"So now what Commander?"
I glanced over at Chief Williams when she spoke; I appreciated her vocal inclination, as she had voiced my own concerns.
When we had returned to the colony after dealing with the geth's assault, Shepard had gotten a status report from Fai Dan… it hadn't sounded good.
The decision had come quick, we had plenty of medigel, and between the Commander, Chief Williams, and myself, there was a considerable amount of first aid and medical knowledge. The three of us had fanned out through-out the colony and checked up on everyone, treating wounds and figuring out the issues with the colony, which were many. Wrex had been sent back to the dock to check out the geth remains for anything valuable, salvageable, or 'still twitching' as the Commander had put it.
Once we were done, thankfully there were few serious wounds or injured persons, and had given our reports of what was missing or wrong with the community, the Chief had posed her question.
Shepard scowled as he adjusted his omni-tool, most likely reloading it with a medi-gel packet for quick use, "I don't want to waste time, but these people need help, and I don't want a mess of synthetics to suddenly flank us or assault this colony again, and possibly the Normandy. We're going to at very least deal with that damn transmitter and the geth down there, if we can find ways to fix their problems while we're down there, all the better."
The krogan's lips pulled back, baring his teeth and the ridges above his eyes creased, "Sounds fun."
I could practically feel the Gunnery Chief's scowl beside me, I couldn't exactly blame her, the krogan looked fearsome and enraged.
Then Shepard spoke up, his voice clearly amused and teasing, "Oh calm down you two, that's a smile."
We both looked at the Commander disbelievingly, "I'm sorry sir, but… you're kidding right?"
As Wrex chuckled, Shepard shook his head, "Yes Ash, I'm completely sure I know what a krogan's smile looks like, I've seen it enough times… in all honesty, that was almost certainly an elated grin, wasn't it Wrex?"
The corners of said Krogans' lips turned upward and he bared his teeth a little less, "Actually… it was more of… joyous exclamation," his gravelly bass voice was clearly amused, though at what was hard to tell.
I filed away the link between that facial expression and Wrex's explanation of it's meaning. Though I was unsure whether the krogan was being truthful or not, it closely coincided with Shepard's assessment, thus it was likely that it was an accurate definition.
Something beeped, and my eyes caught the holographic reading scrolling along on Mason's visor, "Okay, I've got the schematics, if you'd call them that, of the tunnels Fai Dan was referring to," his emerald eyes darted back and forth behind the face-plate of the environmentally sealed suit, absorbing the information as it flowed across the visor.
After several moments, the screen cleared and those striking eyes focused on the three of us once more, "Alright, let's go."
The tunnels were almost partially rubble, and the sniper in me chaffed at the lack of places for a good shot. Too many angles, to many covered corridors, and a couple too many doors for my tastes, and once we got done with this blasted transmitter we would be going uphill... damn, damn and more damn, the rifle would be almost useless here.
I slid in front of the squad, point, I was always point, and for a reason. I peeked around the awkward corner to find nothing, no movement. A click on the com and the squad followed after me while I moved across the walkway. Too much open space to check, too many ambush possibilities, I focused, pulling the dark energy around me like a security blanket, an old friend, a sharp tensing of my body and I accepted the slightly distorted view of the world for the biotic barrier I surrounded myself with.
My barrel swept back and forth over each side of the walkway even as the squad sidled up behind me, still no movement. I pushed forward, making sure to distinguish myself against the background but keep my footfalls soft, nothing was keeping the geth from seeing us if they were out there, and I wanted to take a hit before Ash or Liara, but that didn't mean the geth knew we were down here yet.
My squad got the idea, keeping their own steps light, or in Wrex's case just quiet, as they followed behind me.
A fist went up at the intersection, and I could almost feel them freeze behind me, a quick glance to the left told me that nothing had gone through their recently, the doorway in front of us read completely offline to my hardsuits sensors, but there was light coming from the right.
Right it was then.
Quick steps brought me to the opening in the wall, I pressed my back against it and inched my way over to the edge once again, I exposed only the least little bit of my face, enough to see down the hallway.
Ah, I was wondering where the geth were.
I checked my radar to be sure that there weren't any hidden behind some rocks that I couldn't see.
- JAMMED -
Okay... that was seriously annoying. Problem was that there was a chance the geth would detect me if I engaged the counter-jamming built into my rifle.
It wasn't worth it. Even if there was one or two I couldn't see, taking out the others would be like shooting fish in a bucket.
Decision made, I keyed the assassination protocols into my rifle. I took a moment to crunch the numbers for distance adjustment and get a feel for the planet's gravity-well. The dark energy gathered in my palm as my neuron's fired over and over in sequence.
I spun from cover, releasing the biotic field from my left hand down the corridor and bringing the hand to the stock of the rifle in one movement. The muzzle came to bear as the blue distortion hurtled down the hallway, knocking the synthetics off their feet.
Red-tinted cross-hairs landed on the lone shock trooper.
My finger twitched, the rifle kicked into my shoulder and the geth's upper torso ceased to exist.
The crosshairs on my HUD twitched from the recoil even as I swung the gun over, watching the circle coalesce into a triangle over the sniper at the end of the hall.
-twitch-kick-THOOM-
The muzzle swung again, cross-hairs tinting orange as the target registered hostile.
-twitch-kick-THOOM-
"Commander-"
Reflexes kicked in, the gun pulling away from my body, the other hand slapping open the manual heat valve on the gun, letting the super-heated steam blast forth and the heat indicator plummet before shoving the valve back into place with a metallic -clickCHACK-
"-do you need any help?"
I waited for a second, when nothing shot at me I grinned, "Nope. We're heading out."
As the rest of the squad moved in on my position, I actually looked at the hallway; there was something white on the wall at the other end, and here was another one beside me, looked like the switch for a valve if I remembered my plumbing.
If this blasted thing didn't control the water, I'd eat my helmet.
Shouldering my sniper rifle I clicked on my right omni-tool, and with several carefully chosen finger twitches set it to scanning the valve. The data popped up on my HUD and what do you know, my helmet's safe for another ten minutes.
I curled my index finger, trying to open the valve, the angry beep in my ear told me that on no uncertain terms was the valve going to be opened remotely.
"Uh... sir?"
"Just a second Williams," I hunkered down in front of the valve, looking for the switch or button to open it... 'Ah, there it is.'
-click-
...
...
"Commander?"
...
...
-WHAM!-
-Ka-KLUNK-
The sound of rushing water made me smile, 'There we go.' With a satisfied nod I spun on my heel and headed off down the hallway towards the other valve.
"Not all that bad Shepard."
"Thank you Wrex."
Williams tried to stifle the snicker when she spoke, "It really was a pretty good kick, sir."
A.N.): Okay, there's two ways this could go, I could go through the rest of the underground area, or I can just jump on to the part with the Mako and onward. If I continue the underground thing I'm just going to add it on to this chapter, but if I jump it's going to be a brand new chapter. It's your guys call.
I'm going to leave it up to you guys (and gals). I'm going to start both just in case, but in a week I'm going to really start working on whatever you guys decide, I sorta need a break ;
I'm half considering doing a oneshot of some kind for Avatar: The Last Airbender (I got back into the show just recently)...