HOLOCAUST
CHAPTER FIFTY:
FEARING SUCCESS
August 5, 2186
1540 hours.
Hangar Bay 28, Rubicon Quadrant, Zeta District, Omega.
Second War for Omega, Battle of the Zeta District.
Captain Marcus Lee Shepard, Military Advisor Garrus Vakarian, Chief Engineer Tali'Shepard vas Normandy, Shadow Broker Liara T'Soni, Soldier Javik, Master Thief Kasumi Goto, Moses, EDI, Second Lieutenant James Vega, Second Lieutenant Imogen Keeling, Major Kaidan Alenko, Flight Lieutenant Steve Cortez, First Lieutenant Jack, Ruler of the Terminus Aria T'Loak.
Marcus wasn't far behind, his weapon raised as he dashed out of the tank, dashing from the hatch, Javik, Tali, Keeling, Kaidan and James not far behind. He watched as Aria swatted the trio of assault troopers aside like they were nothing, the asari snarling loudly enough to be mistaken for a female shatha as she gruesomely dissected a nearby centurion with nothing but her everflowing dark energy.
Marcus brought forth his own in support, as did Javik, their blue and green biotics working in tandem as they sent forth a blast of biotic energy comparable to a freight train in strength, crates and cover being lifted into the air, revealing the Cerberus combatants hiding behind them. They stood up, only to be knocked over as Marcus and Javik sent the cover flying backwards, slamming into them and knocking several on their backs. Marcus took this moment to summon more energy and shoot himself forward, his motion a blur as he appeared directly in the middle of the enemy squad in a split second. Rifle in one hand, he turned and aimed at a charging trooper, tearing into him with high-velocity plasma pellets. He whirled around and activated his omni-blade, thrusting it into the skull of one of the troopers still in the ground, pulling it out with a sizzle of blood.
He turned and fired into the kneecap of another charging trooper, this one a centurion, who had his stun baton out and brandished. He stumbled, momentum carrying him to the ground where Marcus developed a swift kick to the front of his helmet, the force snapping his neck. The trooper accompanying him swung at Marcus with his own baton, screaming obscenities, only for Marcus to envelop said arm in a tight lock, pulling the arm back roughly to break it. A crack, followed by a roar of agony, ended by Marcus slamming his omni-blade into the soldier's belly, pulling it back out and rushing for cover as Cerberus reinforcements poured into the warehouse, opening fire and littering the ground he had occupied moments before with a hellfire of bullets. He even saw a biotic warp impact the ground, indicating a dragoon was on the field.
As Javik opened up with his particle rifle, the steady thrum of it firing followed by a bright lance of energy scatching through the air, a body slammed into the crate beside Marcus, the N7 turning to see a familiar form, fresh from her recent slaughter and carrying a few specks of red blood on her face and otherwise pure-white vest.
"Nice of you to wait for us, Aria," Marcus remarked with a slight frown, wincing slightly as Garrus opened up with the geth tank's main gun, pelting the Cerberus troops flooding through the doorway with heavy plasma fire. Moses was also making his presence known, the loud cacophony of pulse cannon fire echoing through the warehouse as he remained a goliath slicing through waves upon waves of soldiers in white and gold, their weapons feeling like mere mosquito bites against his formidable shielding.
Javik looked to be in his element, using a combination of biotics and particle weapon discharging to keep Cerberus troops pinned and unable to advance. Any flanking attempts were quickly dealt with by Kaidan and Keeling, who used their marksmanship skills to keep an eye on the enemy's movements and counter whatever tactic they used. James used his Revenant as a non-stop battering ram of firepower, a maelstrom of bullets pelting those lucky enough to have survived Moses and Garrus' onslaught. And that wasn't counting the rest of the squad, who, except for Garrus, were now filing out of the tank one by one to join the fray, each taking their own positions on the flank and center to keep Cerberus suppressed and unable to expel them. Jack and her students were running wild, a tempest of dark energy tearing apart even the armoured guardian units.
"I apologize if my homesickness got the better of me, captain," Aria replied with a smile, pulling out her M-11 wraith shotgun, checking over the sleek chrome finish before wracking the slot, sighing happily at the beautiful sound. Tali quickly joined Aria on her left, shotgun tearing the leg off a phantom attempting to flank them. Her feminine electronic scream was the last noise she made before Tali fired again, the phantom's head disappearing in a spray of crimson, headless corpse slumping to the ground. Shortly after, the phantom's sword seemed to lift into the air all on its own, Kasumi, now cloaked, rushing forth to decapitate an assault trooper with it.
"I like the sword, but it's definitely not my style," she joked over the comms, "I'll stick to guns. Also, dragoon, on your right, Shep."
Omni-blade ready, Marcus elbowed the dragoon in the nose, knocking it back before he delivered a quick jab at the heart, energy piercing armor and bone to pierce his heart. The dragoon dropped dead, barely a sound made as he came back in time to dodge another hail of bullets, "Thanks, Kasumi."
"We're pushing them back!" Garrus shouted, "Now would be a good time to make a push before they get reinforcements!"
"Agreed," Marcus announced, before turning back, yelling over the screech of gunfire, "All forward! Make for the doorway! Jack, have your students provide support. Garrus, keep doing what you're doing. Javik, take Keeling, Kaidan and James and push center right. Moses, take the others and push center left. Aria, Tali, Kasumi...you're with me. Hit their right flank, divert their attention. Kill every last one of them."
Jack and her students pulled back as ordered, but didn't let up on their biotic barrage, a non-stop flow of blue energy cascading across the field to batter enemy lines, sending some flying from cover and into the open where they could be gunned down by Javik and Moses' teams. Marcus led Aria, Kasumi and Tali up the enemy's right, where they had left themselves heavily exposed. Another dragoon took notice of them, sending a biotic flare towards them. Aria battered it aside, followed by another, before lifting the dragoon up and pinning him to the ceiling, holding him there as Marcus, Kasumi and Tali crouched and poured bullets and plasma into the enemy flank. Six troopers fell instantly from the blaze, a centurion and a nemesis falling shortly after as they also succumbed. The rest fell like flies, while the half dozen left retreated through the doorway, one dragging an injured comrade with him, leaving a long smear of red blood on the ground. What few injured were left were gunned down by Javik, who showed no remorse for his enemy.
With an exhalation of breath, Marcus slammed a fresh clip into his rifle, turning to the shuttle, "Cortez, get back to the Normandy, but make sure to steer clear of those cannons. Garrus, leave the tank, we can have Grunt and his men take it to Aria's bunker once we've secured a clean LZ. Everyone else, prepare to advance. Squad, fall in with me. Jack, have you and students remain behind us in support. Aria, you lead the way. I want a clean sweep of all sectors and remember to stay frosty. Cerberus has had plenty of time to make themselves at home, and I don't want any surprises. Stock up on ammunition, lick your wounds and let's get back to it."
Taking a quick look around their new surroundings, Marcus realized that what had been a storage warehouse had been converted into a hangar bay. The glowing words "Hangar Bay 28" hung on the wall above them, gleaming brightly with the Cerberus logo above it. Several white and gold SX3 Thunderbolt fighters lay in their docking cradles raised above deck, along with two SX5 Yellowjacket interceptors, three SX7A Hornet bombers and one SX7 Nightstalker heavy bomber, all of them covered wing to tail in white and gold Cerberus colors. All of them were powered down though, their pilots having had no opportunity to reach them as Marcus and his men secured the hangar bay. And considering this was only the twenty-eighth bay...
"When those cannons are down, I want the OLF to secure these hangar bays," Marcus declared as they approached the door, "If we do, we'll cripple Cerberus' air force here. They'll have to scramble fighters and bombers from their carriers, and they won't be much of a problem once the cannons are gone anyway. We cannot allow Cerberus to keep these. That'll be be the OLF's first objective: secure the hangar bays, then torch and burn. We can't have it, neither can they."
"Destroy?" Aria asked, incredulous, "We could use these against them."
Marcus chuckled, shaking his head, "No Aria, we can't. We can't afford the men that we would need to secure and hold these hangar bays. You think Petrovsky will let us keep them? He will send troops to retake these bays, and if he secures even one of them, we've lost the advantage. It would be better to simply destroy them to ensure he doesn't get it no matter what. Besides, we have a fleet: we hardly need them."
Aria waved a hand dismissively, "It's your battle plan, Shepard. Do what you think is necessary."
"Good. Once the cannons are down, the contents of these bays are to be demoed before we advance any further," Marcus motioned to the doorway, keeping his rifle stock pinned firmly against this shoulder, "For now, we push forward. Aria, where to next? We need to get to those generators, ASAP. We're vulnerable enough as it is."
Aria brushed past him with a roll of the eyes, keeping her shotgun close to her chest as she checked the path ahead. She licked her lips, nodding, "We're a couple decks below where we need to be. We'll need to go through the Zeta courtyard, up the flight of stairs, then advance through to the tram station. From there, we should be able to take a tram straight to the gunnery control deck. If my money is bargained correctly, Petrovsky will have stocked up his generators there. Take those out, and his cannons are finished. No doubt Cerberus will have it neatly defended, though."
"We'll deal with that as it comes," he turned to his squad and nodded, "Let's move. Once Petrovsky knows where we're headed, we'll have to move quickly. There's no telling what contingencies he might have," he turned to James, EDI and Garrus with the stoic frown of his "commander" mode, "Do you have the explosives?"
"Sure thing, Loco," James replied with a smirk, holding up the second bandolier wrapped around his chest, this one lined with C12, "Enough to penetrate the armor of a light cruiser."
"Careful now, James," Garrus piped up, grinning, "Explosives are dangerous. You shouldn't play with them. Shame on you Marcus for letting a child play around with them."
"Fuck off, Vakarian," James spat playfully, a grin of his own matching that of the turian sniper, "You should keep those talons slightly blunt. Perhaps you need a manicure before you start handling bombs yourself."
"Look at that. The child has been offended," Garrus chuckled, mandibles clicking with delight, "Besides, Vega: I've got to keep my talons sharp. Lots of soldiers to kill. That's why they're useful. Your human fingernails couldn't scratch an asari, let alone body armor."
"Perfect for using bombs, wouldn't you say?" James joked in return.
"If it were an adult using them, sure."
"How ironically childish."
"A smart child is still a child, Vega."
"Zip it, both of you," Marcus ordered, popping up his head through the doorway to check for hostiles. Judging by the blood smear, Cerberus had retreated towards the courtyard, having moved through the doorway down the hall on the right. Grunting, he lifted his rifle and motioned to Garrus and Keeling, "You two, take point. I'll cover your six. The rest of you, hold here, advance as ordered. We'll clear the area ahead. I want radio silence until contact with the enemy is verified."
Garrus was quick to follow orders, his mattock brandished and ready, with Keeling joining him with her own valkyrie rifle. Marcus, holding up two fingers for a moment, then motioned them forward, giving them both the go ahead. Both Garrus and Keeling fast walked into the hallway, their weapons covering both sides, before moving on the doorway. Marcus followed behind them quietly, his rifle scanning the empty hallway. The lighting was bright for most of it, but darker in some areas, and numerous doors leading to other sections of the district lined the hallway. The same dirty, grimy walls remained, holographic imprints of the Cerberus logo all that had changed from its usual bleak appearance. Despite having the station for more than six months at this point, most of the design had barely changed from when Marcus last saw it.
Petrovsky put more effort into upgrading the defenses than actually altering Omega's appearance. That, and sticking the damn Cerberus logo wherever he can. A typical reminder that Omega is now under Cerberus control.
Well, not for much longer.
"Clear," Keeling announced. Marcus nodded and they moved ahead and through the doorway, with the N7 not far behind, giving one final check of the hallway before passing through. He sniffed, finding the same dank, musty smell. It was a disgusting scent, one that reminded him of the slums of the Texan Megapolis back on Earth. It reminded him just how eerily similar Omega was to the worst parts of human cities: a haven for the criminally applied and the financially starved. A perfect place for self-proclaimed rulers to set themselves up in, and a place so unchangable that even a technologically advanced occupier couldn't be bothered to shape it to how they want it other than throwing their symbol wherever they could.
A shithole, pure and simple. Nobody wants to live on Omega: the only people who do live here are those too desperate for a home to compromise. The Citadel for the poor. Doomed to a history of violence and dispair, unable and unwilling to cultivate anything substantial or produce anything significant. Why Aria cares so much about this station is beyond my ability to understand.
As they entered the next room, they could hear voices: the familiar electronic voices of Cerberus soldiers. One of them was strained: it sounded strangled. He concluded they were the soldiers who survived the battle in the hangar bay, and motioned Garrus and Keeling to stop. Once they had, he had his turian comrade approach from the right, Keeling from the left. Marcus moved with Keeling, approaching the left doorway while Garrus approached the right one.
They soon found their enemy: the injured trooper, shot several times through the chest and still leaking blood, sat up against a wall, cradling his wounds while arguing with the trooper beside him. The other five stood in a ring, watching their sectors, preparing for Marcus and his team to inevitably arrive. One of the troopers spotted them and, without waiting, raised his rifle to fire. He was shot through the side of the head by Garrus, and the room erupted into gunfire for a brief moment. The other four were gunned down before they could retaliate, while the trooper attending his comrade was shot through the head by Marcus.
The injured trooper reached for a weapon, but Garrus nailed him in the right eye socket, blowing his brains out across the wall behind him, silencing his strained moaning immediately. Knowing the enemy had likely heard the gunfire, Marcus dashed across the room, tapping the haptic interface and opening the door.
The courtyard lay directly infront of him. It was a large chamber, easily one hundred meters in length, and seventy in width. Some sort of reception area was located to the far right, sheltered behind panes of bulletproof glass and plain steel walls. Two doors rested at each wing of the back area. The orangey-brown floor had been somewhat cleaned up, with some of the smell dissipating slightly within the courtyard in contrast to the rest of the hallway. A large "welcome" sign sat in the middle of the great courtyard, while four massive observation windows made up the walls on the far left, allowing a clear view of the space outside Omega. None of the fleet could be seen, and the particle cannons had ceased firing, resting in their cradles, spinning aimlessly as they looked for a target but failed to locate one.
The lighting was bright: not quite glaring, but enough to be annoying. It reflected off the visor of his helmet, making it hard to see: but just as he tinted it...
His kinetic barriers burst to life as it was pelted numerous times from enemy weapons fire. Growling, he quickly strafed back into cover, hearing more bullets ping off the wall behind him uselessly as the Cerberus soldiers in the room continued to fire for several seconds before ceasing.
"How many are in there?" Keeling asked, fingering the barrel of her rifle.
"Thirty plus foot mobiles is about as much as I could count," Marcus stated, "More than we can take on. They've got two dozen assault troopers in cover, probably got a centurion or two among them. No doubt they'll have a Nemesis lurking about, and probably some dragoons or phantoms."
"Well, we do need to get through that courtyard," Garrus pointed out, sighing heavily as if he had enough of their current situation, "It's that or take the long way around. And we don't exactly have that liberty."
"Thank you, Vakarian," Marcus snapped snarkily, wincing as a bullet bounced off the wall a little close to his face, gritting his teeth angrily, "Do you have any smoke grenades?"
"I do," Keeling declared, "Got about five of them. Want me to spread out a smoke screen?"
"Not yet. We need reinforcements," Marcus hit the comms, finger tapping the side of his helmet as he heard the sounds of dozens of Cerberus troopers communicating with each other in an almost unintelligible ruckus of shouting and grunts, "Liara, this is Shepard. We've run into more enemy troops. Thirty or so. I'm going to need you, Jack, her students, Aria, Kaidan and James down here now."
"Understood, Marcus. On our way." Was the asari's response before the comms went silent again.
A few seconds later, they moved around the corner, their respective weapons raised, Aria in the lead as always. A torrent of machine gun fire harassed them as the Cerberus platoon likely saw them coming through the doorway. And given by how loud the weapon fired was, and the lack of fellow staccato beats to accompany it, likely meant that the platoon had also set up a machine gun emplacement to keep them pinned.
Just great. Like we need anything else to slow us down any further. Better fix this clusterfuck.
Liara quickly formed a biotic barrier around the doorway, reflecting any further gunfire: the rest of their rounds were absorbed by the shield, blue energy greedily consuming the shards of metal as they came. Liara held the barrier as Jack and her students arrived in the room, Kaidan and James taking position beside Liara, James on the left and Kaidan on the right, one on each of her flanks. Aria dove into cover beside Marcus, growling angrily as she gripped her shotgun more tightly.
"We need to get moving, Shepard. Petrovsky will have found out we're here by now! He could be sending an entire battalion to stop us!" Aria complained, a noticable blue aura beginning to form around her as her biotics charged up.
"Aria, have a little faith," he joked, turning to Keeling, "Deploy a smoke screen on my mark. That'll cover Kaidan, James, Garrus, me and you as we move in. Kaidan, James, Liara, you're with me: we'll take the right. Garrus, take Keeling and Aria and flank left. Here's the objective: my team will flank around and attempt to reach that reception area I saw before: with luck, we'll take it and outflank them. Keeling, Garrus...your job is to outflank that machine gun emplacement and eliminate it. Once that's done, we'll give Jack and her students the go ahead to move in. There's an entire platoon in there, so keep it simple: you find a target in your crosshairs, pull the trigger. You get injured, shake it off until we've taken those generators out," Marcus quickly secured his rifle in his hands, taking a deep breath as he nodded to Keeling, "Fresh clips in your weapons people, it's show time."
Keeling took that for what it was. Reaching up to the top of her bandolier, she quickly popped a smoke grenade free of the harness and swapped places with Marcus. Priming it, she tossed it through the open doorway, where Marcus imagined it flying through the air, a whirlwind of dense smoke erupting from its tailend, before it came to land on the ground, a cloud of thick vapour permeating the air, obscuring the enemy's vision.
Without hesitation, he switched to thermals, the rest of the squad following suit, "Go! Go!"
He was the first through, James and Kaidan hot on his tail. He raised his pulse rifle, thermals finding its first heat signature through the dense smoke. Two more outlines stood beside him, their own weapons raised and ready to fire into the cloud in the hopes of hitting something. He didn't hesitate: he tapped the trigger twice, watching the superheated plasma slugs burst into the trooper's helmet. His head snapped back and he fell to the ground dead. His two comrades, unnerved by his death, opened fire, and Marcus' barriers once again lit up as they ate up the bullets meant for him.
He strafed right as planned, Kaidan's M-9 Usurper and James' M-76 Revenant joining the fight with a constant stream of high-velocity rounds littering the field. The two soldiers fell immediately, torn to pieces by the combined fire. Marcus continued to find targets fire, only ducking when the machine gun emplacement opened fire again, a roar punctuated by a tempest of metal death given away its reemergence. He managed to find a pair of crates which he dove behind, knowing their metal exterior would serve as temporary armor against the bullets. Kaidan, James and Liara joined him, the former activating his tech armor to give him added protection. Orange light erupted around him, holographic energy encasing him in a shell of temporary invulnerability. Kaidan poked out from cover to fire once more, accompanied by James shortly after, who went prone, face pressed against the stock of his light machine gun. Liara meanwhile sent a flurry of biotic warps directly into the front line of Cerberus soldiers, keeping them busy while the rest of the enemy platoon attempted to push the attackers further back.
Marcus looked up to see Keeling, Garrus and Aria to not be as badly struggling as they were, the three of them advancing fairly easily without the horde of fire to confront with. It looked like the smoke screen had worked, despite the Cerberus troopers possessing the thermal vision to see right through it. The trio advanced through their cover, keeping a low profile and relatively hidden from the Cerberus forces ahead of them. Aria was in the lead, the asari looking like she was about to burst with annoyance at not being able to fight the enemy head on. Marcus was just glad she was sticking to the plan.
She really meant it when she said I had operational command. As long as she doesn't try to undermine me, we can win this.
First thing's first though...take this fucking courtyard.
"Shit!" James cried out. Marcus snapped to look at the marine, finding that his shields had burst and a bullet had lodged itself within his heavy armor. In response, James turned to the soldier responsible and unloaded the rest of the clip into him, the retaliatory burst shredding armor and flesh, leaving nothing but a bloodied mess that slightly resembles a former living creature. James then rolled back into cover, sighing happily as he realized the round hadn't penetrated, "Ah...had me good for a second there. Too close to my heart...literally."
"Don't leave your ass hanging out then," Kaidan replied snarkily, grabbing a grenade from his side and tossing it at the enemy. Moving back into cover, a loud bang rang in their eardrums, a large cloud of dust being kicked up into the air from the blast. From what Marcus saw, the blast didn't harm anyone, but it had caused a hole in the platoon's center to open up.
Meaning an opening in the enemy's fire.
"Move!" Marcus barked, standing up and placing his pulse rifle ontop of the crate, using it as a platform to hold his rifle while he fired it full pelt into the enemy, keeping them from reforming, "Get to the reception area! I'll provide suppressing fire! Aria, a little help!"
"Sure thing, asshole!" Aria snarled. All Marcus saw was the asari suddenly appearing from behind cover before disappearing in an explosion of blue light. Just as suddenly as she evaporated, she reappeared behind the enemy machine gunner, who was now turning to face Marcus. Aria grabbed the assault trooper behind and ruthlessly snapped his neck before taking aim with her shotgun and blasting the machine gunner in the back of the head. His skull blew apart in a frenzy of blood and gore, his brains painted among the crates infront of him. Aria quickly kicked the dead trooper off the gun he had slumped again, not caring that his brains were running down the sides of the heavy weapon as she simply grabbed it, took aim and began to fire into the backs of several Cerberus soldiers.
"Is that the thanks I get?" Marcus asked with a grin, slapping a fresh clip into his now depleted rifle as he rushed to join the rest of his team, who were now in the reception area raining down fire on their outflanked foe.
"Where's my thanks?" Aria replied, likely wearing her own grin, "I just took care of this asshole behind the gun and now I'm using it to do some house cleaning. You missed out on marrying me, cunt. I'd have made a great and terrible housewife."
He shook his head, shrugging off a few stray bullets in the back of his shield as he landed beside Aria, summoning his own biotics to lay down a series of shockwaves. Returning to cover, he took aim with his rifle once more, taking out those fortunate to survive his and Liara's combined biotic onslaught, "You're not my type, Aria. But I think you know that."
"You're not mine, either," the Queen of Omega replied, fresh from wiping out Cerberus' left flank and now turning her attention to the suddenly retreating Cerberus platoon. Garrus and Keeling joined her, clearly not approving of her hasty rush into the combat zone but keeping it to themselves as they helped the others mop up the enemy, "You're too...perfect. Mr. Fucking Good Guy. Your type are insufferable."
"Tolerable enough to help you, though?"
"Tolerable enough, indeed. But only that. We're not friends, Shepard."
"Oh, you wound me. And here I was thinking we were on our way to something beautiful."
"Get me back my station and maybe, just maybe, I'll give you a kiss on the cheek. Will that shut you the fuck up?"
"Tempting, truly, but I'll pass."
"See? Captain fucking Perfect."
"With a capital P, Aria. And...well, I guess I'm literally a captain."
"Still just a boy scout."
"Don't recall letting you in on this conversation, Jack."
"You're on an open comm, jackass. General Asshole up-on-high can probably hear every word."
"Well, isn't that just unfortunate. Petrovsky heard Aria proclaiming that she'd be a great housewife. He'll be thrilled!"
"Fuck you, Shepard."
"No thanks, Aria. Married."
"Well, I know who I'm about to fuck up. Calvary incoming bitches!"
What had been a centurion and four guardians lined in formation and slowly retreating was quickly eaten up by a giant, dark energy explosion as Jack led her students into a biotic swoop towards the enemy platoon. Serving their purpose, Jack and her students successfully forced the rest of the enemy platoon to stand up and make for the doorway at the back, only for the two teams on the flank to pour fire directly into them. They were all cut down in an instant, ending the brief battle. Thirty men...cut down and wiped out within minutes.
He lowered his rifle, exhaling deeply as he assessed the new situation. Corpses lay strewn across the courtyard, all of them wearing white and gold. No doubt their actions were being noticed by Petrovsky, and Marcus had even less doubt that the general would simply sit there: by now, he would know where they were headed and what for. No doubt reinforcements were on their way...possibly an entire battalion, like Aria said.
They reunited in the middle of the courtyard, Marcus bringing up the comms once more, "Squad, advance to the courtyard, enemy force has been neutralized. We'll proceed to the gunnery control center, but we've got to do so at a hurried pace. Petrovsky has likely already been alerted to our presence."
"Understood, Captain," Javik replied as stoically as he always did when in battle.
It didn't take long for the others to arrive, setting up a semi circle infront and behind them, watching out for hostile forces. Those who had fought reloaded their weapons, grabbing ammo from the bodies of the fallen Cerberus soldiers to use for themselves. They didn't bother checking their omni-tools for information: Cerberus was too smart for that. They likely had fail-safes linked up to their heart monitors set up to purge the omni-tool of data in the event of the soldier's death. Not to mention such troopers wouldn't be entrusted with anything significant anyway.
"Shepard-Captain," Moses suddenly spoke up, Marcus turning to look up at the prime, "I have successfully hacked the local surveillance system that Cerberus has installed. I have gained access to all cameras along our designated path. Cerberus forces are minimal between here and the generators, and I believe a hasty advance would allow us to avoid the bulk of Cerberus reinforcements where sent. Cerberus themselves are not yet aware of my hack, but soon will be."
"You're pretty useful for a geth," Aria complimented Moses in her own special way, the asari wracking the slot back on her shotgun as it refitted with the internal sink. She turned to Marcus, shrugging with a sort of exasperation, "Well? What are we waiting for? Time's not our friend here."
Her only response was a nod as Marcus signalled for Garrus, EDI, Javik, Keeling and Kaidan to form around him, with Tali, Liara, Kasumi, James and Moses remaining behind them as support, and Jack and her students just behind them. Jack had barely said a word so far, which was different for the former convict, although he had no doubt she was relishing in ripping apart the Cerberus troops, getting some much needed metaphorical revenge...even if it wasn't the Illusive Man himself as she probably wanted.
He motioned Aria to move ahead and lead them, while the rest of them followed quickly behind. Their weapons were raised at all times, aimed directly ahead as Aria tapped the interface for the door infront of them, the two sheets of bland, brownish metal sliding apart with a groan to reveal another hallway, this one ending with the flight of stairs Aria had talked about, all of them leading up, with another pair next to it leading down. Another door led to the right, while another led to the left: the left was another corridor leading off elsewhere into the district, while the right was an elevator: one too small for everyone to fit inside.
As the group moved to follow Aria up the stairs, they stopped suddenly as a voice began to loudly filter into the room. All weapons instantly snapped to the source of the sound, only to lose tension as they realized what it was.
A vidscreen, a large one at that, made up a large portion of the upper wall. Playing on it was somekind of propaganda reel, with a smiling human female with immaculate blonde hair and mesmorizing blue eyes relaying information to the population while the Cerberus logo spun in the top left.
"This is your local Cerberus news. General Petrovsky reminds all non-military personnel that the mandatory curfew between 5pm to 7am is still in effect. Those caught violating the curfew will be charged with criminal misconduct. Those found impersonating Cerberus personnel or found to be colloborating with enemies of Cerberus will also be charged with treason and dealt with accordingly. General Petrovsky only wants the best for the people of Omega. A peaceful Omega is a secure Omega. Peace equals security. Stand aside and allow our men and women to do their job," Marcus turned to see Aria was paying careful attention, the asari's face creased in a sneer at the overly happy Cerberus news reporter. Looking down at her datapad, the woman spoke again, this time clearing her throat before starting, "Now for today's news. General Petrovsky, the gracious and kind man that he is, has opened up food stalls in the Ceshmire District. Those who are in desperate need of provisions are welcome to take what they need. Do not be greedy and do not steal from others: those found guilty of doing so will be incarcerated. Do not take the General's generosity for granted. Do not take advantage of him. He does this for the people of Omega, not for you. Know the difference and you will be well fed."
Food stalls? Either the man is using this as a tactic to win over the people, or he genuinely cares. Something the Illusive Man lacks.
"In other news, the war for Omega carries on. Our soldiers fight valiantly to crush the rebels and bring order and peace to our station," the woman reported, catching the attention of everyone in the group, including Aria, who's sneer vanished to be replaced with a frown of confusion, "These terrorists are enemies of the people and threaten the integrity of Omega itself. Cerberus fights to stop the Reaper threat, but we cannot do that if we are wasting time fighting petty rebellion and terrorism. They are not your friends. They do not care about you. They care only for themselves and will only bring ruin to you and your family. Please...if you know anyone who may be associated with these terrorists, do not hesitate to contact us. If you are listening, and you yourself are a terrorist, General Petrovsky is ever so lenient. He will offer clemency to any rebel who surrenders peacefully. Do so for your own good: you are only prolonging a pointless conflict. The Reapers are the real enemy. Let us end this war so we may focus on the war that matters. Thank you for listening, and remember: we are the unwanted ally, the necessary mediator."
Just like that, the woman disappeared as the Cerberus logo spinning at the top was enlarged and slid down to cover the entire screen. The words "Cerberus News Network" appeared at the bottom in giant orange lettering, with somekind of electronic music playing momentarily over it.
"Well..." James began, the first to speak after seeing what the group saw, "...that's interesting."
"You never told me about a resistance, Aria," Marcus turned to the asari, not angry but befuddled, "I mean...I should have known there would be one, but not something of this scale. Cerberus wouldn't pump out propaganda like this if it were just a small insurrection. There is clearly a very well organized rebellion going on here."
"You're not alone, Shepard," Aria turned to him, waving her arms uselessly in irritation, "When I left, the station was his. No information comes out of this place unless it's Cerberus: you know that. How the fuck was I supposed to know there was a rebellion going on here? Besides, now that we know there is one, we can use it to our advantage."
"Indeed," Liara added, gaining Marcus' attention, "An attack from without is more effective when complimented by an attack within. Before, the resistance was all Cerberus had to deal with. Now they've got an invasion force to worry about too."
"Can we talk about the rebels latter, sir?" Keeling spoke up, gripping her rifle, "As interesting as this development may be, we've still got Cerberus troops hot on our asses. They could arrive here any second or cut us off."
"Soldier of the Century is right, Shepard," Aria spat, turning back to the stairs as she moved towards them again, "Those cannons need to go bye bye or that rebellion will be all we have."
There was no more time wasted. The entire group rushed up the stairs, running past a holographic Cerberus propaganda poster on the wall of the first floor of stairs. It depicted a Cerberus assault trooper holding his rifle upright, the stock on the ground, while he held a miniture version of Omega in his hand, looking calm and collected. Beside him was a turian in black armor in the same posture, but with their mandibles open in a frozen warcry and their talons closed shut, blue blood running through their fingers from the equally miniture version of Omega in their own palm, this one crushed and destroyed. The two soldiers looked at each other, giving each other stares of death. And, below it in the same orange writing Cerberus always seem to use, read 'Who should really hold Omega?'
A simple sentence. But one that probably made the difference.
The squad had to advance up two decks before they finally reached the tram station. Aria was first up, scanning the area. She immediately stopped and crouched, holding out a hand to motion for them to stop. Backing up until she was hidden by the stairs, she turned to Marcus, who patiently waited for her to give her assessment, "Tram station is dead ahead. Tram is on the left side, but there's a Cerberus squad already there. Tram looks like it just arrived, so they probably got off it. They've got a combat engineer setting up a sentry turret, and I saw at least three nemesi setting up by the pillars on the right. The rest are assault troopers taking up somekind of arrowhead formation. They're waiting for us."
"She's correct, sir," Keeling announced, lowering the scope from her rifle as she finished taking a look for herself, "Eight enemy troopers, three nemesi, one combat engineer and a centurion. Arrowhead formation. Looks like they're trying to set up a chokepoint. Likely aware of our objective."
"Of course I'm right. I wouldn't fucking lie," Aria spat, glaring at Keeling before turning back to Marcus.
"Well, we try to approach them from here and they'll tear into us," Kaidan stated, leaning up against the wall, rifle held tightly against his chest, "I recommend Jack and her students set up a barrier. Then we can spread out."
"No need," Marcus stated, the N7 grinning as he turned to their new gargantuan geth friend, "Moses, you're up. Focus on that turret and flush out those nemesi. Garrus, take out those nemesi as they come out of cover. Everyone else, advance behind Moses and focus your fire on the main enemy formation. Aria, you will open up our charge with a flare. Watch your fire and make sure you don't damage the tram: we need it. Tali, once you're on the tram, you're on hacking duty. I want full control over that tram."
"Got it," was the roll of affirmatives he got.
Cerberus no doubt heard Moses coming before they saw him. The tower of a geth's footsteps were constant, rthymic thuds that marked its approach. Eventually, the prime appeared in its totality, assault rifle fire pouring into it shortly after. Secretly behind it, Tali used her energy drain in reverse, draining her own kinetic barriers to constantly cycle Moses', temporarily making him nearly invulnerable. Without waiting, Moses deployed his Stalker-class combat drone before bringing up his pulse cannon and opening fire on the sentry gun, who's screaming and muzzle fire could be heard and seen respectively. The bang, bang, bang of its pulse cannon drowned out the sounds of the soldiers shouting, the blue flashes punctuated by one great orange explosion, signifying the turret's destruction.
With the turret gone, Marcus ordered his squad forward, using Moses' large form as a sort of shield. Nodding to Aria, he watched the former Queen of Omega bask in a brilliant blue glow before seemingly thrusting her arm into the air, blue energy seemingly flying off her arm as it smashed into the center of the Cerberus line, a massive purple explosion enveloping five troopers and the centurion, the six of them disappearing as they were instantly vaporized. One surviving trooper was thrown into a wall, having survived the explosion but losing half his arm in the process, blood spurting from where his arm had been dissected at the elbow. Marcus shot the trooper in the head, killing him instantly.
Aria dashed over the squad's cover, tackling the second survivor to the ground, dropping her shotgun in the process as she screamed in anger. Javik shot the last trooper in the head with his rifle, his entire helmet blasted away from the particle blast. Aria, legs on either side of the trooper and sitting on top of his waist, smashed her twin biotic fists into his head over and over, denting the helmet until it was nothing but twisted metal, likely mangling the soldier's face beneath even worse. By the end, Aria let out a final scream before punching her hand clean through the side of his head, pulling it back with brains and blood dripping from her fist. Exhaling deeply, she stood up as she wiped the blood on the side of her pants, leaning down temporarily to pick up her Wraith shotgun. Looking up, she saw nothing but Marcus looking at her.
"What?" she asked, looking annoyed.
"Feel better now?" he asked, grinning.
She hesitated for a moment before letting out, to his surprise, a genuine chuckle, "Yes, much better. Going to take considerably more kills to make me cheery, though."
Marcus turned to move to the tram but stopped, still smiling, "Oh, by the way...you've got blood on your cheeks." He then walked towards the tram, imagining Aria trying to wipe it away, only to make it worse.
The engagement was over in fifteen seconds. Garrus picked up off the nemesi with unflinching lethality, a single hole blown through each of their foreheads, blood pooling around their dead corpses. Most of the enemy squad had been wiped out in the explosion, and Marcus turned to find the combat engineer's body sitting down, lying against a wall with nothing but a lower jaw and a neck stump for a head: having seen the blood dripping from one of Moses' huge hands, Marcus already knew what happened.
Moving to the tram, Marcus saw that Tali was already at the control panel, her omni-tool out and fingers dancing over the holographic keypad as she worked to break Cerberus' control. Marcus motioned everyone else to loot the corpses and move onto the elevator. The last person onboard was Jack, who Marcus had watched roll over a dead trooper to remove his grenades and ammo, tossing them to James.
"Well thanks for that, Diablo," James offered, slotting the thermal clips and extra grenades into the necessary slots on his bandolier and belt. Jack stood beside him, arms crossed and eyebrows raised.
"'Diablo?'" she asked.
"He has a thing for nicknames, Jack," Marcus explained, standing beside Tali silently as she worked, rolling his neck and hearing numerous cracks as muscles loosened, "Just go with it."
"It's Spanish for 'devil'. You're covered in tattooes, your hella angry all the time and you're a damn psycho. I give new names to those who I think don't think suit their names."
"Mine's Loco," Marcus stated, then motioning to Tali, "She's Sparks."
"Scars. About the only thing this ape got right," Garrus remarked.
"Lola. Not sure why," Keeling added stoically.
"Sneaky," Kasumi stated. She sighed, "Not very original."
"What about Prothy the prothean over there?" Jack pointed to the prothean, who stood at the head of the tram, ignoring the rest of them as he looked down the long, dim tramway, "What's his nickname?"
James just shrugged, "He doesn't have one. He's just an asshole."
"Well miss, at least Diablo makes sense," Prangley joked, high-fiving Rodrigez with a laugh, "She really is psychotic."
"The psychotic biotic, remember?" Jack shot back, arms crossed and with a smirk, "But don't worry, Prangley. You can have your juice box soon."
"Done," their quarian engineer interrupted, putting away her omni-tool and picking up her shotgun from where she had leaned it against the control panel. Her line was punctuated further as the tram shuddered, moving slightly forward before beginning to speed up, moving at a reasonable pace along the dimly-lit tramway as it moved towards the gunnery control center.
"Excellent work, Tali," he patted her on the shoulder before moving over to Moses, "What's the strength of the Cerberus forces in the control center, Moses? Do they have a heavy presence?"
A few seconds later and Moses responded, "Cerberus has a company of troops currently setting up defenses for our arrival within the control center. I count at least one hundred troops, with forty-seven assault troopers, six centurions, twenty guardians, five combat engineers, ten dragoons, seven nemesi and five phantoms. They have good cover and are established in such a fashion as to be able to ambush us as soon as we enter through the main entrance. Doing so would be suicide."
"We've done suicide before," Jack quipped, "Bring the fuckers on."
"The difference is that the Collectors were dumb as shit, Jack. Cerberus has Petrovsky," Marcus pointed out, shaking his head, "The General knew exactly what we were going to try and do. And the fact that Cerberus hasn't taken control of the surveillance again already means that they have the ability to do so, but Petrovsky doesn't want them to. He wants us to see. He wants us to see that he has us. That we won't be able to reach our goal. He's giving us a fair warning."
"Oh, how nice of him," Aria replied sarcastically, "He's giving us a nice little warning before he has his troops chase us off his station."
"I never said we were giving in, Aria," Marcus shot back, sighing, "We're just going to have to reassess what we do next. We can't go charging in: they'll be waiting for us and they'll chew us up. We won't be able to try what we did in the courtyard again, and no matter how strong Moses is, he can't stand up to that amount of firepower at once." He thought about it for a moment, running through his options.
Charge through, we die. Reuse previous tactics, they adapt and counter. Either way, we die. There has to be another way...
Then it came to him.
He turned to Moses once more, "Reaccess the cameras again. Can you see the generators?"
A few moments, followed by a response, "Yes. I count eight large, high-powered particle accelerator generators to the far left of the control center. In setting up their trap, the Cerberus company has established themselves on the right of the control center, meaning they have left the generators vulnerable and unprotected."
"Why?" Aria laughed incredulously, "Is Petrovsky stupid? He's leaving the key to his defense wide open for us to take out! If we had rocket launchers, he'd be fucked!"
"There's no viable defensive positions to establish," Moses countered, "They cannot be entrenched. The only cover available is the generators themselves, and attempting to set up the ambush there would endanger the generators even more. That, and the General likely knows we'll target the generators first, and is playing upon your desperation, Aria."
"Well he's a master fucking player, isn't he?" Aria spat, turning back to Marcus with gritted teeth, "I need a solution, Shepard! We are not going back!"
From where he was, he could see they were not far away from the gunnery control center now. He could see the entrance: a small door, with a large section of wall to the right, all of it heavily reinforced concrete built during the by Krogan Rebellions. Faded lettering at the top was written in kresh, the krogan language, which roughly translated into "Central Gunnery Operations": a relic of the former krogan presence that successive rulers had failed to erase. Below it was newer, holographic letter stating "GUNNERY CONTROL CENTER" in English, obviously added by Cerberus.
"I have a plan," he pointed to the gunnery control center, holstering his rifle, "We'll have to go through that entrance, but if we divert the company's attention, we can buy ourselves enough time to place the charges and get the hell out of dodge," he tapped the side of Moses' leg, getting the geth's attention, "I'll place a small team with Moses. Your job will be to demo the right side of the wall and make yourselves an entrance: you guys will make yourselves a way into their left flank. With luck, they'll think we're entering from that area, and will focus all their attention there. That'll give me, EDI, James and Garrus enough times to get to the generators and set the charges. We'll blow those guns and signal the fleet. You'll have your invasion, Aria."
Not long after, the tram shuddered one final time as the support clutches latched onto the tram, keeping it in place. The squad poured off the tram, watching the door until Marcus and Tali were the last ones to leave the tram.
"Okay, everyone aside from those named are with Moses. If you've got explosives, use them to break through that wall: remember, it's reinforced concrete, so it'll need a lot of force to crack," he turned to EDI, Garrus and James and nodded, who raised their weapons and followed him towards the doorway. Arriving at it, they waited and watched as Moses and his team arrived at their designated section of wall.
A minute went by as Moses used his pulse cannon and the squad used their grenades and C7 charges to blow a hole through the wall. Eventually, an avalanche of concrete blew inwards as they finally breached it, showering whatever troopers were unfortunate enough to be behind it in shards of solidified cement. Moses led the charge, the rest of the squad following suit as they opened fire on the nearest Cerberus soldiers. With battle joined, Marcus quickly motioned for James, EDI and Garrus to follow him into the control center.
They spotted the generators almost immediately: eight, monolithic glowing turbines rested to the left, lined up in two columns of four generators each. They were white and gold, with a Cerberus logo painted on the front and glowing a brilliant blue, a loud, engine-like sound emitting from them as they thrummed. Luckily, they didn't look thickly armoured, meaning their C12 explosives should do the trick.
The four of them dashed up the steps onto the same level as the generators, and they immediately got to work. Gunfire echoed throughout the control center, muzzle flashes repeating ad nauseum at a consistent rate. The group set two C12 charges to each generator, one on each end, so that the full explosive force would be utilized: it was also possible that the sheer proximity of the generators to each other would also create a domino effect, but they could never be too sure. Once the final charge was set, Marcus gave the thumbs up for them to retreat, with James tossing him the detonator before retreating. He hit the comms to the rest of the group, giving them the all clear to retreat.
Moments later, and the group, whilst under heavy enemy fire, retreated to the tram, with at least forty or so troops pouring through the hole in the wall in pursuit of them. A few chips of Moses' armor had been blown off by penetrating bullets, while a few others, such as Javik and Kaidan, had a few grazes and wounds, but nothing deadly.
They fought the Cerberus troops off long enough for the tram to begin departing back towards the tram station, the enemy soldiers continuing to fire as the tram left.
Marcus turned to Aria, noticing the asari looking at him expectingly. He held up the detonator, and nodded.
She smiled...and nodded.
This thumb pressed the detonator, and a few moments passed. Just when it deemed the detonator's signal hadn't reached the charges, a thunderous boom echoed though the tramway, followed by several more. Tremors rocked the entire area as a tempest of flame boomed through the doorway, but didn't get any further. The explosions eventually finished, signalling the destruction of the generators.
...and by extension, the particle cannons and Omega's only remaining defense against the UGC fleet aside from the already ravaged Cerberus ships.
Aria began to scream obscenities into the air, all of them directed at Petrovsky, as Marcus contacted the fleet and notified Gerrel and Hadrian that they could renew their attack and deploy the rest of the OLF ground forces. With that said and done, Marcus sat down, rifle in his lap, allowing himself a brief rest during their new ongoing war.
They had one their first great victory, but not the war. But now they had set the ball rolling...and it was time for the war to begin in totality.
{Loading...}
August 5, 2186
1603 hours.
War Room, The New Order Headquarters, Dyuko District, Omega.
Second War for Omega.
General Oleg Petrovsky.
A few taps on the console, followed by an audio measurement screen appearing above his communications terminal. He stood beside it, hands clasped behind his back, nose twitching as his beard began to itch. He ignored the ruckus of the room, focusing entirely on this one communication, a sense of pride in his mind as he prepared to once again address the one man he respected above all else.
The call was accepted, and Petrovsky spoke, "You must be tired, captain. You've been very busy."
His response was quick, the man never losing a single prompt, "Sure have. I'm guessing you know by now that your generators are gone? Your cannons will soon be disabled and my fleet is going to mop up the rest of yours."
Petrovsky scoffed, a ghost of a smile on his lips, "I watched the entire battle, captain. You've won yourself a victory, but the war is not over. Surely you know this war will be decided on the ground alone."
"I'm aware," the soldier replied, laughing, "As is your biggest fan. You're a good man, Petrovsky, fighting on the wrong side, but I won't keep barking up your tree. We've made our decisions and now we must live with them. Whatever it is you've set up here...I'm here to end it."
"Then it is my duty to stop you. You see captain, you represent chaos," Petrovsky stated, hands unclasping as he braced them against the desk, leaning over his terminal, "It is my duty to stomp out that chaos. Omega is a very delicate place, and one the Illusive Man has entrusted me to keep intact. We both fight the Reapers, captain, we just differ in your methods. We are damned to our own differences."
"No, Petrovsky, your damned to the Illusive Man's arrogance," was his simple reply, "But so be it. Gear up, get entrenched and heat up the hot chocolate, General. We're coming."
The comms then went silent, his terminal reporting the comms had been cut off.
He smiled. So you are, Shepard. And like I said, it is my duty to stop you.
Switching off his terminal, he stood up straight and turned to the QEC, tapping several commands into the panel as he sent a transmission request to the Deliverance. It was time to contact Banes and get this ship ready for possible combat.
If we can neutralize the Normandy, then perhaps we can cripple Shepard's morale and resolve.
Several moments passed by as the QEC quietly waited to set up a link with its twin on the Deliverance, the only movement a slight purple ping on the terminal to demonstrate that a connection was pending. After close to a minute, the link was finally established, and Banes' form quickly came to fruition. He was in his white Cerberus uniform, hair neatly combed and face devoid of facial hair as it always seemed to be. His eyes immediately landed on Petrovsky, who he quickly nodded to, standing straighter, hands at his sides, "General Petrovsky. You wished to speak with me?"
The General nodded, noticing Banes' slightly retired look. Must have recently woken up. How unfortunate for him. "Yes. You've no doubt heard of the UGC's recent assault on this station."
Banes nodded, scoffing, "I was notified by Vice Admiral Bonaparte, yes. He said they had suffered some setbacks, but that our cannons were doing a fine job of pushing the enemy back. In his words, they are running with their tails between their legs. He ordered me to have the Deliverance on standby and ready to hunt down any survivors should the UGC attempt a second attack. So far, nothing. I can only assume we've won, yes?"
Petrovsky's face was grim, and he knew it as Banes' smug look seemed to die down a little, "Not quite, captain. A small UGC ground force was able to penetrate our defenses and land. They reached the gunnery control center and disabled the guns. The UGC fleet will soon be upon us."
That seemed to anger Banes as the captain leaned against, what looked to be nothing, but was most likely his own QEC terminal, "What? How the hell did that happen? Why didn't we box them in? If it's in the Zeta District, we could have disabled the tram! How large was the enemy force?"
"Do you take me for a fool, captain?" was the General's response, not entirely unsurprised by the captain's respnse, "And they were platoon size, at best."
"We could have sent at least a few squads! Maybe a company!" Banes exclaimed.
"Do not lecture me on ground-based military tactics, Banes," Petrovsky firmly stated, making it clear he was not going to accept Banes' insubordinative behaviour, "I sent R Company to secure the control center and to establish a trap for our guests. I had several squads in the area delay them. Unfortunately, our visitor wasn't the typical sort."
"Who the fuck was it?" Banes almost demanded.
"Our friend Shepard." He watched the captain's face for facial cues. They were all there: surprise, followed by a brief glimpse of exasperation, concluding with a look of acceptance.
"I see. That explains our inability to stop him," Banes replied almost apologetically, standing up from his console and straightening up again, "I apologize for questioning you, General. It appears we've got quite the problem on our hands. I'm assuming he brought his squad with him?"
Petrovsky nodded, "Yes, along with a geth prime we haven't seen before, along with Subject Zero and those students we failed to capture on Grissom Academy. He quite cleverly figured out my trap and destroyed the generators. Without those guns captain, I'm afraid First Fleet will be obliterated within the next hour."
Banes frowned at him, shrugging as if the answer was obvious, "Then have it pull back. No use losing an entire fleet to a battle you know you've lost."
Petrovsky shook his head, "The UGC fleet has geth warships, captain. Knowing the geth, any retreating ships will be swiftly pursued and destroyed. The UGC is anything but lax when it comes to disposing our forces. And even if I did order our forces to retreat, they would have nowhere to go and the Illusive Man would most likely have them sent back: he expects everyone one of us to fight to the last man if it means any possibility of victory."
"Fuck, you're right," was the captain's answer. He licked his lips, turning back to Petrovsky with a shrug, "So what now? The Deliverance is a powerful ship, but we can't take on an entire fleet. With our fleet soon to be gone, you've probably already determined that this will be a ground war."
He nodded, stroking his beard once more in thought, other hand propping up his elbow, "You catch on quickly, captain. Although perhaps this is for the best: I never was a good admiral. I cannot attempt the same tactics I did with Aria: Shepard is far too...smart for that. Speaking of Aria...I believe this entire operation her orchestration. She is, after all, present on this station."
Banes shook his head, chuckling quietly to himself, "Unable to let go, is she? I thought you said she'd never return?"
It was Petrovsky's turn to smile, if only a little, "Oh no, you misunderstand. I knew Aria would someday return. But I believed her arrogant and foolish. She would rush in with a mercenary fleet: mine would cut through hers, and whatever ground forces she deployed would be quickly dispatched by our superior troops. She would make a rush for Afterlife, I would support and destroy her forces. I would then have her executed, mostly because I don't offer second chances. I offered mercy once, I wouldn't make the same mistake twice," he sighed, licking his own lips this time, "But to return with a proper fleet, and Shepard leading her troops...it appears I have made the mistake of underestimating her. She is, after all, far from idiotic."
"So what?" Banes asked again, "I need a directive, General. While this station still stands under a Cerberus banner, I cannot, and will not, order the Deliverance to retreat. I have agents Ezno and Leng ready to deploy if need be, as well as a contingent of our best elite soldiers. Leng has a squad of phantoms he's personally trained, and Randall has a few dragoons and assault troopers he trained himself. Just give the word. They're eager to put Shepard down like the treacherous scum he is."
How crude. Throwing words like "traitor" around. Shepard is no more a traitor than Liara T'Soni. He cannot betray an organization he never swore allegiance to. But better not tell Banes that. If it makes him a more competent combatant, then best let him continue believing that.
He shook his head, "I do not require your men at this moment, captain, but do make sure to keep them on standby. What I do need...is you. The Deliverance. I do not ask you to take on an entire fleet, but a single ship. Surely you know that wherever Shepard goes..."
Banes' lips slowly formed into a smile, "...the Normandy follows. You want me to destroy his ship?"
Petrovsky nodded, "Shepard is a soldier at heart, but the loss of his flagship would cripple his resolve. He is, ultimately, nothing without it. Destroy the Normandy Banes, and we might just secure victory. You have the ship, and the Deliverance is the only ship we have capable of engaging it in a fair fight. Do whatever you have to, but destroy that ship. Am I clear?"
Banes nodded, straightening up as he nodded, "I understand completely. Me and my crew have been eager for a rematch. No doubt EVA will also want vengeance for her predecessor...well, whatever you call payback for a shackled AI."
"Do not be over confident. Control your hubris, captain," Petrovsky cautioned, "Just because your ship is evenly matched in firepower, does not mean the Normandy has lost the advantage. Remember your last engagement and learn from it. Do not make the same mistake twice."
"I don't need a lecture in naval-based tactics, General," Banes echoed, hands clasped behind his back, "Whatever mistakes were made before, there will be no repetition. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have a ship to hunt down. Is there anything else?"
His overconfidence will one day get him killed. "Nothing. Good hunting, captain." With that, Banes nodded and ended the call, holographic form exploding into rapidly dispersing particles before the QEC dimmed and went dormant once more. Petrovsky took a deep breath, turning back around and looking over New Order HQ. It was a bustle of activity, numerous officers and soldiers moving about as they prepared the station's forces for the inevitable deployment of UGC troops. It would be the first major war fought by them for months...but they had prepared for this eventuality. They were ready. They could do this.
He closed his eyes, exhaling a deep breath before turning and walking to his holographic chessboard. Bending over it, he observed the board, eyes examining every detail. With a final exhale, he reached over to the other side, entering the necessary details. The queen, her passage clear, moved forward and neutralized his rook, the holographic depiction of the rook evaporating as it fell down. He nodded, standing, straightening out his uniform.
And so it begins.
He turned back to his terminal, taking a seat as he began preparations for organizing Omega's defense.
{Loading...}
August 5, 2186
1609 hours.
Cerberus Military Barracks, Omega Apex, Dyuko District, Omega.
Second War for Omega.
Captain Armistan Banes.
The walk from the Deliverance and the docking bay to the barracks wasn't long, but it wasn't short. Given that the barracks was located where the VIP section of Afterlife and the entire shopping district of the Dyuko District used to be, and the Deliverance was docked at least a kilometer away from it, the distance took a long time to cross by walking.
Normally he would have contacted them via omni-tool, but when he did, neither of them responded. Trying twice more, he eventually gave up and decided to head for the barracks, where they said they would be. As he walked through, he noticed that the Cerberus presence in the Apex had increased significantly, with groups of five walking around on an almost constant basis. Sure, Apex had always been occupied by nothing but Cerberus troops (as Apex was essentially 'Cerberus Town'), but to this degree? The increase in presence was telling of how much of a threat the UGC posed to the station.
He didn't fail to notice a couple of RAMPART mechs among the patrolling squads, either. Petrovsky had largely assigned his 5,000 strong RAMPART force to law enforcement, allowing Cerberus troops to be allocated to quelling rebellion and dealing with the Talon insurrectionists. The mechs were LOKI mechs but with upgraded armor plating, VI processing and weaponry, making them an intimidating sight. They completely ignored Banes as he walked by, already set on a predetermined path of patrol. More than likely the population had been sufficiently quietened to allow for redistribution of RAMPART units to strategically important areas vital to the Cerberus occupation.
After walking around 500 meters, he finally passed by New Order Headquarters. Infront of the main entrance was a line of six guardians, and behind them, ten assault troopers. Security had been tightened since the increase in Talon attacks, only further cemented by Aria's return. He even saw two, inactive Atlases standing outside, cockpits open and ready for a pilot to take control of them. To his right, two modified Makos sat, their engines switched off but their turrets manned, turning them into stationary defense turrets. No matter what, New Order Headquarters was armed to the teeth, ready to repel any Talon or UGC assault.
There was a line of three kodiak shuttles parked to his immediate left, doors closed and pilots leaning against them, talking to each other: one of them was smoking, while the other two ate what looked to be slices of pie. Directly ahead, Cerberus workmen began to set up barricades, while others set up sandbags all along the entrance towards the barracks. Two had already been completed, a large Steelhead defense turret set up behind one, with several mortars lined up behind the other. The Steelhead turret was made up of two barrels, with the user protected by a large shield composed of the same materials used to make guardian shields. The user had to stand up to use it, but it fired .30 caliber high explosive rounds, capable of penetrating lightly armoured vehicles and decimating infantry with a semi-automatic fire rate. Two of these would be set up: one on the far left, the other on the far right, allowing for both turrets to catch an enemy in a crossfire. Lined between these were mortars, sentry guns and heavy machine gun nests. Overall, the combined fire would tear apart any enemy force, even krogan and geth.
A veritable fortress.
He saw the Cerberus commander overseeing the operation: Colonel Ashe's replacement, Colonel Kirk Farland. Banes approached the man from behind, arriving beside him as the two looked over the construction. When Farland said nothing, simply appraising the man beside him before turning back, Banes crossed his arms and spoke, "Preparing for the final defense already? I thought we left that for when we were making a last stand."
Kirk shook his head, smiling, "Petrovsky's orders. I agree with them, actually. Hope for the best, plan for the worst. No doubt we will defeat the enemy before they even leave the Rubicon Quadrant, but we must be planned for the worst case scenario. This is, Shepard, after all. I think his service history has earned more than simple caution. Just looked how the Citadel operation turned out. Petrovsky refuses to make the same mistake."
Banes nodded, "That's actually a smart idea. I just think its a little pre-emptive to waste so many resources here when we should be strengthening the frontlines."
Kirk sighed, shaking his head, "We have a 40,000 strong army, Banes. What you see here is but a tiny fraction of what we have at our disposal. Besides, you might find the frontlines will get closer than you expect. Again, prepare for the worst. Frontlines are never static, remember that," with a sigh, he turned to Banes, eyebrow raised, "What brings you here, captain? I thought your place was in the fleet, not down with us meat grinders."
Banes nodded, turning and giving the Colonel a small salute, "It is, and I'm not here for an inspection. I was on my way to the barracks to meet Agents Ezno and Leng."
"Ah yes, the dynamic duo," Kirk sarcastically remarked, grinning from ear to ear, "Those two are about as different from another as one can get. One is rash, the other is cautious. The other is reckless and ruthless, the other is methodical and cold. Can't get much different."
"Yeah, well with Shepard leading this UGC assault, I suspect their skill sets will be required to put him down," Banes noted.
"Too true," Kirk complimented. Bane shot a quick glance to the chronometer on his omni-tool, coming to the conclusion he must hurry if he wants to get Leng and Randall on board in time for his attack.
"Well, I must take my leave. You're doing a good job, Colonel. Get at it." With that, he turned and walked away towards the barracks, Kirk supplying no response as he simply returned to overseeing the construction of his fortifications. Banes could see the barracks from where he was, so he began approaching it.
In the eight months since Petrovsky conquered Omega, many changes had been implemented to the overall order and infrastructure of the station. Due to the sheer size of the station itself and the many districts the General's army had to administrate, Petrovsky had chosen to establish quadrants: these quadrants, or 'sectors' as the colonels called them, took up four seperate areas of the station, allowing for the equal distribution of leadership and control. In the northeast, there was Rubicon, where the UGC forces had chosen to land. In the northwest, there was Hudson. In the southwest there was Rhine, and in the southeast there was Styx. Each of these four areas held the entirety of Omega's civilian population, and each held their own Cerberus outpost from which military operations could be conducted. Each quadrant had its own governor to rule over it, all four ultimately answering to Petrovsky: these governors were his colonels.
Kirk Farland was the governor of the heavily divided Styx Quadrant. Colonels Connor Amish, Mitchell Wchest and Heather Colwood were governors of the Rubicon, Hudson and Rhine quadrants respectively. The Hudson and Rhine quadrants were found to be the most peaceful and orderly, while the Rubicon quadrant was placed under a much stricter martial law due to the Talon rebellion, and the Styx quadrant, suspected to be the center of Talon operations, was the most heavily contested, with large pockets of the quadrant falling into disarray and chaos. However, Colonel Farland had recently proposed a solution: Operation: Darksword. Wtih Petrovsky's blessing, Farland, on August 2nd, began a search-and-destroy operation to locate and wipe out the Talon HQ. So far, it was going well and Farland was confident the Talons would be ended by August 7th.
Then the UGC happened.
These four quadrants all surrounded by the very core of Omega: a place Petrovsky dubbed the 'Apex'. Occupied entirely by Cerberus forces and off limits to civilian personnel not of Cerberus allegiance, Apex was the beating heart of the Cerberus rule on Omega, centered at New Order Headquarters, or what used to be Afterlife. And down below, in the now unoccupied mining sector...
...the Dark Zone.
Cerberus had managed to contain the adjutant menace to the lower levels of Omega, effectively sealing it off and abandoning the entire sector, siphoning power from it to power their Collector-based force fields. Petrovsky was looking for a permanent solution to the adjutant problem, but deemed venting the sector too risky, as Omega's systems were too old and ancient to mess around: instead, he dedicated most of his engineer units to building a neutron purge: a task that was projected to be completed in early February, 2187.
Unlike everything else regarding Petrovsky's plans, his recovery and maintenance program was...well above what anyone expected him to. The General had stated he wanted to do more than simply rule Omega...he wanted to fix it. So he directed a large chunk of their scientific wing to building proper sanitation, building hospitals, etc. He even had plans for proper education facilities to be established, a law enforcement agency, government...
He would turn Omega from the most lawless station in the galaxy into a place of order and safety. In a way, Banes respected that goal. He saw it as a waste of time in regards to the Cerberus war effort, but it was ultimately Petrovsky's decision what he did with the station and its population: he ruled it after all, not Banes.
Just don't see much point if the Illusive Man is going to have him scuttle the station anyway once Titan is constructed. Or perhaps he doesn't know the Illusive Man as well as I do...
He finally reached the barracks, tapping the door's interface to walk in. He navigated numerous corridors before he finally found what he was looking for: the training arena.
Moving inside, he found the chamber quite empty, with the majority of Cerberus forces on high alert and redeployed after Shepard's deactivation of Omega's external defense network. The only occupants of the otherwise large chamber was the familiar forms of Leng and Ezno, both of them free of their armor and currently...well, to put it accurately, beating the shit out of each other.
Or at least trying to, anyway.
Neither seemed to notice him for a moment as they continued sparring. Randall seemed to be gaining the upperhand, using his more deconstructive techniques to counter Leng's more offensive strategies. For each punch Leng swung, Randall was able to block it with lightning fast efficiency, making sure to get a few strikes in wherever he could. But Leng was slowly learning, quickly blocking a few of Randall's own strikes, as well as striking Randall with a few of his own. When it came to intelligence, Randall was a superior. But in combat, the two were evenly matched: Ezno was a former Alliance Corsair while Leng was a disgraced N7. Both were special forces operators of some description, both knew how to deconstruct a threat, and both were heavily augmented by cybernetics, increasing their strength, speed and durability, not to mention gifting them a slow, but helpful, rengenerative factor.
None spoke a word, simply continuing to exchange blows, before Banes finally cleared his throat loud enough to gain their attention. They immediately dropped their arms to turn to him, Randall immediately straightening up. It was indeed strange to see Leng outside of his usual black light armor, with the assassin wearing nothing but a singlet and a pair of sweat shorts. The singlet was soaked with sweat, while the assassin's muscular frame demonstrated that he was nothing short of an absolute tank of a man. Randall was no less imposing, wearing similar clothing to Leng.
Banes approached, hands clasped behind his back, stopping when he was infront of them, "I would like to know why neither of you responded to my calls. I've tried pinging you three times."
Randall nodded, motioning to a pair of omni-tools lying nearby, "Had them on silent, sir. Me and Leng had some differences to sort out and we did. No doubt you need us for something important, especially if you walked all the way down here just to speak with us, sir."
"Indeed. I need to kill something," Leng remarked, but no smile ever graced his lips, "We've been sitting around far too long. We should be looking for Shepard and killing the treacherous asshole."
Banes smiled, "Well, you might just get your wish. If you haven't heard already, the UGC has launched an invasion of the station. They deployed a small ground team to neutralize our cannons and they succeeded: pretty soon, it's going to be war across the Rubicon quadrant," he looked between both of them, his smile never deteriorating, "Take a wild guess as to who is leading that squad."
"Shepard is here, sir?" Randall asked. The question was more rhetorical than anything else. Randall was hardly the man to have something repeated to him.
"Yes. You two might have just found your redemption," Banes dictated, turning to Leng, pointing an accusing finger at him, "But we will do this my way. You will not go off half-cocked like last time. Randall may have failed on Rannoch, but he at least had a good plan, Leng."
Leng nodded, biting his tongue. This surprised Banes, expecting the assassin to lash out in objection. The only respons he offered was a simple grunt, "Fine. As long as we kill him. He's lived far too long as it is."
"What do you wish us to do, sir?" Randall asked, hands clasped behind his back and ever the professional.
Banes glanced between them once more and nodded again, "Petrovsky wants me to take the Deliverance and eliminate the Normandy. We kill his crew, and that will get his attention. He'll be more vulnerable then...Shepard's not perfect, and people make mistakes when they're shaken. That'll be the perfect time to take him out. I want you two to stay here and await orders. I'm putting you under Petrovsky's command. No doubt he'll give you both a command. Everybody here is pitching in to stop these fuckers."
Leng said nothing while Randall nodded, "Understood, sir. We'll collect our gear and await further orders as instructed. Good hunting, sir."
"You too, Major," he sighed, rubbing his temples with a shake of his head, "You two will get your chance. Every moment Shepard is near, our window of opportunity opens up. Shepard will die. Leng, I fully expect you make the killing blow: you can keep his damn head as a trophy if you wish. But we must be patient. Good things come to those that wait."
"Understood," was Leng's cold, bitter response. He showed no other emotion other than that.
With a final sigh and a twist of his step, he began to walk out of the barracks, "Good. I will contact you when the Normandy is destroyed. They will not survive this time. And when they are dead, Shepard will crumble. Just you watch."
And off he went, back to the Deliverance, and onwards to victory. For that is all that possibly await them.
I'm ending you here, Shepard. With one blow...
And so it began.
{Loading...}
August 5, 2186
1613 hours.
77th Swanston Avenue, Rubicon Quadrant, Zeta District, Omega.
Second War for Omega, Battle of the Zeta District.
General Nyreen Kandros.
It was times like this that Nyreen missed her cousin Tiran. He would have liked fighting for a common good. It's what he was good at. A pity he's gone...I would have been glad to serve beside him, fighting Cerberus. Spirits...he doesn't even know about the Reapers, Cerberus or anything that's going on here, does he? Perhaps it's better not knowing...
Nyreen was alone, hood over her head as she kept to the shadows of the empty street. Cerberus' mandatory curfew would be in effect in just over forty minutes, and most of the population had retreated to their homes rather than risk defiance. Luckily, Nyreen preferred it: not only were civilians out of any potential crossfire, but the possibility of innocent people getting hurt was next to none. Just the way she liked it.
No point to this resistance if we hurt those we're supposed to be liberating.
Lighting was still up, and there were more than likely several patrols up and about, patrolling the streets as 'night' crept up on the Omega population, or at least what humans considered to be night time. Her Locust SMG was holstered on her hip, the turian concentrating entirely on keeping herself scarce and beneath the notice of Cerberus: to them, she was just another civilian, especially with the shadows she was hiding under concealing her sidearm. She had chosen to go in alone for that very purpose: a Talon bodyguard detachment would only bring suspicion.
She breathed in the seemingly-toxic-but-not-really smell of Omega: its signature musk, a disgusting fume that smelt like rotting oranges mixed with stale drell perfume. If it hadn't been for her having lived on the station for years and getting used to it, she probably would have left already. Her nose still wrinkled at it however, her disgust unconcealable. There was simply no liking such a smell.
Omega: home of the desperate. Because how else could you justify living in this glorified shitheap? Even the vorcha must find this place repulsive. The lighting, the smell, the overall architecture...only so much Cerberus can do to pretty it up.
She froze for a split second as she heard a clang of metal to her left.
Swiftly and within a second, she twisted on the spot, crouching as she bent her right knee to kneel on the ground, snatching up her SMG and taking aim at the source as a single talon hovered near the trigger.
There was a tiny squeak, followed by a small bundle of fur dashing across the dusty deck, away from the knocked over bin and away down the street, its little scuttles evaporating into the night.
She sighed, shaking her head as she quickly stood up, holstering her SMG. Startled by an Earth hamster. Spirits, get a hold of yourself.
Could have been a cloaked phantom. I had to be sure.
She turned back, pulling her hood back and over her frill, her sudden turning movement having kicked up enough air to knock it off. Straightening her coat, she turned back, only to be confronted by a glowing, orange light.
She recognized it immediately. Another Cerberus propaganda holoboard, one of many found across the station's many populated quadrants. This one showed a Cerberus assault trooper, crouched and handing food to what looked to be a starved asari child. The child munched happily on the food given, while the trooper, unarmed, kneeled to her level. And standing near them, gigantic and almost Reaper-like in size, stood a massive turian with the Talon insignia on their chest, foot raised and ready to stomp on them both, mandibles stretched in a sneer of fury.
And, as usual, a simple sentence. 'We offer assistance. They offer resistance. Which do you want more?'
Damn you, Petrovsky. You clever bastard.
It certainly was smart. Not a new tactic, but not one the Hierarchy would endorse. Petrovsky knew he couldn't win the people over by destroying the Talons, so he had to smear their image and make them look like the bad guys, while winning over the population. By doing that, he 1. Took away the public opinion and made them more likely to support Cerberus and 2. Undermined the entire reason for the Talon rebellion. If the people didn't want liberating, what was the point of liberating them?
The people of Omega deserve better. They deserve their freedom. Petrovsky may be a good man, but the organization he represents will never let Omega live in peace. I won't rest until this station is free from his grip.
Bringing up her omni-tool, she activated her omni-blade and slammed it into the wall. The holoboard stuttered and then blinked out of existence with a blast of circuitry, her blade destroying the projector in a single thrust. Pulling it out, she put her omni-tool away and moved around the corner, ready to continue her investigation.
Nyreen's original mission had been simple: reconnassance. She was familiar with this mission, as it was something she did all the time. Each day, without fail, she would give command of the Talons temporarily to her second-in-command, leave for her pre-selected district alone dressed in civilian clothing, mingle with the crowd for half a day and find Cerberus targets of relative importance. Once she had ascertained a target, she would ping her friends at Talon HQ, they would send a small force, and she would join them in an assault on said Cerberus target and bug out. These targets could be anything. A force field maintenance crew. One of the quadrant outposts. Communications repairs. Random patrols. One of Petrovsky's lieutenants. A convoy. Whatever it was and wherever it was, Nyreen made sure to hit it. And her methods had proven highly effective.
Until today. Today was different.
They had proceeded as usual: except this time it was more defensive. Colonel Farland it seemed had adopted a new strategy for dealing with the Talons, and they were currently sweeping his quadrant for her HQ. This worried her significantly, as they would no doubt find it very quickly, but a recent attack on an Atlas armoured company had dealt a massive blow to their operations, forcing Farland's commanders to pull back, giving up whatever gains they made for Talon troops to retake and once again become entrenched. But it was merely a delaying action.
After this, she had heard reports of unusually large Cerberus troop movement in the Rubicon quadrant: specifically the Zeta District. After checking that no Talon troops had launched unapproved attacks or other rebel groups had developed, Nyreen decided to once again deploy and covertly check out what was going on. After all, the Zeta District encompassed the one area Cerberus restricted access to, and to see several squads, a platoon and a company move through that area was certainly alarming.
Nyreen worried it could be a major offensive. She had no choice but to check it out.
She dashed across the street, out of the shadows, just long enough to reach the other side, slamming against a wall. She heard a rustle from within and quickly ducked, realizing she had accidentally hit a window frame.
Shit!
The windows flew open, Nyreen expecting a Cerberus soldier to stick his head out. Instead, she was met by a small batarian child. He immediately saw Nyreen, cocking his head seemingly in confusion. Nyreen, desperate to keep her cover, raised a single finger to her mouth, hoping the motion translated to the little kid.
The child just smiled, reaching a hand. Nyreen realized what he was doing, and she slowly stood up, allowing him to touch her forehead. His grip tightened slightly (or what one would consider tightened for a child) and he lightly giggled. Nyreen's eyes widened.
I don't know if they align with Cerberus or not. Damn it!
But to the same degree, the little kid's innocent eyes, that great big grin...all that innocence...it reminded her what she fought for. She fought for things like this.
She motioned the child back inside, closing the windows so as to not alert the child's parents or legal guardians. Windows closed and back into a crouched position, she dashed forward, trying to get out of sight. She could see the street corner just ahead...
...and then she heard footsteps. Lots of footsteps.
Running! I can hear people running!
Nyreen immediately assumed the worst. She stopped, unholstering her SMG as she tucked herself by a nearby bin, ignoring the smell of the rotten refuse as she pressed up against it, keeping one eye exposed to see what was happening.
Her fears were confirmed in an instant. Appearing from around the corner she had been about to turn into, over a dozen Cerberus soldiers emerged, running straight onto the street. Luckily, it seemed they hadn't spotted her. Regardless, their actions caused her to frown: they seemed to be running in response to something, but if not her, then what?
Before she knew it, an entire platoon was running through the clearing, and they weren't stopping. Thirty soldiers, ranging from assault troopers to centurions, guardians to nemesi, phantoms to combat engineers, all made a mad dash down the street, away from Nyreen and around the corner to the far left. One assault trooper carried a large portable machine gun emplacement on his right shoulder, while another carried a missile launcher, as if to deal with something armoured.
What in the spirits?
She heard snippets of the centurions' back and forth comm chatter, getting more and more confused as she heard it.
"...sector 9...!"
"...ing from everywhere...!"
"...fuck you mean..?"
"...hole battalion of 'em...!"
"...e ready...!"
Within moments, the voices dissipated and became lesser and lesser before deteriorating to background noise in the distance. She slumped against the bin, no less confused as to what she just saw. Believing most of the Cerberus platoon had moved on to wherever they were going, Nyreen moved to move out, keeping her SMG out just in case more troops arrived.
And then a set of explosions, followed by gunfire and screaming, forced her back into cover, SMG back out and aimed towards the street the platoon disappeared down.
It was like a war had erupted out of nowhere. The familiar electronic shouts of Cerberus soldiers could be heard, but all she heard were sounds of retreat and yelling as gunfire echoed down the street, muzzle flashes erupting around the corner spasmodically, with the telltale boom of a M-300 claymore unmistakable amongst the ruckus. Another explosion sounded, followed by the gunfire dying.
What in the spirits is happening over there? Is it my men? Do they think I'm in danger and have attacked?
She watched as a Cerberus assault trooper appeared from around the corner, rifle up and firing at a target around the corner. His head soon exploded from a well placed sniper shot, body crumbling in a heap. Several more troopers arrived, but they weren't firing back...they were running.
Never before had Nyreen ever seen the enemy run.
Organized retreats and calm withdrawals, but never a full rout. What is going on over there?
She soon had her answer.
"WHERE DO YOU THINK YOU'RE GOING!?" boomed a thunderous tone, the form of a large krogan in silver battle armor and wielding a claymore in one hand appearing behind one retreating trooper, chuckling with sadistic glee, "You are no worthy foe! You flee like a coward!"
He blasted the soldier in the back with his claymore, the soldier's guts exploding outwards and onto the deck. The soldier took a second to look at the gutless expanse that had appeared in his torso before collapsing forward, dead. The krogan just laughed, stomping over his lifeless corpse as several more krogan followed behind him, followed by even more, and then dozens more...
Spirits...that's a whole battalion...
The Cerberus platoon was decimated without mercy. Another trooper, this one a combat engineer, attempted to shoot the silver armoured krogan in the back, but this only irritated him. His eyes notably lit up as a blood rage kicked in, the krogan holstering his shotgun as he reached out and grabbed the soldier by the visor, dragging him until he was directly infront of him. Snarling, his other hand grabbed under the jaw of the engineer, the soldier punching the krogan in the chest desperately, but to no effect. With a howl, the krogan pulled his other hand up, gruesomely tearing the engineer's head off, snapping it off the spine and tossing it away. He kicked the corpse onto the ground, blood pouring onto the ground as the krogan, blood soaking his face, beat his chest and roared into the air, his krogan echoing his war cry as what remained of the platoon was butchered.
A few moments passed in silence, before one of the krogan consulted the silver one. The silver armoured one nodded, before turning to his men and booming, "This was merely a platoon, my brothers! Soon we will link up with Shepard and drive the rest of these pro-human fleshies from their holes! If you want blood, you will have it! Who are we, if not the 1st Aralakh Battalion! Harness the anger of Kalros, and let Cerberus eat it! Omega will be ours! Onward!"
And with that, the krogan battalion, ran down the street the platoon had first appeared from, likely off to continue their butchery of the Cerberus forces. A thunderous horde, the 800 strong krogan force was likely unstoppable. After their roars and massive charge had disappeared around the corner, Nyreen stood up, taking a deep breath and thinking about what she had just seen.
It was obvious that krogan battalion hadn't been here for a while...they had just arrived. And judging by their unit, it was clear they were military: it wasn't some Blood Pack army, which pointed towards UGC involvement. Nyreen had only heard bits and pieces of what was happening in the rest of the galaxy thanks to intercepted, unsecured Cerberus communications and from what she heard, Commander Shepard (or 'captain', as he seemed to be known as now) had been very busy. Curing the genophage. Repelling a Cerberus invasion of the Citadel. Liberating Eden Prime from Cerberus. Creating peace between the quarians and geth. It seemed wherever the man went, he was making a difference. And everybody knew about the UGC at this point.
So what if these krogan were UGC? Could it be the UGC had finally turned its sights on Omega and sent a liberation force?
And then there was no mistaking who that krogan commander mentioned. Shepard is here, on Omega. Why else would he be here if not to reclaim the station from Cerberus' hands? He's already disrupted many of their operations. Retaking Omega would more than likely be on his to-do list. If so...
Even as more gunfire sounded in the distance, Nyreen couldn't help but come to the epiphany of what this actually meant. UGC reinforcements could significantly turn the tide of our rebellion against Cerberus. With their help, we can evenly divide their attention, opening up two fronts. And what if that krogan battalion isn't all they brought? There can be no doubt that the UGC wouldn't attack a well defended Cerberus fortress without a large enough ground force: not even krogan are enough. So what did they bring? And how did they break through the Cerberus defense fleet in orbit?
Whatever the case, Nyreen had to get word of this back to HQ. The rest of the Talons had to know that help had finally arrived: that they could possibly go from 'close to defeat' to 'near total victory' with this new development. Without any more hesitation, Nyreen turned and ran back down the street she came from, her steps light and almost soundless, only light thuds being heard through the empty street as she made the perilous return to her HQ, not wanting to risk announcing it over an unsecured omni-tool channel.
This is it. A game-changer, at last.
Hopefully it was enough.
"Now that you're on the ground and Petrovsky's fleet was in ruins, I'm guessing the real war began."
- Reia'Inas pav Earth.
"Without a doubt. All my cards were on the table, and Petrovsky soon learnt that the rules of battle had changed. No longer was he just facing Aria. He was facing a fairly worthy opponent."
- Tali'Shepard pav Rannoch.
"You flatter me, Tali. Petrovsky was still just as large a threat. But perhaps he was starting to realize that we weren't going to go down as easily as Aria did the first time."
- Marcus L. Shepard.
A/N:
Sorry for the long wait, but here you go. Another chapter for you to enjoy. Made it extra long so that the wait was worth it.
Before you ask: yes, I'm loving Mass Effect: Andromeda. With three weeks of holidays coming up, I'm going to be devoting all of my time to it, or at least what I can spare. I'm only 17 percent of the way in: I've recruited all squadmates, and I'm currently working on Eos. Won't spoil anything, but if you're a Mass Effect fan and loved the pace of the first Mass Effect, then pick up this game: it is well worth it.
Until next time,
Keelah Re'lai, troopers!
