Chapter 35

Shepard slammed a fist on the elevator button. The middle button blinked red. She jammed it again. It was still red. The gunfire below stopped. Shepard punched the button over and over. She spun back to her room. The door stood wide open, one of the men's arms preventing it from sliding closed. Shepard found her Omni-Tool, snapped it on, and dashed back to the elevator.

Her fingers quivered as she punched up the screen then tore off a control panel next to the elevator. Now, she did need Kaidan. Kaidan or Tali or someone that would know what they were doing. Someone mechanical. Damn! How to - Booms echoed up the elevator shaft again. They sounded closer now. Sounded like assault rifles not just individual shots.

She scrolled furiously with blood dripping off her fingers. She cursed. She wasn't getting anywhere. She flicked it off. Trying not to concentrate on the echo's, she twisted apart wires in the panel. She tried the red one, then the green. She cut the yellow one darting a look up at the elevator. She was so bad at this. Hell. Wait! She twisted the red to the yellow, the elevator doors slid apart.

Shepard sprang up and looked down an empty shaft. The elevator wasn't coming. She glanced back at the control panel, but there was no time. She flicked Omni-Tool light on and stared below. Finally, some luck. The elevator car was at the CIC, just one floor down. It meant the station soldiers were probably on the bridge though.

She lowered herself down into the shaft and dangled from the edge of the doorway. Her light illuminated the metallic roof of the elevator catching falling blood drops in beam. She let go. She dropped stumbling across the top of the elevator. She careening into the wall catching herself. She hugged her side and drew in a sharp breath. The shooting echoed in her ears. She lunged for the metal hatch. She pulled it open with blood slick hands. The gunshots exploded in volume echoing through her skull and into her bone marrow. Flashes in the elevator care meant the doors must be open. She dropped down inside.

She hit the floor in a crouch. Three armored station soldiers, one a woman, fired on her right into the CIC sending sparks flying from the consoles. The galaxy map flickered in the center. Three Alliance uniforms huddled under the terminals opposite the station soldiers. One of the officers peeked over the consoles and returned fire with her a rifle she must have taken from a dead station soldier. Bodies, mostly in Alliance uniform, bleed across the CIC.

Gunshots burst in her ears. Shrapnel sprayed from the elevator as Shepard darted to Alliance officers. The two ensigns swung their weapons at her. Their eyes widened, and they inching back to make room for her. The third Alliance officer slouched against the console bleed with twitching eyelids. A station attacker rounded on them by the elevator. The ensign with the assault rifle rose up and fired. Shepard pulled her hard to the floor as the attacker fired. Shepard slid forward smashing a foot into his leg. He stumbled forward aiming at her, and she fired point blank into his chest again and again. He fell backward, and Shepard scrambled back to the women. The ducked under the gunfire. Shepard shoved them back off the grated floor panel. She grunted prying it up and sliding it aside. She waved down to the hollow below.

"Down. Don't forget him." Shepard tipped her head at the wounded officer.

Gunshots burst behind Shepard. The ensigns scrambled to get down in the floor. Shepard swung around keeping low and darting looks between the console supports. A station soldier crept around the consoles from the elevator side again. Shepard brought her pistol up and fired. She rolled aside as he fired. A shot took him in the knee. He stumbled, kinetic shield zinging, and armor cracked but unharmed. His flickering shield absorbed another shot. Shepard kept moving close to the ground getting in closer. Her third shot drove him tripping backward. His shield broke. Shepard stood and shot him in the head. His helmet cracked, and his head clipped the wall as he fell to the floor.

Shepard swung around as the other shots stopped. The other two station soldiers streaked toward the cockpit gangway. Shepard shot around the other side of the console to meet them at the gangway entrance. She changed out heat clips feet flying. A silhouette in the cockpit windows moved at the end of the gangway. Joker on crutches. He had no gun, of course. Hands cupped around his mouth as he yelled shuffling backward into the cockpit. Whatever he was saying, they seemed on bent on getting to him. Shepard converged with the two attackers at the gangway entrance. She ducked a shot and slammed a shoulder into the back soldier throwing him to the floor. The other, a woman, didn't pause and pounded down the gangway at Joker.

"Get down! Get down!" Shepard yelled at Joker.

She raised her gun firing stepping away from the fallen soldier rolling to get up on his feet. Shepard snapped the trigger fast in a clustered. The woman neared the cockpit as Shepard closed in. The woman's shield broke. She lurched forward as a shot took her in the back, and Shepard slammed into her. The woman smacked her helmet face down into the floor with Shepard on top. Shepard pressed her pistol to the back of the helmet and fired. Even if her shield wasn't down, that was a kill shot. Joker crouched by the pilot's seat and peeked out. He didn't look hit.

Pain burst through Shepard's right shoulder with the sound of a gunshot. Her pistol clattered to the gangway from shocked fingers. Armored feet charged down the gangway as Shepard twisted pulling the crew women's armored body on top of herself. The soldier Shepard had shoulder to the ground rushed down the gangway with his pistol flashing. Armor fragments sprayed in Shepard's face as her left hand strained for the dropped pistol.

"Hey!" Joker yelled.

It was enough. The gunman glanced up at Joker. Shepard lunged over and tightened her fingers around the pistol. Her shot missed. The station soldier ducked as a light overhead burst in a shower of sparks. Her left handed aim was all over the place. A shot burst by Shepard's head, and she twisted around the woman's armored body still holding it as a shield. The attacker slowed his pace pounding shots into the woman's armor. The armor split and blood started to spray with each shot.

Shepard fired again and again and again, breath hissing fast and hot through clenched teeth. Her shots stuck the walls and the floor. The attacker ducking as he returned fire even though her bullets were missing by a long mile. A bullet shot through the woman's armor. Shepard writhed screaming against her teeth before trying to steady her gun again. Shepard fired. The shot hit the ventilation duct over the attacker's head. It erupted with screaming gas, and the man reeled back. Shepard steadied her gun. The gunman caught his balance. He lifted his rifle as she clenched her breath. He sited down the barrel. Shepard pulled the trigger. The man's gun flashed as he toppled backward. The shot hit above Shepard's head in the cockpit. Shepard squinted down the site of her barrel. The attacker sat up from the gangway floor and scrambling to his knees. Shepard pulled the trigger again. His shield burst. The next shot, and he fell to the floor with misty red plume behind him.

Shepard panted lowering her shaky hand. The pistol dropped from her slippery red grip rattling on the floor. She folded the woman's blood torn body off of herself. Pieces of armor clattered to the floor like jigsaw confetti. She sat up. A shot had penetrated through the station woman's' armor. Shepard hissed touching where it had clipped her hip. It wasn't deep. It wasn't as painful as the shoulder. Shepard prodded at her right shoulder. Jolts of pain shot down her right arm flexing her fingers out. It was a clean exit-entry. It hadn't hit the joint. It was bleeding though. Bleeding bad.

"Shepard!" Joker hobbled over in a rush and fell down gangway beside her. "Damn. You're bleeding. No medigel?"

"No," Shepard hissed.

He reached for her shoulder, but she shoved him off with her left hand. She grunted stumbling to her feet. Metal feet pounded through the CIC. Shepard's breath froze. Her hand empty. Another attacker flew around the corner. He must have been in the war room. He stopped and aimed his pistol. A shot threw him stumbling back. Shepard flinched, her ears ringing as Joker's arm wavered pointing around her legs. Two more shots flashed. The first was way off, but the second hit the man's shield.

"Gun." Shepard put her hand down.

Joker jammed a shaky pistol into her left hand. She threw out the clip, popping in the one from her pocket, ducked a bullet, aimed, and fired until the clip ran out. Her left-handed shots were only slightly better than Joker was with both. The man fell down. She rushed over gun still clenched in her hand, wet with blood and sweat, and fired against his helmet. She checked the other two bodies.

"Why'd they target you?" Shepard demanded.

"Told 'em I was sending a message out." Joker stood up.

"We're not close enough."

"They didn't want to chance my bluff, I guess."

Shepard shivered. She had to think. Booms echoed from lower decks.

"Stay here." Shepard walked down the gangway and kicked one of the pistols on the floor to Joker.

Joker stooped for the pistol. "I don't know how-"

"Take it!" Shepard snapped. "You did just fine a minute ago. Hide under the grated panels in the CIC. Some others down there."

"What about—"

"Do it!" Shepard boomed at him.

Joker swayed on his crutches with empty glassed eyes.

"Joker! Do it!"

He blinked. "Yeah. Okay, Commander."

Shepard stepped over the bodies around the CIC's consoles. One dead attacker killed before she showed up. Two Alliance officers lay face down in red puddles. She had this one, the two sneaking around the CIC, three rushing her on the gangway, and two upstairs by her cabin. Eight dead then, little under half. She punched the elevator button but nothing happened.

Metal creaked and hushed voices rose to Shepard's left. Her head whipped toward the war room. She pulled her hand away from her shoulder and held the pistol out. She slipped on the ball of her feet along the wall and up to the doorway. She burst around the corner. A shot fired at her. She ducked. It was poor aim. Shepard raised her head, and her pistol lowered. Three Alliance crewmen blinked at her holding bloody wounds. One was only halfway up the ladder in the corner. A corporal fell against the wall on shaky legs and held his side. He dropped the pistol.

"Out to the CIC. Hide under the panels. Move!"

They rushed past her. Shepard strode across the room with pain shooting from her hip. Blood plastered the pants' fabric to her leg. Her steps faltered as she rounded the corner into the QEC room. The quantum communicator - whatever issue it had before was a scratch compared to this. It was wasted, completely shot apart. It was an intentional target clearly. She sighed rubbing her forehead with the back of her left hand. The last attacker she hadn't counted on, this must have been his handiwork. Her left hand dropped to her side still clenching her pistol.

She didn't have time to try the elevator's control panel again. They'd obviously overrode it. Her eyes fell on the ladder beyond the war room. It rose out of the floor near the boardroom's table. It wasn't a direct route, and she hadn't crawled through the ship much, but it would work.