Act III: Hunted
Four: Sins of the Father
The shuttles run silent into the valley, depositing their deadly cargo a click from the three-gabled house. They are twenty. Turians, Salarians, Humans. They quietly traverse the distance to the house – one group moving across the north shore of the lake, the other through the base of the valley.
They will take no chances this time, not after so many failed attempts to catch their prey. One spots the craft that had escaped Alingon two days ago. They scan it for vital signs, confirm that no one is hiding in it. They will deal with the craft later once their quarries are dead and the last loose ends tied up.
Two in the northern group break off several hundred metres from the house, going low to the ground and retrieving their sniper rifles. They can see flickering lights through the windows, though they cannot discern the shapes of any figures moving behind the glass. No matter – they know this is the place. The southern group detects heat signatures near the Plain Dealer – less than a day old.
"Snipers in position. Group 2 move towards the wall."
"Copy that, moving to position."
They have them cornered. All communication into the valley is being blocked. No one will save them this time.
Liara hazards a glance over the windowsill of the upper floor's southwest room. From her vantage point, she can see several of the Broker's men approaching from the south. They move slowly, clearly believing that they are undetected.
"Bau, how many?"
"Thermal scan is picking up around two dozen – several snipers in the grass further out."
"More shuttles after this?"
"I'd count on it," Tomasz's gruff voice comes in over the comms. "You two clearly merit quite the welcome party."
She ducks back below the window, checking her thermal clip and focusing until she can feel her heartrate begin to drop. She's faced worse odds before. But then again, Shepard was there.
She links her omnitool to the scanner, and waits until the soft wireframe glow begins to appear in her vision. She can see Tomasz just inside the house's main entrance, clad in now-ancient Alliance armour and his shotgun ready to intercept anyone who makes it to the door. Jondun is crouched along the west bay of windows on the main floor, waiting until they are close enough to go loud.
"How close are they to the charges?"
"Closest one in the group along the lake is maybe 50m from them. South group will be just opposite them when they hit the wall."
"Go loud?"
"Not yet," Tomasz responds. "We want them close enough that they're funneled to the south door."
One of the snipers in the northern group scans his scope across the western face of the house. He can see shadows in the upstairs windows, but no clear signs of activity inside. The lower windows have clearly been boarded up, restricting what he can see inside. No matter. Soon, the southern group will be within reach of the main entrance.
"Bloodhound here," the voice of their leader crackles over the comms. "Signs of our prey?"
"They're here. No confirmed sighting yet, but the ship is due south and we can see shadows along the walls."
"Kill anyone inside – except the Asari. I want the satisfaction of finishing Tazzik's job for him."
In the moment his focus shifts out of the scope, he spots something odd on the roof. A weathervane? An antenna? The house is certainly old enough for one. Putting his eye in the scope, he scans upward. For an instant, he makes out the profile of a mounted sniper rifle.
That is now pointing directly at him.
"Shit."
The first shot rings out. A single shout of panic, then another.
"Go loud!"
Liara hears the two assault rifles positioned in the bedrooms roar to life, which lay down a spray of covering fire as the mercs scramble for cover. She sees one sprint for the cover of the rock wall, only to trip one of the proximity charges laid in the grass. It throws up a column of fire; she can hear the merc's scream from here. She watches as another is felled by the sniper, then leans out into the window and snaps out a burst at another merc making their way to the wall.
"I have eyes on one tracking towards the door," she can feel Tomasz focus and track their run, then hears a shotgun blast from the floor below. "Dropped."
One floor down, Jondum shuffles across the base of the wall as the mercs return fire. He pauses to shoot through one of the slats in the wooden covers on the window, but doesn't wait to see whether he's killed another. As he rolls behind one of the old, stone pillars at the corner of the room, he hears one of the tripwires go, hears the blast of electricity as the arc grenade bursts at the base of the wall. The force of the blast throws a column of rock shards through the armour of the nearest merc, killing them near-instantly.
The northern group is the more exposed, and they go down quickly. The automated assault rifle takes out another, and he feels the hairs on his neck stand up as Liara throws a biotic warp at another, then finish them off with her sidearm. He smiles in grim satisfaction to himself. The trap is sprung.
The southern group are now fully in cover, their backs against the rock wall as their shields recharge and weapons are reloaded. The commander barks orders at his soldiers, laced with obscenities as the automated rifles above them graze perilously close to their bodies. The sniper manages to pick off another one as they regroup.
"For fuck's sake, get a charge in that window!"
One of the group's engineers briefly glances above cover, narrowly avoiding another shot from the turrets above. Locking onto the gun with his omnitool, he overloads its circuits, its covering fire ending in a shower of sparks.
Granted a moment of reprieve, three members of the southern group break from cover, leaping over the rock wall and sprinting for the main entryway. One of them activates a tripwire on the wall's north side, his shields fried by the blast of the arc grenade. He keeps going, though, and is barely ten feet from the door when a lone figure leans out from behind the doorway, catching the merc with a shotgun slug directly in the stomach. The other two return fire as the figure disappears, each of them running for the entrance. One crosses the threshold.
Tomasz watches the first merc enter the house, their midsection shredded by the shotgun rigged to go off at the sign of unidentified movement. To avoid loose ends, he empties another slug from his own weapon into the merc's body, a pool of blood forming at his feet. The second merc, a Turian, survives the shotgun blast, though their weapon isn't so lucky. Locking eyes with Tomasz, the merc charges him, wrapping their arms around his waist and throwing them both to the ground.
Tomasz is quick to respond. It's been a long time since he was in a firefight, but the memories his body has for combat are not easily lost. He manages to catch the younger Turian in the shoulder with the butt of his shotgun, loosening their grip on his waist as they struggle on the floor. They punch and counterpunch for what seems like an eternity, until at last Tomasz is able to get a foot underneath his attacker, kicking upward and throwing the Turian off him. The merc gets to his feet, and spots Tomasz's shotgun cast off to the side. Tomasz notices too late, and knows he will not be able to reach it in time.
Mid-run, the Turian stumbles, crying out in pain and collapsing to the floor. Retrieving his weapon, Tomasz spots the knife's hilt lodged in the merc's back. He nods to Jondum across the room, who is busy scrambling to cover the main doorway.
"Killed another in the group by the lake. Go cover the western wall with Liara!"
Tomasz does as instructed, crouching behind one of the large central pillars and surveying the situation. Liara has thrown a biotic singularity into the heart of the northern group, lifting two of them bodily into the air and making them easy prey for Tomasz. Swivelling out from behind cover, he catches one squarely in the chest, and watches as Liara kills the second with her sidearm. He catches the reflection of light in the scope of the sniper lying in the tall grass, and is about to warn Liara when he hears the roof-mounted sniper ring out. All at once, the northern group is gone.
Things are not going according to plan.
There are only three of them left, another cut down by the Salarian now manning the southern doorway. Cursing their leader's belief that this group would be enough, the last sniper take aim at the gun on the roof, knocking out its mount and sending it tumbling to the ground. He takes his eye out of the scope in time to see one of his remaining squadmates cut to pieces by a proximity charge.
He adjusts his scope, scanning for targets. The Salarian steadfastly refuses to be drawn out of cover, only his weapon momentarily visible as he snaps out another burst in the sniper's direction. He knows the Asari is on the top floor, and a third – probably Human – in the western rooms of the main floor, but the walls of this ancient house are too thick to penetrate from his vantage point. He'll have to move.
Too late, he spots the Asari in the upper floor window. He sees her biotics flare, feels himself involuntarily pulled forwards and upwards, suspended in the air and desperately grasping for his rifle, which now seems barely, just barely, out of reach. He sees the Human appear in the southern bay of windows, shotgun in hand and pointed directly at him.
It is the last thing he ever sees.
Her biotics spent, Liara watches Jondum gun down the last merc in the southern field. She feels her vicelike grip on her sidearm loosen, her muscles slacken as her omnitool's count of unidentified signatures falls to zero.
"Not detecting any hostiles!"
"Neither am I."
They regroup downstairs, a moment of reprieve bought.
"How many guns are still functioning?"
"One – the assault rifle in the northwest room. How much medigel do we have left?"
"Nine."
"Eight," Tomasz replied, wincing as he activates one for a wound on his right shoulder. "Is the sniper rifle that was on the roof still functional?" Seeing Jondum's nod, he moves quickly to the entryway, locating the rifle in the yard and slinging it over his shoulder.
"That was a probe," Liara says simply. "He did the same thing on Intai'sei. There will be more."
"Agreed," Jondum replies. "Probably very soon. We must presume more heavily armed."
Tomasz rejoins them. "These walls are thick – old stone. They won't come down easily. Think they'll have anti-air capabilities?"
"Unsure. But we can't run. He found us here quickly – even when we had a headstart. Anywhere we run he will find us again. We either kill him now or he kills us."
Tomasz cocks his shotgun. "With your shield or on it, I suppose."
They hear the shuttles before they see them, the distinctive pulse of the thrusters echoing through the isolated valley. There are definitely two – possibly three. They have done away with the pretense of stealth, one of the shuttles flying low directly opposite them. From her vantage point against the west side of the house's main floor, Liara can see it slow to hover a hundred metres from them, its rear door opening to deposit yet more of the Broker's mercs.
"Scanners are picking up eight – no, nine – in that shuttle. Thermal signatures suggest at least some heavy weapons."
Liara hears the second shuttle touch down to their east, its engines coming to a full stop. Her omnitool is noting more and more thermal signatures; this group is easily as large as the first one.
An incoming message pings on her omnitool. It says unknown, but she knows who it is. So does Jondum, who waits until the pings end to play the message.
"You fight like young recruits, with nothing held back. Admirable, but mistaken. This place shall be your tomb."
From the upstairs bedroom, Jondum hears the telltale sound of a projectile grenade leaving its chamber, spots the flare from the launch with a moment to spare. He snaps out a burst from his Locust at the merc holding it, watches them fall to the ground, but feels rather than sees the grenade burst against the house's western wall. Shards of glass and wood splinter in all directions, throwing up a column of dirt in front of him. He draws his carbine, switching to its thermal scope and tracking more of them through the smoke. He catches one running for shattered windows, their body thrown backwards by the force of the slug. Still, he sees more out of the periphery of his vision. He knows he can't get to them in time.
"Liara, Tomasz, you're about to have company on the main floor!"
Liara hears the first one before she sees them, their booted feet thudding against the wall as they vault the windowsill. She hits them with a biotic warp, knocking them backwards and giving Tomasz time to strike them with the butt of his shotgun. As the merc falls to the floor, she empties her thermal clip into their head.
Three more come through the main doorway. One is felled by the rigged shotgun just inside the door, but the other two make it inside, one of them putting several rounds through the trap to permanently disable it. Tomasz sprays rounds at both, forcing them into cover and giving Liara time to retreat behind the northernmost pillar of the house's western wall. Another leaps through the shattered window, forcing Liara to return fire to draw them away from Tomasz. The numbers are rapidly turning against them now. She can see two more thermal signatures approaching on her omnitool's scanner, and she busies herself with the merc nearest her, using her biotics to throw them against the far wall with as much force as she can muster.
"Jondum, we need you down here!"
She receives no response, but watches as a flash of light bursts through the ceiling above her, a slug from Bau's carbine catching another merc in the chest. From his vantage point, Jondum tracks another through the floor on his scanner, firing a single slug in their direction as they duck into cover.
"I hope you know you're paying to fix that, Spectre!"
"Gladly! We need to live through the night first!"
Liara hears two more grenades fire, feels the walls rattle as they strike the house. Shattered by grenades, bullets, and the slow wear of time, the ceiling above her begins to collapse. Scavenging as many thermal clips as she can from the bodies near her, she sprints across the rear of the house to its east wing. She can hear shots from Tomasz's shotgun across the house, and she hopes that he made it out too as the western half of the upper floor fully caves in.
Jondum realizes too late what is happening, feels the floor give way beneath him as he falls to the main floor. He lands awkwardly in a flurry of splintering wooden boards, the wind knocked out of him as he hits the ground hard. For a moment, he can see stars above him, his ears still ringing from the blast of the grenade that he narrowly avoided. He's lost all sensation in his limbs, save for the cold steel of his carbine in his right hand.
He feels a strong hand grasp his left and pull him from the rubble. Pulled back to reality, he is vaguely aware of Tomasz pulling him forward as his vision returns. Tomasz is bleeding from his shoulder, though whether from a gunshot or debris is unclear.
"Come on, Salarian. It's not your time to die yet."
He feels himself hauled towards the east side of the house. He spots Liara across the room, locked in biotic combat with one of the mercs, the shockwaves of their blows throwing books, thermal clips, and anything that isn't tied down across the room. Gripping his carbine, Jondum focuses on a merc coming into view on the opposite end of the room, willing himself to shake off the cacophony of the fall. He exhales, inhales, exhales, inhales, concentrating on his breathing as his vision sharpens, tracking the merc as they advance. At last, Liara connects with the biotic merc's chest, sending them sprawling and causing the other to divert their path towards the Asari. Jondum seizes the opportunity, firing a shot clean into the merc's head.
"They have us pinned down!" Liara shouts above the roar of gunfire. "We need to stay in the same room or they'll pick us off one at a time!"
Tomasz nods in concurrence. "The east wall is the firmest in the house – no doors and no windows. If we stay here they have to come inside to get to us."
"How many medigels left?"
"Now down to six," Tomasz notes, applying one of their remaining ones to Jondum. "But lots of thermal clips. Make them count."
They stand their ground, letting the mercs come to them. It's easier to communicate in a single room, spotting for one another and darting in and out of what little cover remains. Liara finds that she and Jondum work increasingly well together in a firefight, and Tomasz slots in almost effortlessly, father and son clearly sharing many instincts. The onslaught is heavy, and they burn through their remaining medigel rapidly; within minutes they are down to only three, even as the floor is increasingly strewn with bodies and blood. Still the mercs keep coming. Liara can feel herself tiring, and throws what she suspects is the last biotic singularity she can muster. Four mercs dangle in front of them, suspended in the air seemingly by sheer force of will. Tomasz and Jondum finish them off rapidly and then, suddenly, the cacophony of gunfire turns to silence.
Tomasz is bleeding – badly. Liara hands him her last medigel, and she can see relief wash over his face at it closes the wound. To her left, Jondum's breathing is rattled, his armour streaked in blood and blast marks. She feels exhausted to her bones – at most, she has a handful of biotic attacks left before she passes out.
"Impressive," Ramires's growl says through her omnitool. "Fights best when cornered like a rat in a trap."
"Fuck," Tomasz swears. "I was hoping we'd killed him along the way."
"Was always unlikely," Jondum observes, "he wants us for himself – a war trophy he can take back to the Broker. All of that was just to soften us up."
"Well mission fucking accomplished for him, then."
"I told you I would find you," Ramires says again. "I told you there was nowhere in the galaxy you could run that would be beyond the Broker's grasp – and mine. If you run, I will find you again. It is as inevitable as time."
Liara hears booted footsteps on the ground outside the house. The sound is coming from her left, circling the perimeter, stalking its prey. Suddenly, she is less sure of their odds. They are three and he is one, but there is something so methodical in the sound of his movement, so confident, that the sliver of doubt enters her mind.
She hears Ramires walk up the stairs of the main entrance, hears him stop at the threshold of the door. "You did all the things to this house that I would have," he observes. "Except one."
She doesn't hear the micro-EMP as much as feel it, her omnitool and sidearm suddenly useless in her hands. They are blind, their scanners gone. Not only blind, but deaf and dumb, the vital translation software's loss rendering Jondum, Liara, and Tomasz mutually unintelligible.
The figure of Ramires comes into view, a heavy pistol in his hand. Without guns or tech attacks, Liara has only one option. Gesturing to Jondum and Tomasz to get out of the way, she hurls a biotic warp at their assailant with all the force she can muster. It hits the back wall, passing through Ramires's figure as if it were air. Because it is.
A decoy.
Liara hears Jondum mutter a curse that she can no longer understand, hears Ramires's booted footsteps behind her and rolls out of the way at the last moment as his shotgun blast sails by the spot where she stood moments ago. She feels a second blast graze her arm, lodging fragments in her armour and skin at the elbow. Screaming in pain, she ducks into the best cover she can find, which isn't great, and watches as Jondum, out of options, charges the assassin directly. His swung fist catches Ramires in the midsection, but their hunter is quicker than his massive frame would suggest, catching Jondum's second blow in his own fist and kicking the Salarian back against the wall. He goes down hard, groaning and struggling to get back to his feet. Tomasz is next. Physically, he is a more even match for Ramires, and manages to pin him against the room's inner wall, bloodying the assassin's face. Liara takes full advantage, hitting Ramires with a biotic throw and pushing him further into the wall, sending centuries-old wood and granite splintering against the force of the impact.
Ramires is up in a flash, catching Tomasz squarely in the jaw and sending him staggering. Liara slumps against the far wall, hoping Jondum can get to his feet in time. Her ears are ringing, her exhaustion total after that last biotic attack. She has no idea how long the EMP will keep their systems down, but she has to hope it is soon.
Tomasz continues to fight on alone, the strength of years long past returning to him as he grapples with their would-be assassin. Ramires is younger, faster, stronger, but Tomasz has made him bleed for every inch of ground he's gained, their faces both covered in blood. He knows he cannot win this way; he could not have punched an assassin to death thirty years ago, let alone now. But he plays for time. He twists out of Ramires's grasp, spinning and throwing another punch and catching Liara's eye, hoping the Asari can muster something – anything – to aid him. He feels Ramires catch his fist, pin him back against the wall.
Jondum picks his moment well, leaping against Ramires as his attention is fixed on Tomasz. He goes for the legs, tripping Ramires and leaving him prone on the ground. Trapping him underneath the weight of his body, Jondum rains down blows, screaming to the heavens as he repeatedly strikes his opponent. But Ramires is much stronger than him, and manages to twist beneath his weight until he is on his back, at which point he punches Jondum squarely in the face. Reeling, the Salarian collapses to the floor.
Tomasz knows they are running out of time. His companions are exhausted and bloodied, and he can feel that he is not as young as he once was. He spots Ramires's shotgun on the floor, its owner having lost it in the last minutes' melee. Ramires spots it too, and they simultaneously lunge for the one working weapon in the room. He is closer, but before he knows it Ramires is on top of him. He can nearly reach it, if he can just manage to squirm his way a few more inches. He reaches out to grasp it, and feels a sharp pain radiate through his body as Ramires plunges the combat knife deep into his right hand, pinning him to the floor. His vision is hazing over, but he feels the knife withdrawn from his hand, only for the same pain to radiate from his back moments later as the knife is lodged there.
Liara watches Ramires withdraw the knife and retrieve his shotgun. She watches the assassin survey the room, noting Jondum slumped against the wall and Liara ducked behind cover. He keys something on his omnitool, and suddenly Liara can understand him again, their assailant translating for them.
"I want my voice to be the last thing any of you three hear, and I want you to know it." He takes a step towards Liara, who knows that she is next. "I want you to know that you were beaten, that your trap was sprung and you still died. The Broker's reach is without parallel in the galaxy. He demanded your deaths, and I have obliged him." He glances at Jondum, "I guess we were not both survivors." He turns back towards Liara. "And we will find Shepard too. Your Illusive Man is not as omnipotent as he believes. It may take months – even years – but your interference will be undone. I will remember you, Asari, and I will smile when I am the only one left to see Cerberus burnt to ashes, all of your meddling for naught." He points the shotgun at the table she is crouched behind, and she knows, deep down, that the end is here.
From the corner of her eye, she sees a spark of energy settle over Ramires, then a blur of light as Jondum hurls his omni-knife at Ramires. It strikes him on the right side of his chest next to his shoulder, lodging itself in the space between the two armour plates. He drops his weapon in surprise, roaring in pain as he works to remove the blade from his flesh.
Liara seizes the moment, calling forth every last bit of strength she can muster, and throws a biotic singularity at Ramires. It is not as strong as she had hoped, but it does his job, lifting him a handful of feet off the ground. It will not last for long. Tomasz seizes the moment too, grabbing the dropped shotgun from the floor next to him. Grimacing in agony as he rolls, he pumps every round the gun has left into Ramires's prone body, watching the assassin's eyes go wide with shock, then very still as his bloodied, broken body collapses to the ground.
All three of them lie there, too exhausted and wounded to do anything but stare at the ceiling. Liara's vision is swimming, her heart racing. She can feel her own blood flowing across her armour from the wound in her shoulder. The floor is covered in blood – hers, theirs, their enemies'. With Ramires dead, she can hear their electronics whirring back to life, including Jondum and Tomasz's shields.
Tomasz is the first to rise, slowly, crawling on the floor to Jondum. His movement is laboured, his breathing rattled as he continues to lose blood. "On your feet, Salarian."
Liara is only vaguely aware of their conversation, her focus gone as her body struggles in vain to deal with its myriad of wounds, the sheer exhaustion of one biotic attack too many.
"Vitals dropping. She's going into shock from exhaustion and blood loss."
"Where's the nearest hospital?"
"Too far," Tomasz says through a fit of coughing that brings up blood. "She'll be dead by the time we get there." He reaches into the back pocket of his old, battered armour, his movements fumbled with his mangled, bleeding hand. "Applying medigel," he turns to Liara, "this is going to hurt"
She feels the needle pierce her shoulder. The pain is unimaginable, and she lets out a pitched, keening rattle in response. She feels warmth as it enters her system, sealing the wound and staunching the bleeding. Her heart is still racing as the medigel floods her system, and she can feel bile in her throat as her heartrate continues to climb. With what little strength she can muster, she twists to face the floor, her torso heaving as she throws up.
"Not gonna do the job," Tomasz mutters. "She needs another one." He grabs her shoulder, flips her over onto her back. "This one is really going to hurt."
The second medigel needle stabs into her midsection, flooding her chest with repairing sedative. The agony is unbearable; this is the most physical pain she has ever experienced. She can feel her heart slowing, the urge to throw up again receding as the medigel does its work. She lies on the ground, her breathing heavy, but less and less frantic. The blurring of her vision begins to recede, the ringer in her ears stops.
She is alive. She will not die here – at least, not yet.
Tomasz collapses next to her, blood still flowing from his wounds. Grimmacing as she applies weight to her shoulder, Liara kneels over Tomasz, her gaze scanning his wounds.
"Medigel?"
"That was the last one," Tomasz says through coughing.
"No," Liara says simply, then increasingly frantically. "Nononono. Tomasz, Tomasz! We have to get you to a hospital."
He shakes his head. "I don't have enough time for that," he says simply. "It was my life or yours." His breathing is increasingly laboured, his eyes fixed on hers as his body desperately fights a losing battle against his wounds.
"Why?" Liara demands. "Why me? I brought this on you!"
"Listen to me!" Tomasz's voice is suddenly very firm. "You saved my son from those…things. If not for you, he would be lost forever. Do you believe there is a chance that he will live again?"
Liara nods.
"If he lives, John will need you," Tomasz says simply. "He will need your strength, your love. You have to live, or he will be lost." He coughs up more blood, "John is extraordinary, but he is not an island. He has never been."
She nods through tears. "I will be there for him when he wakes up."
"Good," Tomasz says simply. "And keep that Salarian close. He's the reason you're still alive."
His breathing begins to slow, and Liara can feel his life slipping away as she draws his body into her arms. "I'm so sorry, Tomasz."
"Don't be. I'm an old man. I've lived enough for both of us. Thank you for at least letting me die as I intended – breathing the air of my family's home. Just promise you will do one thing for me."
She nods, tears pooling in her eyes.
"When you see John again, tell him I'm proud of him. As proud as a father could possibly be of their son."
In Liara's arms, he stills, and breathes his last.