"So," Garrus Vakarian said, wiping blood off the front of his armor. He glanced around the warehouse. Dead bodies lay burnt, scorched, or torn apart all around them. Midday light shone in from a hole blown in the rooftop. A dozen corpses were crushed under a shuttle with a ramming prow bolted onto the front.
The door to the shuttle unfolded, and a hulking bruiser stepped out, rolling his shoulders.
"Hey, guys, you think Nasanna stiffed us?"James Vega shouted, remarkably cheerful for all the bullet holes that decorated every surface which wasn't covered by the bodies of dead Eclipse mercs.
"Or maybe," Axton added as he crossed the warehouse, calmly reloading his Dahl rifle. "She just wanted to take out the guys who killed her sister to keep it all hushed."
The trio looked around the remains of the warehouse, at the gaping holes in the walls - including the one James crashed through - and piled remains of two dozen Eclipse mercs and a trio of Lightsuits. Debris covered the floor, and the scorch marks and molten scars of elemental rounds traced wild patterns on the walls.
"Bloodwing, what do you think?" Garrus asked. The cybernetic bird let out a single, dismissive caw, and the turian nodded.
"I agree," he said, and the others nodded.
"Let's go get our paycheck," Vega grunted, and they headed back toward the shuttle.
A flaming aircar exploded behind them. None of them were sure why it was on fire to begin with.
Chapter Eight: High-Caliber Resources
The turian sat in his throne in the heart of the great ship, a three-fingered claw clutching his jaw and mandibles. They were pressed close together, and the turian's mask-like features were drawn as tight as his facial cartilage allowed. The inverted U cutting over his face was slightly twisted by the clenching of his features, and the corpse-like pallor of his gray skin was tinged with a steady, pulsing red from the walls around him. The architecture of the ship - his ship - pressed in around him, a subtle wrongness to the twisting, vaguely organic curvature of the metal, layer after layer of cords twisting in a form resembling muscle and running below insectile carapace plating.
Part of him wished for the more familiar metallic bulkheads of a Hierarchy cruiser, for the inorganic angles and flat panels of turian design. He would gladly trade the power and strength of this mighty vessel for a place where he could find a few minutes' peace. At least on a turian ship, he wouldn't have to constantly devote attention to staying centered.
Here, in the depths of this great ship, it was a constant struggle, most often a quiet, background effort. The minds working within the ship would leak out, touching at the edge of his awareness, but they were easy enough to push away. It was when the great vessel shifted its actual attention toward-
A wave of data, memory, and thought swept over him-
marching across a burning world, sapientsfoodingredientscomponentstargetspossibilitiestosavefromthemselves running below, infantry an vehicles firing up into the sky or engaging the countless converted limbs below. Defender's strongpoint, somewhere in the jungles below. Sensor focus. Backtrack signals. Confirmation. A raising of an appendage, a thousand calculations to properly calibrate. A spear of molten metal, millimeters in width, six kilometers in length. A slashing arc of fire-
He gasped, pain running along his face. He pulled his claws away from his head, to find dark blue blood staining the tips of his fingers. More ran down the front of his face where they had dug in. He grit his sharp teeth, mandibles pressing tightly against his jaw, and spoke.
"I am Saren Arterius," he whispered, his words sharp and forceful, a cast-iron edge to the flanged voice of a turian.
The words strengthened his resolve just by hearing them, and he exhaled, pushing back. The attention of the great vessel shifted, possibly accessing a different set of memories as it moved on, and the pressure of the ocean of data lessened.
A faint beeping touched Saren, and he looked up. His command console was flashing a priority message.
He stood quickly, uncoiling from his throne and activating the console. His operations were largely hands-off, an unexpected advantage of working with a force of synthetics. An organic force would demand constant reports and coordination between disparate units, but the geth knew what they were doing and communicated with such efficiency and focus that he rarely needed to act personally.
His eyes tracked over the message. It was short and straightforward.
Contact on Illium: SSV London departing for mass relay. Navigation data attached. Artifact confirmed on board.
With a couple of flicks of his claws, he issued orders, and within seconds he had an acknowledgement from the geth. They were moving to respond before he'd closed the terminal window.
For a moment, his thoughts flicked to the human who was undergoing final adjustments in one of the holds below. What was his name, before they'd taken him? Higgins, yes. He had been most forthcoming, with only a minimal amount of implantation to unlock what he knew. He would soon be ready for deployment.
A second contact light blinked on the console, and Saren opened it, glad for something to keep him busy. While directing his forces, he didn't need to worry about the ship's presence around him. It was only while idle that he had to fight it.
The holographic image of an asari appeared before him. She was a matriarch, an order of magnitude and more beyond his own age, though it was hard to tell through the hologram. Her clothes were typical asari: form-fitting, sleek, finely crafted, and exposing a fair degree of blue flesh. Her had was mostly covered with a curiously insect-like hood and crown, with a pair of long spine-like protrusions extending both down over her face and stretching up over her head. It was an elaborate clothing style that she had only started wearing recently, at about the same time that she and Saren had started their mutual association.
Not coincidentally, around the same time they'd both started working with Sovereign.
"Benezia. Report," he demanded.
"Internal security footage from the Hyperion facility on Eden Prime has been leaked," the asari said. Her voice was deadly calm and had almost no inflection to it. A side effect of what they were both experiencing.
"Not unexpected," Saren said. "Was anything damaging exposed?"
"Data from the helmet cameras of several Hyperion soldiers," Benezia replied. "Specifically, from the hangar bay. You are visible, and your voice can be heard."
Blazing red fury lanced through his muscles and bones and implants, and pain followed suit. It was a swift, savage rush of movement and noise, and when he recovered his senses, Saren saw that his arms were bloody once more, and that the terminal he'd been speaking into was lying across the room. Benezia's hologram lay on its side, still standing prim and proper despite the odd angle.
He composed himself and picked up the display, setting it back up properly. As he worked, he concentrated, pushing back Sovereign's presence. The fury that had come over him had been partially his, but it had also been a gateway to let the ship in as well.
"The reaction?" he asked as he fathomed what this meant to them - him.
"The Council has issued a request for you to report to the Citadel to address this," Benezia stated. "Extranet traffic indicates the expected mixture of accusation, denial, and speculation."
"Begin the standard damage-control package," Saren said, scratching one mandible. "Emphasis on commercially-available holographic editing software. Pick some of my enemies who would want to smear me. Also, begin a backtrace on this leak. I want to know who released the footage, and whether this was just a leak or if someone with access is deliberately trying to undermine our oper- my operation."
"Of course," Benezia said.
"Wait," Saren cut in. "Belay that last. Focus on damage control. I'll handle the backtrace personally."
"As you wish," Benezia replied. A few moments later their contact cut, and Saren started opening his own communications channels and data feeds. He accessed Citadel communications using his own Spectre authorization, and began the hunt.
If he kept busy, Sovereign would not intrude further.
"Okay, before we go any further," Lilith said, "Who the hell are you?"
The odd-looking hacker's expression didn't change, but Roland heard a faint sigh.
"I'm a friend," she replied.
"Uh huh," Lilith said. "Just show up out of the blue, and decide to help us because you want to?"
"Cynicism aside," Roland cut in, "She has helped me. If it weren't for her, I wouldn't have had any warning about Eclipse in Eternity. Both Claptrap and I owe her for that."
"More than that," the hacker said. "I also kept the Nos Astra police from responding until you were clear of the site. Not that keeping the police off your backs is that difficult on Illium, with the right resources. I've also wiped shuttle registration logs, which should give you a little more time to prepare before your shuttle is impounded."
"Right," Lilith said, but her tone was less suspicious. "What's your stake in this?"
"I have as much invested in recovering the Vault as you do," she replied. A moment later, an image appeared on Roland's ECHO display, showing a turian with slate-gray skin, white armor that shifted from typical turian design on one side to an organic, almost geth-like form on the other. His face was marked by an inverted U shaped scar. Cold blue eyes glared, exuding a frigid malice even through the hologram.
"Or to be more accurate, I'm invested in preventing someone else from reaching it first," she continued.
"Saren Arterius!" Conrad squeed. Everyone turned to face him, to find the scientist had almost skipped in place. "Wow! That's one of the most badass Spectres in the galaxy! Though the scar is new…."
"That footage was taken from Eden Prime," the hacker added. "He is aligned with the geth. I have an interest in preventing him from opening the Vault."
"Fair enough," Lilith said with a nod. Roland frowned, but didn't voice his suspicions. Lilith didn't seem totally convinced, and the implication of having a Citadel Spectre as an enemy was troubling. Even megacorps like Atlas or Maliwan had legal restrictions and could be relied on to protect their profit margins Spectres were above the law, and the whole point behind them was to prosecute threats without legal restriction.
But Roland kept his suspicions under wraps, for the moment. Instead, he concentrated on the present issue.
"Okay, so if you're on the team, what do we call you?" he asked. There was a long pause on the other end.
"Angel," she finally said, and Roland nodded.
"Alright, Angel, and everyone else," Roland said. "We've got an objective, but I'll be honest, we don't have what we need to achieve it. We've got the technical expertise to bypass security, between Doctor Verner and Angel."
"And me!" Claptrap added. Roland nodded, not having the spine to break his poor little mechanical heart.
"But I don't think we've got enough firepower between us," Roland added. "Maliwan has an army of Eclipse troops inside those two towers."
"Not to mention," Lilith added, "That Nos Astra will not exactly be letting us lift off in this shuttle, after what we've already pulled with it. So we're going to need a ship and a pilot."
"I can pilot a ship!" Claptrap said, raising a hand.
"A pilot who can land a ship," Lilith corrected, and Claptrap let out a disappointed "Aw."
"Plus we need someone to get us past the Dantius Towers' perimeter security," Conrad added. "I can get us into the building itself, but I don't have clearance past the outer security perimeter. We get too close, and they'll shoot us down."
"I think I can help with all of those," Angel said.
"Of course you can," Lilith muttered, but Roland nodded.
"Go on," he said. "What have you got?"
"I've been doing some preparation for an operation like this," she said. "I have at another mercenary who can provide assistance who is on Illium right now. Ideal for a run on a corporation. I also have a lead on a Maliwan security specialist who was recently fired by Nassana Dantius, who may still be familiar with their perimeter security layout."
"What about a ship?"
"I have a lead on a pilot who was fired from Hyperion within the last twenty-four hours for physical disability. I also have a Hyperion freighter on the Nos Astra docks which we might be able to hijack, as it just recently had its codes wiped and new access codes have been issued."
Her tone shifted to one of amusement.
"And it looks like those codes have to be reissued due to a bureaucratic mix-up, and new codes are being assigned. I've intercepted and replaced them." Another pause. "I can get you onto that ship, at least for the next twenty-four hours. It will take time for Hyperion to notice that the codes aren't the ones they issued, but once they do, they'll improve their security procedures, and I'm not sure if I can take control a second time."
"Okay, shoot us those personnel files," Roland said. The data appeared on their respective ECHO units, and Roland looked over them. He froze as he saw one of the names.
"Oh," Conrad squeaked.
"What," Lilith asked, starting to look over the files. "Are we trying to recruit Urdnot Wrex hims- holy shit are you serious? That guy is here on Illium?"
"I'd almost be as afraid to have him on my team as to not," Roland said, surprised. "But if anyone's going to get us into the Dantius Towers and back out alive, its him."
He looked up at the others.
"Normally a job like this would have more time to prepare. But we don't have that time."
"Yeah, ten minutes of objectives, three days to prep, and an hour of mayhem," Lilith agreed.
"Right," Roland added. "Not a lot of time to get this set up. Conrad, you and Claptrap lay low and keep an eye on the shuttle. Lilith, myself, and Angel will take care of recruitment. Let's move, people."
Captain David Anderson stood on the bridge of the SSV London, moving back and forth from his CIC and pilot's stations, trying to take everything in while not looking over anyone's shoulders. It was not easy, but he'd had enough experience at it to pull it off well. Navy crewmen sat ready at their stations, while officers took reports and spoke with their subordinates, making sure every station ran at peak efficiency. Marines were all armed and at the ready as well, and a full squad was assigned to the main cargo deck.
They all knew what they were carrying and how valuable it was. No one wanted to risk a foul-up on this operation. Tens of thousands had died on Eden Prime because the geth and the corporations wanted that beacon.
Anderson paused by his CIC, checking the system hologram. It showed traffic plots from all the incoming and outgoing ships moving through Illium, which meant thousands of craft, the majority transitioning between the system's main relay and the planet itself. At this time of the year, Illium was close to the relay, so lots of ships were actively moving between them. Even so, it was fairly easy to keep a watch. Ships entered through the relay, engaged short-range FTL drives to get within the accepted trade corridors leading to the planet, and then moved in closer with thrusters. It left a lot of empty space between the relay and Illium itself.
The London had just exited the Illium traffic zone and was about to engage short range mass effect drives. The ideal points of ambush would be either while in the traffic zone and while approaching the mass relay itself. Either way, an attacker would have to hit fast, before they could re-engage FTL.
"Captain," the ship's pilot, Flight Officer Lovell called. "We're almost outside the traffic zone. But I've got something moving parallel to our course."
"On my display," Anderson called, and the exchange sent a subtle thrum of tension through the room. Something was happening. It might be nothing, but . . . .
Anderson engaged his personal ECHO and looked over the navigational and sensor readings. A small craft was indeed moving a few kilometers away, and was directly parallel to the London's path. He frowned and checked the traffic zones, and saw that there was still too much debris to make an FTL jump.
"Adjust course, Lovell, get us away from whatever it is."
"Yes sir."
"VI," he added, "Run a trace on that ship's profile."
The London altered its path, bringing its nose around, and Anderson felt his center of gravity shift as the thrust gently pushed him straight down and at a slight angle.
On the sensor feed, there was a spike of emissions, and the contact wheeled around to stay in their path . . . and it accelerated toward them as well, flying directly in front of the London with surprising speed..
"Sound general quarters!" Anderson shouted, and the crew jumped at his command with only the tiniest hesitation.
Anything under power and trying to prevent them from jumping to FTL speeds was an automatic threat. It meant someone was trying to stop you from jumping, and anything in the path of a ship traveling at such speeds was a threat until they could maneuver clear.
"I've got contacts being launched from the object!" reported the sensor officer. "Looks like they're spreading out in an FTL blocking pattern. Mass sufficient to kill us if we jump!"
It didn't matter what that contact was shooting out. What mattered was that the mass would be enough to gut the London if it hit anything while at FTL speeds. Even with the mass lightening field that would surround the ship, an impact with a big enough object would be devastating.
"Arm guns and target that thing, whatever the hell it is! VI, identify that contact!" Anderson hurried onto the command pedestal overlooking the CIC. "Lovell, get us out of that FTL-blocking cone and jump, ASAP! I don't care if you have to ram straight through!"
"Aye-aye, sir!" Lovell called back.
"Tracking contact," the London's VI reported. "Mass and emission profile consistent with Kowloon-class light freighter. Contacts are anti-ship disruptor mines. Mines are moving to intercept in standard FTL blocking pattern."
"Rad spike, sir!" the sensor officer shouted. "Cherenkov from a mass effect field, one kilometer out!"
Anderson's blood ran cold.
A heartbeat later, the new contact resolved itself on his sensor display.
A geth cruiser, running hot, weapons powered, and radiating heat. The wasp-like ship wheeled toward them while the London was still trapped in the FTL-blocking cone and opened fire.
"Like I said when you first boarded," Lieutenant Alenko said as they walked through the dim corridors of the London, "You'll get to keep most of the specialist weapons you had. But the Alliance isn't the Lance. Standard issue is actually pretty good. Won't have to pay for your own weapons, either."
Behind the biotic Marine walked newly-minded Corporals Williams and Reiss, clad in freshly-refitted Alliance Marine uniforms and armor. Reiss was a bit reserved, but Ashley was doing all she could to not smile.
"I'll be honest, sir," she said, "Standard issue is just fine. As long as we get something in the green range, at least."
"Green range is Alliance standard-issue, Corporal," Alenko said. They came to a halt outside the armory station on the crew deck. "You'll want to check with the quartermaster and get your personal weapons back once he's done checking them out. There shouldn't be anything missing, unless one of you was, I dunno, packing an Eridian gun?"
"We should be so lucky," Reiss muttered. "Lance had standing orders to confiscate those if we found them."
"That's what I heard. Bit of a crap deal there," Alenko said. "And its the same way here too, sad to say. Just make sure you've got your full kit as well as your personal weapons ready and stowed in your SDUs. I need you two ready for action as soon as possible. We're on high alert and we need the-"
Alarms sounded, and they looked up.
"That sounds like-" Ashley started to say.
"General quarters," Alenko finished. He spun back toward them. "Get to the quartermaster and grab a rifle and your SDUs then get ready for combat!"
"Yes sir!" both of them said at once.
The ship shivered beneath their feet as they turned and started down the corridor toward the armory, and they both recognized the sudden shocks that rumbled through the deck: The London's main guns were firing.
"Might have been safer sticking with Roland!" Reiss called, and Ashley shook her head, laughing at the irony.
"What kind of ship is this we're acquiring?" Roland asked as he walked along one of the public walkways overlooking a commercial section of the docks. Asari, turian, salarian, and humans mingled, a combination of dock workers, freighter crews, and hired guns, and he passed a number of businesses designed to suit the transient crowd and blue-collar workers who kept the spaceport running: bars, parts dealerships, supply resellers, and the like.
"Records indicate that, um," Angel said, pausing. The weird-looking visual display was gone, reduced to only an audio feed, and Roland preferred it that way. "It is identified as the... Ugh. Policy Itinerate."
"Who named it that?" Roland muttered.
"Hyperion appears to have a random corporate buzzword naming system for all their ships," Angel said, and Roland could hear the shrug in her voice. "Its a standard freighter, a few years old. Unremarkable history. Hyperion won't miss it for a few days after we steal it, and by then you could have Migrant Fleet Manufacturing completely rebuild it from the ground up if you wanted."
"Better than nothing," Roland said. "So where's this pilot?"
"He's staying at a human-operated bar just ahead. Zeke's. Run by the Zaford family, from their financial records."
"Are there any computer networks you don't have access to?" Roland asked, but before she could answer he stepped through the door into the bar.
It was standard as bars went, but Roland noted a lot more wood in its furniture. Faux-Earth Irish memorabilia was scattered around, and the back wall was taken up by a massive collection of various and sundry alcohol bottles, neatly divided into levo, dextro, and likely-to-kill-non-krogan sections. The bar was fairly populated with humans, some abhumans, and the odd mix of aliens, but most of the people there were gathered around the main bar itself, laughing and singing off-key to along with the bartender to some twist on an Irish drinking song.
Roland moved through the bar, ignoring the singers, and spotted the man whose picture Angel had given him. He strode toward the table, taking stock of the man sitting there: lean, not very muscular, with a thick beard that had likely taken many months to grow out. A common pilot's cap sat on his head, of the gold and white typical of Hyperion, though the logo had been cut out. He sat alone in a booth, drinking slowly and staring at holo displays without much interest.
"You the guy they call Joker?" Roland asked as he approached. The pilot's head snapped toward him, quick and alert. Roland saw in his eyes that this was a man who was dead sober.
"Jeff Moreau, that's me," he said with a nod. "Callsign and nickname Joker. Until recently, 'Certified Hyperion Experimental Combat Flight Specialist.'"
"Heard you were pretty good," Roland said, sitting down at the bar across from him.
"Good, yeah," Joker snorted. "Yeah, good. You know what good is? Good is remembering to turn the damn autopilot on when you have to go take a piss, and then remembering not to get any on your displays when you come back because you shook enough times. Good is not crashing the ship in a fiery wreck the moment you brush atmosphere. Good is matching the orbital velocity of a mass relay while navigating a congested trade corridor and not accidentally slamming into any idiots going the wrong way from the relay at FTL speeds."
Roland sat back a bit as the pilot's words became more heated.
"I wasn't just good. I flew top-of-the-line frigates and cruisers, ones that hadn't even been fully tested before they put them in the field! I could drop a ship within fifteen hundred k's of a mass relay ten times out of ten, on my off day. I was the one who proved it was possible to use heavy frigates as atmospheric deployment platforms. I could maneuver through flaming station wreckage without scratching my ship to drop an entire company of loaders onto an enemy position with less than six meters error!
"And I get fired because Jackass himself decided 'no disabilities allowed in his piloting corps!'" Joker raised a hand to slam it down on the table, but then stopped. Instead he pushed his empty glass across the table until until it fell and shattered on the floor.
"How are you disabled?" Roland asked. It was unnecessary; he already knew from the files Angel had sent over. But he needed to keep Joker talking.
"Vrolik's Syndrome. Brittle bone disease. Pfh," Joker threw up his hands, then tapped the table with his fingers. "Hey, barkeep, another." Blue motes flashed in the center of the table, and another glass of beer materialized. "Do I look like I have to run or do pull-ups to fly a damn frigate? This isn't the twentieth century where you had to jam foot pedals to maneuver a prop-plane."
He sighed, took a long drink, and nodded toward Roland.
"Let me guess, you have a job offer?" he asked, and Roland nodded.
"High-risk," the mercenary said. "Involves stealing Hyperion property. You interested?"
"Hell yes, I am," Joker said, leaning forward. "Pay's good, but payback is a whole different thing. What's the job?"
"Maliwan is our primary target, but we have an escape vehicle lined up. It's a Hyperion ship. Nothing fancy, though. Regular freighter, but we do have the access codes."
"Okay, sounds easy enough." Joker drank the rest of the beer. "God, this is going to ruin my liver if I don't get into a cockpit soon. What's the catch?"
"You adverse to working with a Siren?" Roland asked.
"Long as she's not a krogan or vorcha," Joker said, though Roland caught a thoughtful look in his eye at the realization that he would be hurling himself into mortal danger just by being in proximity to a Siren. "Bonus points if she's human or asari. Extra if she's quarian. Please tell me she's quarian?"
"Human," Roland said, and Joker shrugged, giving him a "I'll take it" expression. "Now, are you adverse to working with a CL4-TP Hyperion model?"
Joker's merry expression faded, and he exhaled.
"Does it have a mute button?" he asked, wincing.
"If you've got a sidearm, yeah," Roland replied. Joker frowned, looking away for a moment, and then sighed.
"Yeah, I can put up with one. Just one, right? We're not talking about an army of the little junkboxes?"
"No, just one."
"Then you've got a pilot," Joker said, and extended a hand across the table. Roland shook it, carefully.
"Here's the time and place we'll be meeting to discuss the operation. There is a time limit on it, so be ready to move once you've got your part of the plan."
"Target with broadsides, alternate shock and corrosion!" Anderson ordered even as the London's automated GARDIAN batteries opened up. He felt a lurch in his gut as the cruiser's artificial gravity cut out, but his boots and their built-in magnetic soles kept him locked to the deck instead of being hurled across the CIC while the ship maneuvered.
Lasers sliced back and forth along the geth ship's flanks, at the same time as beams from the synthetic ship cut into the Alliance cruiser. Shields flared along both sides; the beams passed through the outer kinetic barriers but were stopped cold by the close-in all-purpose shield systems. Anderson's eyes flicked to the shield readouts: kinetic barriers holding at full strength, central shielding systems down by forty percent.
Both the London and the geth ship gained broadside firing solutions at almost the same time. Both led with the usual armaments: shock-elemental broadsides opened fire, pumping out streams of mass accelerator rounds marked by long blue streaks. The geth got the targeting solution first and managed a full broadside before the London's own gunnery crew, and the ship shivered as shock rounds hammered the shields. Static washed over the displays as some of the electricity got through, scrambling sensors and weapons.
The London returned fire with a single tremendous barrage of a dozen heavy batteries. The geth ship used speed and fast-firing guns, at the expense of raw firepower, but the London's weapons were far more powerful, shot-for-shot. Their guns slammed into the kinetic barriers, some punching through to hit the inner barriers. Lightning struck the geth ship just as it had the London.
A heartbeat after the shock batteries had blazed, and at the same time as the geth's guns cycled and fired again, the London's corrosive guns erupted. A sudden flood of accelerator rounds slashed back and forth between the two ships, a mixture of green-tinged and bright blue, and the London shook violently enough that even Anderson's magnetic boots couldn't keep him steady in the zero gravity. He gripped the railing around the central hologram, and saw damage reports on his display.
Several of the geth rounds were disruptor or phasic in nature, as they'd partially bypassed the shields and torn out chunks of the ship's hull. More than two-thirds of his ship's GARDIAN batteries were destroyed or disabled. A couple of compartments were depressurized. Two crewmen dead.
The corrosive rounds had mostly impacted on the geth cruiser's inner barriers, but several had broken through and struck the hull. Armor plating and the decks underneath were burning and dissolving under the deadly acids the shells had been carrying, exposing sections of vulnerable interior components. But it wasn't enough to disable the cruiser.
The London's guns cycled again while Lovell was frantically trying to avoid the geth's next volley. Disruptor rounds streaked in again, and just before they impacted Anderson spotted something else in the space between the two ships. He gripped the handrail while mass accelerator rounds hammered the London, blowing open compartments wherever they managed to break through the weakened shields, and he keyed his ECHO.
"All crew, be advised, dropships inbound!" he yelled, even as the wasp-like geth ships and heavy fighters bolted toward the wounded London. The GARDIAN batteries fired upon them, but their shots were haphazard and only vaporized a few of the geth ships. The damage from the disruptor rounds, overheating of the lasers' own coils, and scrambled targeting due to the shock impacts were taking their toll.
"Prepare to repel boarders! Secure that beacon! Destroy it if we have to!"
Detonations ran through the floor plating, and the ship shook violently. Ashley didn't need to see the damage reports scrolling past in the corner of her helmet's HUD to tell her that people were dying. She'd been on enough combat warships in her career to know what was happening. Admittedly, those had been Atlas ships with Crimson Lance crew, and she had cared a hell of a lot less if they were dying.
"Alert," the London's VI reported as she and Reiss grabbed and synched Avenger rifles to their helmets. "Multiple geth craft have landed on the hull. Identifying enemy ingress points."
The London's schematics appeared on her HUD, with red sections indicating where the geth were trying to get aboard the ship. Ashley glanced to Reiss, and though she couldn't see his face, she didn't need to. Lancemen learned to read and communicate with body language and hand gestures, and she could tell by the set of his shoulders that he was grimly prepared for what they were about to face.
Her eyes moved back over the display, and they started away from the armory, magnetic boots clamping and releasing with that curious stick-and-pull sensation that everyone certified in zero-G ops was familiar with. Geth were cutting into the hull or moving through hull breaches around the lower cargo decks, just ahead of the engineering decks. Markers indicating Marine presence were converging on them. She identified where Lieutenant Alenko was located: one deck ahead, his squad intercepting a red geth contact.
"LT, we're just a few seconds away," she called over their local ECHO. Alenko's still image appeared in her HUD.
"Copy that, and hurry!" Gunfire roared on his end, both digistruct bullets and the thoop-thoop-thoop of rapid-fire geth guns. When she heard him speak again, it was directed to the rest of the squad. "Use shock weapons to break their shields and corrosive on their frames! Don't bother with incendiary!"
The pair of recently-inducted Marines charged down through a hatch sperating the two decks, weapons high and ready to fire, and the muted sounds of battle erupted into a full, deafening din of short-range gunfire and screaming Marines. The rapid, familiar chittering and electrical whines of the geth were just barely audible over the torrent of exchanging gunfire.
Reiss and Ashley rounded the corner, to find a full squad of Marines trading fire with a cluster of geth further down the hallway. Most of the geth were the troopers she had seen on Eden Prime, but she counted a number of larger, black-painted geth standing nearly two meters tall, wielding heavy shotguns or weapons that looked like they had tanks attached to them. Flamethrowers, perhaps.
An abrupt pull yanked on Ashley as she was about to fire, and her body jerked toward the deck. Her barrel dropped, and the long burst that erupted from the Avenger tore into decking and bulkheads instead of the geth platform. She blinked in surprise, and adjusted near-instantly to the shift in gravity, adjusting her stance and bringing her weapon back up. The Marines with her, along with Alenko and Reiss, were also thrown off-balance for a moment, but recovered with the instinctive speed of proper zero-G training.
But that heartbeat was all the geth needed.
In the momentary stutter in the Marines' fire, the geth redoubled their own, their shots unaffected by the sudden reactivation of artificial gravity. Geth disruptor rounds tore into the humans, and Ashley saw the back of one Marine's helmet explode. Another toppled backward, a dozen rounds bursting through his breastplate. She heard a death gasp through the Marine's audio systems as he fell.
Reiss dropped to the deck beside her, bloody holes in his stomach and upper left arm. Ashley grabbed him and hauled him out of the line of fire, moving on automatic reflex, and had him behind cover in a matter of seconds. She snatched up an Insta-health vial and passed it to him, and he grabbed it, fiddling with the injector and inserting it into a port just below his ribs.
Marine fire redoubled as she pulled Reiss to safety, their weapons blazing in aggressive, disciplined counterfire against the geth, and Ashley's fire joined theirs'. There was no fear - or at least, the Marines did not allow terror to dominate them. In that moment, the former Lanceman could see the subtle difference in how they reacted to the enemy fire: The Marines were coordinated and controlled, holding their position while fighting side-by-side, covering each other even as their comrades fell. It was discipline enforced by knowing the warrior next to you was depending on you. Lance troopers would return fire just as savagely, but never as coordinated; Lance discipline was enforced by fear of death, not the need to protect one's comrades.
"Alert," the London's VI belatedly called over the ECHO as they fought. "Gravity systems compromised by geth. Initiating countermeasures."
"We know," Ashley muttered, shifting her fire to put down another geth platform. One of the Marines next to her dropped to his knees, blood spraying from the meat of his thigh. Ashley pulled another insta-health injector and jammed it into a port on the back of the Marine's armor while firing her rifle one-handed. Shots sprayed wildly down the corridor, and Ashley felt another lurch in her stomach as artificial gravity cut out again.
Then one of the geth destroyers surged forward, smashing through the gunfire and into the middle of the squad. It went down almost as quickly, shields shattering, and its body vanishing under a virtual storm of lightning from the volume of shock rounds. The body collapsed into ash and scorched, glowing metal.
But in death, the destroyer had given the rest of the geth an opening, and even as it was blasted to molten, sparking pieces, two more destroyers and several other trooper platforms had thundered after it, magnetic clamps pounding and clattering on the deck and weapons blasting at point-blank range. One wielded a plasma flamethrower, and sprayed gouts of white-hot fury over the Marines. Others carried shotgun-analogues, which fired superconducting rounds that generated searing bursts of high-energy plasma on impact.
Half of the Marines died nearly instantly. Seared and bloody human bodies were lifted off the deck or launched down the passage. But for all the brutal efficiency, the geth had made a terminal tactical error:
They had entered close combat with humans: a species as well-armed as the turians, violent enough to earn krogan respect, and with nearly as adaptable a gene-code as the vorcha. Though in the latter case, it was through pummelling their own DNA into submission rather than a natural result of their homeworld.
Four of the geth trooper platforms were blasted apart even as they killed Marines, and one of the two destroyers was slammed into a bulkhead by Alenko's biotics. Pinned to the wall by the altered gravity field, it was unable to respond before the Lieutenant shoved his submachinegun into the middle of its chest and filled it with thirty-plus shock rounds. Other Marines poured bullets into the geth until their weapons ran empty or overheated, and immediately ignited their omnitools. Glowing, gold-orange blades were flash-fabricated and sliced through geth bodies the instant they were born, severing limbs and rending internal components.
Ashley found herself face-to-face with the remaining destroyer as it blasted apart the same Marine she'd just stabilized. Viscera and charred armor bounced off her shields as she overheated her Avenger into the geth monstrosity. Bullets smashed through the shield, cutting sparking furrows in the hulking machine's armor, and at least one bullet tore into the geth's shotgun, blasting a gaping a hole in it. More rounds ripped into its right arm, blowing apart chunks of synthetic musculature.
It dropped the shotgun before the shrapnel from the weapon had hit the bulkhead beside it, and snapped the working arm ahead. Metallic fingers grabbed Ashley by the throat and lifted her up, slamming her bodily into the bulkhead hard enough to blast the air out of her lungs. She felt something give inside her chest, and in the back of her mind Ashley knew that the only reasons she was still conscious were due to her armor and the gene mods that had been pumped into her when she'd joined the Lance.
The destroyer's fingers tightened around her neck, and she knew she had seconds before it crushed her throat, armor and gene mods or not. She activated her SDU and pulled out a Jakobs pistol. It was a huge, polished gunmetal semi-automatic hand cannon styled after a 19th-century revolver but with significantly more advanced innards made for one thing: power.
As the fingers tightened around her neck, Ashley raised the pistol, jammed it through the geth's barriers, and pulled the trigger as fast as she could. The pistol roared in the close confines, and the destroyer jerked with the force of the first shot. The second made it start with its typical machine stutter. The third exploded out the back of the platform, and the stutter became a piercing squeal right before it dropped Ashley. Gasping for breath, vision blacking out, she still kept enough wits to finish emptying the Jakobs' magazine into the stumbling destroyer's flashlight face. White lubricants and electrical conductive fluids sprayed from the geth's body, and the magnetic clamps on its feet lost power as it died.
Ashley swept the corridor, which had become suddenly quiet. The geth were dead, corpses floating in the null gravity, alongside the remains of the Alliance Marines. Of Alenko's original ten-man group, only two were still standing. She snatched up her Avenger as the survivors moved through the dead geth, firing kill-shots into their chests to make sure they were completely disabled.
"Gah, missed the best part," grunted Reiss, and Ashley glanced over her shoulder. The Insta-health injection had restored the worst of his injuries, but he moved with the pained gait of someone who had just had potentially fatal injuries repaired within moments, at the possible expense of long-term genetic damage. That was the downside of using too much Insta-health.
"Plenty more to kill," Ashley said with a nod.
"Okay, people," Alenko called to the survivors. The Marines, both new and established, turned toward him. The Lieutenant glanced over the dead, and shook his head.
"Keep moving," he ordered, and Ashley knew that he knew they didn't have time to tend to the dead. "We've got more geth in the cargo section, and more Marines who need our help. Move out!"
Lilith watched intently as the human ran down the thinly-populated street. This low in the spaceport district, the facilities were mostly light civilian docking bays and warehouses. The people living and working down here were much lower income, many of which were non-asari dock workers or freighter crew.
The human, running down the alley between docking complexes in near mindless panic, was clearly neither. He was too ragged, wearing a set of stained clothes and a colonist's jacket, instead of the usual spacer jumpsuit or dockworker fatigues. More importantly, he was armed. Admittedly, it was a cheap, large-barreled Tediore design from before they had implemented the throw-it-and-it-explodes "feature", and Lilith's ECHO display indicated that it was a common, mass-produced version and marked it with a dull white outline. Still, a gun was a gun.
The human who followed the thug did so at a much more sedate pace, and a glance showed that he was also neither dockworker nor spacer. The heavy armor, the powerful barriers surrounding him, and the purple marker the ECHO assigned the Dahl assault rifle he was toting proved that. He walked with absolute certainty and patience, as though his target had nowhere to flee.
That would be because he didn't. Lilith had tapped into the local security network with the help of their new hacker buddy, and learned that the bounty hunter had locked down most of the exits from this section of the spaceport using a government issue command code, which meant either he was much more technically savvy than he looked, he had the backing of Nos Astra's police, or he simply didn't give a fuck.
Whichever was the case, Lilith knew that this was her man.
The Siren hopped down from the higher level walkway where she was observing the pursuit. Midway through the fall, she phased out of normal reality and hit the ground. Then she dashed around the corner of the alley where the fleeing human thug was headed, and as he ran into sight, she burst back into reality just far enough away from the quarry that he didn't get hit by her lightning.
The human jerked to a halt to abruptly that he fell to his knees, and Lilith strode toward him. Her helmet was off, so he could see the golden fire in her eyes and along her tattoos. It had the desired effect, as he screamed in abject terror and raised his pistol, but by that time Lilith was close enough that she could just grab it by the barrel and yank it out of his hand. She threw the weapon over her shoulder and kicked him back out of the alley. He fell to the ground and started skittering backward, until he hit the armored legs of his pursuer.
"Huh," came a low, snarling voice made of equal parts rusty engine, gravel, and British. "Thought I spotted you shadowing us. Didn't know you were a guddamn Siren, though."
The human had steel-gray hair, one black eye, and one cold, icy white. The left side of his face was distantly handsome, though worn by decades of war, while the right side was one massive collection of scarred skin. He glanced down at his quarry, and calmly put the barrel of his rifle against the top of the thug's head.
"Zaeed Massani," Lilith said.
"Last I heard," the bounty hunter said. "You're Lilith Shepard, aren't you?"
"Yep," she replied. "Got a job for you, if you're interested."
"What I figured," Zaeed growled. "Only two types of people come up to me like this, and the other kind just want me dead."
"Please!" the thug shouted, looking up at Lilith. "You can't let him-"
Zaeed kneed him in the back of the head, and when the thug fell over, he planted a boot on the man's neck.
"Shuddup."
"He going to be a problem?" Lilith asked. "Don't want to have to drag him back to my ship."
"Nah, he's a local job." Zaeed shrugged. "And unless you're working Torgue-Urdnot, you usually can't just shoot them on Illium. The live bonus keeps the pay steady, but it gets complicated bringing 'em in kicking. Thanks for that, by the way. You want a piece of the bounty?"
"Nah, he's all yours," Lilith said. "You up for something after turning this one in?"
"Hell yes," Zaeed said with a nod. "But it's gotta be high risk, if you're coming to me. No one seeks me out unless they need to fight a ground war with just three men."
"Extremely high risk," Lilith confirmed. "We're taking an entire corporate army."
"Corp run, eh? Figures," Zaeed said with a nod. "Normally I wouldn't just take a job like this out of the blue. Do my homework before I put my rifle on the line. But you? Hell, Hannah Shepard's daughter, most famous human Siren in the galaxy? Why not; know you and your rep. Give me a time and place, and we'll talk pay."
"Sure thing," she said. She glanced to the bounty Massani had literally under his heel, and lit up her omnitool. The bounty hunter did likewise, and it only took a moment to synch up and let her send the location of their meeting.
"Alright then," Massani said. "Let me get this sack here delivered, then I'll meet you there."
Lilith nodded, and they parted ways. As she moved through the alleys and corridors of the noisy spaceport, Lilith found herself walking with a bit more spring in her step. With Massani on board, they might not all get horribly killed.
Reiss got shot the moment he entered the cargo bay, half a dozen rounds slamming his shields and the last hitting him in the gut. He fell back, cursing under his breath as he did so, and Ashley shoved him behind the cover of a big stack of lashed metal cargo containers.
"Fuck, again?" he half grunted, half laughed, and she jammed another Insta-health vial into his armor.
"Stay down until it patches you up," she barked, and rose. Lieutenant Alenko was using his biotics to pull one of the cargo crates around to cover them, but she could see the corpses that littered the bay, floating through the open space. Many were geth, but nearly as many Marines and Navy crewmen. Those who were still alive were doing their best, but the geth outnumbered and outgunned them, and the Navy crew had only white-quality shields and sidearms to begin with.
The geth had secured one end of the bay, and two of the big destroyer-types were manhandling - or was that gethhandling? - the Eridian device across the room to where a hole had been cut in the bay's hull, and the interior of a geth dropship was visible.
"We can't let them get away with that beacon," Alenko yelled as he ducked behind the cargo crate he had repositioned.
"Also, getting shot is terrible," Ashley added, blasting a geth until it collapsed. Alenko shrugged, admitting her point.
"What are you packing in your SDU?" he called, and ducked back as bullets slammed into the crate next to him. "Do you have any rockets?"
"I've got a Tediore," she replied. "Cheap crap but it explodes."
"Good enough. If I get you close, can you blow up that beacon?"
Ashley fired a few quick bursts, putting down another trooper with well-placed rounds to the synthetic's torso.
"Yeah, but is it that bad?" she said.
"I see at least twenty geth," Alenko replied. "We can try to push through, but I'm not sure we can get there in time!" Ashley nodded and steeled herself.
They had their orders. Recover or deny.
"Bound forward, I'll cover you!" Ashley shouted, and she rose, firing toward the geth. They shifted their attention toward her, and her barriers flashed. But their fire was pulled off the Lieutenant, who surged forward. He reached another set of secured crates, and his biotics flared, launching a geth trooper through the air toward the other Marines across the bay. They killed it in mid-flight, and Ashley charged through the gap in enemy fire.
The kept maneuvering and shooting, the Lieutenant covering them with crates and Ashley laying down suppressing fire. The geth became more defensive as they advanced, recognizing that they didn't have the numbers to toss away while trying to secure their objective. Ashley's shields began to run low, but she made it halfway across the bay before having to duck into cover and stop the assault.
"Running out of time!" Alenko shouted, and Ashley nodded. The destroyers were nearly to the dropship, and more than a dozen geth remained. She activated her SDU and brought up a lightweight, boxy Tediore rocket launcher. It had a three-round internal magazine, but it was one of the newer models, which meant when it ran out of ammo it would explode in a few seconds unless someone discarded it. Naturally, Tediore marketed that as a feature. "Once its out of bullets, it becomes a grenade! Perfect for kids!"
"Take it out, I'll cover you!" Alenko ordered, and she nodded. Ashley rose, settling her sights on the beacon.
Ironic; they'd fought like rabid skags to save that damned thing, and now they were fighting just as hard to destroy it. And not even to get paid.
She squeezed the trigger as that thought went through her mind, and there was a sharp burst of static noise from the geth. The destroyers stopped in mid-step,wrenching the beacon around, but not fast enough.
She saw the first rocket hit a destroyer, and blew it in half in a plume of fire and spraying electrical fluids. The second was on target, and struck the beacon dead center.
Then everything went white, and Ashley felt a sharp impact in her back, and then darkness.
On Illium, everything was legal with the right licenses. That allowed the Illium government to tax everything that passed through their ports, which meant that everything that came through Illium was tracked. And that meant that Nos Astra, as with every other port, had a division of bureaucrats that put terror into people's hearts on a level synonymous with "Spectre," "humans," or "dancing Claptrap."
That bureaucracy required offices, and Nos Astra crammed said offices in everywhere they could among the corridors, atriums, and docking facilities. The one Roland was looking for was located adjacent to a wide open-air taxi service platform lined with merchant kiosks. A bored asari wearing the cream-colored coat and jumpsuit that was ubiquitous among corporate office workers and scientists the galaxy over was sitting at a desk in an office just outside the taxi station, absently typing on a keyboard and listening to raspy, high-pitched trance music.
"Excuse me, are you Seryna Kar'lia?" he asked as he stopped next to her desk. The asari frowned and looked up at Roland.
"Most people don't ask for me by name," she said, and switched off the music. "Just bring me paperwork too important to mail. Who's asking?"
"My name is Roland," he started, but before he could continue she started standing. Her eyes flicked up and down the area outside the office, noting the small number of businessmen and spacers who were within earshot, and she nodded.
"This is about Maliwan, right?" she asked, walking back around her desk and sitting down."I've got ears. Nassanna wants your head, preferably after she's ripped all you know about the Siren from it first."
"Nice to know I'm famous," Roland mused, and Seryna shrugged.
"Let me guess, you're going after her first, right?" the bureaucrat asked, and Roland nodded. "Good. We have something in common."
"What's your problem with her?" Roland asked. He knew the answer of course, but like with Joker he wanted the story from her mouth. Seryna exhaled, leaning back in her chair.
"Because she's a crazy, paranoid bitch who is also one of the most corrupt corp-heads on Illium, which is saying a lot when it comes to this planet," she said. "I used to be her head of security mostly because I was sane enough to keep things running fine, but, well, I disagreed when she started enforcing her work contracts with bullets to the head and discreet trips to construction mixers."
"So, what, you quit?" Roland asked. Seryna shook her head.
"She fired me. I think I caught her in one of her less lunatic moments because she didn't fire at me and instead just kicked me out. But she also warned me to never leave Illium, or I'd be dead before I got off-planet. And she even arranged for a job for me." She spread her arms. "Of course, it makes it easy for her to track me. So she's probably got someone watching us talk right now."
"You're remarkably calm about all of this," Roland mused, while quietly double-checking the exits in case a dozen Maliwan Lightsuits came dropping out of the sky.
"I've spent the last three months waiting for her to come kill me," Seryna replied, her tone dismissive. "So if you're going after her, you've got my help."
"Well, that was easy," he said.
"On one condition," Seryna added. "Nassana has to die. Promise me that and you've got my support."
"Corporate assassination is… something I've done before," Roland said with a frown. "Not that I'm a fan of it, but everything I've heard about Nassana tells me no-one's going to miss her."
"Then I'll tell you everything I know about her defenses," the asari said.
"What do you know about her current security setup?" Roland asked. "Because you've been out of her employ for a while. How do you know they haven't changed anything?"
"Because I built her current security setup," Seryna replied. "Its why she's watching me. I've worked as a commando, an engineer, counterintel. Hell, even did a stint in the navy as a gunnery officer. That defense network is set up to defeat just about anything, and I designed it so it couldn't just be torn down without spending millions that Nassana would never part with to rebuild the damn thing from the ground up. And I know how to get around it."
"You built a weakness into the defense?" Roland asked, and Seryna nodded.
"You work for Dantius, you insert some insurance," she replied. "If I could, I would go after her myself, but she's got too much manpower protecting her. But if you want to guarantee you get through, you might want to either bring one hell of a good engineer along-"
Roland imagined Claptrap trying to do that kind of work, and shut out the mental image.
"No, we don't. Not for Maliwan tech, anyway."
"-Or you'll bring me along for the ride. The others didn't like that idea, but I gave them the exploits anyway."
"Wait, 'others'?" Roland asked.
"Look, you and your squad-full of crazy are not the first group to come to me looking to slap the blue off Nassana Dantius' ass," Seryna said. "There's a whole bunch of people who want her dead or just have a huge hate-on for Maliwan, and you're the third one today to show up asking for exploits in her security."
"Who else wants her dead?" Roland asked, dreading to hear it.
"Let's see. There was a krogan. Old as shit, probably crazy - the old ones tend to go bonkers after a millennia or so. Said something about genetic research..."
The windows leading into the ninety-third floor of the Dantius Towers Building B exploded as a cargo hauler smashed into it, crushing cubicles and offices and sending workers scrambling to get away from the abrupt, high-explosive interruption to their daily drudgery.
Krogan surged out of the doors of the crashed cargo hauler, clad in yellow and red armor and firing Torgue-Urdnot shotguns and Vladof assault rifles. They shouted and howled and charged with berserk fury, weapons spraying wildly. They generally ignored the office workers, instead focusing on troopers wearing the yellow and black of Eclipse who were rushing to the site of the crash.
A massive krogan walked behind them, moving with the certainty old millennia of experience. The old krogan warlord nodded to his warriors as they traded fire with the Eclipse troops who had been stationed on this floor.
"Dispose of them quickly," Warlord Okeer ordered. "And secure the genetics labs!"
Maliwan's labs held the secrets to more than just human genetic modification, after all. And Okeer and his new breed of krogan would rip the prize they sought from the corp's bloody hands if need be.
"There were these three mercs. Two humans - one a big bruiser-type, I think - and a turian with a robo-bird. They apparently got stiffed on a job..."
The shuttle descended slowly and carefully, touching down on the rooftop opposite the primary tower. Getting any closer would likely get them noticed and shot down by Eclipse. They weren't that dumb.
Axton hopped down as the door opened, followed by Garrus. They swept the rooftop. It was quiet.
"Bloodwing, overwatch," Garrus ordered, and the bird lifted off his shoulder, flying overhead.
James locked the shuttle down behind them and strode onto the roof, hefting a rocket launcher of bearing the Vladof sickle on one shoulder.
"So, we got a plan besides 'shoot them until we get to Nassana'?" James asked.
"That is the plan," Axton said, and James nodded.
"Simple. I like it."
"The bridge to the other building is about ten levels down," Garrus said, and took the lead toward the door that gave access to the stairwell. "Let's get to work."
"And a volus who I think was high off his rocker. Don't expect him to last long, though, but he was funny."
The volus waddled into the enormous lobby of the Dantius Towers, Building A. A pair of Eclipse mercs - human and salarian - were standing at a receptionist's desk that was big enough to serve as an anti-tank barricade, and beyond them was a vast, open atrium and twenty levels of offices that surrounded the entry lobby. People moved among manicured plants and bubbling fountains and pillars that showed the Maliwan emblems and images of their products. Elegance and sleekness were pronounced, with the curving lines of asari architecture married to the gleaming lines and bold reds, blues, and golds of Maliwan's corporate aesthetic.
The human Eclipse merc glanced up at the volus as he stumbled toward them.
"Excuse me, sir," he said. "Can I help you?"
The volus stopped and stood for a moment, swaying, before lurching his head up toward the guard's face.
"Yes, you may," he spoke, his tone slurred but imperious. "Is this the home of the foul creature named Dantius?"
"Uh, well, CEO Nassana Dantius is the owner of these towers and I do believe she is here today in her penthouse," the guard said. He was a bit uncertain how to react to the "foul" bit. At least in a way that wouldn't get him shot.
"I will speak with her," the volus said, and pointed one lazy hand toward the elevators at the far end of the vast atrium.
"Nassana Dantius is not receiving visitors today," the guard replied, firmly, much more comfortable with being obtuse and having the guns to back that up.
He glanced to his partner, and the salarian started toward the obviously inebriated alien. They would have to throw him out, and would preferably beat him up first, of course; he was an idiot and drunk and you didn't just walk into a corporate office like this while being a drunken idiot. Maliwan and Eclipse had an image to maintain, even if that image was of a finely crafted, elegant, glowing-line-covered boot stomping on a person's face.
"I do not think you understand," the volus said. "I will speak with her."
"No sir, you will not," the guard replied, and his companion pulled out a shock baton. "I'm going to have to ask you to leave."
He then reached down and grabbed the volus by the shoulder, secretly hoping that the drunken moron would fight back.
An instant later he was flying face-first through one of the pillars.
"Fools," the volus muttered, a swirling aura of dark blue energy forming around him. The other Eclipse guard stared at his companion in shock for the span of a few seconds, and then swung the shock baton down into the volus' head. It stopped a centimeter from touching the suit, held fast in a field of altered gravity. The volus gestured offhandedly as he walked past, and the other mercenary was hurled through the armor-glass doors leading into the lobby.
Other Eclipse soldiers rushed toward the entrance from around the atrium, raising their weapons and shouting at glowing volus as he rounded the desk. Civilians stopped what they were doing and stared; humans and turians among them began making bets.
Mass accelerator rounds ripped toward the squat alien, bouncing off a kinetic barrier that formed before him.
"Pathetic, mortal worms," the volus spoke over the barrage of bullets bouncing off his shields. "You ignorant fools know not of what you face."
He stopped behind the desk, ignoring the gunfire hammering his barriers, and raised his hands. Dark energy gathered around the massive hunk of furniture, and it started to rise up off the floor with a deep, ominous creaking.
"For I… I am NIFTU CAL!" he shouted, his voice becoming an abrupt roar. "I am a BIOTIC GOD!"
The desk shot forward in a blur, slamming into the line of mercs shooting at him. Bones broke, mercenaries screamed, and the desk shattered against a fountain, sending water, wooden debris, and the bodies of mercenaries flying in every direction. Civilians screamed and fled (save for the turians and humans - they started betting more furiously), alarms sounded, and the volus strode through the chaos.
"And you will SMELL MY GREATNESS!"
"So you've only got to worry about maybe the first two, I think," Seryna finished.
"Crap," Roland muttered, closing his eyes and shaking his head."So i guess we're doing this now."
"If you want to get in there before they lock the place down and everything is set on fire?" Seryna said. "Yep."
"Wonderful. Come on, I got to get my team together before someone else gets involved."
"Well, shit, Angel," Handsome Jack murmured as he watched everything unfold. He opened a comm line to a Hyperion cruiser currently orbiting Illium. He grinned as he began issuing orders.
"I was thinking about just sitting this one out, but If that's not an invitation, I don't know what is!"
Codex - Citadel Species - Humanity: Physiology
Humans are a levo-based mammalian species with a morphology bearing close superficial similarities to quarian and asari body structures. Human physiology is remarkably robust and durable, able to handle a wide range of climate and temperature extremes, although they lack the organ redundancy and durability of krogan. Humans are quick on their feet, a result of evolution in a plains environment, while also possessing exceptional stamina. Most remarkably, humans possess an extremely variable genetic structure for a species so relatively young to the galaxy.
The genetic variance is exacerbated by large-scale tampering of the gene structure of major human population centers by unscrupulous corporations. the robustness of human physiology has resulted in the creation of a number of "abhuman" variants, with exceptionally malformed body structures. Variance ranges from something as simple as unusual hair color, skin pigment, or eye colors to greatly enhanced musculature, enhanced agility, or greatly increased or reduced size. Unfortunately for most abhumans, the genetic mutations that result in abnormal body structures also tend to impact mental capacity and stability. As a result, many mutant humans suffer from mild to severe mental conditions including schizophrenia, dementia, psychopathy, phobias, and other adverse mental conditions.
Because of this tendency toward mental instability, as well as a tendency to develop particularly destructive or bizarre technologies, the human species is commonly referred to as "insane" by the other Citadel species.
Codex - Citadel Species - Humanity: Humans Systems Alliance
The Human Systems Alliance is a transnational polity established by human governments on Earth to oversee interstellar colonization, defense, and police operations. Set up prior to the First Contact War, the Alliance initially drew personnel and resources from modest donations by countries on Earth. However, after the First Contact War, which helped demonstrate both the kind of power that unchecked human megacorporations were able to attain as well as the power the Alliance wielded when intervening in the conflict, the Alliance received much greater support from colonies and Earth nations. It has steadily grown from a mere arm of Earth's governments to being an omnipresent military and political power.
The modern Human Systems Alliance defends core human colonies, but also polices both human colonies and corporations, as well as protecting outer colonies from the predation of pirates and bandits. The Alliance considers maintaining control of wayward warlords, corporate military forces, and its species' own rampant genetic abnormality to be its primary duty, with only a secondary emphasis placed on diplomacy with the Council and the Terminus. As a result, the Alliance military is large and at times very heavy-handed when maintaining order, especially in areas where human mental and genetic instability is prevalent.
While the Human Systems Alliance maintains a powerful military, it is outnumbered by the sum total military forces of the various corporate armies. As a result, the HSA uses a combination of political and legal clout and its status as a major defense contractor and controller of economic law to turn the various corporations against one another. In the event of a corporation stepping too far out of line, the HSA will often "initiate broad legal action" against the corporation in question, which translates into declaring said corporation a free target. This always results in other corporations targeting and damaging or undermining the offender until the HSA calls them off by "settling all outstanding claims."