Sorry for the super long delay folks. I have been crazy busy with life and work. I hope to get back to writing here quickly but I will be away in 2 weeks for San Diego Comic-con so I will be a little indisposed but will endeavor to write a bit after geeking out a con and with out further ado.
Chapter 8
Finding the Good Doctor
Entering the briefing room I see that I'm the last person to arrive. Sitting down next to Garrus Shepard gives me a nod and starts her briefing. "We have received information pointing to doctor T'Soni being on this planet" she waves at a screen showing a planet "Therum, she is scheduled with the local government to be doing excavations here for a while. The nearest landing site is here several kilometers away. We will be dropping in the Mako and making our way to her dig site. I'll be taking Wrex,Garrus and Milo for this mission."
Huh I guess she doesn't stick to the three person squad from the game, might make my chances of surviving a little better.
"We start the operation in 45 minutes. I want everyone prepped and ready in the Mako as soon as possible. Dismissed."
As Shepard is leaving the room I run up beside her and walk with her to the elevator. "So commander I'm hurt you didn't even give me a call after last night." I say to her with as straight a face as I can manage. "It's not every day I get used as a pillow then abandoned without even a call."
Keeping her face straight she turns to me and says "Well you were a lumpy pillow so I decided to not use you again."
Leaning against the elevator wall I give her a look of mock hurt "So you were just using me for my body? I'll never live this down now. The 'one night' pillow that's what people will call me."
"Hahahahaha, well I could start calling you lumpy pillow or just lumpy if you like?"
Making a face I say with seriousness "Gah, please don't Garrus would have a field day with that."
"Aww I always wanted a big cuddle pillow that I could throw around though."
"Oh, so you do want to use me as a pillow again? Well I might consent to the name but only if were sleeping together… wait that didn't come out right."
Going bright red the elevator chooses this moment to reach the cargo bay. Getting out I head to my locker trying to hide my face. Looking back I see Shepard equally red and heading to put her armor on as well.
"Hey why are you and Shepard both the colour of tomatoes?" Garrus asks as he walks up beside me to grab his weapons.
"Uh, well I kinda put my foot in my mouth and said something stupid."
"Well this is you so I kinda figured that part out already. I mean what exactly did you say." I tell Garrus everything that had happened and by the end he is having trouble breathing from laughing so hard.
"Hey shut up beaky I'm terrible when I talk to women you know that."
"Well yes but that is just too damn funny. You proposed sleeping with her before you even asked her on a date. That's a new speed for moving to fast."
Punching him in the arm I say "Shut up it isn't like I was going to ask her out I was just making a joke and it spiraled way out of control and crashed and burned leaving people and wreckage strewn everywhere. I'm like a natural disaster when it comes to women. Give me a fire fight and I'm good but put me in a room with a beautiful women and I'm a socially inept moron."
Nodding his agreement Garrus starts for the Mako which Wrex and Shepard are just getting into. "Okay I want Garrus on power control, Milo up front working the turret." We all nod understanding and hop into the tank. Wondering why I would be put on the turret with less combat experience than the others I hop in and realize the answer. The Mako looks fairly large but the interior is much smaller as the armor plating is quite thick with tech for the shields also on the inside. Garrus would need to run the shields as he has tech expertise while I don't and Wrex is too big to sit in either seat.
"So I've never used one of these any advice?" I say dropping into my seat next to Shepard while strapping myself in at the same time.
"You ever play any video games?" She asks.
Laughing at the irony of the question in my head I simply respond "Ya, some."
"Well hit the on button and the controls and read out will work like almost any video game controller since the 20th century."
"Hmm… sweet!" Hitting the button turns on smaller screen in front of me with the same view as outside the window but I can use a zoom and the trigger are fairly self-explanatory as they have labels on them.
Garrus chuckles at me as he knows quite well that I love video games since I made him play tons of them with me back on the Citadel. Hearing a whooshing noise I look up to see the bay doors open in front of us. Oh crap! I forgot about this part! (Author's note: I'm deathly afraid of heights at the best of times, therefore me free falling from orbit is a thought that makes me want to puke.)
"Mako you are go for launch in 10, 9, 8" Joker drones through our headsets.
"Might be a bad time to mention this but I'm scared of heights." I say with as little trembling as I can manage.
"6, 5,"
"Nothing to worry about once you start the fall you should be fine." Shepard says while patting me on the shoulder.
"2, 1, Launch."
"VROOM" we shoot off the ramp and begin free falling.
"IT"S NOT THE FALLING THAT I'M SCARED WILL KILL ME IT'S THE SUDDEN STOP AT THE END!" I scream to be heard over the rushing noise of air and fire on our hull.
Wrex starts laughing hysterically at me right until we hit the ground. "CRASH" We screech to a halt. "While I'm not afraid I respect his logic for his fear more than someone who's just afraid of falling for falling's sake.
All three of us turn and look at Wrex as if he suddenly grew two more heads.
"What? He has a point. Cant a Krogan appreciate someone's fear?" He says the last bit with a feral smile.
"Now that last part sounds more Krogan." Garrus says turning back to his screen.
"Commander we're getting some strange readings, really strange like off the damn charts. It's coming from a dig site several clicks from your location."
"Send us the coordinates Joker and remain on stand-by." Shepard says as she finishes her last checks to make sure the tank wasn't damaged in the drop.
"Roger that commander."
"Ok then let's get going." Shepard says as she suddenly punches the gas.
Crap I remember that in the game the Mako drove like shit, I wonder if its cause the vehicle is terrible or if Shepard can't drive?
"CRUNCH" as we drive along the lines of lava it actually feels like Shepard is deliberately hitting every single thing in the way on purpose.
"Christ Shepard I'm not going to have any spine left by the time you get us to the dig site!" I say as I bounce all over the damn place hitting my helmet off the roof as I desperately try to tighten my harness to compensate.
"What are you talking about?" she asks giving me an angelic smile which doesn't fool me one bit.
"We have Geth up ahead!" Garrus barks from behind Shepard.
Grabbing the controls I bring the turret to around thanking whoever designed the turrets adapter to counter for when the tank was moving. This thing bounced around like a small car driving over full size logs with broken shocks. I was pretty sure my teeth were going to rattle out of my freaking head.
"Where the hell did you get your license Shepard the back of a cereal box?" I stutter as I blast a missile into center mass of the last group of Geth ground troopers.
Without missing a beat while swerving hard to avoid a rocket she responded "Nah they were giving them out for free if you bought two pieces of furniture when I was furnishing my apartment. Got a free TV as well."
She said it so seriously I just gaped at her wondering if she was actually telling me the truth. A sudden hard turn around a lava pit dinged my head off the wall bringing my focus back to the road and how much Shepard seemed to be just swerving for no reason.
Coming up to a canyon we had to swerve hard and hit the rocket jumpers to avoid a rocket from a turret sitting in the middle of the way. Swinging the turret around I pound the thing as fast as I since we don't exactly have much room to maneuver. With an explosion the target is gone but we suddenly see four rockets streaking towards us. "Turrets surrounding the main gate I count four from here. No way we can avoid all the rockets with this narrow canyon." I yell down from my spot in the turret.
"Off to the right there I see what looks like a path around… I'm going for it. It's going to get bumpy so hold on." Shepard says while swerving us hard since we had all of five seconds to make decision with more rockets streaking towards us. Going up over the hill we see another turret that immediately starts firing at us and causes Shepard to slam into reverse as I start firing at the turret. Luckily the rockets are just as slow in life as in the game. Shepard decides to jump over the hill and let me fire off a shot then reverse making me slam my head on the display every time.
The turrets explode after a few shots and we move forward slowly. "Dammit Shepard you might have given me a concussion slamming my head every time you moved us there."
"Shut up it wasn't that bad!"
"Shepard we got Geth ground units advancing on us." I yell cutting her off from any further retort while swinging the cannon around and pegging a group hiding around a crate. Firing a shot into the side of the Geth's cover I find that the box was loaded with something caustic as it explodes with enough force to rock us sideways.
"Holy crap what the hell was in there?" Shepard yelps as she swerves over the last of the Geth trying to avoid flying crate pieces. In the back I can hear Wrex laughing maniacally. Pulling up to the far gate she throws the Mako into park. "Alright the gate is shut and there's a building on both side and it seems most likely that the controls would be inside one of them. Garrus I want you to cover us from the Mako and make sure no one sneaks up on us. The rest of us will split up and take separate buidings just go slow and call for back up if anything happens."
With that she jumps down and starts heading towards the building beside the entrance gate, Wrex starts towards the gate on the right of the exit gate so I start heading up to the last one.
Edging to the corner I pull a mirror out of my pocket and stick it around the corner to check the area. There are a couple of tall fuel tanks with a path going around the side of the far end of them. Replacing the mirror I unstrap my shotgun and move up slowly all the while priming my biotics just in case. Suddenly I hear the telltale whirr of a Geth's flashlight head moving. Stopping I envelope myself with a biotic barrier. "I hear Geth in this building, not sure how many. Will report in a moment." I whisper into my comm.
"I got the one here. I'm taking it out." Shepard reports.
From distance I hear the sound of Shepard's Avenger belting out mixed with the sound of Geth pulse rifle noise. Shepard's soon drowns out the second. Shaking my head and moving my attention back to my own Geth problems. Aiming my Avenger down to the end of the hall I start moving towards the corner when something catches my eye. A shimmer in the air right in the corner. Stopping I start aiming where I thought I saw the movement in the air. As if on cue I hear the noise of a Geth around the corner. I go to move again and I see the same distortion in the air. Sudden realisation hits me as a Geth trooper comes around the corner firing at me. I quickly pull up my biotics and hit the trooper with a throw just as a Hunter decloaks and fires its plasma shotgun at me. Taking a slight hit as I roll to the side I close the distance with him running under his arm as he swings his shotgun at me. Quickly I pull up more dark energy as I put my hand into some of the wires in its torso. I use a massive push directed everywhere to blow the Hunter apart. As the top half falls it keeps moving and still has its weapon and opens fire again. Taking the full hit this time I see my shield meter fall to zero. Dashing over I put my rifle to its eye and pull the trigger. The eye makes a fizzing noise as it explodes in sparks scorching my leg armor but causing no damage.
"BAM" Sudden pain envelopes my left side. I spin from the impact seeing the trooper I threw and apparently forgot about aiming its pistol at me. As I hit the floor it walks over to me and puts the gun to my head. I close my eyes not wanting to watch. "Blam, blam,blam."
'Wait… I'm not dead?' Opening my eyes the geth falls to the floor minus its head and arm. Looking up I see Shepard running towards me.
"Milo are you ok?"
Opening my mouth all I can do is cough and suddenly I realize I'm coughing blood. 'Shit this isn't good!'
Looking down as Shepard start addressing my wound I see that the shot went clean in between the plates of my armor when my shields went down and look like they punctured my lung. She cuts some of my undermesh off starts applying medi-gel too my chest the slowly rolls me over and does the same to the other side. "This is all I can do for now without a doctor but my scans are showing it only grazed your lung so you should be fine as long as you don't overdo it. Of course my Omni-tool isn't meant for this but it should be good enough until we can get you to Doctor Chakwas. We can't afford to break away from this mission so you will need to stay in the Mako."
Wheezing but starting to feel slightly better but still like I was running on one lung I look at her and say "Hell no I'll follow and give Biotic support but stay behind cover. I won't push it and if I fall behind I'll just make my way back to the tank."
Looking impressed Shepard just nods and responds with "Just make sure you don't try to run or you could tear your lung open." Helping me to my feet she pulls my arm around her shoulder and helps me to the Mako since the Medi-gel is still working on my body.
Getting into the tank Garrus checks that I'll live and berates me a bit before taking over the turret position.
Lying on the floor I look up and see Wrex looking at me inches from my face, gulping I sat "What's up Wrex besides your face from me?"
Snorting in amusement he looks at my wound and says "Well at least you will have a good scar to impress the women of your species with. Although I'm told it mainly works with Krogan female."
I start laughing and immediately regret it as I spit up some more blood. Shepard looks back and tells us both to stop or I'll damage myself more and we both just lapse into silence.
After one hell of a bumpy ride Shepard announces we have hit a road block and must continue on foot. Getting out we see that there is only a small passage through some rocks with more lava to the left and a cliff to the right. Following the others at a slightly slower pace, they begin moving through the choke point that I realize would be perfect for an ambush. I keep back as I'm not going to be running to cover any time soon so better to stay further back so that I have more time to hobble to cover. As we crest a hill we are met with an absurd amount of gun fire which catches the others by surprise since it seems to be long range. I quickly throw up a barrier so we can at least make it to the rocksin front of us. Thankfully they aren't far since I don't have much juice left in me. As Garrus and Shepard start picking off the snipers and keeping them occupied some troopers and a rocket trooper decide to move up to hit us while two of us are distracted. Unfortunately for them Wrex is pissed off about having to duck from fire and charges them since the snipers are now busy. Looking into my pouch I pull out an energy drink and energy bar and start chowing down quickly to give myself some more power for using my Biotics.
This takes all of 15 seconds as a Biotic that is low on energy can consume a meal in less than a normal person takes to have drink. I look up and see that Wrex left a swath of broken parts and pieces of Geth from our hill down a gulley and up into the rise on the far side a good 350 yards away. How the hell did he do that so quickly?" Seeing the others staring to move up I follow along. On the other side and up the hill we get to a small facility for what I'm not sure. Suddenly I start getting that feeling of deja-vu as we approach the entrance. Suddenly it snaps into my head as I grab Garrus by the shoulder and scream "GET DOWN!" we all dive to the side as suddenly a drop ship fly's over us dropping several troopers and an armature. We all move for cover behind some machinery as the enemy opens up on us.
"Well shit!" Wrex says looking around the corner "Even I don't want to charge that!"
Not sure what to do we just take down the foot soldiers but can keep enough fire on the armature to do any good. Suddenly I have an idea as I watch how it moves. "Shepard!" I yell to get her attention. She quickly comes over. "Take Wrex and circle around this machinery and me and Garrus will draw its fire until you are in place then unload on it while we stop and when it turns to fight you we switch again. It's so slow it won't be able to get us and we can keep fire up longer." Nodding she signals Wrex and they both go dashing off too our left. Leaning out I throw another Warp at it as Garrus fires from the opposite. We both duck as it fires another blast of energy at us ripping even more of our tattered cover to pieces. "BOOM, BOOM, BOOM." Looking around I see it turn as Wrex unloads his shotgun and Shepard does the same. Then we the machine gets about three quarters of the way turned the duck behind cover and me and Garrus start our weapon biotic combo up again forcing to turn and try to deal with us. We do this for about three minutes before it's shields short out and ne of use hits something vital bringing it down.
We all move past the Armature's corpse and to the entrance. "Good thinking there Milo it wasn't able to comprehend that it needed to deal with one of us first." Shepard says with a small pat on the shoulder. Wrex gives me a grunt of approval as he passes.
"Nice thinking partner," Garrus says with approval "for once the plan doesn't call for you to catch a grenade in the face." And he's back to being an ass. Pulling a bit of energy biotic I poke him in the side letting the energy zap him as if he grabbed a power outlet. "Oww dammit I keep forgetting to make my comments about you from further away."
Snickering I follow them down the mine shaft. As we got to the end I see Shepard up front put her fist up for us to stop. She motions Garrus forward and the two sneak to the edge of the rail. Both taking a breath almost at the same time they both fire. "Clear" Garrus says after sweeping around to check for more baddies.
Moving down in front of the ruins on a catwalk we are suddenly ambushed by two drones. We all fire at the same time and they both explode without much effort. We all look at each other and shrug mutually thinking those were way too easy to kill.
Hopping into the elevator which seems to be the only thing in the tunnel besides the ruins which all the entrances seem sealed by a barrier. Going down the silence is too much for me so I say in complete deadpan "Man they're so cheap they don't even have bad elevator music and this service is terrible I think I'm going to use a different Geth mining service next time."
Shepard snickers Garrus laughs a bit and Wrex just looks at me weirdly. Getting to the bottom seems to take forever and the elevator doesn't seem to go very fast a trait I'm noticing seems to be kinda universal, a fact that I put to the question to my companions since we all are getting quite bored.
"I'm not sure why all elevators now a days all go so slow, I tried to look it up once on the Extra-Net once but it almost seemed like someone was purposely deleting info on it." Shepard says.
After a bit more conversation we finally get to the bottom. Stepping out we hear "Hello? Is anyone there? I'm trapped!"
Jumping down we see Liara floating in mid-air. They don't show in the game what a mess she is. She looks like she has been there for a few days and is shall we say not very clean. She also looks very weak and tired.
"Doctor T'Soni I presume." Shepard says walking up.
"Yes. Please you have to help me!"
"How did you get trapped and how do we get to you?"
"I was running from the Geth and turned on these facilities defenses. But I must have pressed something I shouldn't have because this stasis field trapped me. I've been here for two days already, you need to help me!"
"Don't worry doctor we will get you out. First I need to ask do you know what your mother is doing with Saren?"
"My mother? I haven't spoken to her in years!"
Shepard looks thoughtful before replying "Very well we will be back once we find a way around the field."
"Thank you!"
With that we start down some more scaffolding just as a few more Geth show up but there is only a few and we make short work of them. Walking by a laser drill I stop and start looking at the controls as the others check and clear the cave.
Walking back over to me Shepard watches as I fiddle with some of the circuitry. "Is it salvageable?"
Not responding I look at my Omni-Tool and start using it as a solder gun. After a couple of quick fixes the laser suddenly just blasts the wall under where Liara is trapped.
Staring flabbergasted all I can say is "Umm… woops?"
Garrus walks over and looks at the diagram I looked up to fix he points at the circuit I fixed last. "You should have fixed this first to stop it from firing automatically." He just shakes his head and says "Well at least you didn't blow up a hanger this time."
"You blew up a hanger?" Wrex asks with a bit of interest.
"I'd rather talk about when I don't feel like my lung is going to fall out if it's all the same." I state while glaring daggers at Garrus.
"You better I wanna know details!" Shepard says with a bit of glee in her eyes.
"Well I would like to thank for choosing Milo mining services. Making Geth look bad at mining since 10 minutes ago." Shepard smirks and Garrus shakes his head, Wrex just ignores me at this point.
Walking down to the hole we created we see that the field was disrupted or destroyed by the laser. Walking to the center of the tower we find what looks like an elevator and a control panel. We play with the controls which are all in glyphs which I assume are Prothean, we manage to get the elevator moving up.
The others walk over to Liara when the elevator stops. Not feeling well and breathing badly I just wait in the center. The others free Liara just as the whole facility starts shaking. "The facility wasn't stable to begin with when you activated the laser you must have triggered a seismic event!" Liara yells over the shaking of the earth.
Not wasting any time everyone runs back to me as I hit the button to take us to the top as Shepard yells for joker to meet us at the entrance. Wrex just says "If we die from this I'll kill him!"
As we get to the top we go to run when suddenly the entrance is filled with Geth and a Krogan battlemaster who says "Give us the Asari, or not that would be more fun."
Shepard looks at him like he is an idiot "I think we will keep her thanks."
Motioning to me to stay back they charge the Geth, Wrex demolishing three of the six Geth within a minute with Shepard and Garrus in a firefight with the rest. Suddenly I realize the Krogan is missing. Looking around I spot him trying to take Liara. I pull my pistol as I can't hold my rifle. He just looks pissed as I try maneuver in front of Liara who seems to have fainted. He reaches her before I can and proceeds to grab her roughly and drag her away. Looking around I see the others are too busy to help so throwing caution to the wind I run at the battlemaster pulling up my Biotics and throwing a pull at him. It shakes him but doesn't stop him. He turns dropping the doctor and reaching for me with a pull as he glows with Biotics as well. I drop under his arm and throw a Biotic charged punch. He actually grunts in pain with amount of power I threw into the punch with my one good arm. Unfortunately I can't move as quickly as I should and he grabs a hold of me. Thrashing as much as I can he starts squeezing and I feel something give in my chest. "AAAAAAARGHH" the pain hits me like a freight train. I start seeing red and pull up a dangerous amount of dark energy and hit him with a super concentrated singularity. I hear him start screaming and he drops me. As I fall on the ground I see the Krogan fall as well then everything turns to black and fades out.
Hope I didn't drag on too much for this chapter. As always reviews are appreciated. Cheers if I meet anyone at Con. :)