A/N: Good morning!
For those asking about why the cybenox hasn't killed Liara if her hard-suit is compromised by the wounds she sustained…well, I'm just a wonder at description in this particular tale, aren't I? For some reason I had figured it out but actually didn't put it in the narrative, so my apologies…totally my failing. I will clarify the reason that Liara is still alive despite the damage to her suit the next time the scene is on her.
In the meantime, on we go!
Boots rang on metal as Helen and Jura rushed across the airlock and to the black ship. They could still hear random spats of gunfire over their helmet head-sets but the shouting seemed to have stopped.
That was not a good sign.
Chakwas, not used to the weight of a full hard-suit, lagged behind despite her best efforts. Jura was not as fast as she normally would have been either- the black, featureless hallways were disorienting her. Still, it was only a few moments before they found the central chamber and darted within.
The massacre was unbelievable. Unfamiliar creatures lay slaughtered all around, torn flesh and limbs of eye-wrenching hue littering the smooth black floor as if some kind of surrealist artist had set off a grenade in his paint pots. At first, none of their team was visible among the carnage, and both women could only stare, baffled at the sight.
Motion then drew their eyes and they realized one of the aliens was still alive. A crimson beast half hauled itself up, dragging useless legs behind it as it snarled and dug its claws against the floor. Sparks screeched up from the contact and it pulled itself a foot or two closer to a slumped figure. Sam's black N7 armor, splashed with gore, actually provided a fairly decent camouflage among her surroundings. It was only as she lifted her rifle and sent three more shots toward Crimson's face that they realized she was even there.
Jura immediately lashed out with biotics as the beast recoiled from the gunfire, but like butter sliding off of teflon, the dark energy barely seemed to take hold, slipping away almost as it contacted the beast. Compensating as it looked toward her, she just fired with her pistol, taking out both eyes and sending it writhing to the floor.
Trusting Jura to insure it was dead, Helen picked over the mess as she hurried to Feris's side, helping to prop her up and taking off her helmet. The woman was pale, damp with sweat, but she shook her head.
"It's not bad," she said, trying to catch her breath. "The others-"
"Where are they, Sam?" Jura asked, walking over. The marine pointed toward the pedestal and Jura headed that way, picking up speed when she saw Miranda. "Helen!"
Determining that Sam, while seriously injured, was not in immediate danger of dying of her wounds, Chakwas gave her some medi-gel and a stern 'don't move', before she ran after Jura.
Miranda lay where she'd fallen, slumped in a pond of crimson. Helen rolled her gently onto her back, running a scan. "I'm getting a pulse but it's thready, she needs blood replacement and surgery now or we're going to lose her. I need her back on board the Aswa immediately."
Feris, who'd gotten to her feet despite Helen's admonition not to move, limped over to where she'd last seen her cousin. Ashley lay still beneath the torso of one of the creatures. Grimacing, Sam managed to get it off of her as Jura lifted Miranda with biotics, guiding her toward the airlock. Helen started after her, but changed trajectory as she saw Feris crouch beside Williams.
A quick scan and she nodded. "She's got a concussion, she's just unconscious," she said to the worried marine. "Few lacerations, couple of broken bones, nothing life-threatening. Stay here, don't move her. I'll send Jura back the moment I have Lawson in the infirmary. Where are the Captain and Dr. Shepard, do you know?"
"No, I lost track of them," she said. "I'll keep looking."
"Be careful, and don't try and lift anything more. You break those ribs any worse and I'll be treating a punctured lung…that's if I get to you before you drown in your own blood. Understood?"
Feris nodded and watched Chakwas run after Jura, before painfully getting to her feet again. Holding her hand to her side, trying to ignore the grating of her ribs, she started to look for Liara and Shepard. By the time Jura came running back in, Sam was clearly hurting and troubled.
"They're not here," she said to Jura as the pilot reached her side, catching hold of her. "They're not bloody here."
"What could have happened to them? They didn't get back to the Aswa. Could they have retreated further into the ship? Gotten lost?"
"I doubt it. Liara wouldn't run from a fight, not until it was over. She wouldn't just leave us here."
"If the doctor had run, perhaps? She could have gone after her-"
"She would not have left us here, not in a battle like that," Sam replied firmly. "C'mon, you know her better than I do. You think she'd abandon us to a massacre to run after a civilian who was leaving the danger area? She-"
She broke off, then straightened, pulling away from Jura. "Bloody hell…"
"What is it?"
All Jura saw was a strange, empty archway. As it was as ebony as their surroundings she hadn't noticed it before.
Sam reached the arch, waving a hand through. There was no feeling of cold, no hair standing on end. The black membrane that had stretched through the opening was gone, leaving it empty.
"There was a doorway here," she said to Jura. "Some kind of portal or energy field. It's gone now."
Frowning, she turned and started picking her way over to the interface pedestal. "I have to see if I can power it back on-"
"Right now you need to get to the infirmary," Jura told her. "You and Ashley both need treatment-"
"If that really was a portal and Liara and Del went through it, I need to get it back on. They could be trapped."
Jura huffed in frustration, then nodded. "Be careful. I am taking Ash onto the Aswa. You have until I get back to find the answer and if not, we are going back to the ship and finding a way to tow this monstrosity to home space before something else can go horribly wrong."
Nausea and a dizzy, floating helplessness were not sensations that sat well with Utchibahna Sihra- the helplessness most of all.
She half-dreamed- of the towers of Nikodivekk, of the tall and silent trees and rich earth of the Wishedach Wild. She dreamt of the Ubuut, and here is where dreams turned to gray fog, to the swimming, leaning, unfocusing return to consciousness.
Words, strange and flat, unintelligible, reached her ears a moment before the 'voice' spoke in perfect Rakhani, directly in her ear. Weak and sick as she felt, she did not move, feigning a continued unconsciousness.
"…it was still breathing. I put the mask on it to filter out any further toxin but…I think it's in really bad shape-"
"She."
"I'm sorry?"
"This is a rakir female."
"The…that one species you were telling me about? The one the Council was waffling over making first contact with?"
"Yes. Osco must have taken her off her home world for some reason, and left her here to die when they had to evacuate."
There was a light touch at her neck. Sihra remained still- not difficult to do as her limbs felt a thousand raktas heavier than they should. Tentatively, without being obvious, she tried to get this creature's scent. There was a faint, not unpleasant hint of skin and water and the rich smell of blood- but the action made her dizzy again, and she nearly fell into that sick sleep once more.
"She put a translation collar on her…why would she bother to do that and then leave her behind?"
"Because she wanted to talk to her. I know Osco. It came down to nothing more than this…rakir…made her curious, and she wanted to talk to her before she cut her up and found out everything that made her tick."
A pause, and then- "This poor woman…torn away from her own home world by creatures she doesn't understand, surrounded by things that to her must seem like magic, and then left here to die. Osco gave her no more thought than as a simple curiosity, something to be cast aside like a used tissue if she couldn't get anything useful from her, mentally or biologically."
"That is true. Yet this woman is going to be incredibly angry and very dangerous when she wakes up. She's also still breathing in the #$%^." The last word was unintelligible, the 'voice' simply letting out a garbled click instead of continuing.
"What? The mask-"
"Covers only her first set of nostrils."
There was another touch, her head and then her ear. It took all Sihra had not to try and lash out but to remain utterly still. "She's still breathing with this second set."
"I-I didn't know. I just…I'll find something to…"
A moment, and then the touches returned. Something was pasted over Sihra's far nostrils and instantly half of her sense of smell vanished. Oddly enough, so did half the dizzy nausea. In moments, she felt far stronger.
The creatures who had been talking over her had gone- no, not gone. Moved away, speaking low now from a distance, the 'voice' in her ear no longer echoing in Rakhani. She forced herself to count, then slowly risked opening her eyes a crack.
The two things were on the other side of the room. One was laying down on some kind of table, while the other did some strange motions at a box that glittered with light. Sihra had seen enough of these boxes to not trust any action taken near them. They were some kind of magician's tool.
She could not see the one on the table, and the other had its back to her. Cracking her eyes open a little more, she lifted her head. The thing over her face was an irritation, as were whatever was pasting her far nostrils shut.
Her wrists were still fastened. She knew from experience that biting the restraints would only hurt her teeth and do no good toward removing them, but her hands were in front of her and she was far from helpless.
Glancing around carefully, she saw no other creatures. They were in the room alone. Moving as silently as possible she eased up onto her feet, remaining crouched low. The last of the heavy muzz had left her head, and neither being had noticed her. The one near the box had lifted her hands, and Sihra blinked as she took off her head.
No, it is not her head. It is a helmet, like the Stunted wear in the mines. She grimaced in distaste. Soft creatures indeed if they had to hide their faces and heads behind metal, like children!
Beneath the helmet, the creature looked like a detrak, like the ones that had brought her here. Flat and barefaced, small eyes, an almost nonexistent mouth and jaw. Tiny, almost rudimentary ears and a flop of ebony hair.
She turned toward the one laying on the table, saying something to her. The translation came but Sihra was too focused to hear it. Soundlessly, she pulled the annoying mask off of her face, nostrils flaring wide a moment. Then, she surged forward, crossing the distance between them in a single, easy leap.
"I have the environmental systems," Del said as she accessed the computer. "I think I can purge the cybenox gas out of the facility, make it safe to take our helmets off."
Liara grimaced a little as she lay on the bio-bed. She felt dizzy, and her wounds were throbbing, but she was unconcerned with herself, her thoughts with the cousins and her ship.
As well- much as they had not gotten along- Lawson had been under her jurisdiction and protection, and she'd failed in that duty. No one could have predicted those things just rising out of the floor and attacking, but as both a Spectre and a commanding officer, it was her duty to stay with her crew, to fight with them to the bitter end, and to protect those who could not protect themselves.
Instead, she'd done something monumentally stupid and gotten herself injured. If she hadn't, Shepard wouldn't have pulled her through that doorway and they wouldn't be here…sealed away from her people by Goddess only knew how many light years.
I was trying to protect her. Instead, she is the one that ended up saving my life. Not once, but twice.
If she had put her foot down, insisted that Shepard remain behind, Liara would be dead. If not in the attack by the crew of the black ship, then the moment she took her helmet off here and breathed in that cybenox gas.
She was right. Because she was familiar with Osco she recognized the trap. Mordin would not have. Anyone else would not have. She was right to insist on coming.
Her hand rested on her wounded side, thankful the damage to her hard-suit had been limited to the body and not the helmet. Usually, the gas lines from the processing pack to the body of the hard-suit only supplied the extreme minimum of neutral gasses, pumping in more simply to provide appropriate pressure against the skin in extreme low-gravity or vacuum environments. If the pressure needed to be released, tiny valves along the side of the suit opened and allowed gases to escape. The actual oxygen mixture was too valuable to waste filling the body suit for pressure differentials, and fed the helmet exclusively when it was locked down. The seal at the neck prevented any oxygen from escaping elsewhere into the hard-suit, and prevented any of the inert gasses in the hard-suit from entering the helmet and the wearer's lungs. Clearly the cybenox gas had to be inhaled- if it could kill from mere contact with flesh or blood, Liara would never have woken up. As her helmet seals remained intact, she remained in no danger from the outside contamination.
That wasn't to say a marine couldn't lose their oxygen and die in a breach that didn't compromise their helmet…sadly, it happened fairly commonly. An explosion, for example, could tear not only the hard-suit itself but break the neck seal between body and helmet enough for oxygen to start leaking into the rest of the armor and then out through the damaged area. The oxygen lines joined the helmet at the neck and then were embedded in the back of the hard-suit to the processing pack. Normally these were well covered and protected by a padded area and then the weapon's pack that was fastened over them, but sometimes those lines could be torn or damaged as well, or even wrenched- partially or fully- from the back of the helmet connection, causing a leak. Sometimes, the processing pack itself would become damaged and stop functioning, losing oxygen to the helmet almost instantly. In those circumstances, the wearer became unconscious swiftly, and died just as fast.
Every commando, every marine, every soldier who worked interstellar prayed that if they happened to be cast into space with suit damage, that this latter would be the style of it. A very quick death was far preferable over floating in the cosmos for several minutes, knowing your air was leaking and unable to stop it…unable to do anything but watch the last hope of your life mist away from you in a cloud of frozen white, until you finally passed out. You would feel the cold of space starting to leech in, feel the burning in your lungs as you strove to breathe, feel the slow encroaching black and know it for what it was. You would have plenty of time to think.
"There, I think I have it," Shepard said, finishing with the computer. Reaching up, she unfastened her own helmet, cautiously slipping it off and pausing a breath, before she nodded and set it aside. Turning toward Liara, she reached out to help her with her own helmet.
"We'll need to get your heaviest pads off to assess the damage. There's no working medical scanner, so I'll need to use my omni-"
The rakir had leapt so fast that even Liara didn't see motion until it was slamming into Shepard, driving her shoulder first into the console she'd just been working on. She impacted hard enough to break the holographic projection screen with a bright flash of sparks, and she cried out in pain.
Ignoring her own pain, Liara automatically shoved herself into a sit, reaching for her pistol, and encountering empty air. Her weapons pack had been removed and set aside so she could lay down, and was now on the other side of the rakir and the human woman.
Still, she was far from unarmed. Her hand flared hot with dark energy, freezing the rakir in place and holding her motionless.
The alien had Shepard off her feet, pinned back awkwardly against the wall as she half-sat on the ruined console. The human was clearly in pain, breathing in short, sharp gasps between her clenched teeth, her head craned back away from the claws that pressed into the flesh under her jaw. Less than three inches from her nose were the rakir's bared teeth. A reflection of the blue licks of biotic energy shifting over its body shone against a ruby shiver of blood that welled from Del's skin near the dimple of one claw, slowly tracing downward.
Barely able to move and not daring to swallow for fear of pressing those claws deeper into her skin, Shepard spoke through her clenched teeth. "Don't hurt her."
"Merah-"
"She's just afraid, confused. H-how would you react if you were her? Don't hurt her."
Liara narrowed her eyes dangerously. She could not haul the rakir backward- not with her gripping Shepard the way she was. The motion would only serve to tear the human's throat out.
Meeting the alien's strange ovoid eyes, Shepard said, "We don't want to hurt you. We're not your enemies."
The only answer was a low and furious growl. Liara fought to remember what she knew about the rakir. They were predatory, hunters and killers to the very core.
Yet they maintain a civilization, habitate in groups. There are ways to earn their respect. Their culture…their culture revolves around domination!
"You listen to me, you weak piece of filth," she said. It took no acting to put the note of fury and threat in her voice; indeed, none of this would truly be an act, or a bluff of any kind. "I am going to release you and when I do, you are going to let her go and step back, do you understand me?"
The rakir snarled something, the translator chirping on a moment later. "Why should I listen to a smelly, hairless, weak little detrak like you?
"Because if you do not do exactly as I say- if you hurt her- I will tear your worthless, mangy skin from your flesh and crush your skull into a bloody paste!"
The rakir rumbled. It took Del a moment to realize it was laughing.
"How, detrak?"
Lifting her other hand, Liara biotically tore an extinguisher unit off the wall and then crushed it with a singularity. It was not an easy feat, requiring a lot of energy that would have taxed her a bit even if she wasn't already wounded. She felt a wave of dizziness from it but refused to let it show on her face, refused to waver. At the slightest hint of weakness, she would lose whatever hope she had with the rakir.
The female saw this happen, of course. Her eyes widened and her oblong pupils narrowed sharply. When she said nothing Liara let the crushed unit fall and growled.
"That will be your head if you do not release her, do you understand?"
"Yes," the rakir replied, and warily Liara let her biotic hold fade away.
Del felt a wash of hot breath blast over her face as the alien snorted, but she was no longer baring her teeth. Stepping back, it loosened its claws and dropped her. Gasping for air she half-slumped forward, her hand going under her chin and to the burning cuts the talons had opened in her flesh.
Liara nearly reached out to catch her, but didn't know if the rakir would see that as a sign of weakness. Instead, she stepped between the two and continued to glare at the alien.
"Give me your name," she ordered.
The rakir glared, nostrils flaring wide and eyes narrowing again. She was still rumbling, a growl deep in her chest that sounded like distant thunder. Liara never glanced away, meeting the glare with every bit of ferocity.
"I am Utchibahna Sihra of the House Utchibahn, First Prilekk to the Ubuut of Nikodivekk. I am not your prisoner."
Given the way she introduced her name, it was clear that 'Utchibahna' was the family name and not her given. Sihra would be the name that others would call her, and Prilekk would be her title. Were she any other species in the galaxy, Liara would know her choices clearly. If she called the female Utchibahna she was glorifying her House but depersonalizing her as an individual. If she called her Sihra it would likely be far too informal and possibly seen as a sign of false camaraderie, of blatant disrespect.
If she called her Prilekk, it would show respect to her as an individual and to her accomplishments…provided it was a title she had earned.
Again, this was trusting that the rakir thought like most other known sentient species. In truth, without knowing their psychology beyond respect of strength and domination…anything could be the gravest insult and turn this into an immediate battle- one Liara was pretty much guaranteed to lose in her condition.
She took a chance. "Prilekk, I am Liara T'Soni of the House T'Soni, Captain of the Aswa and Spectre to the Galactic Council."
Apparently, the use of her title was the right choice. The female seemed to relax a little, if only slightly, though her gaze remained wary and slightly disgusted. "You are a ship captain?" she asked.
"I am."
"And which sea do you sail?"
"That is a complicated story, Prilekk," Liara told her, making sure to sound irritated. Judging by the rakir's snort, she was unimpressed.
"And your little levayha over there?" she asked, indicating Shepard with a nod.
"She is Delilah Shepard, a doctor-"
"Doctor?" The rakir laughed again, derision and ridicule in the tone. "You detrak have Stunted females? You make them your levayha? Truly, I am in the land of the mad!"
Pronunciation Guide:
Utchibahna – YEW-chee-BAH-nah
Sihra- SEER-ah
Nikodivekk- NICK-oh-DIV-eck
Wishedach- Wish-EE-dock
Ubuut- YEW-boot
Rakhani- Rah-KAH-nee
Rakir- Rah-KEER
Detrak- DEH-track
Prilekk- PRILL-eck
Levayha- Leh-VAY-hah
