The atmosphere in the camp was chilling. A massive trench surrounded the whole camp, turian squads hunkered down within every available inch of space. About two hundred meters out in every direction was thick forest. There were a few paths through the foliage, though not many.

Pervax, while projecting an image of utter calm, was as nervous as everyone else on the inside. A ground battle against an enemy they knew nothing about was always a recipe for disaster. It was undoubtedly why the acting commander had ordered the Cabal to go into the field and scout. It was tactically the correct decision, but Pervax admitted to himself that losing biotic support when they were about to be attacked was not a good feeling.

Still, that didn't mean they were defenseless, not by a long shot. A camp of over two hundred turians couldn't be. Behind the trench where protective walls. Behind those were emplacement guns, heavy turrets that could put out enough fire to reduce a turian to paste in less than a second. Behind those was a full array of vehicles. Mostly IFV class, though they were lucky to have three Krask rocket artillery. Still, any enemy that could achieve spaceflight could put together armor support, and Pervax didn't want to go against that.

The first sign of the enemy was the swerving of several nearby by turrets to face the sky. Their V.I. had already locked on to some distant target and Pervax already cursed under his breath. The enemy had air support. His helmet zoomed in on the distant vehicle, a helicopter of some type. It approached them briskly, though it did not open fire. When it got close enough to fall within overlapping fields of fire, three separate turrets unleashed their weapons, filling the air both with storms of mass effect-accelerated slugs and a sound like constant thunder, easily enough to deafen any turian without a helmet.

The helicopter died in a second, though Pervax knew without a doubt that it was just a scouting force. Indeed, it wouldn't be long before the next sign of the enemy came. It was a horde of transports which stopped themselves just beyond the range of the emplacement guns and disgorged an array of troops.

"What the- what kind of aliens are that?!" spoke one of the privates near Pervax. He couldn't help but agree silently. Even though he had seen footage that the attacked squad had captured, none of it offered a look at what the invaders looked like up close, merely their vehicles. The sight of their forms was revolting, to say the least.

They were all cyborgs, though nothing like the modifications in Citadel space, at least any he had seen. Where most cybernetics were made to replace missing limbs or organs, the aliens had seemingly replaced almost their entire bodies with metal. Some had even replaced their hands with weapons such as blades. Whatever skin they had was pale and withered, almost stretched out over more metal. It looked far too brutal and invasive to be voluntary, as if whatever government they served had forcibly mutilated them all into soldiers. An old legend popped into Pervax's head, that during the height of the Krogan Rebellions the Hierarchy commissioned a set of cybernetic warriors capable of fighting the Krogan head on. The project was ultimately dropped because the procedures were too agonizing, and ultimately made soldiers that were little better than before, or so the legends goes. It appears these aliens thought otherwise.

They clustered around their transports, seemingly preparing to charge them from beyond the turrets range. Unfortunately for them, they were not beyond the range of the Krask rockets. The entire division went up in smoke and fire. It all felt too easy for Pervax, like the enemy was just testing their capabilities. That, or stalling to mass forces.

Unfortunately, he was proven right a few seconds later. Suddenly, there was a sound like thunder coming from all directions. It was immediately followed by an absolute swarm of alien troops pouring out from the walls of the woods. Any idea of measured response was abandoned. It was an all out attack, dozens and dozens of troops supported by more armored trucks.

The turian line responded in turn. Squads fired mass accelerators in sequence. Phaestons unleashed dozens of slugs, reached their near max heat capacity, and cooled off while another soldiers fired in their place. It was a system that let the lines emit constant fire, no one section would leave itself open. Supported by emplacement cannons and IFV vehicles, not one of the cyborgs got halfway to the trench.

That didn't mean they went down easy. Their cybernetic enhancements granted them a heavy level of durability, rounds hitting their chests would often hit three of four times in the same area before penetrating. Many of them had limbs be shot off only to continue charging and firing with their off hand. Many turian soldiers silently thanked the spirits that the enemy hadn't sought to outfit their troops with kinetic barriers.

The return fire was by no means pleasant either. Most of them carried kinetic weapons, though a few carried stranger affair. One soldier fired a rocket at once of the turrets, though instead of a standard explosion it released some strange energy. Worse were the multiple soldiers that fired heavy machine guns that unleashed blasts of energy. More than a few turians found their barriers popped and ended up going down. Those soldiers were marked as priority targets.

Despite the tide unrelenting, the turians were holding them back. It wasn't pretty, and a few troopers went down, but there were over a hundred turians, and any cyborgs that got past the halfway point were shredded by the IFVs. At least that's how it went at first. But it became apparent the cyborgs had a few extra tricks when the distant sound of roaring reverberated over the battlefield, soon revealing itself to be a massive missile coming from behind the treeline. Thankfully, much of the turian armor was rated for point defense, and what could have been a devastating strike exploded in the air. But every vehicle and turret stopping a missile was one not stopping a cyborg, and it was more than apparent that the enemy had far more than one missile. This battle was just getting started.

Hey guys, finally managed to get out another chapter, and the fighting finally begins. I hope you enjoy.