A/N: This chapter will introduce antagonists and the main purpose for this story. Also review!
Sorry for the delay, however I hope the length of the chapter makes up for it
3-8-2184 0154 hours (Citadel standard time)
Har
Forward Operating Base
Team B
As the blue jay shuttle landed on the landing pad, Ramirez and his team stepped out along with their prisoner, the view from the landing pad allowed them to take in the sight of the city before them. Even at night, Ramirez could still see the waste of the city with little trouble, the blazing fires and numerous street lights providing enough light to witness the destruction. All around them Cerberus soldiers were running in all directions, the sounds of gunfire and the occasional explosion could be heard in the distance. The horizon was blotted out by the huge skyscrapers that the city consisted of, but the evident beauty of the structures had been somewhat marred by the days of nonstop warfare. Buildings all around bore their own individual mark of destruction and chaos. Some had been opened up by missiles, the explosions having left gaping holes in their sides. Others had been scorched from fire, or had partially collapsed; others had every window shattered into tiny fragments of glass. Sirens could be heard all around them, and the constant shouting from the Cerberus soldiers made it difficult for Ramirez to think.
"So this is what Hell looks like," he muttered numbly, taking in his surroundings with a heavy heart. As a titan, he had seen his share of carnage, so much so that at times it had little effect on him. However, the difference this time was that Shepard was longer with him.
'Shepard is somewhere in that god forsaken battleground and I am here escorting a prisoner safe and sound.' The thought made Ramirez sick, but he understood the reasoning behind Shepard's motivations, the lives of the many always outweigh the lives of the few.
Kasumi could sense his guilt and placed a hand on his shoulder. He turned around and gave her a small smile and placed one of his hands on top her own. She blushed at the gesture and was happy her hood hid her facial expression.
The moment was interrupted by a cough. Ramirez turned around to see Anton standing in his usual white and yellow Cerberus assault armor. "I'm not interrupting anything am I?" He asked coyly. His smirk vanished when he only saw Ramirez's team on the helipad. "James where is Shepard?"
Ramirez slowly shook his head. "He wanted me to make sure the General got here safely. As far as I know he could be anywhere."
Anton just stood there not knowing what to say. As a soldier he knew following orders meant the difference between life and death, even if he was one to always question them, but did he have the heart to follow an order that would let his friends die so that numerous strangers could live? "Miranda would want… to interrogate the prisoner. I'd suggest you talk to her. The interrogation room is down the hall and towards the right when you step inside." He told them.
Ramirez nodded his head and turned to face his "Kasumi, get some rest and Legion try to intercept any radio chatter from Cerberus and the Batarians. Maybe their transmissions can give us an idea on Shepard's location."
Kasumi could feel that he wanted to be left alone and decided to get some sleep. Legion merely gave an affirmative and just stood there while the geth programs within the platform started to hack their way into the communications.
He then walked toward his assigned directions, hoping to quickly peel every single drop of information the general had tucked in his head. He led the cuffed general through the door. The hallway inside lacked any color and gave the impression of a demolished building. Ramirez took the prisoner down the hall and stepped inside first door on his right. In there was a rectangular table with two chairs on opposite sides. Once inside the room, he chained the general's legs to a chair and chained his already cuffed hands to the table in front of him.
"Alright here's how this goes. I ask you questions, you answer them. I neither have the time nor patience to deal with any crap that you'll have. So just make this easier on everyone and answer my questions. If you lie to me, then you'll suffer twice as much understand?" He asked with commanding tone.
"HA! If you think-" Before the general could finish his sentence, Ramirez punched him square in the rib cage, the sound of bones cracking could be heard. The general nearly collapsed from the punch, his raspy coughing and wheezing was proof of that.
"Now I want names, locations, communication codes, star maps, anything and everything inside that bald head of yours." he said.
"Soon your race will be exterminated through a righteous fire. You will beg for forgiveness when we unleash our fury!" The general practically yelled.
In response Ramirez got out his taser and tazed the general. He placed his hands on the general's mouth to prevent his screams from being heard. The general experienced immense pain as all the muscles in his body contracted giving him the worst cramp he had ever felt.
Satisfied that his message was clear, Ramirez placed his taser back in his armor's belt. "How about we start somewhere simple? That blue creature that fought us outside your bunker, what was it?" he asked in a frustrated tone. He was losing patience with the man and wasn't going to put up with more of his bullshit. When it came to protecting his friends, Ramirez was willing to do anything he could to keep them safe even beat the hell out of a chained prisoner.
"It does not matter what pain you inflict on me…the Hegemony wil-"
Before he could get a respond, the door opened and standing in the doorway was Miranda with her arms crossed in front of her chest. "What the hell do you think you're doing?" she demanded.
"Interrogating this bastard." He replied.
"In the hall now!" Knowing best not to argue with her, Ramirez obliged her request.
Once they were both in the hall, Miranda gave him an ice cold stare that slightly made him uneasy. "You think physically abusing him will gain us anything useful?"
"The sooner I can get information out of the gut, the sooner I'll be able to launch search and rescue to find Shepard." He defended.
"Clearly you need a lesson in proper information gathering skills. Watch and learn." she told him as she stepped inside the room, followed closely by Ramirez.
Calmly, Miranda took a seat in front of the general ignoring the lustful smiles he gave her. "Hello. My name is Miranda and I'll be interrogating you today. Let's start off with something simple shall we? What is your name and rank?"
The general practically spat in her face. "Fuck you, Cerberus whore. I hope my men find you and chain you to the wall and fuck the living breath out of you!"
Miranda only smiled in response. She knew better than to give him an emotional response. She was in control now, not him and she would remind him of that fact. "You know it's a real shame, those men of yours fighting and dying out there. They counted on you, and you're failing them. You can cease their deaths and suffering, all you have to do is give us the information we're seeking."
The general glared at her. "Ha! You think we are weak? We are all willing to die for our noble cause! We will ensure your race's stain on this galaxy is wiped out!" he yelled.
Miranda sighed. "Very well. Commander release the restraints on our colleague, he is free to go."
"What!?" Ramirez and the general asked in unison, believing they misheard her.
"He won't talk, therefore he is allowed to leave if he so wishes to."
"What? You can't be serious!" Ramirez exclaimed. He clearly furious at idea of releasing the prisoner. Nonetheless he obeyed his orders and walked over to the general to undo the restraints. He hoped Miranda had a plan to extract information from the general.
Just before Ramirez was able to undo the restraints, Miranda opened a file in her hands and looked at it with a concentrated stare. "It's a real shame, though that your family won't have the same luxury as you have."
Baron Ulig stared at her, confused at what she was referring to. As if to answer his question, Miranda handed him the file. It was a picture of a young female batarian and a small boy. They were both smiling deeply, with no care in the world. Next to the photo were financial records, addresses, and other contacts that Baron had over the years.
"Is this your family? Your wife, she is very lovely. And your son, with so much innocence. It would be a shame if anything were ever to happen them."
Ulig leaned over the table. "If you think of hurting them….." he warned through clenched teeth.
Miranda looked up. "Me? Of course not. Neither I nor my organization would ever think of hurting them, so long as you provide us with the information we seek. Otherwise a Cerberus team could just simply visit your home on the corner of South Shanton. Such a lovely place you have there. The team can then break into your home using the security code, 2-32-12, correct me if I'm wrong. They can then simply walk in, up the stairs of your double story home, take a right at the top to the room at the end of the hall. Your room, I'm sure. The team will walk in on your sleeping wife, put a pistol to her head and pull the trigger, spraying blood all over the new silk sheets she had just bought, which would be a total waste. Next they can walk over to the other end of the hall to your son's room and just like his mom, have whatever fire his life contains be extinguished."
Miranda looked at the general who was giving her a death glare. "The choice is yours, general."
Weighing his thoughts the general proceeded to divulge any information he had. Satisfied with the information she had gained, Ulig was released as an informant, not that he had much of a choice in the matter.
Ramirez exited the room with the intent on finding Shepard. "Ramirez where are you going?" Miranda asked.
"To find Shepard." he replied.
"No you're not."
"And why not?" he demanded, wanting a good reason why he shouldn't go rescue his long time friend.
"You're emotionally compromised and reckless right now. Besides Garrus's team is closer to Shepard's last known location, so we'll send him in. In the mean time you can get some rest. Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go deliver my report to the Illusive man."
Ramirez decided to cool off, fully confident in Garrus's skills to locate and rescue Shepard. He decided to locate Legion and see if he had any update on Shepard's location.
Har
Location Unknown
Team A
Shepard opened his eyes slowly and groggy, somewhat awake he noticed everything was upside down and barely visible. His head felt swollen, and his seat belt, which kept him in his seat, felt as if it was digging into his body.
Slowly the events that had previously occurred came back to him. 'We crashed. Great we crashed in the jungle and now I'm hanging upside down. How long have I been unconscious?' He thought, wondering how long he had been in this predicament.
He started fumbling with the seat buckles trying to find the bottom buckle. After a moment of searching he found it and popped it open. Suddenly his lower body leaned forward, just before falling out of the seat and smashing through a part of an intact part of the windshield and hitting the ground hard.
The impact set electric shocks of pain through his body and radiated around his left arm. He tasted blood and realized that he'd bitten his tongue when he had hit the ground causing blood to leak through his mouth. With enormous effort, he pushed himself to his knees using his right arm as support. The slightest movement caused immense pain to be sent all throughout his left arm. He forced himself to look at it and immediately felt a wave of nausea; a bone was sticking out from his wrist and from the elbow up, his arm was completely bent the wrong way.
He used his good arm to push himself up to his feet and assessed his surroundings. Immediately he was able to make out the black and white uniform of Jacob, who was still dangling from his seat.
"Jacob! Jacob wake up!" Shepard called out his name, but his only response was silence. Jacob's body simply hung there limply.
"Jacob." He called out softly. Jacob groaned, but didn't move. Using his right arm, Shepard reached into his belt and pulled out a knife. Instead of wasting time undoing the seat buckles, Shepard simply cut them. Jacob unconsciously fell out of his seat, so Shepard used his right shoulder to catch him. However, the weight of the Cerberus operative caused both men to tumble towards the floor, or rather ceiling, of the wrecked shuttle.
Shepard groaned and pushed Jacob off of him. Getting back onto his feet, he looped one of Jacob's arms around his shoulder and dragged him out and away from the wreckage. He walked over to a tree and leaned the unconscious operative against it. Shepard looked at the wrecked Blue Jay and was shocked to realize that it was only half a shuttle. It ended just before the cockpit, with tangled teeth of charred metal and was on fire. The scent was almost enough to cause him to vomit.
Suddenly there was movement from the bushes behind them and instinctively Shepard reached from his pistol on his holster, only to realize that it was empty. A large figure emerged from the bushes and Shepard was relieved. Standing in front of him was Grunt, the krogan super soldier.
"Shepard! I knew a simple crash wouldn't keep you down." Grunt said with enthusiasm.
"Grunt, am I glad to see you. I thought it might've been an enemy patrol." It was only then that Shepard noticed that Grunt had sustained a few injuries himself. He had a few bullet wounds with cuts and bruises around his body, but nothing too major. Shepard also noticed that unlike him, Grunt was actually equipped with weapons. A total of a machine gun, assault rifle, shotgun, sniper rifle, two pistols, and large weapon with a rather long blade underneath it.
There was a cough behind Shepard. "Owwww," Jacob moaned, lifting his head. "That really sucked. Next time you think on making a crash landing Shepard, warn me so I can parachute out. I'm sure I'll be much safer." His eyes wandered over to the trashed shuttle and whistled. "Yeah, next time definitely parachuting out." He noticed Shepard's arm and cringed. "Uh, I think you might want to get that checked out."
"It looks worse than it is. Right now we have to find a way to get a transmission out to the team and..." Looking around he noticed there was only three of them. "Does anyone know where the pilot is?"
"Dead, even by krogan standards." Grunt replied, bluntly with a lack of emotion.
Neither Shepard nor Jacob pressed on the matter. "Anyway," Shepard spoke up. "We need to find a nearby camp or a communication tower or even a simple radio will do."
"Why not use our own radios?" Jacob asked.
"The helmet radios are only have a short range and the one on the shuttle is destroyed…so now we have to find one from the batarians."
"There was a Batarian camp near here." Grunt stated, pointing with his finger south. "They had a radio tower. Maybe we can use that." He suggested.
"Why didn't you tell me this sooner?" Shepard asked annoyed.
"You didn't ask." The krogan replied, calmly.
"Is that where you got all the weapons?" Jacob questioned.
"Heh heh heh." Grunt's, somewhat maniacal, laugh filled the team with unease.
"Well then," Jacob said as he pushed himself up against the tree into a standing position. "Lead the way Grunt."
Once the team was fully equipped with weapons, they set off deeper into the jungle. As they made their way towards the enemy camp, they found other parts of the shuttle all torn up. The large mass of twisted metal radiated heat as it burned.
It was long before they reached the enemy camp, only to see that it was buzzing with activity. It appeared as if an entire company of men where tasked with locating Shepard. He quietly led his team over to a log on top of small cliff, overlooking the camp. From here they had the perfect vantage point, and the darkness allowed them additional cover.
They heard a Batarian, probably the leader by the look of his uniform and figure. "These corpses are still fresh, which means that they have to be near." He said with an authoritative tone.
"Commander Iselk! The armory has been emptied." A batarian soldier shouted towards the commander.
The commander appeared to be in deep thought. "Well then this certainly changes things." Turning over to one of his subordinates, he said "Radio command and inform them of this new development.
Shepard was too concentrated to listen in on the conversation that he failed to realize that a Batarian soldier was patrolling the area and noticed Shepard's team hiding behind the log. "Hey guys they're over here!" he shouted as he attempted to aim his rifle at the group.
With impressive reflexes, Jacob rolled over onto his back and with quick speed, fired his shotgun. The round impacted the batarian, dead center in the chest killing him.
Almost immediately the log they were hiding behind was peppered with mass effect rounds, as the entire camp became aware of their location.
"Kill them. Do not let them escape!" Shepard heard Commander Iselk yell.
"Light them up!" Shepard yelled, firing his own weapon at the group. He felt the heavy vibrating ripple course through his arm as he fired his assault rifle with only one arm. The sound of the battle was almost deafening as hundreds of rounds were being fired in a matter of minutes. Shepard gritted his teeth as he fought to control his aim of the weapon. He sighted multiple infantry units that were attempting to flank them and watched as they were torn apart from the force of Grunt's machine gun, who appeared to be the only one actually excited about the firefight.
Jacob, who was sniping targets to keep them from rushing them, saw as a few soldiers were aiming missile launchers on their position. "Get down!" he ordered. BOOM! The impact caused a part of the cliff to collapsed, sending the log rolling down with it.
The sound of rustling leaves and clanking armor was growing louder in Shepard's ears. He knew they were getting closer and it wouldn't be too long before they managed to surround them.
"There's too many of them! We need to retreat!" Shepard yelled.
Grunt then equipped the strange weapon and fired, sending fireballs flying towards the batarians. No one could have predicted the damage it was capable of causing. As soon as the rounds impacted solid ground, it unleashed a massive blast vaporizing anyone near and leaving only a large crater in its wake. The blast was so strong that it caused the ground to shake and as a result the radio tower came crashing down on top of the batarian line, sending clouds of dust everywhere. Shepard took a small satisfaction that it landed directly on top of Commander Iselk.
"Heh heh heh. I like." Grunt said, eyeing the weapon and holding it as if it was the sole meaning of living. Shepard and Jacob exchanged nervous glances, not too sure that letting a reckless krogan super soldier handle a weapon capable of unleashing massive amounts of damage was a good idea, but in the meantime they had more pressing matters to deal with.
"Alright we'll use the dust as cover. C'mon this way." Shepard ordered running through the jungle, before setting behind cover where there were excess amounts of trees and not a moment too soon as grenades detonated near their positions. His shields faltered slightly before recharging.
"So anyone have a plan?' Jacob asked as he lifted three batarians, allowing Shepard to fire at them.
"Yeah one." Grunt said, holding his strange weapon up.
"No. Save it for later in case we need it." Shepard ordered. Just then a series of explosions drowned out all sound as missile launchers impacted the ground. "Grunt, Jacob cover me." Shepard ordered as he went prone on his stomach.
"You better have a plan Shepard!" Jacob shouted as he and Grunt attempted to suppress the enemy advance. Shepard however was placing any remote explosives he had, Jacob saw this and handed over his explosives as well.
Suddenly the unmistakable sound of a tank track's rolling through the jungle and tumbling over trees. "GET DOWN!" Jacob yelled. An instant later the main cannon of the batarian Ogre tank fired sending an 85mm round towards Shepard position. Jacob raised a barrier shield over the team, but the rounds kinetic energy was too much sending Jacob flying back a few meters.
"Grunt fire that damn weapon!" Shepard ordered as he threw two smoke grenades and a frag grenade at the approaching infantry.
Grunt brought up his weapon and fired at the tank. It exploded in a massive fireball, incinerating anyone who was near. "Ha! I love this gun!" he shouted into the air. Grunt at his point had gone berserk, one arm containing a machine gun the other holding the bladed weapon, utterly annihilating the enemy forces.
The distraction Grunt caused, allowed Shepard to run over to Jacob. "Jacob, are you all right?"
"Ugh, damn that's going to leave a mark." Jacob replied.
Shepard allowed himself a light chuckle. "That was damn near impressive. Now c'mon we have to move." He said giving Jacob a hand.
Turning his attention over to Grunt, he saw that the smoke screen was now large enough for them to make their escape. "Grunt, c'mon!" Shepard ordered.
Grunt sent one more round from his weapon before turning tail and retreating, though he would have much preferred to stay and fight.
He managed to quickly catch up to Shepard and Jacob as the trio ran from the enemy, who were not far behind. Just then the sound of a massive explosion went off, followed by the cries of various injured batarians.
Jacob laughed. "Hey Shepard I think that plan worked." Before Shepard could respond, the sound of a sniper going off was heard followed by Jacob collapsing towards the ground. "AHHH!" he yelled as he fell faced first into the ground.
"JACOB!" Shepard screamed. He quickly turned around to fire his assault rifle at the approaching enemies killing a whole squad, even with his injuries. It was then that he saw the glimmer on the scope of the sniper who had shot Jacob. Time seemed to slow down as Shepard's mind took in all the information. The sniper was approximately 200 meters away covered by two trees. At this range, coupled with his injuries, Shepard knew he couldn't hit the sniper, but the sniper had the perfect shot and Shepard knew it.
Before the sniper could pull the trigger fast enough, a bullet hit his left eye cracking open his skull as he collapsed to the ground.
Shepard looked behind him to see Jacob sitting and holding a smoking sniper rifle. Time seemed to revert itself back to normal as Jacob fired a few more shots in rapid succession. Shepard immediately ran over to him and gave him a hand up.
"Can you walk?" he asked him.
"I don't think so. The sniper shot my knee." Shepard looked down and saw blood was pouring from a gaping hole in Jacob's knee.
"Grunt…" Shepard began, but was quickly cut off by Grunt.
"I know." Grunt attempted to stall the enemy as Shepard dragged Jacob through the jungle. He saw a ditch only a dozen meters in front. Both men tried to quickly get to it as possible as the excess number of trees seemed to thin out and that was the only remaining cover in the area. Explosions started to detonate across the exposed field as enemy mortars zeroed in on their location. Shepard was only a few meters from the ditch when he suddenly felt a massive force hit him from behind that sent him flying face first into the ditch.
When he sat up he saw that the massive force that had shoved him was none other than Grunt, who had sustain dents to his armor and few wounds on his forearms. His face was blackened from the smoke of dozens of missiles that were used on him.
Three earthshaking blasts vibrated through the ground and Shepard heard the clanking of armored boots followed by the tracks of Ogre tanks.
"Shepard we have contacts! A shit load of infantry!" Jacob shouted, his sniper rifle firing at the closing infantry. "Confirming at least five tanks….Jesus, how many are there?" Jacob breathed. He ducked back into cover as a shell from the tanks impacted the ground in front of them, reducing the grassy plain into a dirt crater.
Shepard looked up and scanned the area to see the batarians were setting up gun emplacements and their infantry were advancing alongside tanks. He instinctively ducked his head slightly as a few shots flew over his head. Things didn't seem to be going very well for his team.
"Shepard this is a fight worth dying for!" Grunt excitedly shouted as he pulled a frag grenade from his belt and threw it as far as he could over the ditch. There was a deafening bang followed by cried of agony. He then managed to take out two more additional tanks. The loss of heavy firepower did halt their advance momentarily, though not for long as the last two batarian tanks suppressed them while the infantry advanced.
"These guys aren't going to give up." Jacob said. Using his biotics he lifted two batarians and Shepard was able to take them out.
"Son of a bitch," Shepard hissed as a round hit his shoulder. Still being able to fire his weapon, he popped up from behind cover and sprayed shots the advancing batarians. Grunt stood at the same time and, using his fortification to boost his shields, was able to fire two blasts from his weapon. Between the two of them, they were actually able to bring down both remaining tanks and a squad who attempted to rush Shepard's position. However, within seconds a tide of bullets forced them to take cover again.
"Shepard, if you have any clever last second ideas, now would be a good time!" Jacob shouted. "Fuck!" he swore as he was shot in the dead center of his right hand, leaving a blood leaking, and gaping hole. Jacob merely got out a clean rag and wrapped it around his wound and immediately returned to firing at the batarians.
"I'm thinking!" Shepard snapped, attempting to rise up and fire again, only to have a burst of bullets keep him down. He had ordered that Ramirez to ensure the safety of the general and return to base. He was beginning to sorely regret that decision. He looked at his team mates and saw that Jacob's lower half of his ear was torn off and even with his injured hand his determination to hold out as long as possible didn't wane. Grunt on the other hand, firing his heavy machine gun and cutting down dozen of enemies at a time, let out a vicious roar that froze the enemy's heart with fear. He had additional wounds to his face and forearms, but with his heavy armor he wasn't need of immediate medical support like Jacob and him. Getting from his position, Shepard aimed his weapon at the nearest batarain, and in unison the trio fired everything they had left cutting down any batarian foolish enough to step out of cover. For a second the tide seemed to turn.
Then things got worse.
So focused was Shepard that he wasn't aware that the Batarians were throwing in a special set of troopers.
"GET DOWN!" Grunt hollered over the deafening noise of gunfire. Jacob and Shepard followed his command and not a moment too soon as the ground in front of them was overwhelmed by an inferno. Everything was burnt to ash.
'They have a flamethrower.' Shepard thought, now realizing what provoked Grunt to take cover. The idea of dying the most painful way possible unnerved Shepard slightly. Dying at the hands of a bullet didn't bother him as the pain would be minimal at its worst, however being burned alive sent a shiver down Shepard's spine. He didn't have to be a mind reader to realize that Jacob and Grunt thought the same way as him.
"If you have a flash bang grenade use them!" Shepard ordered. He and Jacob took their combined total of three grenades and tossed them over the ditch. As soon as the sound of the flash bang detonating and the blinding batarians cries was heard, Shepard's team popped out of cover and fired at the exposed pryo troopers. Grunt using his last frag grenade tossed it into the dead center of pryo troopers. The grenade's explosion acted as a catalyst as all the pryo troopers' fuel tanks exploded burning them and anyone near alive. Their cries of agony filled the air and for a moment everything seemed to revert to silence. However, a stream of bullets caused Shepard's team to get back into cover. Now with the odds more even, Shepard's team managed to suppress the enemy and the open field between the two groups became no man's land as death showered the field with bullets flying back and forth like a hail storm.
It was then that the sound of a mantis gunship's rotors was heard and a few seconds later it appeared overhead, with its gun pointing at Shepard's team. "Hug the wall!" Shepard ordered. As his team did so, a shower of bullets impacted any exposed land. Shepard heard, Grunt cry in agony and saw that the top half of his left foot was completely shot off. At this point, Shepard was beginning to panic, when the sounds of missiles flying through the air was heard followed by a deafening explosion.
Shepard and his team looked up to see that a blue jay had arrived and it was a sight for sore eyes. The shuttle opened fire on the batarian line and within seconds a dozen batarians had collapsed to the ground, numerous bullet holes covering their bodies. Before the Batarians could recover from the surprise, Shepard and his team began firing back and coupled with the blue jay over head, were completely devastating the batarians. The ground soon became littered with their corpses as a stream of yellow poured onto the ground like a river.
After a few seconds of heavy fire, the batarians completely abandoned their positions, running as fast as they possibly could away from the Cerberus shuttle. Shepard's team fired a last volley after the retreating batarians, which managed to bring down a few more of them.
Once the area was secured, the Blue Jay landed and the doors opened to reveal everyone's favorite turian, Garrus Vakarian.
"Shepard, I believe I just saved your ass." He remarked with his usual teasing tone.
Shepard was extremely relieved to see his friend, and assisting Jacob, they limped over to the shuttle's opened doors. "Well I guess that's one point for then. Now you still have ninety-one more saves to go before you catch up to me, Garrus." He coyly replied.
Garrus let out a fake mocked snort as he helped Shepard carry Jacob towards the shuttle. Seeing his friend's wounds, he remarked "Spirits, Shepard. You look like hammered shit."
Shepard let out a laugh. "War will do that to you."
Once they were all strapped in, much to Jacob's hesitation, the Blue Jay lifted into the air. From there Shepard was able to get a airborne view of the city. The city of Superiority was at peace now. Although 'peace' didn't really seem like the right word choice. The batarians had been evicted, but the entire city was in ruins. Shepard could see the damage as the shuttle raised higher into the air. Shepard's mission was done here, but the Cerberus troops stationed here would continue fighting until the entire moon fell under their control. It was likely that with the information now obtained, collateral damage would no longer be a concern for Cerberus. Shepard let out a breath as the shuttle returned to the Normandy.
Cerberus Headquarters
Undisclosed Location
The Illusive Man sat at his desk, reflecting over the debriefing that Miranda had sent him. The report was harrowing, and the injuries that the team had sustained would take some time to heal. Thankfully, the Illusive man did not have any assignments critical for the war effort at this time. He imagined that the Alliance was now in session discussing its war strategy.
The Illusive Man eyed his terminal as a new message popped up. It was marked top priority and required the highest level of clearance to access it. The Illusive man brought the message up and noticed that it was a message.
It read:
To: Redacted
From: U
As per your request, I've obtained information regarding the council races and analysis of their military capabilities and strategies on how to effectively fight them should they declare war upon us.
Asari
The asari military is a mishmash of city-state sponsored elite units by the republics, from their militia groups to their fairly professional navy. Despite the large population asari, few of them enlist for military service, though much larger than human forces. All asari are capable of biotics, therefore presenting a very clear threat.
Interestingly, with the exception of certain prestigious command positions, the asari military is fairly free of social maneuvering and manipulations of the rest of asari society. This is probably due to the freewheeling, often shifting nature of military deployments, which makes social bonding difficult. The capability of asari leadership is based on merit, therefore their senior ranks are the most dangerous threat and their removal from the battlefield should be top priority.
Ground Combat
Asari do not practice attritional or asymmetric warfare concepts within their ground troops. With only a few wars in their history, their ground units focus on scouting, infiltration, and use of small elite tactical forces to decapitate enemy leadership and make use of biotic assisted static defense. Given the overwhelming power of the asari navy, this is hardly a surprise as they have never faced planetary invasion or large-scale wars since the krogan rebellions.
Asari ground combat follows the idea of guerilla warfare, using small groups to harass and defeat a numerical superior force. They have zero confidence in the ability of large numbers as they rely more on stealth than raw firepower. Their military formations are designed to tie up and occupy and enemy force, whether it'd be pirate assault, invasion, or even simple mercenary fights.
Split into three ranks, the front rank, under the cover of the rear guard, fight defensively pinning enemies down with biotics and automatic fire whenever possible.
The middle ranks provide defensive barriers and warp attacks in order to halt the enemy advance. Huntresses and commandos strike swiftly, sowing chaos and confusing within the enemy ranks, forcing enemies to adjust to the multiple lines of attack. Flanking the enemy forces, causes their reserves to become committed in the fight, exhausting their forces.
Once the enemy is demoralized, the senior ranks of the asari military spring into action. Prior to this point, they hurl powerful biotic attacks towards the enemy ground forces. Once the enemy has committed their reserves, the elite ranks charge, using biotic charge to close the distance, and destroy enemy command structure. They utilize biotic explosions and sniper fire to cover their retreat.
Once the enemy central command is down, the asari military will use pressure tactics to encourage to encourage routs and retreats, while flanking commandos will rush ahead to set traps and further disrupt enemy fallback.
Their air force and armored core will assault isolated pockets of resistance in order to divert the enemy forces from the frontlines or risk a gap in their force. However, their gunships and tanks do not stay in one place for long as they engage one group, reducing their combat effectiveness before breaking off and engaging another group. This is to ensure that enemy commanders either spread out, making it easier to target them, or group together reducing mobility and buying time for the asari forces.
Navy
The asari navy is unmatched in Citadel space in terms of flexibility, efficiency, and armor. They are the only race, aside from humanity, to ever produce a ship larger than 3 kilometers long.
Asari ships have vastly more effective mass effect cores than any other race, and have seen some improvement due to the aid of prothean engineers. The asari 'Cascade cores' use shifting multiphase mass effect fields, balanced by a team of specialist biotic engineers, to allow faster mass shifting and some sort of short-range FLT jump. These cores allow asari ships to effortlessly dodge most long-range kinetic shots and even some torpedoes.
The Asari navy also possesses some of the strongest ship armor in existence, along with humans. Silaris armor is incredibly resistant to both laser fire and kinetic shots, requiring numerous shots to break through it. Such armor equipped onto a Destiny-class super dreadnought allows it to stand toe to toe with an Alliance battleship, though they latter still having the advantage in firepower. While the techniques behind making the armor are public knowledge, the expense is massive. Only the asari economy, which controls 57% of the galactic market, is able to manage the expense in manufacturing such armor.
The flexibility of the asari navy is due to the governing style of the Asari Republics. There is no bickering between the defense departments and the governments, which allows the navy to quickly gain any asset it requires. However, unlike the Alliance or the Hierarchy, most revenue gained by the asari goes not the military, but to infrastructure, research and development, and development of new colonies.
The asari fleet, as with other races with the exception humans, is built around the power of their dreadnoughts, supported by heavy cruisers and destroyers and light frigates. Much like their ground deployments, asari naval doctrine relies on frigates acting as forward scouts and rapid deployment of strike forces rather than deployment from bases.
In battle, asari frigates and destroyers harass the enemy and keep them occupied while their dreadnoughts and cruisers line up their shots. Asari do not prefer to engage fully in the fight like the turians, but rather use overwhelming numbers of extremely accurate long range bombardments by frigates, softening the enemy fleet. Their superior heat dissipation and armor allow them to engage longer in battle than other races. Once the enemy fleet is damaged, they go in for the kill.
However asari ships are not built for endurance in space, in turian and human standards. The elegant design of their vessels means they sacrifice aerodynamics for cosmetics. Most patrols last less than two weeks, leaving gaps in their defenses. They also lack the experience to repel boarding parties and their ships lack the science and research labs in human ships and the intelligence components in salarian vessels. Despite these flaws, asari ships are solid with good damage control and full medical facilities. They also have strong survival and evacuation protocols on all their ships.
Strategy
A large scale simultaneous blitzkrieg attack on multiple asari colonies would work best. Their light defenses would be easily smashed and in shock and awe would leave the enemy momentarily stunned. Depending our goal in the war, we can either bombard their planets or hold them hostage to force a truce. The asari will use the economy to hamper us and chances are to reduce losses they will accept and hit us when they have the advantage, therefore complete capture of several of their colonies would be more ideal.
For naval combat, it would be ideal to engage the asari navy at close range where our ships can still do massive damage while leaving small maneuvering room for the asari ships. Heavy use of corvettes, frigates, and carriers are required to obtain orbital supremacy. The sheer number of bombers and frigates harassing their dreadnoughts will force the asari frigates and destroyers to break off and engage the (redacted) vessels. Our cruisers can protect our carriers while the destroyers engage the asari cruisers and frigates. Their efficiency and armor will be a challenge, however for larger vessels, boarding and capturing dreadnoughts and heavy cruisers are recommended.
Once orbital supremacy has been established, total annihilation of the asari economy is required to ensure they are no longer a threat. Heavy use of drones, artillery, mechs, and aerial bombardment will weaken and demoralized the asari population. Cyber attacks on their large companies and/or insertion of elite strike teams should be deployed in order to gain valuable technological knowledge and wipe the asari of their advantage. In order to distract the asari elite units, large numbers of troops, tanks, and gunships should be used to distract them. Civilians taken hostage will allow us to use a bargaining chip, their safety for the surrender of the asari military. The asari lack of commitment to deploy their elite units to the frontline will give us a bonues as such individuals, while extremely experience and dangerous, lack numerical superiority. While we can replace our losses, they cannot so complete destruction of the top asari diplomats, scientists, military leaders and soldiers, teachers, historians, and economists must be achieved. The long life span of the asari ensures long-time resentment towards (redacted) so we must ensure they cannot regain superiority.
Salarians
The salarian military mind is similar to that of an exterminator. They go about with such precision and efficiency to ensure they do not have to repeat the same task twice. The Salarian military and intelligence, primarily the STG, are too twined together that they cannot be separated. They believe that the idea of declaring war is both naïve and stupid. They only engage in combat once the target has been identified, scouted for weaknesses, scanned for alternative approaches, and indirect sabotage has already been performed.
The powerful reflexes and high reaction times allow the salarians to outperform all other races in everything, but strength and durability. Therefore their military focuses on three main areas, precision targeting, forward recon, and preemptive strikes.
The Salarian Union's military doctrine is based on a strategy of defense, but is operationally offensive by pre-empting enemy threats and securing a quick decisive victory. The Salarian Union maintains a heightened state of readiness, advanced early systems, and a robust military intelligence capability to ensure attackers are defeated even before the fighting begins
Ground Combat
The salarian ground forces are typified by four traits- extremely tough defenses, accurate weapons, rapid medical support and heavy use of drones. They are similar to a stiletto, small and utterly not much of a threat, but when used and applied correctly can it bring down the mightiest of forces.
All salarian military units are designed for one task. While this inflexibility is a liability, when used correctly they are indeed a deadly force. The salarian military fights offensively, yet reactively. They plan every attack after intense scouting and intelligence gathering, and will craft down elaborate strategies that minimize their losses while guaranteeing the maximum damage to their enemies.
Salarains specialize in cyber attacks and sabotage, making the enemy forces be on guard constantly. Entire salarian units are able to automatically react to flanking or other situations in unison. This is what makes salarians extremely dangerous even in small groups.
Salarian ground forces are extremely mobile, eschewing fixed defenses. While worthless in a 'stand up' fight whether it be offensive or defensive in nature, they are unmatched in strike assaults, sabotage, and mobility.
Navy
The salarian navy revolves around three main areas- heat endurance, range, and damage control. If a fight deviates from the plan, the salarians carefully manipulate events and accurately predict the reaction of the enemy commander in order to achieve victory. (Note: In fact they are able to plan for almost every little detail in a battle, that it is likely that they are aware of us planning effective strategies to defeat them and are counter-strategizing their own forces.)
Salarian technology, with the exception of armor, mass drives, and weapons, is well advanced beyond other races (again this excludes humanity as they do not use eezo). They use x-ray lasers and particle beams in their GARDIAN systems, which are linked into a pseudo-neural net of reactive VIs, and possibly a few AIs, optoelectronic sensors, and cybernetic links to salarian gunners. They've managed to create particle beam artillery, stealth tanks, and rumor has it they are constructing a prototype laser rifle, though it has been unconfirmed at this time.
Salarian focus on heat endurance is unrivaled. Unlike other races, salarian heat sinks are multiphase ceramic liquids that go through energy phase shifts when properly energized. This consumes a great deal of heat energy and excess heat is vented through an array of radial vents, cleverly hidden in the 'wings' of salarians ships. (Note: In order to take this advantage away from them, the use of precise bombers and fighters are recommended to target this area on salarian ships.) They also maintain droplet heat sinks as a backup. They've even managed to reverse engineer a more primitive stealth drive that reduces a ship's heat signatures.
The salarian concentration on range and speed is common knowledge, as salarians have the fastest ships. While the asari cores are superior in efficiency, salarian cores are superior in range, allowing a ship to perform at least two or three light years beyond that of other drives, with the exception of the humans. In-system thrusters in precise manners are also superior, giving their ships powerful maneuvering and speed.
In battle salarian ships pair up multiple assault frigates with their fierce destroyers into hunting packs, with scout corvettes doing reconnaissance. Once the target is sighted, the scouts lock up targeting, while frigates and destroyers dive in. With the enemy fleet engage with lighter units sometimes even light cruisers, heavy cruisers and dreadnoughts begin sniping from the sidelines.
This forces the enemy fleet to break open their battle formations to deal with heavy ships, annoyingly the heavy ships will retreat back continuously fighting weakening the enemy fleet further. At this point, the destroyer/frigate attacks will tear the guts of the fleet, while light cruisers fire on advancing ships, acting like some sort of wall. When the enemy fleet is weakened enough, the salarians deploy their dreadnoughts to destroy any remaining resistance.
Salarian ships are sculpted in long elegant lines that come to a broad crown in the front and spreading wings in the rear. This design enables them to perform quick strikes and direct assaults at the cost of lack of efficiency in heavy battle.
Damage control equipment and medical treatment facilities are built into every single ship. They make heavy use of VI automation and mechs to cut down on the requirement of salarians to crew the ships. They are not built to repeal boarding actions as they rely on security stations to prevent this.
Salarians build their ships to withstand very long patrols. Each vessel has a science lab with mainframe, sensors, and spectroscopes. They also feature intelligence labs, with compilations of intelligence related to their mission and secure data communications with the STG, which at this point we still haven't been able to crack it.
Strategy
After much extensive analysis, there is no effective strategy to deal with the salarians as war between them and us results in a pyrrhic victory at best and mutual destruction at worst. Blitzkrieg will not work as the amassing of large number of troops will heighten their awareness and begin preparations for a counter attack. Use of drones and cyber attacks will be ineffective as the salarian are unrivaled in this area. If the salarians are pressed into a corner they will use biological weapons, similar to that of the genophage and the krogans, and we will respond with the use of nuclear weapons. Both societies will be wiped out. While our colonies not located near a mass relay are safe from such attacks, we can expect to lose a total of 37% of our population in the first year of combat alone. The salarian defensive counter measures are extremely tough and their mines guarantee that our ships suffer numerous losses. Likewise our defensive counter measures would obliterate the salarian fleet. In essence neither side posses enough firepower to defeat the other.
Turians
The entire race is basically an army. Because of this every member of the species over the age of 15 has some form of military experience. Their weapons are more of a third limb than anything else. The army is so huge, that it is larger than the asari, salarian, human, and batarian ground forces combined; numbering at 1.12 trillion soldiers, excluding reserves. They focus on flexibility as even the smallest unit can call in for air support. Their biotics are grouped together, making them easier to find and harder to kill.
The fact that the turian army outnumber entire populations and that they practice total warfare, it's no wonder why the threat of turian intervention keeps races in check. Unlike other races, the turians are willing to fight anyone to the last man, to the last rifle, to the last bullet.
Turians focus on three things, overwhelming firepower, strict unit discipline and effective combinations of forces. As of right now the cleverest turian general would be Adrien Victus as that bastard hasn't lost a single battle. Though his 'recklessness' has caused his career to stagnate a bit, I have a feeling that he doesn't care.
Ground combat
The current combat doctrine of the turian army is based on the effective combined utilization of holding formations and strike formations with combined-arms warfare. In the case of an attack, the holding formations would contain the enemy and strike formations would counter-attack to neutralize enemy forces. In the case of an attack, the holding formations would pin enemy forces down whilst the strike formations attack at a point of the turians choosing. The fact that they also bring in heavy firepower and usually outnumber the opposition doesn't hurt either. They sacrifice tactical flexibility and innovation for strategic and operational flexibility and adaptability.
Turian basic ground combat is based on a combination of arms. Every turian ground force is about 35/35/30 split of infantry, combat armor, and air support. This means that while they have zero advantages, they also have zero weaknesses.
The turians posses' three unit types: assault, defense, and open. An assault unit is meant to break strong defensive enemy lines. Defense units do the exact opposite; they are placed in strategic locations and are meant to defend ground, which they will do to their last breathe. Open units are the most flexible, as they are when fighting in the field, or when clearing urban areas and/or stations. The breakdown of not only the numbers, but kinds of vehicles, infantry, and air support varies based on these roles. For example, defensive units have more lighter vehicles and aircraft, heavier infantry, while open units have almost all light infantry and heavy aircraft and artillery support. The only liability to their combat doctrine is that they are unable to innovate, for example if outnumbered and outgunned the Turian army will sacrifice entire units to stall the attackers while the retreating forces lay traps to cover their escape. Humans, on the other hand would create weapons from whatever resources they have in the field, such as nail bombs, Molotov cocktails, and even use noises just to annoy and frustrate the enemy. This causes the enemy forces to advance slower and more cautiously, covering less ground and their focuses is drained away from the battle due to the human's distractions.
Navy
The turians have a big gun fixation, as seen by their Giant Mass Accelerator Cannons (GMAC). They have the largest industrial sector, problem is they don't know how to use it to create other things that aren't meant to kill or hurt someone. The turians have the largest military fleet in the galaxy and have the largest amount of dreadnoughts, right now I believe is sixty in total with seven carriers. 65% of the turian naval fleet can be classed as a heavy cruiser or heavier, while they lack scouting abilities I'd doubt that'll be necessary with their firepower.
Their maneuvering is adequate, while their sensors are above average. Their damage control and supply capacities are extremely impressive. While their medical department is improving to stellar levels, research and scientific labs are nonexistent.
Contrary to popular belief, the turians have the best and strongest logistics division than any other race, probably because the military needs it to succeed. This allows them to engage excellent in all levels of combat ranging from small to large. With the Volus managing their economy, the turian war machine is nearly invincible. The only real threats they have are the (redacted) and the geth, both of which are machines. Despite not seeing large scale action, the experience the turians have gain never goes away as they literally re-act every battle and would create new ones at SCHOOL! I kid you not, I ask a turian seven year old what he did in summer camp, and do you know what he said? He said, he learned to FIRE A SNIPER RIFLE! WTF?
Turian ships are built with a blend of aerodynamics and cosmetics. They have on long center hull, with two wings on either side swept back that clearly mark them as a warship. Even their merchant ships are simple heavy frigates and destroyers or light cruisers with attached cargo-pods, and their freighters are mostly a pair of cruiser hulls cut in half and slapped to either side of a large cargo-pod system.
While they don't have backups or secondary fallback systems, their power management levels are superb. Their weapons hit harder and their shielding is tougher than almost any other ship class equal size in another race's navy.
All turian ships have a gym, hand-to-hand combat ring, firing ranges, and a big lounge area. Since all turians are practically soldiers, they rely on Volus, and while they used to rely on the salarians and the asari they are slowly being phased out by humans. I guess they're smarter than to trust the asari and salarians on their ships. Good thing to since they've created the (redacted).
Turians go very heavy on forward and broadside firepower, with one class focused on it. They have the most extensive GARDIAN arrays, and their ECMs used to be pretty pathetic, the new (redacted) Alliance VIs being exclusively sold to them has drastically improved it. In fact it would take either a dozen VIs or a single AI to crack through. The human and turian military are so twined together that I'd think they'd be married if they could, which is probably why the salarians and the asari have stepped up their espionage efforts on both of us.
Strategy
After countless analysis and scenarios, the results have come out the same. We lose, every single time! The turians, while lacking in some areas, are so strong on things like firepower, logistics, and numbers that any weaknesses we can employ are useless. An attack on the turians would just unite every single one of them. However there is one good thing, because of the extremely good relations and the fact that we are a deterrent to (redacted) they'll most likely attack (redacted) or (redacted), plus our shared hatred of the (redacted) gives something to unite us.
Humans
I cannot slip into Alliance space; therefore I recommend all espionage efforts against them.
When the Illusive man finished reading the last sentence, he almost chuckled. He knew that was meant for any wandering eyes that weren't his. While he was smarter than to fully trust the turians, he knew that their honor and good relations with humanity guaranteed a mutual alliance that even he wasn't willing to jeopardize. Despite that it was best to still be careful and be ready for anything. He then had his personal AI, Charon actively guard it.
He was about to retire for the night when suddenly the doors opened to reveal a somewhat tired and exhausted Cerberus communication specialist. This was the Illusive man's personal communications officer and had proved his loyalty to the organization time an time again with no hesitation. It was this commitment that allowed the Illusive man to trust this specialist with even the most vital of information. Panting with breathe, he said "Sir…we have…confirmation….of Commander…Iselk being in the city of Superiority." He finished, gaining his breathe.
The information caused the Illusive man to be absolutely stunned, something that was never heard of. Turing to face the dying star in front of his station, he quietly said "This…changes everything."
"Should we inform Captain Shepard?" the Cerberus specialist asked.
"No. The Collectors are top priority." The head of Cerberus replied. "That'll be all."
"Aye, sir." The Cerberus specialist said as he exited the room.
'So Ilek, you've managed to find your way of Shanxi. Question is what are your motives now?' The Illusive man pondered as he thought over the implications the survival of that batarian has now caused.
Uncharted Space
Collector Ship
The creature known as Mortem entered the command deck, where he received a transmission from three unknown figures. Their holograms appeared on screen, but were blackened and were using voice disguisers to avoid being identified.
"Ah, Mortem so kind of you to join us." One of the black figures said with extreme sarcasm.
Mortem growled in response. "Hold your tongue primitive! Your kind hasn't even developed space flight, so do not talk down to me!"
"That may be true, however you still require my agents to assist you on your mission. Otherwise I wouldn't be here."
Mortem was not happy having to deal with primitives. Such acts, he believed were underneath him. However, he didn't dare question the Collector General's orders.
"I assume the one they call Shepard has been dealt with?" One of the other figures said, this time with a slight feminine voice.
Both Mortem and one other figure remained silent. Before Mortem could respond, the other figure beat him to it. "No. Shepard escaped my men, however he was severely injured in the process. The good news is that is time we now have time without risking interference from that pathetic human."
"Well then, I guess we can carry on the next phase of our operation. Mortem, has the gas been developed yet?" the feminine figure asked.
Mortem shook his head. "No. My scientists state that it'll be ready for disbursement in three weeks. Has our target been chosen?"
"Yes. After a brief update by my agents, we believe Omega will be the ideal testing ground. Once the gas is released, your men will attempt to take the asteroid." the large figure said, the same one who had insulted Mortem earlier.
"Then that settles it. Gentleman I'll see you once the next phase of the plan has been complete." The feminine figure said. All users holograms disappeared, leaving Mortem to decide what to do in the mean time.
"Pilot, take us to Hegemony space." he ordered.
His response was only a vibrating sound, which indicated affirmative. Aside from the General, Mortem was the only other Collector able to speak. As his ship approached the mass relay, he had a sudden thought to attempt indoctrination of his kind. He smiled at the thought as his ship vanished in the electric current of the mass relay.
A/N: Yeah I know I left you guys with a shocking ending. What will be next?