3-09-4
"Twenty seconds left, Shepard!" Jeong's voice nearly vibrated with the tense emotions Robert felt in him. Fear bordering on terror, frustration, anger.
"This guy's going off the deep end," Ashley remarked. "If we go in unarmed he could shoot us all."
"And if we go in with guns blazing, who knows how many people get hurt?" Robert asked. "I can stop him if he acts, but I say let's play along."
Shepard looked back at them, her green eyes moving from Ashley to Robert. After Jeong shouted five seconds she nodded. "Alright." Louder, she shouted, "We're coming out, weapons down!" Shepard holstered her shotgun and held her hands out.
Ashley gave a frustrated look and put her rifle up. Robert holstered his pistol and joined her in following Shepard into the open.
Behind them, Tali grumbled in Quarian, not bothering to let her vocoder translate it.
Stepping into the open gave them a view of what was happening. Liz Baynham was on the ground, a growing pool of blood below her and her mother kneeling over her. Juliana's hands were stained with her daughter's blood, trying to stop the bleeding from Liz's hip. Standing over them, gun extended, was Ethan Jeong. His security personnel had their guns drawn as well, if at rest. "I've read up on you, Shepard. And your team." Robert sensed the desperation, the near panic, within Jeong. Something had gone wrong. "I was still hoping you wouldn't find out about Species 37. That you'd get rid of the Geth and clear out. That this treacherous little bitch would be dead."
"Well, we know," Shepard said. Her voice was firm, but without the edge of active threat. "You used the Zhu's Hope colonists as test subjects. Little more than lab rats. You broke the law and made yourself a monster."
"Who cares about a few stupid colonists?" he shot back. "Analysis of the Thorian could lead us to whole new ways of understanding how to manipulate a brain. ExoGeni had the chance of a lifetime here on Feros, we couldn't let the colonists screw it up! Imagine being able to control violent prisoners without guns? Or being able to break up riots? We could do this with the Thorian's spores if we can figure out how to reproduce them and use them ourselves."
"You're talking about slavery," Robert said. "That's what this is."
"No it's not!" Jeong retorted. "But I'd expect to hear that kind of thing from you. I've read up on you too. You're worse than Shepard! You made a career out of sticking your nose in and demanding everybody obey you or get blown away by a starship gun."
"Put the gun down, Jeong," Shepard said. Again her voice was firm, and now it took a commanding edge. "I don't want to hurt you."
"I don't care what you want! Because of you, because of Saren, I'm ruined!"
Robert felt it then. Jeong's uncertainty, his fear, all of it held him in check. But it was starting to shift. Within seconds he would build up the nerve and give the order to open fire.
He reached up with his hand. With the movement his power reached out and gripped Jeong's firearm. Jeong cried out in surprise when the gun was wrenched from his hand and sent flying into Robert's own hand.
Biotic energy surged from Shepard's arm and struck one of the guards. He went flying backward.
The other guard brought his weapon up. But before he could fire Robert reached out with his energy again. This time, however, his control slipped. Instead of grabbing the weapon like he'd done to Jeong, Robert felt his energy become raw, unchannelled force. It struck the man directly and sent him flying as if struck by a car. He slammed into the opposite wall and fell, utterly still. Nearby researchers rushed to check on him. With a sense of panic himself Robert desperately sought out the man's life energy, to make sure he survived, and was relieved to feel said life was intact and not fading. He hadn't killed the man on accident.
Jeong stared at his open hand with wide eyes, followed by glancing back at the guard Robert had just tossed. Accident or not, it had a clear sobering effect upon the ExoGeni officer. "God, you… you're… you're not going to kill me, are you?"
"That wasn't in the plan, no." Shepard glanced toward Robert with evident concern. He returned the look sheepishly. "A bit much, wasn't it?"
"Not intended. I let my control slip."
"I'll say," Ashley said. "He looked like he was hit by an aircar. If he wasn't in tactical armor I think it might have actually killed him."
"Be more careful next time, please," Shepard instructed Robert. He responded with a nod. "And can you help Miss Baynham? It doesn't look serious, but I want to make sure she's alright."
"Sure." Robert went over and kneeled beside the mother and daughter. He could sense the wound was indeed not too serious, so long as the bleeding was stopped. "I'll hold it in while you get a medical kit," he told Juliana, who responded by pulling her blood-coated hands away. Robert, rattled as he was at his failure in control, didn't want to risk it again by using his life energies, instead pushing his hands to the wound and applying pressure. "You'll be okay," he assured Liz.
The wounded young woman responded with a nod.
Shepard turned her attention to the rapidly-paling Jeong. "Alright, why did you want to kill us? What's going on here, and what's it got to do with Saren?" Her eyes narrowed. "Start from the beginning."
"Saren Arterius found out about our experiment," Jeong said. "I don't know how, but since he's a Spectre I guess he had ways to do it. He came to me about a week ago and threatened to expose ExoGeni if we didn't give him access to the Thorian. He wouldn't let me call Corporate so I had to make the decision."
"And instead of helping us set a trap for the most-wanted man in the galaxy, you knuckled under," Ashley said accusingly.
"If these experiments were exposed, the company would be ruined!" Jeong insisted. "The fines alone, and plus the lawsuits…"
"Don't forget the jail time," Robert added from where he was aiding the Baynhams. Juliana was now returning with a medkit, including a medigel dispenser. "Especially for you. Your bosses certainly would've negotiated a plea deal."
"I couldn't let news get out!" Jeong insisted. "So I let Saren have access and thought it was over. Then yesterday the Geth attacked!"
"Whatever Saren got from the Thorian, he must be afraid we can get it," Tali said.
"I'm not sure… listen, the Thorian made him give someone up. One of the Asari he went with didn't come back." Jeong shook his head. "The Thorian, I don't think it sees us as living beings. We're… we're tools to it. Potential thralls, that's it."
"And you were feeding people to it." Ashley glowered at him. "How would you like it if the damn thing enslaved you?!"
"It was for a higher cause. The company… we would've compensated the subjects!"
"If any survived, you mean," Shepard said. "So why are you freaking out now? What's this about being ruined?"
"Since you got rid of the Geth, I was able to reach Corporate," said Jeong. "They've ordered a purge. They want the colony shut down."
"And the colonists?"
"As I said, purge." Jeong shuddered. "And my career is in shambles. I'm going to be blamed for this."
"Maybe. But you had bosses, right? People who approved this? Ordered it? You turn states' evidence on them and I'll put in a good word for you. If your bosses' bosses are smart, ExoGeni may even get out of this intact."
Jeong actually had to think about it. Robert sensed the calculation. He knew his career was over either way, but a reflexive part of him still didn't want to betray his company, still had a faint hope that maybe, just maybe, the company might make it out of this, and he'd keep his job intact. In the end, resignation won out, and Robert knew Shepard had won even before Jeong's reply of "Alright. I'll testify."
"Good. I'll hold you to that, don't doubt it," Shepard said. "Now, is there a way to disrupt the Thorians' control over the colonists? This thing is already attacking the Normandy with them. I don't want to kill them trying to get to the Thorian."
Juliana looked up from where she was finishing the medigel application to Liz's hip. "In testing we found there was a way to briefly disrupt the Thorian's control, using a weak, non-lethal concentration of a specific nerve gas mixture. It doesn't eliminate the spores, but it disrupts their control over the nervous system and knocks the subject out."
"We're going to need that gas, then," Shepard said. "And a plan on how to distribute it."
With Liz stabilized, Juliana and Robert stood. "This way," Juliana said. "We have the compound already loaded into gas grenades. We use them to secure colonists for taking blood and tissue samples after infection."
"You're okay with this?" Robert asked her.
"No, and most of us weren't," Juliana replied, guilt radiating from her. "But we didn't have the courage to stand up to Jeong and the bastards at Corporate. They made sure we couldn't leave until the tests were done and forbade anything but e-mails, which they read before sending." She shook her head. "It was just too easy for us to give up. I don't know if I'll ever sleep again." They arrived at a pile of crates. "Here, we should have a few dozen of them ready for use…"
In the orbital space over Feros, the Starship Aurora was still locked in combat against Geth vessels. Railgun and mass effect-propelled projectiles joined the plasma bolts of the Geth weapons striking her shields, while her own energy armament returned fire. Torpedoes from the bow launchers raced out and impacted against a Geth cruiser. Denuded of particle shields, the cruiser couldn't resist the naqia-enhanced warheads of the torpedoes. It was broken in half by the resulting detonations.
"Enemy target destroyed," Angel reported triumphantly. Her hands moved effortlessly over her tactical board, directing the Aurora's advanced Darglan-based plasma weaponry to continue the onslaught against the Geth ships. On her tactical sensors she observed the Koenig contributing. Under Will Atreiad, the ship was weaving in and out of Geth fire and returning said fire with its own. Torpedoes from the Koenig flew from the rear launcher and collided with a light Geth craft, nearly vaporizing it.
In her seat Julia could see they were winning the engagement, but not fast enough. Three Geth cruisers were still intact, weaving around each other to keep Angel's gunnery from tearing them apart one at a time. There were six more of the light ships and still many dozens of fighters engaging the Koenig and the flight group. "Can we beam anyone out yet?"
"I wouldn't recommend it," Jarod said. "Those Geth ships pack a punch against unshielded targets. If we drop shields and they get a direct hit, we could lose vital systems."
"How long do they have?"
At the sensor station, Lieutenant Amira al-Rashad checked her sensor readings of the planet. "Going by the readings, no more than twenty minutes."
Julia tapped a key on her chair. "Andreys to Anders, Andreys to Delgado. You need to get out of there, now."
"We're trying, Captain, but they're not making it easy," Anders answered. "They've brought a lot of firepower."
"Well, we won't be able to beam you out. So do what you can."
"Aye ma'am."
From their safe place at the entrance to the dig site, Anders and his Marines could fire back at the Krogan and Geth that were assembled. Above them a Geth dropship was still hovering, providing support fire and having driven off the relatively unarmed runabouts.
"I'm open to suggestions," Anders said. "Before we all get terminal cases of hotfoot."
From her point in the hiding place, Cat was looking out at the firefight through the helmet plate of her suit. They were back out in the hellish temperature, which didn't make the situation any more comfortable for any of them. "Well, Lucy can always do her badass Life Force Knight stuff to get the dropship."
Nearby Lucy shook her head. "I've never made a jump that high. If we can get it lower to the ground…"
"I doubt they're going to comply," Anders remarked.
"Do your heavy suits not have anti-air rockets?" asked Tra'dur.
"They do, yes, and I'd love to use them, but we're also under fire from multiple angles, and my perimeter teams are already hard-pressed trying to get through to us," noted Anders.
"We want the Asari!" a voice shouted. "Send her out and we let you live!"
"He's lying," Lucy said.
"Your powers aside, Lieutenant, I was already pretty sure of that," Anders observed sarcastically. "So, any options before we try a likely-suicidal charge? Or do we just hope and pray Captain Andreys can retrieve us without risking the ship?"
"Your landing craft, I thought some of them had transporter technology as well?" Liara asked.
"They do, Doctor, but that would require them to drop shields, and they can't with that Dropship here," Talara said.
"Why not order the pilots to fly a distance away, outside of the Dropship's effective firing range?" Liara asked.
"Ordinarily a good plan," Anders agreed. "I'd already be having them try it if it didn't likely mean they get shot at by the Geth ships in orbit."
"Although it might be an effective way to lure that Dropship away," Lucy pointed out. "The Geth may not want to divert attention from the fight in orbit."
"Yeah, but I'm not sure…"
As their tactical debate continued, Caterina checked her omnitool. She was thinking of their briefings on what the Geth were. "The Geth maintain an active uplink, right?"
"Yeah, according to the Quarians," Lucy said.
"Then maybe we can disrupt it," Cat suggested. "Enough to get that Dropship out of the way, at least. Or force it to come closer to maintain the network with the other platforms."
Anders smiled. "Okay, I like that one. Some good old-fashioned e-warfare. What do you need?"
"I need to isolate the frequency they maintain their network on. Then we can tie our omnitools and armor suits together and disrupt it." Caterina was busy operating her omnitool. "Wait… Lucy, Tra'dur, do you see…?"
"I do," Lucy said.
"As do I," Tra'dur added. "Operational at the one hundred and twenty-four point six kilohertz range in the second Groenitz-Hallen band. The omnitools, together, could create a short-wave disruption effect."
"Everyone, link your omnitools to Lieutenant Delgado's," Lucy ordered.
The science team did so. At the instruction of "You heard the lady, Marines!", Anders and his team did likewise. "Here," he said, checking over their findings. "For best effect, send out the disruption pulse at this…"
"Got it," Cat confirmed. "Ready… now."
Slinking near the entrance, and barely out of the incoming fire, Caterina brought her left arm up to point it in the general direction of the Geth dropship. After a couple of keystrokes she activated the pulse, powered by not just her omnitool but those of the others as well.
For several moments nothing happened. Then she noticed it on her scanners. The Geth ship was starting to descend. "It's working," she said. "They're trying to reacquire their network signal with the other Geth."
Lucy nodded and stood up. Everyone could see she was bracing herself. Talara even thought she could feel the energy settling in Lucy.
"What are you doing?!" demanded the Krogan outside. "Pull back up! Pull…"
It was too late. Lucy shot forward. She raced to the opening of the dig site entry tube and, just before the first step down, jumped. The energy in her leg muscles was amplified considerably by the life energies she was calling upon, sending her higher and further than even the best Human athlete could have managed in this gravity. At the apex of her jump Lucy's lightsaber flashed to life. The moment she landed on the Geth dropship she brought it down, slicing a gash through the vessel's armor-plated hull in defiance of its flickering particle barrier.
This spectacle, and the failed attempts of the Geth and Krogan to fire on Lucy, gave the others the moment they needed. "Semper Fi!" Anders called out, and at his order the Marines charged out of the tube firing. The heaviest armor went first, drawing fire they could better withstand and dealing out even more. Grenades and missiles flew through the air. The missiles exploded on impact, blasting through particle barriers to destroy Geth or kill Krogan. Some that missed still created explosive shockwaves that sent foes flying. The grenades did much the same.
"Behind us!" Anders shouted, and the science team, with Liara, fell in. Liara was in the worst shape. The water and rations had given her some energy, but she was still weak, and the emergency suit she was in was proving as incapable as feared in fully protecting her from the deadly heat of Therum's inhospitable surface. It took everything she had just to keep herself in the rear, where Cat was following. Occasionally plasma fire started to come toward them, but the Marines' own fire would quickly eliminate the Geth platforms making those attacks.
Anders himself spotted one of the biggest Krogan he'd ever seen emerging from cover, a massive shotgun in his arms. "Down him, now!" Anders cried. He opened up on the Krogan, as did the squad around him. The Krogan roared in retort and opened up with the shotgun. Anders didn't turn, but he heard the sickening sound of the powerful slug in the Krogan's shotgun shattering the helmet plate of the Marine beside him. Like that he knew he'd lost one of his Marines. That their mission was almost successful, indeed, that the runabouts were ahead and his perimeter teams already in place to cover their retreat into the waiting craft… that was soured by the knowledge he'd lost one of his people.
He was darkly satisfied to see the Krogan didn't last long enough for a second shot. He went down in a hail of energy pulses.
To remind him he had other problems, the ground quaked. The magma pocket below was about to erupt. "Double time it people, get to the runabouts!" Anders guided his Marines in, continuing to direct fire at the Geth force even now moving on his flank. "Just a bit longer, Marines! We hold until our science people are safe!"
"We're almost there," Talara urged the others. Ahead of her Tulari, who was holding a wounded arm, stumbled into the protection of a power-armored Alakin corpswoman who pulled her toward the Warri. Other Marines were already boarding the Gonzales. Talara looked back to where Liara was collapsing to her knees from exhaustion. She stopped, as did Tra'dur. "Doctor T'Soni, just a little further."
Cat came up and helped Liara up. "We're almost there," Cat said to her. "You can make it."
"How… do you… do this?" Liara asked between gasps.
"Practice. And not my first volcanic planet." Cat smiled from a memory. "But my first when I wasn't being chased by a lava monster. The Doctor and I got a little lucky with that one, we… watch out!"
Cat noticed the threat just before the enraged roar echoed in everyone's helmets. The bleeding, battered Krogan battlemaster was back on his feet and already charging toward them. A mad gleam filled his ruby-colored eyes, eyes that looked so close to Wrex's, but now full of nothing but mindless rage. "Look out!" she shrieked. With a heave of her arms, Cat threw Liara forward to get her to safety.
Then there was raw pain when the Krogan slammed into her. His arms gripped Cat by the ribs and carried her along until, a couple seconds later, he rammed her at full force into the pillar of the dig site's half-completed structure. Cat screamed from the pain of the impact, a savage pain that filled her chest and drowned out everything else.
That pain increased as the Krogan slammed her into the pillar again. And again.
With the Marines fully engaged fighting the remaining Geth, Tra'dur was the first to react. She raised her sidearm, the same heavy slugthrower with which she had shot down the raging Weyrloc Tral on Tira, and opened up. The first shot hit the Krogan's hip, shattering armor and sending blood erupting from the wound.
Cat, rendered nearly mindless herself from pain, feebly reached for her pulse pistol. But then the Krogan slammed her into the pillar again, this time with enough force that her head snapped back and slammed into it as well. There was a brief surge of pain in Cat's head and then a nice, merciful blackness that put an end to the agony.
Again Tra'dur's slugthrower rang out. This time the shot was nearly fatal, but the armored carapace of the Krogan's head and the angle kept it from penetrating fully. In agony and still raging, the Krogan roared and tossed Caterina at Tra'dur. Tra'dur didn't have time to evade before Cat slammed into her, flailing like a thrown rag-doll. The impact knocked Tra'dur to the ground.
The Krogan was already moving forward. Without even thinking about it, one of its powerful legs slammed down on Tra'dur's left leg. Pain exploded up the limb accompanied with the audible snapping of the bone. Tra'dur brought her arm up with the gun and fired again. This shot was the best yet, going through the Krogan's chin and pulping his right eye. But in the throes of a blood rage this pain was insufficient to register. If anything, it won the instinctive attention of the creature, who slapped Tra'dur's hand with enough force to send her gun flying from it. His other foot came down on her arm with enforce force to fracture bone. Tra'dur yowled in response, and thought frantically. She could already see the Krogan's next act. Likely to either be a boot on her head, or a punch. Unless the Marines acted, of course, and turned their weapons on the raging Krogan.
But the shots that hit Krogan were not from their rifles. It was the slightly weaker shots from a pulse pistol. Talara took up a firing stance, both hands on her weapon, and put shot after shot into the wounded Krogan. The setting was high enough to wound, to kill if she hit the right point, but the redundancies of Krogan physiology were making that difficult.
The benefit was that she'd drawn the Krogan's attention. He turned away from Tra'dur.
The downside was that he was charging her now.
It was a moment that, in retrospect, could have gone many other ways. Talara could have tried to dodge to the side. She may have even made it. Or she wouldn't have and, like Cat and Tra'dur, would have endured a hammering at the hands of a blood-raged Krogan. Or she might have opened fire, with similar chances of succeeding or failing and taking a hit.
But she did neither.
There was, for Talara, a moment of absolute clarity like few she'd ever realized. It was perhaps like the one she'd felt when she heard that the Alliance had gone to war with the Nazi Reich, and that it was a war she had an ethical obligation to fight in, a war where she and her fellow Falaens would be called upon to uphold the spirits of the mythic heroes of their Altean past, the memories of King Alfor and Queen Fala and Princess Allura that should be honored.
That moment of clarity kept her from leaping out of the way. It kept her from just trying to shoot. Instead, as if by instinct, Talara raised her hand and screamed, "No!"
Within her body, within her soul, Talara felt something resonate with that cry. A feeling similar to when she was trying to interface with the Castle of Lions, endeavoring to save the lives of Princess Allura and Lucy Lucero, came to her, but stronger. Greater. The feeling surged with power, and surged from her hand and from her, from everything that was Talara, leaping toward the Krogan.
Raw force, unseen, unheard, slammed into the blood-raged alien, sending the Krogan flying back into the pillar it had just been slamming Caterina into.
Tra'dur, despite the pain she was in, forced herself to sit up. Her eyes widened briefly at seeing what Talara had wrought.
Talara herself stared at her hand in surprise. Inside she felt strange. Like something within her was stirring. A part of her just now waking from a slumber that had lasted her whole life.
The Krogan roared and charged at her again. Talara focused on that feeling within her and drew from it, imagining the Krogan falling back, insisting it must.
Another wave of force answered. Yet again the Krogan slammed into the pillar.
And this time, he didn't move. He didn't have time. Anders and one of his Marines poured more fire into the blood-raged Krogan until even his robust physiology couldn't function any longer. He collapsed beside the pillar. Talara sensed something like a light going out. A flicker of flame dying, replaced only by nothingness.
"Move move move!" Anders' voice broke her from her thoughts. "Tend the wounded!"
"Right away!" Talara rushed forward and picked up Caterina. She was unconscious but alive. That Talara knew for certain.
There was an explosion from above them. Everyone briefly looked to see the Geth dropship blow apart. A moment later Lucy landed fifteen feet away, slamming the ground and creating a ripple of fine dust from the impact. Her lightsaber, still active, was held out and ready for more fighting.
But it wasn't a fight they had to worry about. The ground shuddered beneath them, more violent than before.
"Lava eruption imminent!" Theek shouted. "We must get to safety!"
Lucy shut down her lightsaber and returned it to her belt. She went straight for Tra'dur and helped her up while Anders picked up the exhausted Liara. "Let's go! We're out of time!" she shouted, running toward the Warri as she did. The rear hatch of the runabout opened, revealing the modular area in the back for storing their gear.
The shuddering under them ceased for a moment. Lucy and Talara both felt what came next in the seconds before it did. A loud roar filled the air and, behind them and the dig site, a jet of lava flew upward by at least twenty meters. As Lucy made it to the Warri with the hobbling, injured Tra'dur, lava spewed violently from the dig site tube. She helped Tra'dur into a seat and dashed to the cockpit. The Warri moved under her as she passed through the small living space between the cargo module and the cockpit. By the time she reached the cockpit the ship was already in mid-air. She took a seat at operations and tapped a key. "Warri to Aurora, we're clear. I repeat, we're clear, and we have wounded. How do you want to..."
"...handle this?" Lucy's voice said over the speaker.
The Aurora shuddered again, taking another hit to her degrading shields while, on the screen, another Geth cruiser was burning from Angel's efforts. "Shields are down to fifteen percent," Jarod said.
"The Koenig's shields are also down to twenty percent," Meridina confirmed.
"Status on pilots?"
"Four fighters lost. One escape pod."
Julia frowned at that. Six dead flight crew. "Tractor it or have Koenig pick it up. Helm, put us in position to receive our runabouts without exposing them to enemy fire. All ships, I want those runabouts back safe and sound."
"Aye ma'am," said Locarno.
"Orders relayed," Meridina confirmed. "Received."
"Aurora, we've received your course," Lucy's voice said. "We'll be out of atmosphere in ten seconds. Nine… eight…"
The Geth attackers finally seemed to notice the two runabouts climbing through the atmosphere. They broke away from where they were keeping Koenig boxed in. The attack ship maneuvered to open up on the aft of one of the ships, blowing it to pieces with pulse phaser cannon fire. Angel's plasma beams lashed out at the ships as well, slicing one apart and damaging the others. Nevertheless they fired.
"They're shooting at our runabouts. But no hits yet," al-Rashad said.
"...two… one…"
The two runabouts entered orbit. The Aurora was already moving to meet them. Of the remaining three Geth attackers, one went up to the Koenig's continued attack. The two remaining ones continued to move for the runabouts.
"Miss Delgado, I want those attackers out of the way!" Julia insisted.
"Aiming now, Captain," Angela assured her.
This time the Aurora's main bow cannons opened up. The thick sapphire pulses utterly obliterated one of the attackers. Sapphire beams carved into the remaining attacker, joined by the amber bursts from the Koenig's pulse phasers. It dodged and weaved, trying to get a clear shot on the Warri or Gonzales.
The Koenig's solar torpedoes raced out and struck the Geth attacker in the mid-section. It blew apart in a burst of white light.
More heavy shots from the lone surviving Geth cruiser struck their rear shields. "Shields down to ten percent," Jarod said.
"Come about and reinforce bow shields," she ordered.
The order was followed. It provided two benefits; bringing their biggest weapons to bear on the target and bringing the shuttle bays out of the line of fire.
"The runabouts are landing in the Main Bay," Jarod said.
"Good. Tactical, give them everything we've got left."
"Aye ma'am." Angel grinned at the order before finishing her new firing solution.
The resulting exchange of fire filled the orbital space over Therum. More sapphire pulses and beams were joined by over a dozen blue-white sparks, the drive fields of the solar torpedoes that followed the target lock Angel had achieved. The shields of the Aurora flashed blue as they struggled to repel the incoming railgun and plasma fire.
The exchange, when finished, clearly went against the Geth. The Aurora's bow shields were still intact, if degraded, while the Geth cruiser was reduced to a burning wreck. "I won't have the Geth attacking Nova Yekaterinburg in retaliation," Julia said. "Finish them off."
"With pleasure."
Again the Aurora's weapons fired, this time on tandem with Koenig. All energy fire, no torpedoes, which were unneeded. This barrage blew the Geth cruiser apart, leaving only debris field of inert, blackened shards.
"Status on Geth fighters?" Julia asked Meridina.
"They are under control," Meridina replied. "Commander Laurent assures us they will be eliminated within the minute."
"Task the secondary batteries to help finish them off."
Meridina did so. The particle interceptors on the Aurora continued firing where they could safely engage the Geth without hurting their own fighters. Julia watched with satisfaction as every glowing red dot on the holotank disappeared. She tapped the panel on her chair. "Bridge to Main Shuttle Bay. How did it go?"
"Anders here. Mission successful, but not without casualties."
Julia nodded and forbade herself even the slightest celebratory grin. "How bad?"
"Private Yamashita is KIA, headshot. Lieutenants Delgado and Tra'dur are wounded, Delgado badly wounded."
Julia glanced back to see the quiet look cross Angel's face. "How badly?"
"She got tackled and slammed around by a Krogan in a blood rage, Captain. She's alive, but the corpsman confirm head trauma, suspected concussion, and broken ribs at the least. Internal bleeding is confirmed. Doctor Gillam's just now arriving to get her to medbay."
"And Tra'dur?"
"Broken leg and arm. She's otherwise fine." There was an edge in Anders' voice. "I assume full responsibility for the injuries to the science team, Captain. I'll have a report to you by 2230 hours."
"I understand." Julia nodded. "Bridge out." She tapped the key on her chair again. Again she was looking toward Tactical, where Angel was quietly stewing in anger and worry, while one of her subordinates, Syrandi Luneri, remained quiet at her battle station, Secondary Tactical, along the starboard side of the bridge beside Auxiliary Communications. "Lieutenant Luneri, please relieve Lieutenant Delgado."
The Dorei, her dark purple skin joined by the teal-colored spots of her spotline and purple hair, looked up and nodded. "Aye Captain," she said in her accented English, the sound vaguely Pacific Islander to Julia's ears.
With gratitude showing in her hazel-colored eyes, Angel rose from her station and went straight for the nearest lift.
"Stand down from Code Red," Julia ordered. She released her harness and stood. "Maintain Yellow status. Commander Meridina, please join me. Commander Jarod, you have the bridge."
"Yes Captain," Meridina said. She released her harness and stood. Jarod did the same, leaving Lieutenant Sabiha Neyzi to take Ops while he went to the command chair. Meridina followed Julia off of the bridge.
Once the Mako pulled back into the vehicle garage for Zhu's Hope, the trouble began.
The Baynhams, and a much-subdued Jeong, cooperated extensively with Shepard and her squad. Thanks to them the squad knew precisely where to go to get to the Thorian and what to expect. They found that the moment they pulled into the garage and encountered the husk-like humanoid figures, all that remained of age-old servitors of the Thorian. They resembled walking shoots of green plant more than anything, but Robert sensed the malevolent intent within them and pulled the trigger on his pistol. A WHUP sound filled the air with each shot, the resulting blue bolts of energy blasting away part of the creature. A shotgun roared, then another; Tali and Shepard were joining him.
There was more weapons fire from ahead. Robert sensed that veneer of despair and fear, made stronger now that he knew what it was. The colonists had a defense line here and the Thorian was forcing them to fight. Its control was absolute; any rebellion, even a thought, brought with it intense and unstoppable pain.
Ashley responded by firing from the cover of the Mako. "The grenades, now," Shepard ordered, pulling one off. Robert and Tali each added one. With a little nudging from Robert the three grenades landed in a perfect pattern to spread the gas to all of the shooters. One by one they collapsed.
This was only the start. At the lift, in the halls leading to the colony, at the colony itself, the colonists were all armed and fighting to hold them back. The Thorian had them shooting to kill while Shepard refused to give the same order, insisting on suppressive fire to support the throwing of the grenades. The Thorian undoubtedly realized what was going on. The colonists were becoming more aggressive as they continued, more heedless of their own lives. But regardless of the danger, Shepard continued to insist on the grenades.
By the time they got to the colony proper, the incoming fire was inescapable. "Commander, whatever you're doing, it's working. They're no longer attacking the ship," Joker said over their comms.
"Good. Get everyone you can spare into hazmat-compatible protection and send them out on my order," Shepard replied. "I'll need them to secure the colonists."
"Shepard, there's too much fire," Tali said. "We'll never get a grenade thrown without getting shot."
"Ma'am, maybe we should cut loose," Ashley said. "The way this thing sounds, they're better off dead than enslaved to it."
"I understand the sentiment, Sergeant, believe me," Shepard answered. "But I'm not killing these people unless we have no choice, and we still do. Get your grenades ready. Robert, we'll go in and draw their fire as best as we can."
"You want me to project a shield again." It wasn't a question. And Robert knew he didn't need to bring up what happened last time. There was still a sting in his side from it.
"Exactly. I'm counting on it. Ready?"
He drew in a breath to ready himself. "Yes. Let's go."
The two went out into the fire. Shepard's biotic barrier absorbed the initial shots to strike it. Before it could falter Robert focused his power forward, creating the same area of reversed force he'd tried in the ExoGeni HQ. His control strained to its limits.
Shepard spread her arms forward. Energies gathered before her, the purplish-blue of dark matter, joining Robert's shield of force and reflecting the attacks. "Now!"
Ashley and Tali came up and tossed their grenades, one after the other. Two, then four, then six were flying into the various areas of cover, all while shooting continued to wear at their defenses. Robert felt a sharp pain in the middle of his head from the strain he was taking on. Sweat dripped down Shepard's face at her own efforts.
Sickly green gas formed in clouds ahead, each grenade adding to it. The colonist shooters began choking. There was no cry of "Fall back!" as normal enemies might give. For the moment, their foes were not people; they were tools, mere things, reduced to such by the Thorian.
The grenades kept getting thrown so long as the shooting continued. When it finally stopped, and several seconds passed, Robert and Shepard dropped their defenses. Robert's legs felt little better than rubber and he went to his knees. Unable to wipe the sweat from her face on account of her helmet visor, Shepard satisfied herself with a gulp of water and several bites from an energy bar. Combat biotic rations, Robert knew.
"We're clear, that's all of them," said Ashley.
"No." Robert got back to his feet, with effort, and took a drink from his own canteen. "There's one more."
They advanced to the center of the colony. As they turned a corner around one of the prefab buildings, they found the last of the colonists still awake. Fai Dan stood with his hand on a pistol and trembling violently. "I… I was supposed to lead these people," the leader of Zhu's Hope gasped. "I… I failed them."
"This wasn't your fault," Shepard said to him. "ExoGeni did this to you. It allowed this."
Slowly Fai Dan's hand gripped the pistol. It came up with jerky motions, as if he were in the middle of a seizure. Robert felt his despair, his pain… and defiance. "It wants me to stop you," Fai Dan said. "To protect it. But… I won't. I won't be a… puppet!" He let out a wordless cry afterward as the pain within spiked. The spores in his brain were flooding his pain centers with sensation. "I won't!"
"No!" Shepard cried, realizing his intent.
Robert also sensed it. As Fai Dan brought the gun barrel to his temple, finger already tensing on the trigger, he acted. He reached out and grabbed the weapon with his abilities. The barrel rose before it fired, letting off a shot that tore skin and hair from Fai Dan's scalp, but did not hit his skull. Blood started to flow immediately from the wound.
"No!" Fai Dan cried, even as Tali's arm shot forward. The gas grenade landed at his feet and went off, creating another cloud of green-tinted gas. He inhaled it and began to shudder before collapsing, unconscious.
"Good job," Shepard said to them.
"I could sense the intent, and the defiance behind it. The Thorian's spores are literal torture, Shepard. Mental and physical." Robert scowled. "Even the most innocent independent thought is punished. Killing himself was the only way Fai Dan saw to get out of this."
"We should be careful going down," said Ashley. "If this thing's spores get into us..."
"We'll keep helmets on and run on internal air," Shepard said. Her left forearm came up and her omnitool appeared. "Shepard to Normandy, is my hazmat team ready?"
"We're on our way, Commander," Alenko answered.
"Good. Now…" She looked around until she found what the Baynhams had described. "They said the ship is blocking the path down. Let's get that crane moving to get it out of the way."
"On it," said Tali.
Shepard looked at Robert again. "Can you sense this thing?"
Robert attempted to do just that for a moment. There was life here, below, vast and ancient, and oh so very frustrated… and afraid. "I think. It's not happy we shut down all of its puppets. And it's frightened out of its wits, I think. I would expect trouble as we go down."
"Well, I can see it's smart." Shepard's expression was grim. "ExoGeni's crimes aside, this thing enslaves people. I don't take kindly to slavery."
"Nor do I," Robert admitted. "And you know what I used to do for a living."
"Yeah." She smiled at him. "So, ready to face another slaver?"
"Always," was the answer, with a smile added to the reply.
"This guy's going off the deep end," Ashley remarked. "If we go in unarmed he could shoot us all."
"And if we go in with guns blazing, who knows how many people get hurt?" Robert asked. "I can stop him if he acts, but I say let's play along."
Shepard looked back at them, her green eyes moving from Ashley to Robert. After Jeong shouted five seconds she nodded. "Alright." Louder, she shouted, "We're coming out, weapons down!" Shepard holstered her shotgun and held her hands out.
Ashley gave a frustrated look and put her rifle up. Robert holstered his pistol and joined her in following Shepard into the open.
Behind them, Tali grumbled in Quarian, not bothering to let her vocoder translate it.
Stepping into the open gave them a view of what was happening. Liz Baynham was on the ground, a growing pool of blood below her and her mother kneeling over her. Juliana's hands were stained with her daughter's blood, trying to stop the bleeding from Liz's hip. Standing over them, gun extended, was Ethan Jeong. His security personnel had their guns drawn as well, if at rest. "I've read up on you, Shepard. And your team." Robert sensed the desperation, the near panic, within Jeong. Something had gone wrong. "I was still hoping you wouldn't find out about Species 37. That you'd get rid of the Geth and clear out. That this treacherous little bitch would be dead."
"Well, we know," Shepard said. Her voice was firm, but without the edge of active threat. "You used the Zhu's Hope colonists as test subjects. Little more than lab rats. You broke the law and made yourself a monster."
"Who cares about a few stupid colonists?" he shot back. "Analysis of the Thorian could lead us to whole new ways of understanding how to manipulate a brain. ExoGeni had the chance of a lifetime here on Feros, we couldn't let the colonists screw it up! Imagine being able to control violent prisoners without guns? Or being able to break up riots? We could do this with the Thorian's spores if we can figure out how to reproduce them and use them ourselves."
"You're talking about slavery," Robert said. "That's what this is."
"No it's not!" Jeong retorted. "But I'd expect to hear that kind of thing from you. I've read up on you too. You're worse than Shepard! You made a career out of sticking your nose in and demanding everybody obey you or get blown away by a starship gun."
"Put the gun down, Jeong," Shepard said. Again her voice was firm, and now it took a commanding edge. "I don't want to hurt you."
"I don't care what you want! Because of you, because of Saren, I'm ruined!"
Robert felt it then. Jeong's uncertainty, his fear, all of it held him in check. But it was starting to shift. Within seconds he would build up the nerve and give the order to open fire.
He reached up with his hand. With the movement his power reached out and gripped Jeong's firearm. Jeong cried out in surprise when the gun was wrenched from his hand and sent flying into Robert's own hand.
Biotic energy surged from Shepard's arm and struck one of the guards. He went flying backward.
The other guard brought his weapon up. But before he could fire Robert reached out with his energy again. This time, however, his control slipped. Instead of grabbing the weapon like he'd done to Jeong, Robert felt his energy become raw, unchannelled force. It struck the man directly and sent him flying as if struck by a car. He slammed into the opposite wall and fell, utterly still. Nearby researchers rushed to check on him. With a sense of panic himself Robert desperately sought out the man's life energy, to make sure he survived, and was relieved to feel said life was intact and not fading. He hadn't killed the man on accident.
Jeong stared at his open hand with wide eyes, followed by glancing back at the guard Robert had just tossed. Accident or not, it had a clear sobering effect upon the ExoGeni officer. "God, you… you're… you're not going to kill me, are you?"
"That wasn't in the plan, no." Shepard glanced toward Robert with evident concern. He returned the look sheepishly. "A bit much, wasn't it?"
"Not intended. I let my control slip."
"I'll say," Ashley said. "He looked like he was hit by an aircar. If he wasn't in tactical armor I think it might have actually killed him."
"Be more careful next time, please," Shepard instructed Robert. He responded with a nod. "And can you help Miss Baynham? It doesn't look serious, but I want to make sure she's alright."
"Sure." Robert went over and kneeled beside the mother and daughter. He could sense the wound was indeed not too serious, so long as the bleeding was stopped. "I'll hold it in while you get a medical kit," he told Juliana, who responded by pulling her blood-coated hands away. Robert, rattled as he was at his failure in control, didn't want to risk it again by using his life energies, instead pushing his hands to the wound and applying pressure. "You'll be okay," he assured Liz.
The wounded young woman responded with a nod.
Shepard turned her attention to the rapidly-paling Jeong. "Alright, why did you want to kill us? What's going on here, and what's it got to do with Saren?" Her eyes narrowed. "Start from the beginning."
"Saren Arterius found out about our experiment," Jeong said. "I don't know how, but since he's a Spectre I guess he had ways to do it. He came to me about a week ago and threatened to expose ExoGeni if we didn't give him access to the Thorian. He wouldn't let me call Corporate so I had to make the decision."
"And instead of helping us set a trap for the most-wanted man in the galaxy, you knuckled under," Ashley said accusingly.
"If these experiments were exposed, the company would be ruined!" Jeong insisted. "The fines alone, and plus the lawsuits…"
"Don't forget the jail time," Robert added from where he was aiding the Baynhams. Juliana was now returning with a medkit, including a medigel dispenser. "Especially for you. Your bosses certainly would've negotiated a plea deal."
"I couldn't let news get out!" Jeong insisted. "So I let Saren have access and thought it was over. Then yesterday the Geth attacked!"
"Whatever Saren got from the Thorian, he must be afraid we can get it," Tali said.
"I'm not sure… listen, the Thorian made him give someone up. One of the Asari he went with didn't come back." Jeong shook his head. "The Thorian, I don't think it sees us as living beings. We're… we're tools to it. Potential thralls, that's it."
"And you were feeding people to it." Ashley glowered at him. "How would you like it if the damn thing enslaved you?!"
"It was for a higher cause. The company… we would've compensated the subjects!"
"If any survived, you mean," Shepard said. "So why are you freaking out now? What's this about being ruined?"
"Since you got rid of the Geth, I was able to reach Corporate," said Jeong. "They've ordered a purge. They want the colony shut down."
"And the colonists?"
"As I said, purge." Jeong shuddered. "And my career is in shambles. I'm going to be blamed for this."
"Maybe. But you had bosses, right? People who approved this? Ordered it? You turn states' evidence on them and I'll put in a good word for you. If your bosses' bosses are smart, ExoGeni may even get out of this intact."
Jeong actually had to think about it. Robert sensed the calculation. He knew his career was over either way, but a reflexive part of him still didn't want to betray his company, still had a faint hope that maybe, just maybe, the company might make it out of this, and he'd keep his job intact. In the end, resignation won out, and Robert knew Shepard had won even before Jeong's reply of "Alright. I'll testify."
"Good. I'll hold you to that, don't doubt it," Shepard said. "Now, is there a way to disrupt the Thorians' control over the colonists? This thing is already attacking the Normandy with them. I don't want to kill them trying to get to the Thorian."
Juliana looked up from where she was finishing the medigel application to Liz's hip. "In testing we found there was a way to briefly disrupt the Thorian's control, using a weak, non-lethal concentration of a specific nerve gas mixture. It doesn't eliminate the spores, but it disrupts their control over the nervous system and knocks the subject out."
"We're going to need that gas, then," Shepard said. "And a plan on how to distribute it."
With Liz stabilized, Juliana and Robert stood. "This way," Juliana said. "We have the compound already loaded into gas grenades. We use them to secure colonists for taking blood and tissue samples after infection."
"You're okay with this?" Robert asked her.
"No, and most of us weren't," Juliana replied, guilt radiating from her. "But we didn't have the courage to stand up to Jeong and the bastards at Corporate. They made sure we couldn't leave until the tests were done and forbade anything but e-mails, which they read before sending." She shook her head. "It was just too easy for us to give up. I don't know if I'll ever sleep again." They arrived at a pile of crates. "Here, we should have a few dozen of them ready for use…"
In the orbital space over Feros, the Starship Aurora was still locked in combat against Geth vessels. Railgun and mass effect-propelled projectiles joined the plasma bolts of the Geth weapons striking her shields, while her own energy armament returned fire. Torpedoes from the bow launchers raced out and impacted against a Geth cruiser. Denuded of particle shields, the cruiser couldn't resist the naqia-enhanced warheads of the torpedoes. It was broken in half by the resulting detonations.
"Enemy target destroyed," Angel reported triumphantly. Her hands moved effortlessly over her tactical board, directing the Aurora's advanced Darglan-based plasma weaponry to continue the onslaught against the Geth ships. On her tactical sensors she observed the Koenig contributing. Under Will Atreiad, the ship was weaving in and out of Geth fire and returning said fire with its own. Torpedoes from the Koenig flew from the rear launcher and collided with a light Geth craft, nearly vaporizing it.
In her seat Julia could see they were winning the engagement, but not fast enough. Three Geth cruisers were still intact, weaving around each other to keep Angel's gunnery from tearing them apart one at a time. There were six more of the light ships and still many dozens of fighters engaging the Koenig and the flight group. "Can we beam anyone out yet?"
"I wouldn't recommend it," Jarod said. "Those Geth ships pack a punch against unshielded targets. If we drop shields and they get a direct hit, we could lose vital systems."
"How long do they have?"
At the sensor station, Lieutenant Amira al-Rashad checked her sensor readings of the planet. "Going by the readings, no more than twenty minutes."
Julia tapped a key on her chair. "Andreys to Anders, Andreys to Delgado. You need to get out of there, now."
"We're trying, Captain, but they're not making it easy," Anders answered. "They've brought a lot of firepower."
"Well, we won't be able to beam you out. So do what you can."
"Aye ma'am."
From their safe place at the entrance to the dig site, Anders and his Marines could fire back at the Krogan and Geth that were assembled. Above them a Geth dropship was still hovering, providing support fire and having driven off the relatively unarmed runabouts.
"I'm open to suggestions," Anders said. "Before we all get terminal cases of hotfoot."
From her point in the hiding place, Cat was looking out at the firefight through the helmet plate of her suit. They were back out in the hellish temperature, which didn't make the situation any more comfortable for any of them. "Well, Lucy can always do her badass Life Force Knight stuff to get the dropship."
Nearby Lucy shook her head. "I've never made a jump that high. If we can get it lower to the ground…"
"I doubt they're going to comply," Anders remarked.
"Do your heavy suits not have anti-air rockets?" asked Tra'dur.
"They do, yes, and I'd love to use them, but we're also under fire from multiple angles, and my perimeter teams are already hard-pressed trying to get through to us," noted Anders.
"We want the Asari!" a voice shouted. "Send her out and we let you live!"
"He's lying," Lucy said.
"Your powers aside, Lieutenant, I was already pretty sure of that," Anders observed sarcastically. "So, any options before we try a likely-suicidal charge? Or do we just hope and pray Captain Andreys can retrieve us without risking the ship?"
"Your landing craft, I thought some of them had transporter technology as well?" Liara asked.
"They do, Doctor, but that would require them to drop shields, and they can't with that Dropship here," Talara said.
"Why not order the pilots to fly a distance away, outside of the Dropship's effective firing range?" Liara asked.
"Ordinarily a good plan," Anders agreed. "I'd already be having them try it if it didn't likely mean they get shot at by the Geth ships in orbit."
"Although it might be an effective way to lure that Dropship away," Lucy pointed out. "The Geth may not want to divert attention from the fight in orbit."
"Yeah, but I'm not sure…"
As their tactical debate continued, Caterina checked her omnitool. She was thinking of their briefings on what the Geth were. "The Geth maintain an active uplink, right?"
"Yeah, according to the Quarians," Lucy said.
"Then maybe we can disrupt it," Cat suggested. "Enough to get that Dropship out of the way, at least. Or force it to come closer to maintain the network with the other platforms."
Anders smiled. "Okay, I like that one. Some good old-fashioned e-warfare. What do you need?"
"I need to isolate the frequency they maintain their network on. Then we can tie our omnitools and armor suits together and disrupt it." Caterina was busy operating her omnitool. "Wait… Lucy, Tra'dur, do you see…?"
"I do," Lucy said.
"As do I," Tra'dur added. "Operational at the one hundred and twenty-four point six kilohertz range in the second Groenitz-Hallen band. The omnitools, together, could create a short-wave disruption effect."
"Everyone, link your omnitools to Lieutenant Delgado's," Lucy ordered.
The science team did so. At the instruction of "You heard the lady, Marines!", Anders and his team did likewise. "Here," he said, checking over their findings. "For best effect, send out the disruption pulse at this…"
"Got it," Cat confirmed. "Ready… now."
Slinking near the entrance, and barely out of the incoming fire, Caterina brought her left arm up to point it in the general direction of the Geth dropship. After a couple of keystrokes she activated the pulse, powered by not just her omnitool but those of the others as well.
For several moments nothing happened. Then she noticed it on her scanners. The Geth ship was starting to descend. "It's working," she said. "They're trying to reacquire their network signal with the other Geth."
Lucy nodded and stood up. Everyone could see she was bracing herself. Talara even thought she could feel the energy settling in Lucy.
"What are you doing?!" demanded the Krogan outside. "Pull back up! Pull…"
It was too late. Lucy shot forward. She raced to the opening of the dig site entry tube and, just before the first step down, jumped. The energy in her leg muscles was amplified considerably by the life energies she was calling upon, sending her higher and further than even the best Human athlete could have managed in this gravity. At the apex of her jump Lucy's lightsaber flashed to life. The moment she landed on the Geth dropship she brought it down, slicing a gash through the vessel's armor-plated hull in defiance of its flickering particle barrier.
This spectacle, and the failed attempts of the Geth and Krogan to fire on Lucy, gave the others the moment they needed. "Semper Fi!" Anders called out, and at his order the Marines charged out of the tube firing. The heaviest armor went first, drawing fire they could better withstand and dealing out even more. Grenades and missiles flew through the air. The missiles exploded on impact, blasting through particle barriers to destroy Geth or kill Krogan. Some that missed still created explosive shockwaves that sent foes flying. The grenades did much the same.
"Behind us!" Anders shouted, and the science team, with Liara, fell in. Liara was in the worst shape. The water and rations had given her some energy, but she was still weak, and the emergency suit she was in was proving as incapable as feared in fully protecting her from the deadly heat of Therum's inhospitable surface. It took everything she had just to keep herself in the rear, where Cat was following. Occasionally plasma fire started to come toward them, but the Marines' own fire would quickly eliminate the Geth platforms making those attacks.
Anders himself spotted one of the biggest Krogan he'd ever seen emerging from cover, a massive shotgun in his arms. "Down him, now!" Anders cried. He opened up on the Krogan, as did the squad around him. The Krogan roared in retort and opened up with the shotgun. Anders didn't turn, but he heard the sickening sound of the powerful slug in the Krogan's shotgun shattering the helmet plate of the Marine beside him. Like that he knew he'd lost one of his Marines. That their mission was almost successful, indeed, that the runabouts were ahead and his perimeter teams already in place to cover their retreat into the waiting craft… that was soured by the knowledge he'd lost one of his people.
He was darkly satisfied to see the Krogan didn't last long enough for a second shot. He went down in a hail of energy pulses.
To remind him he had other problems, the ground quaked. The magma pocket below was about to erupt. "Double time it people, get to the runabouts!" Anders guided his Marines in, continuing to direct fire at the Geth force even now moving on his flank. "Just a bit longer, Marines! We hold until our science people are safe!"
"We're almost there," Talara urged the others. Ahead of her Tulari, who was holding a wounded arm, stumbled into the protection of a power-armored Alakin corpswoman who pulled her toward the Warri. Other Marines were already boarding the Gonzales. Talara looked back to where Liara was collapsing to her knees from exhaustion. She stopped, as did Tra'dur. "Doctor T'Soni, just a little further."
Cat came up and helped Liara up. "We're almost there," Cat said to her. "You can make it."
"How… do you… do this?" Liara asked between gasps.
"Practice. And not my first volcanic planet." Cat smiled from a memory. "But my first when I wasn't being chased by a lava monster. The Doctor and I got a little lucky with that one, we… watch out!"
Cat noticed the threat just before the enraged roar echoed in everyone's helmets. The bleeding, battered Krogan battlemaster was back on his feet and already charging toward them. A mad gleam filled his ruby-colored eyes, eyes that looked so close to Wrex's, but now full of nothing but mindless rage. "Look out!" she shrieked. With a heave of her arms, Cat threw Liara forward to get her to safety.
Then there was raw pain when the Krogan slammed into her. His arms gripped Cat by the ribs and carried her along until, a couple seconds later, he rammed her at full force into the pillar of the dig site's half-completed structure. Cat screamed from the pain of the impact, a savage pain that filled her chest and drowned out everything else.
That pain increased as the Krogan slammed her into the pillar again. And again.
With the Marines fully engaged fighting the remaining Geth, Tra'dur was the first to react. She raised her sidearm, the same heavy slugthrower with which she had shot down the raging Weyrloc Tral on Tira, and opened up. The first shot hit the Krogan's hip, shattering armor and sending blood erupting from the wound.
Cat, rendered nearly mindless herself from pain, feebly reached for her pulse pistol. But then the Krogan slammed her into the pillar again, this time with enough force that her head snapped back and slammed into it as well. There was a brief surge of pain in Cat's head and then a nice, merciful blackness that put an end to the agony.
Again Tra'dur's slugthrower rang out. This time the shot was nearly fatal, but the armored carapace of the Krogan's head and the angle kept it from penetrating fully. In agony and still raging, the Krogan roared and tossed Caterina at Tra'dur. Tra'dur didn't have time to evade before Cat slammed into her, flailing like a thrown rag-doll. The impact knocked Tra'dur to the ground.
The Krogan was already moving forward. Without even thinking about it, one of its powerful legs slammed down on Tra'dur's left leg. Pain exploded up the limb accompanied with the audible snapping of the bone. Tra'dur brought her arm up with the gun and fired again. This shot was the best yet, going through the Krogan's chin and pulping his right eye. But in the throes of a blood rage this pain was insufficient to register. If anything, it won the instinctive attention of the creature, who slapped Tra'dur's hand with enough force to send her gun flying from it. His other foot came down on her arm with enforce force to fracture bone. Tra'dur yowled in response, and thought frantically. She could already see the Krogan's next act. Likely to either be a boot on her head, or a punch. Unless the Marines acted, of course, and turned their weapons on the raging Krogan.
But the shots that hit Krogan were not from their rifles. It was the slightly weaker shots from a pulse pistol. Talara took up a firing stance, both hands on her weapon, and put shot after shot into the wounded Krogan. The setting was high enough to wound, to kill if she hit the right point, but the redundancies of Krogan physiology were making that difficult.
The benefit was that she'd drawn the Krogan's attention. He turned away from Tra'dur.
The downside was that he was charging her now.
It was a moment that, in retrospect, could have gone many other ways. Talara could have tried to dodge to the side. She may have even made it. Or she wouldn't have and, like Cat and Tra'dur, would have endured a hammering at the hands of a blood-raged Krogan. Or she might have opened fire, with similar chances of succeeding or failing and taking a hit.
But she did neither.
There was, for Talara, a moment of absolute clarity like few she'd ever realized. It was perhaps like the one she'd felt when she heard that the Alliance had gone to war with the Nazi Reich, and that it was a war she had an ethical obligation to fight in, a war where she and her fellow Falaens would be called upon to uphold the spirits of the mythic heroes of their Altean past, the memories of King Alfor and Queen Fala and Princess Allura that should be honored.
That moment of clarity kept her from leaping out of the way. It kept her from just trying to shoot. Instead, as if by instinct, Talara raised her hand and screamed, "No!"
Within her body, within her soul, Talara felt something resonate with that cry. A feeling similar to when she was trying to interface with the Castle of Lions, endeavoring to save the lives of Princess Allura and Lucy Lucero, came to her, but stronger. Greater. The feeling surged with power, and surged from her hand and from her, from everything that was Talara, leaping toward the Krogan.
Raw force, unseen, unheard, slammed into the blood-raged alien, sending the Krogan flying back into the pillar it had just been slamming Caterina into.
Tra'dur, despite the pain she was in, forced herself to sit up. Her eyes widened briefly at seeing what Talara had wrought.
Talara herself stared at her hand in surprise. Inside she felt strange. Like something within her was stirring. A part of her just now waking from a slumber that had lasted her whole life.
The Krogan roared and charged at her again. Talara focused on that feeling within her and drew from it, imagining the Krogan falling back, insisting it must.
Another wave of force answered. Yet again the Krogan slammed into the pillar.
And this time, he didn't move. He didn't have time. Anders and one of his Marines poured more fire into the blood-raged Krogan until even his robust physiology couldn't function any longer. He collapsed beside the pillar. Talara sensed something like a light going out. A flicker of flame dying, replaced only by nothingness.
"Move move move!" Anders' voice broke her from her thoughts. "Tend the wounded!"
"Right away!" Talara rushed forward and picked up Caterina. She was unconscious but alive. That Talara knew for certain.
There was an explosion from above them. Everyone briefly looked to see the Geth dropship blow apart. A moment later Lucy landed fifteen feet away, slamming the ground and creating a ripple of fine dust from the impact. Her lightsaber, still active, was held out and ready for more fighting.
But it wasn't a fight they had to worry about. The ground shuddered beneath them, more violent than before.
"Lava eruption imminent!" Theek shouted. "We must get to safety!"
Lucy shut down her lightsaber and returned it to her belt. She went straight for Tra'dur and helped her up while Anders picked up the exhausted Liara. "Let's go! We're out of time!" she shouted, running toward the Warri as she did. The rear hatch of the runabout opened, revealing the modular area in the back for storing their gear.
The shuddering under them ceased for a moment. Lucy and Talara both felt what came next in the seconds before it did. A loud roar filled the air and, behind them and the dig site, a jet of lava flew upward by at least twenty meters. As Lucy made it to the Warri with the hobbling, injured Tra'dur, lava spewed violently from the dig site tube. She helped Tra'dur into a seat and dashed to the cockpit. The Warri moved under her as she passed through the small living space between the cargo module and the cockpit. By the time she reached the cockpit the ship was already in mid-air. She took a seat at operations and tapped a key. "Warri to Aurora, we're clear. I repeat, we're clear, and we have wounded. How do you want to..."
"...handle this?" Lucy's voice said over the speaker.
The Aurora shuddered again, taking another hit to her degrading shields while, on the screen, another Geth cruiser was burning from Angel's efforts. "Shields are down to fifteen percent," Jarod said.
"The Koenig's shields are also down to twenty percent," Meridina confirmed.
"Status on pilots?"
"Four fighters lost. One escape pod."
Julia frowned at that. Six dead flight crew. "Tractor it or have Koenig pick it up. Helm, put us in position to receive our runabouts without exposing them to enemy fire. All ships, I want those runabouts back safe and sound."
"Aye ma'am," said Locarno.
"Orders relayed," Meridina confirmed. "Received."
"Aurora, we've received your course," Lucy's voice said. "We'll be out of atmosphere in ten seconds. Nine… eight…"
The Geth attackers finally seemed to notice the two runabouts climbing through the atmosphere. They broke away from where they were keeping Koenig boxed in. The attack ship maneuvered to open up on the aft of one of the ships, blowing it to pieces with pulse phaser cannon fire. Angel's plasma beams lashed out at the ships as well, slicing one apart and damaging the others. Nevertheless they fired.
"They're shooting at our runabouts. But no hits yet," al-Rashad said.
"...two… one…"
The two runabouts entered orbit. The Aurora was already moving to meet them. Of the remaining three Geth attackers, one went up to the Koenig's continued attack. The two remaining ones continued to move for the runabouts.
"Miss Delgado, I want those attackers out of the way!" Julia insisted.
"Aiming now, Captain," Angela assured her.
This time the Aurora's main bow cannons opened up. The thick sapphire pulses utterly obliterated one of the attackers. Sapphire beams carved into the remaining attacker, joined by the amber bursts from the Koenig's pulse phasers. It dodged and weaved, trying to get a clear shot on the Warri or Gonzales.
The Koenig's solar torpedoes raced out and struck the Geth attacker in the mid-section. It blew apart in a burst of white light.
More heavy shots from the lone surviving Geth cruiser struck their rear shields. "Shields down to ten percent," Jarod said.
"Come about and reinforce bow shields," she ordered.
The order was followed. It provided two benefits; bringing their biggest weapons to bear on the target and bringing the shuttle bays out of the line of fire.
"The runabouts are landing in the Main Bay," Jarod said.
"Good. Tactical, give them everything we've got left."
"Aye ma'am." Angel grinned at the order before finishing her new firing solution.
The resulting exchange of fire filled the orbital space over Therum. More sapphire pulses and beams were joined by over a dozen blue-white sparks, the drive fields of the solar torpedoes that followed the target lock Angel had achieved. The shields of the Aurora flashed blue as they struggled to repel the incoming railgun and plasma fire.
The exchange, when finished, clearly went against the Geth. The Aurora's bow shields were still intact, if degraded, while the Geth cruiser was reduced to a burning wreck. "I won't have the Geth attacking Nova Yekaterinburg in retaliation," Julia said. "Finish them off."
"With pleasure."
Again the Aurora's weapons fired, this time on tandem with Koenig. All energy fire, no torpedoes, which were unneeded. This barrage blew the Geth cruiser apart, leaving only debris field of inert, blackened shards.
"Status on Geth fighters?" Julia asked Meridina.
"They are under control," Meridina replied. "Commander Laurent assures us they will be eliminated within the minute."
"Task the secondary batteries to help finish them off."
Meridina did so. The particle interceptors on the Aurora continued firing where they could safely engage the Geth without hurting their own fighters. Julia watched with satisfaction as every glowing red dot on the holotank disappeared. She tapped the panel on her chair. "Bridge to Main Shuttle Bay. How did it go?"
"Anders here. Mission successful, but not without casualties."
Julia nodded and forbade herself even the slightest celebratory grin. "How bad?"
"Private Yamashita is KIA, headshot. Lieutenants Delgado and Tra'dur are wounded, Delgado badly wounded."
Julia glanced back to see the quiet look cross Angel's face. "How badly?"
"She got tackled and slammed around by a Krogan in a blood rage, Captain. She's alive, but the corpsman confirm head trauma, suspected concussion, and broken ribs at the least. Internal bleeding is confirmed. Doctor Gillam's just now arriving to get her to medbay."
"And Tra'dur?"
"Broken leg and arm. She's otherwise fine." There was an edge in Anders' voice. "I assume full responsibility for the injuries to the science team, Captain. I'll have a report to you by 2230 hours."
"I understand." Julia nodded. "Bridge out." She tapped the key on her chair again. Again she was looking toward Tactical, where Angel was quietly stewing in anger and worry, while one of her subordinates, Syrandi Luneri, remained quiet at her battle station, Secondary Tactical, along the starboard side of the bridge beside Auxiliary Communications. "Lieutenant Luneri, please relieve Lieutenant Delgado."
The Dorei, her dark purple skin joined by the teal-colored spots of her spotline and purple hair, looked up and nodded. "Aye Captain," she said in her accented English, the sound vaguely Pacific Islander to Julia's ears.
With gratitude showing in her hazel-colored eyes, Angel rose from her station and went straight for the nearest lift.
"Stand down from Code Red," Julia ordered. She released her harness and stood. "Maintain Yellow status. Commander Meridina, please join me. Commander Jarod, you have the bridge."
"Yes Captain," Meridina said. She released her harness and stood. Jarod did the same, leaving Lieutenant Sabiha Neyzi to take Ops while he went to the command chair. Meridina followed Julia off of the bridge.
Once the Mako pulled back into the vehicle garage for Zhu's Hope, the trouble began.
The Baynhams, and a much-subdued Jeong, cooperated extensively with Shepard and her squad. Thanks to them the squad knew precisely where to go to get to the Thorian and what to expect. They found that the moment they pulled into the garage and encountered the husk-like humanoid figures, all that remained of age-old servitors of the Thorian. They resembled walking shoots of green plant more than anything, but Robert sensed the malevolent intent within them and pulled the trigger on his pistol. A WHUP sound filled the air with each shot, the resulting blue bolts of energy blasting away part of the creature. A shotgun roared, then another; Tali and Shepard were joining him.
There was more weapons fire from ahead. Robert sensed that veneer of despair and fear, made stronger now that he knew what it was. The colonists had a defense line here and the Thorian was forcing them to fight. Its control was absolute; any rebellion, even a thought, brought with it intense and unstoppable pain.
Ashley responded by firing from the cover of the Mako. "The grenades, now," Shepard ordered, pulling one off. Robert and Tali each added one. With a little nudging from Robert the three grenades landed in a perfect pattern to spread the gas to all of the shooters. One by one they collapsed.
This was only the start. At the lift, in the halls leading to the colony, at the colony itself, the colonists were all armed and fighting to hold them back. The Thorian had them shooting to kill while Shepard refused to give the same order, insisting on suppressive fire to support the throwing of the grenades. The Thorian undoubtedly realized what was going on. The colonists were becoming more aggressive as they continued, more heedless of their own lives. But regardless of the danger, Shepard continued to insist on the grenades.
By the time they got to the colony proper, the incoming fire was inescapable. "Commander, whatever you're doing, it's working. They're no longer attacking the ship," Joker said over their comms.
"Good. Get everyone you can spare into hazmat-compatible protection and send them out on my order," Shepard replied. "I'll need them to secure the colonists."
"Shepard, there's too much fire," Tali said. "We'll never get a grenade thrown without getting shot."
"Ma'am, maybe we should cut loose," Ashley said. "The way this thing sounds, they're better off dead than enslaved to it."
"I understand the sentiment, Sergeant, believe me," Shepard answered. "But I'm not killing these people unless we have no choice, and we still do. Get your grenades ready. Robert, we'll go in and draw their fire as best as we can."
"You want me to project a shield again." It wasn't a question. And Robert knew he didn't need to bring up what happened last time. There was still a sting in his side from it.
"Exactly. I'm counting on it. Ready?"
He drew in a breath to ready himself. "Yes. Let's go."
The two went out into the fire. Shepard's biotic barrier absorbed the initial shots to strike it. Before it could falter Robert focused his power forward, creating the same area of reversed force he'd tried in the ExoGeni HQ. His control strained to its limits.
Shepard spread her arms forward. Energies gathered before her, the purplish-blue of dark matter, joining Robert's shield of force and reflecting the attacks. "Now!"
Ashley and Tali came up and tossed their grenades, one after the other. Two, then four, then six were flying into the various areas of cover, all while shooting continued to wear at their defenses. Robert felt a sharp pain in the middle of his head from the strain he was taking on. Sweat dripped down Shepard's face at her own efforts.
Sickly green gas formed in clouds ahead, each grenade adding to it. The colonist shooters began choking. There was no cry of "Fall back!" as normal enemies might give. For the moment, their foes were not people; they were tools, mere things, reduced to such by the Thorian.
The grenades kept getting thrown so long as the shooting continued. When it finally stopped, and several seconds passed, Robert and Shepard dropped their defenses. Robert's legs felt little better than rubber and he went to his knees. Unable to wipe the sweat from her face on account of her helmet visor, Shepard satisfied herself with a gulp of water and several bites from an energy bar. Combat biotic rations, Robert knew.
"We're clear, that's all of them," said Ashley.
"No." Robert got back to his feet, with effort, and took a drink from his own canteen. "There's one more."
They advanced to the center of the colony. As they turned a corner around one of the prefab buildings, they found the last of the colonists still awake. Fai Dan stood with his hand on a pistol and trembling violently. "I… I was supposed to lead these people," the leader of Zhu's Hope gasped. "I… I failed them."
"This wasn't your fault," Shepard said to him. "ExoGeni did this to you. It allowed this."
Slowly Fai Dan's hand gripped the pistol. It came up with jerky motions, as if he were in the middle of a seizure. Robert felt his despair, his pain… and defiance. "It wants me to stop you," Fai Dan said. "To protect it. But… I won't. I won't be a… puppet!" He let out a wordless cry afterward as the pain within spiked. The spores in his brain were flooding his pain centers with sensation. "I won't!"
"No!" Shepard cried, realizing his intent.
Robert also sensed it. As Fai Dan brought the gun barrel to his temple, finger already tensing on the trigger, he acted. He reached out and grabbed the weapon with his abilities. The barrel rose before it fired, letting off a shot that tore skin and hair from Fai Dan's scalp, but did not hit his skull. Blood started to flow immediately from the wound.
"No!" Fai Dan cried, even as Tali's arm shot forward. The gas grenade landed at his feet and went off, creating another cloud of green-tinted gas. He inhaled it and began to shudder before collapsing, unconscious.
"Good job," Shepard said to them.
"I could sense the intent, and the defiance behind it. The Thorian's spores are literal torture, Shepard. Mental and physical." Robert scowled. "Even the most innocent independent thought is punished. Killing himself was the only way Fai Dan saw to get out of this."
"We should be careful going down," said Ashley. "If this thing's spores get into us..."
"We'll keep helmets on and run on internal air," Shepard said. Her left forearm came up and her omnitool appeared. "Shepard to Normandy, is my hazmat team ready?"
"We're on our way, Commander," Alenko answered.
"Good. Now…" She looked around until she found what the Baynhams had described. "They said the ship is blocking the path down. Let's get that crane moving to get it out of the way."
"On it," said Tali.
Shepard looked at Robert again. "Can you sense this thing?"
Robert attempted to do just that for a moment. There was life here, below, vast and ancient, and oh so very frustrated… and afraid. "I think. It's not happy we shut down all of its puppets. And it's frightened out of its wits, I think. I would expect trouble as we go down."
"Well, I can see it's smart." Shepard's expression was grim. "ExoGeni's crimes aside, this thing enslaves people. I don't take kindly to slavery."
"Nor do I," Robert admitted. "And you know what I used to do for a living."
"Yeah." She smiled at him. "So, ready to face another slaver?"
"Always," was the answer, with a smile added to the reply.