, lightning up the panel near the door. Loud hissing emanating from beyond the thick doorway before it slowly quiets down. Replaced then by the heavy thunk of it unlocking and then slowly moving up. A yellow light spinning around near it and bathing them in color. However, their eyes remained locked on the opening edge of the door. Water even starting to flow the other way to fill the empty space behind it and making the pools of blood start to drain towards the airlock for space.
"This is strange," Dadea notes, checking her omnitool while still keeping one eye on the door. "I am getting high temperatures on the other side when it should be fucking cold."
Arcane raises an eyebrow as he peers around the launcher and kept watching. Until they heard a loud splash and their guns clicking to get ready. What steps into the light made them freeze up for a moment as they start to see something akin to a varren-like beast as it becomes covered in the light to show itself. Sunken eye sockets and a large ball dome in the middle of the head was the most outstanding feature of it as it snaps its large sharp teeth that don't seem to have any sign of lips over them or even skin in general with how bony and muscled it was. A drooling snarl coming from it before more suddenly rushes around the corner, coming out in droves and almost like a flood.
All guns and blasters start to fire as Arcane and Dadea both fire off rockets into the hoard. Large squishy explosions became the results while body pieces and blood spewed everywhere and onto the rest of the hoard. The two took no chances and fired again, letting loose another salvo of rockets and hitting off another large chunk. The chainguns already spinning and firing off bullet after bullet into the hoard. All the creatures running around the two as they try to fire at anything moving towards them. The last salvo of rockets being sent off and hits the thickest chunk of the hoard of beasts to at least do some damage.
Arcane and Dadea immediately move to the edge of the catwalks and take out their blaster gun and pistol before firing away. Mevea gritting her teeth as she tries to aim for larger hoard packs coming at her and Jaix, getting lucky with making them fly back. Jaix having a similar situation with the two ending up back to back as they kept firing till they would eventually run out of bullets. The rapid pack barking and growling at the two, scrambling on top of the little concrete hill as they were gun downed. But soon problems arose.
Jaix's gun suddenly clicks and makes a screeching noise to which he kicks it towards the group and they make it fly over their heads. He then takes out his blasters and started to fire, backing up till he was completely back to back to Mevea. Mevea glances down and notices the amount in the belt before it clicks empty and she kicks it away as well. Immediately going for her lightsaber soon after and slices at one getting close. The hoard kept running around them and snapping their jaws at the two. Some dropping in the middle as they were shot down from the two above.
The blaster kept firing down to the beasts with Jaix and Mevea try to hold out. The two hoping it can be whittled down to a more managed level soon. But it was quickly dashed as more poured out and join their packmates. Arcane frowns at how quickly the situation is dissolving and snaps his head towards Dadea. "Get the door ready to close and open the airlock!" he yells before hearing Jaix scream and grunt. His eyes snapping back and seeing one jumping onto his side to which he quickly shoots and shoves it off. The unneeded signal being called for the others to pounce now.
Mevea immediately swinging her saber around to try and hit what she could. Mostly getting legs or their stomachs. However, they start to be held onto as they claw and bite at the armor and what the beasts could grab. "Door! Now!" Arcane calls before flying down and lands between them. His magic flaring and sending out a strong shockwave that sent them all flying. He quickly snaps his head around before using his magic again and grabs as many dead corpses and flings them to the open airlock door. Some of the large pack rushing to gorge on the thrown piece of flesh and while using another spell to push and knock the ones in front of him into the airlock door, knocking them out or breaking their necks. He then sends a magic laser towards the one that pounced on Mevea and takes it off her, allowing her to get up and slice at a few. Jaix getting the same treatment and blasts as many as he could while on the ground.
Arcane looks between the two, using his magic blasts once in a while to make an honest effort as the bodies were left somewhat smoldering. Another jumping onto Mevea's back and clawing at it. A growling bite onto the back of the shoulder made her cry out before a magic beam blasts it off of her and against the wall, killing it. She then slices another jumping at her in half, holding one back with an arm. Jaix having two more jumps onto him and shooting them both in the head, throwing and swinging them around into the pack.
Arcane looks between the two as one jumps onto his back and claws at his wings, ripping out a few feathers. He opens his wing and flings it off before frowning and powering up his horn. "ENOUGH!" he yells with energy as he flaps into the air and sends out a massive magical shockwave that sent everyone and everything flying through the room. Luckily, Mevea and Jaix were only knocked down when they heard the yell and ducked down. While the beasts were all splattered against the walls. Arcane pants as he slowly lands and tries to assess the situation as he looks around. His view filled with many more bodies with only two of them moving. Mevea groaning as she picks herself up, along with Jaix using a crushed beast to support him.
"Next time…warn us," Mevea pants as she looks to him and becomes slightly concerned at the blood coming out of his wing, staining his feathers.
Arcane snorts before looking to the airlock door. "Dadea…lock it down," he starts to order, dragging the dead gang bodies back in and pushing the beasts out. "Space them. Jaix, collect all the weapons. Either sell them or fix them up for ourselves. I'll leave you to decide. Mevea…with me," he huffs, his magic grabbing a leg of one of the beasts and dragging it behind him.
Dadea immediately rushes to the doorway and starts to work properly on it, wanting to make sure everything was gone. While Jaix got to work digging the guns out of the piles of the dead and collecting them into a pile in the center of the room. Mevea looking over the carnage before following behind Arcane, pocketing her lightsaber into her armor as Arcane himself did not look very pleased with the situation.