Gunnery Chief Williams adjusted the heavily modified assault-rifle in her hands.
The Commander was having them go in hot, dock or not.
She glanced at the two other members of the squad, both aliens. She didn't like it, but the Commander's reasoning was sound, he had been sure to come to her before the actual briefing and explained who he was taking and why to her.
"Equalizing interior pressure with exterior atmosphere," the Chief was reminded why she didn't care for the Normandy's VI, "Logged: The commanding officer is ashore, navigator Pressley has the deck."
With a pop and a hiss, the exterior door of the Normandy slid open and Mason stepped out of the Normandy quickly, his body flaring blue for just a moment before a strange distortion settled around him.
The Krogan, Wrex, followed closely behind him to the right, Doctor T'Soni and Williams followed behind them.
Ash knew why they were doing this, with that biotic field of his up and his enhanced shielding, Shepard could reasonably expect to survive most any suprise attack with minimal damage. Their resident tank as Shepard called him, the nickname brought a small grin to Chief William's face, was there to cover him if things suddenly got hot.
Even though the Normandy's sensors showed nothing out there except a single guy, human even.
To some, it might've seemed a bit paranoid, but one look at the Commander's uncovered face reminded her, 'He got those from not being careful and almost paranoid.'
Mason was the only one of the group that didn't have his gun out, which confused the Gunnery Chief some.
His hardsuit's boots made declamatory thuds against the concrete as he strode down the dock straight to the man standing there.
I didn't pay much attention as the man spoke to Mason, I was mostly scanning the area behind the guy. Shepard was uneasy, and that made the rest of us uneasy.
A glimpse of black against the gray concrete caught my eye, "Shit!"
Mason snatched the front of the man's shirt and threw him aside as a pink-red flare flew through the air where the colonist had stood moments before. My rifle snapped up and I fired a staccatto of shots into the fool Shock Trooper as the blast connected with Shepard's shielding.
The unique sound of Mason's custom-modified pistol, a freakish half-second -pattapat- , and a triple burst of green appeared on the Shock Troopers flashlight head before melting away into a puddle of green.
I didn't take time to enjoy the view and dove behind one of several crates for cover.
"Liara. Singularity, at the doorway. On three. Ash, Wrex, waste 'em. I'm going straight down the middle with mines," Wrex and me gave affirmative grunts, and Miss Greenhorn Alien practically squeeked before acknowledging.
"One." 'Safety's off,' I could see Mason out of the corner of my eye, taking cover behind a crate, the colonist wedged between him, the low wall, and the box.
"Two." The commander flipped the pistol to his left hand and pulled out the other that he had in place of a shotgun.
"Three."
Sometimes it scared me how good Shepard was. He had been expecting that ambush, and the second one of the two stalkers that followed it.
But I always reminded myself with a smile, 'He's one my side.'
As it was, the four of us were jogging up toward the colony, our saved colonist stuck in the middle of the four of us. Crumpled geth shells behind us.
The colonists chatter reached our ears before we reached their barricade. Shepard stopped just past it and jerked his head at 'our' colonist, his voice deep and commanding, "Go."
As he ran off, Mason turned his head to the colonist nearest to him, "Where's Fai Dan?"
The colonist pointed, "You can go straight through the frieghter, you can't miss him."
Shepard started jogging again, the rest of us following without complaint. I tried to tune out the colonists scared comments the fear in their voices as we moved quickly to the other side of the frieghter.
Mason slid to a halt in front of an older man with a shaved head and big ears, the man spoke before Mason could, "Commander! I'm glad they finally sent someone to help us."
The woman in a hardsuit beside him spoke up, "You're a bit late aren't you?"
"Arceilia!" The man snapped at her, couldn't really blame him, then turned back to us, "I'm sorry, everyone's been on edge since-"
A faint noise caught my attention, my head jerked away from Fai Dan even as Arceilia brought her gun up and shouted, "Look out!"
Our guns popped up, Mason swapping his pistols for his sniper rifle as Fai Dan shouted out to the colony, "Get in the tower! Protect the heart of the colony!"
"Wrex." One word and the krogan sprung into action, the distorted blue field of a biotic barrier enhancing his already impressive shields as he stepped straight into the line of fire.
The mass accelerated rounds slammed into his shielding as he stepped forward, Shepard right behind him with his rifle actually mounted over the Krogan's shoulder. T'Soni and I flanked the pair as Mason's rifle boomed, T'Soni flared blue-er than usual and threw out her arm, a number of geth flew into the air when the following field slammed into them.
I gleefully pumped rounds into the airborne geth, idly noting that the shot Mason got off nearly cleaved a geth in two.
The synthetics fell quickly under our combined fire-power, but the Commander didn't stop, "Williams, shotgun, you're with me on point. Wrex, assault rifle, rear gaurd. Liara, stasis fields and lifts."
Swapping guns as I jogged up beside the Commander I tried to figure this man out, all smiles and jokes on the Normandy or Citadel, those dead sexy smirks and sarcastic comments when there's nothing around to shoot, but something pops up-
My musings were interrupted by a mans terrified screams, "Don't let me die! Please! Don't let me die!"
Shepard exhaled harshly and flared blue, the distorted field surrounding him as the two of us ran up the stairs.
Mason skidded to a halt in front of the door a moment before I did and was rewarded with a carage shot in the chest from a grateful geth.
I lunged into the space and spun on my heel, firing my shotgun once, twice into the shock troopers chest before it could recover. Dropping it like the hunk of slag it was.
Suddenly I felt myself falling backwards and hitting something hard, a flash of red painting my vision with spots.
The pressure around me suddenly changed with a -THOOM-.
For a moment I thought I'd been shot and waited for the pain, slumping against the wall I was leaning against.
"Williams," I felt myself literally hoisted to my feet by the collar of my hardsuit, "As enticing as having your backside pressed against me is, we've still got work to do."
I stood shakily and looked behind me to see Mason with his rifle in one hand as the other dropped to his side.
Okay... so I wasn't hurt...
A quick glance around revealed two holes in the walls. One in the pillar behind me, a geth sniper round if I recognized it properly, which would account for the flash of red. The other was about the size of my fist straight through the concrete wall beside the door, only Mason't gun could shoot like that.
I put two and two together. Mason saw the sniper beam at my head, yanked me out of the way just in time, then shot one handed through the wall. The shrapnel from the round going through the wall would've killed the geth.
Me, in all my grand stupidity, thought I got shot and had slumped against him. Great. Just shoot me now.
"Right Commander." I could feel the heat on my cheeks.
Shepard moved quietly through the doorway, 'Jeez, I have a hard enough time because I'm a Williams... now I've got to embarass myself in front of him by doing stuff like that!?'
He waved me and the aliens forward, once again with him at point. After a pair of turns I noticed a red dot on my radar, "Commander?"
"I see it," the rifle shifted in his hands some, "Hold here for just a sec."
He slid forward, silent and low to the ground, the splotchy gray paint-job on his suit blending in well with the concrete around him. I did my best to keep an eye on him as he crept around a bend, but even then I almost lost sight of him.
Mason moved up an incline to our right in the large room, there was a lot of open space around us, which would make the shotgun useless, I switched over to my assault rifle, holding it close as I waited for Shepards orders.
Suddenly the TEAM-COM clicked on, "Liara, how far from yourself can you set up a singularity?"
I could practically hear the blue alien beside me think it over before replying, "About twenty-five meters Commander."
"Good. Wrex, Williams, you to are going to pop out here and start shooting at anything that moves, Liara, you're behind them, I want you to put a singularity at the end of the hall, it's approximately twenty meters."
I keyed my com and could hear the other two do the same, "Roger."
"On my mark."
This time, I wouldn't embarass myself in front of him, or these two aliens either, I would do better this time, I would.
"Mark."
The three of us burst from the cover of the wall into the room, heralded by the booming sound of Mason's rifle.
T'Soni stayed behind Wrex and me as the two of us unloaded into the geth in front of us. I couldn't help but grin as a blue sun appeared at the end of the hall, and almost every geth in the room flew into orbit around it. Talk about fish in a barrel.
As Wrex and I pumped rounds into the damn synthetics, Shepard's booming rifle could be heard over all other sounds in the large room, echoing several times over with each shot. I didn't bother to see what he was shooting at, I knew he would be keeping us out of harms way.
When the sounds of gunfire died down and the slag metal that used to be geth fell to the ground, the characteristic whine of a geth dropship was finally noticable.
I looked up to see the sizeable ship hover just above us, "Well... shit..."
Suddenly, I heard several loud 'Ka-pchunk' s. And almost exactly like Ferros, a number of geth troopers fell to the ground in front of us.
As I raised my gun to open fire, a blue distortion flew through the air to my right and landed in the center of the synthetics, knocking the mess of them off their feet and into the surrounding walls, I actually winced from some of the crunching sounds that came from the impact as some of the geth litterally folded in half.
A quick glance up confirmed what my ears were telling me: The dropship was leaving.
I turned back to thank T'Soni, it was a pretty good job, but I stopped when I saw her. She was staring, mouth slightly open, off to the side. I followed her gaze to find the Commander at the other end, walking calmly down the incline towards us as he holstered his sniper-rifle.
"Uh... Commander?"
He finished the sentance for me, "Why didn't I do that earlier?"
"Well... yeah, why?"
"Because if I had, then I wouldn't have been able to do it when the dropship dropped its' little present for us. I was saving it in case of that," he waved a hand at one of the geth corpses in the room.
"Oh..." 'Does he always think a step ahead?'
The krogan startled me out of my musing with deep voice of his, "Are we gonna bother telling that guy that the geth've been dealt with before we get going?"
"Yeah, we are," Shepard looked over at Wrex, the grin in his voice even if you couldn't see it through his faceplate, "Because they might know where to go after this."
A.N.): Sorry this one took a bit longer, couldn't figure out how to start it. Anyways, on to the next chapter!
P.S. Reviews are loved! Digital cookies for everybody (who reviewed)!