The wind whistled like the howling of lost souls as it battered itself against the curves and angles of the massive Peak 15 tower. Shepard swung down out of the Mako, doing a quick, practiced survey of the area, looking for signs of immediate danger. Not finding any, she followed the mournful shriek of the wind to the towering facility that clung on the mountain above them. It boggled her mind how a remote testing facility could employ enough people to fill such a huge tower. Maybe they housed them on site . . . in four-bedroom condos.
Sweet baby Jesus, I hope they managed to evacuate everyone.
Hearing someone hammering on metal, she walked around the tank to see Garrus clinging to the front, prying the colossus head loose of the machine gun. The turian grumbled to himself, reciting a laundry list of curses as he tried to get enough leverage to wrestle the chunk of geth loose.
Pausing in his battle, he nodded toward an M29 Grizzly, the older armoured vehicle wrecked off to the side. Flames licked the cold air from the armoured vehicle's destroyed chassis. "You didn't come up here earlier, did you, Captain? That looks like your work."
Shepard just shook her head and turned back to the garage doors. Rockets had reduced the main doors to twisted hunks of metal, but an intact pedestrian portal stood a couple metres further down the front wall. Turning her back to it, she ignored the alarm from her hard suit that warned her of impending frozen death. She had time yet, and no desire to step through that mouth into hell a moment earlier than she needed to.
"I sure hope there's some sign about where we need to look," she whispered, almost to herself. The door behind her yawned beneath the empty stare of the windows floors above. The darkness inside them crawled under her skin, shifting and alive. No, not alive . . . undead. She shook that off. It was far too late in her career to get squeamish and superstitious.
Yeah right, like you aren't crazy superstitious, Shepard.
The screech of metal giving way was followed by a heavy thump as the ruined colossus head landed in the snow next to her.
Garrus returned her glance with a challenging glare and a flick of mandibles. "A trophy, Captain? You could mount it on the wall of your cabin."
She glanced at it and rolled her eyes, then opened the files that Nihlus had transferred to her computer. One of them was the text of the code white. "Loose contaminants in the Rift Station hot labs," she muttered to herself. "Rift Station." She opened the floor plan of the facility.
Garrus jumped down, landing next to the geth head. "Could we do this inside, out of the wind?" he asked, his teeth chattering. "My armour is nudging over the system failure point."
She sent the files to his omnitool. "Sure, you find me the Rift Station labs on that floor plan and plot us a course to them. Legion, cover the right side of the door." Shrugging, she reached up, Roger's reassuring weight settling into her hands. She pressed her back to the wall as Legion took the position opposite her. Holding up her fingers, she counted down three, two, one, then activated the door.
The geth ducked around the door frame and swept its assault rifle across the area. After a moment, it stepped back. "Area is clear of hostile forces, Shepard-Captain."
Shepard walked through the door into a space between the outside garage doors and a set of inside ones just as large. "You can just say 'clear', Legion. I'll assume the rest." No pedestrian door cut a hole through that wall. She launched her drone, Legion's appearing a second later to hover next to hers, their orange light casting a sickly glow in the dim space.
Expecting a fully-armed reception on the other side, Shepard sent her squad into cover against the wall, then strode up to the door, hoping that the drones would draw at least a little fire. Instead, when the metal sections lifted toward the ceiling, she stared down the length of a large, completely deserted garage.
No enemies. No friendlies. No bodies. No equipment.
Maybe the lack of vehicles means they were able to evacuate.
Shepard walked up the slight ramp, jumping a little as her drone beeped and blinked out. The air hung heavy and silent, the wind outside completely muted. Silence throbbed in her ears. "What the hell?" After another second, she waved for her squad to join her and moved down the center of the room. They needed to keep moving.
Shaking her head she double-timed it up a short flight of stairs. Another door waited at the top. "We got here far too easily."
"We haven't seen Therum or Feros levels of resistance, that's for sure," Garrus agreed, taking the stairs two at a time.
Shepard brought Roger up, couching his stock against her shoulder, and looked to her squad as they took position to cover her. Once they gave her the nod, she walked up to the door. It opened to reveal a short hallway, the walls lined with automated turrets, their barrels facing toward the inside of the facility rather than toward the garage.
"Spirits," Garrus muttered. "That's a hell of a lot of firepower." He stepped around her to look at the closest turret.
"It appears that security focused on sealing contaminants within the facility," Legion stated the obvious with complete equanimity.
Shepard envied its lack of emotion as her lower gut rolled over and tied itself in a squelching knot. "Let's go. We have a deadline." She pushed past Garrus none too gently, heading for the inner door.
You're getting reckless again, Janey, you dumbass. Just face the fear, or you'll see your best friend bleeding out at your feet by the time you're done.
On the other side, they found a deserted security office. Shepard checked the lockers to find the guns and armour still sealed inside. When she tried to activate the computer console, she got no response. She turned away, a slow shudder crawling up her back as she felt unseen eyes watching them. The whole place felt phase-shifted, the people invisible, but still there, moving around. Her helmet started to feel as though it had her trapped.
She shook it off and headed for the elevator, trying to ignore the voice shouting inside her head that elevators constituted cages just begging for an ambush. It helped that the elevator opened into another short corridor, this one as completely empty as the one before. Well, almost as completely empty, but for a thick layer of snow.
"We're inside, right?" Garrus asked.
Shepard nodded and stepped out, her boots making that dry, walking-on-styrofoam crunching squeak that she always associated with mid-winter on Mindoir. Drifts of the brittle crystals heaped against the walls despite the ceiling and narrow windows remaining intact.
She motioned Garrus and Legion into semi-cover positions next to the door. "What's on the other side?" she whispered to Garrus.
He checked his omni. "Reception lobby, a few offices up above on the far right and point along the perimeter. It looks like the upper section is all glass enclosed, so no real cover for ambush there, but the room has a large, concrete divider down the center."
Shepard nodded. "Okay, so a decent place to leave a reception committee. Check." She raised Roger to high ready, then stopped, her brow wrinkling, eyes looking up at the ceiling. Cocking her head a little, she strained to hear over the wind, sure she heard gunfire from several floors above. Her heart actually slowed at the sound. Gunfire meant survivors to explain what happened or enemies to fill with bullets. Either made for a better alternative than the endless nothing. She glanced at Garrus.
He nodded. "I heard it." He pressed up behind her, but not close enough to trigger the automatic door. He brought his assault rifle up, and nodded that he was ready to move.
Shepard took a step forward.
"Shepard."
Nihlus's voice threw her heart up into her throat, setting it hammering against her tonsils. She lifted a trembling hand to her ear. "Sweet baby Jesus, Nihlus, give a girl in a creepy abandoned facility some warning, will you?"
"Sorry." Odd, but he sounded more amused than sorry. "Just checking in. The Normandy has been locked down and impounded by the port authority, although the crew isn't letting them board," the Spectre reported. "Wrex, Williams, and I have been detained for questioning about an unauthorized armoured vehicle drop."
"Roger that. Are they coming after me?" Even though she asked it as a question, she knew the answer.
"No, but rest assured that moments after you clear the blast radius for the safe zone, you'll be intercepted and arrested."
She nodded. As she thought. "Understood, thanks for the heads up." She frowned. "How'd you get them to let you call me?"
"My friend in the administrator's office took a coffee break." He chuckled. "She'll do what she can … has me throwing my Spectre authority around a little to investigate something while I'm grounded here, but we're looking at some pretty heavy shovelling to get out of this, Shepard."
Sighing, she nodded. "Story of my life, Nihlus. A whole lot of nothing to report here so far. Took a little geth fire coming in, but nothing compared to what we took on Therum. So far the facility has taken some damage, but no sign of contaminants, geth, Saren, or any employees. We think we heard gunfire a moment ago, so maybe someone is still alive in here. We'll let you know when we find something."
"Roger. Keep in touch. Nihlus out."
Shepard closed the channel and opened an encrypted one to the Normandy. "Hey, Sparky, what's going on?"
"We're locked down, Captain, but we've also kept the port authority locked out. They're afraid to cut us open for fear of the Alliance getting testy over their new prototype being sliced and diced, so we're at a stalemate for the moment."
"Okay. You know that crate that you put on my table? The one with the questionable items you found in the Blood Pack hideout on Omega?" she asked, able to hear the confusion and hesitation in his silence.
"Yes," he replied at last. "What about it?"
"Just be prepared to bring it to the administrator's office when I call. You, Tali, and Liara. If the port security wants to confiscate your weapons, agree, but tell them the crate is Nihlus's and under Spectre authority." She hesitated, then took a deep, noisy breath. "If anything happens to me, get the crate to Nihlus. Understood?"
"Roger that, Captain. Just make sure I get the call from you to bring it in."
A weak smile cut through the frost freezing her face rigid. "Will do, Sparky. Take care of my boat, COB."
"Yes, ma'am. Alenko out."
Shepard closed the channel and brought Roger back up. "Okay, enough time wasted. Let's get moving."
Garrus stared at her, mandibles dropped, brow plates raised with an unspoken question.
She shrugged and stepped toward the door. "Insurance. Come on, Nihlus and the ground party have been detained, and my ship has been impounded for this little stunt. Let's make it count, Brother C-Sec."
Shepard checked with Legion before she opened the door, but she needn't have bothered. The geth remained steadfastly focused on guarding their flank.
The door folded up to reveal a surreal scene. The lobby stood under several feet of snow, banks of it heaped up around the tables, desks and chairs that lay strewn haphazardly around the space. The effect made Shepard feel as if they entered a long abandoned, ancient ruin rather than what had been a thriving, bustling place of business hours before. Like the rooms and corridors before, the lobby stood completely empty. Nothing moved but the wind, even the plants frozen into statues.
Leading the way into the large room, Shepard reached out, brushing her fingertips over the frozen leaves of a ficus. Other than the wind's constant, mournful howl and the steady clang-bang of its grip tossing a piece of metal back and forth, a hush hung over that lobby, one that demanded fear as its toll for passage.
"Feels like a graveyard," Garrus whispered, clearing his throat a little. He pressed close, as if drawing heat and life from her as he'd done on Feros.
Shepard nodded toward an exit in the far left corner of the room. "Legion, take the left, meet us up at that door."
"Affirmative." The geth set off at a half-crouched, easy jog.
Taking point, Shepard led Garrus along the right wall, her eyes moving constantly, gaze brushing warily over art hanging half off the wall, ice already creeping across the canvas. In the corner, an information kiosk sputtered, a partially formed blur of static that emitted no sound. From every corner, behind every table, beneath every overturned desk, the feeling of being watched by ghosts deepened until it squirmed under her skin: worms gnawing their way through an apple's flesh.
She climbed the double flight of stairs and moved quickly along the front of the offices. Broken glass, smashed doors, and tipped over tables all pointed to something violent having happened, but she couldn't pick out a single sign of fighting. No bullet holes, no scorch marks, no grenade blasts … not even scuffled snow on the floor of closed offices where people had grappled. She stopped in the last office and checked the weapon locker in the corner. Still full, just like the ones in the security office.
"Looks more like a panic than a battle," Garrus said, as if reading her mind.
Shepard swallowed hard, forcing about three feet of razor wire down her throat. "Where the fuck is everyone?"
"They could have pulled back to a shelter or defensive zone," he offered. "There might not be bodies this far out if the retreat was orderly."
"Does this look at all orderly to you, C-Sec?" She shoved aside the clammy fingers that scraped dirty nails up her back and took a deep breath, stretching her shoulders back until they cracked. "Where are we headed?"
"Next elevator leads to the central station hub. Houses the VI core and access to the tram to Rift Station." He nodded to the doorway where Legion awaited them.
"Okay." Strides, long and determined, carried her to the elevator. Maybe they'd finally get some answers.
"I don't care how many times you tell me that it's the standard interface, C-Sec, it's still a Tower of Hanoi. Graphical representation of the correct order of operations . . .. Blah blah . . .. Whatever. It's a free to play GalaxyBook game disguised as a scientific process. That bothers me in a way I can't even begin to articulate." She let out a tiny sigh when he didn't bother arguing the point any further than he already had. Fighting over the ridiculous method of shunting power in the VI core had kept her mind off the fact that someone had come through after the emergency and reactivated the reactor and tram systems but not communications.
Someone had beaten them there, leaving only empty rooms behind. Nothing about that gave her any hope. She ran her fingers through her hair, glad to be free of her helmet at least.
"Now arriving at Rift Station," the VI's faux-female voice announced. "Binary Helix Research Facility."
The tram rolled into Rift Station, the empty waiting area wrapping around her as if the car propelled her through a thick membrane of cellophane. She couldn't see what clung to her, tighter than her skin, suffocating her, only feel it. Stepping out the door, she allowed her eyes to follow the long, orderly lines of at least a hundred empty seats to two doors at the other end of the room. So many people had lived and worked there.
Closing her eyes, she pulled in a deep, noisy draught of air, steeling the churning in her guts and the slight tremble that had worked its way into her thigh muscles. A strong hand pressed between her shoulder blades as she rolled her shoulders, squaring them to bear the weight of whatever lie ahead.
She pulled away from the contact without looking back at Garrus, not wanting to see the confusion and possible hurt prompted by her withdrawal. As much as she appreciated his concern and support, her nerves itched and spat with the oppressive emptiness, twitching with the strain of constantly being stretched too far in every direction. She knew if she didn't pull away, something would snap. She couldn't afford to snap. Not yet.
"I can't get the smell of whatever the hell got cooked in the decon chamber out of my nose," Garrus grumbled.
Shepard heard the shish-click of him shrugging his rifle into his hand as he followed her to the doors. Even though her nose still burned with the fumes and stink of the plasma decon and whatever it had purged before they got there, she didn't reply. Instead, she reached up, settling Roger into her hands and strode forward with purpose. They needed to figure out what the hell was going on and get the fuck out.
The door straight ahead led to the labs, but it had been sealed and didn't give way to her bypass attempt. The one on her left led to the barracks and living quarters, its control glowing an inviting green. "Come this way," it whispered. " Trust me, you're not being funnelled into a trap. Honest."
"Yeah, right," Shepard grumbled under her breath as she stepped up to it.
"Shepard?"
She shook off Garrus's question, and set into a jog, her assault rifle at high ready. The door led to an antechamber, two elevators on the one wall. One led to the hot labs. She hung Roger on her back and walked over to hit the control.
"Hot labs are offline," the VI told her. "Code Omega local execution. Loose contaminants led to the hot labs being activated. Once they achieved maximum depth of three kilometres into the glacier, the neutron purge was activated, killing all life forms present."
Shepard shook her head then kicked the elevator door. "Goddamn it. We've spent this entire mission three steps behind Saren, and it's really starting to piss me off, C-Sec." Spinning away from the defunct lab entrance, she pulled Roger once again and headed to the other elevator door. "Fuck."
Three storeys up, the elevator let them out into a canteen area. Other than a few large crates set up like fortifications and a couple of chairs lying on their sides, the place remained as untouched as everywhere else.
"It's impossible, isn't it?" Shepard asked, stopping in the doorway to an empty med center. "They had to have been evacuated, right? You couldn't subdue this many people without some sign of something being left behind." Reaching up, she pressed the heel of her hand to her temple, a vague, stomach-turning ache spreading through her head.
"Shepard?" Garrus turned her around and leaned down to look into her eyes. "Are you feeling okay?"
She nodded and hit her medigel. Couldn't hurt to be cautious if she had a concussion. The ache in her head didn't come from the slice in her scalp though. It started at the base of her skull, pressing up like fingers spreading out and working their way between her skull and her brain.
"Yeah, I'm fine. This place is just starting to get to me. She batted his hands away, but gently, giving one a slight squeeze. "I'll be just fine once we find someone alive. Someone we can question." She chuckled, but it came out hard and dry, edged with a hysteria that made the millions of tons of rock over her head seem to tremble. "Hell, right now I'd settle for someone to shoot." Glancing behind her, Shepard watched Legion for a moment. It only spoke when she asked it to report on something or to accept commands, and showed no real reaction to what they found, or didn't find.
Was it merely registering and recording? Was it trying to puzzle through what was going on?
"Legion?"
The geth turned to face her, looking up from one of the cots. "Shepard-Captain."
"Do you have any theories about what's going on here?" She walked over to him, head tilting a little. A soft warning chime went off in the back of her head as she felt the hysterical edge come through her words as aggression. It felt foreign, carried on the pressure building from the invisible fingers.
"We cannot reach consensus. Forty-six percent currently favour the theory that this facility's population was evacuated while thirty-two percent favour the population being subdued by forces wishing to contain the biohazard contamination," it reported, its tone as even as always, its gestures appearing to be imitations of her own.
Shepard's anger eased back, the tide ebbing in the face of the geth's indecision. Seemed they weren't all that different after all. "And the remaining twenty-two percent?" A soft smile brushed the corner of her mouth.
"The remaining geth favour the collection of further data in order to form a reliable conclusion."
"Hear, hear. On this we have reached consensus, Brother Legion." Shepard nodded toward the cot. "Was there something you saw there, or were you just staring into space as you tried to work through the possibilities?" Edging a little closer, she saw a stain on the canvas. "Is that what you were looking at?"
"It is." It leaned down, hovering over the stain and activated its omnitool. "Analysing."
Shepard waited for a moment, then glanced over at Garrus. The turian just shrugged and paced toward the door labelled as Maintenance. The captain looked back. "Legion?"
"Analysing."
"Okay then." She walked over to the dispenser and refilled her missing medigel, pausing to smear some over the wound on her head. She turned back to see Legion in the same position.
The mountain pressed down on her, the endless, windowless walls and windows that looked out onto rock wrapping her in their coils, constricting until she could barely draw breath. "We need to keep moving," she whispered, pacing to the door and back.
"Analysis complete," Legion said, straightening. "Substance identified as organic. Eighty-nine percent circulatory fluid, species asari. Eleven percent organic toxin. Acidic base, species unknown."
"Asari blood and toxic acid?" Shepard reached up to rub her temple with the hand not holding Roger in a death grip. "Fantastic." She gave Legion a wan smile and a nod. "Thanks, Legion, it's more than we had five minutes ago."
"Shepard?" Nihlus's voice embedded an ice pick through her ear into her brain.
"Ow, Jesus." She lifted a hand to ear. "Whisper, Kryik. What's going on?"
"Gianna just arrested the administrator thanks to the information the squad and I collected. How are things going out there?"
"We're deep into the Rift Station now. Not a soul living, dead, or otherwise. Everything looks like the people here all vanished. Even the weapon lockers are still full. Legion just found a bloodstain. Asari blood mixed with an acidic toxin." She stopped, looking around as she heard something . . . a soft rustle or scrape of armour against stone, maybe?
"Asari blood . . .?" the Spectre asked.
"Just a second, Nihlus."
Garrus backed toward her, his head cocked. He nudged her with an elbow, not looking at her as he gestured toward the maintenance door.
"Yeah." Shepard gestured to Legion to take cover next to the door. "Nihlus, let me get back to you." She closed the channel and took cover next to the geth, motioning for Garrus to be ready when she opened the door.
She triggered the mechanism, giving the C-Sec officer a few seconds to get clear through the door before following him. A short curved hallway ended at another door. Another hallway, another door. They moved silently, slipping through each cautiously and in order: Garrus first, Shepard following, Legion watching their rear.
The air quality changed as they approached the last door. Shepard took her position against the frame and froze. Again, she heard a slight rustle, the scrape of something non-metallic against stone. She didn't know whether to feel relieved to hear signs of life or not. It depended on the form of that life.
Fuck. This is where the zombies or face huggers attack.
Shepard closed her eyes for a breath. When had she ever let her imagination get the better of her? She was a fucking soldier, goddamn it. She needed to get back to acting like one rather than a kid in a haunted house.
Opening her eyes she nodded to Legion and Garrus, to check that they were ready, then activated the door. Garrus stepped through, Shepard giving him a ten count before swinging around the doorframe herself. Instead of coming through on his left flank, she slammed into the turian's back, Roger catching under his arm.
"What the hell, C-Sec? Clear the door." Yanking Roger back, she gave Garrus a shove, then stepped around him. She stopped dead, her jaw falling slack as she stared up a long, curving tunnel carved out of the rock. "Just when I thought this nightmare couldn't get creepier. What is this place?"
He turned to her, his brow plates lowered, mandibles dropped, and gestured for her to listen. She reached up, turning up the ambient on her implant. Still, it took a second before she heard it. A soft clicking sound, scraping . . . claws just brushing the stone, then a chittering.
Could be geth.
She didn't believe it and brought Roger's sight back to her eye after turning her implant down. A finger directed her squad into their positions, then she moved forward, knees bent and ready, weight low and stable.
The cavern curved to the right, tight enough to limit their sight line to seven or eight metres. Shepard sniffed the air, fairly sure she could smell the burned ozone smell of the geth plasma weapons, but several other elements pricked her nose, ones she couldn't identify. She paused at a small white puddle, drips leading up the incline ahead of them.
"Geth circulatory fluid," Legion said, its voice hushed.
Shepard nodded and held her index finger to her lips before pointing ahead. The worms began to wriggle under her skin again as she heard the slide-click-reset of a jammed door, but muffled . . . sealed on the other side of several closed doors.
You're going to be missing the silence and peace here in a minute.
As they rounded the final curve and the cavern ended at a prefab doorway, she cursed that inner voice for being right. Something lay strewn just off to the side of the short entry tunnel into the man-made structure. It didn't move as she slowed their approach, sidling around the mass a little in order to give them room and time to respond if it attacked.
A viscous green liquid covered the creature and painted the stone with random splashes. Shepard crept forward, easing up to it, fairly sure it was dead, but not taking any chances.
"What the hell is this thing?" Long, sinuous stalks almost like tentacles came out of its body, ending in three sectioned claw-like . . . hands . . . pincers? Four legs and two short, thin arms protruded from the almost crayfish like body.
Garrus prodded the sectioned, smooth shell along its back with a boot. "It's dead, whatever it is."
Shepard nodded, able to see the holes torn open in the creature's underbelly. "Legion, take some samples. We'll give them to Dr. Chakwas to see what she can make of it."
"Affirmative." The geth moved to do as she'd asked.
Shepard pushed forward into the short, curved section of prefab tunnel. It ended a couple metres in at a functioning door. Glancing back at Legion, she arched an eyebrow. "Finished?"
"We will complete our task in eighty three seconds, Shepard-Captain," it replied.
Despite herself, Shepard let out a surprised chuckle. "Try to be precise, will you?" She turned away from the dance of his head flaps, pacing a little as she counted down the seconds. When he straightened and traded his omnitool for his weapon, she pushed forward, activating the door.
Stay cool, Janey. Don't start being a human bulldozer here, or you're going to fuck up.
A short corridor awaited them on the other side. Shepard crossed the threshold cautiously, her eyes riveted on tendrils of a white, glossy substance stretched along the walls in ropes as thick as her wrist.
"What the hell?" Garrus muttered behind her. He walked over to the closest strand, reaching out to touch it with a talon. "It's tacky."
Shepard ran her fingertips over a couple of filaments nearer the next door. They joined together, lattice-like. As Garrus said, it felt tacky, snagging her gloves even with the slightest touch. "Why do I feel like a fly all of the sudden?" she asked between her teeth, her jaw aching from clenching them for so long.
Both hands back on her gun, she crooked a finger to call Legion up to take position at the next door. When the geth and Garrus took their positions, she triggered the door. Instead of moving inside to sweep the room, the turian stayed where he was, his mandibles spreading, his entire body tensing.
Shepard looked around the doorframe, her lungs freezing solid for a moment, the sheer horror of what awaited them on the other side stealing her breath, even her thoughts. Squeezing between the still immobile Garrus and the doorjamb, Shepard took three steps into the next space. Webbing - for that's all she could process it as - filled the room but for a low, narrow tunnel through the center. Geth chassis hung from the webs, packed in against the walls a couple metres thick. Torn apart, chunks melted away by the green acid, most of the geth appeared to be dead, but here and there a flashlight face still sputtered and semi-attached limbs twitched as if the geth writhed in agony.
Shepard swallowed a heavy knot of revulsion and panic. "What the hell did these people turn loose?"