Chapter 8

The Beacon

Hm, the last chapter didn't get as many reviews as the ones before it, oh well. Halo Reach draws ever closer, I'm upset to hear that Bungie will stop making Halo games after this, sigh here's to Bungie, may you go out with a bang

"What the hell are these things?" Taylor shouted over the roar of the Warthog's turret. Rebecca was driving as fast as the Warthog would allow, heading for the dig site where the beacon was. Taylor was firing the Warthogs turret, at what appeared to be machines with an organic shape. They were swarming every last Human establishment in sight, shooting every last person that they saw, soldier of civilian.

"I recognize them from a file I read!" Rebecca shouted "They're Geth!"

"Those self-aware machines that the Quarians created?" Taylor asked "Well this is going to be just great for their public image!" he said sarcastically.

"Worry about that later!" Rebecca told Taylor, as she drove the Warthog through a field of grain, crushing the plants underneath the tires "We need to get to that beacon, we're not that far!"

"Good!" Taylor replied, downing a silver Geth with the turret "The sooner this is over the..." Taylor paused as he spotted a red Geth, aiming what looked like a rocket launcher at the Warthog. "Shit!" Taylor swore as he brought the turret around, spraying bullets at the Geth. The Geth's shields failed, and the Geth itself collapsed, but not before it had managed to fire a rocket. "ROCKET!" Taylor roared "JUMP!" Both he and Rebecca jumped out of the Warthog, just a few seconds before the rocket slammed into the side of it.

The Warthog exploded, rolling over several times before it finally came to a stop, upside down and on fire. "Damn it," Rebecca muttered as she got to her feet, taking her shotgun off of her back. "I guess we're walking the rest of the way," she said to Taylor, as he removed his DMR from his back. Taylor nodded as they both moved forward, under the cover of the grain. "This should be it," Rebecca said, as she and Taylor looked over the edge of a small cliff at the dig site. It was empty.

"Fuck," Taylor swore "It's not here anymore." He turned to face Rebecca "Who do you think took it, the Geth or our people?"

"No clue," Rebecca said honestly "We should move up to the camp," she said, pointing away from the dig site and towards a hill. "If it's still on this planet it'll be there."

"Alright, let's move," Taylor said as he and Rebecca began to sprint up the hill and towards the camp.

Not too far away, Shepard and his squad were advancing on the dig site. "It should be at the end of this trench," Ashley said, as she, Kaiden and Shepard, all advanced towards the dig site.

"Things aren't looking too good here Shepard," Nihlus said over the COM lines "There's some burned out buildings, and a lot of bodies. I'm going to check it out, I'll catch up with you at the dig site."

"Contact!" Kaiden shouted, as he dove behind a rock, Shepard and Ashley taking cover behind a destroyed Warthog. Three Geth Troopers approached them, firing their rifles at the positions of the three ODSTs. Ashley leaned out of cover, and threw a plasma grenade at one of the Geth. The grenade stuck to the Geth's arm and detonated, destroying it. A dark blue aura appeared around Kaiden as he exited cover and extended his arm. Both remaining Geth were enveloped by a similar aura, and floating helplessly in the air, as if gravity no longer affected them. Lining the Geth up, Shepard fired his battle rifle, eliminating both Geth.

"The dig site should be right up ahead," Kaiden, as the three of them sprinted forward and into the dig site. "What the... there's nothing here?"

"Shit," Ashley swore softly "Either the Geth took it, or it was moved."

"I've got a bad feeling about this," Shepard said in a worried voice "Weren't there supposed to be hundreds of Marines and ODSTs stationed at this colony."

"Oh son of a..." Kaiden said, as he looked behind Shepard "There's a couple of them right there." Shepard and Ashley turned around to see three Marines impaled on giant spikes.

"Jesus," Ashley muttered as they approached them "No respect for the dead." As they approached the spikes they lowered and the bodies on it began to move. "Are they still alive?" she said as the bodies detached themselves from the spikes.

"What did the Geth do to them?" Kaiden said, as he got a good look at the bodies. The flesh had decayed to a sickly gray, and glowing blue cybernetics were visible through openings in the flesh. The creatures attempted to rush the ODSTs, but were quickly cut down by concentrated fire.

"I don't know what's going on here," Shepard said, looking at Ashley and Kaiden "But we need to find that beacon if it's still here, or where it is if it isn't. The longer we stick around the farther away it can get from here."

"Change of plans Shepard," came Nihlus's voice over the COM lines "There's a small spaceport up ahead, I want to check it out. I'll be meet you there."

"Alright," Shepard said, looking at his squad mates "Let's get to that spaceport."

Nihlus slid into cover behind a crate as he approached the spaceport. Pointing his rifle out of cover, he quickly scanned the port, and saw a Turian standing there. "Saren?" the Spectre said in a surprised voice.

The Turian turned to face Nihlus. "Nihlus," he replied as he began to walk towards him.

"This isn't your mission Saren, what are you doing here?" Nihlus asked as Saren approached him.

"The Council thought that you could use some help on this one," Saren said as he placed a comforting hand on Nihlus' shoulder.

Nihlus let out a sigh, and turned around to look at several burning buildings. "I wasn't expecting the Geth, the situation's bad," he said in a worried voice.

"Don't worry," Saren said, as he drew a pistol, aiming it at Nihlus' back "I've got it under control," he said as he pulled the trigger. The shot impacted on Nihlus' barriers, and two more followed. As Nihlus wheeled around in response to the shots, a fourth shot slammed into his chest, piercing a lung and causing Nihlus to drop his rifle. Despite the injury, Nihlus charged at Saren, attempting to wrestle the gun from his grip, but Saren's fist connected with the side of Nihlus' temple, knocking him out.

"Nothing personal Nihlus," Saren said as he aimed his pistol as Nihlus' head. "But I can't have any witnesses." His finger tensed on the trigger, but before he could pull it, a bullet slammed into it, blowing the pistol out of his hand. Saren looked around widely, trying to see where the shot came from. When he was unable to, knowing it was suicide to fight a hidden sniper, he quickly climbed onto the nearby cargo train and, slammed on the controls that activated it. As the train sped off, he allowed himself a small smile.

'More likely than not I would have had to abandon my position as Spectre, I would have been caught in the act sooner or later,' he thought. 'Besides Nihlus has a pierced lung an a concussion, the chances of him surviving are low, and I'll just deny any testimony from a Human. I will simply say that they are delirious from the invasion, the Council still doesn't trust them so everything will work in my favor.' He registered the urge to laugh, the Council's narrow minded tendencies was going to easy.

"Why did you shoot the pistol, why didn't you shoot him in the head?" Rebecca asked as she and Taylor ran towards the wounded Turian. "If you had done that he might not have gotten away."

"Yeah, but it might have caused him to clench down on the trigger, and the other Turian would be dead," he replied as they crouched down beside the wounded Turian. "You got any Medi-gel?" he asked.

"No, just some Biofoam, but it should do the job," Rebecca said as she pulled a canister out of her backpack. She inserted the tip into the hole in the Turian's armor and pulled the trigger. The white foam was injected into the Turians wound, filling the hole and holding the lung in place. "Well, that should hold together for six hours," Rebecca said as she threw the empty canister to the side "We have to get him to a proper medical facility before then."

"Yeah," Taylor said as her looked around at the destroyed colony "Good like finding one of those around here. What we need to do is..." Taylor stopped when he heard what sounded like a crate being overturned.

"Who's there?" Rebecca shouted pointing her shotgun at the crate that the noise had come from. A nervous looking dock worker stood up from behind the crate, holding his hands above his head.

"Don't shoot, I'm not a Geth," he said in a panicked voice.

"What were you doing back there?" Taylor asked, looking at the dock worker.

"I was..." the worker said, rubbing his neck in embarrassment "Taking a nap. When I woke up everything was going to hell and I'm just glad that that other Turian didn't find be back here."

"You saw that?" Rebecca said, lowering her shotgun "Is there any chance that you saw anything else?"

"Um yeah," the worker said as he rubbed his temples "They were talking, I think that they knew each other. I heard that one," he pointed to the unconscious Turian "Call the other one Saren. He let his guard down, and Saren just shot him in the back."

"None of this makes sense," Taylor said as he looked around "The Geth pop up, Turians killed each other," Taylor paused as he looked off on the distance "There's that too," he said pointing towards a distant hill. Rebecca turned and saw a massive ship in the distant. "What the Hell is that thing?" Taylor asked.

"It looks like a ship," Rebecca said, looking at the ship. "God damn it, it's the size of dreadnought." As the spoke, the ship lifted off, leaving a trail of reddish smoke behind.

"Did you see the size of that thing?" came a voice from behind Taylor and Rebecca. Both of them wheeled around to see three other ODSTs standing behind them. "Who are you?" the center one asked in deep male voice. "What the-what happened to Nihlus?" he said, pointing at the unconscious Turian.

"Another Turian called Saren shot him," Rebecca said "As for who we are, I'm Lance Corporal Rebecca Frost."

"Specialist Taylor Winters," Taylor said "We sealed up Nihlus with Biofoam, he'll be alright. Saren jumped on that train and took off. If you're looking for the Prothean beacon then it's probably over there somewhere."

"Alright," said the ODST "I'm Commander Shepard, we were supposed to be the team to pick up the beacon when the Geth attacked. We'll go after the beacon, keep an eye on Nihlus, we'll be right back."

"Got it," Taylor said as Rebecca nodded. "You know someplace safe that you can lay until this is all over?" he asked, looking at the dock worker. The worker nodded before running off, obviously eager to be gone.

Taylor and Rebecca watched as Shepard and the other two ODSTs climbed onto a cargo train, and sped off. Taylor sighed as he looked at Nihlus. "Eden Prime is never going to be the same again," he muttered.

After five minutes of travel, the train came to a stop and the passengers disembarked. As they did so, they spotted a blinking canister not to far away. "Demolition charges!" Kaiden shouted as Shepard ran towards the canister, and opened a hatch. After a few seconds of work, the charge ceased to blink, having been disarmed.

"There's bound to be more than that, we need to get moving!" Ashley shouted as Shepard stood up and the three of them ran up the nearby stairs. A Geth with an assault rifle aimed at them as they came up the stairs, but Shepard destroyed it with three well placed bursts.

Emerging onto a set of catwalks, the squad fired on a small group of Geth, causing two to fall, the other two quick to follow. "Looks like they were in a hurry," Shepard said as he ran to the end of the the catwalk and disarmed the bomb there. "There weren't that many charges."

"Commander," Kaiden said, pointing "Look it's the beacon." Shepard and Ashley looked where Kaiden was pointing and, sure enough, the beacon was there, glowing dimly. "It's still here, and by the looks of it, it's been activated," Kaiden said looking at the beacon as Shepard pressed his hand to his COM unit.

"Roger Normandy, standing by," Shepard said as he took his hand away from his COM unit.

Ashley approached the beacon slowly, squinting at the odd green light it was giving off. Without warning, the beacon flashed and a strange force began to pull Ashley in. Noticing this, Shepard rushed forward, wrapping his arms around Ashley's waist and threw her away from the beacon. Unfortunately, the beacon pulled him towards itself and he floated a few inches off of the ground, shaking as if he had a seizure.

He couldn't think, he couldn't hear, and all that he could see, was image after image rushing through his head, more and faster than he could handle. He felt his jaw clench and his fists tighten, as beacon exploded in front of him, and he descended into darkness.

Well Shepard has found the Prothean beacon and it has inconveniently exploded greaaaaat. Sorry if updates are coming a little slow, my brain is moving a little slowly as of late and I sometimes have to force these things out, so be patient. Next chapter we're going to the Citadel, I'm sure we're all looking forward to Udina's bitching (I was being sarcastic FYI) As always please review.