Alone I
Kim sat in the dark and cried. She had come so close to a second chance, only to have it snatched away from her. She could still feel the bullets piercing her flesh, slaying her, consigning her to this purgatorial prison of her mind. To that matter, she didn't feel complete. She felt that everything that had made her Commander Shepard had been stripped away from her, the tactical knowledge, the leadership skills, the combat ability all gone, just leaving behind the parts of her that were Kim, the scared little girl who hid under the floorboards while four eyed demons murdered her family. She was mired in despair, lost in the recesses of her past, so broken she wished she had stayed dead. Oblivion was preferable to this hell of self-torment.
Tali gasped as her mind was wrenched out of her body to hover, formless, in the middle of nothing. Then a speck in the darkness, rushing ever closer, and taking form as it approached. It was a door. Suddenly feeling her limbs again, she looked down and realised that she was naked, the exosuit replaced by a swathe of grey flesh shot through with silvery lines that wound around her body. She shivered, suddenly realising how cold it was, and as if by magic, or force of will, she was clothed again, but not in her exosuit prison.
She wore a long, flowing dress of white silk and a black shawl, her face and arms bare. Miraculously it didn't feel so cold, although the thin material barely preserved her modesty, let alone her body heat. Thus attired, she pushed open the door and stepped into her Commander's mental prison.
The first thing she noticed was the pitch blackness. The second was the sound of sobbing. She blinked, trying to track down the source. Eventually deciding to follow her ears, she set off, searching for her Commander.
Kim watched the strange woman walking around, trying to find her, but she was staying hidden. She wasn't ready to face anyone yet. She was too busy sitting and crying over the train wreck of a life she had led.
Lost II
The door slid open. She clutched the shotgun, screwed up her eyes and started whispering in her head.
please no please no please no please no please no
She almost screamed as something touched her shoulder, but then she heard the whispers return, except they were far stronger, like a proper voice.
-We are here now-
She looked up and saw a single light shining at her from the centre of a curved metallic shell. The voice spoke again.
-Are you damaged?-
"I can't remember anything. Why can't I remember?"
-Over time memory will return-
"Who are you?"
-We are Geth-
"Okay then. How do we get out of here?"
-Follow us, Shepard-Commander-
"Shepard-Commander?"
-Your name-
Geth slipped out of the room, followed moments later by Shepard-Commander. They made their way down the hall, her with the instinctual knowledge on how to move silently, him (the voice sounded male) with his servos specially muffled for stealthy movement.
"Where are we going?"
-Be quiet. Think your words-
She concentrated for a second.
-Like this?-
-Yes-
-Where are we going?-
-To the fire control centre. The Collectors are disabling our weapons. We must destroy their ship-
-Collectors?-
-Enemies-
That was good enough for her.
Searching III
The Gethsemane were adaptive, ferocious and cunning fighters, but they needed more than that. They needed something that only experience could bring. They needed leaders. And the Riser had picked out the perfect ones.
Joker tapped a control and the Gethsemane scoutship Risatuu slipped out of the hangar, carrying with it a full company of Gethsemane warriors. At first he had been incredibly wary of the Geth-like AIs but his suspicion of them passed as soon as he had encountered some of them getting drunk. Apparently the Gethsemane had enough organic components that getting drunk was possible, although it usually took a lot more than even a Krogan to get them tipsy. Although the thought of a drunk eight foot synthetic with an integrated railgun that could stop a tank was a little terrifying, the mere fact that he'd seen them do it had made them seem a little more, well, human to him. Plus, they all had different personalities. He was happy to call some of them friends.
His co-pilot, an Engineer model, checked her screens before reporting in.
"All systems seem go, Captain."
That was another thing he liked about the Gethsemane. The pilot commanded the ship. The Engineer, who he had taken to calling Sparkie, had modified her vocal processors at his request, replacing the usual car-crash grinding of Gethsemane speech with a cool female voice with the hint of a Deep South twang to it.
"What's our destination, Captain?"
"We're off to Omega to collect a professor and a vigilante."
"Naturally." Sparkie flicked her head flaps in sequence from left to right, a gesture that seemed to correlate with a Human rolling their eyes.
Joker peered out of the cockpit at Gethsemane Station. He had no idea how the Gethsemane, who numbered in the low hundreds, had got the resources to build on that scale. The station sat out in the void between stars, a single, organic looking shard of metal ten kilometres long, and it still wasn't finished. It had a strange beauty to it, he supposed. But enough about that. He had some flying to do, and the Risatuu was a sweet ship. She really demanded flying.
They made fairly good time to Omega, but it was when they docked that the funtimes started. Sparkie sat, legs crossed and one of her strange hoof-like feet tapping on the floor, as almost twenty Blue Suns faced down the twelve Gethsemane that had just boarded the station. They were standing in a line, assault rifles raised at the synthetics, who merely stood, their own weapons levelled at the Blue Suns. If it came down to a gunfight the Suns didn't stand a chance. The two Sentinels were up front, their plasma beams primed and the Engineers behind them reinforcing their shields as they combined into a barrier that would protect the entire group. The Soldiers were just behind them, close enough so their own shields could contribute to the group barrier as their weapons pointed outwards. The Vanguards, Infiltrators and Adepts were crouching at the back, ready to propel themselves into the chaos that would surely follow the opening volleys.
One of the Sentinels suddenly flicked her head flaps up and boomed out a noise so loud Joker clapped his hands over his ears back on the ship. The Blue Suns dropped their weapons, shrieking as they desperately tried to block out the sound. That was another feature of Gethsemane Sentinels - riot suppression. A useful skill where non-lethal options were required. After the foghorn screech stopped there was no sound from anyone within earshot for almost two minutes before activity returned to the markets. As the Blue Suns picked themselves up, all it took was for the Sentinel to flick her head plates up again to send them scurrying away in fear. Sparkie nodded slowly.
"Nicely done. I thought for sure we were going to have twenty dead Suns on our hands."
Joker nodded, still slightly dazed from the strength of the sound.
"Holy fucking shit. I'd forgotten the big girls could do that."
Sparkie blew out a shaky breath - no she didn't. She made that slight electronic warble that indicated she was mimicking the human habit. Despite her appearance, it was too easy to forget she was 80% synthetic.
The group of Gethsemane headed into Afterlife, their black shells gleaming dully in the pulsing light as they stomped their way up the stairs that led to Aria's hangout. Her six guards were all dangerous mercenaries, each with tens of kills to their name, but they were utterly and painfully outgunned by the twelve synthetics now facing them. Nevertheless they took up defensive positions around their boss, demonstrating impressive loyalty.
"YOU SHOULD NOT CLUSTER SO CLOSE. IN YOUR CURRENT DEPLOYMENT IT WOULD TAKE A SINGLE VOLLEY OF GRENADES TO ELIMINATE YOU. WE HAVE COME SEEKING INFORMATION, NOT CONFLICT. ATTACKING ARIA WOULD BE SUICIDE."
The spokesperson, an Infiltrator, came to sit on the sofa. After a second, the guards returned to their posts, although they still seemed jumpy.
Aria turned to look at the synthetic.
"And you are ..."
The Infiltrator had got Sparkie to add a volume control to his vocal synthesiser as well.
"Unimportant. We need information. Dr. Mordin Solus and Archangel. Their locations."
The Asari leaned back in her seat and smiled.
"So you're here to do business."
"Incorrect. We are here to extract information. The only control you have over the matter is the method of questioning."
"You clearly seem to think you have the power here. So tell me, why did you announce to the club that attacking me would be suicide?"
"Think of it as an olive branch. Locations. Now."
"I'm not sure I like your tone of voice, machine."
"This dick-measuring contest is a waste of both my time and yours. We require some information, information that it does you no harm to divulge. If possible we would like to avoid ... unpleasantness. Railgun shells are expensive."
Aria didn't quite know what to make of the synthetic perched on her sofa. His speech exuded confidence, not the bluster of someone who has grossly overestimated himself but the quiet, disarming surety of someone with supreme confidence in their own skills and hard evidence to back up that confidence. He was right. She gained nothing by withholding the information.
Five minutes later and supplied with all the data they needed, the group split, six going to extract Mordin and six going after Archangel. It was the group after Archangel that first ran into trouble. While Mordin's group were scaring the plague guards to death, Archangel's group were mining an unfortunate Batarian for Archangel's location. They took a short hop outside, the Infiltrator using his jump jets, the others pushing off buildings as they floated in zero gravity to an access point. The Infiltrator slipped down, cloaked, and froze. At least this time the YMIR was powered down. He relayed the information to the Soldier, who dropped down beside him, already deploying his stabilisers as his railgun loaded up with a high explosive round. The Sentinel took up position in front of him, her shield up at full, ready to absorb the damage that would roll through the room when the heavy mech was vaporised. The four other teammates headed out of the room, taking cover positions as they prepared to defend their location. The blast, when it came, was deafening, followed by an equally deafening "FUCK ME". For a race of (mostly) synthetics, they used an awful lot of Human colloquialisms. A Salarian Eclipse merc came running up, only to have his brain expelled from the back of his head by a precision shot from one of the Infiltrator's silenced rifles.
-Head over the bridge-
-Negative. Telemetry suggests gunship on the ground. We should take it out-
-Alright, we'll split two-four. Infiltrator, Vanguard, Adept, Engineer, head over the bridge and rendezvous with Archangel. Sen, cover me while I poke a hole in the gunship-
-Affirmative-
The freelancers on the bridge didn't have much chance, with four Gethsemane hitting their rear. Likewise the Blue Suns guarding the gunship quickly fell to volleys of plasma beam fire as the Soldier brought his railgun to bear, this time loaded with a penetrating round aimed to pass right through the fuel tank. Although the launcher used a system of magnetic and mass effect fields to hurl the slugs, when it bored through the armour plate that was good old fashioned friction at work. The gunship went up in a fireball, incinerating everyone in the immediate vicinity, including several hapless mechanics. Then they followed their squadmates over the bridge.
They found Archangel pressed up against the wall, rifle aiming at the Engineer as she stood perfectly still in the middle of the room, the other three all with their weapons pointed at the Turian. As the other two entered the room, the Sentinel spoke up.
"TRY NOT TO PISS YOURSELF. YOU'LL GO RUSTY."
The Turian still stood, silent, faceless beneath his helmet.
"WE'RE NOT HERE TO ELIMINATE YOU. YOUR SKILLS ARE REQUIRED BY THE RISER."
He still stood monolithic, rifle gripped tight.
"LOOK, TURIAN. WE'RE GETTING YOU OUT OF THIS SHITSTORM WHETHER YOU LIKE IT OR NOT. SO YOU CAN EITHER HELP OUT, OR WE'LL SEDATE YOU AND DO ALL THE HARD WORK OURSELVES. WHAT'S IT GOING TO BE?"
He finally spoke with a voice of steel.
"You're not Geth."
"NO SHIT."
"So how do we get out of here?"
"HAVE YOU EVER SEEN A GETHSEMANE HYPERVELOCITY STRIKE PACKAGE DO ITS BUSINESS?"
"DON'T BE STUPID, OF COURSE HE HASN'T."
"WELL IT GOES SOMETHING LIKE THIS."
And with that the Soldier set his stabilisers into the floor and swivelled his railgun to point at the Eclipse force gathering at the end of the bridge. Several of them, having heard the phrase 'Hypervelocity Strike Package' drift across the bridge, had quietly fled, a smart move given the circumstances, but the majority were still standing there, dumbly staring as the barrel of the railgun aligned with the centre of their group.
"CRUNCH TIME."
And with that the projectile leaped out of the launcher.
The principle of Mass Effect weapons technology was simple: the faster it goes, the more damage it does. The HVSP projectile took that to extremes. For someone watching the universe at one millionth of its usual speed, they would have seen the projectile leap out of the launcher and traverse the distance to the mercenaries in around one second. Since the distance was around one hundred metres, that means that at a rough estimate the strike package had accelerated to one hundred million metres per second, or one third of the speed of light. Assuming the viewer is watching the event a million times slower than the average life form, they would see that after around ten metres the outer shell of the projectile had been flared off, leaving a contrail of plasma that shone with the brilliance of a star's nuclear fire. At this point the projectile spreads out a little, having released a cloud of ultra dense ball bearings that spread out as they flew. They went on for about another thirty metres before they were all gone, the clouds of air molecules they were passing through suddenly and violently stripped of their electrons to form searing bolts of plasma. For plasma, one third of the speed of light was a relatively sedate pace but it was enough. The roiling wall of hyper-heated gas rolled over the hapless Eclipse mercs, for the briefest of instants transforming the whole area into a taste of hell before the plasma encountered the walls of the station, its progress slowed enough for the electrons to become reunited with the nuclei and transform the blast of pure death into innocuous gas molecules again.
The stench of ozone filled the air as Archangel examined the Soldier's handiwork. Of the Eclipse mercs there was no sign apart from the fact that their bodies had survived just long enough to shield the wall and floor behind them, leaving patches of unaffected wall in the exact shape of Eclipse mercs as the surrounding bulkheads bubbled, fused and melted together. As the area cooled further, droplets of molten titanium condensed in the air, making it very briefly rain liquid metal. The drops solidified on the floor, leaving little round coins of upraised titanium on the scorched and sloughed decking.
"By the Spirits."
"NO, BY ME. MAYBE I SHOULD GO AND SIGN IT."
"Ah ... So that's Eclipse down. Got any more goodies in that railgun of yours?"
It was the smallest one, the Infiltrator, that replied.
"No more strike packages. One high explosive, one armour penetrating and one high impact left."
Suddenly a loud boom reverberated through the facility.
"They've breached the lower level." Archangel seemed icily calm. "Well they had to use their brains eventually."
"We'll deal with them."
-Sen, stay up here with me to hold the fort. The rest of you, get down and seal off the lower level-
-As you command-
The Soldier kept his stabilisers jammed in the floor, railgun swinging down to meet with his munitions carousel as he brought up his two heavy machine guns and his grenade launcher shifted like a dog sniffing the air. Meanwhile, the Sentinel stood at the back of the room, plasma beams primed to eliminate anyone that came up the back stairs as the other four headed down to seal off the lower level.
While they were gone Archangel kept the majority of the Blood Pack busy with his sniper rifle. The Soldier's machine guns and concussive projectiles weren't practical at the range Archangel was working at and so he settled for the occasional grenade, whereas the Sentinel hardly got any action at all, the Blood Pack completely unable to get across the bridge.
Ten minutes later the four other Gethsemane returned, having completed their mission, but something was wrong. The Engineer seemed to have gone limp, being supported by the Vanguard and the Adept. One side of her armour was fused and melted and the unpleasant scent of burnt meat emanated from her chest.
-She ran straight into a Blood Pack flamethrower-
-Get her up here-
Whilst they were distracted, Garm and an entire contingent of Blood Pack Krogan charged over the bridge. The armoured juggernauts shrugged off the machine gun fire and the scything shrapnel bursts on their armour, bludgeoning their way into the building as the Adept dragged her wounded sister into the upper floor. The Sentinel opened fire, plasma beams succeeding where simple bullets failed in felling Krogan after Krogan, slashing through limbs and skulls with impunity. Garm roared and started charging up the stairs at her and she situated herself at the end of the corridor, plasma beams stabbing out, all four focused on the charging Krogan's head. About three quarters of the way down the hall his barriers shattered but by now he was going too fast to be stopped. He smashed into the Sentinel, crushing her against the wall as he gripped one of her arms and ripped it out of the socket. Her cry of pain was cut short by a point blank blast from his Claymore to her neck that scooped a furrow out of her body as it severed her head. He finished her off with a couple of hammer punches to the chest, then got up, already reloading his shotgun as he searched for another target. He found it, but he wasn't the only one with a shotgun.
The Vanguard blasted the Krogan right in the head at point blank range, forcibly evacuating his brains through the back of his hump as the Gethsemane hissed in vindictive satisfaction. Then the fight was done. The Blood Pack were defeated.
Any savage pleasure in the victory would have to wait. Although the gunship was history, Blue Suns started dropping onto the building's roof by aircar and shuttle. The Adept sat in wait as they started dropping down from the ceiling.
Without warning she activated her biotic whips and brought them both smashing down, creating an enormous biotic blast that sent the group of mercs flying through the air, bones smashed by the brutal force of the smash. She then cast a Flare that curved upwards, nodding in satisfaction as the attack brought a smoking skycar spiralling down to crash on some unseen lower level of the station. The Soldier joined in, covering a different window with each of his arm-mounted machine guns as he tore through the mercs and the Vanguard, the Infiltrator and Archangel found themselves tag-teaming, the Vanguard yanking mercenaries out of cover with Pull fields for the Turian vigilante or the Infiltrator to execute with clean headshots. After the damage Blood Pack had inflicted, the Suns were almost too easy.
Spoke too soon. An aircar pulled up and an enormous Batarian leaped out, rolling as he landed to come up with a rocket launcher held in a firing position.
"Archangel!" he screamed, squeezing the trigger and sending a missile flying straight towards him. His next line was cut short by the Adept, who leaped on the Batarian, gripping his head in both hands, twisting and pulling it clean off his shoulders. But she couldn't stop the missile impact. Both the Vanguard and Archangel were thrown to the ground, the missile having exploded directly between the two. Fire licked at the Vanguard's armour as he rolled, mechanically roaring, but the Turian laid still, half his helmet shattered and a pool of blue blood slowly spreading beneath him.
-We need medevac at our location now-
Sparkie was quick to reply.
-Shuttle en route-
"Hold on, Archangel. Help's on the way."