MORDIN
The elevator took the duo right down to where they needed to go. First thing the two saw was a pile of boxes. Cole, ever the curious one, poke his head over the other side, revealing a dead Blue Suns merc, a pile of heat-sinks, and a box of what Yara told him was 'eezo'- Element Zero. Useful stuff, supposedly. It also resonated like Rayacite. He guessed it responded to the same energy pattern.
Taking the only avenue open to them- towards the Omega Guard barricade- Yara and Cole kept their guns up.
"Don't shoot, they're clear to come in." A turian poked his head up above the make-shift barricade made to keep people from entering the district. What happened to those trying to leave?
Going around through a small café, Yara stocked up on the free heat sinks lying around.
Damn! She hasn't got a problem with nicking shit from anybody! First dead people, and now mercenaries?
A medi-station on the wall was raided too.
One last guard bade them luck, "Good luck in there. Blue Suns and vorcha are shooting anything that moves."
Oh, that's nice. Same here.
Yara nodded at the turian, who locked the door behind them.
"You OK, Yara, still feeling ill?" The Commander looked askance at Cole, who promptly backed off. Women were scary sometimes.
"I'm just peaky. Nothing else. I'll be fine, now let's go."
In true two-man fireteam fashion, Yara lead, while Cole covered other approaches. Down a set of stairs, and out to a wide room with two burning piles of bodies.
Huh. Must be trying to stop the plague…
Up ahead were two Blue Suns mercs talking, not paying any attention to anyone. Cole sent two Lightning Lances out from his assegais, taking them out soundlessly. Well, apart from their heavy armour hitting the metal decking. Cole's Radar Pulse sensed a live guy to their right.
"Human. Should have guessed. Bad enough you infect us with his plague. Now you lack the decency to even wait until I die before you come to steal my possessions." The batarian coughed, a wet, hacking cough that screamed 'I'm dying!' to the in-the-know.
Yara crouched down, and waved her omni-tool over the alien's chest, releasing a dose of medi-gel. The batarian tried to wave the pistol in his hand towards her, but couldn't find the strength once he realised he felt better.
"Why? Why would a human help a batarian?" He coughed again, but the amount of blood coming out was a lot less.
"I need to find Mordin Solus, and you haven't shot at me on sight. Plus, I'm here to help. Not steal and kill. Unless you count mercs and vorcha."
Cole turned away and wandered over to the bank terminal. From what he could tell, and with heavy use of the translator app on his new omni-tool, he found out he could access his account (he didn't have one). Reaching out, he could feel the data stored on the database, all in the form of electricity. Maybe…
He took off his right gauntlet, and placed his hand on the scanner. Reaching out into the internal servers of the bank terminal, he set himself up an account. After all, all the money Yara seemed to find had to go somewhere where she wouldn't get done for 'liberating' it. After he'd done that, he ripped as much data on the Omega Blue Suns, the Blood Pack, and the Eclipse, plus all of their capital, and moved it all into his account.
All in the space of about ten seconds, he'd become ten billion credits richer. Aaand, it's gone. Somehow, the Council had just acquired a lot of money, from an anonymous donator. Hmm.
Meanwhile, Yara had managed to convince the batarian to give her directions to Mordin's clinic, promising someone would come back and help him. She wandered over to him, and saw what he was doing.
"Cole! You can't just fund the Council with non-existent money!"
"I'm not. I just ripped that from the mercs here on Omega. Simple really. All your money is kept, at its most basic level, as a form of electricity, right? Well then, I can manipulate it."
Yara's jaw dropped, as the implications struck her. Cole just wandered over to the nice green door panel, sensing more energy inside.
God, I'm becoming a vampire with all this energy around! Oooo! Cake!
He spied a box that practically sang energy! Someone helpful had scrawled 'Heavy Weapon Ammo' on the case lid. Opening it up, he sucked the cells dry, surprised once again at how much the batteries of the future could hold. Going by the state of his core, he'd be able to fly properly anytime soon! He couldn't wait!
Yara finished gawping and strode across the room to hack open a door panel. Inside were two dead turians. After listening to the log, the two could tell that things were getting desperate- when mercs started locking each other up to stop the plague, you could tell. If mercs didn't have their honour, then they had nothing but money. Heh. Oops…
The way to Mordin's clinic was littered with wall safes and datapads. Cole wasn't sure why, but the Blue Suns didn't want them reaching Mordin- didn't they want to fix this thing? Never mind. The main point was, the Blue Suns couldn't defend against his Lances. Yara was beginning to feel left out, though. He let her play around shooting mercs' faceplates off while he drank the remnants of some alcoholic drink left lying around. What a waste!
Just after the slightly troublesome barricade was a locked door, behind which was a family of humans. Naturally, Yara couldn't loot their safe with them still alive, so no money from this room. They'd been locked in here for two days! However, they did explain something about gangland warfare- ever since the plague started, the vorcha had been bearing down on the Blue Suns' territory. And yet, the humans were the ones being persecuted.
Cole, being the conscientious war-machine he was, was getting antsy to get moving again. Seeing this, Yara thanked them, and told them they'd be safe to move to the clinic soon, once they'd cleared the way. As he was waiting, Cole made the finishing touches to his FTL mass drive on his Mattock. By holding onto a metal plate he'd screwed into the grip, he could supercharge the drive, making it shoot the slugs at FTL speeds. He couldn't wait!
Plus, he nicked the damage modifier from one of the dead mercs for Yara. Wouldn't be fair if he could annihilate them, and she'd be stuck on their shields still.
Another room, another firefight. This time, Cole caught his first sight of a vorcha and a krogan. Scrambling up to the upper balcony, and Yara staying on the ground, he slung his Mattock around and sighted down a vorcha's chest. Relaying a charge into the mass drive, he shot a round at the nearest alien. With no delay, and a colossal CRACK, the alien vapourised, as did a colossal amount of the ground behind it.
"What the fuck was that Cole?" Yara on the radio. So someone did know how to use one.
"That was me, and my supercharged mass drive. How do you like my new FTL gun?"
There was a lull in the shooting coming from below him, and then she started picking off the shrieking vorcha. Cole picked off the charging krogan, shattering its head plate, and knocking it back as its face vapourised. Turns out his research into alien biology was useful, after all.
Yara continued to crack off shots, switching between the Harrier and the Indra sniper rifle for the long shots.
After the dust settled, she took one long look at his rifle, and shook her head. She didn't want to know. Cole's Pulse told him another chest of eezo was ahead, and two humans.
Picking up the chest, he shuddered at the barely-restrained energy in the ore, before Yara slid open the door heading towards the two humans.
Too late, he registered the feel of a corpse between them.
"Hey, hey! Back off! We got here first!"
Two blonde guys, no weapons. One corpse, three wall safes. Not cracked. Petty looters.
"Hey, what'd I say? We found this stuff! It's ours!"
His mate obviously couldn't tell the difference between a wall safe and the Mona Lisa.
"Ah, forget it. Nothing but junk in here. This place is worse than the last one."
Serial looters, then. At least they didn't kill the poor turian on the floor, Yara noticed. She was not happy.
"What are you doing in this apartment? Did you kill that turian?" Ah. Spectre-Yara. Yippee.
"What? Him? Nah, the plague took care 'a' him. We're just here to take a full accounting of his worldly possessions." The guy winked. He actually winked. What a sleezeball.
"Stealing is wrong, but… carry on. So long as it's from the dead!" She fired a shot off at the one still crouched over the turian, while Cole set about draining the credits from the wall safes. Bastards didn't know he could do it at range.
The guys glanced at each other. What? I mean, OK, she'd be hypocritical if she said otherwise, but still…
Then Cole noticed something. A pistol. Just behind the first guy's back. His finger inched towards the trigger, until his arm twitched in the pre-move.
Cole shocked him before he got any further. The shot went straight through his mate's leg, and out the other side. While he was howling, Cole Arc Restrained the first guy, and then moved over as Yara stepped in.
"Thought you'd shoot me, eh? I guess you don't know who I am. Commander Shepard, of the SSV Normandy. Council Spectre. And you're under arrest!" Cole could see where this was going. She ripped some bed linen off the bed, and tied the second guy up.
"I think we'll leave them here, don't you?"
"I quite agree, miss, shall we leave?"
"Yes, let's!"
With that, Cole and Yara sauntered out, leaving the two howling and struggling to get free.
So, the rumours were true. Mordin's clinic was guarded by mechs. A bank of charging slots held about twenty of them. Possibly enough to stave off a merc attack. If they weren't too serious. A room held a small stockpile of goodies, which promptly disappeared into the mass-fabricator on Yara's wrist. Palladium, heat sinks, Heavy Weapon Ammo (in case she found one), and medi-gel upgrades.
Cole could hear Mordin blathering in the background. Heplacore this, Demazane that.
While Yara approached him for the cure to the plague, and joining her mission in stopping the Collectors, Cole wandered around, chuckling as he went on.
"… investigating use as a bio-weapon? No. Too many guns, not enough data equipment. Soldiers, not scientists. Hired Guns?.."
God! The guy just went on! Yara wasn't getting through to the guy. He was absolutely necessary to the mission… And he was a scientist… Ah, hell.
"Solus! Hold on! We understand you can't leave your clinic now. We're here to distribute your cure, and then find out why and how the Collectors are abducting human colonies. We need you. Plus, I'll even throw in the one-time offer of studying the Prime Conduit. You see, both myself and Yara here were resurrected, for want of a better word. We're here to save the galaxy."
"Mission? What mission? No no no. Too busy. Come here to distribute cure. You knew. Human. You work for Cerberus?"
Wha-? How did he get that? We aren't wearing the badge or- Oh. Genius. Right.
"Never mind. Plague spreading too fast. Cerberus interaction unexpected. Good. I need some muscle."
"You're very well informed, Mordin. I take it we're not the only ones who work for an organisation?"
"No longer. STG in youth. I… needed to make up for some mistakes. Hence here. Daniel is a good apprentice. Here. Cure. Aerosol form. Insert into life-support systems, and all will be fine. Vorcha ahead. Be careful."
With that, Mordin just went back to administering his cure to the unconscious turian on the table.
Twists and turns, but no true resistance, until the two met a team of vorcha attempting sabotage on the fans.
"Yara, they have a flame-thrower!"
"I know! Go left, hit the tank!"
Cole dived left, as Yara drew the flamer's fire, and he slung his Avenger off the mag-plates. Taking aim, he saw the lightly-protected oil tank on his back. CRACK! BOOM! The flamer was shredded into tiny fleshy pieces as the tank exploded behind him. Yara dove for cover as shrapnel cut into the barricades. He gave a sheepish grin as the two vorcha behind the first screamed, as they ran into each other, patting out the fires on their arms. They fell to a Lance each.
"Are you going to let me get a shot in, or am I just here to curb your enthusiasm, Cole?" Yara scowled.
"Well. I'd be doing just fine. Except I have no idea how to use the console for the fans. And, y'know, this is your mission, anyway."
Turns out you just needed to pull a handle. Well, shit.
The central fan started up, and Yara shoved the vial into the container slot.
"It's not enough, Cole. Go right, turn on the fan at the bottom and meet me back up here in a sec."
"Right!"
Cole broke right and sprinted down the ramp as fast as possible. He didn't want to encounter any vorcha reinforcements. Even if they were useless.
Bolting down the alley, he made it to the right-side fan control room, and slammed the handle up. The fan started up, and, to make it so he didn't need to come back, he shocked the control panel, shorting it out.
As soon as the doors slid open, a contingent of seven- seven- krogan and ten vorcha started barrelling towards him. Knowing he didn't have time to pick them all off, he gathered a knot of energy in his hands, and sent it out in a Shockwave, sending the lot of them flying. As they hovered around, convulsing, he picked them off with clean kill-shots with his Lances. When the twenty-odd corpses hit the deck, he blew the smoking, white-hot ends of his spears.
"Cole! I need back-up!" Turns out, while he was picking off the ones after him, the vorcha had dug out their rocket launchers and pinned Yara down.
Shot after shot was eating away at her cover, until he sent a Hyper-Bolt at the nearest lot of the Rocketeers- a beam of electricity that branched off until they were encased in a net. Cole yanked back, and the group of three went flying into the internal fans of the- ooh. Nasty! He threw Lances at the rest of the Rocketeers, while Yara drew out the Indra and sniped off the rest of the ground-troops, capping a krogan in the head-plate, and a vorcha in the knee-cap.
"Phew! They are seriously desperate to destroy the life-support! Let's find out why…"
Yara ambled over to the knee-capped vorcha, and set about prodding his knees. Didn't even ask any questions. She looked at Cole.
"Well?"
Oh, right. Good-cop, Bad-cop.
"Listen up, buddy. This here is Commander Shepard, and she likes a bit of fun before she eats her food. And you're the first course. So, you tell us why you were sabotaging these fans, and we won't kill you. Or rather, we won't eat you. Kapeesh?"
The alien just nodded like a rattle, and started talking.
"Gah! Don't eat me! Please! We were given the plague-thing! By Collectors! Told we would thrive! Yes! Thrive! Humans immune! They take blame! Gah! Don't eat meee!"
Cole chuckled, as Yara pressed down harder, then took her foot off. She made a great show of picking her teeth, and looking over the scum on the ground. He whimpered.
"Well, Cole, d'you reckon that's enough?"
"Y'know what? I don't, Yara."
"That's what I thought."
Yara stood back and let Cole take his turn. Keep 'em guessing.
"Y'see this here, vorcha?" Cole held up his hand, crackling with white electricity, lancing between his fingers. "This is called electricity. Y'know what that is?"
"Gah! Yes! Yes! Don't touch! Don't touch me!" The guy was squealing away, you'd think he was terrified!
"Good. Now, tell us. How'd the Collectors contact you? Why'd they target this place?"
"Gah! They took us! Held us hostage! Please! They did not tell us! Please!"
Cole looked at Yara, who shook her head. No survivors. Fair enough.
On their way back, Cole and Yara discovered Daniel being held up by a group of batarians, sequestered away in a hab-room. He'd been trying to distribute a pill-based cure, the fool. To batarians? Cole'd been awake/ alive for nigh on a week, and he already knew of their violent and slaver-like tendencies. That and a hate of humankind, due to the Skyllian Blitz.
The situation quickly devolved into a Mexican standoff. Cole stood there, pointing his spears at the two batarians on either side, while Yara aimed at the leader holding Daniel with her M-358 Talon pistol. Cole made sure she was inside his Frost Shield diameter.
"Let the boy go, he means no harm."
"No harm? You humans started this plague! And this one was trying to kill us with this 'medicine'!" The lead batarian hawked and spat. A massive green globule was spat off to the side. Not nice.
"Not true! We just came from the life support- which you may have noticed was turned off- where the vorcha confessed to being given a chemical that made the plague. It was done on purpose to implicate the humans. I have a recording to prove it. Now, let the boy go, and we can discuss this like adults, yes?"
Cole kept himself and Yara covered in the Frost Shield area, while he dropped his assegais to his sides, and Yara put away her Talon. They showed their empty palms to the room, sure in the knowledge that Cole could still take them out with a Bolt Stream or two.
"… Stand down." The batarians lowered their guns- Yara recognised an illegal shotgun or two amongst them- and stood off to the sides.
"Explain your… recording. Then we'll see about letting you live."
Cole smirked. Like they'd have a chance!
It took barely five minutes for the batarians to be assured, and convinced to spread the word it was the vorcha acting on someone's orders. Cole was actually glad he wouldn't have to fry them. They were just scared, and sick.
Mordin was waiting for the two, and their addition, Daniel, when they returned.
"Daniel! Told you it was bad idea! Glad that Shepard found you. You'll be taking over the clinic while I'm gone. Secret mission, you know how it is."
"M-me? But, what about Davis? Or Edna? Couldn't they do it? Wouldn't they be better?"
"No. You have good heart. Good brain. They are just good at following orders. Now, go inside and take stock. I'm leaving soon."
"Yes, sir!" Daniel strode inside, back straight, as if he hadn't run into a tight spot not five minutes ago. Ass.
Mordin looked at the two. Cole hadn't taken a hit, and he didn't even have any armour, just body paint and a red hooded jumper, for the most part. And yet, Commander Shepard had scratches all over her armour, despite the advanced N7 shield module.
Yes, I think it's about time I had some fun in life! The old salarian thought.