Hey again. Well, a shorter chapter, I know. However, I can imagine with the lot of us gearing up for Christmas, you might appreciate a shorter one in favor of having more time with your families, no?

Anyway, I'm still at Virmire-week, a week which seems to be strecthing into becoming a month instead. I'm also busy at work with ppolitical bullshit, as you might have noticed in the former chapter. Like reader pointed out, there WILL be RAMIFICATIONS of walking out on the Council like that. It's the same as if a man walked out from the UN's meetings while flipping the entire room off. Because that's basically what Donnel Udina did. Never liked the man myself, but with the story that was revealed about him in the third game, I couldn't help but feel that maybe, just maybe, Bioware screwed him over. What would happen if he wasn't constantly picked on, angered and humiliated? And of course, not corrupt?

Also, yeah, it's about Goddamn time we get a view of what Kasumi is doing with her time. Spending it on a vacation probably...

Ramifications

Coruscant, Galactic Republic Space

Sh'oy's De'noual - Upper level restaurant.

15:22 (local time estimate)

A word that could be used to describe what she was currently eating, could very well be "strange".

Kasumi didn't mind new foods, and had tried out cuisine from all over the world, as well as what levo-foods she could scrounge up from either Salarians or the Asari. Of course, what the Asari ate looked like mutilated frogs and octopuses, and the Salarians... they ate bugs. So, it was rather limited what she could boast of having eaten in her travels across the galaxy. Now, she was trying out a meal so completely alien, and yet so familiar because it was a human recipe, that she was unsure of what to think.

Also, the dress kept getting under her arms, threatening to be dirtied by suddenly ending up in her food.

"You don't like it?" She looked up from her platter, a mixture of alien-looking shellfish and crop-produce, and to one of her dinner-partners. Ashoka had been called away on a mission, something about drug-dealers in the lower levels, so for now Kasumi was sharing a meal with her newest friends, Senators Amidala and Chuchi, the latter looking rather amused that Kasumi was constantly either poking at her food or glancing to their escorts, a pair of civilian-dressed clones. Didn't matter that you took the armor away when they all looked alike.

"I... do, I do. It's just so... strange." She said, using a, thank God, actually normally looking fork to pick up one of the sliced and spiced pieces of shellfish. The meat was white with red and purple stripes, like someone had stripped a prawn and painted it purple. Chuchi just smiled at that, no doubt enjoying the bemused girl trying to figure out new kinds of food.

"I was a little unaccustomed to human food when I got here as well." Chuchi admitted, picking up a perfectly tempered piece of something-that-looked-like-a-roll-of-sushi-but-wasn't, and put it in her mouth; "But... your species has a lot of delicious platters."

Padme looked at her co-worker with clear amusement in her eyes, then back at Kasumi, who despite her own wishes, was still dressed up in the fine civilian gowns Padme had picked out for her. At least it wasn't the ambassadorial gowns and dress, that thing just looked silly in public;

"I can't help but find it so odd that we are of the seemingly same race, yet from different galaxies." She said, putting on one of the friendly smiles she gave when deep in thought. Kasumi picked a new piece of the strange food before responding;

"I know, right? It's really weird. Then again, there are traits here that are similar to different species in my galaxy." She said in her usual, cheery voice before eating the piece. Despite the alien appearance and smell, it tasted a lot like chicken and soy-sauce. Strange, because she was certain she was eating a sea-animal.

"That's actually something I've been dying to hear more about. Aside from what was told in the Senate, I know next to nothing about your home, Kasumi." Chuchi said, placing the back of her hand under her chin while looking at the petite Japanese. With her two chopsticks between her fingers, she did strike a rather amusing pose like that, Kasumi thought. The thief-turned-ambassador smiled, trying to come up with a good way to start;

"Well, not much to tell, is what I'd normally say. Of course, normally when people ask about my home, they ask about my house, not my entire galaxy, so let's see... Well, for starters, we have a whole bunch of different races there. There's humanity, of course, like Padme and me." She said, then took what looked like octopus in her mouth, chewing away while considering what to say next. Padme helped her, luckily.

"And your humanity, aside from being at war with these "Reapers", what is it like? Culture, traditions, religion?"

"Whoa, whoa that's a big one. Eh, cultures... I can't speak for western culture much, aside from that they seem to still cling to eating pizza even hundreds of years after it was introduced. My area is more along the lines of eastern culture." Kasumi explained, putting down her fork in favor of pouring herself a glass of water. Taking a sip, she quickly found out that it was a heavily spiced wine.

"When you say "western" and "eastern", what do you mean?" Chuchi said. Kasumi expected Padme to offer an explanation which connected to this galaxy, but the woman seemed just as curious. What, they didn't have different cultures here?

"Padme, don't you have a few different cultures in humanity here too?" Kasumi asked, hoping for a 'yes'.

"Not many... we have the Mandalorians, warrior-like, bound by honor and not liking the Republic all that much. They are neutral in this war as well." Padme explained.

"So, their culture is different from that of other countries on their planet?" Kasumi asked. Padme raised a brow at that.

"Ehm... no. Mandalore is the name of the planet. They are under the government of Duchess Satine." She explained. Thát caused Kasumi to almost spill her wine.

"What? You have an entire planet under one person, with one culture?" She asked, trying to keep her shock from her voice. Even the Turians had different cultures depending on where on Palavan one went, not to mention their colonies.

"Yes, that is how their system works. Most planets are one nation and under one person. I'm guessing you have something different?" She asked, smiling. Kasumi ignored her food now. This dinner had just gotten a whole lot more interesting.

"Well, yes. Pretty much all planets are made up of dozens, maybe even hundreds of nations. The nations of Earth, my homeworld, number in the hundreds. Most of them are joined in the Systems Alliance, but we all still have our own cultures. We just share the military." She explained. She didn't even notice that they were not the only political figures dining there at the moment, and that most nearby had stopped their own conversations, opting to listen in instead.

"Amazing. How do they manage to keep so many nations from getting involved in wars?" Chuchi asked. Kasumi shrugged;

"Mostly it's because we have the Alliance and the United Nations acting the role of the policeman of the world. If a nation attacks another one, everyone will get mad and attack the attacker. It took some wicked wars to get those institutions created. Other than that... Hey, I'm not really that versed in politics and diplomacy." She said. Chuchi seemed a little disappointed by the answer, but didn't let it show for more than a second.

"Then how is your culture Kasumi?" Padme asked, bringing the conversation back on track.

"Well, actually I'd say my people is kinda similar to those Madari- Mandalorians, I mean. Really honor-bound and defensive of our culture. We don't like our neighbor much, but they keep to themselves." She said, not mentioning China by name. She didn't mind the Chinese people, but their government still insisted on those islands... two hundred years after the dispute started. She noticed that Chuchi seemed to pale, just a little.

"You okay Riyo ?" Kasumi asked. The Pantoran senator regained her composure and smiled again, even if it took some time to get rid of the shock in her eyes.

"Yes, yes. It's just that... you say your people are like the Mandalorians?" She asked.

"Honor-bound, sometimes aggressive?" Kasumi asked, not understanding the problem.

"What Riyo means, I think, is if your people has the same history of violence and conquests as the Mandalorians. They have a long history of war and violence. They even form the template for our clone-troops." Padme said.

"Huh... well, I'm not proud to admit it, but we did do some pretty crazy shit in the second world war. War crimes and that kind." She said, not liking the path the conversation was heading down at; "But that was a long time ago. These days the most aggressive thing you'll see a Japanese do to another human is to chase him with a... rubber-thing in a hilarious tv-show."

"Oh... well, I suppose everyone have their history. I'd be surprised if your humanity was innocent, what with the video this Admiral Fisher sent." Padme said. Kasumi nodded;

"Yeah, no one's clean, but we did some pretty efficient repairs when we discovered we weren't alone in the galaxy. Then, we kinda bonded together and faced down everything trying to wipe us out."

"You have been at war with the other races of your galaxy?" Chuchi asked, sounding concerned. Not that Kasumi blamed her, really. It was strange looking at Kasumi and thinking "her species is a war-mongering one".

"Yeah... we have these other races in the community called "The Citadel" where we all meet and talk and such. Before that, one of the races, the Turians, wanted to kick our butts for opening Relays. Problem was... we didn't know it was illegal. Heck, we didn't even know the Citadel existed back then." Kasumi said, leaning back in her chair while holding the glass of now-proven wine.

"So... they demanded that you stopped? And then you went to war because you wanted to keep doing it?" Chuchi asked, leaning forward in her seat. Kasumi shook her head, closing her eyes while thinking of a proper wording. Damn this diplomacy-stuff was hard work. Never being able to curse and swear.

"Not... exactly. They saw some human ships, and this was about fifty years ago, so we didn't have the same navy as we do today, and they simply said "why the heck not?" and attacked us. Then we fought back, lost a planet, took it back, thousands of deaths, we started gaining ground, they started shooting even more... then the Council came in, a race called the Asari, who for a wonder look a lot like your race Riyo, and said we had to stop shooting each other. Since then, we've been at peace and such. Still, there is... animosity towards the Council." She said, looking away. Her eyes landed on a pair of men eating quietly, not looking at her.

Of course, being a master thief at trade and having to rely on seeing the unseen, Kasumi could easily make out that they, like the pair of clones on the opposite side of the room, were watching over them. More guards, in civilian clothing.

"Why? I can imagine being part of a large community would have many boons." Padme said, looking both confused and curious. Kasumi shrugged at the question, took another sip of the wine, then looked back at the senator.

"Not really. Sure, we are trading, but that's about what we got from it. Before we joined, and before the First Contact War, humanity was well on the way to unlocking AI's, had dozens of dreadnoughts in the making, and we even had colonial plans for several planets, from what I understand."

"I'm guessing from the way you said "was", that you didn't get to keep those things?" Riyo said with a somber voice. Kasumi had to admit, it was nicer than she would have imagined, getting sympathy for humanity from someone not human.

"Nope. The Council didn't like Artificial Intelligences, so that program was forced down the drain. We weren't allowed to have a big fleet either, so half of those dreadnoughts, plus hundreds of ships were scrapped, sending billions of dollars down the drain, and of course they had to decide which planets we could colonize. Oh yeah, from what I remember, their forced introduction of a new currency, the Credits, bankrupted several nations, crashed the European Union into the dust and rendered a hundred dollars just enough to pay for a small basket-ball...So, things haven't been the best." She said, finding herself scowling. She hadn't lost anyone in the First Contact War, but Keji's grandfather had been stationed on Shanxi. With emphasis on the 'had'.

"I... aren't there any boons to being a member of this 'Citadel' at all?" Padme asked, obviously a little disturbed by what she was told. Learning how her fellow humans were treated, it was probably a shock to her.

"Well... they let us trade with the other races, and patrol our borders... just not doing a good job of it." She muttered, placing her glass on the table again.

"What do you mean?" Chuchi asked.

"On the paper, they keep human colonies safe with all the big fleets the Turians have. In reality though, we're almost annually attacked by slavers at our colonies, with thousands of dead. Heck, just before I got here on official business, one of our greatest colonies, Elysium, was attacked... so many dead, the cleaning wasn't even done yet by the time I went back a few days later." She said, clenching her fist. Kasumi Goto was not a violent woman, heck she never even beat up the people she stole from when they were bad people. But what she had seen from Elysium... it shook her to the core. She could guess Padme had something similar in mind, as her expression became set in a hard line. Chuchi just looked saddened, probably not knowing what to say.

"What happened then? Who did it?" Padme asked, looking at Kasumi.

"In reverse order. It was a race called 'Batarians', but apparently just a large gang of pirates... as if, not even the regular marine or the highest admiral buys the story. And what happened? Nothing..." She said, remembering how she had run into the scarred marine captain with the artificial eyes. He had recounted how Anna had told him that officially, the Batarians denied all involvement.

"What?" Chuchi asked, stirred from her silent state.

"What do... how could nothing happen after that?" Padme demanded. Kasumi could see the hard expression becoming a scowl, something so unlike what she had seen in the senator so far, that it seemed like it didn't belong on the woman at all.

"The Batarians denied involvement. If we attacked them, it would be us the Council attacked to keep the peace." She said. She kept her voice clear of all emotions, because she didn't like her voice when it was filled with regret and venom. Chuchi, being blue of nature, paled to almost grey. It was fairly obvious that she was unused to that sort of incompetent political back-stabbing and near-obvious betrayal. Still, there was a hard light in her eyes, something that spoke of having been in politically ugly situations before.

"How... can that even be called a functioning government? I'll admit, the senate doesn't function as well as it should, and there are corrupt people in office, but... when someone is attacked, we don't buy lies, not anymore. We help our allies, not letting them being attacked again and again." Padme said, her voice so low that those who listened in had to visibly make an effort to hear it.

"Honestly? I don't know... and I can't really imagine how my boss is going to keep up working with them before doing something...rash." Kasumi muttered, looking out the window, at the busy and sprawling cityscape beneath them.

...

November 31st

Arcturus Station, Arcturus stream

Office of Admiral Anna Fisher

16:12 (station time)

"A toast, to you Udina." Anna said, raising her halfway empty glass of scotch at the screen as she watched Donnel Udina throw a political brick at the Council, with a recorder recording it all even. If Udina knew the recorder was there, he might just have undergone the most radical testicle-growth Anna had ever seen; "My favorite hater who finally stood up to that bitch-monger, the lizard and Kermit the frog." She then swilled the liquor down. For unknown reasons, the screen had decided to time the news-feed directly with Hackett getting to the point where she was supposed to be convinced to give the new tech to the Council.

Stephen didn't speak. It was one of the rare moments where he had no clue as to what he was going to say next. The news had hit him like the brick Udina had just verbally launched at the Three Big, as well as the punch they had returned to the human race as a whole.

"See? They don't give a jack-off's ass that we're getting slaughtered in the thousands. They just want us to be their human shields." She said, her voice somewhere between scowling and boasting. On one side, she was glad that her tinfoil-hat mind had finally been proven right, on the other, even she could see that Udina's verbal moral spanking of the Council would have some consequences. It was just damn good she had prepared for something like this. Hopefully, she had prepared enough.

"I...I'm going to the Citadel. We need to sort this out before-" Hackett started. Anna just turned on the spot and stared him in the eye, her mildly drunken stare enough to cut off his words, as he turned his attention from the screen to his niece. While very, very few things could make him falter, or wince, a stare-down with his niece was certainly a candidate for the post as 'most scary thing he had seen all week'.

"Sort out? Uncle, I'm not sure if you paid any attention to that screen, but the Council pretty much just told us to go anal-probe ourselves with the biggest cactus we can find!" She growled, pointing hard finger at the screen showing Udina walking out of the Council chambers. Her uncle was silent for a few moments. On the Battlefield he might be the most legendary tactician since Tsun Tzu, but politically he was as a child, incompetent and unable to convince politicians that he wasn't buying their shit.

Neither was she, true, but when people gave her shit, she usually just gave them a knee to the crotch, or a blackened eye, should the shit-dealer be a woman. While it had gotten her into trouble more than once, it had also ensured that she was subjected to fewer lies, less political bullshit and even fewer reporters.

She still had fond memories of chasing off that Jilani-woman with a loaded gun. Sure, she wasn't going to use it, but the threat alone had been enough to send the woman running with a dark stain between her legs.

"...Shit." Her uncle finally uttered the first real swearword she had heard him use since... actually, she couldn't remember the last time he had cursed.

"Yes; Shit. Now, since we've seen just how big a shit the Council gives for human lives, what are we going to do about it? And don't you dare even considering having Petrovsky arrested. I've seen the numbers, he has already lost more men to the Reapers than the Council has ever lost in an entire campaign since the Rebellions." She said, turning off the screen as Tevos began an interview about how the humans needed to learn that they were not the center of the galaxy. Especially because she had seen the news once already, and knew that Sparatus was about to compare Udina's walkout to the Batarian ambassador. While Anna wanted her uncle in the right mood, comparing a human to a proven criminal, a Batarian even, would send him into a state.

Stephen Hackett, top Admiral of the Systems Alliance, legendary warrior, and just about the most badass badass one would ever find commanding the collective armed force of the Human race, sighed and sunk back, landing in the chair Anna normally used for her now regular guests, the Quarian Admiralty board.

Ever since she had woken up from her brief coma, Anna had been back to work like nothing had happened. She had made a new rule on the station though, one that all the military commanders, even those of the Citadel races, were sent: 'Don't touch the Reaper-tech'

"I don't know. There's a reason I joined the navy, and not the law-school." Her uncle admitted. Anna's hard stare on him softened, and she sunk into the chair she herself used. Taking a deep breath, she looked at her uncle again. How the last few months had aged him. He looked like he was close to the eighties, not his...wait, he was eighty, but he looked 'twentieth-century eighty', not twenty-second century eighty'.

"Listen... Hell, I know I'm not often one to argue for calm and that sort of things, but... okay, you know what? Never mind that shit, I'm filled up to my ears with the bullshit the Council's been giving us all these years. What have they ever done for us? Nothing! How much have we sacrificed for them? Too much. We never even got reparations after Shanxi. You remember their reasoning?" She said, her scowl resetting itself.

"We don't apologize for policing the galaxy...Fedorian's words" Hackett said, his eyes closed shut with a grimace of anger on his face.

"And how many humans were killed by Turian fire, without warning and without an apology afterwards?" Anna asked. It was moot though, as she knew that her uncle knew the number by his soul.

"Too many. But that doesn't change the fact that we can't do much about this. Even if the most radical change comes to pass, and we should withdraw from the Citadel, it would not be a wise move." He said, massaging his temples while speaking.

"Not what I would have considered actually, but not a bad idea." She said, half-lying. She had to, of course. If even she hadn't proposed the idea, it would seem all the more reasonable that it was done.

"No, a bad idea. Without the Citadel, we would be alone in the galaxy. Humanity cannot stand alone, even if we wanted to." He said. Anna just smirked. It was almost unnoticeable, but it was a smirk alright.

"What if we didn't stand alone?" She asked. Hackett looked up from his building migraine, meeting her eyes. If she had her mind in her eyes, he would be able to see that she wasn't just a cunning old fart, like him. She had foresight and ruthlessness too, and in abundance.

"I know that you want to have the Quarians as permanent members of the Alliance, and while I can't come up with a reason it's a bad idea, I feel like it wouldn't be enough. They only number in seventeen millions. It would not be enough to make a difference if we came to a conflict with the Council." So, he was thinking ahead, like her? Good, anything else would have disappointed her.

"Who said I was only thinking about the Quarians?" She said, smirking visibly now. There were times when having power was just what made her day so much better.

...

November 31st

Virmire, Hoc system.

One kilometer north of Point Rain.

18:31

Jane was trudging through the plant life covering the ground, not being able to see her feet for the low ferns that seemingly sprung from the sand, without the fertile soil usually needed for such plants. Another odd thing was that she didn't remember any ferns at all when she had been to Virmire the last time. Still, she kept her rifle at the ready, armed with disrupter-round and ready to cause some synthetic deaths. So far, they had remained unnoticed, a remarkable feat when one considered the fact that she was leading a line of fifty soldiers, plus her own men and women.

The latter group though could have been bigger. Having to leave not one, but two old friends in hospital-beds on Arcturus, and now another one to provide overwatch with the snipers, her known group was down to just the seven of them, leading a charge into hostile lands. She wished they had the Mako, but with the trashing the last one had received, command hadn't issued a new one to the Normandy.

Bugger really, as it meant hoofing it to the target.

"Keep quiet. The last thing we need is to alert the geth." She whispered, directing the message to Thomas and Clarke in particular. Of the two of them, she couldn't decide who was the more juvenile. When out of action, on the Normandy, Thomas Fisher was the single most childish adult she had ever had the misfortune of meeting. But in the field, when not under fire, Clarke fucking snuck up on people! Who even did that when on missions?

She bit down a curse when she rounded the next large rock, finding a pair of the inhuman Husks standing around, drooling. They were looking the wrong way, luckily, so she would still have the element of surprise. She ducked back down behind the rocks, calling her next-in-command up to her side.

"John, the geth can reveal us even if we kill them. Can those Husk-things do the same, you think?"

"Don't know. I was too busy slaughtering them to ask the last time." He shrugged, hands gripping around his shotgun.

"We need to take them out. Preferably before they start moaning and give us away." She said. She hadn't meant it as his cue, but he took it anyway, looking over the rock before grapping a particularly big knife from his bandolier. It looked like a mix between a Kukri, and a Machete.

Before she could say a word, he had sauntered over the wall, thrown the blade into the skull of one Husk, then retracted it and plunged it into the skull of the last one, sending it crashing to the ground with a blade-wielding Quarian sitting on its back, retrieving his blade from the back of its skull.

Jane got out from cover and looked at the blade, then the Husks, and lastly the Quarian who had done it all.

"Really?" She asked, taking in the scene. Even for her, that weapon was just excessive to the point of being odd.

"Picked it up on Earth." He shrugged, sliding the blade back into place. Despite wanting to know just why, what, how and when, as well as why he hadn't used it before, she stuffed those questions for later, opting instead for just nodding and continuing. In the back of her mind, the place where she stored her less important thoughts, she wondered if she could get one of those things. Heavens know Fisher was potent with a blade too, so maybe swords weren't completely out of fashion anyway?

Nah, she'd probably just stick to using a nano-forged carbon-blade from her Omnitool if the need ever arose. Besides, being trained as a Vanguard, she didn't have a problem with close-up and personal situations. They were part of the job.

They continued, walking through the sands as they left the more fertile ground behind and started curving back again, hopefully bypassing what defenses were in place to stop them. As they came across a shallow river, floating lazily as if there was no battle going on, Jane started hearing the sounds of fighting coming closer as they came by the first AA-gun. She stopped, using a hand-signal to order her group to follow her example.

Looking around a bend in the river, she saw a crashed gunship with the pilots positioned against the hull. One had most of his head blown all over the metal, while the other was clutching a gunshot in the shoulder.

A geth stood above him, pressing the muzzle of its weapon against his helmet.

Jane closed her eyes and ground her teeth as the shot rang out, painting the man's brain across the hull where it merged with his co-pilot's. Fuck, this was less than ideal. With cynical eyes, it was a good thing, as the geth would interpret any renewed shooting as the last ditch resistance of the crashed crew. With human eyes though, with her eyes, it was tragic. Gunned down like animals, no one deserved that fate.

Except for Batarian Slavers.

But the men here weren't slavers, they were her responsibility. She leaned back behind the bend of the river, looking at the men and women following her. She couldn't waster their lives by attacking for revenge, not now. They were too close. If they were discovered now, the deaths of so many would have been for nothing.

Still, the AA-gun had to go down, and the geth would find them sooner or later.

"Target whatever hostiles you see." She said, simple as that, and vaulted out behind cover. The instant she did, she was received with a blast of rounds cutting at her shields, diminishing them like they were paper against bullets. Before she even knew what had happened, she was thrown backwards into the water.

"Contact!"

"Scrap them!"

"Taking fire!"

"Catch this you mechaaaaaaah!"

The screams her soldier fighting was the first thing she heard when she picked herself out from the water. She could hear them belching out fire, and many, many more geth returning the fire with gusto. What was supposed to be a quick mow-down had become a full-fledged battle, stretched across the shallow river where troops took cover behind rocks, fallen three-trunks or even just crouched where they were, hoping not to get shot. She then noticed that there were no one near her, and that most of her crew was already ahead, taking the fight to the geth.

Then, a form materialized out of invisibility, appearing a meter in front of her, pointing a loaded shotgun straight at her head. Even as she started humming with biotic energy, she knew she wouldn't be able to deflect the attack with a barrier, or even attack the geth.

The mechanical construct flapped its pedals a single time before pulling the trigger.

Only to have both trigger, handle, barrel and gun split apart as a massive sword went clan through it from behind, cutting through the geth as well as the gun like an Omniblade through warm butter. The geth sputtered and sparked, whining the usual mechanical whine of something like pain as the blade carved downwards, splitting it completely from head to toe, if geth did indeed have toes. As the blade was retracted, she felt herself being pulled to her feet by a newcomer and looked up to see Williams hoisting her back to a stand.

"Well, that was a bit closer than I'd like." Thomas said from behind the geth as he held the blade, now drenched in white cooling-fluids, in front of him.

"Get to your feet Captain, we have a battle to win!" Williams shouted, giving her the final push she needed to regain her feet. Jane picked her rifle back up before nodding a thank-you to the Chief. She looked back at the battle at the same time as Fisher took off at a run, cleaving through the body of a geth twice his size. This time, he got the blade back out again, but immediately took fire from a Prime who had just finished mowing down a soldier it had caught in one hand.

Jane yanked up her rifle and sent, a bit wavering from her tumble, shots flying at the geth. Luckily, and this was the only time she would ever call it 'luckily', the Prime was big enough that all shots impacted. The geth didn't seem to mind her shots through, and focused fully on trying to get Fisher dead. So focused actually, that it didn't notice the red-armored Bulwark impacting on its back from behind with a body-slam that was, though not biotic, powerful enough to make it stumble. The Bulwark-soldier then jumped onto its back, pressing a rifle in between the joints of its armor and pulled the trigger in one long burst.

The geth might have the best shields around, but if a weapon got inside those shields, the geth was just one big target. It came crashing, sputtering and sparking to the ground where it splashed into the water, short-circuiting the now exposed wires and joints that rifle-fire had opened up.

Fisher looked at the Bulwark-soldier, Riley, and pointed a finger at her, but then retracted it and instead pulled his modified Carnifex into the face of a geth that stayed outside his reach with the sword. For some reason, it wasn't shooting at him. Still, it didn't matter much when he sent it to the ground with a broken flashlight.

All around her, the battle was turning in the favor of her men, and Jane joined in the fight, sending the upper half of a geth into the wall as she warped away its legs and hips, if one could call it hips on a geth. She then turned her attention, shotgun now in hand, to the closest geth and charged it. It fired at her, and she rolled under that fire, coming up just below it. It fired again, plasma eating through her shoulder pads and into the flesh of her shoulder itself. Screaming in anguish, she pulled the trigger for her own shotgun, sending the geth stumbling backwards with the first rounds, then shot it again, and again, collapsing its shields. She shot it again, shattering its torso and sending it flying backwards. She sat up, her left hand clenched on her right shoulder as the Medigel started healing her wounds.

"Dammit! I hate hunters!" She cursed, then got to her feet while checking that the geth was indeed dead as a doornail. She then shifted focus on the next geth closest to her, sending a ball of biotic energy into its head as it was about to impale a marine on what looked a lot like her own Omniblade. It was just so much more advanced in appearance, that it didn't seem fair to her that the bad guys always got the best toys.

The geth was sent toppling forward, allowing the marine to get to his or her feet, difficult to see from the distance, and pour fire into it. The geth didn't get back up, and the marine kept on fighting, as did Jane. Somewhere around her, Thomas Fisher had just carried out a well-done impression of a medieval-style execution, cutting out the knees of a geth before separating its flashlight-head from the shoulders. Jane charged her biotics, looking for her next target.

"No more contacts." A marine called. Jane had to stop herself from punching a soldier by mistake. No more? Had there only been so few guards? She shook her head and gave a silent apology to the marine who was, probably as Jane couldn't see his eyes, surprised.

"Sound off. Check for wounded and dead." She said, no longer bothering with silence. The geth knew they were here now, so no point in being sneaky.

"Pjortir is dead ma'am." A marine called out, crouching next to the still body of a marine missing a sizeable part of his chest, with the sizzling armor giving witness to the plasma that had boiled straight through. Dammit, wasn't the Phase-II armor supposed to stop plasma? From what she had heard from the commandoes, the geth had hardly touched them on Feros.

"Anyone else?"

"Doktiev and Matrha are wounded. Medigel should keep them stable, but they won't be fighting anything anytime soon." A familiar female voice said. Jane looked to her left to see Riley put a female marine up against the rocky walls of the bank. The woman had a few scorch marks over her chest while the male marine had his legs covered in them. The right one in particular looked like Scorch's leg had after Noveria.

"Dammit... we can't leave them here..." Jane muttered. She clenched her fist, the only way she could release some steam without screaming, then looked around. Resting her eyes on a soldier with a cracked visor, probably from the impact of either a biotic geth or the stock of a rifle, she pointed him out.

"Name?"

"Corporal Dmitri Tarkoya, ma'am." The man said, saluting despite having a wince to his movement. Yeah, he wasn't going to be fighting either, she decided.

"Take the wounded back to the tunnel Corporal, then get yourself looked after. If the medics clear you, then come back here. If not, you stay at the main force. I can't have wounded people slowing us down or getting killed. Understood?" She said, her voice letting it be clear that there was no room for argument. Not that she had to, the man nodded and saluted again, then went to where Riley was tending to the two wounded.

One dead, and two wounded... against a lot of geth. Cynical as it might seem, Jane was satisfied with that number. It could and would probably be a lot more before they were done. She allowed herself a look at the marines who were all more or less standing at attention, waiting for her words.

How many of them would be dead before this was over?

And how many will be dead before we are past the Chirstmas Holidays? (Marines, I mean) And with that, and... no wait, there's more.

I've been writing this thing for a solid year now, which is why I updated today instead of tomorrow. This, today, is me celebrating my anniversary. Damn, looking back, I've spent the year writing more in one story than I've ever done in anything else ever. To be honest, it's a bit humbling, to know that I can possess this sort of drive, and that there are badass people like you who actually enjoy my work.

Consider this chapter, or the entire story as a whole, to be my Christmas present to you guys. Any reviews you give me will be considered as your presents for me :)

To all of those out there who enjoy my work, even those who hate it as well, (there has to be some, I mean come on? :) I wish you all a Merry Christmas, and a happy New Year. The latter is because Jennifer's inspiration is coming here with her family for Christmas, so I'll be dedicating my time to her (I utterly adore the little Banshee)

Merry Christmas people, enjoy your holiday and treat the cashiers in the wallmart's nice. they have a tough job. Also, a greeting to those few of my readers doing service overseas. You might not be from my country, but Damn me if I'm not still proud of the work you do.

Alright, enough ranting.

Enjoy yourselves people, I know I will.