Maybe the Protheans deserved it.
It was a harsh thought, but the further upward they fought into the tower, the more Zedd felt it wasn’t harsh enough. The reasoning for that was simple and a bit petty, yet undeniably centered in logic and reason.
Specifically… “Fuck these stairs!”They were a joke of engineering; narrow slabs of exposed construction that wound up the interior of the shaft. What, did guardrails not exist just because all of you were biotic? Worse than that, it was like basic structural logic didn’t matter to those oh-so-advanced aliens as they had designed a vertical meatgrinder choked with dust that they had to blast their way through and hope for the best.
Something skittered against the far wall with a clicking noise, the echo metallic through the space of the shaft.
Nuh-uh. Zedd didn’t even bother looking up, gun raised as he blind-fired into the shadows. Blue force streaked from the Full Stop, the light illuminating a four-legged synthetic monstrosity for all of a second; the thing clinging to the ceiling just above them.
The thing scrambled sideways, the shot dodged with an upside-down insectile jerk as it dropped from shadow to shadow; nearly silent as it flared red. Oh.
Only to be joined by more flares above them in the darkness. Oh no.
“We got more!”“We fucking see that!” His own scream to Ashley was half-choked as his gun went high and active again, semi-automatic kinetic packets joined by shardfire in pulses that lit up the stairwell. “Hoppers!” Garrus shouted over the comms as more shardfire tore out in the landing just below them. “More Hoppers incoming from the lower floors!” The crack of the Mantis sniper rifle was loud enough to echo above so much else, near-deafening as it bounced off the walls. “These things are a pain to get a bead on!”Hoppers, huh? “I’ve been thinking of calling them Ninjas actually! Geth Ninjas?” Zedd ducked a phasic round and spun with another series of blue shots, one of the wall-crawlers dropping midleap with a cratered optic. “I dunno, it just sounded better to me.”
“Ninjas?” Garrus rounded the landing to join them, rifle still firing out as his mandibles flared in genuine confusion. "And what are ninjas?"
Fuck it. Zedd shook his head, racking his gun again to vent the heat build-up. "Call ‘em whatever you want. I’m just starting to hate these things!"
"We don’t like ‘em either, Victors!” Jane Shepard snapped up the vertical incline, too good to use the stairs like a normal person as her Biotic Charge slammed a synthetic into a wall before she blew another to scrap with another point-blank Katana shot. “Just take the things down!”
"You know who could handle them easy?" Zedd tracked a Hopper as it bounced between two rusted support beams, yelling loud over the comms. "Kai Leng! Real good at this shit! Be real nice if he was here right now!"
“Get over yourself!” He could practically hear the roll of Jane Shepard’s eyes as loud as her voice, the woman barking the words out as a Hopper chose that moment to spring her way. “I d-”
She grunted herself short, free hand glowing a violent blue in the dark.
The biotic Throw Shepard let free was a masterclass of force, the attack a kinetic sledgehammer into a wall hard enough to twist its chassis completely sideways with a shrieking crunch.
As if learning from its brethren’s mistake, another Hopper bypassed the Shepard in the red armor and skittered straight down to the wall towards her brother all in blue. Claws scraped bright against the surface as it scrambled over it, lines sparking off atop the ancient metal.
The Commander didn’t flinch.
Hell, he didn’t even raise his rifle.
With a grunt, John Shepard stepped into the machine’s path; left arm wrapped in biotic fields so dense Zedd could barely make out the limb beneath as the blue energies warped the air around it.
A Breakfist.
Now, that one Kira could do.
Sure, she complained about the muscle strain, but she could pull it off.
Though, definitely not with as much skill as Shepard as the man caught the Hopper at arm’s length. His fist drove itself square and deep into the center of its frame, impact compressing barrier and chassis both in the same second; the thing crumpling around John Shepard’s newly-made crater in the wall.
“Target neutralized.” The Commander sounded over the channel, rifle raised again as the good Asari doctor moved into place behind him.Liara raised her hands, a fleeing Hopper suddenly wrapped in a Singularity, the localized gravity well yanking the machine off the wall and left it spinning helplessly in a trap of dark blue.
A trap that allowed perfect placement for John to casually shred it with a disciplined burst from his Avenger. “Good work! Push the gap!”Alenko took that order from the Commander to heart as he rushed past Zedd, the biotic taking the steps three at a time to rush to Jane’s flank. “Covering the left!” His pistol barked out with multiple quick pulls, omni-tool flaring orange alongside it.
Weapons locking up in a shower of sparks, the Geth on the landing above were sitting ducks for Jane Shepard; the Spectre cresting the landing to tear them apart with an explosion of biotic force.
With the top cleared, they spilled into the upper chamber; a gasp forced out of Zedd’s throat for a bare second as the heat jumped almost a good twenty degrees. The bare second lasted longer than the gasp as his Mantle auto-adjusted for the temperature, protection systems already active. His eyes snapped up, widening behind his glasses at the sight of the ceiling tower torn completely open; heavy metal panels hanging loose and trailing embers as they groaned in the wind. The smog-choked amber sky of Feros was visible through it all, and — even without the pollution — it was far from clear.
“Incoming!”Ashley’s call-out had them duck the Geth drones pouring from the gap above, each engine whining as part of a larger mechanical chorus as they fanned out toward them. At the far end of the ruined room, not to be outdone, a line of troopers held a fortified wall behind a pile of too-thick slag.
A line of red light seared through the thick dark smoke — “Sniper!” — as Garrus dove behind a rusted console the instant before a shard punched a hole through where his chest had been.
Before anyone could return fire, heavy thuds shook the platform, each shudder traveling right up through Zedd’s boots.
"Destroyer.”John grunted at his sister’s quiet call-out, eyes tracking the rear. “I see it.”“I got it.” Zedd answered from the stairwell, rushing out with the Full Stop leveled and turned back to standard krogan-piercing power. “Tali!”"Sending an Overload to its localized network, just—” The quarian breathed in nearly as fast as her three fingers moved across her omni, words stacked up against each other. “—just got it!"
Her omni-tool flared a brilliant orange as the Destroyer stomped through the archway like a walking barricade, oversized gun lifted the same moment Tali’s tech attack hit. Electricity arced across plating as shields shorted out with a pop loud enough to be heard in between rounds of shardfire as drones fell from the ceiling.
Zedd didn’t hesitate to pull the trigger.
Reinforced metal sheared clean off as a blue slug of directed energy took out a knee joint, the massive machine buckling with one leg gone. Pistol still raised, Zedd fired off shot after shot with each step forward he took; recoil kicking back against his palm.
Still, he didn’t stop until the geth’s chest cavity caved in fully, the entire thing collapsing into dead sparks and leaking coolant.
A hard breath blew out of Zedd as he finally stopped to rack the slide of his weapon open to let it do the same, thick blue-hued steam trailing out from the gun’s innards in a fog as it vented hard.
All eyes went skyward as a shadow passed over the broken ceiling; a geth dropship lifting away beyond the ruined edge of the tower. Thrusters flaring, it banked hard and away from the city center it hovered over — its path a straight shot to the sprawling megastructure in the distance that extended high into the smoggy cloudscape.
“A retreat?” John rifle lowered even as his eyes tracked the exhaust trail.“Tired of playing, huh?” Jane clicked her tongue, shotgun racking loud in her hands. “Cowards.”Both Zedd and John rolled their eyes, but it was John who spoke up next. “Let’s just meet this leader and find out what the geth wanted on-planet.”
– o – o – o – o – o – o – o –
“Sorry for doubting you.”By the time the squad descended back down — forced to use the winding nightmare that was the stairs without power in the structure — the smoke in the plaza had already cleared and the oh-so-rude woman at the barricade before was waiting for them.
“I mean that.” One hand wiped at her face, half-dried blood flaking off. “I’m sorry.”“You should be.” Jane Shepard didn’t bother breaking stride, walking past the woman with a scoff. “Don’t make the same mistake again.”…unfortunately, some hard words right there. Zedd couldn’t deny that for all the bite she had to her, Jane Shepard was unfortunately the cooler of the Shepards. Not to say that John didn’t have some gravitas to him, but the edge… the edge of Jane was just… Damn, maybe I am into her.
All of a sudden, Zedd was glad Kira wasn’t here to smack him.“What’s your name, ma’am?”“I…” The woman blinked up at John as he voiced the question, dark eyes going wide for a moment as if she had suddenly remembered that civilians were supposed to introduce themselves to military personnel. "Arcelia Silva Martinez. Security, more or less."“More or less?” Arms folded, Jane Shepard didn’t even bother looking back as she asked the question over her shoulder. “Pick one.”"Look, lady, the depth of my job involved less gunfights and more keeping kids from tagging buildings despite what I was supposedly hired for.” Arcelia gave the Spectre a flat look the other woman didn’t even bother acknowledging, back still turned. “ExoGeni didn't exactly give me the best to work with here.”
“That is Spectre Jane Shepard, ma’am.” John’s voice dropped down on the rent-a-cop’s shoulders with a bite that had Zedd blinking as he recognized a bit more of Jane in that tone. “I understand the situation but I expect you to address her with respect.”
“I…” The woman stammered again, tongue running over dry blood-flecked lips. “Spectre? I mean… I’m sorry. I didn’t know.”“It’s fine.” John lowered his Avenger from his shoulder but didn’t bother dropping it back in the holster, posture still straight as he looked down on the woman no taller than his sister. “You said a Fai Dan was in charge. Is he still…”“In charge?” Arcelia nodded, interjecting quick. “Yes, he is… sir.”Shepard nodded back. “I was going to say alive, but that’s even better. Where is he?”
Her eyes darted toward the darkened corridor behind her, grip on the shotgun tightening just the slightest bit. It was so small it was barely noticeable, but Zedd couldn’t help but blink as he tracked it anyway. “He’s in the main module, been trying to keep people together.”John nodded again. “Then take us to him.”
– o – o – o – o – o – o – o –
The route the brown-skinned women had them weave through was winding and deeper into the colony’s interior than he expected.
Zedd’s hands stayed in his pockets, fiddling with the miniaturized bodies of his LVs while his aviators fed him a steady stream of telemetry that only got more depressing the more he had a chance to read through. Dry water taps hissing with empty pressure below dead power couplings that hung from on high like limp jungle vines were already bad enough, but stack that on top of families packed into cramped refabs filled with too many weapons and not nearly enough food…Well, you had several problems on top of a potential disaster just waiting to happen.Every problem announced itself without needing to be spoken.
And yet nobody was bothering to pack a bag.
Zedd watched a mother as she wiped dirt off a child’s face, an entire family watching them pass as they sat in their meatgrinder of a colony and somehow just… enduring it.
There’s gotta be limits to greed. He knew the hypocrisy in that, considering what he’d turned Victory into but colonial well-being had always been his number one. The people were the whole point and without human resources, you didn’t have much.
So, he also understood why ExoGeni was doing whatever they had done here.
Only thing was, he just couldn’t track what the long game was supposed to be.
The man of the house waited for them near the rear of a prefab, surrounded by a dozen colonists atop a slightly elevated platform.
Huh…Zedd tilted his head to the side. Little older than I figured he’d be.
Thinner, too; though that wasn’t a surprise given the food situation on the colony. Past that, the man had features clearly softened by at least a faint Chinese descent — if his name wasn’t a big enough clue at least.
As he saw John and Jane step forward under the light, what looked like relief loosened his shoulders and spread across his face for a second.
Then Zedd blinked as it almost immediately vanished — the man shifting like something had pushed all that back down. …huh.
It was like watching a flip switch; it was that sudden.
“Commander Shepard…”Jane stepped forward, shotgun resting on her shoulder. “Commanders.”“Commanders Shepard.” The colony leader didn’t even blink. “Thank you for coming. The tower…?”John raised his chin. "Clear.”
“For now.” Jane nodded, the woman raising her eyebrow as John stepped up beside her. “Geth pulled off to that giant tower with the bridge.”That was enough to make Fai Dan’s gaze sharpen, blankness breaking for at least a moment as he looked off toward the horizon. “That’s where they came from. ExoGeni has a primary facility across the Skyway. Our peopl—”"Then that’s where we’re going.” The Spectre didn’t seem to have any interest in waiting, M-23 dropping back into her hands. “We’ll take ‘em out.”"Wait! We believe there might still be Geth in the tunnels." Fai Dan didn't raise his voice, but the words still rushed their way out as the man’s hand came up. "And our water is cut off, the power in the colony’s systems are failing, I cannot spare anyone t—"
"Unfortunately, we’re not here as aid workers.” Jane bit down on the word aid, almost spitting it out like an insult as she narrowed her eyes. "The geth are on your back. We’re here to fix that and then figure out why they’re there in the first place."
A few colonists reacted to that.
No sound — nothing even angry — but they shifted all the same, all at one; a synchronized adjustment of posture across a dozen differed bodies like a flock of birds catching a sudden change in the wind.
Zedd tilted his head, lenses running a rapid biometric scan. Just a collective physical twitch without even a twitch in heart rates. Yeah. Perfectly normal.
“Unfortunately…” John echoed with a held-back sigh. “My sister is right. We have a mission to complete. And once we handle that at the source, I’m sure your local problems will get a lot easier to sort out.”Fai Dan swallowed, gaze dropping to the metal floor grating as both hands curled themselves into tight fists, relaxed, and curled again. "The Skyway."
It took a while for the words to leave him, but when they did, he followed up with more. "If you want answers, you’ll find them there."
Jane turned to the squad. "So, we’re going to shoot at some more geth then?”“Not…” John hummed for a moment as Jane turned to look his way. “Not so sure about that.”An eyebrow rose as Jane Shepard fixed him with a look. “What do you mean by that?”“Well, I’m just an Alliance Commander.” John tapped the N7 on his blue hardsuit as he eyed Jane back. “Of the two of us, you technically have authority you can abuse.”“...continue.”“I proposition that you stay here and squeeze the people for information, hold down the fort and clear out any Geth left in the process, while Garrus, Liara, Tali go with me to investigate what this company could be hiding.” John tilted his head to the side. “I’d stay behind but you know people can’t really deny a Spectre, can they?” Green eyes narrowed up. “...I feel like you’re playing me.”Zedd swore he saw John’s lip twitch. “No idea what you’re talking about.”
Okay, maybe he’s cool too.