"Typical."

The salarian grunted and shifted his satchel to the other shoulder; not an easy feat when clinging to a slippery ladder that seemed to tilt back a few degrees from vertical. As usual, I'm the only one who can think ahead, he fumed to himself. I'm the only one who can figure out that broadcasting a signal through fifteen feet of reinforced concrete requires more than a dinky little personal radio. I'm the only one who can operate the central comms station. He shoved the grating blocking the top of the ladder and climbed out of the access shaft into the main array's base. And of course, I'm the only one that bothers to check if the thing is actually working before powering it up.

It wasn't working, and now he could smell why. The chamber floor was covered with big puddles of acrid-smelling pinkish water, obviously the product of a coolant leak. He shielded his eyes from the ever-present drips and looked up along the retracted antenna to the top of the shaft. Bright halogen floodlights illuminated a menacing pillar of dull black metal that rose at least eighty feet up into mist. Somewhere up there, a coolant pipe had burst, and he was going to have to find a way to patch it if they ever wanted a ride off this hellacious furnace of a planet. The daytime temperature was now up to lead-melting extremes and nothing metal would survive for long out there. He reached up to his ear and keyed his mic.

"Captain, there's a refrigerant leak up here. The electronics will turn to slush if we try to extend the antenna and make a transmission."

"Then fix it," came Chara's exasperated voice. The salarian hissed in disgust and closed the channel, unable to think of anything to say that wouldn't lead to a fight.

"Once I get that fucking payoff, I'm going far away from her and the rest of this sub-zero IQ circus," he muttered to himself,

There was another ladder set into the wall, with service platforms around the antenna at several levels. Sevvalt wrapped his fingers around its ferrocrete rungs and was about to start another climb when a particularly large droplet splashed all over his face. He cursed and staggered back, wiping the liquid from his eyes. He hefted his gun in one hand and squinted into the haze, trying to pinpoint what triggered it.

One of the metal platforms creaked and sprung suddenly as though a heavy weight had been catapulted off it.

Slowly, the gun's stock came up to the salarian's shoulder. He swept the barrel from one platform to the next as he slowly thumbed the safety off. "Where are you, fucker?" he murmered. Just one twitch, one breath of movement above and he'd have the bastard dead to rights.

Something landed in the puddles behind him, sending spray all over the back of his legs. He whipped around with lightning speed, finger already depressing the trigger.

Not fast enough.

"He's been up there long enough, do you think he fixed the antenna?"

Korac shifted around on the crate he sat upon, gesturing towards the access hatch in the ceiling with one hand. "He could… .he could be in trouble, maybe."

"Oh no, what a terrible concept," Wrex deadpanned. He was carving designs into the steel of the control room door with one hand, idly tracing out krogan runes and little happy faces.

Looking up from the files she was reading, Chara glanced at the dark opening, then back to the holoscreen. "He's taken his damn comms bud out again. Give him five minutes and hit the power switch; that'll get his attention." She scrolled down through the base's transmission logs. Nothing had been sent since the antenna was retracted for the planetary day cycle, She grabbed the human girl and dragged her in front of the screen, pointing accusingly. "You haven't sent any messages to Regional Command about having the package and you haven't received any messages from prospective buyers. Why?"

"No-nobody knows about it yet," the woman stammered. "Velorum didn't want to share the money with anyone else. He had plainclothes pick up the volus when he was supposedly on vacation and issue the old 'batarian kidnapping' scam."

"What a fantastic idea that turned out to be," Chara waved a hand over her body. "considering we're speaking face-to-face. You idiots consider yourself lucky if we can return this to the owner before the Eclipse start an intergalactic gang war to get it for themselves."

"Is that really likely?" Korac inquired. "I thought the Suns, Eclipse and Blood Pack all had their territories worked out years ago."

Chara turned and held up the case that had been sitting innocently by her legs. "This thing threatens nearly a quarter of their revenue. Every gambling machine will become a free money fountain if this program hits the extranet. They absolutely WILL go to war over this. Hell, someone else already has."

From across the room, Wrex's raised voice boomed out, "I told ya, I don't think that our boy here is interested in the case at all. He's probably settled his score and on his way home now to kick back and-"

A loud thump reverberated from the ceiling. Korac was on his feet in a heartbeat, snatching up his rifle. Chara turned to face the open hole, pushing the human behind her as Wrex slowly advanced on the centre of the room. Muffled sounds, wet and repetitive, issued from the darkness beyond the hexagonal hatch. It sounded like someone was sitting next to the upper hatch some ten feet above, shuffling a bag of steaks around. The Turian slowly brought his rifle up until the muzzle was sticking into the hatchway.

"I think we should ask Sevvalt what he's doing up there," he hissed. Wrex pulled a grenade from his belt and stuck one thick finger through the safety pin.

"If I don't like the answer, I'm giving him an earful of my own."

"All right, count of three. One… two…"

A black shape hurtled through the open door and struck the tip of Korac's rifle hard enough to pull him over. The turian yelled and Wrex staggered backwards, gaping at the slick mass of goo and shapes underneath the turian. Chara flinched and lifted her arm up to shield her face. She saw a grenade fly up through the opening and closed her eyes against the blast. After the splat and earthshaking boom came dead silence.

"Oh spirits, what is… what is all this?"

Chara peeked through her fingers at the thing sprawled out on the floor as Korac picked himself up off of it. It was dark brownish black with deep greenish fluid smeared over it and she could make four limbs with elongated fingers and a long, slender-

"Goddess help us."

Now she could see the corpse tangled up in itself on the floor in front of her. There was no mistaking who it was. Chara wrapped a hand around her own throat to keep her food down; the human woman turned around and let herself go all over one of the consoles. Her heaving sounds did nothing to ease the asari's discomfort.

"Where is his skin? Who does this kind of thing?" Korac was moaning as he viciously pulled back the cocking lever on his Widow. He glanced at Sevvalt's body and dry heaved.

"Looks like I was wrong," Wrex rumbled, eyes widened. "He sure did a number on your friend there." The krogan's unflappable composure had just been flapped. Wrex looked up at the ceiling and racked the slide on his shotgun. "I think the blast got him."

As if in response, the salarian's bloodied helmet dropped through the opening and clattered onto the floor.

Korac roared and fired through the tiles, the armor-piercing steel splinters shredding them like paper. He loosed off three rounds before Wrex and Chara joined in, a hail of shotgun pellets and rifle shots tearing up the ceiling around the hatch, sending plexene-chip snow and sparks everywhere. All three magazines were empty barely three seconds later, complete stillness settling over the room as flakes of tile and metal drifted down over them. The entire reinforced steel hatch frame and door ripped through the damaged celing and crashed down onto the body below, then all was quiet again.

"Not dead," Korac muttered, fishing around in one of his hip pouches for a new thermal clip. "We're not that lucky."

Wrex was about to say something when a bellow sounded from above them. Four rage-blinded krogan could not hope to match it in intensity and malice. As it trailed off and died out, the three remaining mercenaries looked from one to the other with uncertainty and shock written on their faces. It was the quiet, devastated voice of the human, Jez, which finally drew all their attention.

"There's an orbital shuttle in the Number Three docking bay. I think we should go check it out. Immediately."