Burnt for Beacons Chapter 13, a mass effect fanfic

Mass Effect 1

Burnt for Beacons

Chapter 13 - Depot Sigma-23

"I'll start the self-destruct sequence giving us enough time to get back to the Normandy. It should take care of the remaining rachni onboard. But if we are overrun, the Normandy has their orders to leave us behind. There will be no time to dick around. Understood?"

Ashley couldn't think of any alternative. They were trapped. The rachni onboard were beginning to tear apart bulkheads and threatening life support systems. Some were beginning to attack the doors and if the squad delayed further, there was a chance rachni would make it through to the Normandy.

Liara and Ashley both nodded.

The post-Nepmos debrief had revealed that the huge, glowing rachni they'd encountered were something called "brood warriors." They'd been sitting in the comms room when Shepard had given them the news.

"These bigger rachni," she paused to look at the datapad in her hand, "you say they were bioluminescent?"

"Yes, Commander. They had large glowing speckles along their bodies." Kaidan pointed to his own side starting at his shoulder and running down to his hip, to help with his explanation.

Shepard hummed thoughtfully. "Records of the Rachni War suggest brood warriors, that's the male gendered rachni, only fight when a hive is," here she made air quotes with her fingers, "'severely pressed.' The archival descriptions match the guys you killed and the fact that they showed themselves suggests you eliminated the hive on Nepmos."

"We didn't see any on Noveria," said Liara.

Shepard rested her chin on steepled hands, looking concerned, "No. No, we didn't."

The meeting moved on.

"Durand has shared the coordinates for the second listening post, on a planet called Altahe. It's a Roche World. It's dusty, windy, and mostly rock. Nothing too taxing in terms of armour requirements. Listening Post Theta has been quiet for four days and I'm not going to pretend that I know what's going on but given what you've reported, I don't like our chances of finding any of those soldiers alive. However, until we know for sure, we are going to treat this as a rescue mission. I'll expect you each to prepare accordingly. Kaidan, you and I will review the data now. The rest of you, get some rest." Shepard's eyes met Ashley's before darting away.

Altahe was as bad as Shepard had said it would be. There was nothing to capture the imagination, or distract from the mission ahead, just a dark sky, darker cliffs, and brown dirt as far as the eye could see.

Kaidan took a meandering path through a mountain pass. It had been nice watching him and Lieutenant Marie Durand get to know each other. No one could stomach the idea of leaving the three Nepmos survivors at the outpost surrounded by mountains of corpses. Shepard had insisted that they stay aboard the Normandy while they waited for an official Naval transport ship. Berthing them hadn't been a problem. They all required medical treatment, and it was only on the third day that they were in any condition to leave their beds in the med bay and begin moving around the ship. At first, all three of them had shuffled around like ghosts, but gradually they seemed to find themselves soothed by the hustle of life onboard the frigate. Kaidan began by giving them small duties to perform and between that and their counselling sessions they seemed to move out of shock and into grief. Attentive to the needs of all three of his new charges, Kaidan spent most of his time with Marie. Ashley found them together often; just talking quietly while Kaidan worked, shifting their bodies so they could be closer to one another. When they had gathered beside the Mako to leave for Altahe, Marie had rested her hand on Kaidan's arm and wished him a safe return.

They made it look so easy. Ashley wondered what it would be like to stroke the back of Shepard's neck, to slide her fingers up through the short spikes of her closely cropped hair and then tangle her fingers in the tight curls further up. To push her against a wall and to kiss her clavicle before bringing her thigh up between—

Ashley huffed air out through her nose and stared at the haptic display in front of her. No sign of life yet. No sign of anything. Just a dark grey expanse without even a moon to light their path.

The Mako rumbled across the terrain now heading straight for the listening post somewhere off in the distance. Ashley checked the map.

"Three klicks to the base," she said.

Kaidan nodded, Wrex grunted, and Garrus made no response.

She spent some time looking at the ground scans and found something of note. One of the scans was picking up signs of rachni below ground. The light from the base was glowing dimly ahead of them. It seemed to be a typical underground prefab, but there was something not quite symmetrical about the buildings around it. She connected through to Garrus' scope view, just as he made the announcement:

"We've got rachni nests, big ones."

"And here I was thinking this job would be easy," Wrex rumbled.

Kaidan eased the Mako towards the nearest mound, and Garrus hit the first rachni to appear with his cannon. Wrex took the second out with sustained machine gun fire and the fight was on. Ashley marked targets and the two in the back worked hard to keep up. Twice, acid hit the Mako inflicting damage to the hull before Wrex and Garrus figured out the best strategy for taking down large groups of the creatures: Garrus fired the cannon into the middle of a group, the impact knocked them off their feet, and then Wrex fired at them with the gun. Ashley checked the scans. There were more rachni, but they all seemed to be inside the compound itself.

"Let's move out," Kaidan said, and Wrex thumped the door control.

The clean-up of the base was easy compared with what they had already dealt with, but here there were no survivors. They found only two large rachni skulking in the corner and the little chicken-sized offspring proved no obstacle at all. What they did find, was a shipping manifest that suggested that the rachni had come from a ship in Argos Rho.

"The rachni infestation on Altahe seems to be the result of a supply drop. The logs you downloaded from the freighter meant we were able to backtrack the ship's course to its origin: Depot Sigma-23." Shepard tapped her datapad thoughtfully. "It's likely that we will find more rachni there. Whether we can figure out what they are doing there remains to be seen." She looked out at the assembled crew and Ashley was pleased to see that she seemed comfortable and relaxed, as she leaned back in her chair. "I'll be leading a small team: Ashley and Liara. I want biotics for crowd control, but I need you to manage things here, Kaidan." He looked up expectantly. "There is a military personnel carrier waiting to receive our guests. I want you to organise the handover. I've sent the details to your omni-tool." He nodded.

Shepard was being kind. Buying Kaidan and Marie a little extra time before they had to separate. Ashley wondered if they would try to make the long-distance thing work.

"Williams, ready the gear. Liara, I'll speak with you further. The rest of you, carry on."

They met at the docking bay doors.

Shepard was looking over her weapons and Liara was bouncing lightly on her feet. The rebuke Ashley had been waiting for still hadn't come. It was impossible that Shepard hadn't noticed her insignia and N7 stripe were missing and equally impossible that Ashley wouldn't be reprimanded for the 'mistake', so all week she had been planning her defence. Yet here they were, and Shepard still hadn't said anything.

Shepard was positively cheerful. Ashley could hear the ill-concealed joy in her voice when she messaged through to the XO, "Pressley, what's taking so long?"

"No one's responding at their end, Commander. We're doing everything the hard way."

Shepard's smile was delightful to behold and when she turned it towards Ashley, the marine felt her breath hitch before she responded with a grin of her own. It was good to have this squad back together. Not just because their specialities perfectly complemented each other, but there was an ease there as well. They, all three, knew loss and understood each other better because of it. At least, that is what Ashley put it down to. She turned her mind away from the dark thoughts that threatened and instead checked her shotgun, again.

"Commander, the Normandy is talking to their system. We can confirm that there are rachni onboard."

"I'm not picking them up on the scanner."

"There is an entrance corridor on the other side of the airlock that leads to the shipping warehouse. The rachni seem to be mostly confined to that area. It's just outside of your scanner's range, but you should pick them up fairly quickly once you are inside."

"Copy."

The door finally opened, and they walked into Depot Sigma-23. Aside from the buzzing of the lights and typical engine noises, it was eerily quiet on board what should have been a bustling delivery depot. They walked through a long entry corridor and finally came to the warehouse. A sprawling maze of stacked crates created endless ambush opportunities for the rachni they knew were hiding in the shadows. Ashley checked her scanner and found multiple blips. Shepard was already motioning them into position from her spot crouching low beside some machinery. The crates offered plenty of cover but that worked both ways. Shepard put Liara out of harm's way where she'd be able to utilise her biotics and still be safe from acid attacks. It was the downside of the lighter armour. It seemed that Shepard was conscious of it, too; she signalled Ashley to take point.

They wound their way through the maze and Ashley was soon alerted to the approach of several rachni soldiers. She signalled to the others to prepare themselves, before swinging her shotgun to meet the small, green bugs. She heard a scrabbling sound from above and looked up in time to see an enormous rachni trapped in a blue corona of light. It was lifted higher into the air, where it spun slowly and harmlessly. Shepard took aim with her pistol and began shooting, but Liara moved her hands almost carelessly and the creature's body crumpled. The trio worked their way through the warehouse, taking down one enemy after the other. At some point, their scanners jammed, and they could no longer check for hiding creatures. Ashley ground her teeth in frustration as Shepard signalled for them to keep moving forward. They were trying to get to the control centre, where they might be able to tap into the security feeds and logs. She saw the flick of an antennae behind a crate to her right but couldn't get a bead on the creature itself. She gave the signal and Shepard moved Liara into position. The asari's biotics flared as she flicked her wrist, lifting the rachni out from behind cover. The marines fired on the floating beast, and it exploded into a shower of acid and broken limbs.

"Ranger Three, your scanners are being actively jammed from within the depot itself. We are doing our best to unscramble the mess they've made but it could take some time. Over." Charles Pressly's voice came loud and clear through the helmet comms, piercing the silence.

"Copy that," Shepard replied tersely. It was her serious voice, but she wasn't angry. She's still enjoying this; the challenge of it, the difficulty. This is how she survived Akuze, Ashley realised, or maybe, she reconsidered, once you survive something like that everything else seems trivial. She allowed a grin to creep onto her face. Shepard caught it and smiled back from behind her visor and just for a moment, Ashley forgot everything else. Liara cleared her throat and motioned for the pair to keep moving.

They found their way to the front of the ship and held their collective breath as the door panels slid open. There were no rachni on the other side, and nowhere for the full-grown ones to hide. Shepard led them into the infirmary. There were no people, dead or alive. Nor was there anyone in the cockpit. They made their way back along the corridor to another empty room. Ashley couldn't have said with any surety what the room had been used for. It was almost as big as the sleeping quarters they'd passed on the way in, but unlike the barracks, this room was mostly empty. Except for a terminal. And what appeared to be a bomb.

She looked over to Shepard anxiously, but the Commander was already moving towards the haptic display of the terminal. She gave the bomb only a cursory glance before she began typing.

"Personal data recorder for Major Elena Flores." Ashley watched as Shepard folded her arms and tilted her head to listen. "Sigma-23 is almost fully operational. The barracks and storage lockers are complete, and we've begun stocking the munitions. It is highly unlikely the Alliance will patrol in the nebula. I expect our only risk will be from pirates and who will believe them? Looks like we'll have space for two reinforced platoons of Cerberus commandos." Shepard hummed low in her throat, but that was the end of that entry. She keyed through to the next one. "The package arrived today for field testing. I'm told they are fundamentally similar to the units being developed on Noveria. They promise this batch will be stable. Something about them developing in proximity to the master control unit. We detected some pirates setting up anchorage in a neighbouring system. I think we will try deploying them there first." Shepard tipped her head back thoughtfully but said nothing. Liara nodded, clearly having connected the dots between these units, the rachni on Noveria, and how they had spread throughout the Styx Theta cluster. "They've escaped containment. Clever bastards. We treated them like animals. We should have treated them like P. . They're spreading," Elena Flores' voice continued relentlessly. "Boarding the supply ships and sending them to random destinations. They'll be all over the cluster in a week. General, if you recover this message, my advice is: screw the rachni. They're too smart. Use one of the other projects. Flores, signing off… for the final time." Shepard rubbed her shoulder, and then flinched. Ashley was suddenly aware of a low, rhythmic scraping noise, just audible in the silence. Liara opened the door, and the sound became much louder.

"The rachni!" Liara almost shouted, "they are trying to break through to the Normandy!"

"For fuck's sake," Shepard said, carefully enunciating each syllable, before looking down at the scuttle charges.

Ashley did a quick mental stocktake. There had been no survival pods. Nothing to help them get back to the Normandy without risking bringing the rachni with them, so they'd have to fight through however many remained.

Shepard was crouching low over the bomb, her fingers running along the sides, following wires up to the console, and shouting at Pressly. Finally, she turned back to Liara and Ashley.

The scrabbling seemed to be all around them.

"Guys, they've plugged up your oxygen supply. Keep your helmets on and get the hell out of there!"

"Don't leave me behind." Liara said, "I'm not very good with directions," she added sheepishly, then she chuckled; a joyless thing.

The three women nodded their mutual understanding, Shepard set the charges, and then they ran.

They blasted their way through a hoard of rachni soldiers; Ashley could only guess where they'd been hiding. Then a large rachni turned towards them, clambering away from the console it had been using. Ashley took it out with her rifle. They kept running through the twists and turns until they saw the glowing green light of the exit up ahead. They tumbled through and were met by a team of acid spitting little ones, which had been trying without much success to burn their way through to the Normandy on the other side. Ashley shot them dismissively, while Shepard screamed at Joker to open the doors and let them through.

They tumbled inside and the doors swished shut behind them.

"Decontamination in progress. Logged. The commanding officer is aboard. XO Pressly stands relieved," the Normandy VI chirruped.

"Jesus Christ." Ashley slumped to the floor.

Liara threw off her helmet and looked down at her, grinning.

Shepard was already back on the comms, leaning with one arm braced against the wall, her back turned to the other two. She seemed to be shouting questions at the poor unfortunate on the other end. The Normandy leapt away from the rachni infested ship as it exploded into dust behind them.

Ashley poured the scalding water into the teapot and carried it over to where Liara was sitting. They settled down quietly together, leaving the tea to steep a little longer. Kaidan and Lieutenant Durand sat alone on the other side of the mess, clearly oblivious to what was happening around them. Kaidan laughed at something Marie had said and she smiled joyfully back at him. Their knees touched under the table. Ashley peered into the empty teacup in her hands, the porcelain was cold against her skin.

"I don't know how you marines do it," Liara said, also fiddling with her cup.

"Do what?"

"Go into battle, risk everything, then come back to the same ship, and do it all over again." She picked up the teapot and filled Ashley's cup, then her own. "Those two understand the true nature of things." She flicked her eyes towards the two Lieutenants. "Some people need someone to come home to."

"Are you," Ashley sucked in her breath theatrically, and then in mock horror finished with: "coming on to me?"

The asari rolled her eyes.

"You know who I am talking about."

Tali sat down beside them. "You two need to stop gossiping about me all the time. It's getting embarrassing," she purred. Garrus was with her. He carefully lowered his body into a chair before sliding a bottle of Tupari towards Tali and opening one for himself.

"Hmmm." Garrus made note of the cosy-looking human couple before losing interest. "I hear you two survived quite a mission."

Liara gave them a brief rundown and finished with: "It was Cerberus, again."

All three aliens turned to face Ashley, the angle of their chins giving away that they had questions about the human supremacist group.

She did not feel equipped to deal with the scrutiny, but these people were her friends and they deserved… something.

Her voice started soft and hesitant at first. "Humanity is new to space." She suddenly found it hard to meet Garrus' eye. Instead, she focused on the teacup in her hands, on its warmth. "Until I joined the Normandy, I hadn't even spoken to another alien. I didn't know anything. Just thought I did." Her voice lowered in shame. "My understanding was based on stories, which were based on stories. Humanity has always been like that. Facts and logic don't sway us; stories do. All it takes to manipulate a human is to get them to feel something deeply: anger, hate and fear are probably the most powerful emotions. Love and a sense of belonging are in there, too." She frowned, trying to get her thoughts all tidy. "Once someone has attached an emotion to their understanding, all the facts and logic in the world won't make a difference. It's hard for humans to change their mind at that point." She took a sip of her tea. "That's what has happened with Cerberus, I think. It's a bunch of people who have heard stories based on stories that have made them scared. They don't trust that people in power have their best interests at heart, so they are trying to take power for themselves, to protect people that they care about. They can't see the damage that they are doing, they cannot see that they have crossed a line, because they are too tied to their original feelings of fear." She paused again, recognising the need to tread carefully. "The ideal would be to take each person in Cerberus, to make them feel safe, to introduce them to aliens, to help them understand that while the Council isn't perfect, and the Systems Alliance isn't perfect, and the governments of the nation-states aren't perfect, they are doing a lot of good work and they are trying to do it ethically, in a way that preserves life and advances humanity. And when they do stuff up, there are equally ethical ways to create change."

Garrus looked about to interrupt, but Ashley forged on ahead, needing to get the rest out before the inevitable debate.

"Humanity has always been at war. We'll fight anyone for all sorts of reasons," she smirked, knowing that she was tapping into the major stereotype that aliens recognised in humanity. "But we thrive when we come together, when we find new ideas, new cultures, new technology. Everyone is better off working together, finding common interests, seeing our strengths and weaknesses through the eyes of others, and advancing each other. It would be good if we could remind Cerberus of that. But the reality is we don't have the time. They are not just in the way, but actively working to divide the Council species at a time when we need to be united." She sighed. "It's our job to take them down. We must do it as quickly and quietly as possible and the whole time, we need to be making sure that the right stories get back to Earth. Stories that attach positive emotions to uniting humanity and aliens, so that when the reapers come, we are ready."

There was only silence following her proclamation.

As it stretched, she worried that what she had said had fallen flat, that she'd got it wrong, that she'd used the word 'alien' far too many times.

"What you have described is universal. All species that I have met, with the exception, perhaps, of the salarians, are swayed and controlled by the power of stories."

Garrus hummed, his mandibles flaring, "Turians are one of the more religiously liberal species, but it is the power of stories that guide us. All species are susceptible to dogma."

"And no society is fully united. Even the migrant fleet has factions. Most of us unite behind the story that one day we will reclaim Rannoch from the geth, but increasingly word is spreading of quarians who believe in something called the Nedas Movement. I don't think they are dangerous. It is easier to control a population when the ship's captain acts as arbitrator for almost all decisions and disputes. Even then, stories play a major role in decision making."

The group settled into a comfortable silence and Ashley felt herself begin to relax into it.

"So," Garrus stretched out the vowel in his bi-tonal drawl. "We take down Cerberus." He curled his claws into a fist shape and held it out towards Ashley. She smiled at the human gesture and bumped her own fist against his."

"We take down Cerberus," she agreed.