Chapter Three
The Beacon

"Beyond the boundaries of your city's lights.
Stand the heroes waiting for your cries.
So many times you did not bring this on yourself.
When that moment finally comes, I'll be there to help.
And on that day, when you need your brothers and sisters to care.
I'll be right here."

3 Doors Down: Citizen/Soldier

Nihlus Kryik, Council Spectre moved swiftly through wreckage that marked the outer perimeter of Constant, the colony world's capital. He'd already determined that the beacon had been moved from the dig site, which meant it's most likely destination was the colony world's only spaceport.

Said move was likely the only thing that had saved the lives of the science team, at the expense of two companies of dead and dying Alliance Marines - whose bodies now decorated the landscape where they fell or held aloft upon extendable spikes for reasons known only to the Geth.

Intel on the Quarian-designed synthetic race was centuries old and sketchy at best, as no one who had ever gone into the Perseus Veil to spy on them - not even the Salarian Union's vaunted Special Tasks Group, upon whom the Spectres had been based - had ever returned alive to tell the tale in the last two hundred years since they drove their former masters out.

He'd heard the hushed whispers of the scientists in the storage shed they were hiding and assumed they had been much more quiet when the Geth had been there, or their bodies would have been impaled upon spikes as well. The Turian paid their predicament little mind, their comfort and safety was not his problem. He was a Spectre on a mission from the Citadel Council. He may hold humanity's potential as a race in higher regard than his former mentor, Saren Arterius, but rescuing civilians would slow him down. He had a mission to complete and any other objective - however laudable – did not even come close to secondary on his list of priorities..

He'd been slowed down enough by Geth patrols, only one of which had gotten close enough to him to bother engaging with directly, but maneuvering around the others had cost him precious time, during which the beacon might be lost. It had to be the Geth's objective as well, as this colony held nothing else that might be of value to the rogue synthetics.

He hadn't faced such an implacable opponent since he'd run afoul of a Justicar on a colony world not terribly different than this one on the fringes of Asari space . She'd hounded him for nearly a week after he'd taken out the suspected Eclipse agents he'd been sent to "deal with" for passing defense schematics to the Batarians. He'd dispatched them and recovered not only the schematics, but patrol data for the Citadel fleet, itself.

The Justicar had obviously seen them as the peaceful farmers they'd passed themselves off as and her code required she avenge them by killing him. The only way he'd been able to escape was to set another farm house ablaze and the family inside with the full knowledge that the same Justicar code would compel her to divert from killing him to rescue the innocents trapped within. The three hour head start had allowed him to get to his small scout ship and clear atmosphere. He'd never even learned her name.

Saren Arterius, would certainly not have approved of his own nominee, Lt. Commander Beckett. Nihlus never understood Saren's deep-seated hatred of humanity. The Relay 314 Incident had been twenty six human standard years ago, and had lasted little more than a few months before the Citadel Council stepped in, nor had Saren taken part in the conflict, having barely been at the age of enlistment in the Turian armed forces when the Council ordered the cessation of hostilities.

He'd been impressed by Beckett's drive to protect the innocent colonists of Elysium against overwhelming odds during the what her people called the Skyllian Blitz. She'd organized the civilians and few remaining Marines into a ragtag militia and beaten the slavers back multiple times. By the end, she'd held off the final wave of attackers who'd penetrated their meager defenses virtually single-handed, before the Alliance frigate SSV Agincourt arrived to relieve them.

This mission would be the first of many together, during which he would evaluate her readiness to join Special Tactics and Recon. He didn't care that she was human, only that she had what it took to be a Spectre.

He'd continually passed along his progress to Beckett's team, but had only received a terse double click from her helmet mic in response to the first two the rest had been met with static, which was not surprising. The possibility of frequency jamming by the Geth – once he'd identified them as the aggressor force – was not out of character for what little was known of the synthetics. They'd maintained a constant level of frequency jamming from the Veil to this day.

Nihlus was shaken from his reverie when he heard movement up ahead in the spaceport, which set all of his senses on high alert. He ejected the nearly spent thermal clip from his Phaeston Mk IV assault rifle and moved into the cargo loading docks of the spaceport where he spotted the a very familiar profile of another Turian standing amidst the wreckage of shattered cargo containers and human bodies.

"Saren!" he shouted, unable to believe his good fortune. Though he was well trained and disciplined for fighting alone - which he preferred, unlike many of his people. He hadn't lied when he'd explained to the young private that he did his best work alone, though such "lone wolf tendencies" as the humans called it were unusual for the majority of Turians. He'd wiped out an entire platoon of Batarian slavers single-handed early on in his career.

"Nihlus," Saren replied with his characteristic lack of inflection, as if he'd barely been recognized by his former mentor.

"This isn't your mission Saren," Nihlus stated, confused by his presence at a human colony. He certainly would not have answered their distress call had he received it. "What are you doing here?"

Saren clasped a hand on Nihlus shoulder then stepped away, as he'd often done when imparting some small, but important piece of information about his performance. He still remembered such critiques fondly from the living Spectre legend.

"The Council thought you could use some help on this one," Saren replied, almost sadly.

"I wasn't expecting to find Geth here," Nihlus said turning his back to his former mentor who had never once betrayed him, falling into his former role of reporting to his superior, "the situation's bad."

"Don't worry, I've got it under control." Saren stated calmly to Nihlus' back as he brought his pistol up and fired a single sledgehammer round into the back of his head, killing him instantly, then turned to the Geth prime who materialized at his side without a second thought.

"Move into the spaceport, kill any humans who get in the way and secure the beacon."

When Castle led Beckett and Esposito into the dig site, only to find the beacon gone, he was astonished. He'd known they'd been planning to move it, but the original timetable had been weeks away while most of the farmers were busy bringing in the harvest. Obviously something had transpired at the dig-site to move up the timetable – which certainly explained the presence of the Normandy crew, though from Beckett's equally perplexed expression, it was clear that she had been tasked to go to the dig-site to retrieve the beacon, not the spaceport, or they might not have linked up.

He knew that Manuel, Dr. Warren's assistant had become increasingly twitchy and paranoid since the beacon had been unearthed, so it was possible that she had moved the timetable forward to get him away from the thing. As smart as the amateur archaeologist was, her specialization was more cultural anthropology than paleo-technology and knew she was out of her depth with this sort of find.

They moved up the ramp to the science team's camp to find the Geth had turned it into a charnal house of horrors. The two trailers that had been placed to house Dr. Warren and her hastily cobbled together team were smoldering wrecks and three of the cargo modules were battered almost to he point of non-functionality. Human bodies – some of them civilians and some Marines - were impaled upon telescoping spikes, their bodies charred a deep black and blue hue, the sort of thing Castle had only in the horror vids Alexis liked to watch when he was home on leave.

But, to their horror, the worst was yet to come as the telescoping spikes retracted and the bodies that had been impaled upon them rose to their feet like a squad of blue and black undead.

"They're..." Castle stuttered, "They're still alive!"

After the twelve zombie-like husks turned on them and attacked, shock wore off and training took over as first Esposito, then Beckett, then Castle opened fire at close range. It was over in seconds, fists and teeth no match for modern small arms fire. When the firing stopped and the echoes faded, the bodies were barely recognizable as human, but for the few that still bore dog tags around their necks, their identities would likely not be discernible without a DNA sample. Castle knew that this day would factor into his nightmares for years to come.

After releasing Dr Warren and her assistant from the last remaining cargo container - where the Marines had locked them, then moved the other cargo containers into a ring around it, which they had defended to the last man - they collected all of the tags they could find, Castle whispered a a prayer for the men and women he'd served with. There would be time for flags and rifles later. For now he had to complete the mission they had started. The enemy was still out there.

Gunnery Chief Richard Castle, sole survivor of the Fourth of the 212 hefted his Lancer Mk IV with renewed purpose, ejected the spent thermal clip and once again took point. He'd honor his fallen comrades best by hammer-punching those synthetic bastards off Eden Prime.

"Semper Fi," he muttered darkly, his biotics rippling, in silent promise to his fallen comrades-in-arms. They would be avenged, if he had to claw out every one of the synthetic bastards' flashlight heads with his bare hands.

The trio crested the next rise and stopped dead in their tracks at the sight before them. Though much of the skyline of Eden Prime's primary spaceport was very familiar one thing stood out. A gigantic black silhouette, shaped like a massive armored insect rising from the ground on four claw shaped limbs, smaller insectoid Geth drop-ships buzzing around the ground beneath it as it rose into the sky. Castle had gotten a glimpse of it before, when it landed but not from this close. His squad had had much the same reaction to it just before the Geth had hit them again.

"What the fuck is that?" Espo asked, his eyes drawn to a massive black alien shape off in the distance.

"It's a ship!" Beckett husked, her eyes drawn to the massive ship so alien in construction that it defied classification, herself. The single image on the holographic display on Normandy had not done the massive dreadnought sized vessel justice. It was huge and so dark in coloration as if even light shied fearfully away from it.

"Look at the size of it!" Castle muttered in near awe.

All three of them were transfixed at the sight of the gigantic vessel - easily double if not triple the size of even an Everest Class Dreadnought, the largest spacecraft in the alliance navy - as it began to lift itself almost effortlessly from the surface of Eden Prime The raw power of such a vessel to not only be able land on a planet, but lift off again under its own power had all of them deducing at the same time that its element zero core must be enormous to generate a mass effect field sufficient to overcome so much mass.

Shortly after the vessel disappeared into the clouds, they shook off their shock, and moved down into the valley toward the spaceport along the wreckage of the tramway construction project. Only a few Geth herding a small number of the zombie-like human husks were patrolling between them and their objective, which they dispatched rather quickly.

The three farmers who'd hidden in one of the cargo containers had been most forthcoming with information about the attack and the smuggling going on in the docks at the shipyard – after a little bit of less-than-gentle persuasion from Commander Beckett. Castle's respect and admiration for her grew each time she prodded Cole, the skeevy little bastard who seemed to be their unofficial spokesman, trying to hold out on her. Beckett was clearly smart and quick which reminded him of his daughter. Her ability to ferret out lies from even the most subtle of Cole's nonverbal cues was worthy of admiration. With Cole clearly under her thumb, she had the lot of them cowed within minutes.

As they made their way into the shipyard loading docks where cargo shuttles would normally be offloading or loading cargo bound either for the smaller settlements and farms or out into space for the markets in the Sol system, was nearly silent, most of the fighting long since having died down. A single body lay sprawled on the ground, as they grew closer it was clear that the body was that of the Turian that Kate had mentioned earlier during her interrogations of both Dr. Warren and the three farmers hiding in the cargo container, lying face down on the deck, his bluish tinted blood forming a small pool around his head..

"Beckett, it's Nihlus," Espo muttered.

At Castle's blank look, Espo nodded at the corpse. "He was a Spectre who came with us on the Normandy, the Council sent him to oversee the pickup of the beacon."

"I'm no expert on Turian physiology, but it doesn't look like he put up much of a fight," Kate noted, kneeling next to the body, pointing at the single gunshot wound to the back of his head, clearly made at close range given the tell-tale marks from the weapon's mass effect field.

"Almost like he knew his attacker and casually turned his back to him," Castle added to the line of reasoning Beckett had begun.

"Whomever it was had to be somebody he thought he could trust," Kate replied.

Esposito seemed a little confused by the give and take between them. He'd served with Beckett off and on for years, would definitely follow her into hell without hesitation, but they'd never finished each other's sentences.

Before Castle and Beckett could continue theorizing, they heard something rustling behind a few cargo containers that had managed to survive the attack. All three Alliance marines were on their feet, weapons up and at the ready.

"Wait!" a man shouted his hands up in the air as he came out from behind the stacked crates near the cargo loader. "Don't shoot! I'm one of you! I'm human!"

Beckett lowered her weapon, but Castle and Esposito kept theirs firmly trained on him, not yet ready to trust a stranger who had hid while they were being attacked.

"How long have you been hiding behind those crates?" Espo prodded. "Long enough to hear everybody here get slaughtered?"

"I'm just a dockworker!" he complained, "I wasn't armed, not even with a spanner! My name is Powell, I visually inspect the cargo tags. I saw what happened to that Turian... another one shot him."

"You're saying Nihlus was murdered by another Turian?" Beckett asked, her detective's training once again coming to the fore as it had with the farmers earlier.

"The other one got here first," Powell began. "He was waiting when your friend showed up. He called him Saren. "Your friend seemed to relax when he saw him, I think they knew each other. He let his guard down and this Saren killed him. Shot him right in the back. I'm just lucky he didn't see me behind the crates."

"We were told a Prothean beacon was brought to the spaceport," Beckett started, back on the mission, "What happened to it?"

"It's on cargo platform two, on the other side of the dockyards," Powell replied. "Probably where that Saren was going, too. He headed straight for the cargo train right after he killed your friend. I knew that beacon was trouble. Everything's gone to hell since they found it while digging for the monorail. First than damned mothership, then the attack! They killed everyone! Everyone! If I hadn't been behind the damned crates, then I'd be dead too!"

"You're Cole's contact down on the docks for the smuggling ring," Castle blurted out, his weapon not wavering from Powel's center mass.

"What... no..." Powel spluttered, "I mean, what does it matter now? So I'm a smuggler? Who cares? My supervisor's dead... the entire crew's dead... what does it matter?"

Beckett's weapon, which she had allowed to drop in an effort to calm the man suddenly tracked back up to the center of Powell's chest.

"Is there anything hidden nearby that we can use against the Geth?" Kate asked, her voice taking on an icy tone.

"A shipment of grenades came through last week," Powell replied, "nobody notices if a few small pieces go missing from the military orders."

"You greedy son of a bitch!" Castle growled dangerously, taking a step closer to Powell, "We're out here to protect your sorry ass, and the only thing you can think about is how you can rip us off? How many of my Marines died because you shorted our ordinance, you little fuck!?"

Espo put a hand on Castle's chest to hold him back.

"I never thought you'd actually need those grenades," Powell sputtered, doing his best to put Beckett between himself and the barrel of Castle's weapon. "Who'd want to attack Eden Prime? We're just a bunch of farmers... how was I supposed to know?"

"The grenades, Powell," Beckett hissed, silencing Castle with an arched eyebrow, her voice gone from ice to steel, "hand em over... now!"

"They're yours, take em!" Powell moaned remorsefully as he retrieved a crate of anti-materiel disruptor grenades from a storage pod, "I never meant for anyone to get hurt... it was never worth... I'm sorry..."

"Save it Powell," Kate hissed again, "get out of my sight before I change my mind and let Castle sanction you!"

"Take the cargo train, that's where the other Turian went. It's hardwired to default back to here after each run, it should be back by now." Powell said before he slipped behind the maze of cargo containers and disappeared.

Beckett, Castle and Esposito swept cautiously toward the cargo train loading area. Aside from a drone and a small number of Geth mobile platforms, there had been little active resistance, which to Beckett's mind was a bad sign that the synthetics and the Turian who strangely seemed to be in league with them – an odd sock given the Geth's history of shunning organics – had found what they were looking for and were pulling back to make their departure.

The cargo train itself, however was better defended, by multiple Geth combat platforms lead by a Geth Prime.

Castle moved forward into cargo train depot and led the charge, opening up on the Prime with a hail of gunfire, his first three round burst landing square in the center of the light on its head. He hammered at the other Geth guarding the cargo train itself with cold deliberation, dropping two with head shots from his rifle then tearing three more apart with his biotics without so much as slowing his advance. Beckett and Esposito moved up to cover him as he pressed to the cargo train until the last one fell – torn from it's feet by pull then blasted by a warp pulse.

When Castle's breathing had finally returned to mormal , Beckett was already standing at the controls to the train, having taken out two Geth to get there.

"You coming, Castle?" she asked flirtatiously, gallows humor on full display. She knew she should be angry at him for wading into the fight without orders, but he'd exercised personal initiative and kicked ass, so she let it go. She'd dress him down for that stunt later.

Though the Geth put up token resistance after they disembarked, it was clear they were pulling out, finding and dealing with the demo charges left in their wake was a higher priority, both to protect the civilians from the blast and to prevent the beacon from being destroyed.

With the way clear, they descended the gangway onto loading platform B and Castle was immediately transfixed by the massive glowing tower of an active, operational Prothean beacon.

"Look at that!" Castle whispered in ear awe. "Actual working Prothean technology... unbelievable!" It wasn't doing anything like that when Doc Warren dug it up. Something must have activated it."

"Shore party to Normandy," Beckett stated into her helmet's comm. "We've secured the beacon, standing by."

Castle stepped closer to the beacon to get a better look at it, not realizing that a hidden subroutine within the long dormant alien device had activated due to his proximity and is dragged toward the beacon's operational field and lifted from his feet nearly a meter off the ground

"Castle!" Beckett cried out, running toward him only to be restrained by Esposito.

"No!" Espo warned, "Don't touch him! It's too dangerous!"

While Castle is held aloft by the alien device, images are blasted directly into his brain. Images meant for the brain patterns of a long-extinct species. Thoughts, sounds and whispered warnings in an alien tongue for an alien mind of a nightmare scenario fifty thousand years old flashed into his mind - garbled and jumbled as his mind tried and failed to make sense of them - but terrifying in scope. At some point during the process, Castle mercifully blacked out.

Just as the beacon released him, it's power source overloaded and exploded, sending Castle sprawling unconscious to the deck ten feet away. Beckett knelt at his side to asses his condition, thankful to find both a pulse and the signs of breathing while Espo keyed his mic to call the Normandy.

"Shore party, to Normandy, the beacon is a no-go... requesting immediate medi-vac at our location."

**Author's note** Yes, I know what you're gonna say. That cliffhanger was mean. How could you do that to poor Castle after everything he's suffered already? Worry not, dear readers, anyone who has ever played the original Mass Effect (which I've done three times since the last chapter) knows what's coming next. Have a little faith.

This weekend is important for three things:

For my Canadian readers, Friday was Canada Day. For my British readers July 1st was also the 100th anniversary of the Battle of the Somme in World War I, the bloodiest single day in the history of the British Army. And of course for me and my American Friends Monday is the Fourth of July. HAPPY INDEFPENDANCE DAY!

Honor the fallen.