Feris, Grunt, and Sihra had abandoned the 'missile' shaft once Liara had reached the bottom and described her discovery. Grunt radioed his father, and by the time they were halfway back to the krogan ruins, nearly a dozen tomkahs appeared out of the blowing dust.
Now those tomkahs were parked half a mile away, at the entrance to the low cavern that was too narrow to accommodate them. The krogan within them, including Wrex- armed and armored and spoiling for a fight-had proceeded on foot, following Feris and Sihra's impeccable sense of smell.
The N7 marine was relieved and grateful they had brought the rakir along. Whatever 'cloak' was in effect here, it was strong enough that their instruments still insisted they were passing through solid rock- when clearly no such thing was happening. Sihra's nose lead them unfailingly, through a twist of what looked like natural volcanic tubes, and ultimately into a tunnel that had clearly been constructed.
If Sam had had any doubts whatsoever that they might not be in the right spot, those were instantly allayed at the first sight of Orthrus yellow and green.
At least a dozen of the merc troopers blocked their way, holding the tunnel and trying to create a choke-point. They had decent cover- something the krogan lacked- but the krogan had two things strongly in their favor: numbers, and brute determination.
In seconds it was a pitched battle, the bellowing roar of weaponsfire from both sides echoing through the tunnel, reaching such volume that, even with the automatic dampeners in their helmets, their heads rung with the sound.
Orthrus had planted more than one turret in the open, and did not seem in the slightest bit hesitant about using grenades, despite the fact that a large enough explosion could collapse the entire tunnel, burying them all. At the third such blast, Sam knew they had to put them down and put them down quickly. They had no time to be delicate, or defeat them through attrition.
A straight charge at their lines would be suicide for many of them. If only we had a way to get behind them, or drop down from…
She blinked, suddenly turning and putting her back to the rock serving as her cover. "Sihra!"
The rakir was nearby, one of the krogan's heavy shield's in her hand. As she did not have a full helmet and therefore nothing to protect her hearing, her ears were clapped tight to her skull as she tried to keep out as much noise as possible. She was firing with her omni-bow as fast as it would allow her to, yet the moment Sam called she immediately moved that way, ducking her head low to the N7 officer and lifting one ear with a questioning grunt.
"How far can you leap?" Sam asked. She imagined the eyes behind the owlish optics were scrutinizing as they turned to her, then thoughtfully toward the enemy lines. She nodded slowly.
"Far enough," she replied, and damned if she didn't sound eager.
"Carrying another?"
The rakir immediately unhooked the shield and dropped it as Sam drew a light grenade from her belt. It wouldn't be enough to kill or risk a cave-in, but it should at least stun and blind the troopers long enough for the krogan to act.
Touching her radio, Sam told Wrex what she'd planned, then nodded to her companion.
"Let's go!"
The krogan immediately laid down cover fire, focusing on the turrets as Sihra and Feris moved out of cover. Sihra's arm whipped around Sam's waist even as the rakir bunched. The battle cry she let out as she leapt was almost deafening.
The world sailed away below them, Sihra's leap carrying the pair over half the distance between the two sides. She hadn't aimed for a straight jump that would land them directly in the center of no-man's-land; instead, she'd angled it to hit the wall.
They collided with the rock, Sihra catching herself and springing off of it again. In a heartbeat they were sailing over the heads of the startled Orthrus troops.
Feris, clinging to Sihra with one hand and holding the concussion grenade with the other, dropped it as soon as she saw the faceplates turn upward at them. Just as their descent came to a landing, the grenade went off, a flash of brilliant light behind them casting their shadows hard on the rock floor.
The rakir released her as they hit, shoving Sam to one side before using her momentum to roll to the opposite side instantly. Bullets chipped off the stone, missing the pair by inches.
Feris recovered, surging to her feet and whirling around, rifle already out and lighting up. She dropped three of the stunned and light-blind troopers immediately, carving a path toward the back of one of the turrets and hitting its power supply.
The krogan were already rushing forward, shouting as they surged upon the choke-point like a tidal wave crashing upon a child's sand sculpture, descending on the confused mercs. They turned to confront the krogan only to be hit from behind, Sihra sailing in to tackle one man in armor, driving him hard into the ground and sending a bolt through his neck before swiping the rifle out of another's hands with a swing of her claws.
Grabbing the unfortunate merc by the arm, she yanked him close, dropping him to the floor and planting her foot on his back. A single wrench hauled his shoulder out of socket and even with all the noise, Sam could hear his sudden scream. She had no doubt that were Orthrus in anything less than combat hard-suits, the rakir would very literally be tearing them apart.
Osco smiled as the asari went limp, the metal tendril around her throat so embedded into the flexible joint and metal around her neck that it was almost impossible to see. Stepping closer, she peered in through the Spectre's faceplate and watched the last, futile struggles of life…until they had fallen still.
Lifting a hand, she almost tenderly cradled Liara's helmet, then stepped back, turning and striding toward the flabbergasted Ruth, who remained half-seated on the ground, staring with wide-eyes.
"H-how…" she asked in a tiny voice as Osco approached her, stooping and catching hold of her hands. With a surprising strength she drew her to her feet. One of those snake-like tentacles sprouted from the floor, curling about the cane and lifting it. Osco took it without a glance, pressing the head back into Ruth's hands.
"Focus, love," Gellian said. "The battle is here, and there is no time for discussion. I will wake the soldiers."
Ruth was shaking, tears staining her face as she looked at that spot between Osco's brows. Not a mark remained of the wound, not a bruise…no indication that a bullet had torn through her skull with violent finality. Swallowing, she tore her eyes away and toward the dead asari still hanging from the wall. She blinked as it started to melt into the black, submerging into the wall as if sinking in oil.
"What are you doing with her?"
"Sending her outside. Let them see what awaits them if they enter here…what awaits all who are not part of the new dawn."
Ashley was only able to make a cursory search for Dr. Shepard. With the enormous amount of carnage it was nearly impossible to tell where one body ended and another began, and she had troops to get through the archway to hit Osco before the evil little bitch had a chance to slip away again. It also remained that they had no idea how to activate the gate- it could shut off at any moment and if it did, there was no telling when they'd be able to switch it back on, or orient it to link with wherever those aliens had come from, and not the Alliance controlled moon-base.
Still, she couldn't just go without at least trying. While Garrus directed the others to gather as many spare thermals and workable weapons as they could find, Ashley wandered through the mess, looking for any scrap, any hint that the doctor may have escaped alive.
She would have been near the pedestal, wouldn't she? Accessing systems and trying to find a way to make her cure.
She got to the pedestal, but if Shepard had been anywhere near it, there was no evidence of it.
"Commander, we're ready to move," Garrus called out. "We got notification that the krogan have located Osco's hidey-hole. They're hitting it from the front."
She felt her gut sink and looked over at him, before steeling herself and heading back that direction. She hadn't found the doctor, but that could be good news as well as bad. Shepard might still be alive somewhere. If she was, she'd have to be on her own for now. Bringing Osco down was their top priority, and they had to strike while the iron was hot.
"All right, we're going to have to move fast. As soon as the first one is through keep it going, no hesitations. Upon arrival immediately secure the area until we're all clear."
She looked at Tali and Delphine, the younger girl wide-eyed and grim behind her face-mask. Ashley had to remind herself that, while she may have been honed and 'perfected' by Osco's PMD, she was still only sixteen years old, and a civilian.
She shouldn't be here. None of us should be here. If I find that crazy bitch I'm going to drop her out an airlock. Bullet's too good for her.
"You all right?" she asked, then gave Delphine an encouraging nod. "Just stay close, ok?"
"I will," Delphine said, lifting her chin in a determination to remain brave. Ashley gripped her shoulder a moment, then cleared her throat, turning back to the arch.
"All right, let's move out!"
Man by man, they ran into the archway, weapons up and each vanishing the instant they crossed the threshold. Ashley went through on the heels of the krogan and turian soldiers, Deefa following close behind her. Mordin waited until last, watching first Tali and then Delphine cross within before he tightened his grip on his pistol and plunged in after them.
Less than sixty seconds after Williams gave the order the last of them were gone, the black ship's large control room empty of life. For a few long seconds, there was nothing but silence.
Then, the ravaged, bloody body that had once been a turian suddenly shifted, seeming to roll languidly to the side before it flopped bonelessly on its face. Two arms shot up from the floor where it had been laying, parting the black metal like water, groping for purchase. The rest of the body followed after it, and Del Shepard fell onto her stomach, blood smearing over her face-plate and hard-suit as she half-landed on a dead alien.
Trembling, moving weakly, she let out a muffled but pain-filled cry, rolling onto her side and immediately curling defensively, one hand gripping the opposing wrist as she sucked in a desperate breath.
Recovering slightly after a few seconds, she pushed herself into a sit, looking around in stupefaction. The silent massacre around her turned her stomach, and she bit her lip sharply as she tried to control her gorge, tears flooding her eyes before another bolt of pain made her gasp and snatch at her arm again.
Turning her hand over, she could see her glove was torn. On her wrist there was some sort of black mark, no bigger than an old-fashioned pencil-eraser. Tiny thin lines fanned from its center, finer than spider web. She rubbed her thumb over the mark and could feel the firmness of metal. Pressing on it slightly only renewed the pain- a burning ache that shot up her arm and stole her breath again.
Eyes swimming, she looked up at the archway. Everyone had been killed, but the cure was still in process, hidden in its tank beneath the floor. Short of someone crashing the black ship, there was no stopping it now. Getting to her feet, she fumbled for her pistol, drawing it and then regarding the weapon.
Gellian's on the other side of that, somewhere. The cause of all this grief and pain and madness.
Del looked at the archway, before her jaw steeled. Not allowing herself to hesitate…she took a deep breath, and strode through.
Slowly the form in the blue and gray hard-suit emerged, slipping through the blank wall at the end of a corridor, rejected as if being spat from a macabre mouth. Liara slumped limp to the floor, the lights from the aqueous alcoves shimmering over her.
Long dead eyes regarded her silently, the bodies floating in each alcove holding a silent memorial, welcoming another to their number.
Then, the squeak of boots on the smooth floor, the swift beat of running. A panting, human figure in a hard-suit appeared around a corner, pistol in hand and hair sticking to sweat damped cheeks as she looked first right, and then left…and then froze upon catching sight of the crumpled body.
Shepard was not sure at first what it was she was seeing. Moving hesitantly, her heart thundering from her run, she started slowly toward the figure, before her eyes suddenly flew wide. Recognition hit her with a slam and she darted forward, dropping her pistol with a clatter and skidding to a halt, nearly falling at the Spectre's side.
"Liara!"
The eyes behind her face-plate were half lidded, vacant and dull. Shepard's breath actually seemed to hitch in her throat, stuttering on the crest of a sob as she started fumbling for the catches of the helmet, her ragged breaths bringing desperate, prayer-like pleas even she hardly heard.
"No, no…Liara, please…don't…"
She couldn't get the helmet unlocked. Bent and tortured metal prevented two of the locks from releasing. Fumbling frantically, tears blurred her vision as she realized that she would never get them free. They felt almost…crushed, bent inward and crumpled in a way that shouldn't be possible.
"Liara! Liara, please…please breathe…"
She sat up, shaking fingers accessing her omni-tool and linking her HUD display to Liara's suit vitals. They appeared almost instantly-flat, red, and final.
"No!" she wailed, then grabbed the asari's shoulders and shook her. "No! You don't get to do this! You're too strong for this! Liara!"
Sobbing, she tore off her own helmet, casting it aside, then half lifting the limp asari in her arms. Sitting alone on the floor, Shepard clung to her, feeling as if her very soul were being gouged out of her chest.
This wasn't possible. It wasn't happening. Liara had always been the strong one, the decisive one. She couldn't just leave like this. She couldn't just die…
Del's head suddenly snapped up as if yanked by a string, her sob breaking off with a choking gasp. Her dark brown eyes, red-rimmed from her tears, stared at the alcoves of floating bodies, before she turned her hand and looked at the metal marks on the wrist and heel, visible through the tattered tear in the leather.
Was it possible…?
Immediately shifting, she pulled Liara halfway into her lap, so that she was sitting with the asari's helmet resting against her chest, her arms wound around her torso. Kissing the side of the helmet she whispered, "Just hang on."
The floor suddenly opened up and swallowed them silently down.
It was like floating, sort of- falling slowly with support. Shepard held tighter to Liara, closing her eyes. The sensation of movement was gentle but disorienting, and there was no sense of direction. As they moved, engulfed in what looked like solid metal in each direction, she held on to only one thought, picturing it desperately, holding it in her mind.
Then, air was opening up above her, and the gentle cradling beneath turned into an equally gentle push. Finding solid ground, she pulled herself and Liara up onto it, and quickly took in her surroundings.
A fairly small chamber was around her, like a large bubble trapped in a lake of oil. As she looked around, tiny pinpoints of blue light grew out of the walls, transforming into thin beams. Like the one on the pedestal, these beams automatically targeted her eyes and instantly…she was surrounded by displays, screens…and that strange, quiet waiting.
She searched desperately through them, never releasing Liara, and quickly made her selections. Shifting a bit, she extracted herself from beneath the asari, gently laying her down flat. Bending, she kissed the crest of her helmet, before reluctantly getting to her feet and moving away.
The blue light drew back from her eyes, the spots on the wall moving and seeming to coalesce directly above them. As the lights moved, the floor lifted up, carrying the asari with it, until she lay on a smooth, rectangular slab four feet off the ground.
The light focused, a waterfall of pale color falling over the dead Spectre. A couple of feet away, Shepad clasped her hands tightly and tucked them under her chin, her eyes swimming.
"Please."
From the slab on which she lay, thousands of tiny structures- as long and thin as hairs but jointed and hooked at the end with infinitesimal claws- suddenly sprouted. They clicked ever so faintly as they tapped over the helmet, seeming to feel it out for a microsecond before a sound began. It was so high pitched as to be barely audible, the hiss of sand through fingers. The claws drew lines over the helmet, and where they passed the metal, ceramic, padding, and plastiglass began to carve away, cut into dozens of perfect squares and disposed of piece by piece.
They kept working, completely taking the helmet apart in less than a full minute. With it gone, Shepard could see Liara's face fully- and pressed her eyes closed, tears streaming with renewed vigor.
Dark blue and purple marked her throat-so dark that in some places it looked black. In the midst of the darkest smear, her throat had a strange, caved in appearance. Her face was also flushed a deep blue, her sky blue eyes somehow paler as they gazed silently upward at the light above.
Resisting the urge to go over, Shepard instead took a steeling breath, and opened her eyes again.
"Please…"
The little claws weren't done with their work with the removal of the helmet. Almost gently, several tugged at her lips just far enough to slip between them, and as they did Del suddenly grasped her wrist, pressing her eyes shut again.
"Not that much," she said under her breath. "Not all the way…"
The bruising on Liara's throat began to fade, its 'collapsed' appearance abruptly filling out again. The purple color of her face slowly faded to a healthier blue. Then the claws retracted, vanishing back into the table, and Shepard rushed forward. Her shaking hands gently cradled the asari's face.
"Breathe, Liara. Please…just take a breath…"
Everything was heaviness and warmth, a few bright, dreamlike images snapping like camera flashes in the dark. A laughing face. Vivek smiling. Aethyta hand on her cheek. Jura. Chakwas. Ashley. Sam.
Shepard.
"Liara…Liara! Breathe, damn you!"
I am breathing, she thought, slightly irritated. She was comfortable, exhausted, and she didn't want to wake up. It seemed as if it had been forever since she'd just slept. I am breathing, Del, just let me rest…
Then heat moved through her throat, searing along with her gasp, pain stabbing in her chest. Startled by the force of it she arched and frantically reached out, only to be grabbed.
"Liara!"
Heart thundering in her ears, the asari tried desperately to banish the heavy feeling in her head.
Drugged? Was I drugged somehow?
"Liara, shh…shh…it's ok. Just…just t-take slow, even breaths. You're safe. You're s-…"
The pain eased, and Liara tried to focus on the blur hovering over her. She recognized the trembling voice that broke off in a thick sob, but it took a moment to place. Then, as if some kind of heavy fog had been lifted off her mind, everything abruptly clarified.
"Merah…?" she whispered.
Shepard's face was damp with sweat and tears, a heart-broken relief shining in her eyes. The expression alarmed Liara, even as she fought to recall what was going on…how she had gotten there.
"Merah, are you all right-?"
She broke off as Del suddenly hugged her tightly, gripping her hard.
"Liara….thank God. Oh…thank God…"
