A/N: Well that took a while didn't it, although that seems to be becoming the norm. I apologize for how long it takes me to update, but I'm in the last week of school so things are pretty hectic. Not to mention this was kind of luke-warn as far as writing goes, so in order to put in the effort you deserve it took me a bit. I don't know why I wasn't as into the Virmire mission as I have been with others but there you have it. I am however excited to write the Ilos and Citadel missions wrapping up RE1.
So on with the chapter.
Chapter 14: Resonant's Effect
"You good on ammo?"
"Yeah, I made sure to load up before I got off the Normandy."
"Alright good, we're moving soon Tali."
"Alright Jon."
I stop and look over to where Shepard is talking to Wrex, he hasn't raised his gun yet so that's good. I've briefly checked with most of the squad now to make sure they're ready. Shepard maintains a calm face even when Wrex pulls his gun on him. I cringe a little when I realize it's the double barrel he's pointing at Shepard, but then Shepard says something and Wrex just deflates, he actually looks a little ashamed. Shepard puts a hand on his arm and says something else, Wrex nods and is back to his old self. Shepard walks over to me.
"You check in with everyone?" He asks.
"Everyone but Wrex." I reply.
He nods.
"What did you say to him?"
"I told him what he needed to hear."
I just nod. "You have a knack for that."
He chuckles. "Alright looks like Kirrahe is ready, come on."
…
"So you need Ash or Kaidan?"
"Yes, need Alliance officer to lead third team." Kirrahe replies.
Shepard thinks for a moment. "Ash you go with Kirrahe."
"Commander I-"
"I said Ash Kaidan, we need you for the bomb and Ash for the heavy combat."
Kaidan looks like he still wants to go, but accepts Shepard's judgment.
"What do you think Jon?" Shepard asks after the others have wandered off.
"I don't like this, do you have a plan?"
"I have an idea. Hey Tom!"
Tom looks over and Shepard waves him over.
"You need something Commander?"
"You were Alliance before right?"
"Yeah, why?"
"You still remember Alliance protocol?"
"I had a drill sergeant from hell, I will never forget."
He smiles. "Good, you're going with Ash ,and Kirrahe."
He salutes. "Yes sir." He then jogs over to Ash and they start prepping gear.
"You think that'll help?"
"Better than nothing. Alright you're on Shadow team with me."
"Aye aye boss."
We jump down into the shallow water around the side of the facility. Garrus and Liara are here with me and the Commander. I pull my Widow out and pull the bolt, ready to fire. We move swiftly but quietly forward until we reach the first checkpoint.
"Garrus, Knight scope it out."
We nod an affirmative. I look down the scope.
"Several regular troopers and a Juggernaut." Garrus says.
"There's a dish up top too, might want to take it out." I say.
"Alright, you two take the Juggernaut, Liara throw a singularity in there, on my mark."
"Mark."
Garrus's shot goes off just before mine, his round impacts the shields and takes them down, my round punches right through the upper right of its chest. The juggernaut jerks and falls over. Liara's singularity impacts a moment later lifting the troopers and some other random objects into the air, Shepard runs forward firing bursts of assault rifle fire at the floating Geth, Garrus and I keep sniping at the Geth. Only one still remains alive when Liara's singularity wears off, only to receive a burst of assault rifle fire from Shepard as it gets up.
"Good work everyone, knight, take out the dish."
"Roger that."
I grab a grenade from my belt and Select 'magnetic' from the grenade interface. A loose throw sticks the grenade to the center of the dish, the explosion firmly placing it out of commission.
"It looks like their orbital comms are down hit them now!" Ash's voice comes over the comm.
We continue forward to the next checkpoint.
"Just about the same as the last checkpoint." Garrus says.
"Same plan then." Shepard replies.
I works just about the same too. As we move through the base Shepard stops at a terminal.
"This looks important, Knight, see what you can do."
"Alright."
I flip through a few programs on the terminal before coming up with an idea, a few seconds of tinkering and we're set.
"The automated turrets have stopped firing!" Ash's' voice comes over the comm.
"No someone's overloaded them! They're going to explode!" A few muffled explosions filter through the comm soon after. Shepard just shoots me a devious smirk.
"Nice one let's keep moving."
We reach the walkways around the facility, and keep moving forward. We hear over the radio that the fliers have returned for refueling and Shepard has us look for the refueling station. We find it shortly after. Firing at the fuel tank causes it to explode and take out most of the fliers, we mop up the rest and move on. A brief fight outside the facility before we move into the compound proper. We're in between an inner and exterior wall. Garrus moves over to a console.
"We could activate alarms on the other side of the base to draw some heat off this side, but I don't know if the salarians could take it."
"Don't activate the alarms, we can deal with whatever's in there." Shepard says bringing his hand up to the side of his helmet. "Which is what exactly?"
"Prime, and some indoctrinated Salarians." I reply.
Shepard opens the door and we move into a large cargo area. A few salarians look over at us with a dead stare. They start shambling over towards us, some of them start firing pistols.
"Put them out of their misery." Shepard says quietly.
A few bursts of assault rifle fire are all it takes, but once the Salarians are gone Geth troopers start moving in. I duck behind a crate and return fire, the Avenger rattles out its clip worth of rounds, and quickly reload, briefly noting I really need a better assault rifle. The troopers go down fairly quick and we continue deeper into the storage area, as we come around a corner a prime steps off a hub. An angry synthetic growl is all the warning we get before is starts blasting away with its pulse cannon. Everyone scrambles for cover. One of the shots hits my shield and nearly knocks me off my feet while also draining half of my shields.
"Shit these guys don't screw around!"
He just keeps firing away but there's only one of him and four of us, I use overload and take a chunk out of his shields before just pouring on assault rifle fire, everyone else does the same and the prime goes down fairly quick.
The next area is the prison block. Looking into the cells some have a couple salarians, some have one, and some have bodies. We move over to a cell that has a relatively sane looking salarian, Shepard lets him out. We put another cell full of salarians down, nothing left but husks.
"This is sick, these people have nothing left." I say.
"There's nothing we can do but avenge them." Shepard says looking straight into my eyes.
I nod. After the prison block we take an elevator up to a research lab. A big Krogan turns towards us… and charges.
"Shit, MOVE" Shepard shouts.
I dive to the side into a piece of machinery, the scanner stops and a husk shambles out. "Aww come on."
I don't have time to pull my gun before the husk grabs me, I wrestle with it for a minute before I shove it away and grab my knife. I take a big overhead swing and bring the blade down onto the top of its skull. The blade breaks through with a dull crunch and the husk falls over dead. I put my knife away and pick my assault rifle back up. The others have finished off the Krogan and other husks.
"Are you alright Jon?" Liara asks me.
"Yeah I'm fine, don't worry." I reply.
I nod to Shepard, and we move over to the door at the end of the room. Rana Thanoptis cowers behind the desk in the next room. She opens up Saren's lab for us before Shepard tells her to run.
"You enjoyed that, commander." Garrus says.
Shepard just smirks. We take the elevator up and step out into Saren's lab. Shepard notes the Prothean beacon down below. The room is dark, not just in a physical sense either the rooms seems to be looming over you, I grip my assault rifle a little tighter and follow Shepard down to the beacon.
He steps up to it and it activates giving him the next part of the vision. That looks painful. As soon as it's over Liara is at his side. He gets up and reassures Liara. We move to the display at the end of a long platform above the beacon. A red hologram activates, Soverighn.
"You are not Saren." This simple statement seems laden with pitiless hate, and distaste.
"What is that, a VI or something?" Garrus asks.
"Simple beings of flesh and blood, you touch my mind fumbling in ignorance, incapable of understanding."
"Not a VI."
"There is a realm of existence so far beyond your own you cannot even imagine it. I am beyond your comprehension, I am Soverighn."
"This isn't just some reaper ship, It IS a reaper."
"Reaper' a label created by the Protheans to give voice to their destruction, in the end what they chose to call us is irrelevant, we simply… are."
"The Protheans vanished 50,000 years ago you couldn't have been there!" Liara says.
"Organic life is nothing but a genetic mutation, your lives are measured in years and decades, you wither, and die. We are eternal, the pinnacle of evolution, and existence. Before us you are nothing. Your extinction is inevitable, we are the end of everything." He turns his attention to me. "You, your presence here changes nothing, we will sweep over you and eradicate you just like every civilization before you."
My blood turns to ice in my veins. "He knows". I swallow hard, but try to not look to shaken.
"There is an entire galaxy of races united and ready to face you." Shepard says.
"Confidence born of ignorance, the cycle cannot be broken."
"Cycle what cycle?" Liara asks.
"The pattern has repeated itself more times than you can fathom, the Protheans were not the first civilization to fall, they did not create the citadel, they did not forge the mass relays, they merely found them, just as your civilizations have. The legacy of my kind."
"Why would you build the Mass relays, just for us to find them?"
"Your civilizations are based on the technology of the mass relays, our technology. By finding them you develop along the paths we desire. We impose order on the chaos of organic life, you exist because we allow it, and you will end because we demand it."
"We will stop you! Nothing is invincible, nothing lasts forever."
"Your words are as empty as your future, I am the vanguard of your destruction, this exchange is over."
And with that the windows in the room blow out, the computers burst into flame, and a tremor nearly nocks me off my feet.
"Uh, Commander. That reaper ship just pulled a U-turn that would have sheared any of our ships in half. We need to go, like now." Joker says over the comm.
"Alright come on, let's get to the bomb site." Shepard says.
We move back down through the elevator, and across a bridge that was raised before. We get in a few brief fights with Geth and a few Krogan but nothing major. We finally arrive at the bombsite and the Salarian team radios that the AA guns are offline. Joker brings the Normandy over and Kaidan and two techs walk off with the bomb. The comm crackles to life.
"Commander we're taking a lot of fire at the AA tower!"
"Do you need help?" Shepard asks.
"I don't think so, but if you could meet us halfway that would be great."
"Right we're on the way. Liara, Wrex, and Tali stay here guard the bombsite. Knight, Garrus you're with me."
Wrex and Tali jump off the Normandy and together with Liara get into defensive positions around the bombsite.
The rest of us move off towards the AA tower, shortly after leaving the area a Geth drop ship flies overhead.
"Drop ship headed your way Kaidan!" Shepard says over the radio.
"It's already here! But well be fine for a while get the Salarian team back here!"
"Alirght, call us if you need help."
"Roger that commander."
Half way to the AA tower we stop. We're up on a wall that has a long ramp connecting to a lower area leading to the Tower. Me and Garrus pull out our rifles and set up, Shepard also grabs his sniper.
"Alright Ash we're in position, where are you?"
"Just on the other side of the gate!" As she says that a large gate at the far end of the area opens, and people start rushing through, the last person being Tom unleashing a relentless stream of Revenant fire. I look down the scope to cover them just in time to see Tom knock the legs out from under a Geth and proceed to beat its face in with the nasty meat hammer muzzle break on his gun.
As they fall back towards us we start firing on the now bottle necked Geth coming through the gate. Garrus is dropping headshots left and right, Shepard is holding his own, and I have gotten a couple double kills. The team makes it up the ramp and we start falling back towards the bombsite. Just as we arrive Saren pops up on his hover… thingy. Along with several large Geth.
A frantic firefight breaks out with no intermission to talk. I pull out my Shotgun for this fight and start firing. The area quickly turns into a chaotic mess of close combat, Shepard is off fighting Saren over there somewhere, Garrus just gun whipped a trooper and that hunter is about to shoot Ash. OH SHIT.
"ASH!" I start running over to her, but I'm too far away. Time seems to slow as the hunter pulls his shotgun up, Ash reacts to slowly, and I see it dawn on her face what's about to happen.
Just before he fires Tom tackles the hunter, the shotgun goes off, blood and bits of bone go flying through the air, Ash screams. Time suddenly re-asserts itself as I crouch down next to Ash, her entire right arm was blown to bits by the shotgun blast. I quickly apply some medi-gel to try and stem the bleeding. Shepard is suddenly next to me.
"COME ON WE GOTTA GO!" He yells over the gunfire.
I pick Ash up wounded soldier style on her left side, and start moving towards the Normandy's cargo bay. Everyone falls back with us giving covering fire, Tom's Revenant loudest and longest among them. We finally get inside, and the cargo bay closes as we accelerate out of the atmosphere. We quickly get Ash up to Dr. Chakwas, only after she starts tending to Ash does someone realize that I'M bleeding. A quick check shows it's a light wound, just some shrapnel in my left arm, but I need to take care of it regardless. Its good Chakwas isn't the only medical personnel on board, she is the only doctor, but we have a few medics and nurses. The med bay quickly fills up as the after battle adrenaline rush wears off and people realize they've been hit. Wrex is the only member of the ground team who doesn't show up, which isn't surprising. It turns out I've got a couple light wounds, there are several bullets wedged into my armor as well, one in one of my shoulder pieces, another in my chest plate, and a few shotgun pellets in my thigh plate, they're going to leave nasty bruises but I'll live. The medics usher us out of the med bay as soon as we're taken care of to give Doctor Chakwas room.
It's around an hour later that I find myself waiting in the mess hall to see how Ash is. I'm bandaged up, and washed up, but I haven't eaten anything, to anxious. Shepard sits down next to me, and we just sit in silence for a while.
"They're both still alive." Shepard says.
"Yeah…"
"If you wouldn't have told me about… you, she would probably be dead right now."
"Maybe…"
"No, knowing about what was happening caused me to send Tom with Ash, you saved her."
"This seems like a hollow victory, she can't fight anymore. Prosthetics are good, but not combat worthy."
"But she is alive, I'm sure Ash will find another way to contribute, outside of combat."
"Yeah, but the military was her life."
"I know, but you've given her a chance to live for something else, a chance she wouldn't have had otherwise."
I sit in silence, staring down the floor, trying to process Shepard's wisdom. Doctor Chakwas come out of the med bay a short while later. I stand up quickly, but Doctor Chakwas holds up her hands.
"She's fine but I want her to rest right now. You need to rest yourself, you shouldn't go this long after such a strenuous battle."
"I just wanted to-"
"I know, don't worry about her, now go get some rest. You too." She says pointing at Shepard.
"Alright, goodnight Doctor." I say turning towards the crew quarters.
"Goodnight."
As I lay down the day finally catches up with me, my body finally winning the battle with my mind, and I immediately fall asleep.
I wake up the morning after, and very slowly make my way into the mess hall, disheveled and half-awake I sit down with some breakfast.
"Are you ok Jon?" Tali asks somewhat tiredly herself.
I look at her. "My body is pain."
"Ouch"
A/N: So there you go Ash is alive but out of action, I thought that was a good compromise between one dying (which I didn't really want), and both living (Which I thought was too good). But the effects of that will come up later. Next chapter will be the trip back to the Citadel and time on the Citadel before their escape will serve as an interaction chapter of sorts. And at the end I'm kind of leaning towards going to Omega with Garrus, I believe I could come up with some good chapters within that primary idea, BUT I know this has been done before (MTM is awesome) but if any of you have anything to say about that I'll listen.
So until next time Knight out.