The Four were pinned down, scattered around a derelict factory, and they were only being assaulted by the vanguard of the force that they had intended to ambush. Shepard peeked out from cover and tried to ascertain the situation, but a flurry of rounds knocked down his shields and forced him back into cover before he could locate the muzzle flashes that would indicate the enemy's positions. From the amount of gunfire, he estimated at least seven enemy personnel, all armed with automatic weaponry that they seemed more than capable of using effectively.
He looked around to find the remaining members of his squad. He knew that one of them was dead, but he hadn't had time to look at the face. Was it O'Reilly? That would make things much more difficult now, but far easier later. Assuming there was a later.
It wasn't O'Reilly. The Irishman was pinned into cover roughly opposite Shepard, watching him, waiting to know what their next move was. The other two were watching him in a similar fashion, but further away from the enemy.
"Suppressing fire." Shepard ordered laconically. If he could get the enemy ducking, he might be able to see what was happening, then formulate a strategy. The men complied, and the fact that they weren't all picked off the moment they ducked out of cover was a promising sign. Shepard waited a second to confirm his safety, then mirrored the action, looking out and locating the eight batarians, then examining them more thoroughly through his sniper scope. All appeared to be standard grunts, armed with assault rifles.
Despite the fact that they were in good cover, Shepard managed to pick one of them off with a double shot from the sniper rifle, the first bringing down the alien's shields so that the second could penetrate the creature's armour. Unfortunately it was at that moment that his fellow marines' weapons finally chose to overheat due to constant firing, and once again Shepard wished for some thermal clip technology.
However, what happened next was both very good and very bad, from the perspective of the marines. The batarians had no heavy weapons, and therefore no apparent way to break the deadlock. However, they had also realised that a continuing stalemate would result in all of them gradually being picked off one by one by the sniper rifle. The weapon overheat that the psychopath's squad mates had just suffered, however, presented them with a way to end the stagnation that could potentially end in their favour, due to their superior numbers. They charged.
Shepard dropped his sniper and drew his Karpov pistol, and squeezed off a dozen rapid shots at the running foes, bringing down shields and dropping one of them with a brace of rounds to the torso, before he was forced back into cover by a wild retaliation of rounds impacting against his shields and the ground around him. Then, they were upon him, and he fired a round into a face at point blank range, before swiping a rifle aside and slashing a throat with his knife. The others swept on past him to assault his less capable men, and he picked off another with his pistol before he couldn't fire due to the risk of hitting one of his own men by accident.
O'Reilly met the charge readily, smashing a batarian in the face with his overheated weapon, burning him and knocking him to the floor, when the Irishman stamped on the alien's throat, before tossing his main weapon aside in favour of his own pistol, and spraying wildly at the next batarian, staggering him before a lucky shot punctured the shields and went through the armour.
The other two were left with three batarians that closed with them, determined at least to use their deaths to weaken the force before it encountered their commanders. They moved to meet the charge before the wild fire of the charging enemy could bring down their shields, one of them mirroring O'Reilly's move with the assault rifle before it finally cooled sufficiently to fire, and finishing him with a burst to the head, before gunning down a second batarian.
The final man was slow to attack the batarian facing him, and managed to block a blow before he was shot in the gut past his kinetic barriers. He was knocked down, but opened fire with his rifle and managed to riddle the batarian with bullets. Shepard treated him with medigel in order to keep him alive until the end of the mission, and then dragged him to his feet.
"We need to get out of here." He announced. His squad looked at him disbelievingly. "We need to attack them from the flanks, we can't stay here or we'll just get slaughtered..." His brow furrowed in contemplation. "Wait. You two, stay here, stay in cover, and make them think you're the main force. Let them pin you down. O'Reilly, with me. We'll assault them from the flank and take out the enemy commanders before punching through and falling back."
The men complied with his orders, the two men moving to find better concealment, whilst the Irishman and Angel Eyes hurriedly left the building and advanced parallel to the enemy column's route.
They didn't have long before they heard the gunfire that indicated contact. Shepard checked his Omni tool; the signal that indicated the location of the Command personnel had indeed finally encountered his ambush.
"O'Reilly. I'm going to provide sniper support and give you an opening to exploit. Once you're in, I'll move to close quarters and give you support there. Our priority is to eliminate the Command personnel and end the broadcast, then disengage. Is that clear?"
"Yes sir." Shepard moved to a window from where he had a good view of the enemy's flank, and selected a point that would give ready access to the leaders. "In position, sir." The Irishman reported.
"On my mark, move out and engage." Shepard brought a batarian into his sights. "Three," he adjusted to aim for the head "two," his finger tightened on the trigger "one," he pulled the trigger twice, the batarian fell, he adjusted his aim and fired again, bringing another alien down "mark."
O'Reilly sprinted out of cover, firing tight, accurate bursts from his assault rifle that further exploited the flaw in the enemy ranks that Shepard had created. Angel Eyes allowed his weapon to cool for a couple of seconds, then opened fire again, bringing down the batarians that had been fastest to react to the ambush and most accurate in their response. The Irishman reached the loose enemy formation and began leaping over corpses, moving along the corridor that was clear of living enemy personnel. He managed to move fast enough to punch through the defensive line without taking any shots, and moved into the building that held the targets.
Now that Shepard's charge was out of his line of sight, the Corporal slung his rifle in favour of his pistol and blade, and advanced out of cover to follow O'Reilly's line of advance. As the enemy's attention was largely on the man that had just punched through their formation, he managed to again take them largely by surprise and successfully take an alternative entrance into the building, albeit one that left him somewhat further away from the target than the Irishman.
The batarian high command had an extensive bodyguard unit, who had O'Reilly pinned down in cover with heavy automatic fire, whilst a trio of shotgun wielding melee specialists advanced on his position, the leader wearing a human made leather trench coat over his armour, presumably some sort of trophy. Shepard moved up, staying out of the enemy line of fire as best he could, until he neared the Irishman's position.
"Need your gun!" he called, and, obligingly, the Irishman slid his assault rifle over, before drawing his pistol and readying himself.
Shepard ducked out of cover and opened fire on the three melee specialists, causing them to scatter and accelerate their advance so that Shepard had to pick a target, and, even with the Irishman providing supporting fire, they wouldn't be able to bring all of them down. Shepard advanced towards the Irishman's position, firing in steady bursts to avoid causing his weapon to overheat, and ducking and dodging in order to evade the majority of batarian fire.
The batarian wearing the trench coat reached the two humans first, brought down O'Reilly's shields with a double blast from his shotgun before dealing him a vicious kick to the chest that knocked him from his feet. The Irishman scrambled up again almost immediately, but was forced to give ground before the assault of the other two melee specialists, leaving Shepard alone with the leader, who spun to point his shotgun at the human's head-
And squeezing off a round just as Shepard dived aside, glancing him and lowering his shields, but failing to do any more than bruise him. The human rolled to his feet and out of the line of fire just ahead of the batarian's next shotgun blast, and responded by firing at the alien on fully automatic, lowering the creature's shields and staggering him, giving Shepard a moment to close and aim a high spinning kick to his foe's head, a kick that should stun him and all but end the fight-
A kick that the batarian caught, clearly intending to hold Shepard in place with one hand whilst he blasted the human into oblivion with his shotgun in the other. Shepard responded by lifting his other foot, and allowing himself to drop to the ground, discarding the assault rifle in order to free his hands to break his fall, before using his free leg to sweep at the batarian's foot, bringing him down to the floor as well and causing his shot to go awry.
The batarian let go of Shepard's leg in order to bring his shotgun to bear on the human's torso, only to have it wrenched from his grasp by a powerful kick from Shepard, who then rolled to his feet to face the batarian, who had mirrored his action. Now, neither of them were armed, and, despite themselves, the other batarians had ceased fire to observe the rare spectacle of what would appear to be a prolonged close quarters fight.
"Private-don't stop shooting..." Shepard commanded, and the Irishman raised his weapon in response, only to have all of the batarians in the room raise their weapons...
To point them at Shepard.