New Singapore, Eden Prime, 11:00 Local Time 2192 AD

"Hey boss, you ain't gonna like this"

Zaeed turned his attention to what the private had said. He looked closer at what he was pointing at with the binoculars

"What in the Goddamn…" and then cursed under his breath.

A group of civilians were trying to make their way to the subway. Problem is that the subway is closed and all trains deactivated

"Vito, take Jedore and Vosque and bring those civvies here"

Vito looked at him incredulously

"Wouldn't it be even more dangerous for them to be here rather than down there?"

Zaeed looked back at him

"I know it is, but I'd rather have them here, compared to doing God knows what God knows where, and getting killed by God knows who." After a brief pause, Zaeed added "And 'sides that, at least we'll have some extra pair of hands if we need them"

Understanding that, Vito took the two soldiers he was assigned and ran off towards the group of civilians.

It took a few minutes until they had reached the civilian group. Through the binoculars, Zaeed could see that the civilians we're hesitant to follow.

However several shots were fired from across the street they were in. Most of the shots missed. But a lady from the group, probably around her fourties, was shot. Vito had pushed the group into cover, and was hunched behind a concrete barrier. He peeked around the side to try and assess the lady's condition. He saw that she had taken a shot through the left shoulder. Her coat was turning into a blood red color. She started screaming for help.

"Jedore, Vosque, give me some suppressive fire!"

Vito bolted out of cover as his squadmates complied. Running in a zig-zag pattern across the street, he held on to his helmet and hunched his body as to make a smaller target. He dropped onto prone when he reached the lady. Looking at the wound, he saw that it wasn't as bad as he thought it would be. Vito took her by the good arm and dragged her back to cover. As soon as he did, Jedore went up to the lady to treat her wounds.

"Medigel should seal the wound" She said as she packed her medical supplies back in. "No major artery was hit, she's lucky"

Acknowledging that, Vito ordered the group to make its way back to the building that the rest of his squad had fortified.

A few shots pinged on his cover, one of them nearly grazing his face. Cursing, he popped out of cover when the enemy fire lessened, and took a few potshots at the enemy. Even if he had hit an enemy, he wouldn't have done any serious damage. The Batarian infantry had shields, blocking most bullets until the generator couldn't keep up and needed to recharge. In a stroke of bad luck, Vito didn't have any D-Rounds packed in his magazines.

He retreated into a concrete barrier a few meters back. No doubt that the group would have reached the fortified building by now. If he could somehow lure the enemy unit into range, the squad's sniper, Dan, could knock a few of them out. Dan had been wise enough to pack in D-Rounds for his sniper rifle. He could effectively pick off individual infantry without having to deal with shields.

Rounding a corner, Vito ran straight towards the building entrance.

"There's sixteen of them!" he said as he jumped into cover inside the building.

As the first Batarian rounded the corner, Dan fired his rifle and killed one. He breathed then exhaled, firing two more shots. One shot had missed while the other landed on a Batarian's chest, sprouting out orange blood from the tennis ball sized hole that had been carved by it. Letting out a small sound of amusement, Dan zeroed in on another Batarian. This one was smart enough to be taking cover. It was a shame that one of his legs were sticking out however. Shooting at the leg, the Batarian jerked and fell out of cover. Dan took another shot and blew his head off.

The rest of the Batarians had wisely decided to not follow their now dead colleague's example and hunkered down. One of them threw a smoke grenade over their cover. As smoke began to pour through, Dan's visibility on the Batarians became hindered

"I lost visual" he calmly said, going back into cover.

Zaeed nodded and ordered some of the other soldiers

"Tye, Hakim, cover the door" he said as he moved to a better position to attack the enemy.

The two soldiers positioned themselves on the side of the doorway, giving them the advantage as they can see the Batarians as they go through the doorway, and can shoot them as soon as they do.

They listened for footsteps, hearing the 'tap-tap' of the Batarian feet. As the sounds got louder, the soldiers shouldered their rifles and aimed at the door's general direction.

The door opened, and half a dozen Batarians barged in the room. Tye and Hakim fired their rifles immediately, catching the Batarian invaders off guard. One of the invaders crumpled down in pain, screaming as he did. His friend was far more fortunate, in the head and dropping dead instantly.

The other Batarians had realized what was happening, and scrambled for cover. As aliens took cover, Zaeed sprung from his position, behind the Batarian invaders, and let loose a volley of bullets. While he had hit several of them, tearing down one of their shields, and flushing others out of cover. Seeing the Batarians in panic, Hakim pushed out of his cover and attacked the enemy at close range. He switched from his rifle to his SERBU shotgun and rushed one of the Batarians, knocking the alien to his back. Hakim shoved the shotgun up the alien's face, and pulled the trigger. The shot bypassed the shield entirely, being too close to the body. Hakim was hit on the side by a hit from another Batarian. The attacker had tried to do to him what he did to the other Batarian, pointing a pistol directly at his face. Hakim reacted instantly, kneeing the attacker and then knocking the pistol out of his hand. The Batarian got back up and pulled out a curved knife, prompting Hakim to pull out his own knife.

The two of them attacked each other viciously, sending out slashes and stabs as soon as an opportunity presented itself. The fight went on for a bit, the both of them were focused, eyeing each other like apex predators fighting in the wilds. Hakim watched as the Batarian reared back and lunged forward for what he had assumed was a downward stab. He responded to block the attack, raising his arm to block it, but the attack turned out to be a feint, and the Batarian landed a few inches away from where Hakim had expected him to be. The Batarian then charged forward and tackled Hakim, sending him down, before putting his knee down on Hakim's chest and put the knife at his throat. Right as the Batarian was about to stab him, a loud crash was heard. Shields flared around the Batarian, a crash was heard again, and the Batarian's head had gone missing.

Hakim wiped the orange blood off his face and armor

"I had that under control" he said

"Sure you did" Tye replied casually, holding out Hakim's shotgun "Come on, a judge ain't in working order if he ain't got his hammer"

Hakim took the gun and made a small laugh at the pun that Tye had made

"You keep making shitty puns like that and I'm going to have to whoop your sorry ass"

"Only for you brother" Tye said, patting his back

They checked their ammo then walked up to Zaeed, who had was searching one of the Batarian's bodies

"What you looking for boss?" Tye said

Zaeed then seemed to find what he was looking for, unclipping some kind of bracelet from the alien's wrist, then wearing it on his own. After a moment of him waving his hand like he was crazy, an orange hologram appeared from it.

"Bingo" he said as he scrolled around what Hakim assumed was the device's screen

"They call it an omni-tool" Zaeed said "Got word from ArFoCom* that they wanted as many working ones as possible"

Hakim looked closer, inspecting the glowing, orange device.

"I'm guessing that it works something like our nComs?" Hakim said, referring to the commonly used mobile devices, a hand held device used to access pretty much anything digital or on the internet. It was called the pinnacle of mobile computing, but didn't have as much computing power as the average computer.

"True" Zaeed said, unclipping the device from his wrist. "It's one of their main communication devices when their out on the field. The Eggheads back at the hot labs wants them intact. What little they have to work with either has corrupted data, or they can't access it" Zaeed said as he searched another Batarian "I'm not sure how they do it, don't really care either. As long as it helps us kill more four-eyes, I'm fine with it"

-000-

Shuttle 47, Departing from HNS Trinitus, Over Eden Prime, 2945 PSC

"Ready for your first drop, New Blood?" the Turian squad leader. At his age of 42, Force Commander Junius Sark was a very experienced veteran. Especially for a Turian. His actions early in the Council-Hierarchy war had sent him skyrocketing up in the meritocracy. He was part of the first batch of Blackwatch troopers, and his superiors often used him as an example for what a Turian should strive to be.

He looked at the young Turian in front of him. His plates were pale, and he lacked any face markings. A Bare-face

'He must be space born then. Rather rare, considering how most of our kind avoid flying unless necessary'

"Absolutely, sir"

The young Turian said as he looked up at him, his expressions showed that he was ready, but if his twitching mandibles said anything, it would be that he was afraid

'No, more like anxious'

They were deploying into a colony belonging to a race that they had only met not even six hours ago. Even Junius himself was apprehensive.

"Try to relax" Junius said, although he wondered if it was to the young Turian, or himself "If these 'Humans' are anything like what we were told, then we'd get along just fine"

"Yes sir" the Bare-faced Turian said, taking a deep breath. "Thank you, sir"

"Keep your head low and follow orders. You do all of that, and you'll make it out of here alive" A Turian from the front of the shuttle said "So just keep your wits about you. Alright Saren?"

"Of course" was all he would say.

-000-

*ArFoCom: Armed Forces Command, Central headquarters of the Alliance Armed Forces, like the Pentagon for the US Military. The highest ranking military officials can be found in this part of Arcturus Station

And that wraps up the first part of the ground combat, sort of.

Sorry for being kinda late, I got cought up in school, and didn't get any chance to work on this one for a bunch of days.

Chapter introduces Zaeed, and the would-have-been Blue Suns. Vito Santiago, Jedore, and Darner Vosque. Hakim, Dan, and Tye are OC's, like Sokolov and Rodney from the previous chapter.

I'm not sure if i should work on the Blackwatch squad POV or Hackett's POV, i'm gonna try and work on them both and see how it turns up. If both goes well i might turn them both into chapters.

The reception to the story has been really good thus far, WAAAY better than i thought it would have done. Thank you for everyone who bothered to read, it means quite a lot to me.

Once again, thanks for reading. Please report any grammatical errors you find if possible, and leave a review if you feel like it. And i hope that i can get a chapter done soon