Hi all of you out there, I'm back!

I know this chapter is long overdue and I'm so sorry for the delay. I had planned to take about one mount break back in spring when my grandmother, who had been sick, died in beginning of June and prolonged this absent. Although it was expected and she had lived longer than expected, it still struck me pretty hard. Then after that, my grandfather got sicker and sicker, if you can call dementia that... It was hard to explain to him why the doctors couldn't do more for my grandmother and watch him grieve and not understand.

So this summer was... well, hard I guess in a way. And my priority wasn't to write even if I could've written... and then when I finally could write something, thenI felt like I should put some effort in my other story which I have been neglecting.

But now I have another chapter for you and I hope you'll like it. It was hard to write this chapter as I had started it before my grandmother died and had to push through it to get it done. So if it isn't as good as the previous chapters, then you know now why. I just wanted this chapter done with and go on to the next one and forget what happened as I started this.

So I say again and again; THANK YOU all for reading, supporting and giving wonderful reviews (both good and bad ones)! Altough I am happy to say that there hasn't been that many bad ones.

Enough of me, please enjoy!

Escape the Fate

Chapter 17: Geth On Feros II

Garrus POV

The geth Hopper jumped into the line of sigh of his scope and he pulled the trigger in an instant. The bullet went straight through its optics and the light died as it went clean through the head. Satisfied with another perfect headshot, Garrus watched the last geth fall from the ceiling and crash into the pile of rubbles beneath.

"Aw, I wanted that one," he heard the pirate say with a fake pout from just a few feet in front of him.

In the corner of his left eye, he could see the Commander shake his head at his sister's comment a few feet away before he turned to head up the ramp and further into the structure.

"I hate those things," Kaidan said as he looked down at the fallen Hopper Garrus had just killed before it had had the chance to attack the Staff Lieutenant. "They always jump out of the way before I can hit them."

Garrus lowered his sniper rifle as he gazed over the garage of the ExoGeni Corporation's headquarters. Or at least what was left of it. The geth had left it in rubbles, but the poor structure had taken more damage once they had arrived, courtesy of their fellow pirate friend who had taken the liberty to go all out with her biotic. After all, most of it was already demolished and a little bit more wouldn't matter much.

They also had to leave the Mako outside as it was impossible to get it through the garage door because the roof had caved in and only left an opening small enough for them to go through one on one. It was then they had been attacked by the geth who had forced the surviving employees of ExoGeni to flee to an outpost further down the skyway which they had climbed to get here. But although they had been attacked, they had not known why and what the geth was doing here. At least that was what they had claimed.

Clapping her hands to remove the dust on her gloved, Quinn asked the other biotic user with a carefree voice; "Maybe you're just a bad shot?" Then it turned to her normal scornful tone they all knew very well as she continued; "Perhaps you should try and use that biotics of yours a little more than always go for your pistol? Why else do you have it? Just for show?"

He could not see her face as she had turned her head towards the Lieutenant, yet somehow he could imagine the expression she was using. A small crock at the corner of her mouth, the fuzz over her green eye raised and a small spark in both eyes as her provoke hit home.

Kaidan, he could see his expression clearly, yet as always they were hard to understand. It didn't help when the Lieutenant shifted his expression to something else and then back to his normal expression. It seemed to amuse the pirate though, as she turned around with a chuckle and headed up the ramp after her brother. Garrus followed.

"You need to anticipate their movements," John spoke from up on the second level. "Follow their pattern. Strike at the right moment."

"That's easier said than done. You're snipers, of course it's easy for you," Kaidan said to his defense. "They're not moving like anything I've ever seen before. It's not like I can put up a barrier in front of them as they jump."

"You can learn," Garrus said as Kaidan walked up next to him. "They wouldn't see it coming and crash right into it."

"Practice makes perfect - as they say," John agreed.

It wasn't like the human Sentinel was without skills. Although he had a lot more to learn. It was indeed true to what Quinn had said and Kaidan went mostly for his weapons than use his biotic to attack. Mostly he used it for defense and protection. The kinetic barriers he used was strong but he had a long way to go if he wanted to be like the other two humans he seemed to look up to.

John stopped by a door to the right which would hopefully bring them out of the garage and into the headquarters. If not, then they wouldn't have many other options as most of the garage was underneath the rubble. And he guessed that neither of them was really keen on digging through it to get to another door.

"It's locked," he said when he tried to open it as it wasn't opening automatically. Then he turned slightly towards his sister.

Tilting her head to the side a little, she asked, sounding rather offended and crossed her arms over her chest; "What? Just because I'm a criminal you expect I can decrypt any lock?"

John's fuzz over his left eye rose in the same manner as Quinn's had earlier. "You hacked the Normandy, so- yeah, pretty much."

A satisfied snort escaped the pirate before a small chuckled followed. "Ah, yeah. That was hilarious. Your face was priceless when we arrived in the Artemis Tau Cluster. So angry."

The tightness in John's jaw was evident even for Garrus who had a hard time understanding all the different expressions humans made. He could even see the twitch in the Commander's eyes as the anger crossed him for a second, another thing much like his sister, before he composed himself again.

"Can you do it or not?"

Quinn's voice grew carefree and light with a hint of mockery beneath as she said; "Sorry to disappoint. That was a one time - two-" her eyes went upwards as she thought for a second, "-maybe three... Hm.. No, two." A nod to herself before she turned her eyes back to her brother, a certainty in her voice as she said; "-Two times only. The third one I'll save for a later date. For something more interesting than a door on Feros - which can easily be blown up." Her gaze fell to where John stored the grenades on his belt. Then up at him again.

"We're not going to alert the geth more than we already have," John said to that then turned to Garrus and Kaidan. "One of you want to give it a try?"

As the Staff Lieutenant seemed to be more interested in listening to the siblings quarrel, particularly the sister, Garrus took the offer. He walked up to the door and took John's place. Kneeling down by the small panel, he opened up his omni-tool and the small screen lit up just above his forearm. Less than a second later had he linked it to the security system and found it to be an easy decryption.

Yet the conversation above him continued.

"You've hacked my ship twice?" There was an edge in John's tone and the disapproval was clear. The pirate remained quiet. Yet that didn't mean she hadn't answered him and by John's darker tone as he spoke next, he knew that was the case. "How?"

A snicker followed from the pirate by the demand. Then she spoke in a proud tone of voice; "The same way I got all of those Alliance cargo ships to where I wanted them to be - a little virus."

As if it was waiting for its queue, the override was completed and the door opened, revealing a long, narrow and dark corridor. Beyond it, Garrus saw natural light lit up the room and more debris lying on the floor. The geth must have gone through the roof there as well.

"It was quite easily actually," the pirate continued and he could almost hear the satisfied smile on her mouth. "It was quite easily actually. You know, for being the newest and most advanced ship out there. One would think they must've put in a lot of safety precautions to prevent the controls from being accessed. Yet all I had to do was to find an available console and put this little baby in."

"Where did you get that from?" Kaidan asked.

Garrus closed the omni-tool and the small screen disappeared as he stood up. Then he stepped to the side to give room for the Commander to take the lead, yet the man was busy starring coldly at his sister. Garrus turned to her as she answered the question.

"From a turian I knew. Reiyla. Really cleaver girl. Loved the tech stuff." Quinn took a step towards the door, which got the party moving with John taking the lead, Quinn second, followed by Kaidan and with Garrus last.

Quinn continued; "She created these viruses to get ships out of their routes and deceive them to think they were still heading the same direction. Rather handy in my line of work." Quinn said with a lighter tone, almost fond. But the tone grew cold and distant as she continued; "But she's dead now. So there won't be any more of these handy little things."

"I'm sorry," Kaidan said with an sympathetic tone as he walked through the door.

Still with a tone that sounded cold and dethatched, the pirate asked; "For what? That she's dead or there won't be any more of those things?" She didn't give the Lieutenant the chance to answer. "She's dead. Everybody dies."

The way she spoke was like she had expected it to happen from the beginning. That everyone she encountered would eventually die and it was better to keep her distant emotionally so to not get hurt when they actually died. Or maybe it was that she actually couldn't feel anything. That all the hardships she gone through during her short life had not just put up walls, but also ridden her of all emotional attachment to people.

There was no doubts that the pirate saw things differently than most people. Her way was like most criminals and killers he had encountered when working as an C-Sec Officer. Yet there was something that wasn't like them at all. For claiming to be a cold blooded killer, Quinn hadn't really killed someone who didn't deserve it since being on the Normandy. Although he did not fool himself in thinking that she wasn't the person who had the reputations of being a ruthless killer. He had read the files about her and after meeting her, he could tell that most of it, if not all, was the truth.

"What about the second time you used the virus?" John demanded as he stepped out of the hallway and into the next room, his head slightly turned sideways to his sister. "What did you do then?"

As she too stepped out of the hallway, a sound to the right drew the siblings attention. Although he could not see what it was, Garrus quickly pulled out his assault rifle, seeing the siblings going for their weapons as well, but was interrupted by a bolt of pulsing energy heading their way and the two siblings had to jump out of the way.

"Fuck!" Quinn exclaimed and jumped out of the way and further into the room along with John.

The bolt hit the ground where the two had just stood and the force of the blast had Garrus thrown back into the hallway and falling on to his back. Next to him he heard another grunt, after a body was thrown to the floor as well. Sparks flew violently towards his feet and he could feel the heat of it through his armor, but before they could do any damage, they died down and disappeared. As he sat himself up, he found Kaidan lying on his stomach next to him and through the doorway, he saw another bolt cross it

On the ground where the sibling had stood just moments ago, lied the remains of their weapons they had held. A shotgun and an assault rifle broken and burned along with the ground. The impact spot had a permanent mark with a slight round crack in the center. Even the sparks had left their burning marks.

But Garrus couldn't see the siblings from where he sat and realized that they had to still be inside the room. A third blast was fired and saw that one too cross the doorway and then heard Quinn's voice as she called to her brother to get out of the way. Not long after did he see the pair push up against the opposite wall to avoid the impact and the sparks that followed. Neither of them had the time to draw another weapon as another bolt was thrown their way and they had to move again.

Grabbing his assault rifle which had fallen next to him, he stood up and quickly moved over to the doorway and saw a geth Armature about to fire another blast at the two siblings. The large geth stood tall on four legs and its head almost reaching the ceiling. Its neck was drawn backwards as it was firing up another Siege Pulse from its assault cannon from where a mouth should have been if the geth would have one. As it kept its' attention on the siblings, it would give Garrus the chance to fire at it. But its shield was tough to break through even when using the cannon on the Mako and as soon as he fired on it, it would notice him straight away. But hopefully it would give the siblings a chance to grab their weapons and be able to fight back.

Kaidan stepped up beside him and seemed to be on the same page as him. Both of them took aim but also prepared themselves to get out of the way when and if the large geth decided to attack them. The two of them fired and sure enough the geth stopped in its tracks and turned its head towards them. They used everything they got to sabotage the shield and bring it down, yet it was persistent. Not soon after, both John and Quinn joined them in trying to bring the shield down.

For a moment there, the Armature seemed unsure on which pair it should focus its attention on. One pulse was shot at Garrus and Kaidan, who moved out of the way and further into the hallway and as soon as the sparks had dissolved, they were right back at it. The same thing was with John and Quinn, although all they had to do was move out of the way and then kept on shooting. This repeated once more until the Armature realized it was pointless to go for both pairs at the same time. So instead it took the chance with the siblings, as they would be easier targets.

The kinetic shield flickered as it was running low and soon broke. Now they could go for its optics on its head.

"Grenade!" Quinn then shouted before a small object was thrown in front of the geth and then rolled underneath its stomach.

Garrus and Kaidan, who was the closest to the Armature, withdrew into the hallway yet stayed so they could see what was happening and kept shooting. The grenade detonated and the force from it lifted the geth up into the air and blew one leg clean off. The other three legs bended underneath it as it came crushing down on its stomach. Now its head was closer and easier to hit, which didn't stay intact for long and the geth Armature collapsed completely.

"I guess it was pointless going through this door," Quinn said as she caught her breath and looked at the rubbles next to the dead Armature, then walked up to the hallway. "That fucking thing fried my shotgun!"

"We need to find another way," John said as he gazed through the room.

Garrus looked around too and found nothing but rubbles blocking a door next to the Armature. Getting to it would be futile as the pieces was so large that they would need to bring equipment from Zhu's Hope and that was if they even had that sort of things on this planet. They could always have the biotics try to move the debris, but from the looks of it, the structure was insecure as it was and they could end up doing more damage than good.

Instead, they all returned back to the garage and at the far end, spotted another door. As they got closer, they realized that it was blocked by a kinetic barrier. The geth had really taken precautions with whatever they were doing.

John put his hand against the barrier, but retreated it just as quickly as sparks flew by the light touch. "Damn it," he said through clench teeth and shock the hand slightly.

"No way to burn through this shield with the weapons we have," Kaidan spoke up. "We'll have to find another way in."

"If there is one." John let his gaze follow the wall.

Quinn suddenly walked off and Garrus turned to watch what she was up to. The pirate walked up to the half wall that was between the two doors and looked down.

"This could be the way," she said and walked along it. Suddenly, she began to climb over it.

"Wait. We don't know-" But before John could finish, the pirate had already jumped down. "-what's down there..." he finished with a loud sigh and then a hand went up to his temple and slowly shock it. "I guess that way then." He walked up to the half wall. "Why can't she think before she acts? This impulsiveness she has will get someone killed one of these days."

Although John had muttered that out loud, Garrus felt it had been more to himself than to the rest of them. Yet Kaidan felt the need to add; "Or herself."

There might lie a truth to what they said, yet the pirate showed her impulses worked. She worked with what she had and what was delivered. She was flexible and clever with that and her quick thinking had saved them quite a few times. As her fighting style and morals wasn't limited to what was right and what was wrong, it gave her a more verity in options.

Garrus easily climbed over the railing with his long legs. As he looked down into the dark hole, he could spot some debris lying at the bottom. From what he could guess, it was about an eight to ten feet drop to the very bottom. From where he stood he smelled smoke. Something was burning from down there.

The two humans jumped and he followed shortly after. He landed in a pile of trash and the smell of smoke was clearer down here. The acrid smell of burning trash and flesh entered his nostril and he had to swallow down the bile that threatened to come up.

"Huw, what's that smell?" Kaidan asked and waved a hand in front of his face.

"Burning flash," Garrus answered.

John too seemed bothered by the smell, yet he tried to not let it show. Instead, he followed the pirate who was going through the tunnel. Garrus followed, but the smell seemed to intensify as they got closer to the opening. Quinn stepped out of the tunnel and stopped just a few feet away from it and looked down at something by the rubbles. As they got closer, Garrus could make out the body of a dead varren.

Suddenly a shot was fired and Quinn's shield flickered as it deflected the shot. In an instant, Garrus drew his rifle and hurried out of the tunnel along with the Commander and Kaidan.

"Damn it!" A female voice cried out to the right at the same time.

A human female stood beyond the rubbles, clutching a pistol with shaky, inexperienced hands and pointing it at them. Once she realized they weren't geth, she cautiously lowered the gun and took a few steps forward. Her cloths told him that she was one of the employees of ExoGeni as it was similar to what the people in the camp had worn.

"I'm so sorry," she said quickly. "I thought you were geth, or one of those varren."

Garrus lowered his gun along with the rest of them. Or so he thought. The pirate stormed over to the woman and grabbed her violently by the collar as she roared;

"What the hell are you doing going around shooting people like that?! If it wasn't for my shield you'd have killed me!"

"I-I'm s-sorry!" The woman cried out in fear.

"Sorry doesn't cut it." The icy tone in the pirate's voice was alarming even to him and Garrus saw the pistol she was holding got pushed up against the woman's temple.

John reacted instantly. "Wow, hold on," he shouted and bolted up to the two women, yet careful not to agitate his sister further. "Come on, it was a simple mistake. She's clearly not familiar with a gun. Besides, you're fine, Quinn, so let the girl go."

"A mistake which could've gotten me killed," Quinn roared, although she never took her eyes off of the woman she held close. "One which not many people live to make again."

Even from where Garrus stood, he could see the fear in the woman's face. There was a visible gulp before she opened her mouth and pleaded; "I promise, I didn't mean to-"

Although before she could finish, Quinn had shoved her away and used a murderous tone as she demanded; "Who the fuck are you?"

John grabbed a hold of the girl's shoulder and helped steadying her before she could fall onto the debris by their feet. Once the girl got her footing, John turned his face towards his sister and gave her a stern look, but kept his scolding to himself for now. A wise choice, though Garrus as he watched the pirate clench her fists even tighter. One wrong word from either of them would certainly have her lash out.

The woman looked reluctant to answer, but a comfortable hand on her shoulder from John gave her the nudge she needed. "My name is Lizbeth Baynham. I'm just a research assistant for ExoGeni. I came here with my mother." Her gaze was cast down and her expression changed. "I don't even know if she made it out alive."

"She's with some others from the colony," Kaidan said gently. "She's safe for now."

As soon as those words had left his mouth, the woman shot her head up at the Staff Lieutenant and her eyes had turned big and round. It was almost like she couldn't believe what he had just said. "She's alive? Oh thank God. I thought I was the only one left," she said and a small sob escaped her and the tension in her shoulders loosened some.

With an encouraging tone, John said; "You're safe now too." But his tone then grew curious, "But why were you here in the first place?"

Lizbeth's face fell shameful. "It's my own fault. Everyone else was running and I stayed to back up data. The next thing I knew, the geth ship latched on and the power went out." She looked up at John as she continued and her tone grew somewhat desperate; "I was trapped. I tried to get out, but the way was blocked."

"We'll get you out as soon as we find out what the geth are after," John reassured her, but she didn't look that convinced.

"It's not the geth; it's the energy field they put up. They don't want anyone else getting access to the..." Lizbeth trailed off and her gaze was turned away from them like she was hiding something.

When she didn't continue on her own, John tried to coax her; "We're here for the geth. It's very important that we find out what they're after."

She continued to hesitate and began to fidget with her hands uncomfortably.

"If you don't tell us everything, then you might as well put that pistol to your head and pull the trigger," Quinn spoke with a harsh tone and a cold stare at the woman. "If you don't, the geth will when they find you. And we won't be here to help you, cause we will be busy finding out what the hell it is you won't share."

"Time we can spend on getting you out of here instead," Garrus added.

Still quite hesitant, the woman let her gaze wander to each of them before she lowered her head once again and spoke softly; "I don't know for certain, but I'm guessing they're here for the Thorian."

"What's a Thorian?" Garrus asked as he had never heard that word before.

Lizbeth looked up at him. "I really don't know that much about it. It's an indigenous life-form. I know it's very old. Thousands of years, even."

"Why do you think the geth would be interested in the Thorian?" John asked.

She turned her attention to John. "It's just a plant. I don't know why the geth would care. ExoGeni was studying it, but I don't think they found anything special."

"What else can you tell us? Do you know where we can find this Thorian?" Kaidan asked.

"I-I might be able to, but not with those geth crawling around everywhere," she said, but then her voce grew urgent. "Look, we need to get out of here, past that field."

"Any suggestions?" Quinn asked, her tone still grim.

The woman shock her head back and forth. "No, not exactly. But I think the geth ship is powering it. I've noticed the geth laying power cables everywhere. You could follow those cables, but there's geth all over the place." She turned to John and pleaded; "Please. Just get that field down so I can see my mother again."

With another reassuring hand on her shoulder; John said; "You stay put. We'll go open some doors."

The woman went for her pocket as she said;"Here, take my ID. This should get you past any locked doors." She pulled out the small ID card and gave it to John. "Good luck with that field."

Quinn's POV

She watched the krogan fall helplessly between the flight of stairs with content on her face. His screams ended abruptly as he hit the bottom and the crack to his bones was like music to her ears, knowing that another enemy had died by her hands.

"Damn that krogan was persistent, " Kaidan said from somewhere behind her, followed with a painful grunt.

Before turning around to see what state the rest of the team was, Quinn whipped her nose with her free hand and indeed found blood as she looked down. The krogan had managed to get a good punch to her nose and face. Although it didn't feel broken, she guessed there would be some bruising to look forward to.

"Yeah, they usually are," John agreed as she watched him stand up with a hand pushing at his back and a face that told her the krogan had gotten a hit to him as well.

Even Garrus looked like he had been hit by the charging krogan as he rolled his shoulders back and forth .

"Let's find out what he wanted out of that VI," she said and walked up to the machine with the male-human-like hologram.

"ExoGeni Corporation reminds all staff that the discharging of weapons while on company property is strictly forbidden," the VI spoke with that monotonous tone which was the standard for these consoles. As the rest of them approached, the VI spoke; "Welcome back, Research Assistant Elizabeth Baynham. What can I do for you?"

"What information was the last user attempting to access?" John asked, his voice revealing that he was still in some pain.

"Fetching data," the VI spoke and then grew quiet for a short moment before speaking again. "The previous user was attempting to access details on the study of Subject Species 37, the Thorian."

"Tell me everything you told the krogan," John demanded.

"I was unable to provide the previous user with any relevant data. Aside from lacking proper access, there had been no new data available on Species 37. All sensors monitoring the observation post at Zhu´s Hope have been inactive for several cycles."

"What does Zhu's Hope have to do with the Thorian?"

"The Thorian is a simple plant life-form that exhibits a sentient behavior uncommon with other flora," the VI explained. "Through dispersion and the eventual inhalation of spores, it can infect and control other organisms, including humans. The Zhu's Hope control group has yielded interesting results. Before sensors went offline, almost 85% of all test subjects were infected."

"ExoGeni knew all along what would happen to those people," Quinn said, not that surprised by it. The colonists had been acting suspiciously when they had first arrived and had not seemed to like being questioned.

The VI continued; "It was deemed necessary to assess the true potential of Species 37."

"No wonder they were behaving so strangely," Garrus said.

Kaidan turned to John. "We should contact Joker."

Her brother didn't waste a second before he put a hand to his helmet and pressed on the comm button as he stepped away from the VI and spoke; "Joker. Come in, Joker."

Mean while Quinn turned back to the VI and asked; "What is the size of this thing?"

"The Thorian appeared to be a diffused creature. It's cognitive abilities are centered in large nerve bundles, but it receives data from kilometers of meandering tendrils. We have discovered bundles approximately one meter in diameter, but these seem insufficient to coordinate the massive sensory potential it possesses. It may simply process such stimulation slowly, or perhaps there is a nerve cluster of a greater magnitude we have not yet encountered."

With a raised brow, Quinn continued to ask; "Is it intelligent? Can I reason with it?"

The VI responded; "The Thorian exhibit the focused behavior of a predator. The release of spores is an act of survival, not aggression. It does trigger advanced behaviors in the humans it enslaves, but we have yet to discover whether it recognizes-or is capable of recognizing-humans as more than tools. It is sufficient alien as to defy classification at this time."

"Do you know how the creature controls its slaves?" Kaidan asked suddenly.

"The will-subversion manifests as intense pain if directives are ignored. The effect is severe enough that subjects are soon conditioned against even minor thoughts of rebellion. Observation suggests the Thorian views its thralls in a utilitarian way. Care is apparently taken to avoid injuring them, much as a craftsman avoids damaging his tools. As long as no action is taken against the creature's objectives, the subjects are free to pantomime a normal existence until specifically tasked with something."

"Damn it!" John suddenly exclaimed irritated and brought the attention of the others. "That field's blocking us. I can't get through to the ship."

"We need to drop that field and get back to Zhu's Hope," Garrus responded immediately.

John turned back to the VI and demanded through clenched teeth; "VI, tell me about the field surrounding the facility."

"I have limited data on the geth. They have effectively blocked all sensors within the facility. I have detected unusual power fluctuations, but am unable to determine the source."

"Great, we're going in blind," Quinn said and stepped away from the VI and grabbed a firm grip on her assault rifle. "We need to find that ship. Let's get moving."

"Going to standby mode," The VI spoke behind her as she headed for the door through the room.

It was eerie how quiet it was. If she didn't know any better, then she would have thought the facility was empty or abandoned. The only sound came from their own footsteps and breaths, and they weren't even loud to begin with. For a second there Quinn thought they were heading the wrong way because of the silence, but as more corpses of the ExoGeni employees laid scattered on the floor as they got further and further inside, did she know they were heading the right way.

Light came from one of the doorways ahead and the four of them walked quietly towards it. Quinn, who was leading, carefully peaked through it and found a balcony overlooking a large room with high ceiling that could easily be four stories high.

Walking out on the balcony, she found it had collapsed at the left side where she guessed a staircase had once been, leading down to the floor below.

A sound that she recognized quite well brought her on the defenses and gripped her assault rifle tightly. Carefully she walked up to the edge of the balcony and kneeled as she spotted two geth standing below by something that looked like a giant claw that had broken through the wall and a glowing orb in the center of the claw. It almost looked like they were praying to it.

"The geth must have anchored their ship to the side of the building with these claws," Garrus spoke quietly as he and the other two joined her side.

"The geth certainly aren't subtle," Kaidan whispered, then asked; "How do we cut the power if it's coming from the ship?"

Quinn took notice of the various cables leading from the claw and the hole in the wall and was spread out through the room below. Some was even climbing the walls.

"Could the ship be dislodged? Maybe there's a flaw in one of the other claws we could exploit," Garrus suggested.

But their talk didn't really interest the pirate. The two geth below was her target and that was all that mattered for the moment. Neither of the two synthetics had took noticed of them yet and that would give her the opportunity to take them by surprise. Not as fun though, but sufficient. Not much waist of ammo and energy that could be used for later.

About to head for the crumbled stairway, someone suddenly grabbed her by the arm and pulled her back roughly. Snapping her head back to whoever it was, she found John placing his sniper rifle up on the edge of the balcony right next to her and beside him, Garrus had done the same with his rifle. Before she even had the chance to protest, the two took their shots and killed the two unaware geth in an instant.

"Nice shot," Kaidan said once the two geth had been killed.

John turned to her slightly with a satisfied grin on his face when he felt her stare on him linger. Although annoyed, she kept her thoughts to herself. There would be more geth for her to kill and there was no point in arguing about something this insignificant. Instead she stood up and walked over to the edge and jumped down the ten feet to the floor below, having her biotic soften the fall and land softly on her feet.

Quinn kicked one of the dead geth to get it out of her way and also to have something to take her frustration out on. Then she walked up to the glowing orb and giant claw, which looked even bigger from down here.

Underneath the wall debris laid more corpses, which must have been killed once the claw had broken through the wall. The poor idiots couldn't have seen it coming before killing them. Something she couldn't decide if it had been a good way to die or not.

Three grunts followed the men as they dropped down behind her and soon joined her side as they too took in the sight.

"What is this place?" Kaidan asked in disbelief. "Almost looks like the geth build themselves some kind of church."

"Why would a synthetic devote resources to something like this?" Garrus asked, he too sounding like he couldn't believe what he was seeing.

"Who knows?" John said before turning around and heading for the next door.

Thank you for reading!

Hope you liked it and I see you in the next one ^^

I haven't prepared a teaser as I want to go on to the next chapter as soon as possible. But I'm curious...

Which of the two siblings is the most fun to read about?

Is there something you would like to see happen with either of them?