Herp. Hurp. Herk.
I experimented with a different type of segue this chapter. I hope it isn't too confusing.
Mavigon was a ball of ice and snow without a breathable atmosphere and too far away from its star to have much in the way of light. The ammonia-based planet was cast in darkness for all of its 43-year orbit around the small sun, Han.
The base held by John Castor, Helena Blake's former partner, was out of the way and heavily guarded. Shepard cursed her luck as the first of many rockets fired at Precious from the defense turrets surrounding the base.
"Guess they know we're here," she said, agitated that they hadn't any more information to go on than a few rogue communications from the comm buoy near the edge of the system.
"Bring it, ma'am," Williams said a feral grin on her face. Garrus deployed countermeasures as Wrex gave a hearty laugh and thumped Williams in the back. It knocked the smile off her face. Shepard laughed while Liara watched with obvious trepidation.
"Do you always run head long into danger?" she asked.
"Pretty much," Alenko told her with a shrug. "Yeah."
"Goddess."
Herp. Hurp. Herk.
Dr. T'Soni overexerted herself within the first fifteen minutes of the fight inside the bunker. John Castor's small band of mercenaries was mostly turian and krogan. Dr. T'Soni managed to take care of the two human biotics and one of the krogan, but her shield failed just as another, almost as large as Wrex, charged into her biotic bubble barrier.
It was then that each of the squad realized just how afraid of krogan the young asari was.
"Oh, Goddess! A krogan!"
Garrus had cringed at the terrified pitch of her voice, but hadn't been in a position to get to her. Two turians had pinned him in a corner on the far side of the base. Wrex managed to get to her in time, giving the merc a good head-butt and punch in the jaw with his shot gun. Shepard and Williams had unloaded their shotguns on the merc.
Now Garrus lined up another shot as he laid a hand on the doctor's back as she vomited at his feet.
Again.
He thought maybe she'd already emptied her stomach and wondered, not for the first time, at the alienness of the asari. Maybe they had two stomachs? One for digesting, the other for re-digesting? The thought made him queasy.
"You alright, T'Soni?" he asked, taking his hand off her back long enough to take his shot. The crack of his sniper rifle drowned out her voice and the slug penetrated the shields of the turian with the white and green colonial markings of Oma Ker. The body slumped over a control panel.
"Say again?" He ducked for cover to let his rifle cool off and studied the asari. Even under the dim light of the bunker, she looked pale. Well, paler than her already pale blue color.
"Just…fine…" she managed weakly. "I'll—I just need a moment."
"Uh-huh," he grunted. "Two more krogan in the corner." He nodded in the direction and her eyes rounded. Spirits, she was afraid. "Wrex and Williams are taking care of them."
He hopped up and lined up another shot. The barefaced female in his sights dropped behind cover. Damn it. "Alenko! On your six! Draw her out!"
Hurk. Herp. Hurp.
Kaidan turned and looked at his flank. The merc on his HUD was hunkered down out of Garrus' sights. Sweat trickled into his right eye, stinging and temporarily blinding him. The sudden loss of vision threw off his aim and the mass effect field went wide. He couldn't see the female turian, and he couldn't get to his eye because of his visor.
"Shit."
Kaidan blinked rapidly, trying to clear his eyesight. He shook his head in an effort to do – well, something to get complete vision in his right eye back. Tunnel vision on an op wouldn't help anything, and he had to take out that turian before she could injure or kill anyone. Something rammed into him and knocked him flat on his back, surprising him. He yelled out as landed. Weight settled on his chest. He brought a fist up only to be blocked.
"Alenko!"
Shepard was sitting on him.
Belatedly he realized he'd done something he hadn't done in years: He'd lost situational awareness when his vision had gone. The shock stilled him, brought him up short. It took him a moment to get his bearings.
"Commander," he said conversationally even though it was difficult to breathe with the weight of Shepard plus her armor. Shepard's biotic barrier mingled with his, interacting. It felt like a spider was running along his skin and up his spine. He wanted to push her off. All he could see was the fastener of her leg plating through the blurriness of his vision.
"Mind telling me what the hell that was about?" she asked just as conversationally as she blasted the now floating female merc with a carnage mortar. The recoil pushed her back, unforgiving ceramic against unforgiving ceramic. His chest plate groaned.
"A mistake?" he said, still blinking his right eye. It wasn't producing enough tears to flush the sweat, but it did make his nose run. Now his head was congested.
"A mistake," Shepard repeated. There was an edge to her voice. "What happened?" She shot another target – another turian – but she hadn't bothered to get up. Her barrier swept over his once more. Again it felt like spiders up his spine.
"Weak seals around my face," he told her truthfully. "Sweat in my eye."
She took her eyes off the battle field briefly to look at him. She'd dumped her helmet the moment the bunker airlock had chimed. Her short brown hair was slicked down with perspiration. The base was darkened from too many shells hitting too many lights, but Kaidan was certain that her face was flushed from the exertion of battle. And, as sappy as it sounded, he was almost certain he could drown in her eyes if she kept looking at him. His breath caught. He wet his lips nervously. Shepard's eyes darted down to watch.
"Next time," she said, looking away and taking with her the floundering feeling, "use cover, Lieutenant."
"Aye aye, ma'am." Kaidan's heart still thudded in his ears, not from adrenaline but from something else entirely.
Finally, he remembered to breathe.
Herk. Hurp. Hock.
The krogan merc wasn't as big as Wrex.
This must be the runt of the litter, Ash thought as she ducked and rolled away from the Runt's swinging arms. The Runt was still formidable even for a runt. He was still a seven foot tall wall of scaly muscle.
Well, maybe six and a half feet tall…
Ash had long since switched to her shot gun and fired a shot at him. The slugs pierced his shields and took out one eye, but it didn't slow him down. He only yelled and charged at her again.
Wrex slowed him. In fact, Wrex hit him so hard, the Runt slid to a stop at Wrex's feet.
Between Wrex's guttural yell and the crash of ceramic against ceramic and huge krogan against not-so-huge krogan, it was like watching a midair collision on an action vid. Only this action vid didn't have any of the sappy love story crap with bad actors and no chemistry.
Wrex pulled out a knife and hacked at the plate on the smaller krogan's head, surprising Ash. "What the hell?" The Runt flailed, giving a scream of … what was that? Terror?
Ash had no idea the beasts could feel.
"Can't regenerate if you –" Wrex plunged the blade hilt-deep into the Runt's exposed and bleeding head –"cut off the means to regenerate."
"Good point," she conceded.
Hurp. Hock. Herk.
Liara shivered. Goddess. Urdnot Wrex she'd gotten used to. A charging krogan three times her size?
No. Never.
She spat out the last of the foul-tasting, dry-heaved stomach acid. Humans had a neurotransmitter called adrenaline that attributed to their fight-or-flight response. Asari had a fight-flight-or-freeze response and the neurotransmitter responsible for that was called enth-inatin. Unfortunately for Liara, the exertion of her biotics co-mingling with her want of not being there brought about the freeze part of the response and her body had reacted in kind.
I am no soldier.
She swallowed. The weight of Garrus' hand on her back was reassuring. Surely he would say something to Shepard, anything to sway the Commander from bringing her along on any more missions. If this was what was referred to as 'pulling one's own weight,' then they could drop her off at the next fuel depot. She didn't even care if it was a truck stop.
Trivia/Geekery:Asari biology term is a random generated word that sounded close to epinephrine. The truck stop reference was a reference to A Star to Steer Her By, by Shades of Mauve. Which everyone is reading. Right? Yes! Of course you are!