Acronyms:
COMMO – Communications Officer
1MC – 1 Main Circuit
AU – Astronomical Unit
BPDS – Battlefield Personnel Data System ("Bapdas")
CHAPTER IV: THE TRANSMISSION
Lieutenant Commander Layla Shepard, Executive Officer of the prototype ship SSV Normandy, stood in the Combat Information Center speaking a few orders to the crew to prepare for the jump. After all was set, she strode briskly to the cockpit to watch. She stopped several paces behind the helmsman and stared out the front of the ship, looking in silence with a bit of awe at the mass relay that was little more than a speck of blue light in the distance. Relay jumps always fascinated her. The fact that these relays had been built by the highly advanced protheans, yet any ship could use them…
The pilot's voice shook her out of her momentary musing about prothean technology and brought her back to the present. "Approach run has begun," Joker said as the relay rapidly grew outside the forward window.
The Normandy began an asymptotic approach trajectory as the relay's size grew exponentially out the forward and side viewports.
"Hitting the relay in 3…2…1…" The Normandy was surrounded with bright blue light as the relay fired. Shepard felt a brief moment of queasiness as they transitioned, normal for most crew when transiting a relay. The relay used its massive element zero core to raise the speed of light between the transmitting relay and receiving relay in the same way that a starship FTL drive did, but on a scale orders of magnitude larger. The Normandy traveled to the receiving relay in a matter of seconds in a narrow corridor of space where the speed of light was trillions of times faster than normal; the receiving relay then lowered the speed of light to its normal value. The bright yellow star Arcturus snapped into distant view. Further in-system was the ever-expanding Arcturus Station.
Out the front and side windows, the commander could see two tiny specks of blue light, too dim to be stars yet too bright to be far away. Arcturus was located at a major relay nexus. The relay in the Sol system was a primary relay that linked to Arcturus; it was a fixed one-to-one connection, and there were no secondary relays close to the Sol system. What this effectively meant was Earth was sealed off from the rest of the galaxy save for the one mass relay. Until the Normandy, no ship had the FTL range to make the trip from Sol to Arcturus, since no suitable discharge points existed between the two stars. Despite the stealth ship's speed, however, Sol to Arcturus was still over a two day trip.
These factors made Arcturus the obvious choice for headquarters and a fleet base; any enemies wishing to attack Earth would have to pass directly through the one of the highest warship and defensive system concentrations in the galaxy. Arcturus was a "choke point" of sorts; all enemy opposition wanting to reach Earth would be funneled into a killing zone that few ships could pass. Furthermore, due to Arcturus being a major relay nexus, Alliance reinforcements were only hours away from many spots in the galaxy.
The Normandy turned and set a course for a different mass relay, another primary one. They completed the transit several minutes later, and soon approached a third relay. This relay was a secondary relay, meaning it was omnidirectional and could link to any secondary relay within a radius of several hundred light years. Joker repeated the same process as the relay oriented itself to a corresponding relay near the Utopia system in the Exodus Cluster. Several minutes later the Normandy passed through the final relay and set a course for Eden Prime.
Joker's hands flew across the various panels at the helm as he oriented the ship and fired the engines for a sublight velocity boost. Satisfied, he held his hand over a button and said, "Engaging FTL drive…now."
"Excellent work, Joker," a feminine voice came from over his shoulder.
The pilot jumped and winced at the unexpected minor pain from his hips – he hadn't even heard the commander approach. Granted, he was focused on completing the relay jumps over the past few minutes, but he figured he would have heard her approach.
"Sorry, Joker," Shepard said, a bit sheepishly. "I didn't mean to startle you."
"You just surprised me, that's all," he replied. "I figured I would have heard you approach."
A brief chuckle followed and she continued, "Well, that's good I suppose. It means you're staying focused on your job. We don't want to crash into the side of a relay before the Normandy's even commissioned."
"That'd be a career-ending mistake," Joker said.
"Of the truly permanent variety," Shepard confirmed. "For everyone on board."
"The hearings in Parliament would probably be pretty animated, though," Alenko added. The two men heard a quick laugh from the commander behind them that quickly faded.
"So what brings you up to helm, Commander? Making sure you put your uniform on straight?" Joker asked.
She chuckled briefly, which again stopped quickly. "I sure hope I did. 'Can't get dressed properly' wouldn't look good on the official evaluation form for the Counc – " She stopped midsentence, continuing a couple moments later. "Well that this is the XO of our most advanced ship can't get dressed properly," she finished saying rapidly.
Neither lieutenant acknowledged her sudden pause and marginal recovery, but it essentially confirmed that she had come to the same unspoken conclusion both of them had.
"Well, I'm glad you can button up your uniform properly, Commander, since I just jumped us halfway across the galaxy and hit a target the size of a pinhead." Shepard briefly chuckled again before the pilot continued. "Any orders from Captain Anderson or Spectre McGrumpypants back there?" Joker asked.
"McGrumpypants? Really?" Alenko asked with a shake of his head.
"Spectres are trouble. All he did was scowl at everyone when the Captain gave him that tour," Joker replied.
"And you're an expert on turian facial expressions?" Kaidan asked, a look of amusement subconsciously appearing on his face.
"Eh, maybe. Still, I don't like having him on board. Call me paranoid," the pilot responded with a shrug.
"You are paranoid," Alenko shot back. "The Council, especially the turians, helped fund this project. They have a right to send someone to keep an eye on their investment," he said. And to keep an eye on Shepard, though that's very easy to do…stop it, Kaidan thought as he brought his mind back to professionalism. He had worked with many attractive women before – superiors, subordinates, civilians. Layla Shepard would be no different.
"Yeah, that is the 'official' story. But only an idiot fully believes the official story," Joker said. "And I hadn't thought you were an idiot, Alenko," the pilot said with a snort.
"They don't send Spectres to simply observe a last-minute shakedown run," Shepard agreed. She figured she knew why the Spectre was here: to evaluate her candidacy to that elite and secretive group of agents. But why the shakedown at Eden Prime? That had her puzzled – and concerned.
"Joker, status report," Anderson's voice interrupted over the intercom.
"Just cleared the mass relay, Captain. FTL drive is engaged and ETA to Eden Prime is thirty-six minutes."
"Good. When we decelerate, find a comm buoy and link us into the network immediately," the captain responded.
"Aye, aye, Captain."
"Commander Shepard, meet me the comm room," the captain's voice said from her omni-tool a moment later.
"I'm on my way, sir." She left the two officers and walked to the rear of the ship.
"Is it just me or does the captain always sound angry?"
"Only when talking with you, Joker," Kaidan said as the two continued their banter.
"Huh."
"Yeah. Can't possibly imagine why," Alenko said sarcastically. He continued checking out the systems. He could still run diagnostics and tests that they had planned to run today, before being co-opted into...whatever they were doing now. He knew why the Spectre was truly here: to evaluate Shepard. But why the detour to Eden Prime in place of the shakedown run?
"Shepard suddenly gets assigned as XO, and now we have a Spectre aboard, just a couple days after she arrives." Joker shot Alenko a look, and they both had the same suspicion. They're going to start evaluating her to be a Spectre. While no official words had been said, most of the crew had come to the same conclusion.
"I don't believe in coincidences," Kaidan responded simply.
"Yeah, though she doesn't know anything about what's causing all of the commotion elsewhere in the Alliance."
"With that, she's as much in the dark as the rest of us," Alenko agreed.
"Well, except for the captain," the pilot added. He paused for a moment as he checked the status of systems while the ship was at FTL. "You went through N-school as well, right? You went through that training from hell?"
"Yeah."
"You ever run into her before from that?"
"No, she went through before I did, I think. She probably went through soon after Elysium, or at least that would be my guess," the biotic responded.
"They don't do an N-school reunion or something?" the pilot asked.
This earned a chuckle. "Nah, most people are still too sore and tired from passing – more accurately, surviving – N-school. While you're glad you pass, it isn't something that you want to relive. Each class goes to a bar and gets pass-out drunk. Dulls the pain, at least for a while."
The pilot chuckled. "Exchange the muscle hurt for a hangover, huh?"
"Compared to the way your entire body hurts, a head-splitting headache is the preferable of the two."
"Pretty sure the 206 bones in my skeleton would have broken 412 times after the first hour of N-school," the pilot quipped. "And the captain's an N7 too, plus we have a Spectre. Awful lot of commando firepower for a 'shakedown run'. And why Eden Prime? Something's wrong here. Just wish I knew what the hell it was," the pilot thought aloud, a hint of concern in his voice.
Shepard entered the comm room, but to her slight surprise only found Nihlus present. The Spectre had been looking at an image of Eden Prime on the main view screen, and he slowly turned to face her.
"Ah, Commander Shepard. I was hoping you'd get here before Captain Anderson. It will give us a chance to talk," he said in a calm tone that, given the circumstances, was anything but reassuring.
"Of course, sir. What's on your mind?" she asked.
The Spectre crossed his arms as he slowly began pacing. "This world we're going to—Eden Prime. I've heard it's quite beautiful."
"I've never been there myself, sir, but they say it's a paradise," Shepard nodded. She hadn't gotten a chance to take a vacation there, but from the vids and what she had heard of the planet it seemed to be as such.
"Yes…a paradise," Nihlus nodded. "Serene. Tranquil. Safe. Eden Prime has become something of a symbol for your people, hasn't it? Proof that humanity can not only establish colonies across the galaxy, but also protect them. But how safe is it really?" He finished the last sentence on an ominous note.
"Is there intel that indicates the Terminus might attack Eden Prime?" she asked, a bit of alarm creeping into her voice.
"Nothing directly, no. But humans are still newcomers to the galactic stage, Shepard. The galaxy can be a very dangerous place. Is the Alliance truly ready for this?"
Shepard gripped her hands together behind her back. She really wished that Nihlus would stop with the theatrics and just tell her what was going on. She knew she was being evaluated, and was this just a case of him jerking her chain a bit, to see how she would react? Perhaps how she handled being in suspense, being kept in the dark? Or was it something else? Was something on Eden Prime the reason the Intel folks were running around? But they normally deal with data and information outside of Alliance territory. Unless, whatever this was about had nothing to do with the Alliance…
Captain Anderson then entered the comm room, sealing the door behind him and activating the security systems. "I think it's about time we told the commander what's really going on," he said, then looked at her for a couple seconds. Sorry, his expression told her.
"This mission is far more than a simple shakedown run," Nihlus said.
That's obvious, Shepard thought dryly. "I figured out there are a couple things that I'm not briefed for yet, sir," she replied, a small grin on her face.
"We're making a covert pick-up on Eden Prime. That's why we needed the stealth systems operational," the captain told her.
The last piece of the puzzle falls into place… She nodded slightly, impassively. "What are we picking up, Captain?"
"A research team on Eden Prime unearthed an artifact during an excavation." He paused for a couple moments before dropping the bombshell. "It was prothean."
Her new expression was anything but impassive. Her large eyes widened and her jaw opened in surprise. Of all the things she had expected them to pick up, she hadn't expected it to be prothean. "I-I didn't know there were any prothean ruins on Eden Prime. What kind of artifact? Is it operational?" Shepard asked quickly, with a hint of excitement creeping into her voice. She eagerly awaited the answer, wondering if she could see it up close. She had always wanted to see prothean technology up close with her own eyes—it was much different than looking at a mass relay through a window. For some reason, the protheans had always fascinated her. Their galaxy-spanning empire, their technology, and most of all their mysterious disappearance…
"I'm not sure of the details, but the researchers on site seem to think it can be reactivated. They are referring to it as a 'beacon' of some sort. The last time humanity made a prothean discovery, it jumped our technology forward several hundred years. We only found a small data cache on Mars, and this beacon is far more than that. The scientists seem to think that this discovery is on the same level as the Citadel and the mass relays. We need to extract the beacon and transport it to a secure location for study." It was a serious crime to withhold knowledge of prothean artifacts from the Council. With Nihlus here, representing the Council and Spectres, everything now made sense. He was here not only to work with her, but to ensure the beacon was successfully retrieved.
"The beacon is not the only reason I'm here. I'm here to evaluate you," the turian followed up.
"As a Spectre candidate, sir?" Shepard kept her face impassive this time, but smiled to herself inside. I was right all along. But…me? A Spectre? Now that she heard it officially, a hint of apprehension began to well up within her.
Anderson nodded, but his face had a very slight smile, a bit of pride that she had figured out that she was going to become a Spectre candidate based on just a few disjointed rumors. "You are the candidate the Alliance put forward," Nihlus said.
"May I ask a question freely, sir?" she asked, looking at both of them.
"Go ahead, Commander," Anderson replied. She glanced at Nihlus, and the Spectre nodded agreement.
"Why me, sir? There are many qualified candidates in the Alliance, some with more experience than myself. Furthermore, my identity is well-known," she temporized. Becoming a Spectre, or even just being evaluated for consideration, was an awful lot of responsibility—responsibility she still wasn't sure she wanted to shoulder. If people find out that I don't have…
Nihlus responded rather than the captain as she momentarily put her concerns aside. "You held off an enemy assault during the Blitz single-handedly. I've also read your performance on other missions: Operation Resolution, PALISADE, and Sigma Ceti, just to name a few. You have gained the respect of your fellow soldiers. You have not only shown courage and great biotic skill, but the resolve and adaptability to overcome situations others would find impossible. Your record is impeccable, and you have shown tremendous leadership ability in your assignments. You possess the qualities we are looking for in a Spectre. And as for your identity, the identities of many Spectres are public knowledge."
She paused for a moment, considering the information. "I assume there will be some ceremony for the first human Spectre."
"Correct, Commander. After Elysium, you have proven that you can handle the public scrutiny," the turian replied evenly. Though she hadn't really worked with turians, she got the impression that the turian in front of her wasn't a big fan of ceremony either. "You might ask why a turian has been asked to evaluate a human for admission into the Spectres. I do not care about what species a Spectre comes from. I care only about the candidate's abilities. Petty politics and mistakes of the past do not concern me. The security of the galaxy does," he said. "Discoveries such as this beacon tend to have a destabilizing effect, often in ways we do not anticipate."
Shepard kept her face neutral in front of the captain and her evaluator, but inwardly she began to worry about the public scrutiny. Elysium resulted only in scrutiny from humans, for the most part. Now she would have to deal with scrutiny from the entire galaxy. She set aside those worries, but then began to ponder just what these two men knew about the beacon – it was obvious that they were concerned about something.
After a moment she was able to set her concerns aside as the captain spoke up. "You'll be in charge of the retrieval, Commander. We're landing close to the dig site. Get with the marines guarding it, make sure the scientists have fully powered it down, and get it aboard the ship ASAP. Nihlus will accompany you," Captain Anderson finished.
She nodded, all of the pieces rapidly falling into place. Having a Spectre to keep an eye on this discovery made sense. Even though Nihlus was a Spectre, he was also a turian—due to human-turian relations, he couldn't just go up to the beacon and say, 'Hi, I'm a Council Spectre, I'll be taking this, k thx bai!' to a garrison of marines guarding it.
"I will need to see your skills for myself," Nihlus continued. "Eden Prime will be the first of several missions together where I can see your leadership abilities, though this should be nothing more than a quick pickup."
Her eyebrows rose slightly at the last statement in concern. 'Should be'? "Sir, is there concern for hostile action? Did a faction in the Terminus Systems find out about the beacon?" she asked, wariness creeping into her tone.
"This was a last minute change of orders, Commander. Another assignment was originally scheduled for your first mission with Nihlus," Anderson said. "We're probably about twenty minutes out from Eden Prime, so—"
"Captain! We've got a problem!" The communications officer's urgent voice punctuated from the speakers in the comm room.
"What's wrong, COMMO?"
"CRITIC ping from Eden Prime, sir," she exclaimed quickly, her voice betraying significant worry.
"Joker, drop out of FTL. COMMO, receive the full transmission," the captain responded instinctively, his own voice betraying no emotion.
A moment later there was a slight jolt as the ship dropped out of FTL. Due to relativity and the speed of light, the Normandy could not connect to a high-bandwidth comm buoy at FTL. They could only receive data at a very low rate while at FTL, and only if the ship were within a certain range and a very narrow line of bearing from the buoy. A high-powered ping was needed to tell a ship to drop out of FTL and receive a full FTL transmission from the buoy network.
The captain brought up a terminal, the only thing showing his concern with the situation was the incredible speed at which he did it. Shepard was instantly worried. Routine traffic never required ships to drop out of FTL. CRITIC was reserved for only the most dire of circumstances. She had only twice been on a ship that received a FLASH ping to drop out of FTL, and never had seen CRITIC…
Several moments later the comm officer continued. "Distress signal from the colony, there's firefights with unknown forces…wait…video transmission, Captain. You're going to want to see this, sir. We've linked into the relay buoy, forwarding the full message to Fifth Fleet."
The screen was filmed with a grainy image, which showed a squad of marines in an intense firefight. "Get down!" a marine yelled at the man holding the camera. Frantic rifle fire was being exchanged with some unknown foe. A look of anger appeared on Shepard's face as her blood began to boil at the thought of another colony under attack, more colonists being slaughtered, as the gunfire began to switch to shotguns –
What was that? Shepard asked herself in surprise. She had never heard that weapon before…
"We are under attack!" an officer yelled into the camera, his eyes wide in surprise, and a streak of blood across his face. "Hostile forces…" He paused to fire a burst at some unseen enemy, and there was another sound that sounded…mechanical. Almost like a mechanical…growl…if that was even possible. That wasn't a weapon, so…just what was attacking the colony?
A nearby explosion showered him and the lens with dirt. "We can't…argh!...—eed support! They came out of nowhere. We need—" Shepard watched with palpable anger as blood splattered on nearly half of the camera lens as the officer took several shots and fell to the ground.
Shepard cringed as a horrible groan and screech echoed through the comm room from the speakers. All of the faces of the marines looked up at the sky in horror. The sound sent a shiver down the commander's spine as she had a sharp intake of breath, her eyes widening. Several moments later the camera shifted up to show a massive object descending from orbit. It looked to be like a giant hand, or part of a giant squid, or something similarly alien, covered in a black material, as black as the void of space. It radiated hellish red light from its fingers, or tendrils, sometimes discharging red electrical current for hundreds of meters down its hull. The image made the commander's blood run cold – she had never seen anything like it before. The grinding screech intensified as the video became erratic and blurry. A few moments later the screen went to static with a final ear-splitting screech.
"Everything cuts out after that. No further comm traffic, sir," the COMMO said. "The full transmission has been sent to Arcturus."
"Joker, reengage the FTL drive and take us in at full power," Anderson told the pilot quietly.
The captain rewound the transmission until it froze on the hellish ship that had descended from the sky. Nihlus' nostrils flared, presumably in concern or alarm, and Anderson stared at it with a grave look on his face. Shepard shuddered a little. The ship was certainly a few hundred meters in width, far larger than any known ship that could land on a planet. The element zero core would have to be massive, and the power the ship put forth would have to be staggering, far beyond anything known to Citadel or Terminus powers, in order for the ship to be able to land on a planet. Its design was so foreign, so alien…this was nothing any of the Citadel species had ever seen before. This was something entirely new…and incredibly dangerous. Her mind ran through everything she knew about ships for several moments while she stared transfixed at the screen. Who could have built it? Her answer was always the same. Someone-or something-entirely unknown.
Everyone in the room remained silent for over ten seconds. "Sitrep, Pressly," the captain said after they all had observed the ship, and developed their own thoughts that came to identical conclusions.
"Seven minutes out at full power, Captain. No other Alliance ships are scheduled to be in the area for a couple hours," the navigator reported. "FTL drive at max rated power. Stealth system is in standby. Weapons are cold."
"Take us in. Fast and quiet. Warm up the weapons," the captain said quietly. "This is what I was worried about," he said as he closed his eyes for a moment.
"We will have to move quickly to secure the beacon," the Spectre told the captain and the commander, who had not taken her eyes off of the massive ship frozen on screen. "I'll take tactical command when we land. We must retrieve the beacon intact."
Anderson nodded tightly, then turned to Shepard. "Tell Alenko and Jenkins to suit up, Commander," he ordered the commander, briefly patting her on the shoulder. She turned to face him for a moment, then turned to look at the ship again…in fear. Fear was not something she felt in a long time. Sure, every mission she went on where shots started flying she got a little anxious, but so did every other soldier regardless of rank or combat experience. That was simply natural; one never knew when that single shot would come that got through the shields and barriers. She just had to put that fear aside and do her job. That wasn't a problem for her. She had always been able to do that. But this was a different fear. Something…colder.
She set her thoughts aside as best she could. "Alenko, Jenkins, be ready for ground action in five," she said.
"Aye, aye, Commander."
"Yes, ma'am."
She continued down to the cargo hold, wishing the nervous feeling in her gut would go away. Part of her mind said not again, not after Mindoir, not after Elysium, not another colony destroyed, but this was something far more than a simple colony raid to grab slaves. Whoever these unknown attackers were, whatever that ship was, they had to be after the beacon.
Lieutenant Pressly had seen the transmission as well. He had been in CIC when he heard Joker's page to the captain. From the angle of the camera, that…ship, or whatever the hell it was, was several hundred meters wide, and for it to be able to land on a planet…
"Tear through every database there is about ship design and specifications. I want to know if the batarians or anyone else has been cooking up something new in the past few years," the navigator told the sensors chief. The O-3 highly doubted the ship in question was batarian; this ship appeared to be beyond anything the Council or the Terminus species had. He ran through other options. Was it geth? Probably not. The geth had not gone beyond the Perseus Veil in centuries. Behind the Veil was the territory formerly occupied by the quarians before the geth drove them into exile. Was it something completely new, then?
"Nothing, sir. Not even a remote match," the NCO responded. That answer didn't surprise the navigator in the least.
Since Anderson and Shepard were in the comm room, that meant Pressly had the deck and was in charge of the ship. "Wizzo, warm up all weapons and fuel the disruptor torpedoes," the navigator said. "We may have to set up a snap shot against an unknown enemy when we decelerate from FTL." Let's hope not.
"Aye, aye, sir," the WSO responded.
"Four minutes until we decelerate, Lieutenant," Joker told the navigator.
"Copy that, Joker."
"Weapons are hot," the WSO reported. "All active scanners are powered up but on standby."
The captain came up to the navigator and said, "You keep the deck. If that ship out there—wherever it is—does so much as twitch, get us the hell out of here. Only shoot at it or betray our position as an absolute last resort; we don't know what its capabilities are. Don't hesitate to rabbit to FTL if you need to."
"Understood, Captain." The O-6 went to the lower deck and the cargo hold. Several seconds later Pressly said, "Go to battlestations."
The general quarters alarm rang throughout the ship. The overhead lights dimmed and turned to red. In CIC seats came out of the floor where the crew could sit if needed; the artificial gravity generators would be shut off to conserve heat if combat was imminent. A mechanical, disembodied male voice blared over the 1MC, "General quarters. General quarters. All hands, man your battlestations."
"Joker, engage the IES as soon as we disengage the FTL drive core,"
"Aye, aye, Lieutenant."
"Condition-1 set throughout the ship," a voice told Pressly just over a minute later.
"Two minutes out," Joker said.
Pressly brought up the transmission, freezing on a view of the ship, wondering just how something that size could land on a planet.
Despite seeing the countdown on his display, the pilot's voice brought the navigator out of his thoughts. "Decelerating in 5…4…3…2…1…" Joker paused a moment and said over the ship's intercom so the captain could hear, "Engaging stealth system."
"Wizzo, remove safety interlocks," Pressly told the weapons officer.
"Aye aye sir."
"Where is that ship?" the navigator asked.
"No sign of it, sir. It's not in orbit. It still could be groundside, but we don't detect any emissions." A couple members of the crew breathed sighs of relief, for a moment. If it was groundside, though, they may have to yet deal with that monstrosity… "We had faint FTL trails inbound about 3 AU away. A few ships that look to be in loose formation…I make it five ships. One contact is fuzzy, and not near as blueshifted…but it's large. I'd estimate larger than a dreadnaught-class."
"Larger than the Destiny Ascension?" Pressly asked.
"Yes sir, probably by a fair amount." This statement resulted in a few quick apprehensive glances amongst the crew. "The inbound FTL trail is fuzzy, so it's hard to determine the exact size." The chief's hands flew over the console. "We have no known mass relay along their ingress vector."
Pressly nodded with a tight expression on his face. Why doesn't that last part surprise me. And we have five ships to our one, including that massive dreadnaught. Wonderful. "Take us in low and fast, Joker," the navigator told the pilot.
"Sir, we also have four redshifted FTL trails only 0.4 AU away along a different vector. They likely correspond to the four higher frequency inbounds."
So those other four ships are just a FTL ping and less than five minutes away from us. Isn't that just great, the navigator thought, watching as the Normandy raced towards the planet's surface. And we're deploying a Spectre and some very talented Alliance soldiers groundside against God knows what…
Shepard, Alenko, and Jenkins prepped for combat in the cargo hold. Shepard pulled her hair into a loose bun and removed her dress blues, pulling on the several pieces of light armor. She preferred light armor for the flexibility. This came at a cost of defensive protection, but her biotic barrier provided her main source of shielding.
Alenko and Jenkins had finished putting on their armor as well. The lieutenant wore medium armor. His shotgun and Omni-tool that he installed were not standard issue; Shepard idly wondered what upgrades he had equipped in them. Jenkins wore heavy armor and had a Tsunami assault rifle from Ariake Technologies, a good deal better than the standard issue Alliance assault rifle.
Neither biotic wore a helmet; biotics sometimes felt their abilities "cramped" while they were wearing one. Still, despite the head protection helmets offered, the commander really did not like wearing a helmet and would avoid it if at all possible; for whatever reason they frequently gave her crippling headaches that could actually be debilitating in the worst of cases when she used her biotics. No one had ever figured out why, other than it was just a biotic thing. Her barrier was her main source of defensive abilities, and she had practiced keeping it strong and dense around her head. Both the commander and the lieutenant inserted an earpiece into one of their ears; this allowed communication with the rest of the squad as well as projecting a HUD several centimeters in front of the dominant eye.
The three soldiers strapped their weapons onto their backs. She took a small shotgun, a marksman rifle and a sidearm. The marines did the same, but each of them also took a sniper rifle, and replaced the marksman rifle with an assault rifle.
The members of the ground team performed last minute checks on their gear, ensuring the computers in their weapons were properly synched to their armor. Shepard saw BPDS boot and link to Alenko's and Jenkins' armor, showing important things such as shield and armor integrity and less important things such as rank. For obvious reasons, no rank insignias or special N7 logos were ever worn on armor or fatigues in a combat zone – it would tell the enemy who to at shoot first.
The commander unsealed a storage locker and removed a pair of UAVs. She set both of the small drones on the workbench, unfolding them and completing the brief power up process. Diagnostics looked good, all systems green, linked to BPDS…both were set to go. She wished she could say the same for her own nerves.
Shepard then approached Jenkins, placing a gentle hand on his shoulder, and asked quietly, "Corporal, are you doing okay? You're from Eden Prime, and…if you need to sit this one out, I completely understand."
"I'm fine, Commander," the corporal responded with a tight expression on his face. "I'm ready to go."
Shepard looked at him for several moments, at his eyes, at his expression, at his demeanor, carefully listening to his words and his tone… Despite his words assuring her that he was good to go, her gut told her it could be a problem. She knew what it was like to have her home snatched away from her in an instant, and while she wasn't in a position to do anything about Mindor when she was sixteen, Jenkins was in a position to do something about Eden Prime today. She looked to Alenko, wondering what his thoughts were on Jenkins, wishing, for the first time in her life, that the lies about biotics were true – that they were psychic and could communicate telepathically. But if she pulled Alenko aside, Jenkins would know what it would be about. And that would make the young marine lose confidence in himself.
If the lieutenant had any concerns, he kept them well hidden. Something in her gut kept telling her that Jenkins should stay on the ship, but Anderson had ordered him to suit up, and she would have to take the corporal at his word. She now really wished they had a few extra marines, instead of just the three of them.
"General quarters. General quarters. All hands, man your battlestations." The lights dimmed and turned to a dark red hue. Shepard felt her heart sink; did they detect that ship? A split second later her mind reminded her that they were still at FTL, so they were safe. At least for the moment…
The three soldiers quickly took seats and fastened seatbelts, expecting the worst. Sheparf focused on reviewing the terrain of their dropzone, looking for places to hide colonists and approach the beacon's presumed location both rapidly and stealthily, a frown appearing on her face making it evident that she didn't really like the location.
"Engaging stealth systems," Joker said the moment the Normandy decelerated from FTL. But the stealth frigate didn't immediately engage in evasive maneuvers, and Shepard glanced at her omni-tool to see the telemetry from the Normandy, showing the stealth frigate diving quickly for the planet's surface. Shepard expected a sudden lurch from the Normandy at any moment to evade fire from whatever that ship was, but nothing happened for ten seconds. She hadn't noticed that she had been holding her breath in, and she let out a relieved sigh that they hadn't been immediately engaged on dropping out of FTL.
Captain Anderson and Nihlus exited the elevator and approached the fireteam. Shepard unfastened the harness and hurried over to them.
"Sir, at this dropzone, there's not many good places to protect and hide colonists," she told him quickly.
"Helping survivors is not a concern in this operation. Retrieving the beacon intact is your sole objective," he responded. Both Alenko and Jenkins caught the last word, and were puzzled. Beacon? Both marines exchanged a quick glance at each other.
Shepard jolted at the captain's response, almost as if physically struck. She remained silent with her mouth hanging open for a moment before shouting, "What!? Captain we can't just let them slaughter the colonists – "
"Commander!" Captain Anderson shouted back. "Get the beacon. Nothing. Else. Matters. Is that understood?"
Shepard glared up at the captain, neither flinching nor shifting their gaze. "Yes, sir," she said after several moments of silence, her face locked into an expression of anger. "I don't like it," she said quietly, finally breaking eye contact with the captain as she looked at the floor, her anger fading into something else. Alenko and Jenkins looked at each other with the same expression. Beacon? What's so important about this beacon? Just what the hell is going on?
"I don't like it either, Commander," he told her, his tone much quieter and gentler than from a few seconds ago. "But if we don't retrieve that beacon intact, none of the lives lost will matter."
"Understood, sir," she replied after a couple moment's pause with a tight expression. Alenko could tell that she didn't agree in the least, but she had her orders, and she paused for several moments before speaking again. "Sir, this - I haven't heard the weapons from that transmission before. And that ship is a completely unknown design and larger than anything we have ever seen," Shepard told the captain.
"We'll worry about that ship up here. You just worry about securing the beacon," the captain replied quickly.
Shepard doubted that all of the tech that went into building the Normandy would help much against whatever that ship was.
"There's some serious fires burning down here, Captain," the pilot continued as he brought the frigate low and fast over the surface of the planet just under supersonic speed.
"Approaching drop point one," Joker's voice said over the rush of wind that accompanied the cargo bay doors opening.
"Nihlus…sir, given the unknowns of this engagement, would it be better to stick together? Stay as one team?" Shepard asked the Spectre.
"Normally, yes, but I move much faster on my own," the Spectre responded. "We can cover more ground if we split up."
She hesitated, and opened her mouth to speak, but she closed her mouth and kept her thoughts to herself. He was a Spectre, after all, but that didn't mean she had to like it. "Okay. Be careful, sir," she replied finally.
He nodded as he jumped the several meters to the ground, rolling on impact in one perfectly fluid motion as he leapt to his feet, running to cover.
"Nihlus will move ahead of your fireteam. He'll eliminate any hostiles he finds on the way to the beacon," the captain told her.
She paused, wanting to speak up, wanting to say something…but she was just a junior officer; regardless, she couldn't overrule a Spectre in any situation. And, in this case, unfortunately, neither was Captain Anderson. "We got his back, Captain," she finally told Anderson with a nod. Shepard didn't like this one bit; she would rather they all stick together. Anderson didn't look particularly enthused by the Spectre's lone wolf routine either, but Nihlus had tactical command on the ground, and as Alliance personnel they had no command over a Spectre anyway.
"Good luck," he told her.
"We are approaching drop point two," Joker over the comm as he brought the Normandy to a hover. This section was more rugged than the flat section Nihlus had jumped off at. Several cables dropped from the top of the cargo hold. Shepard grabbed one and slid the several meters to the surface of Eden Prime.
Author's Notes
A note before getting into the next chapters that this Shepard is an Adept. At the start of the game, Adept Shepard is pretty weak and doesn't have access to all their powers – Mass Effect is an RPG and makes sense from a gameplay perspective. Not here. This Shepard has access to all biotic abilities from the start, including detonations.