"This is councillor Anderson, I am taking command of the fleet, coordinate your fire, do not break formation!". Anderson's ship stopped when it reached the center of the inter-species fleet, the fire was once again coordinated and the enemy advance halted, but not before Retribution made it to the citadel, pursued by all of the Normandy frigates and the original.
The arms closed just as the Normandy slipped through, the reaper angled toward the citadel tower, intending to activate the mass relay that would bring the rest of the reapers and the destruction of all sentient life.
The Simmering Dawn spiraled around the massive machine and played the laser from it's Thannik cannon across the front, but the reaper was stronger than Sovereign and shrugged off the blow.
"Joker, get us alongside the reaper, my team and I will go in and try to do what we can from inside.". Joker nodded, totally concentrated on the controls, EDI popped up next to the pilot.
"You will need some protection from the Reaper's mind abilities, you saw what happened to the Cerberus team when they were on that derelict reaper.". Shepard nodded. EDI continued to speak.
"So to prevent that, I have had inhibitors installed on your armor and the armor of your team, to prevent the reaper from affecting your minds, good luck commander.".
"Thank you, keep the ship in one piece Joker, I don't want to be stuck on Retribution any longer than I have to.". He left the bridge and met with his team in the hangar.
"Okay people, we are going on that reaper, get anything you need and some powerful explosives, we'll go in three teams, Miranda, take Legion, Tali and Thane, go down to the main power source or whatever looks important, Jack, Grunt, Samara and Jacob, head up, blow anything that looks crucial, Kevin, Garrus and I will head straight, with the same objective, expect heavy resistance and be prepared for damage caused by our ships, they will still be attacking, good luck everyone.". They split into their teams and waited while Joker brought the ship into alignment with the hull, the group spaced themselves and drifted toward the gigantic ship.
They drifted through the kinetic barriers and landed on the hull, within seconds they had blown a small hole in the armor and dropped in. The inside was dimly lit and ominous, the teams split up and headed deep into the reaper, leaving tracking beacons to find their way back.
There was no resistance as the small team progressed, they would check every chamber, only to find nothing, then the team moved on, after several minutes they reached what seemed to be the weapons triangulation, there were many screens and each showed a different view of the Normandy frigates, circled moved to track each as they weaved around the reaper, the circles would lock on and fire the laser but it always missed because the nimble ships dodged out of the way. Shepard began placing high explosives around the room, Kevin and Garrus joined him, soon the room was set, and the team turned and headed back to their exit.
The group met up with the others and left the ship as one, they pushed off and sailed toward the far wall of the citadel, the Normandy appeared in their field ov vision, cargo bay open like a scoop and ready to pick them up.
The instant the bay door closed, Shepard contacted the bridge.
"Joker, what's Retribution's status?".
"It just began to open a relay around the tower sir, we have five minutes until the relay is fully powered and ready to receive arrivals.".
"Then let's hit that SOB as hard as we can.". With that, David hit the detonator on his omni-tool, s dries of tiny explosions appeared on Retribution, it's shields flickered and dimmed, and it's weapons died for a moment, the frigates hit it with everything they had.
The first salvo of Thannik cannon lasers downed the shields and etched scorched grooves into it's hull, the pulse lasers dented and boiled away more armor, exposing small patches of frame underneath. For four more minutes they pounded the reaper, but it would not give, the relay reached full power and Shepard could see the shimmering image of all the reapers on the other end, his blood ran cold and he broke out in a sweat, there were hundreds of reapers, possibly thousands, if even three got through it would be over.
Suddenly a stray laser hit the relay aligner, and caused the image to fracture and distort, the first two reapers reached the relay on their end and disappeared in a flash of light, but did not reappear in the citadel, the relay sparked and shut down, and the Normandy fired one last Thannik blast at Retribution, the laser gutted the heavily damaged reaper through the center, it split down the middle and exploded, sending debris scattering throughout the space inside the citadel, the arms slowly opened, revealing the carnage outside, EDI suddenly spoke up.
"Incoming transmission from Retribution's remains, very faint and fading fast.". The mechanical yet intimidating voice echoed through the ship's speakers.
"This is only a small delay, a futile attempt at delaying the inevitable, we will continue to come until you are destroyed, more are coming,
you will fall before them.". As the voice faded it said it's final words.
"We will not stop, you will be overwhelmed by our might.". Then Retribution died. Outside the citadel, retribution Omega was retreating through the relay that it had come from and the majority of the surviving Geth and Collector ships were following, out of three hundred, only sixty-some survived the battle, but the alliance and it's allies fared little better, only seventy ships remained and they all were damaged, but the second battle for the citadel had been won.
Anderson and Shepard met on the Normandy, in the conference room, Anderson's council uniform was stained with sweat and several tears ran up the sleeves, a bandaged cut on his forehead and arm were the only other signs of the battle.
"That was too close Shepard.".
"I agree, we need to find a better way to destroy them, or we will not win this war.". Anderson nodded solemnly, Shepard shifted his weight.
"How long do you think we have until the rest of the reapers arrive here?". Anderson shrugged and leaned back against the wall.
"Well, if the image you saw in the mass relay is accurate, the stars in the background place them at somewhere between ten to thirty light-years away, so we have maybe six, seven months.". Shepard and Anderson both sighed, this war was going to be long and harsh, and they may not survive, but they would try their best to stop the coming storm.
Anderson left soon after and Shepard was about to retire to his quarters when Joker called him up to the bridge.
"What is it Joker?". The pilot turned around in his chair.
"You remember those two reapers that seemed to go through the relay just after it was hit?". Shepard nodded.
"Well, we may have found them, or at least half of them.". He held up a schematic, two half destroyed reapers floated in space around the human border colony, Far Reaching, in the Terminus systems.
"There are is already a Alliance battle-group guarding them, they are waiting on us.". Shepard grinned.
"Well, let's not keep them waiting.". Within seconds the Normandy had entered the relay and was on it's way.
Shepard stood on the bridge, watching space race by, and for the first time in days, hope was rekindled in his heart, maybe they could win this war after all.
That is the end of this fanfic, I hope you enjoyed it and please comment, I would also like to know if you people think I should do a sequel , please let me know, for now, I am working on either a Lord of The Rings fanfic or something else, check that out in a few days.
Bye for now,
DN24k