Chapter 21 - Feros - Fighting Back

'An open mind is a fortress with its gates unbarred and unguarded.' - Blood Raven Chapter motto

Arlas knelt down beside the most intact of the shambling corpses, examining it along with Williams and Lieutenant Michael, while the other mercenaries gathered around a couple other corpses. Williams spoke first. "Creepy bastards. Wonder what happened to turn people into this?"

One of the mercs spoke up. "Omni's not reading anything like human DNA in these, ma'am. Lots of other things, sure, plant, fungi, various animals, but nothing human."

Arlas looked up, and frowned. "And they were using psyker power to determine what was where. That is why they were able to track me even after I activated my cloak. Interesting trick, wonder how they did it. Even my people have problems tracking minds in the swirl of combat."

Williams, however, was somewhat distracted. "Creepers."

Everyone paused and turned to her, and she grinned back. "What? I got the first kill, therefore I get to name them. They are creepy as anything you can name, so Creepers."

Most of the mercs grinned or laughed, no doubt appreciating the attempt at humor to restore their morale. Despite the swarm of Creepers surprising the party from behind, the mercs had had enough room, and Arlas had been enough of a distraction, that only Ashley had gotten swiped by one before she had shotgunned the head off one. That hadn't killed the thing, but it had stumbled back enough for her second blast to shred it's torso, which had finished it, or damaged it enough to prevent it from attacking further. By then Arlas had his flamer and sword out, and was frying and slicing the swarm after him apart. The mercs had carefully applied their firepower to avoid hitting him, something he had been sure to thank them for.

Now they had a different problem, as Arlas looked around at the group. "So, who is in charge with this… additional complication?"

The two humans near him shared a glance, before Michael shrugged. "If you have a plan, then you."

Arlas nodded. "Alright, Williams will stay here and assist in holding this point. I will head up to the colony, and scout the situation. Williams, alert the Normandy of the new hostiles and see if they have had any more luck raising the rest of the squad. What do your people have to say about these… things?"

Williams grinned at him. "They have a name Arlas; Creepers. Say it with me. Creeeeeepers."

Arlas ignored Williams as she had apparently lost her mind, and waited for Michael to stop laughing and respond. "Mostly plant and fungal growths, but they are full of a strong acid, not sure why. Strong enough to be melting the surface of the Prothean concrete. No shields, but they are hard to put down as they lack a centralized nervous system, and apparently don't feel pain so they are tough sons of bitches."

Arlas grinned under his helmet, before pulling out his death spinner, and checking the weapon. "Then I will head up and take a look around."

Williams finally finished saying the name she had come up with in increasingly nonsensical ways, and stood with him. "And I am coming with you. Joannis told me to keep you out of trouble."

He stared at the human, his three blood red optics and dark grey and red armor no doubt intimidating as he regarded the human like a statue, before he simply turned and walked to the elevator, not saying a word. She wouldn't listen if he did, and he wasn't going to undermine his own suggestions by repeating them just to have her ignore them. "Michael, stay here and keep control of the bay. Any colonists we find will be directed here."

The mercenary nodded, and turned to direct his men to new positions as Arlas and Williams entered the elevator. He pushed the button to take them up, and glanced at the human. "What did the Normandy say about the new development? Or were you too busy repeating your name for those creatures?"

Ashley glared at him, before opening a communication channel to the Normandy. By the time they had climbed the tenth of a kilometer in the elevator to the top, she had finished her conversation. They hadn't heard anything from the commanders after they had entered the Exogeni tower, but active scans of the tower did show that the number of geth positions were decreasing, the jamming was becoming less overwhelming, and what they thought was the squad was still moving around. The frigate was still in its landing bay, unwilling to leave with the Normandy prowling about, waiting for it, but since it faced the entrance, they Normandy couldn't do anything about it without coming under the guns of the target.

Arlas understood the implied problem well, it was the same one the eldar had when fighting other races. They hit absurdly hard, but they simply couldn't take the same amount of punishment in return. They didn't have the numbers to get into fights of attrition, and used other skills to tilt fights in their favor. The Normandy was similar, as his investigations into the ship had revealed. It was a stealth attack ship, and while its larger than normal core meant it could run faster, had powerful shields and a stealth field, its physical defenses were merely average. In a stand up fight, it might take critical damage taking down even a similar opponent, and if outnumbered, it risked outright destruction.

Therefore,it was better to keep the Normandy off to one side of the tower, watching the landing bay, waiting for the geth to come out. Sadly, that meant they were on the other side of the Exogeni tower, more than a kilometer away, and unable to come over and help without letting the geth frigate slip out to try and attack them. Which meant that Arlas and Williams were on their own. He simply checked the death spinner, and looked at Williams. "You are going to make this more difficult. You should wait with the mercs."

She glared at him, before pulling her shotgun back out. "I can keep up with you easy, Elfy."

He refrained from snarling at the nickname the entire crew suddenly seemed to be using, and made a mental note to track down whoever had come up with it and introduce them to an airlock. "Your death. Just stay behind me."

The elevator dinged as it got to the top, and opened to find a Creeper straightening and turning toward them. Arlas leveled and fired the death spinner, and watched the barely visible shot hit the Creeper in its upper abdomen, the monofilament wire trashing as it uncoiled from its wound up position, cutting the Creeper in half. The coiled wire tangled around the pieces of Creeper, and continued to wildly uncoil, cutting the Creeper into smaller pieces which rapidly began dissolving.

Ashley had just gotten her shotgun leveled when the Creeper came apart and fell, and watched in horrified silence as it continued to get cut to pieces by what appeared to her to be some invisible force. "What the actual fuck?"

"Monofilament wire, coiled around itself. As it flies, the wire thrashes as the tension releases, cutting through flesh and light armor easily. Kinetic barriers should prevent it from hurting you, but it moves slowly enough it might not trigger them. Hence why I desired to move alone."

Williams shook her shock off, and then shook her head. "I can avoid it."

Arlas didn't bother communicating his disbelief, and simply kept moving. He rounded the corner, took the stairs down to the doorway that led to the colony, and looked around, before frowning. He quickly retreated to where Williams was waiting. "Problem. The monsters are moving around the colony."

Ashley cursed, and started forward. "Then what are we waiting for? We need to help the colonists…"

"The colonists are mixed among them, and not being attacked. All the colonists I could see were armed. Assault rifles and pistols mostly, and they aren't fighting the monsters."

"...But… why would…"

"Because they are working with them?"

"...why… Dammit."

Arlas was getting annoyed with the human's inability to adapt to the new situation, and made a note to talk to the Twins about it. Assuming they were alive. "Doesn't matter. We need to find out where the things were coming from, and deal with them if possible."

Having a course of action seemed to help, and Ashley nodded grimly, before following him back into the room where the Geth dropship had been dropping troops. As he expected after the Twins, Ashley, and Wrex came through, the room was a mess, pieces of destroyed geth and dropship scattered about, but he was only interested in the hole in the ceiling. After climbing over some debris, he reached over, and wrapped an arm around Ashley's waist. She yelped in shock, but before she could try to kill him for getting grabby, he fired his grappling hook into the edge of the hole with his other arm, and reeled the two of them up. A minute later, and he climbed up onto the roof of the tower, having helped Ashley get up first. As he got up, Ashley glared at him. "Tell me what you are doing first next time. I almost shot you on reflex."

"Then you need better reflexes. Colony is that direction, keep low, move forward. Mind the holes, edge, and wind."

He moved forward far faster than Ashley, less concerned about a fall than her, and soon was crawling up to the edge, in spite of providing power to his cloak. He didn't believe in taking unnecessary chances when there were unknown forces lurking about, even if he was twenty meters above the colony. After a minute of watching the colony, Ashley joined him, and he sighed before leaning over to her. "White and pink do not camouflage make."

The human glared at him, before hissing back. "This is the armor I was issued, dammit. I do not enjoy it. You want me to get something better, tell the requisitions officer to do his damn job."

He snorted, his gaze already tracking the various creatures shambling throughout the colony. Most were the blank eyed things Ashley had named Creepers, but there were at least two others. He activated the vision enhancement visor attached to his helmet, and zoomed in on the first while speaking. "Two new opponents. First target, forty meters out, by the door Icivia held against the geth, facing toward us, angled to our right. Upright, carrying what looks like a geth assault rifle. Two arms, three digit hands, two legs, two digit feet, unusually broad and deep chest. Wide, crested skull with four eye sockets, but no eyes. Has some kind of blue container or pack on its back. Designating them Crested."

Ashley had pulled out her sniper rifle, and nodded as she looked at it through the scope. "I see it. Looks like they are made out of the same vines and stuff as the Creepers. No idea what the thing on its back is for. Want me to take a shot and see what happens?"

"Negative. This is scouting, not assassination. Second target, fifty meters out, by the crashed freighter. Its…"

Arlas stopped and sighed, before shaking his head. Ashley, however, chuckled. "Looks like an asari, made of plants, but seems far more well built and detailed than the other two. Another one for you to practice your kidnapping fetish on? I mean, it is already naked.."

Arlas gave her a glare that should have blown her off the roof, before resuming his description, having been recording everything on his omnitool. "Second target appears to be modeled on an asari. The one appears to have had a far higher level of skill applied to its creation, as the others were closer to models or puppets, while this one appears almost alive. Other two creatures lacked eyes, but this one has them. And while others lacked gender distinct attributes, asari facsimile is…"

He paused, trying to find the human words, but Ashley was more than willing to fill it in. "Asari creature is almost disturbingly life-like, other than the fact it is green instead of blue. I wouldn't be surprised if that thing could have sex. And… is it wearing heeled boots?"

Not the points he was going for, but Arlas had to admit she was probably right. As he watched, the asari-plant moved from the freighter and sauntered into the colony, pausing in front of several of the colonists, who reacted like they could hear it talking, even though its mouth didn't move. After a few more minutes of watching, and the two of them identified nearly a dozen of the Crested, more than forty Creepers, and two more of the asari-plants, which Ashley insisted on naming Succubus, or Succubi for groups. It was all the same to Arlas, and he had her transmit what they had seen up to the Normandy.

The most important fact, after identifying the new possible hostiles, was that the plant things were coming out of a hole in the middle of the colony, which the freighter had covered. A crane could lower the piece of crashed freighter over it, though Arlas was of the opinion that the colonists had deliberately moved the freighter there to cover the hole, before disassembling it, regardless of what he had been told. It was just too damned convenient that the freighter had crashed in such a way that the crane could lift part of it to conceal or reveal the hole. Either way, the concealed hole was where more of the Creepers were coming from, though only a dozen came out before stopping.

Arlas cursed, and stood up. "Stay here."

He fired the grappling hook into the concrete and quickly dropped down into the colony. He ignored Ashley cursing at him on the communicator, and moved swiftly but carefully toward the hole. After a few minutes of moving forward, avoiding the various plant creatures, he saw his decision had been right, as one of the colonists was moving toward the crane console. No doubt the colonist was about to lower the crane, sealing the hole.

He just barely made it into the hole before the colonist began lowering the piece of freighter. He got to the down to the first landing, and looked up, seeing only the barest a hint of light from the hole, only his vision enhancements built into the visor and helmet let him see in the darkness. It did explain why most of the plant creatures didn't use eyes to find their opponents or prey.

He turned, and nearly cried out in surprise as he spotted a trio of the Creepers standing there, staring at him despite his cloak. Then all three reared back like they were about to roar, and his dangersense screamed at him. He dove under the Creepers, taking a bad roll down the staircase that would doubtless leave him aching later, but he wasn't where the Creepers were facing. And from the retching and hissing noises he could hear from the upper landing, he concluded it was just as well. He yanked the first weapon he could grab off his back, which turned out be the fusion gun, and turned and fired it. The burst of plasma vaporized the three Creepers, as well as the some of the staircase near them and a bit of the far wall.

Arlas quickly swapped the fusion gun for his death spinner, to avoid melting a load bearing wall or column or something, and headed up to check what the noises he had heard. He quickly discovered the hissing noises had been from the acid the mercenary had reported the Creepers carried, and he guessed the retching noises had been how they weaponized it. After a moment of consideration, he turned and began heading down the stairs, reflecting that it was no worse than any number of Tyranid weapons and significantly better than the rest.

He paused at the next landing, and took a moment to settle himself, ensuring he was ready for combat. He expanded his mind and suddenly noticed the warp signature he had felt before in the colony again. This time it was stronger, and he realized it was because the freighter wasn't blocking the feeling anymore. He took a moment to examine what he could of the signature, before concluding it was the most alien thing he had ever felt, and as an eldar pathfinder, that was saying a great deal. He didn't have much time to dwell on the signature, as he heard something moving around on the next landing.

He quickly glanced down, and saw a Crested waiting on the landing. It wasn't looking up at the stairs, but rather out a hole in the stairs into a darkened room. The pathfinder moved carefully past the landing, and deeper into the bowels of the megatower, curious as to what he would find. It took him half an hour to descend down the tower's fifteen story staircase, moving slowly and carefully to avoid the various plant creatures. Once he did though, Arlas cursed and turned right back around, as the stairs ended in a long drop, about two stories worth, and a pile of rubble.

With an exasperated sigh, he turned to begin working his way back up, but stopped as he suddenly got a call. "Arlas, this is Joannis, can you read me?"

Arlas cursed the timing, and quickly moved into a room he had spotted on the way up. A quick glance around showed it was empty, allowing him to respond. "What?"

"Bad time?"

"WHAT."

Joannis sighed on the other end. "Status. Ashley reported you entering the colony and getting into the tower under the colony through a hole under the 'crashed' freighter before the hole was sealed. Also told us of several new hostiles, though the colony isn't being attacked."

"Significant sections under the colony, seen several Creepers and Crested, no Succubi. No way for someone to get in without having to blast through outer wall or fight through the colony. Will report back when I have something to report."

He closed the communication channel, and looked around the room. Light was coming from a small crystal embedded in the ceiling, and rubble had fallen from the ceiling, but there were no significant holes, enemies, or anything of importance in the room. He stepped out, and began to carefully ascend the stairs. He had to ascend two levels before he found the first unblocked passage, but a glance at the floor showed that it was likely unused, as the dust was undisturbed, and quite thick. A glance down the hall showed the room at the end was brighter than the staircase, and after a moment he decided to investigate. He climbed the wall using barely noticeable imperfections, the gloves and boots of his armor molding to give him a grip on the impossible surface, and began shimmying down the hall toward the brighter room. He smirked to himself as he moved, enjoying the strain of his body from defying gravity, moving as all eldar outcasts did; unexpectedly. It was why eldar rangers had a reputation of being able to find a path anywhere, no matter how well protected or isolated, let alone the pathfinders like himself who were renowned for making paths to where they needed to go.

The psychic signature he had felt earlier was close now, it felt like it was a couple stories above the room at the end of the hallway. It took only a handful of minutes to get to the end of the hallway, and the first thing he noticed was that this particular room had a large, circular hole built into the center of it. Dozens of the lighting crystals were embedded in the ceiling, making it fairly easy to see everything in the room. And there was a lot to see.

The room was overflowing with plant life, and he could hear insects and small animals moving in the thick foliage. At the edges of the room, he could see several pipes leading into the room, providing plenty of water. The plants in the room looked vibrantly, almost obscenely healthy, unnaturally so, in fact, in spite of being in the center of a mega tower on a nearly dead planet. It was so thick and lush that Arlas, with his centuries of experience in moving through all types of jungles and forests, couldn't spot a way through without advertising his presence or taking hours to cross. And if there were any of the plant creatures hiding in that brush, they would easily be able to ambush him.

Arlas examined the room, and spotted several of the plants in the room swaying as if in a breeze. In a closed room, however, that meant something was brushing against them. Convinced of his decision to not enter, he backed out of the hallway toward the stairs. He was halfway back when a pair of Crested entered the hallway, one carrying a geth rifle, the other empty handed. He froze instinctively, his centuries of experience telling him that movement would be noticed, even with his precious cloak concealing him, but the creatures both reacted immediately, clearly having some other method of discerning his location The one with the rifle brought the gun up and fired, while the unarmed one gathered energies in its hand, and started to gesture at the eldar.

Arlas dropped off the wall onto to the ground and rolled into one of the doors in the hallway before the second Crested could finish its biotic attack, firing his death spinner as he rolled, but the monofilament wires glanced off a purplish barrier, revealing that both Crested were biotics. He swore, and swapped the death spinner for his flamer pistol and the power sword. After a moment of considering his options, he tapped his omnitool, opening a communication channel to the Twins. "Arlas to Twins, spotted by Crest and pinned down. Will advise if situation changes."

The eldar reached out with his mind, and cursed as he realized that he couldn't hear the Crested, but the noise was now louder. It 'sounded' like a mind, but it had an odd cadance to its thoughts. And there was an unusual hissing noise, that sounded like it was somewhere above him. Arlas suddenly looked up, realizing that the hissing noise was actually a sound, not a psyker noise, and locked the clamps holding his fusion gun and death spinner on his back just as the several parts of the room's ceiling suddenly collapsed. Almost three dozen disemboweled Creeper forms fell, the acid they carried having eaten through the floor, allowing two dozen other Creepers and two Succubi to drop down.

Arlas turned, firing his flamer pistol at a cluster of Creepers and lunging forward to stab one of the Succubus in the gut. He ripped the blade up and out of the plant asari, never seeing the Succubus standing near the hole in the ceiling, looking down at him. He quickly cut a Creeper that had fallen in half as it started to rise after collapsing from its fall, before hosing the second Succubus in flames. He started to turn to the door as he heard steps approaching from that direction, trying to get out of the room before the rest of the Creepers finished standing, before the world suddenly froze. Arlas cursed to himself, suddenly realizing it wasn't the world that had frozen, but himself, likely a biotic stasis. He was halfway turned to the door, and three of the remaining Creepers surrounded him in front, staring at him with their eyeless skulls. He heard two sets of footsteps stop behind him, and concluded that this was about to be unpleasant, before wondering how long the stasis was going to last; by his reckoning, he had been in stasis for more than half a minute, when he suddenly felt his ability to move return.

Before even he could do anything, though, he felt a heavy impact against the back of his neck, and staggered forward, right into a blow from a Creeper to his face. Even though his helmet, he felt the impact, like being punched by an Imperium Space Marine, and hit the ground in a daze, idly grateful that his helmet hadn't been damaged. He tried to get up and keep fighting, only to feel a second impact to the back of his head, this time dropping him into unconsciousness.

Joannis glared at Ethan Jeong, but her sister had already decked him with a single punch, and she wasn't going to degrade herself by punching a cowering flunky. "Mister Jeong, as of this moment, you are under arrest for multiple sentients' rights violations, failure to report a new species, failure to follow first contact protocols, more than one hundred fifty counts of conspiracy to commit murder, and I don't know what else but I am going to hit you with the book and see what sticks. Garrus, cuff this idiot and then keep an eye on him, I want him alive for later questioning, and in as few pieces as possible. As for the rest of you, any and all security personnel are now under my jurisdiction. Failure to comply means you will receive a warning shot to the leg. From a shotgun. Carried by the krogan."

She paused to let all the security personnel look at the gargantuan claymore shotgun in Wrex's hands and then at his massive grin. They then shared a look between them all, before they wisely decided that the three Spectres, ranging in mood from Icivia's annoyed to Joannis' angry to Jaclyn's abso-fucking-lutely livid, were in charge and dying horribly to the local plant monsters was likely to be less painful than irritating the Spectres further. Joannis quickly continued. "All Exogeni employees, you are ordered to step away from your terminals and omnitools, turn over all passwords and logins to myself or my associates, and refrain from tampering with any equipment. Failure to comply will result in being named a willing accomplice to any and all charges that are being given to Mister Jeong there, as well as destruction of evidence and the conspiracy therefore of. Compliance will result in the reduction of charges brought against you, if not outright amnesty. Lizbeth and Juliana Baynham, please step to one side, I have questions for you two. NOW."

Once she got the two scientists to one side, Joannis quickly changed her tone. "Thank you for your cooperation. And I need your help. If the Thorian really is unique, sentient and sapient like your research claims, we need to try and contact it, preferably without pissing it off. But first, the former Spectre Saren. Do either of you know what he was doing here?"

The older woman shook her head, but Lizbeth nodded. "Turian with a cybernetic arm? Yes, he came into my lab almost a week ago. I think. I sort of lost track of how long I was in the basement area. But he asked some questions about the Thorian, then the local executives left with him to take him to it."

"Was he alone?"

"No, he had… I think a half dozen asari, two krogan, and four turians? Only two asari followed him into the lab, the others stayed out in the hall. Either way, he was only there for a couple minutes. In the lab. I know he was on the planet for nearly a full day. A full local day, I mean."

Joannis nodded, and gestured to a nearby chair as she spotted the young woman swaying on her feet. "Take a seat if you need to. What was he looking for?"

Lizbeth took the chair gratefully, before replying. "Samples, I think. He was asking about how old it was, and how prevalent it was throughout the planet. The answers were old and extremely. The Thorian is at least fifty thousand years old at the absolute minimum, and my tests showed that its spores were noted in several widely spaced locations on the planet. It is probably what is providing the breathable atmosphere on Feros."

Joannis nodded. "And what else do you know about the Thorian?"

"Well, crews found it after clearing some rubble in the colonists tower, and began exploring down. After a couple days, they called us and talked about a massive plant appearing in a large room above a deep void in the structure, and requested our help in determining what it was. The initial response teams took the samples I was examining, as well as several air samples, and left some monitoring devices. The sample teams advised avoiding the area where the Thorian was, but the monitoring devices kept picking up footsteps, so apparently the colonists didn't listen. The teams reported the node they found was about the size of a hovervan, and my tests on the samples showed that the creature became more intelligent the more material it gathered or grew. So the node they saw would be probably about as smart as a dolphin or a young child."

Joannis frowned before slowly nodding. "So smart enough to bargain with. How long between finding the Thorian and Saren arriving?"

"About two months, and five weeks after the colonists were all fully controlled by the Thorian. Sort of like fungus back on Earth that takes over insects, but far more insidious. The company installed health monitoring systems on all the colonists omnitools, running in the background where they can't access it. It noticed a build up on the spores in the colonists' bodies, and sudden pain spikes after the spores reached a certain threshold. Likely the Thorian was using pain and pleasure feedback to control them. We also noticed a significant spike of gamma brain waves during the first week or two of being controlled, though what they were for or in response to, we aren't sure."

Joannis nodded, ignoring the sounds of her sister yelling at the guards to suit up, before asking her last question. "So how do we stop the colonists from helping the Thorian?"

Lizbeth looked at her mother, who smirked. "That I can help with, as I was involved with the lab that was doing deep analysis on the spores. There are two ways you can disrupt the spores. The first is a combination of aerosolized pesticides, which renders the spores inert after inhalation. The second is to use an aerosolized sedative, like the AX-12 gas."

Joannis allowed a bemused smile to cross her face. "The Knock Down gas? Standard military response to terrorist attacks or widespread civilian rioting? Yeah, our frigate isn't armed with dispersal devices equipped with the gas."

Juliana blinked in surprise. "What?"

"Due to our rapid deployment to get to Eden Prime, which was already an accelerated deployment, we were unable to fully equip the ship before leaving. Since then, we have had our allotment of AX-12 missiles misplaced once, reassigned twice, and sent to the wrong destination once. We were actually on our way to picking up some when we got your distress call. Do you have some of those pesticides you mentioned on hand?"

The mother Baynham nodded as she rubbed her forehead. "Yes, give me about ten minutes, me and my daughter should be able to make a few dozen doses. We store some of our supplies out here that we can use, otherwise we would have to trek back to the Exogeni tower. They won't be as effective, since you will have to convert some grenades to dispersal devices, but you should be able to make it work."

Joannis handed the scientists a dozen grenades to modify, before turning and heading to her Twin. "Feeling better? Now that you have punched someone."

"Yes, actually. Now if only Arlas would answer his omnitool, we might be able to figure out what he was doing. Ashley is pulling back to Phalanx Company's location, and will meet us there."

"Nothing new from him?"

"Not since he reported being surrounded, right before we came down here."

The two exchanged a look, before sharing a grin. Jaclyn spoke first. "Fifty on him being captured."

"With you two hundred in the hole, you need a win. And since most of his good equipment is destroyed or otherwise not on him, I would call that a fairly good bet on your part. However, in the interests of keeping your morale above the level of your boots, I accept. Though if you get to two fifty in the hole, you have to pay up."

Joannis grinned at her Twin's grumbling, before nudging her and nodding to the stairs down. "Game face, time to deal with the local goons and loons."

Arlas woke up with a fierce headache, and the first thing he did was start cursing himself. Clearly he had been getting complacent, and only fortune had kept him from ending up trapped in his spirit stone so far. The obvious solution was to have a serious sit down and ensure he wasn't falling to his own hubris, but that was going to have to wait until he got back to the ship. As his awareness returned with the rest of his senses, he started taking stock of his situation.

He was being hauled somewhere, two hands on each arm, and his feet dragging across the stones behind him. His fusion gun and death spinner were both still on his back, the creatures apparently unable to rip the weapons out of their holders after he had locked them, but he could see another Crested plant monster carrying his sword and flamer pistol. He refrained from sighing in vexation at the sight of someone else carrying his weapons. Clearly, the biolocks on his weapons needed some tweaking, or the plants lacked enough a psychic presence to activate them. Letting his head roll loosely around allowed him to see a trio of Creepers following behind him, and a succubus in front of him.

Despite the pain in his head from the impact and the pains throughout his body from the roll down the stairs, he wasted a moment admitting the asari plant had very nice legs, before realizing he was getting distracted. Before he could do anything, the group suddenly stopped, and he could see a large hole in the floor beyond the Succubus. A few seconds later, and the unusual psyker emenations were now loud enough for him to conclude that they were near the source, as the Succubus turned toward him, and pulled his head up.

At first, Arlas thought they were aware that he was conscious, but the Succubus began poking and prodding at the bottom of his helmet. It took a couple of seconds for him to realize the plant was trying to disengage his helmet for some reason, but eldar helmets didn't work like that. The Succubus' efforts did let him observe her, and realize that whatever was causing the psyker signal was causing his bones to vibrate.

The first thing he noticed was the Succubus' eyes. He had expected them to be solid black, lacking the spark of life and intelligence, and possessing only primal cunning and vicious malice like a Tyranid synapse creature. While they were nearly a solid black, he quickly realized that they were not lacking in individual intelligence. The Succubus was clearly acting in a methodical manner as it tried to collapse his helmet, carefully examining the bottom of his ghosthelm for the release, a tiny, slowly growing frown of concentration on its face as it continued to try and unmask him.

The second thing he noticed was the plant behind the Succubus, quickly driving other thoughts from his mind as he observed its massive bulk. He was not sure what, exactly, he was looking at it, but it looked like a disgusting, disturbing blend of flesh and plant, tendons and muscles seamlessly blending into the thick plant fibers that grew in all directions, but even he could tell the growths were directed, though they wove and entwined randomly. Dozens of tendrils, as thick as his chest, several significantly thicker, grew into the walls, ceiling and floor, anchoring the massive hybrid, and even as he watched another tendril began to slowly grow toward a column to his right.

He quickly returned to the immediate problem of the plant asari trying to remove his helmet when she, and he was close enough to notice there was no doubt as to the gender, stepped away from him and released her hold on his helmet, eyes narrow and her lips pursed. He allowed his head to drop, before sending out a thin tendril of psyker energies, seeing if he could connect directly with the Succubus. Instead, his probe bumped right into the psyker energy field he could sense shifting around the room, and it was immediately grabbed.

Arlas had a fraction of a second to react to the sudden contact, and could make the choice to let the energies disperse, preventing the source of the psyker energies from contacting him. Or he could leave the tendril as it was, thin, easily snapped, but able to allow communication. Or he could strengthen it, and allow a more complex conversation.

He did the sensible thing, and kept the tendril thin. He was captured, so he was going to have to make contact with this source of psyker energies at some point, and if he waited too much longer, the plants might decide damaging or breaking his helmet was acceptable.

The first thing that always happened was disorientation as one's mind made contact with something fundamentally different from its own, and he had to catch himself as the Crested holding him up suddenly staggered. He stumbled into the Succubus, who easily took the impact without swaying. He stepped back, opening distance to the plant asari, and heard the Crested and Creepers behind him slowly regaining their feet. But the creature hanging in front of him responded before he did, which showed impressive psychic stamina, to recover from the shock of psychic contact so quickly. Even the eldar required a few seconds, and this thing had taken less than that, even if the first message was a jumbled mess.

*… K&ab%d'[th^#e9? …*

He frowned at the bitter and biting taste of Hilksk fruit suddenly in his mouth, meaning that the creature was not actually communicating with him yet, despite getting something across. A common problem, solved by more exposure to the other psyker. Once their minds had found some form of link, which could take anywhere from a second to several years, they could communicate. He privately hoped it was on the shorter side of the time requirements, and added some more energy to the psyker tendril that linked their minds.

*I am Arlas, Pathfinder of the eldar Craftworld Ae'Imedra. Who, or what, are you?*

This time the creatures response was somewhat understandable, and included the sound of water and a feeling of pressure on his left arm. *Orleth… Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn… Nyarla… thotep…*

It took another ten minutes of both parties sending to each other before Arlas finally got a message that he actually understood and lacked a physical response from his body, though he suspected something had been lost in translation. *My hovercraft is full of salt water limbless aquatic reptiles. And I am a fruit in search of a smooth blade and some sweet seeds.*

Or the creature might just be as crazy as a jackaloo, he admitted to himself after a pause of reflection. He was just about to cut the link and take his chances fighting out through the guards when he got one last message. *Remove… helmet… speak… direct…*

Arlas frowned, and let his frown deepen as the creature broke off the psychic contact. He blinked and this time stayed upright instead of trying to pitch himself down the bottomless pit only a few paces in front of him. A quick look around showed his situation had changed, though for better or worse he wasn't sure. The Crested had vanished, and only a handful of Creepers were visible, scattered near the only door he could see. The problem was there were a half dozen Succubi around him now, one holding his sword, another his flamer pistol, and all six were watching him like a predator pack would watch an interloper.

Then a watery gagging or choking noise from the hanging plant creature thing in the center of the room, which he swore was larger than before he had contacted it, drew his eyes back to it. As he watched, a limb slowly descended from the… mouth of the creature, and Arlas suddenly realized that the various holes and depressions made up a face. Though it was a hideous and deformed face, best viewed at a distance and an angle, while squinting and focusing on something else. It also looked vaguely familiar for some reason, like he had seen something similar to this a long time ago, at a distance, in bad lighting and had only gotten a brief partial view of it. After a moment of trying to bring the memory into focus, he suddenly realized the limb he had seen sprouting from the mouth was dangling in front of him.

He examined the limb, observing the fluids slowly dripping from the lower lip, reminding him of a blood sucker's mouth without teeth, the entire limb looking more muscle than plant, a stark contrast to the hybrid makeup of the rest of the creature. He grabbed the edge of the dangling limb, and flipped it so he could look down it, and immediately regretted his decision. It was a dripping mess of mucus and muscles and tendons and small feelers, all pulsing and waving. It made the limb look more like a mouth than anything else about it.

One of the Succubus suddenly spoke. "The Old Growth commanded you to put it on. Do so. It desires to converse with you, to learn of you, to learn… You."

He turned and gave the asari plant monster a glare that should have turned it into kindling if there was any justice in the universe, but it just stared back. He could feel his dangersense whispering to him, its volume rising with every second, slowly but as surely as time itself. Even as he stared, one of the Succubi in his peripheral vision ignited its hand with biotic power, and the one on the other side holding his sword shifted it to a combat stance. Very different from the ones he knew or had fought against, likely an asari or Crested combat stance.

However, he realized he was in no position to fight this fight, especially since one of them had his flamer pistol. And while he was loath to remove his helmet, especially with the spores around, the other choice was likely death or dismemberment. So he collapsed the heavily customized helmet's faceplate, the only part that could collapse, and grabbed the orifice tendril. He let himself shudder once in revulsion, before slipping it over his head. He was immediately glad he kept his sensitive ears covered, as the feelers, mucus and muscles collapsed around him, encasing his exposed flesh, but oddly not impeding his ability to breath.

As the limb finished settling, he instantly felt something brushing against his mind, siphoning memories from it with a speed that would have shocked a veteran Farseer, let alone an indifferently trained Pathfinder. That it also breezed past his mental defenses without even breaking its mental 'stride' just made his fear that much more acute.

It saw everything.

Everything that he knew, everything he remembered. Everything that made him Arlas. All the little mistakes, all the great failures. The few triumphs, and the dark, well hidden secrets that had finally driven him to travel the Path of the Outcast. And his own, personal Great Shame, known to almost every eldar of the Craftworld that had met him or knew someone that had met him, which was why he was sent on this suicide mission, a male from a craftworld that had more than twice as many women as men. Thankfully, Arlas could also sense that it lacked context for a lot of what it sensed, and only got the memories, not the emotions that were usually attached to them. While it knew of his many issues, it didn't know they were issues or why, only that they were remembered.

Most importantly, however, the damn plant finally had a point of reference to communicate with him.

*I H'aaztre. You first… mind found. Greetings. Travelled far have … meet to.*

Arlas felt shock ripple through his mind, realizing this creature was trying to follow a first contact protocol. Or maybe it was just blindly copying the one the humans gave him back on Eden Prime. He quickly reviewed his own first contact protocols, before coming to the unfortunate conclusion that 'leave it to the Farseers' was not an acceptable solution.

*I am Arlas, of the eldar race, from the Craftworld Ae'Imedra. It is an important event, meeting your kind for the first time, and I hope there will be many fruitful exchanges of thoughts and of information with you and your kind.*

He could feel excitement coming off the creature, and idly wished it would remove the… mouth orifice limb thing from his head, so he could get his helmet back on. He suddenly groaned realizing he was going to be taking a very long shower back on the Normandy to get all the slime out of his hair, and could only imagine how the mon-keigh would react to him having to use their public showers. And that was before he included the plant creature sending pleasure or even less understandable messages.

And despite everything else going on, Arlas couldn't help but feel he was forgetting something. Something important…

"Wrex, pull back! Armatures advancing. Garrus, Ashley, put down those fragging snipers and rocket troopers!. Kaidan, Liara, that Prime is your primary target. Destroy it or chunk it over the edge, don't care which, get it gone."

Jaclyn cursed the decision to push up the vehicle causeway back toward the colony. But Phalanx Company had managed to push a call through that they had geth trying to get in through the vehicle bay door, and neither of the twins were willing to leave allies in a lurch unless they had to prioritize. Right now, the only priority was dealing with this Thorian creature, but it wasn't going anywhere, and neither were the colonists it had infected. So saving the Phalanx Company mercs was on the way and cost no time.

Ashley was supporting from the vehicle bay with her sniper rifle, Phalanx Company using the rubble from the destroyed door to great effect in keeping the geth back. But the geth had apparently gathered every unit for one last push to get into the colony, resulting in a Prime, two Juggernauts, four Destroyers, nearly a dozen rocket troopers, three dozen geth regulars, seven geth snipers, and four Armatures. The geth mines were preventing the group from advancing quickly, as Kaidan had nearly had his leg blown off by one. they had to carefully advance, giving the geth time to react to their advance.

The rest of the ground team was in scattered cover around the causeway. Easy to defend, but the geth had the same advantage of heavy cover, and had chosen their location well. It was a stalemate, and would continue to be until something changed. She debated a biotic charge, but returning would be an issue; twelve seconds until she could boost back and with that many geth she would count herself fortunate to survive half that. But the problem was the Geth were working together, forming a perfect warmachine that made taking any of them out, even when caught between two forces, an exercise in frustration and failure. Even worse, the causeway was covered where they were fighting, though for some reason the ceiling vaulted up to above the roof of the vehicle bay, so they couldn't even pull back and have the Normandy or the lander bombard the area with lasers or a lower power main cannon shot.

She knew from experience that if they had been fighting anything other than geth, with the equivalent forces, the fight would already be half over, and they had only been fighting for three and a half minutes at this point. So far, casualties included Kaidan, who was limping from a mine, Wrex's armor, which was going to need at least some patches, one of the Phalanx shield bearers was weaponless, and Ashley had reported a cracked helmet from a deflected sniper round. On the geth's side, they were down a sniper geth, and two of the troopers had minor damage.

She cursed at a sniper as she ducked its attempt to take her head off, before popping back up to throw a couple warps, idly noting the fight was not going well. Her side was committed, otherwise the Geth would just move up and annihilate Phalanx Company and Ashley. Their only saving grace currently was the fact that the cover between where the Geth had dug in and the two lines of cover the organics were using was relatively bare. But eventually they were going to get someone that wasn't watching the right way, or jumped back up at the wrong time, and the momentum would swing back toward the Geth. She needed to find a game changing move, and soon.

Arlas figured whatever he was forgetting wasn't important. If it was, he wouldn't have forgotten it, and if it was somewhat important, he would remember it eventually. But far more pressing, and interesting, was conversing with the plant monster, which called itself H'aaztre. It wasn't actively hostile or dominating, but it hadn't recognized the other creatures it had encountered as fully sentient and sapient, and had thought them animals. A 'quick' conversation, rife with difficulties, had proven the creature could sense psychic fields, and thought those were a sign of true intelligence. That revelation had made him frown, before asking the obvious question. He showed a mental picture of Saren, including the arrogance and condescension that seemed to be the only emotions the turian had. *What did this one want?*

The reply was mostly images. The plant creature vaguely remembered such an individual, but had been far more interested in the blue bipedal that had touched its mind. Not a true sentient, but it had concluded the blue one had partial sentience. The blue one had negotiated information about the Creators for the animalistic one Arlas hunted, and in return the animalistic one would give the plant creature the blue one and the animals in the metal lairs above. H'aaztre had agreed, eager for something to converse with after so long without anything else, but once it had… the translation had faltered there, Arlas had gotten the impression of merging with something and being wrapped inside something at the same time, but what that meant exactly he had no idea.

It took a couple tries to get the plant to finish its thought, and he learned that there was something wrong with the blue biped, the asari it had acquired. A few more questions to H'aaztre revealed that it had tried to get some of the colonists to come down so it could see if they had the same issue, but none had followed its demands, even when the demands became commands. Then, a short time later, the colonists had suddenly experienced a brief spurt of terror, before many had suddenly vanished from its senses. Curious as to what had happened, it knew those colonists were dead, but it hadn't lost any in the weeks before the Saren and the asari arrived, so it had started dispatching various forms. One was based off the Creators, the ones Arlas called Crested, but the others, the Creepers, were based off an older form, something the plant had known already before the Creators had given it the ability to remember and think for longer than the now. However, growing new forms took time, nearly three days, and the first forms had only been ready for their tasks about an hour or so earlier.

Arlas nodded as they finished, before the plant's attention suddenly slid away. *What this?*

It suddenly linked a different mind with his, and for a moment he struggled to keep himself from merging too deeply with whatever H'aaztre was trying to link with him. He finally succeeded, and then took in the view point.

The first thing he sent back was a suggestion to modify the asari plant simulacrums so the faux chests didn't feature quite so prominently. The next thing he did was focus on the rest of the view, rather than just the lower quarter. The Succubus was standing at least twenty meters above the lower level it was observing, clearly on top of a building. Parts of the lower level were encased in whatever the buildings were made of, but enough sections had collapsed to let him see several different geth platforms engaging several figures. There was enough cover to prevent easy elimination of either side, but he could see fire going between the geth to the figures, but also between the geth and the building.

Arlas tried to get the Succubus to focus on the figures, but apparently the plant asari couldn't 'hear' him. So instead the eldar sighed, and sent his thoughts to the plant creature still encasing his head. *The closer metal group are geth, they were killing the colonists. The other group are organics, sentient but you can not hear them, they came to protect the colonists.*

He frowned suddenly, realizing a potential problem in the offing. *They will see your control as a threat to the colonists. They will demand you release them. If you refuse…*

He showed metal ships firing from the sky, burning the megatower down, and then burning the rest of the ruins away. He didn't think they would actually go that far, but they might. The humans tended to react poorly to outsiders that sought to control them, even if it was for their own good. Even if they knew it was for their own good. He let the plant creature see it, before adding there was a way to keep them from destroying everything in a crusade to kill it. The plant paused, its alien mind examining the image he had provided, before turning back to him. *How stop? Burn bad. Long sleep before grow again.*

Arlas relaxed as he noted that the creature's exposure to him was causing it to become more understandable. Now he just had to calm the thing down, get it pointed at the right opponents rather than everything, and get this limpet thing off his damn head.

A/N - And cut! Read, enjoy, favorite, follow, review, and send PMs. Or just read and enjoy. I am not picky.