Disclaimer: I do not own the Mass Effect games. This story is written with no profit in mind. I make no money from it. It isn't for sale or rent.

Chapter 4

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Part 5

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24.04.2183GS

Archaeological dig site

Therum

Five thousand odd Geth runtimes inhabiting a Colossus platform suddenly found themselves the highest authority in their theatre of operation. Their first clue that something went even more wrong was when tens of thousands Geth programs either died or had to emergency transmit themselves to the remaining ships in orbit, before the frigates fled destruction… after a stealth ship destroyed their cruiser. The sheer shock of the impossibility of the situation made the Geth freeze while trying to process the conflicting data and as a result their platform stumbled and only automated programs kept it from crashing on the sharp rocks it walked over.

An organic commander in their shoes wouldn't have been really surprised by something else going wrong. After all, the only thing that actually went right since the Geth arrival in orbit was the opening barrage that levelled the local SA military garrison and with that strike – supposedly eliminated the bulk of the resistance on the ground. After that, the operation should have been simple – land forces at the capital and all active archaeological sites, locate their target and capture her if practical and if not, reinforce the position until she was either subdued and ready for transport or dead. As a secondary objective – recover as much refined material as practical until the primary got accomplished in order to fuel their industrial development.

That was where the plan went horrendously wrong – or it would have if the Geth had the capacity to feel that way. First, the resistance on the ground turned out to be orders of magnitude greater than expected, which was a problem for two reasons. First, with the primary objective's location unknown, CAS from anything but light craft was out of the question in order not to accidentally terminate her.

Second – ever since the Geth aligned with the Old Machines separated from the Orthodox Consensus, they had to dedicate majority of their platforms on building up their industrial base – something that was still ongoing. The original development plan called for six more months before sufficient industrial assets could come online with six months after that until the Geth could have enough platforms and equipment to fully staff and equip their existing ships and crew all existing and in development facilities. The discovery of the Prothean beacon on Eden Prime thus presented both a grave complication and opportunity, with the Old Machine, Nazara, ultimately deciding that such an asset couldn't be left in the hands of the organics.

Simply put, the Geth lacked the assets to properly go after the majority of objectives they had to cover. Nevertheless, they did plan for overkill on the important ones – like Eden Prime, and combat data gathered there indicated that even if orbital support was restricted for most of this operation, they did have more than enough ground deployable assets to accomplish their primary objective with time to spare. Intelligence indicated that Therum wouldn't be a strategic priority for the SA and it would be at least twenty four to thirty more hours before Human ships in enough numbers to challenge the Geth deployment in system could arrive.

Both of those calculations turned out to be in error… and they still had three sites with confirmed Asari present, with no confirmation to the location of the primary objective at any of them. That in turn meant that the frigate assets in orbit were spread doing their best to help locate enemy movements on the ground, restrict, interdict and intercept them when located – which meant further division of already limited forces.

The Colossus platform left out an electronic whine of frustration, an act that further confused some of the programs inhabiting it. Yet, enough of them reached consensus and began issuing orders, while the rest remained confused and continued to argue. They had to locate and neutralize the primary objective in order to deny it to the organic enemies – a task easier said than done, because with the loss of the orbitals to hostile forces, the Geth planet side suddenly found themselves in isolated clusters unable to reliably communicate with each other. The programs within the Colossus issued a set of orders to all assets they could reach and soon thirty ground platforms and drones converged near the entrance of the mine where the heart of the dig site was located. With a live retrieval of the primary objective no longer a concern, the Geth had no more qualms in bringing heavy weapons to bear and soon unleashed them upon the few remaining defenders – who held so long only thanks to an Asari Commando bolstering their ranks. She was also the primary reason why the Geth were there in force – a possible indication that the primary objective was inside this very mine.

Missiles, grenades and plasma blasts rained into the entrance to meet a biotic barrier.

The barrier survived the initial onslaught. The ceiling – not so much. With the tunnel collapsing, the Geth ceased their assault and waited for a group of them who were busy repairing a nearby digging machine; soon, they would be able to make their own entrance now that the defenders were buried under tons of rock.

Active sensors sent a warning that made the Colossus raise its head and primary weapon upwards. A streak of light burned through the sky headed straight for them. Recognition and threat assessment algorithms examined it with machine speed and reached a depressing conclusion – that was an orbital strike and while low powered – the equivalent of a less than a hundred tons of explosive, it was coming too fast for the Colossus to evade it. The same was true for the other platforms as well, however the drones had a chance to make it on the other side of the tall hill where the entrance of the mine was located. The Geth knew it was unlikely to have any effect, they were already calculating the odds, when they opened fire at the descending kinetic impactor with everything they had. They managed to even hit it couple of times – though there was no time to evaluate the effect because a flash of light and heat rudely terminated their processes along with the platform holding them.

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Part 6

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24.04.2183GS

SSV Normandy

Therum

If you asked most people within the Systems Alliance, especially its military, John Shepard was a hero who knew no fear. Even now, years later, his face was plastered on recruitment posters all over Human space, often with a variant of an iconic image from the Blitz captured by a crazy enterprising reporter who not only helped in the defence after being more or less conscripted for the task, but used the down time between getting into cover for his weapon to cool or shields to recharge to take pictures with her omni-tool. It helped that the woman was a retired veteran from Shanxi, though that didn't make her any less crazier or less of a pain in Shepard's ass. She was the one to coin the moniker 'Lion of Elysium' and it was her pictures of him that all but confirmed it to the masses. John had been relieved when the insane woman finally decided to retire and stop spreading his legend either of a misplaced sense of mischief or genuine belief into him being more than he was.

The truth, one he couldn't really show as a leader of men, was quite different. Fear was his constant companion and as his N training empathised, it was one of the things that kept you alive. There were graveyards chock full with dead fearless soldiers and those they dragged down with themselves. The trick of being effective was to use your fear, overcome it but not let it hold you back.

That was easier said than done, however. John would forever be thankful for hardsuits and enclosed helmets – they helped nicely conceal the fact that he often got pale or even lightly shook before deployment. Curiously enough, once he was already underway and adrenaline kicked in for the first time, he was all right. Before that? He usually needed something to distract himself with, yet not to such an extent he overlooked something important.

One of John's preferred methods was to get as comfortable as possible on the driver's seat of a Mako when a deployment allowed it, calmly check if everything was working as it was supposed to do, and put some uplifting music through the speakers. It wasn't like doing so would make a frigate air-dropped IFV any more noticeable anyway. It helped that as an N7 operative, despite his rank he usually deployed with and managed small amount of people – couple squads of special forces or the marine contingent of a frigate, usually three squads at the most. If they were available and needed them, he could take command of more forces once hitting the ground but otherwise, he had a lot less to manage than his rank would otherwise imply. That said, he could only bump up to a full Commander and still expect to get into the fray from the start if it wasn't for his newly minted Spectre status. Even with the rules for special forces being a bit different than for the rest of the rank and file, once he got to be a Captain the only way he would get to fire his weapon in anger would be if something went wrong – like taking out someone his subordinates couldn't neutralize in time if he was anywhere near the sharp end anyway.

Until recently, John had a mixed feelings about that prospect, though now, with the political implications of his assignments they all went out of the airlock.

"Music, sir?" Williams asked after she finished inspecting the rest of the marines and strapped herself in the back of the Mako right across Alenko.

"The Commander has a distinct style." John could hear Alenko's smirk as he spoke.

"While we aren't making an orbital drop today, it fits." Shepard answered. "Besides, its good for morale me thinks." Good for my nerves too, he added in his mind.

"It certainly is!" Corporal Esif nodded vigorously in synch with the upbeat music.

"Everyone ready, Gunny?" Shepard asked and looked over his shoulder. Depressingly enough, they had just enough deployable SA troopers left on the Normandy to fill up the back of the Mako and as IFVs went, its passenger compartment was on the small side.

"Everyone's good, sir."

"That's what I want to hear. Corporal, you're in control of the weapon station."

"Tank you, sir!" Esif chirped gleefully.

Alenko, Williams, Corporal Esif, and Private First Class Sing – along with Shepard himself they made a single fire-team. It was a far cry from the three full squads, six fire-teams and a command section they deployed with on Eden Prime. At least this time around they had the proper tools on hand to handle Geth – everyone had disruptor and AP ammo, heavy weapons and overload programs on their omni-tools. Everyone had reinforced their shields as much as their armours could support too, either thanks to what the small Alliance depot on the Citadel could give them or the supplies they brought from the Spectre Armoury.

Shepard could only hope that their preparations would be enough. On the other hand, this time they didn't have to play light infantry, neither go in completely blind and it was nice to enjoy uncontested orbital control too. He knew that even as the Normandy sliced her way through the atmosphere, two Turian ships were on her flanks deploying shuttles and engaging Geth troop concentrations unlucky enough to be away from anything important and the machines lacked the benefit of AA emplacements that they for some reason had refused to take from orbit unlike any friendly survivors in the capital.

"We're two minutes away from the capital. Preparing to engage targets of opportunity with Gardian lasers." Joker announced. "Strike One, you're clear to deploy."

An alarm blared signalling that the hangar's ramp would open shortly and prompting any personnel in the compartment to either leave or put on a helmet, activate their magnetic boots and hold on. Shepard switched on the Mako's systems and synced them with his omni-tool and thus his helmet's HUD, which gave him close to 360 degree view as long as the cameras mounted on the IFV were operational. He saw the Turian boxy shuttle lift off and shoot out of the ship.

A few moments later, John synced up the Mako's systems with the Normandy, thus getting a view from her forward cameras. The capital was still far below them, though it was fast approaching and despite the ash and clouds, there was enough to be seen to make him wince. There were multiple burning buildings – with dark acrid smoke twisting in the air and pooling above the settlement. As they approached, he saw from up close what was left from the small SA base meant to defend the place and he was thankful that it had been build far enough from the capital to ensure that someone taking it out from orbit wouldn't flatten half the town.

That was why it was built there in the first place – his training confirmed.

While a pleasant surprise, the fact that there were friendlies still fighting down there along with intact heavy AA was confusing. Shepard could understand why the Geth might have been reluctant to employ orbital strikes in the capital's proper, especially if they wanted T'soni alive and didn't know where she was. The presence of said Gardian towers also explained why there was no enemy frigate hovering above the city and burning down any and all sources of resistance – unlike on ships, ground emplacements could have much larger power sources, better cooling and while due to atmosphere not much better range than a frigate's the steer power they could pump was a significant threat to the small ships. If the Geth had limited warships in theatre, it would be plausible they would want to conserve them and take out the AA from the ground. It was obvious they had succeeded in most cases – there were just two of the emplacements remaining so far. However, with that many frigates and a cruiser, the machines should have been able to deploy more than enough strength to deal with the garrison even without taking it from orbit and even have units left to go after the outlying dig sites, not just the capital. They were Geth – machines, so no need of life support and thus were able to stick as many platforms inside their ships as volume permitted.

Yet, they obviously hadn't. What the Normandy could see with passive sensors during the battle and now with every active one lit up as if Christmas came early, indicated a much more conservative ground deployment than expected. That had interesting implications…

"Alenko – a note, once we have a Geth platform to hack, we need to figure out why they didn't send more troops down there."

"Yes, sir."

"We'll reach deployment zone in twenty. Strike-two, prepare to jump." Joker announced.

"Hold on, this is going to get bumpy." Shepard warned and focused on the camera feeds.

The Normandy flew straight towards the closest remaining AA emplacement and soon Joker opened with the forward facing Gardians. There was enough ash and other nastier stuff in the air that the usually invisible lasers had to burn their way through on top of the atmosphere, something that made for an impressive light-show. Lances of coherent light speared from the descending frigate and tow, then explosively converted two, then three groups of Geth into slag pooling over glassed streets.

As expected, John saw that the best place to land was the primary approach towards the AA emplacement – it was wide enough to allow heavy transports to move spare parts up to it. He began a mental count down considering the Normandy's speed, angle of approach and how potent the Mako's thrusters were. He revved up the engine and when the mental counter reached zero released the clamps holding the IFV in place.

"Strike-two, deploying." Shepard announced and accelerated down the open ramp. The vehicle shook and he hit the thrusters the moment the front wheels hit open space. The Mako flew away from the Normandy and fell down just slow enough to avoid damage. Geth drones that survived Joker's attention opened up with missiles and rapid fire mass accelerators and Esif wasted no time trying to engage them. The shields and APS took care of the incoming ordnance just as the Mako hit the ground and the combined result was that if not for the heavy straps holding everyone in place, they would be bouncing all over the interior from the resulting shocks. Even then, the commotion was enough to rattle teeth and make people dizzy – something that John didn't allow to slow him down as he forced the IFV to turn around and point its better armoured front to the enemy drones. A missile detonated against the shields shaking everyone and finally Esif could return fire – as the roar of the HMG and the heartening thump of the cannon announced. Shepard wasted no time in driving back, thus opening the distance between them and the remaining drones – four, no three now after his gunner nailed one. Two more missiles streaked their way, however the APS managed to take them out – one at a safe distance and the second close enough for the shock-wave to buffer the vehicle. Esif then nailed another drone and turned her attention to the remaining two.

"Disembark, take out the drones and check for survivors. Corporal, you'll have the vehicle once the apparent threats are neutralized." Shepard ordered.

"Go!" Alenko shouted and hit the release button for the rear entrance. The restrains released the troopers with a quiet hiss and three of them piled out, careful to use the IFV as cover. Alenko sent an overload at one of the drones and the other two wasted no time in engaging it with AP and disruptor ammo respectively. Meanwhile, the Corporal did her best to shred the other, wildly evading machine. Within seconds it was over and as his subordinates carefully approached the AA emplacement, Shepard turned the Mako around to face down the street and made his way out, leaving Esif to take command of the IFV.

Shepard saw Alenko and Williams covering the buildings to the left and right, while the corpsman ran to perform triage. He shouldered his weapon and carefully moved to back them up while dividing his attention between the motion tracker and the shot up surroundings.

"We've got a live one here!" Sign declared. "He'll make it too, it looks like."

"Sing, get him in a talking state, Williams debrief him." Shepard ordered. "Normandy, Strike-two Actual, we've secured the AA and found survivors. We'll gather intelligence and get back to you. Status on allied deployments?"

"We've got Turian shuttles heading for the VIP's possible locations outside the capital and a ready reserve to deploy in your AO once you've linked up with the locals and made sure they won't get shot out of the sky. I'm coming in for another strafing run to pick up enemy stragglers and will be on station if you need support." Joker said.

"He's as good as he'll get, Gunny. I'm going to check on the rest." Sing left the survivor to Williams and sprinted to a makeshift barricade below the tower where a bunch of wounded laid in pools of blood along with the corpse of the medic who had been trying to keep them alive. "We'll need immediate Med-evac here!" The PFC shouted after taking one good look at the casualties. "Unless we get them to Chakwas now, they're goners!"

"Normandy, Strike-two Actual, can you safely hover above our position to pick up wounded in the Mako?" Shepard asked.

"Strike-two Actual, Joker, it should be safe enough."

"Alenko, use your biotics to get the wounded in the Mako, yesterday. We'll cover you. Sing, can the other survivor wait for later pickup?"

"He's stable enough." The corpsman hollered back.