Disclaimer: I do not own the Mass Effect games. This story is written with no profit in mind. It isn't for sale or rent.
Chapter10
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Part 1
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5.05.2183 GS
THWS Death Dealer, Turian Assault Cruiser
Attican Beta cluster
A small task force dropped from a lowered-mass tunnel between two relays with minimal drift. Sensors swept through the surrounding area, looking for danger, while hot lasers tracked potential targets. The only objects near the relay were tiny debris consistent with communications satellites cut to pieces by GARDIAN lasers.
"That's a confirmed hostile incursion in the region. Comms, send a word to the Citadel. Ops, deploy communications satellites and plan to drop a chain of them all the way to the Thessus system," Captain Icicia Duviso ordered. Her fingers twitched – a nervous tick demanding she rub the edges of the armored plates covering her face. Unless they left a guard at the relay, which was out of the question considering the size of her command, there was no way to ensure their communications lines would remain intact. That could be a big issue if the Geth disturbing dreadnought that struck Eden Prime was in the area, no matter how unlikely.
Captain Duviso waited a few moments for her crew to carry out her orders before issuing more.
"Comms, link us with the rest of the task force and put up the principal commanders."
With an enemy incursion confirmed, they would implement one of the contingencies hastily disused before racing here. Besides the Normandy, Duviso had a division of scout frigates and their command light cruiser under her command to use as her eyes and ears. Then came the heavy hitters – her assault cruiser optimized for the planetary attack, a heavy cruiser, a division of Salarian state-of-the-art cruisers, and their escorts. It was a respectable task force that had no business tangling with a dreadnought.
From her perch above the CIC, the Captain surveyed her crew's work. At the same time, holographic windows popped all around it, obscuring the big map of the Attican Beta cluster.
"The Normandy and our scout frigates will enter the Thessus system first to locate any hostile space elements. They will relate the locations of such enemy assets to the Cutting Wind and remain quiet until the rest of our task force arrives. If the correlation of forces is favorable, we will secure the system before deploying ground forces to figure out exactly what went wrong on Feros. If we find an overwhelming Geth or pirate presence, we will either remain hidden until reinforcements arrive or harry them until reinforced."
Icicia Duviso was a firm believer in giving her subordinates context for her orders when the situation permitted. That way, they would know what the primary objectives were and could better adapt instead of rigidly following the last orders given. That was the best way to work with what some saw as a weakness of the Turian military—their outright devotion to the chain of command and following orders.
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SSV Normandy
Thessus System, Attican Beta Cluster
The Normandy drifted out of FTL with her engines cool and stealth mode engaged. This method took the frigate longer to reach the edge of the system than otherwise, and in exchange, it ensured her hull was cool enough that nothing short of fiendishly lousy luck or an extensive surveillance system had a prayer of detecting it. Passive systems slowly mapped the region, looking for anything unusual.
"Bring us in deeper, Joker," Shepard allowed after they found no surprises in the rough vicinity of Logan – the fifth planet in the system.
On the face of it, the gas giant was a standard example of its kind. What made it curious were the initial survey reports from twenty years ago—they indicated the presence of large objects below its upper clouds, though no trace has been found of them ever since. Like with the other planets in the system showing more substantial traces of Protean presence, investigating this properly was one of the long-term goals of establishing a proper colony in Thessus.
"That's how many horror movies begin," Joker quipped. "I'm just saying, Commander, there're supposed to be space zombies where we're going! Who knows what else is out here!?"
Shepard wasn't sure if Joker was genuinely concerned or merely excited and messing with him. Nevertheless, the helmsman did have a point. They first faced people turned into cyber-zombies by the Geth, and now those creeper things were waiting for them on Feros.
The Normandy swept silently deeper into the system, for the first time taking full advantage of the unique properties of her drive core, which allowed her to maneuver using artificially created gravity wells. That was, of course, after accelerating using the gas giant as cover and cutting power to the engines before emerging from behind it. Their target was the second planet in the system, which is currently on the other side of the star. The rest of the scout force should have arrived in the shadow of Quana, which had the local star between it and Feros. Doing so ensured the best possible cover for the less stealthy Turian frigates.
They spent the next day skulking around, doing what the Normandy was built for. Shepard quickly decided that, despite all his training done to prepare him for such periods of tedious boredom, it wasn't his cup of tea, so to speak. Tea, huh? Anderson was rubbing off on him.
The Normandy eventually got close enough to Feros to be able to passively detect ships that weren't broadcasting their presence for the whole system to see. Sure enough, they found a Geth flotilla hanging above a region of the planet covered with extensive Protean ruins.
Two insect-like cruisers and a spread of frigates had their guns pointed at the planet. They also maintained a rough defensive formation around what had to be a logistics vessel.
This complicated the situation. Unless they handled the enemy in orbit just right, the Geth might obliterate the colony before going down.
"Joker, comm lasers only. Contact the Cutting Wind. We have our work cut out for us."
Shepard wondered if a distraction to get the enemy out of position before striking might work.
"What can passives tell us about the situation on Feros?" The Spectre asked.
"There's a lot of power, heat, and interference down there, Shepard. For what it's worth, it's not consistent with indiscriminate orbital strikes. We'll need to get closer to give you more, and if they detect us…" Joker trailed off, speaking without his usual sass for once.
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Part 2
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5.05.2183 GS
THWS Death Dealer, Turian Assault Cruiser
Thesus system, Attican Beta cluster
Data gathered by the scouts flowed into the CIC so it could be refined before ending in holograms before Captain Icicia Duviso. There was no sign of additional Geth forces in the system beyond Feros. That was less reassuring than it should have been. A star system was a large place, and given the timing, it was perfectly feasible that the scouts had missed well-hidden enemy ships waiting somewhere out of sight without radiating heat and power.
In a place like Thesus, stealth in space was much more feasible than a well-developed star system with a decent sensor grid. In such systems, the best way to do stealth was misdirection – pretending that you weren't what you appeared on sensors and hiding in plain sight among the traffic. Here, the once-mythical concept of stealth in space was possible. Duviso knew it was more or less feasible for some time now, thanks to the Salarian STG skulking everywhere they weren't wanted. The Normandy's very existence was partly an answer to that gap in capabilities present in the Turian Navy. There were two related gaps: the stealth component and expertise in dealing with enemies possessing such capabilities. It wasn't a secret that after it entered full production, the Normandy class would serve as an op-force in extensive training exercises with large segments of the Turian navy.
Instead, due to the ongoing troubles, Duviso was in the unexpected position of working with one such stealthy asset while wondering if the Geth had vessels with similar capabilities waiting for someone to pounce on the obvious bait waiting at Feros. On the face of it, this was a trap with a Geth battle group acting as bait. That was why the Death Dealer and the core of her task force remained outside the system for hours, waiting for their scouts to find the enemy ambush forces.
The frigates found nothing of consequences away from Feros, and the Normandy kept sending more and more intelligence gathered by her passive sensors. This led to the Captain's current dilemma. She already had her forces in the systems, hiding behind a gas giant and ready to either attack or retread depending on what surprises the enemy had in store for them. Taking the bait was tempting. If they struck fast and hard, they had more than a reasonable chance of knocking out the ships above Feros, then jumping away and avoiding an ambush… If there was an ambush in the first place.
The newest data from Normandy painted a different picture. It wasn't what Duviso would have done in the enemy's place, even if ordered without having a covering force at her back. Adherence to orders went only so far if you were a Turian worth your rank and citizenship rank. Risking your command, the soldiers, and the assets you were in charge of without a good reason crossed said line.
Like the Asari liked to say, and the humans more recently, the enemy got a vote, too. Leaving yourself exposed, especially if you believed to be safe, was an excellent way to end up dead.
Icicia glared at the orbital images of their target on the ground. It was an ancient Protean arcology, which now housed a human pilot colony holding over fifty thousand specialists busy restoring the place for future colonists. ExoGeni had its local HQ in a nearby part of the long-abandoned mega-city. That much was expected.
A mass effect shield protecting the place from orbital strikes was something no one saw coming. However, it neatly explained the current situation on the ground and in orbit. The anomalies detected by the Normandy were dead ringers for the few such systems Captain Duviso knew of – they all protected key cities or facilities on Palaven and a handful of the oldest and most important colonies in the Hierarchy. While highly potent defenses, the resources needed to make such a thing feasible were nothing to scoff at for even civilizations that were space-faring for thousands of years. Otherwise, every major city in existence would be protected that way against attacks or accidents. It was no wonder the Humans weren't sure what they were looking for – to the Captain's best knowledge, such defensive systems were only theoretical exercises. It would likely be centuries of development before such investments become feasible for humans compared to expanding their fleets.
Heavy ground combat within the Arcology between the Geth and the colonists could explain most other anomalies in the raw and refined data from the Normandy. The Geth were attempting to disable the barrier protecting the Arcology with ground forces, and their ships in orbit were ready to open fire when it was disrupted. Anticipating a success in a short order explained their otherwise unwise positioning. There was something valuable down there that Geth wanted to be destroyed.
This was a neat explanation that made sense and accounted for the intelligence gathered by the scouts. It in no way disproved the notion that Duviso was looking at a trap she was ready to spring.
In the end, the Captain has a task and a duty. She was also responsible for giving her people the best odds of surviving the coming battle.
"XO, I want two of our frigates to remain inconspicuous and leave at the first sign we've sprung a trap. We can't rely on our communications remaining intact or not being compromised along the chain between this system and the Mass Relay. We will send an update on our plans going forward after we execute our attack on the Geth."
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The Death Dealer and her consorts dropped out of FTL in orbit of Feros, using the planet's curve to hide them from the enemy's sensors. Hangar bay doors opened, releasing shuttles and fighters, which rapidly plunged into the atmosphere, trusting that their barriers and armor would protect them. Meanwhile, the task force maneuvered into optimal firing positions and opened fire, shooting barrages of slugs much slower than usual. Each shot was on a trajectory carefully calculated to use the gravity of Feros to slingshot around the planet and end up intercepting the course of the Geth ships above the colony. With their small craft on their way and shots fired, the Turian ships jumped into FTL, maneuvering to attack the enemy from another angle just when their first shots reached their targets.
Under most circumstances, such an attack would have only worked against stations unable to maneuver because every defensive fleet in the galaxy worth their salt knew to regularly shift vectors to avoid precisely this kind of sneak attack. FTL communications and extensive sensor nets further mitigated the odds of successful sneak attacks within well-developed systems.
Out here, clever tactics that wouldn't have worked under most circumstances were suddenly viable, and Captain Duviso had no intention of fighting fairly.
The barrage struck just as Death Dealer emerged out of FTL in a flash of blue light, quickly followed by the rest of the task force. Even the Geth were too slow to react, in no small part because just as they detected the incoming threat, their ships faltered, struck by the earlier bombardment. Shields flared, straining power systems as drives went from idle to full power in a jolt. The Geth ships did their best to go evasive. However, they were starting from being practically dead in space. Physics was a harsh mistress, and it dictated that they didn't have enough time to accelerate and move into vectors that would make it possible for the Turian ships behind them to miss. Nevertheless, the correlation of forces was such that at least a handful of Geth vessels might have gotten away from the position they got themselves stuck in before the enemy could cripple or destroy them.
The opening steak barrage changed the equation. Already weakened barriers popped, and at the end of the day, the armor covering the rear arc was weaker due to the engine placement. Slugs slammed into engines, fuel lines, and fuel tanks before penetrating into engineering compartments, wreaking further havoc. Hydrogen and antimatter fuel pods lost containment, igniting chain reactions that tore apart the rear sections of multiple ships before the rapid fire of the Turians could cause even more damage, ending the fight in a brutal, one-sided slaughter.
