Prazza'Vael vas Neema nar Defranz wouldn't admit that he was scared. The nausea could be any number of reactions to the sudden atmosphere shift on the entry to Mindoir. He could've caught an infection in the clean room the day before they left the Neema. He wouldn't admit it was fear.
"Hana'Nur should've stayed with us," Prazza said. Uli'Rann vas Gorach stopped scanning the eastern horizon for a moment. He was twitchy and uncomfortable. his new envirosuit, gifted by his parents and the crew of the Neema, was colored a faded silver. He was still adjusting to the thousand little creases in it that jarred his skin. He wasn't scared.
"She's around," Uli'Ran vas Neema said with a shrug, "nice place, hey? All this open space." Prazza watched in horror as the other Migrant Fleet Marine, older than him by two decades, actually let his rifle hang by its shoulder strap to free up his hands. He stretched out both arms in either direction. "By the homeworld, it's good to be off the Gorach. How many worlds have the humans colonized now? I can't believe they need so many." His soft-blue envirosuit creaked as he did a few twists at the waist, humming as he took advantage of the arm room around him.
Prazza lifted the butte of his rifle to right shoulder and swung the short barrel across the road before them. The colonists hadn't paved it yet and the fresh rain had made the foot-recon a squishing slog through the mud.
"What?" Uli'Rann asked.
"Anything could be out here," Prazza hissed, "don't drop your guard!"
"Look at you all ready to retake the homeworld," Uli's vocal light flickered with a laugh, "Hana'Nur won't let anything get the drop on us."
"She's been gone too long," Prazza said, feeling his face go hot under his helmet, "we should report it." Uli shook his head.
"Captain Yun'Razi won't be happy if we bother her," he nodded back up the road, to the ruins of Mindoir's main colony, "you saw that admin building, right? The Hegemony is sending the humans a message, Prazza'Vael. One written in blood."
"Hegemony," Prazza spat, turning back to the road and hustling forward, "you were dozing during the drop, Uli. Pirates did this. The batarians don't want a war."
"Pirates on the order of the Hegemony," Uli said, "by the time we-hey, Prazza, where's the hull-breach? Slow down-anyway, like I was saying. We'll find the signs no doubt. The batarians are smarting over the Skyllian Verge. They feel cheated."
"They were," Prazza said, "the humans are part of the galaxy for all of five minutes and suddenly they trip over three garden-worlds." A sudden flare of anger set him glaring at the shoulder-high yellow grass swaying gently in the twilight. "And what do we have? Not even a decent asteroid to call our own."
"Ah," Uli waved his hand like he was wafting off a bad smell, "don't put that on the humans. They've done the least to us out of everybody. Mind that's only cuz they haven't gotten the chance yet but still…"
"What are the odds we even find more prefabs out this way," Prazza said, popping onto his toes to peer over the high grass, "damn batarians burned everything in admin. If we could've found a map or something at the main colony our job would be done."
"Eh," Uli yawned, his vocal light holding bright blue for a few seconds, "they made a road. Roads lead to things." Prazza's suit VI briefly informed him that the wind changed direction and was now blowing from the southwest.
"This is pointless," Prazza summoned his omni-tool and keyed into squad comms, "Hana'Nur vas Shepard, regroup with us on the road. We're turning back."
"What are you talking about?" Uli turned his head this way and that in confusion. "Why?"
"Because this is going to be some dead-end road and I'm sick of following it into nowhere," Prazza shot a look at the retreating sun. Mindoir's greater and smaller moon looked down on the quarians like pitiless eyes. "be dark soon anyway."
"Prazza," Uli's voice lilted with warning, "if there's anything out this way and we don't catch it you'll be working a garbage scow until the turn of the century. Don't be jumpy."
"Who's jumpy? There's nothing out here," Prazza snapped, "those prefabs were completely empty. The colony is gone."
"Now, now," Uli said, "they could have made it into the fields. Humans are tricky like that. Adaptable. How else do you think they fought off the turians? Someone might've survived and we can't exactly pop into their colony without trying to be helpful. No official contact with the Migrant Fleet." Uli's fingers played a thoughtful rhythm on the butte of his gun. For a second Prazza had faith that he'd gotten the hint to shut-up. "Say. I'm no admiral or anything but I think we could get the humans to help us find a new world. Been mulling it over a while."
Prazza turned, shaking his head a little in denial of the whole ridiculous conversation but Uli went on without a stutter.
"They're ambitious things. And they've got the guts and the guns to map the Verge. They'll be colonizing for years and exploring systems for longer. Good to have friends like that. And they would be our friends." Uli leaned over like he was telling a secret. "They have, what you might call, a cultural trope for refugees like us."
"I've done research," Uli tapped the temple of his visor, "been listening to some of their literature through the public domain sites on the extranet. They've started uploading the uh 'classics' I think is the word they like to use. Old stuff mostly. There's this thing called a Bible. A collection of texts from some of their younger religions. Humans have a lot of those. Probably couldn't learn them all in one lifetime. Easy to forget how diverse we quarians used to be before-"
"What theare you talking about?" Prazza broke in.
"Just filling the silence," Uli said, sounding a little hurt, "but I digress. So they have this thing called the Book of Exodus. It's all about this tribe of ancient humans who got driven out of their homeland and they wandered for centuries." He crossed his arms, shoulders straightening with pride. "Sounds familiar, no? And that's not even the most recent stuff. There's this book called 'The Hobbit', right? And this thing called a dragon kicks these other things called dwarfs out of their home. But they get it all back in the end by-"
"Captain Yun'Razi," Prazza activated his comm-link to the main unit, "we haven't found anything out here. Do we have permission to come back?" Uli stayed quiet for the long stretch it took for their commander to respond.
"Prazza'Vael," Yun's tone was clipped, "have you reached the end of the road?"
"No, we haven't," Uli said, Prazza waved for silence.
"With respect, Captain," Prazza spoke over his comrade, "there's nothing out here. No prefabs. No farming equipment. The fields are still wild native grass. There's nothing-"
"Roadway ends 1.5 kilometers from main colony," another woman's voice crackled on the comm channel, smooth and even, "small construction site. They were sinking a well. Probably getting ready to create another staging area for prefab construction."
"Salvage?" Yun asked, ignoring Prazza utterly.
"A few nice things for people with more space and less moral stability," Hana'Nur said, "nothing we can use though."
"I hate this place," Yun'Razi sounded exhausted. "No granger-units at all?"
"Yes," Hana'Nur said, "several. I'm keeping them all for myself to sell to my black-market friends on Omega." Uli chuckled. "No granger-units. Don't blow a seal over it, Yun, I said this place was going to be emptier than a vorcha brothel."
Prazza choked on his own outrage at the insubordinate words. Then he heard, to his increasing shock, Yun'Razi, One-Eyed Yun, Hardass Yun, actually giggle.
"That's a pleasant image, Hana'Nur!"
"Although the things people get up to out in the Terminus Systems…"
"Hana!" Another giggle. Prazza decided he was simply losing his mind. "Don't tease. Go back to Uli and the new boy and get back to the Gorach. I want your eyes on the salvage we've managed to find so far."
"Not yet, Captain," Hana'Nur said, "these batarians were definitely Hegemony; they hunted down every surveillance bug out here."
"Ah," Uli said, "see, Prazza? Little things tell the tale. Leave a message but don't leave evidence. Hegemony work for sure. Regular pirates wouldn't waste the time." Yun griped on the comm channel.
"Destroyed the granger-units too. Selfish bastards. Even torched the ones in storage. They were all crated up and everything. Pristine units right off the line. So close…"
"They'd never have traded them to us, Yun. Let a few of our people show off their skills on Pilgrimage to the other human colonies in the Verge and maybe two years from now we can beg a few gently used granger-units off them. Well, not the ones here obviously."
"The liveships need granger-units tomorrow not two years from now," Yun said, "alright, Hana, play detective. I know I can't stop you. If you find anything interesting contact me."
"Watch your back, Yun'Razi," Hana said.
"Captain," Prazza said, unable to keep quiet, "is it wise to hang around this long? The humans have to be on their way to investigate-"
"I don't remember asking for your input, Prazza'Vael vas Neema," Yun's voice was cold and unfriendly, "maintain radio-silence until Hana'Nur brings you back in."
"But she's not even team leader!" Prazza hissed after the comm line shut off. He turned on Uli. "Nothing to add, Uli'Rann? You just let Hana'Nur do what she pleases?"
"Prazza, drop it," Uli sounded nervous. Prazza strode into the older quarian's space, almost clinking their visors together.
"Are you scared of her? You are! She's not even a marine she's…is there even a rank? As far as anyone has told me she's some cast-off from the Tonbay that none of the Admirals want in their fleets. Do you know how hard I had to work to make this crappy detail?"
"Prazza, we all made sacrifices," Uli wouldn't even look him in the face as he protested but simply stared off into the fields, "but you shouldn't run your mouth-"
"Run my mouth! You heard her just now. Yun'Razi might be her friend but it doesn't mean I have to be," Prazza spat, "I'm getting a real assignment the second we get back to the fleet. Han'Gerrel is going to be Admiral of the Heavy Fleet by the time we get back. He won't sideline me to some acquisition grind just because the Civilian Fleet has an outsized voice on maneuvers."
Prazza glared at the slowly emerging stars as if he could find the lights of the Perseus Veil.
"We should be doing practice combat drops. Live-fire training. Anti-geth ordinance and tech retrieval. A dozen Migrant Fleet marines for this backwater bung-hole that we couldn't live on even if the humans hadn't snatched it up first." He scuffed the muddy road. "Let the batarians kill them. If it keeps their damn pirates from strafing the Fleet let every human in the Skyllian Verge get wiped out."
"Prazza," Uli shook his head, "kid, shut your mouth. Please."
"Maybe you don't like to hear it, Uli," Prazza poked him hard in the chest, "but I have bigger plans for my life than getting stuck doing the same runs for ten years like you and spending all my time around pariahs like Hana'Nur."
Uli looked down at Prazza's hand then up past his right shoulder.
"I tried to warn him," he shrugged, "but he was venting some heat so I figured I'd let it go." Prazza turned and gave a surprised hiccup as he found the empty space between himself and the fields suddenly filled.
Hana'Nur vas Shepard nar Adeli was tall for a quarian woman but not so tall as Prazza or the over-large Uli. Still she found a way to make the young marine feel short and ludicrous with a sideways tilt of her head.
Her environment suit was gray and black, supple and hard to see against the darkening grass. Her talrin was a proud dark-red decorated in starry, black spikes that locked into each other and rippled as the wind touched the fabric. The reinforced boots, epaulettes, and heavy girdle were the same red but bore nore more engraving than the colorless scars of battle.
She kept herself humbly dressed. Except for her visor. That visor was an insult to everyone she met and a grievous insult Prazza'Vael vas Neema.
She chose to keep her visor an opaque white, denying even the small lights of her eyes or the vague outline of her face to the universe at large.
It was considered haughty and rude amongst other quarians, where the small glimpses of a face were important to the few social ques that didn't involve dramatic body language. There were older prejudices at play as well. Old as Rannoch itself.
The creation of the geth replaced a thousand years of rigid social structure that had assigned the most menial tasks to the same families for generations upon generations. Marking them forever as 'lesser than'.
Some quarians with carried old, proud names like Nur, Zorah, and Razi, 'Of the Stars', 'The Dawn Folk' and 'Fierce One'. Others were scorned with Rann, 'Waste-collector', Briezh ,'Boat-driver', and Vael…
'Ditch-digger,' Hana'Nur's body language seemed to condemn him with it.
Amongst their inferiors, women like Hana'Nur vas Shepard covered their faces to deny any passing menials even a stray glance at their fair, soft skin. The practice hadn't been common for decades after the homeworld was lost. Within two generations the need for steady, diverse marriages had evaporated the boundaries around all but the most stringently proud clans.
One-way, opaque visors were out of style Prazza recalled. The rarity a sign of Hana'Nur's steady decline.
Those who never adapted died out entirely, proudly vanishing in a sea of lesser names. Prazza'Vael smiled with smug satisfaction under his visor, wishing that the uppity woman could see him. He didn't know any other members of the Nur clan. But the 'ditch-diggers' of the Vael clan had family on every a hundred ships of the fleet.
"I'm not ashamed to say it," he said, "this detail is a waste of our time."
Hana'Nur's face remained obstinately hidden. Arrogantly hidden.
"Wiped out? Is that what you said, Prazza'Vael?"
"He's a little puke like we all were, Hana'Nur, but Prazza will learn," Uli lifted his hands like he was placating a dangerous but docile animal, "let's just finish the mission, hey?"
"Very well," Hana'Nur rested her hands on her hips and rolled her neck, "we'll drop it. And I won't have to report your poor attitude to the Neema's captain for mission adjustment considering your prejudice. Do you have a prejudice against humans, Prazza'Vael?"
"Hana'Nur," Uli sounded embarrassed, "we've got to rely on each other out."
"Prazza'Vael nar Defranz?" Prazza's fingers tightened at the insult, the dropping of his crew name was as good as calling him a child, and he refused to let it stand.
"I am Prazza'Vael vas Neema!" He shouted. "I almost died twice on my Pilgrimage and I brought enough rifles back to the marine corps to arm two whole platoons so you can-"
"Do you think the Migrant Fleet shouldn't have contact with humans?" Prazza glared at her, willing her to spontaneously disintegrate.
"I don't care about the humans, Hana'Nur, and you can tell the Captain that." There was a heavy silence punctuated by the rush of wind through the grass around them. Uli said something helpless that his modulator hardly translated.
"One would think a young quarian would have more sympathy for those who lose everything," Hana'Nur said, sounding almost bored, "but then I've met a dozen like you, Prazza'Vael. All noise and very little action."
"Watch your mouth!" Prazza growled, advancing towards her. Hana'Nur didn't move away an inch. She threw her head back and laughed hard.
"Oh," she shook her head, "I needed a laugh. You have to do much better than that, Prazza'Vael if you want to intimidate me. Now. Take a swing at me or fall in line. Angry little boys don't scare me."
Prazza shivered with anger but the thoughts of consequences with Captain Yun'Razi held him back. Just that. Not the strange flutter in his belly as he remembered the other rumors about Hana'Nur. The ones that people whispered about.
"Follow," Hana'Nur commanded with a small curl of her finger, "I'm on the trail and wanted to bring in some fresh eyes. Prazz'Vael, make sure no-one sneaks up on us. Uli, guard the middle."
"Ok," Uli chirped, all helpful and positive, as he unslung his rifle from his shoulder, "mind if I talk, Hana'Nur?"
Prazza was frozen to the spot with fury. Not fear. He would never admit he was scared.
"Uli," Hana'Nur said with a lilt, "you're not going to go on telling me about…what were they called again?"
"The Rings of Power," Uli said with a hushed excitement.
"Ancestors save me," Hana'Nur sighed, "oh, very well. Go ahead."
Uli cleared his throat and as the older quarians vanished into the tall-grass Prazza heard him begin to recite.
"Three rings for the elven kings under the sky. Seven for the dwarf-lords in their halls of stone! Nine for mortal-Prazza, stop goldbricking and follow us-nine for mortal men doomed to die!"
Prazza had little choice but to follow and when he did he found himself tangled in the tall grass, head-bobbing low and almost losing sight of his comrades.
He wouldn't admit he was scared.
What they found in the middle of that field was a truly pitiful sight. The varren still lived and that, to their minds, was the worst part of its condition.
"She's dying slow but she's dying," Uli said, risking a hand on the spine-ridges of the predator, "her back is broken in two. Hopefully she doesn't feel her back-legs."
"Every single rib on her left side is broken. Smashed to splinters really. The skull on these creatures is remarkable in its durability." Hana'Nur was passing a bright orange omni-tool over the half-dead predator. She hovered above the burst purple orb of its eye before shifting down to its slowly moving throat. Each breath was a death rattle. "Uli, what could do this?"
"Fall from a high place," Uli said without any real thought, "at terminal velocity."
"Well, that's impossible," Prazza said, resolutely watching the why they came, marked by the bends in the tall grass, "where would it fall from?"
"Easy," Uli said, "she could've fallen from a shuttle. Maybe a dropship. Come here, Prazza, I want to show you a few interesting things."
"No," Prazza said, "this is idiotic."
"Don't be a brat, Prazza'Vael," Hana'Nur said, "Uli is triyng to help you. Ancestors know why."
"Eh-eh," Uli said, "I'll just describe it. See, the spines are not so high on the back and they lack dark-blue coloration of the standard male varren. The females are more tan and gray, so they blend into the colors of Tuchanka. They're the hunters. But note how there's a bright red flush around the rump." Hana'Nur's voice-light blinked with a laugh.
"The males need it spelled out that much?"
"Ancestors," Prazza shuddered, "its what? In heat?"
"There you go, Prazza'Vael," Uli said, "you're learning. This is all the proof I need that the Batarians did this on Hegemony orders. Varren in rut are uncontrollable and this one is too powerful a specimen to be a random stray left by some pirates. Her mate has to be skulking somewhere."
"Here?" Prazza asked, leveling his gun with the grass.
"If he caught our scent we'd have seen him by now," Uli shrugged, "they're a bit like krogan. A female in rut is worth fighting anything for. If he's nearby he's distracted."
"Why bring them if they're so dangerous? Stupid batarians."
"Clever batarians," Hana'Nur said, "think for a minute, Prazza. They burnt down the fields, trashed the granger-units, and slaughtered everyone in sight. They must've set off a low-payload bomb inside the admin structure."
"So? What does that have to do with some rutting varren?"
"By the homeworld," Hana'Nur said, "Uli, tell him since he just refuses to try using his brain."
"Fills this whole region with apex predators in about…" the big marine counted off on his fingers for a moment, "uf, probably inside three-months. They'll move around a little but this place would be crawling with young, hungry varren by the time the new colony wave comes in to rebuild."
Prazza jumped as a single shot rang out across the sky. He whirled in place rifle swaying as Hana'Nur collapsed her pistol back into its hip holster. A hole above the varren's ruined eye smoked with heat of the projectile's entry.
"She was starting to get restless from our smell," she said without deigning to look his way, "no good getting her blood up when she's half-dead. She'll just twist herself around trying to kill us."
"Better this way," Uli nodded.
"Uli, you missed one thing."
"Oh?" Uli cocked his head and leaned over the corpse. "What?"
"Her right eye is busted. Her left-side ribs are splintered."
"Boof!" Uli exclaimed, flicking the side of his helmet. "Hana'Nur, you are right and I am getting too old for scouting like this."
"So?" Prazza asked.
"So, she would have had to fall two or three times." Prazza looked back at her, narrowing his eyes to see if she was setting him up to look stupid.
Hana'Nur was staring off towards the east, down an alleyway of bent grass.
"Follow," she said once more, "the whole story is at that well, I'm sure of it."
"Prazza," Uli said, "keep your rifle ready in case of-"
"I know!"
"Prazza, we could be friends if you'd just calm down."
Prazza'Vael was not made any calmer by their trip to the construction site. A bubble of light grew out of the dark sea of tall grass as the night swept over Mindoir.
"Look at that," Uli said, glancing up at the sky, "stars from planet-side just seem so cozy." The marine paused and turned his head slowly downward and to the right. "Hello?" He parted the grass with the business end of his rifle. "Another dead varren."
Prazza growled as Hana'Nur pushed him out of her way.
"Broke every tooth and dislocated his jaw. Neck's crumpled. She suffocated."
"What the hell…?" Prazza muttered.
"Tried to run teeth-first into a concrete barrier from the looks of it," Hana'Nur sounded vaguely interested.
"So what do you think?" Uli asked her as they left the corpse behind. "Come on, Hana, don't leave me in suspense."
"Wait and see, Uli," Hana'Nur said, "I don't like to make promises without the whole story. The well site is just ahead. Stay together now. Weapons ready. Speakers off." They shut off the audio output, muting themselves and relying on comm links inside their helmets.
The three quarians huddled up and moved as one, a few scant inches separating them in a wedge shape.
Prazza's heart began to race and in the confines of his suit the rapid tempo became too loud to ignore. A furtive gesture set his suit VI micro-seal around his right thumb and then relaxed, letting air move across the digit.
The little rush of moving air tingled across skin that had felt wind once or twice in his whole life but it calmed him. Outside his suit the wind picked up and the fronds of grass taunted him with a dance in the long cool air. He hated this place. He hated being where others thrived and his kind could not hope to find home.
For a cruel moment he hoped there were no survivors.
"Uli," Hana'Nur said. Uli laid on his belly and moved, fast and smooth as rock-snake, hardly shuffling the grass any more than the gust of wind.
"Cover to the left, two yards. Cover to the right, five yards. No visual on any living hostiles."
"Living?"
"More dead varren…Ancestors."
"W-what?" Prazza asked, watching the grass curtain dance without breaking open.
"This place is a slaughtering ground."
"Prazza, you first. Go left into cover. Uli, could you cover us from here?"
"Too much in the way," Uli said, "I'd be shooting over one or both you."
"Follow Prazza after a count of seven."
"We won't find survivors here, Hana'Nur." Uli voice was soft and sad.
"I'm after answers, Uli." Hana'Nur took a short breath. "Prazza, go."
In spite of their animosity, Prazza'Vael vas Neema would not be found wanting when action was demanded. He crouched and advanced at a run, letting the grass part before him around the end of his rifle. He emerged suddenly, feeling a steel pole press against the center of his foot as he crossed from the fields into the open.
He imagined gunfire. He imagined shouts in batarian or the vibrating snarls of hungry varren. For a brief second he even imagined a dozen points of bright light turning to look at him and croaking in the synthetic voices of the geth. He shoved it all away and made for the solid L-shape of a small flatbed transport. He used a Kelish swear as he slid on the mud and pressed his back the firm, hollow circle of an enormous tire.
"Here, I come," Uli said in his ear, "move over, Prazza."
Prazza'Vael crept along the flatbed and popped up to scan the clearing. He balked a little when he saw Hana'Nur pressed against a standing steel crate. She'd slipped by unseen and unheard. Uli was next to him an instant later, gun level with the far grass.
"Clear, Hana'Nur," Uli said, "I think we can relax."
"Maybe," Hana'Nur said. She raised her pistol overhead and fired once. "Just to be sure." There was a tense moment of silence before Prazza was certain nothing would answer their challenge.
"Speakers back on," her voice crackled across the clearing, "go check the grass around the clearing, Uli. Don't go farther than you can shout."
"Ok," Uli said, "probably no varren left around here."
Prazza began to rise and froze at the carnage around them.
"No," Hana'Nur said absently, "probably not."
There were four dead varren. The closest one to Prazza's cover was a big, blue-backed male with a fearsome number of teeth.
"The pack leader," Hana'Nur commented when she saw him looking, "what can you see, Prazza'Vael?"
"It…it looks like the carrier crashed into it," Prazza said as he circled nervously around to the middle of the clearing. The roadway they'd been following ended here. They were on the furthest outskirts of the human colony.
The lead varren was almost melded to the fender of the vehicle. Gobbets of red meat upset the sleek hood. The tongue, lolling from a half-crushed muzzle, was bright pink and twinned in the shiny chrome of the bumper.
"The crumpling tells a different tell, Prazza," Hana'Nur said. The impact wasn't right for a moving vehicle, "but of course you could also simply see that there are no skid marks. The carrier was at rest."
"I said it looked that way not it was," Prazza snapped, "you're so smart, Hana'Nur tell me what happened to the rest of them." He glanced at the remaining corpses with a burbling stomach. Quarians ate grains mostly and Prazza's parents had ardently mistrusted meat of any kind.
The three dead varren by the large, circular bore-hole at the middle of the clearing made him grateful. They'd been eviscerated. All the insides outside. Gender was impossible to tell in the incomplete bodies.
Hana'Nur actually stepped among them, their pink guts squishy under her toes.
"What did this? A chemical? An explosive?" She asked herself. She scanned the air with her omnitool. "No. No scorching on the ground. No residue in the air."
"They just…exploded?"
"Hmm, the carnage is almost spiraling around them," Hana'Nur laughed like she remembered a private joke, "ah, so it was my second guess then…"
"Second-" the bleeping of his comm-link to the Captain cut off his questions. Yun'Razi sounded exhausted when she spoke.
"Hana'Nur," she said, "I'm about ready to get out of this place. When are you returning?"
"Almost ready, Yun," Hana'Nur scanned the bodies of the varren once more, then stepped to the edge of the bore-hole, "what's wrong, dear? You sound sad."
"We've not found anyone," Yun'Razi said, "but we managed to discover where the batarians made land-fall en masse. Ancestors. There are so many bodies. They surprised the farmers at work. Shot them all in the back as they tried to run for the colony."
"Security forces?" Hana'Nur asked, looking down into the bore-hole as Prazza approached her. He was twitchy from disgust at all the dead varren and felt an embarrassing need to be next to the other quarian. Life on the fleet was so cramped that open spaces unnerved him.
"Some of these dead humans might have been soldiers but their guns and armor are long gone. Fucking batarians even took their shoes." There was a heavy sound over the comm, like a booted-foot striking an object. "We lost our homeworld, lost half our population, lost our fucking future and the Council stripped us of our embassy! These four-eyed degenerates enslave, murder, and reave across the galaxy but do they leave the Citadel in infamy and shame? No. They leave as a protest. With dignity."
"Yun-"
"The largest fleet in history," Yun'Razi muttered, "if we outfitted the civilian ships with heavy guns we'd be unstoppable. Turn Kar'Shan into a glass ball and watched it break into a trillion fragments."
"Yun!"
"The krogan were beloved for killing the rachni," Yun'Razi snorted, "why can't we get a few worlds for wiping out a race of monsters!"
"Captain Yun'Razi vas Gorach," Hana'Nur raised her voice, "you are on an open channel."
Yun's heavy, angry breath filled the comm-link.
"What's happened?" Hana'Nur asked. "Yun? Dear, talk to me."
"The landing site. The ground was filled with tracks. Batarian boots. And…lots of little footprints."
"The babies," Uli sighed over the comm-link, "always the little ones who get it worst."
"Children?" Prazza said, not quite wanting to believe. "Why take children? What use are they?"
"The batarians have been a slave economy for a thousand years, Prazza'Vael, trust that they know they're trade" Hana'Nur said in her clipped, clinical way, "children are more malleable than adults." Prazza stepped forward to stand next to her and glanced down into the bore-hole, somehow not surprised by the sight that awaited him.
Still, the horror was greater than he thought.
"Ancestors…"
"The prefabs were empty because their inhabitants were already dead."
There were ten or fewer adults jammed together, tangled limbs locked in rigor-mortis like they were huddled for warmth. The flashlight of Prazza's rifle shined on blank, dirty faces, eyes staring up at him in a vacant way.
"I found thruster burns out here. A few hundred meters from the clearing. The grass is flattened around here too. Five bodies. Maybe nine. Laying in wait for a while."
"If you followed the road in a straight line," Hana'Nur mused, "you'd end up right at the landing zone on the far side. They surrounded the colony before they attacked."
"Batarians," Yun'Razi said, "the child-takers threw a wide net to prevent anyone running."
"Tevi'Hazt found a few bugs the batarians missed. Private ones that the farmers installed. Their archives show this was two solar cycles ago."
"The well team got too close," Hana'Nur said, "they took them early in the morning. Probably before dawn. Any of those bodies you found have signs of animals eating them?"
"Ugh, varren. Right of course. I should put the team on alert if they've been left behind-"
"Six total. They're dead," Hana'Nur said, "all of them."
"How'd the new guy do? Didn't wet his suit when they rushed you?"
Prazza wasn't even thinking about the words passing through his ears. He couldn't stop staring at the dead faces below him. They were alive two days ago. They woke up and went to work. They were here. And now they were gone. They were all just gone.
"Prazza," a firm hand snatched his shoulder and he yipped as he realized he'd been pitching forward to fall into the bore-hole, "go sit down."
"I…I'm fine," Prazza said, shrugging her hand away.
"Be careful then," Hana'Nur said, "I'm still looking the area over."
"Hana?" Yun'Razi asked.
"Sorry, Yun," Hana'Nur said, "my comm hiccupped. The varren weren't our kill."
"Hana," Yun'Razi said, "no guessing games, please?"
Hana'Nur crouched down and touched the edge of the bore-hole. Prazza followed her movements and saw what caught her interest.
On the lip of the mass-grave was a pair of small handprints and Prazza could imagine someone kneeling at the edge of the pit, leaning forward to look inside.
"Hana'Nur," Uli jogged back into the clearing, eyes twinkling behind his visors, "Hana'Nur! It came back to me. What you said about a spiral. Remember when we went to Nos Astra to sort out that volus merchant who shorted Admiral Jaffa'Shal's representative on the eezo dampeners?" Hana'Nur flicked the side of her helmet and shook her head in self-recrimination.
"The Eclipse corporal that jumped us outside the Port Authority," Hana'Nur said, "Uli'Rann, you have an enviable memory. That proves it." She spoke into her comm. "Yun'Razi, we're following the trail of a possible survivor."
"Hang on, Hana, I can have five more marines over there in a few minutes."
"No, Yun, hold them back," Hana'Nur stepped away from the pit and made a zig-zag to a spot at the edge of the clearing, "we don't need everyone trampling the area. They might be scared and hiding."
"They killed six varren, Hana, by themself by the sounds of it," Yun said, "I can't just let you go after them alone!"
"I only need Uli and Prazza, Yun," Hana'Nur said, "let me do this my way."
Prazza cast his eyes back to the dead pack leader and his trigger finger twitched with anxiety. Uli'Rann fiddle with his omni-tool then passed it over his rifle. There was a little chirp and the lights along the barrel changed from soft blue to an angry red as the thermal clip inside superheated to deliver a heavier slug with each shot.
"Be careful," Yun'Razi said, "and contact me as soon as you find them. Keelah se'lai."
"Keelah se'lai, Yun," Hana'Nur lowered her hand from her helmet straight to the ground and laughed in fond way, "you stuck to the grass didn't you? You clever little thing."
"Prazza," Uli tapped his shoulder, "unless that old rifle can handle an ammo shift switch to your side-arm. The Carnifex's we got are hand-me-downs but they still hit like angry krogan."
Uli stepped gingerly over a dead varren with a whispered apology.
"We're on the trail of a biotic."
"A young one," Hana'Nur added, "lets get back to those prefabs. They've gone to ground there or I'm a vorcha."
"How young?"
"There's no rings I can count for age, Uli," Hana'Nur said, "but…the footprints are small. They're missing a shoe. Maybe limping a little. Humans are tricky. They get bigger in fits and starts."
"Small enough to weigh on my conscience," Uli shoulders his rifle with a sigh, "don't want to put one in a kid's leg."
"It won't come to that," Hana'Nur assured him. Prazza found his voice with a cruel laugh.
"This kind of power," he nodded the varren, "with that kind of trauma?" He jerked his thumb at the bore-hole. "We're lucky they didn't rip us limb from limb if they know we're here."
"Children are stronger than you give them credit for," Hana'Nur said, turning her blank mask on him, he could feel her judgement, "they can withstand a great deal. Provided they find safety in the end."
Prazza drew his pistol and checked that it worked.
Safety? He grimaced at the dead varren and curled his finger around the trigger housing. No chances. Child or no. I'm not dying in this hell if it attacks us.
"Cheer up, Prazza!" Prazza growled as Uli slapped him on the small of his back. "You're all tensed up. We get to go be heroes, hey? Even you must be pleased with that."
"The kid's probably dead," he spat, "have to be pretty special to survive this."
"Maybe it's fate?" Uli shrugged. Then with a deep, booming voice put on he looked in Prazza's face and spoke. "'There are other forces at work in this world besides the will of evil.'"
"Ugh," Prazza turned away, leading the march down the road, "do you ever shut up? Hana'Nur, let's head back…"
He scowled at the empty clearing.
"I'll catch up," Hana'Nur's mysterious voice whispered over the comm-channel, "if you stumble over the survivor stay calm. Don't hurt them. They've suffered enough in two days to last a lifetime."
"Can do!" Uli piped up. He started off down the road, singing the Harvest-Tide Grain-Counting song they'd all learned as children, as if a death-pit wasn't sunk into the ground behind him and surrounded by slaughtered varren.
"Not me," Prazza'Vael vas Neema hissed to himself, "I'm not your servant, Hana'Nur, whatever your lost clan. I'm not your friend either." He glared around at the tall grass, lowering his voice further. "If I have to kill the thing that did this I'll do it. For the safety of the Migrant Fleet marines and even for you and that big idiot Uli. None of us is worth some human."
He briefly considered glancing into the death-pit won't last time, to prove he was above it but paused after a single step.
"Stupid," he said, "they haven't suffered. Not like us. Who cares how much you suffer?" He glared up at the indifferent stars. "No-one cares that the people of Rannoch suffer."
He turned away from the death-pit and the sad, empty clearing with its tall floodlights and slowly decaying bodies. He told himself the slight tickle up his spine as he exposed his back to the huge empty horizon was his suit creasing a little.
Because Prazza'Vael vas Neema was a proud marine of the Migrant Fleet and he would never admit he was scared.