"What the hell was a Cylon beacon doing all the way out here?" Shepard asked as she helped tend to Rael, "And how are either of you still alive after that?" before her gaze locked onto the Security detail. The guard herself sighed and pulled up her omni-tool, revealing helmet camera recordings showing that, the moment the Beacon activated, all of the half-assembled Geth technology had come alive with it.
Weirdly enough, however, as the footage played, revealing the Beacon and its location, a door on the alien device cracked open and something moved through the mist and confusion of a combat area. A cloaked infiltrator unit. It started cutting down the reassembled Geth for some reason, the only thing telling this being the disappearance of some of the less-equipped Geth units.
Tali stared, stunned, "They fought each-other…?"
"That's odd," Garrus replied as he shifted his rifle forward, "The Geth and Cylon we met were buddy buddy, modified by Reaper Tech… There's something off about this unit, though," then he hit pause and pointed, "Look. Its camo never goes offline. I'm guessing they removed anything extraneous and the power-pack lets it keep the camo up," before watching a Quarian guard, who was exchanging fire with a Geth platform, disappear behind a table. A bloody smear then painted the wall behind said table.
"You think they pulled its IFF?" Fred inquired as he looked at Rael. The man shook his head, before coughing. Tali went back to her father and checked on him, while Fred stated, "Ma'am, we should call the Galactica and Evac. IF that thing's got Active Camo, we'll have a hard time spotting it, especially in the dark and without an EM weapon…" and he paused, his voice slightly lowering.
Anakin asked, "You got an idea, Spartan?"
He pulled a plasma grenade off his belt and lifted it to show it, to which Ahsoka chuckled, "Man, am I glad you guys keep those around. Not to mention the Blasters' stun function," and she looked at her Clones before she paused, turning her head toward one of the doors at the same time as Fred and Anakin. The entire room suddenly grew ten degrees colder and was so quiet, one could hear a pin drop.
The quiet thumping that both of them must've heard grew slightly louder, followed by the whine of what must've been a damaged antigravity engine. The two Knights of the Republic kept their hands on the hilts of their Lightsabers, while Fred followed the moving threats with his rifle, his Motion Tracker probably pinging them as hostile.
Rael covered his helmet's mouthpiece, trying to shut off his external speakers as he struggled to keep his coughs down, while Tali's hand hovered over her pistol, gaze locked on the door. Moments later, a much louder thump echoed, followed by the ripple-fire of a Geth plasma rifle and a blood-curdling digital scream.
Then, it all got quiet again. Fred's Motion Tracker showed clear, but the Spartan didn't dare lower his rifle. Shepard, now stiff as a rock, gloves creasing against her rifle's form, whispered, "What the fuck was that…?" while Tali sat there, too afraid to speak. The two Force Users exchanged another glance, only to pause as they saw Fred approach the door.
He told Tali, "Get your father farther back…" before he made sure his weapon was off safe and that a round was in the chamber. He walked up to the door and hit the floating haptic lock, watching as it began to turn. He heard the internal mechanisms of the door shift, before it cracked open and slid upward. The Spartan moved out, pieing both sides of the Hallway.
He was met by stains of coolant on the walls and floor, dripping from deep claw marks that more-so resembled those of a very, very agitated animal than those of a machine. The Geth's corpses lay past, in the flickering hallway, splayed out across the area. The only thing that survived whatever had just hit them was the Drone.
It hovered impotently toward Fred, weapon destroyed or disassembled by the locals, then scanned him. As the others filed out into the hallway to provide cover, the Drone slowly sputtered forward, losing altitude with each half-meter travelled, before it landed in Fred's hand. It chirped at him, the damage on its outer body visible, before his HUD flickered for a moment.
It was trying to get into his suit, but the firewalls and various defenses Cortana must have inadvertently set up for all of Blue Team during her long life as their team AI and John's long-time companion were keeping it out. Tali lifted her shotgun and said, "Let's just put this thing out of its misery, get dad off this ship and blow it up."
Fred watched a stream of data appear on his HUD next, then said, "Give it a second…" and waited. He allowed limited access to the Drone, feeling the faint traces of the datastream through his Neural Lace. He paused, watching information on the beacon appear, including the fact it was basically a drop/insertion pod.
He said, "The Drone… It's sending me information on the beacon," as he watched it all. It was in Geth or Old Quarian for the most part, but his helmet's systems, updated with translation software similar to what Shepard and the others had in their Omni-Tools not too long after their arrival in this version of the Milky Way, began translating it. Noticing the concern in the others' gazes, Tali especially, he told them, "It was a trap, alright… Guess the Cylon didn't expect it to be so successful though."
"Successful? The damn thing's slaughtering its supposed friends," Rael countered, though his voice was weak. Anakin helped him to his feet, with his sole remaining bodyguard coming in to help support the man.
"It's aboard your fleet and transmitting, sir," Fred replied, then added, "The inner pod is armored, too. Blasting the Alarei to pieces might mean it survives, even if by random chance. We need to hit it up close if we wanna destroy it," and he looked at the Drone, "And this little thing seems to know that. Probably doesn't want the rest of its buddies in the Consensus to be destroyed or subsumed."
"You were the first one to suggest we leave, Fred," Shepard spoke as she walked forward, "This new info changed it?"
"Yes, ma'am," The Spartan replied. He activated his own transmitters and started sending the data to the others, allowing them to see what he was seeing. Meanwhile, the drone chirped. It sounded uneasy. As they received the information the drone was transmitting, Tali stared at it for a moment. It was an enemy drone.
"How can we trust it?" Garrus asked, motioning to the little guy.
Fred shrugged, "It's the best source of information we have outside of the mainframe of the ship," before looking at Tali and stating, "We have your father and an officer here who can vouch for you at your Trial. If we wanna risk leaving the Pod whole, we can leave now with them and the intel they have. Otherwise-"
"Wait… Trial," Rael asked, "Did they actually…?" and he looked at his daughter. She nodded, averting her gaze, to which her father let out an exasperated sigh, murmuring, "I'm going to have to talk to Daro'Xen about this…" then he began coughing again. How bad were his injuries, nobody really knew. He had, however, presumably caught an infection of some kind.
"General," Shepard looked at Anakin, "Let's divvy up. One of us takes a few of the Clones and Admiral Zorah back to the hangar and keeps him safe there. The others move in, destroy the Beacon and try to kill the Reaper Cylon before it manages to get off this bucket," to which Anakin nodded. It was a decent plan, if a bit worrying. The damn thing couldn' take out everyone at once, at least.
"We'll get him there… Force Heal might actually help keep him stable," The man replied, "I'll try and rejoin once he's stable. Fives and the boys can handle security," and he heard the clicks of the boys' boots behind him. He smiled, to which Shepard herself approved with a thumbs-up. She rallied her half of the team and they prepped to move.
Zara stepped forward and said, "As much as I'd like to hang back, ma'am, that thing killed my people. I'll be tagging in with you and taking you straight to the beacon so we can disable it…" before checking her pistol. Garrus, Tali, Fred and the Clones exchanged glances, then nodded, before the teams bid quick goodbyes and began moving.
Marching down the corridors, they found flickering lights and battle damage, with blood smears, bullet holes and claw marks every few feet and the corpses of dead Quarians. It was honestly disheartening, but at least they knew what the hell they were dealing with. The team also realized that small drone that Fred had 'talked to' was with them.
For the time being, all they found was corpses. Geth ones, too, farther down the road. With the small Drone chirping at each corpse, trying to see if it would move. Much to its chagrin, presumably, none ever awoke. The battle damage mixed in with the disassembled parts from the machines. Some were missing eye panels, others, the articulated 'jaws' beside the central, glowing eye. Others missed arms and legs.
The Drones missed weapons for the most part, though that was understandable. Even their newly-acquired little guard buddy hovered without a weapon attached to its undercarriage and some smaller panels taken off. Tali herself commented, "I don't feel good about having a Geth drone with us… What if it's guiding that thing after us?"
"It got enough of a scan off the beacon to tell us how to deal with it," Fred replied, looking at her. She looked up at him, then sighed and nodded, with him stating, "Trust me, then, not it. Or them, I guess…" and shrugging. He didn't really know how to refer to the Drone, considering the Geth were apparently a Consensus. A mass of programs forming self-learning algorithms.
He paused as a warning flashed on his HUD, raised his balled fist and turned as the Drone chirped loudly, before moving behind him. The Spartan swiveled about, aimed his rifle and, once more, the entire group went quiet. Distant thumping filled their ears, with the entire team preparing their weapons, the Clones switching the weapons to fire stun rounds.
The machine, whatever it was, drew closer. The warnings in Fred's helmet blared a little louder, to the point he muted them and showed the Drone to be quiet. The thumps reverberated across the hull of the ship, causing the walls to creak alongside the Hull. The hull of the ship itself didn't sound like it was doing much better than the interiors…
A faint gravitational shift. The vessel was trying to move. They heard a light groan as its engines were trying to start, with Tali even remarking, "Sounds like the Beacon's trying to start the engines," in a whisper. She brought up her Omni-Tool and connected to the network while the others took cover, Fred shielding her with his own body.
The Drone beside him chirped again, its single optical sensor locked onto the ceiling. The Spartan showed everyone to wait, aimed up, then quickly flicked the rifle's firing mode to fully automatic again, peering through his own scope. The Drone provided a feed of the optical sensors picking up the 'movement' in the form of the noise of its feet touching the metal.
He whispered, "Be ready to shoot stun rounds," To the Clones over the com. Shepard gave him a tap on the shoulder to confirm they were ready. They all knew the damn thing was tracking them, so everyone prepped their weapons, with Ahsoka herself brandishing the hilts, but not activating the Lightsabers just yet.
The Spartan gave a countdown by lifting his left hand off his rifle and lifting three fingers. He slowly counted down, listening with his enhanced hearing as the machine moved overhead, slowly moving closer and closer while the Drone began to 'panic' in a way, shifting left and right. The second finger dropped and their fingers wrapped around their triggers, the Clones keeping steady, with Jesse mumbling, "This is gonna go well…"
When the last finger dropped, Fred quickly put his hand on the forward handguard and squeezed the trigger. A burst of high-caliber rounds ripped through the thin layer separating them from the machine and the audible scream of the monster filled the hallway, a blood-curdling, terrifyingly loud machine cry… It ripped through the ceiling, pipes spewing steam out, glass shattering as recessed LEDs broke.
The Spartan tried to keep his gun on target, watching the flickering camouflage as the bullets struck whatever armor plating the massive Cylon had. The Clones followed up, shifting and firing their blasters. Azure flashes of light punched through the steam, arcing electricity striking the seeming frame of the monster. It hissed at them and a burst of automatic fire left one of its arm-mounted machine guns, striking one of the Clones and puncturing the armor, thus forcing them to cease fire.
What few glimpses of it Fred had caught didn't paint a pretty picture. It was larger than the previous ones and more well armored, but it lacked the jump capabilities of the previous three that were encountered on Tuchanka. Either the Drive was too expensive to mount for this new Cylon, or this was just a testbed unit.
… He also saw that glowing 'V'-shaped eye. Turning around, he asked, "Everyone alive?"
The clone that got shot, Sharpy, groaned and said, "Wish I wasn't, sir," as Fred walked up to him. It seemed as though the burst had hit a bit more than just the Clone, though. Turning his head right, Fred also saw a shattered Quarian mask and a collapsed form. He quickly checked to see who it was, soon PIDing her as Zara, then saw Tali beside her, eyes wide.
He sighed deeply, then gently placed a hand on Tali's shoulder, causing the girl to look up at him. She seemed to take a moment to process it, then shook her head and breathed out shakily, lifting her shotgun and racking the pump. She said, "We must've pissed it off…" before standing up and gently closing Zara's eyes.
Fred nodded, then walked over to help Sharpy, offering him a hand and stating, "It looks worse than it is," as he saw the wound. It was a gut shot, but the armor plate had taken most of the impact, relatively speaking. He was still bleeding, but it wasn't bad. The Clone laughed, hunched over and mumbled something, only to pause as Fred pulled a medical device off his belt and said, "Biofoam. Stick the nozzle in the wound, it'll patch you up until we get home."
"Sir," The Clone nodded, gently taking the tube and doing as asked. He lifted his blaster, then looked at the General, who had ignited her lightsaber but never got to use it. Meanwhile, she looked at Shepard and saw the Commander immediately give the order to move out. They needed to destroy that thing, whatever it was and the best way to do that was threaten its little deployment pod, which was assumed to be like its home.
Shepard inquired, "Think the Drone can get us there?" as she prepped her rifle.
"It and Tali," The Spartan offered. Tali herself gave her approval, getting a fist bump against her shoulder from Garrus. The two old friends bumped fists next, then the advance began again. Passing by destroyed Geth and the corpses of Quarians, the team soon ran into their first contact with actual Geth, pausing just enough for the first of them to swivel about and fire a burst of plasma.
The rounds zipped through and struck Fred's armor, but the Spartan was quick, destroying the leading of the Geth with a rifle shot clean through the central optic. The second and third Geth moved up, one of them being a heavily disassembled prime with all internals visible. That one fell to Shepard, Garrus and Tali to take out. They did, pelting it with enough rounds from their rifles to tear clean through the kinetic barrier and spray its coolant across the wall behind it.
Following up, Ahsoka outstretched her arm, then pulled it back, bringing forth the last Geth and slicing it in half. As the corpse dropped, the team punched through toward the target area, lead by Tali and the Drone. It began to chirp again, flashing warnings across the squad's tools, com systems and HUDs about the hostile. It turned around and started trying to paint the target for Fred.
He swiveled about and fired, catching the target dead in the chest. The round actually pierced through the armor, but did no damage at first aside from causing the camouflage to ripple, revealing the much thicker frame of the machine, including its strange new, almost humanoid face, eyes replaced by the V visor. Fred saw faint movement as its arm extended and the guns shifted into position.
He grabbed Tali by the arm and pulled her back as the rapid-fire burst rang through, striking ceiling lights and the walls. The clones, now wisened up to the enemy, swiveled about and fired toward it, forcing it into cover as its camouflage flickered and almost died under the EM rounds. It skittered away again, audibly screeching in pain.
The group turned a corner, Ahsoka asking, "We going the right way, Tali!?"
"Yes!" The girl replied as she loaded a fresh thermal clip into her shotgun and racked the pump. As they crossed past another T-intersection, the girl lifted her shotgun and fired a blast toward the right, catching the enemy unit with a few stray 'pellets'. She spoke, "It's following us! Must've figured out we're trying to take its home out!"
"Means we're doing something right!" Shepard commented, only to hear the little drone chirp affirmatively at her. She chuckled and, at the next intersection, she fired her rifle toward where the monster was supposed to be coming from. Three shots, two of which went wide and struck the wall behind it. Another hit its armor plate, to which it returned fire. The shots struck Shepard's kinetic barriers, depleting them.
The clones fired stun rounds at it again, a firing line. Electrical currents arced off the walls and caused its cloak to falter again, before Jesse switched his pistols to standard blasters and let loose a volley of bolts. The rounds drilled through the armor plate, destroying part of the active camouflage panels. He called out, "Alright, it's suppressed!" as Fred moved up and fired, too.
Bullets zipped past their heads as they moved through the door at the end of the corridor, with Tali and the Drone instantly shutting and locking it behind them. She said, "That should keep it aw-" before blanking as its claws dug through the reinforced steel with little issue and started peeling it open. Its strange humanoid 'mouth' opened, screaming again, a reverberating, altered human voice.
Shepard put the barrel of her rifle into the hole and fired, staggering the machine and forcing it back. They ran across the room they were in, seeing dozens more corpses piled around them, both Geth and Quarian, on operating tables or just dead on the floor, blood smears painting the walls scarlet. They punched through to the ship's center, closing another door behind them.
Finally entering their target room, they saw it:The Probe. It was pulsating, transmitting still, connected to a multitude of wires that were trying to track the signal. Tali said, "I'll start working to disable it if you can cover me, Shepard," only to see her Commander give a thumbs up. The group heard the thumping of the monster's hands slamming against the door, before claws began to dig through the plate.
… Then it stopped…
And the lights in the place went dark. Shepard barked, "Bastard just took out our sightlines!" as she turned on her flashlight. The Spartan turned on his VISR, while Ahsoka and the Clones activated helmet-mounted flashlights and turned to face the door again, weapons ready. The drone beside Fred hovered, trying to light the place and pinpoint the target.
The enemy began clawing at the door. The entire force began laying down hellfire the moment the first ray of light poked through, while Tali called out, "I'm gonna need help setting up a bomb!" before pausing. Shepard barked a cease-fire order, noting that they'd drilled clean through the door at this point. Yet, there was no corpse.
The Drone began to whine and chirp, audibly worried as it gazed up. It displayed the machine's muffled steps above and Fred didn't even hesitate. He primed and stuck a plasma grenade to the wall just in front of where the monster would be, took a step back and let the grenade detonate, boiling away the creature's 'floor' from under it.
… It pounced from the fire, camouflage flickering, parts of its armor melting, and landed on top of Fred, cocking back its claw-armed right hand while screaming in anger at Fred. The others began to pelt it with Plasma bolts and bullets while the Spartan dodged the first strike, slammed his armored head against it, then drew his rifle to try and destroy it.
A blast from Tali's shotgun staggered it and, behind it, a lightsaber ignited, before moving diagonally from its right hip to its left shoulder. Ahsoka, who was a second away from doing the same thing from the front, breathed a sigh of relief and smiled as she watched the monster's halves fall to the floor. Fred was quick to put two slugs into its head, before looking at Tali and giving a nod of thanks.
Anakin, who'd probably just caught up with them, stowed his lightsaber and said, "Tali's father's stable… Where's the bodyguard, Zara?" while looking around. He paused as he saw Jesse shake his head, then sighed and said, "Well, that's gonna hurt Rael a bit," before clipping his lightsaber's hilt to his belt.
Shepard said, "I'm surprised you didn't see her body back there, sir…" then he looked over at the Geth drone as it seemed to chirp happily at the destruction of the alien machine. It then turned to face the beacon probe and scanned its internals, before hovering over to Tali to chirp at her a little. The girl waved the drone off, to which it let out a sad noise and returned to Fred. Shepard chuckled and asked, "Ya gonna keep that?"
"Thinking about it," Fred replied. He saw Tali turn toward him, then said, "It helped us."
"It's Geth," Tali replied in a mumble, then sighed deeply and said, "Fair enough, I guess…" before looking up at the pod. She said, "This thing is connected to the ship's mainframe… It might have stored the Data we need. If you give me a second, I can download it before we blow it to pieces with a grenade."
"Go ahead," Shepard replied, "Might be useful in the Trial…"
Tali nodded, wordlessly activating her Omni-Tool to start downloading while also helping Fred set up a daisy-chain of explosives, with his second plasma grenade as its detonator. The rest of the team secured the area, making sure the Cylon creature was destroyed. They saw the blue-shining technology of the Reapers poking out of it and realized it was fairly close to a Husk… Terrifying if the Husks got upgrades now, too.
"Alright," Tali spoke, "Downloaded… What the…?" and she paused. Shepard and the others gathered around, with Tali showing them what she found. Research logs detailing exactly what Rael and his team were doing here under Daro'Xen's orders. The Geth technology Tali had been sending back to the Fleet was rather obviously deactivated and stripped of its intelligence cores, which had been sent separately for use in other experiments by the Intelligence Division.
Her father had, in direct opposition to rules set by the Conclave and Admiralty Board together, begun activating the machines to test out counter-intrusion and combat software on them. And, for the most part, they were succeeding in the experiments, with even a quote from Daro'Xen over com telling Rael, "The end of our War with the Geth is coming, Rael. These ships don't have many more generations left… It is now, or never."
Sighing, slightly disappointed, Tali said, "I heard rumors that they were preparing. There was a lot of scuttlebutt in the Flotilla about it, too, but…" and she looked at some of the disassembled Geth, plus the drone hovering near Fred, "I guess I sort of understand… I just wish I wasn't an accessory to what is a capital crime. This could have devolved to an extreme I don't even want to think about."
"And Admiral Xen ain't exactly wrong about the ships, either, is she?" Jesse spoke, crossing his arms as he looked around, "They're old. Couple centuries with basically patchwork maintenance means not a lot of life left in the Liveships like the Rayya without a complete overhaul at a Shipyard," and he looked at Anakin.
"An overhaul we could provide with the help of the UNSC and Colonials," Anakin nodded, though he seemed in thought. He was, honestly, mostly on how to get Tali off the hook without incriminating Rael. He was still her Father and they were only doing this to prepare for a War that the entire Fleet seemed to know was coming… He sighed. Tough decisions.
Ahsoka smiled, then saw Tali look up at them with surprise. She added, "Don't worry, Tali. If there's something I've learned about my old master over here, it's that he's gonna figure out a way to get that done…" which caused Anakin to crack a smile, too. Tali let out a sound of relief, then stood up and nodded.
Shepard told them, "Alright, team. Pack it in," as she, too, seemed to be trying to figure out what to do with this new information. As they moved out, Fred thumbed the activation button of the plasma grenade and thus the whole chain of explosives. They quickly hauled it out of the room, Drone included, before the explosives ripped apart the Beacon…
… The ship's lights flickered for a moment as power fluctuated, Tali calling out, "Power surge! There's…" and she blanked, "A transmission going out over the ship's FTL Com system!" only for the vessel to be rocked by another power surge. When all had settled, the Com system went quiet and the team stood there, wondering what had just happened.
Meanwhile, in Deep Space nearby… A force stirred awake…