The colony was essentially decimated. The large sprawling mix of houses, factories and assortment of buildings were either flattened or blown apart. The only things still standing were located at what could only be described as the centre of the colony with what seemed to be a large warehouse/factory surrounded by smaller shelters and buildings.

Archer saw Laetana visibly stiffen, her eyes growing wide and beginning to moisten with tears. He placed a hand on her shoulder and tried to think of something, anything to say in order to bring what little comfort he could offer, but he said nothing. There was nothing really he could say.

Without warning his grip suddenly tightened "look" his voice in disbelief. Laetana raised her head just in time to see a shuttle rising from the small amount of standing buildings before zipping off upwards into the sky. The both looked at each other in shock before Archer suddenly realised that the shuttle was distinctively white and blue, the colours of the Systems Alliance.

"That was Alliance! That shuttle, it was a Kodiak. I'd recognise it anywhere!" They turned towards each other, shock and disbelief clear on Laetana's features.

"So if they're here…" she trailed off.

"That means they've begun extraction, or have been for past couple of weeks."

Laetana turned back towards the colony before almost running towards it, causing Archer to almost stumble over in an attempt to catch up with her.

"Serbius is definitely still here, he was one of the top engineers. It's probably why the powers still running."

"If he was he would've already been extracted" Archer replied.

Laetana slowed down a touch allowing Archer to catch up. "How would you know that?"

He paused slightly before speaking "the mission was to extract the engineers and armourers, they were the top priority and were given first access to the shuttles".

Laetana gave him a strange look. "What about the civilians? People who weren't top priority?"

He seemed to have trouble with this and began fidgeting with his Omni-tool.

"Archer."

"The children certainly would've been extracted, if there were enough shuttles…but if not…" He trailed off before steadying himself "we needed the ones that had the most benefit to this war. If we had filled a spot with civvies we may have left behind some who was an expert at propulsion systems, or shielding or… look I know it's fucked but we have to look at the bigger picture. Like you said we are being exterminated. We need all and any help we can get."

Laetana tried to see reason, she really did. She was a Turian after all and had the message of public service and self-sacrifice for the greater good all through basic training. But the thought of simply leaving those behind because of who they were or what they did…it troubled her. What if Serbius was a cook? Or gardener? Would they have left him behind?

He could see clearly uneasy look on her features but chose to remain silent.

They walked slowly through the broken and destroyed buildings in silence, avoiding the piles of dead, both reaper and other species alike. As they both turned a corner they could see the untouched centre buildings with figures walking around in the distance and hurried their pace. Nearing the centre they were greeted by an enormous AA gun, acting like a silent guardian. Archer whistled under his breath causing Laetana to turn around.

"What?"

"No wonder that Destroyer we saw earlier was damaged, that's a GC01 AA gun. The Silverback." He slowed his pace to stare up the giant weapon, marvelling in its size and shape. Laetana having almost no clue what this meant quirked her face plate in confusion, a clear sign for Archer to explain.

"We had these before we discovered mass effect tech on Mars. Usually AA guns are either mass accelerated or are laser built like the GARDIAN's. This is an Alliance invention and works similarly to a Gauze Rifle, using literally a hunk of metal and shooting it towards its target thanks to magnetic fields. The Destroyers shields were designed to stop something affected by mass effect fields traveling at a certain speed. The Silverback fires much slower, pretty much negated any shielding and enemy ship may have."

Laetana craned her head towards the massive weapon, it was beautifully ugly.

"Why aren't these everywhere?"

"Well for one they're expensive to make, you have a finite amount of ammunition and well, they fire quite slowly. If it's targeting one target another can sneak up and take it out with a couple of shots."

As they were talking they noticed an increase of movement and voices being herd from the buildings ahead, being spotted they moved on from the gun and traversed towards the upcoming barricade which held a mounted turret in its centre. As they moved forward three figures were briskly moving towards them, upon getting closer they realised they were an Asari, Human and Turian. Their weapons were held downwards but fingers were kept near the triggers.

"They look pretty intense. How about I do the talking?" said Archer, turning his head slightly.

Laetana replied with a shrug, her mind too focused on finding Serbius.

As the neared the Asari put up her hand, signalling them to stop. Archer responded in a crisp salute.

"Archer Davis, 10th Frontier Division."

"Yes. We know you're with the Alliance and why you're here" the Asari responded curtly.

Archer lowered his hand and removed his helmet, "so the extractions have already begun?"

The Turian male spoke "they are yes, but too slowly. We have too many people here."

The Human finally had his chance to speak, "we are being extracted yes, but it's…complicated. We'd rather discuss it all with you inside, there's a bit to go through." Laetana noticed this Human's accent was similar to Archer's. Perhaps they came from the same land mass?

The barricade opened, revealing a ramp in the middle which both climbed up and started to follow their new tour guides towards what they could assume was the main encampment. Archer walked with the other three, discussing the colonies defences, population and what had occurred so far. Laetana hung back, not in the mood for conversation and trying to keep an eye out for Serbius. Suddenly a male Turian took it upon himself to sidle up to Laetana, evidently looking up and down her body before turning his head towards her. "Thank the spirits, anther Turian. How long you been traveling with the Human?"

"Around four days now" she didn't bother to look at him.

"Damn, sorry about that, I know how infuriating they can be, he hasn't tried to do anything towards you yet?

This made Laetana turn around in shock towards his brassiness and struggled to keep a straight face at the poor attempt of flirting. She was tired, anxious and actually felt pretty crappy, she wasn't really in the mood for the xenophobic white knight, she decided to have a bit of fun.

"Well he started getting flirty when we met which I ignored, but afterwards we both realised what the hell? And pretty much have been fucking vigorously for the past couple of days" While speaking his eyes shot upwards and he failed to hide the look of disgust from his face as Laetana continued. "I had no idea how big humans were, shit, it took me a couple of hours to be able to walk normally again." She almost blew it when her voiced wavered and she threatened to laugh.

Having the desired affect the Turian clearly was gripping his rifle way to tight and started to almost snort out of his nose in hatred.

"That fucking monkey!" He harshly whispered "what in spirits name were you thinking? Why would you even want to be with one of those?" He shakily pointed his hand to a group of nearby humans, a female and her two young. One was barely old enough to walk and Laetana inside laughing slowly dissipated. "We should have wiped them out at the first contact, I should teach that piece of shit a less-"

Laetana threw him against a wall, silently but harshly, she twisted his wrist causing him to drop the weapon and put her face closer to his. "No you won't" her voice like steel "oh you can try, and you can try cause it'd be pretty fucking funny to watch you get snapped in half by him, but you won't. The second that you get near him you will lose your most valuable asset". He glanced down and paled slightly at the large blades hovering near his crutch. "Now do me a favour and don't fucking talk to me again".

She stood up and briskly walked over to Archer who had finished his talks and linked her arm around his, knowing the Turian would see. Archer looked down and raised an eyebrow, but said nothing. In fact he began to blush and a smile crept up on his face.

After a few minutes of walking they reached to main building which appeared to have been and armaments factory, the assembly line and machinery clearly been stripped for parts. The Asari broke off and went inside before coming back with a Batarian. Archer tried his best not to show distaste, he hadn't had the best experiences with Batarians. This one wore a tank top with cargo pants and military styled boots, he appeared to have a fresh, recently stitched scar running around his head, barely missing his bottom left eye. To put it bluntly he looked extremely threatening and Archer would've involuntarily put a hand on his side arm if it wasn't for the fact the Batarian had a tiny Asari infant strapped to his chest, sleeping silently and completely unaware of the dangers around her. The Batarian wiped his hand on a rag and put out his hand to both Archer and Laetana, his grip like a vice.

"Names Rarkus. I've been told who you were and frankly we need the help."

"Just tell us what to do" Archer replied

The Batarian smiled, showing his sharp teeth, "steady on there human, you don't know what we need first. I take it you saw the shuttle?"

Both nodded.

"We've been holding out for just over a month now, this is all that's left of the colony. That shuttle has been coming in for the past three weeks, slowly extracting our people. The only problem is those Reaper Kra'tash have been stepping up their attack, we've refitted the colony with defensives but it won't hold out for long. They're coming again and they're gonna hit us with everything they have. We need more shuttles, we need more extractions."

"Why not just let the shuttle pilots know?" Laetana queried "have them pass on a message?"

"These shuttles are automated" answered Archer. "We don't have enough pilots for every shuttle so they've automated them. When a beacon is released a shuttle will lock onto that signal and travel back and forth until it's terminated or the beacon is switched off. Plus imagine the thousands of refugees on the carrier? It'd be total chaos. No message would be able to get through."

"Let's not forget they have the rest of the planet to extract" the Asari piped up. "We may be the largest colony but we're definitely not the only one."

"And the shuttles have a weight limit" said the Turian "won't take off if we pile people inside."

Laetana rasied her hands in surrender "spirits I get it, we need more shuttles".

"You have a beacon I take it?" Archer turned towards Rarkus who nodded in return.

"We found it upon some Alliance soldiers who…well they didn't make it. Sorry human."

Archer nodded in appreciation. "So what help could we possibly provide? You already have a beacon."

"That's correct but we believe we may know where a couple more are" Rarkus smiled in response. "We have very little fighters here, the ones we've already sent have yet to contact us. We supply you with what you need and you get out there and bring back those two other beacons. You might even find some of your people to still be alive."

Rarkus's logic seemed sound, three shuttles should be enough for extracting the rest of colony. Plus the chance to find some more Alliance soldiers would be perfect.

Laetana suddenly spoke up, "Rarkus, do you know a Serbius Ablius? He's a male Turian, red markings, engineer?

Rarkus turned to her, his voice quiet, "yea, knew him well, best damned engineer we had."

Laetana turned pale her voice a whisper "had?"

"He volunteered to go with the soldiers to try and find the beacons. As I said we…haven't heard anything from them. Or him"

Laetana's mind raced, so he may not be dead. He knows how to fight, he's with other soldiers. He'll be fine. She looked up to Archer who nodded back and gave her a reassuring smile.

Another reason they have to find these beacons.

Sorry for the relatively short chapter.