The Eternal Effect

Disclaimer: We own nothing. Diablo and Mass Effect are owned by Blizzard and Bioware respectively. We just play and write in their worlds, and what worlds they are.

Summary: Do a little recon, they said. It'll be a short trip, they said. What the Citadel Council didn't anticipate was that once they were through the relay, the crew of the Normandy SR 2 would get entangled in a conflict as old as humanity itself. Welcome to Sanctuary, where Heaven and Hell are more than mere ideas, and the locals are...less than friendly.

Chapter 1: Relay to Hell

"That relay is giving me the creeps Skipper." Ashley Williams stated as she crossed her arms and stared past Joker's head towards the fast approaching relay off in the distance. Two days out on 'one last run' for the Citadel Council, and the first two human Spectres had gotten a bad feeling almost the moment they had boarded the Normandy alongside most of their old crew. "You sure you want to do this Commander?"

Jess Shepard raised a reddish brown eyebrow at Williams' discomfort, but couldn't blame her for her paranoia in this case. Something about the whole mission stank, just like the first time they'd taken the old Normandy on its shakedown run. "Two Spectres on the same ship? I'd say deja vu doesn't come close, but all we're doing is a little recon Ash. What's the worst that can happen?"

"We find a still living Reaper?" Jeff 'Joker' Moreau chimed in, before gesturing towards the unusually pulsating relay in front of them. "And with the way that rickety piece of Reaper crap is glowing, I'd be surprised if we get through it in one piece. You sure those tech boys got the damn thing working?"

"Have a little faith Joker." Ashley told him with a smile that didn't quite reach her eyes. "It's been three years since we blasted those damn machines back to whatever dark hole they crawled out of. The relays have been since restored to working order."

"As far as we know." Joker muttered under his breath before turning to face the two women behind his chair. When neither said anything in response, he continued onward undeterred. "I'm just saying, that's the official story we've been told, but we all know the official story is a line of bull after all the crap we went through to get this far."

"He has a valid point Commander." EDI, the synthetic, and trusted AI that controlled virtually every system aboard the Normandy, stated as she too turned to face the two Spectres from her position in the co-pilot's chair.

"I know EDI, believe me I know, but I wouldn't go through with this if I didn't think it was safe. I saw the data of the probes myself, the only thing interesting is a small garden world not too far from the relay. We're just looking around and we'll be back a few days later, afterwards it'll be business as usual." Shepard stated, sounding more confident than she actually felt about this latest mission. That's how the mess on Eden Prime had started, a simple shakedown run which had led to them having to pick up an ancient Prothean beacon. That however, had only been the start.

"That and Liara would hunt you down herself if she has to if we're gone too long Skipper." Ashley retorted as she leaned against the right wall of the cockpit, drawing Jess out of her thoughts in the process.

Shepard snorted but nodded since Ashley was right on the credits in this case. "That does help me sleep better at night knowing she'd be leading the charge if we went MIA."

"Not that kind of hunt, Commander." Joker told her mock seriously.

"Oh ha ha, keep talkin' Joker. That hat can still wind up in the trash compactor you know."

Joker's hand flew up to his head and clutched the old and worn out hat that had seen about as much action as the human pilot himself. "Don't touch my baby. It's been through as much crap as most of the crew put together you know! It's my lucky cap, this goes, we might as well scuttle the ship while we're at it."

"And it's probably the only thing in the universe capable of containing his ego." Ashley threw in from the side and tossed a smirk in the pilot's direction just as he started to turn his chair so that it was facing forward once more.

"An ego that is well earned given our track record of only one ship lost in our rather long and fabled time together Commander Williams." EDI was quick to chime in.

Shepard shook her head and chuckled even as she directed her emerald gaze on the silver robotic woman in the co-pilot's chair. "Careful EDI, you're gonna send Joker's already inflated ego into the red zone you keep talkin' like that. Trust me, it doesn't need any more help."

"I am well aware, Commander. However, I have ways to keep Jeff's ego in check, I assure you." EDi was quick to reassure her, her tone of voice holding an unmistakable note of amusement in her otherwise monotone if feminine sounding synthetic vocal patterns.

"Do I even want to know?" Shepard asked, having a feeling she already knew the answer to her question, especially since Joker was shaking his head and gesturing for them to stop talking.

"Given our past experience, I am certain that you would prefer to remain ignorant." EDI replied her silver eyes never once leaving the displays in front of her.

Ashley coughed lightly to get everyone's attention. "Now that we successfully avoided this awkward conversation topic, could we please just proceed through the relay?"

"With pleasure." Joker readily agreed and wiggled his fingers dramatically. "Behold, the master himself at work."

"Back to square one." Shepard muttered under her breath and roller her eyes, uncertain why she expected her pilot to change now when he had so stubbornly refused in all those years before.

"Commencing relay travel in, three, two, one." No sooner had EDi finished her countdown did the usual arcs of blue energy collide with the ship, before shooting them halfway across the galaxy in the blink of an eye, before they reappeared whole once more on the other side through another matching relay. Once they were fully reconstituted once more, did EDI do a scan of their immediate surroundings and the ship itself before coming back with positive results on everything. "We have passed the relay." EDI announced calmly. "All systems green, drift under one thousand kilometers."

"Alright, anything on our sensors that the probes missed?" Shepard asked, all business as her eyes began scanning the space in front of her ship for anything of interest. There wasn't a lot to see besides a few distant pinpricks of light in the otherwise vast darkness in front of the cockpit window.

"Aside from some distant asteroids and a black hole a few hundred light years away? Nope, as boring as back home." Joker told her with a shrug. "But that's why we took this assignment isn't it? To have some peace and quiet for once."

"That's the idea." Shepard agreed with a small relieved smile. "That and the Council wouldn't shut up about my coming out of retirement for 'one last run'. I swear Tevos was close to begging by the time I left her office, but I would have said yes anyway since she had a point. The galaxy needed the reminder I was still kickin', that we were still kicking." Despite having three years between now and the end of the Reaper War, some people found it hard to believe the saviors of the Milky Way galaxy were still alive and well in most cases. So as an act of goodwill and reassurance for the population as a whole, the Council had made a big stink about getting Shepard to make a public appearance in the hopes of quieting down the masses to some extent, to make them feel safe and protected even if this was a simple recon mission that wouldn't likely turn up anything of note.

But it would give the public something to talk about, and even though it was nothing more than a few retired soldiers flying through a relay, the media would undoubtedly find a way to spin it differently. Probably something about how the heroes of the galaxy went off to bring the light of civilization to a new star system for the glory of a mostly unified galaxy. Even now, despite everything that had happened three years ago, the Terminus Systems were largely as lawless and as uncivilized as they'd ever been, but the point remained the same for even those that didn't feel content to be under Citadel Council or Systems Alliance control, and had instead sought their own way.

Whatever the reasons behind their little glorified recon op, Shepard hadn't needed much persuasion to do something that involved most of her old team again, and while she'd have loved to have Liara along for the ride, she was at home on Thessia, taking care of their recent addition to the T'Soni/Shepard family.

"Guess that means we fly to the garden world, stake our claim, and fly back home. Fine by me." Joker said with a yawn. "Back at home by lunch time if we hurry."

"Joker, your home is practically this ship." Ashley droned without moving more than was necessary to address him.

"Exactly." Joker retorted without missing a beat, the shit eating grin on his face only matched by the gleam in his eyes as he peered over his shoulder towards the unamused Ashley. "'Sides, being around you two is exciting enough for any guy with a pulse."

"He says that while EDI is within earshot." Ash droned back with a roll of her eyes.

"I am everywhere on the Normandy, he knows better than to try and hide anything."

"That and since when does Joker possess something akin to tact?" Shepard said to Ashley with genuine curiosity.

"Good point Skipper. And on that note, I'm gonna get ready for a boring shuttle ride down to the surface. You coming or staying up here with flyboy and his tin lady? No offense EDI."

"None taken Commander Williams."

"Have fun you two, take lots of pictures for the rest of us. Preferably nude pics of you two on some beach down there."

"Tact, none." Shepard muttered under her breath with an amused shake of her own head while Ashley's right hand drifted to the heavy pistol she kept on her hip. Joker grinned but raised his hands in surrender, not about to push his luck further while she was onboard.

Deciding to ignore the pilot's antics before she flew into a murderous rage and shot him, Ashley stepped into the elevator and hit the button for the shuttle bay with a little bit more force than strictly necessary. Shepard noticed but decided to keep her mouth shut as she leaned against the side of the elevator as the doors shut in front of them. "Just like old times."

"A little too much like old times Skipper. You'd think EDI would have beaten that smartass attitude out of him by now." Ashley grumbled and sighed heavily in response.

"Joker still knows how to get under your skin."

"As if he would forget." Ashley snorted unhappily. "That would bereft him of one of his favourite pastimes."

"It could always be worse."

"How so?"

"We could be dealing with a mini Joker if EDi ever asks him to adopt."

Ashley snapped her head towards Shepard at that and felt her jaw go slack for a moment as she tried to process what her Commander and one of her closest friends had just said. "Thanks for that horrifying image."

"No problem, but out of curiosity, what did you think I would say?" Shepard asked, curiosity getting the better of her just as the elevator doors finally started to open once they reached the bottom of the shaft, the shuttle bay and cargo area laid out before them.

"I didn't expect anything specific, but after all we've been through I would have thought you'd have pulled something more mystical on me. I mean 'There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy'."

Shepard only took a moment to identify the quote's author, remembering well Ashley's love for old Earth literature. "Shakespeare? Haven't heard that from you before Ash."

She shrugged in response, but didn't hesitate further as she led the way to the nearby shuttle on the far end of the bay. "Yeah… never liked his works as much as the rest of my dad's things but… it certainly has its own moments." Just as she stopped talking, she stopped and kicked the weight stand that one of the biggest men either women had ever worked beside stopped and looked up at them, a goofy grin on his face. "Get up Vega, we got shit to do."

"More important than maintaining all of this for you?" He asked with a grin and gestured towards his body. Shepard had to put a hand in front of her mouth to stifle the laugh that threatened to escape her while Ashley gave the incorrigible giant a withering glare. "Lola, you at least can appreciate the view."

"I've seen you without your shirt off James, it's not that impressive." Ashley grumbled, but both Shepard and James knew better.

"That's not what you said before we left for this little recon job." James stated, his smug grin only growing.

"What?" Ashley hissed her eyes narrowing dangerously.

Despite the glare that could have melted pure platinum into useless slag, Vega wasn't about to stop his playful banter. "Or perhaps it would be more accurate to say what you didn't say. You certainly seemed lost for words, your hands did all the talking though, or rather groping."

The bright red tint to the otherwise intimidating woman's face was only matched by the way her mouth opened and closed uselessly as she tried to come up with a snappy retort, but it was to no avail in this case. When she was able to speak though, she was none to happy with Vega. "You son of a bitch! You promised not to tell anyone!"

"Now, now. Language, lieutenant commander, or do I have to tie you up, again?" James said, before rubbing his chin as he appeared to get lost in thought for a moment. "Although, you seemed to enjoy that, so maybe I shouldn't."

Shepard couldn't contain herself any longer and chuckled as she walked towards the lockers that contained their respective gear. "You too huh? Liara was pretty creative on our honeymoon, I don't think I got a lot of sleep the first week."

"Skipper, this isn't funny. Promise me that this conversation will forever remain between the three of us. Promise me!" Ashley demanded, or rather pleaded desperately.

"About that…" Shepard trailed off as her green eyes flicked to the nearest security cam in the cargo bay.

"Vega tied you up? God, tell me there is a video of that!" Joker's voice said from the intercom, cackling gleefully. "This is like Christmas, Easter, New Years and my birthday put together!"

"Say another word and I will break every bone in your body Joker!" Ashley yelled out before stomping the rest of the way towards her personal locker with fire all but radiating off of her with every step. James and Jess both weren't about to get in her way and gave the temperamental Spectre a wide berth as they grabbed their own gear.

To that end, James wisely steered the conversation back to the task at hand as he grabbed his armor before starting to slip into the ablative hardware as quickly as possible. "So, Lola. Anything I should know before we land like say, you've been here before and now all the natives want your head, or perhaps there are giant undersea monsters that will eat us when we go for a swim? Anything like that?"

"Not as far as I'm aware, James. This is going to be nothing more than a good old recon mission that will leave us bored." The sound of a nearby door opening with a nearly silent hiss and a quiet snort said someone didn't agree with her assessment.

"Famous last words Shepard. There's no such thing as boring with you, Commander Bosh'tet." Tali Zorah vas Normandy stated as she and Garrus Vakarian came out of engineering, the turian sharpshooter chuckling softly in the back of his dual toned throat as he followed after the quarian engineer.

"She's got a point Shepard. Trouble tends to find you wherever you go. Just look at how you met me on the Citadel, let alone our run in on Omega."

"I seem to remember you were knee deep in merc trouble when I found you on Omega, so that was on you scarface." Shepard was quick to remind Garrus, who only shrugged, not about to argue since they all knew she was right as she finished donning her own kinetic based armor and started loading up on her preferred weapons. The amp in the back of her neck was quickly obscured as she put on the black and red helmet over her head, covering her slightly scarred face that ran blue with cybernetic implants just beneath the surface of most of her body.

"I also seem to remember pulling your ass out of the fire more than once Commander." Garrus countered, the all too easy grin, or the turian equivalent anyway, easy to identify on his mandibled face before he sobered almost as quickly. "So, am I going to have to say what everyone's thinking, or should I keep my mouth shut and hope we're just antsy from being out of practice for so long?"

Shepard paused after grabbing her pistol and attaching it to the magnetic clip on her right hip before turning her helmeted head towards another of her oldest friends in the galaxy. "Honestly? I'm getting the same vibe as everyone else, but I'm gonna hope this all turns into an easy milk run, for once. We scout out the area, take a few readings of the soil, air, etc, and see if the locals are friendly, provided they're suitably advanced of course. If not, we stay off the radar as much as possible and leave no trace of our being in the neighborhood. Standard SOP for this recon run."

"Yeah, besides, we fried the ancient death machines three years ago. What could this little dustball have that's worse than that?" Tali asked, earning an annoyed glare from Ashley from behind her helmet's tinted visor. "What?"

"You just had to say it didn't you?" Ash grumbled, having finished loading up her own impressive arsenal by this point before making for the waiting shuttle.

"Okay, but the galaxy can't hate us that much that it comes up with something worse than Reapers….can it?" Tali asked almost meekly, reminding Shepard of the young, naive engineer she had picked up so long ago.

"If you have to ask Tali, then you really haven't been around Lola long enough." James chimed in with a mock frown plastered on his face.

"Its simple really, when Shepard is involved, just assume the worst, always." Garrus told her with a smirk.

"Yeah, yeah, I'm a trouble magnet, hilarious. Now can we move on guys?" Shepard asked with an exasperated sigh. Sometimes she wondered how she survived all of the teasing her friends threw her way on a regular basis.

"Magnets only attract certain metals, how could you be one for trouble?"

"Human idiom, Tali. They don't make much sense." Garrus told her as he shrugged his shoulders. "They also have one about keeping a feline in a box or something like that."

"Oh Schrodinger's cat right?" When everyone but Shepard raised an eyebrow at that, Tali's silvery eyes seemed to shine a little brighter behind her purple tinted visored mask. "What? I'm not that far behind. I have hung around you guys for how long again?"

"She's got us there Skipper. Alright scarface, if anything decides to randomly burst into flames while we're away, blame Joker." Ashley stated, earning an amused look from Garrus as she started for the shuttle.

"Will do Williams. See you in six hours before we send in a search team?"

"Sounds good to me Garrus. The ship's yours until then. Try not to have too much fun without us ya hear?" Shepard asked, earning an amused chuckle from the sharpshooter behind her.

"No promises Commander."

"That's exactly what I was afraid of." Shepard told him jokingly and climbed into the shuttle before James and Ashley followed suit behind her. A quick double tap on the cockpit door alerted their pilot that they were ready to go. While they strapped in, Shepard kept an open line going with the AI in control of the Normandy. "EDI, anything you can tell us about the planet?"

"Surprisingly little, Commander. It seems to have an earth like atmosphere and gravitational pull, but beyond a similar geography of mountains, dense rainforests, and tundra landscapes, among other similar features you'd expect, there does seem to be a strange energy field surrounding the planet. Sensors are having trouble determining its source or what it might be capable of, but it doesn't seem radiological in nature. It should be completely harmless to you."

"Should? I don't like should. You sure you still want to go down there Skipper?" Ashley asked, but wasn't surprised when Shepard made no move to abort since they'd come this far.

"I trust EDI, and when she says that this energy shouldn't harm us, then it won't harm us. Besides, has she ever been wrong before?" Shepard told her confidently. Ashley shrugged since there wasn't a time she could think of that EDI had ever put them in danger that they hadn't went into themselves.

The shuttle shook a little as they broke the planet's atmosphere, and Ashley immediately tried to sense, so to speak, this strange energy EDI spoke of. No itching of her skin, no goosebumps, she didn't feel unwell so far. She probably would have continued her mental checklist if Jess hadn't shaken her from her musings. "Easy there Williams, you're nervous enough for the three of us."

"Don't forget about me Commander." Their pilot said with a quiet chuckle. Steve Cortez popped his head around his chair with an easy going smile. "Someone had to pilot this bucket of bolts, and I wouldn't trust James behind the controls after he crashed the last one."

"I didn't crash," James was quick to point out, "I slammed it into that Cerberus bitch's escape craft thank you very much."

"And that makes it better how exactly Mr. Vega?" Steve asked, unable to help the teasing grin on his face if he'd tried.

"You obviously have no appreciation for what we ground pounders go through, Cortez. Otherwise you wouldn't ask that question." James told him in mock rage, before he couldn't keep up the facade any longer and began laughing. "It was rather crazy though wasn't it?"

"This coming from the guy that calls me Lola. Yeah, it was pretty loco there big guy." Shepard was quick to agree, the mirth in her voice all too easily heard by the shuttle's occupants.

James shrugged and crossed his arms over his broad, muscular chest in response. "At least EDI got the body she has now because I wrecked miss cyborg bitch's ride."

"I can't believe I'm saying this, but he's got a point." Ashley muttered under her breath.

"Shepard." EDI suddenly said, interrupting the pleasant banter between the four friends with the urgency that filled her voice. "An anomaly appeared less than five kilometers from your current position, I cannot identify its origin, but it's emitting light across the spectrum, as well as a great amount of heat. Current time before collision, twenty seconds. Evasive maneuvers are strongly recommended."

"Hold on!" Steve shouted, having already started a frantic dive towards the surface of the planet long before EDI had finished her warning. Even with the dampeners fully functional, the team felt the sudden shift and acceleration in the pits of their respective stomachs, but beyond a slight discomfort, there was no complaints in that area. But that was a far distant thought however given the reason behind their need to evade something that had seemingly appeared out of thin air in the first place.

"Anomaly has accelerated!" EDI managed to warn them before the shuttle was suddenly thrown to the side as an object hit them with great speed.

"Status report!" Shepard barked and looked around, spotting no injuries among her squad. Beyond a few sparks thrown upon the moment of impact, there didn't appear to be any structural problems that could lead to them venting atmosphere or a bad case of explosive decompression.

Steve was on top of everything as he did his assessment, his fingers flying over the glowing haptic interface before his seat in the cockpit. "Barriers are holding up, whatever hit us somehow passed right through them. Armor's dented but aside from that we're mostly alright, I think."

"EDI, any idea what the hell just hit us?" Ash asked, hoping the AI had some answers for them.

"None, Commander Williams. The readings are inconclusive. An object of that size, estimated mass and speed should have caused more damage than it did in case of a direct hit. Instead, it seemed to just move the shuttle out of the way before continuing its descent, without any change to its own trajectory."

"So...we just got sideswiped? I'd be pissed if I wasn't happy that was all that happened." Ashley deadpanned before breathing a sigh of relief. "Some kind of barrier was around that thing then?"

"It would seem to be a likely assessment, but without further data, this is all speculation at this point." EDI replied, her own voice containing a note of relief that they were all alive and well if a little shaken up. "I'll try and run a diagnostic, see if I can't clear up the interference and give you a more accurate scan of the immediate area. For now, I'd suggest making a landing as soon as possible."

"Already on it EDI. Found a nice spot off the beaten path, shouldn't be any visitors this far out in the woods. I think I spotted a settlement a few klicks east of here. Careful out there Commander, I'll swing back around in six hours unless you need evac sooner." Steve said as he guided the shuttle to a gentle landing in a clearing among a dense forest surrounded by steep cliffs and rocky terrain, making the immediate area hard to access for most.

Shepard had since stood to her feet and nodded her approval before jumping out of the shuttle ahead of James and Ashley. "Right, in the meantime, do a sweep of the shuttle, make sure there isn't a hole the sensors can't pick up. We'll see you soon. I want to know what that damn thing was that hit us."

"Steve, this settlement… how advanced did it seem?" James asked hesitantly, having a feeling they weren't going to like the answer as he paused in the open shuttle door.

"If you're asking if we're breaking some first contact laws by doing this, then I think we'll break pretty much all of them. I only got a glimpse, but it looked like they were still using pitchforks and torches." Steve was quick to reply, all business after that close call with whatever it was that had almost turned them into a pile of smoking wreckage.

"Damn, alright people, for now observe only. Let's hope we don't run into anymore trouble."

"Yeah, wouldn't that be nice." Ashley snarked and shook her head. "I'm going to set up a few motion sensors, hopefully they'll warn us if someone gets too close." She was already out the door, her eyes falling on the immediate area for any good places to set up the sensors in question.

"Good thinking, Ash. Cortez, how long do you think it will take to fix this thing up enough to leave atmosphere without having to worry about unpleasant side effects to the shuttle itself?" Shepard asked as she held out her hand over her shoulder, and the attached shotgun immediately unfolded and the magnetic strip moved upward on her back before the shotgun's waiting butt fell into her hand. She pulled it free the rest of the way before chambering a 'round', and raised it to a combat ready stance all in one fluid, practiced move.

"Hard to say Commander, I have to take a closer look first, but I think I can get this done by myself. So at least we don't have to call in the cavalry yet." The shuttle pilot answered calmly and continued to check his instruments for any sign of damage to the delicate electronics within the Kodiak. "With any luck I can get this old bird patched up in as little as an hour, two tops."

Ash nodded her approval as she started forward, her assault rifle similarly primed and ready for action. "Alright, if anything comes up, give us a call."

"Uh, EDI, you still receiving us?" James asked uncertainly and send a worried glance up the sky.

"Loud and clear, Lieutenant Vega. Whatever this anomalous energy signature is that surrounds the planet, it doesn't appear to affect communications."

"At least we've still got that." Shepard said lowly before she addressed EDI anew. "EDI, can your sensors make out any settlements in our vicinity?"

"Negative, Commander. As far as the Normandy's sensors are concerned, the entire planet is completely uninhabited. The energy field is blocking any attempts to scan the surface beyond the most basic of readings such as air, temperature, etc. Right now, I am unable to pinpoint your exact location beyond the shuttle's transponder. Your life signs disappeared shortly after entering the planet's atmosphere."

"Of course, it would have been too easy otherwise." Ashley grumbled, having since started laying out the motion sensors in the immediate vicinity. "So should we try to find what hit us in case there are more of these things coming or what Commander?"

Shepard ran a hand across her helmeted chin, thinking over their options as she took a step forward, towards the edge of the forested clearing, where Steve had spotted the village to the east. She sighed and shook her head before answering Ashley. "I doubt our presence was missed when we flew in like we did. If that giant glowing orb was as bright for the locals as it was for us, chances are we were highlighted like an asari stripper in the middle of a dance floor."

"Lovely image Lola." James chuckled, but sobered when Ashley glared over her shoulder as she stood to her feet. "Uh….so chances are if anyone was looking up as we passed overhead, they saw us along with whatever hit us. Which means any chance of remaining off the radar likely just went out the airlock."

"Suggestions? We can't simply walk up to them and tell them we came from the stars." Jess asked, and looked around in hopes of finding someone who had viable idea.

"We could always try and play the distant mercenary company card." Ashley offered offhand, only to stop when she felt everyone staring at her. "What? Did I say something wrong?"

"No, that was actually pretty brilliant. As long as we can somehow communicate with them, it shouldn't be a problem."

"Look at that Lola, I knew I married her for more than her good looks." James smirked, and slapped a hand on Ashley's shoulder, only to grunt when she slammed her elbow into his stomach. Even through the thick dark blue plating, she held little back, but the playful smirk on her face held no malice towards the giant man as she continued placing the sensors around the perimeter of the clearing. "Girl can punch harder than me though." James grunted once she was out of earshot.

"Better remember that if you ever get on her bad side Vega. Let's go, we're wasting moonlight." Shepard stated, turning her gaze upward towards the night sky. "We couldn't have landed on this backwater rock during the daylight hours." She grumbled under her breath before starting forward, gun raised and ready if something so much as looked at them wrong.

Now that they had a chance to breathe, Shepard was the first to notice that the woods at the edge of the clearing they had landed in were….strange. While there was nothing visually off about the tall oaks, elms, and pines in every direction, something in the air felt….almost malevolent to the first human Spectre and N7 Systems Alliance marine. To make the feeling of unease worse, the low hanging branches they soon started to press through seemed to claw and grab at them like skeletal limbs, and while their armor and kinetic barriers kept the foliage at bay without any problem, the image was still fairly ingrained in Shepard's mind as they left the shuttle and Steve behind. Something was wrong with this place.

Thankfully, James soon caught up with her while Ashley brought up the rear, silently moving through the dense underbrush despite his massive girth, compared to his two companions. The idle banter was a welcome relief from the silence that had started to fall over the group. "Yeah, and her idea was better than my whole pretending to be gods, or messengers of gods thing."

"James… sometimes I really think you need help." Shepard told him seriously, meaning every word of it.

"Come on, Lola. It's not that bad. 'Sides, the twins enjoyed that movie, what was it, the Road to El Dorado you suggested." James said with a shrug, completely unaffected by Jess's words about his questionable mental state.

"I still think you enjoyed it more than the kids, Vega." Ashley told him with a smirk as she stepped out of the woods around them. "I'm just glad my sister and her family were willing to babysit for a few days."

"Save a small fortunate did ya?" Jess asked, ducking under a low hanging branch.

"That and the twins are just as stubborn as their mother. Can you imagine what those two little terrors would do to a poor, defenseless babysitter?" James was quick to chime in before his wife could.

"There would be no survivors." Shepard said sagely and nodded her head in agreement with James. "No offense Ashley, but I've met the twins. They are that bad."

"Part of that was my mistake of letting Jack and Miranda watch them for a weekend, although it was Oriana's idea, so I blame her for talking me into it in the first place." Ashley grumbled.

"You what?" Shepard asked disbelievingly as she stopped and spun to face the woman directly, the creepy woods forgotten completely in that moment. "Ashley, are you insane? The swear words they could learn from Jack within five minutes are enough to traumatize most adults, and as much as I like Miranda, she isn't that great with kids. She probably tried to teach them self defense tricks that would cripple an elcor."

"Surprisingly, Jack behaved herself pretty well from what I heard. As for Miranda, she was busy with stuff for the Alliance, something about busting up a few remaining Cerberus cells that had been plaguing the Terminus Systems. It was Oriana herself that was the problem." Ashley stated, earning a confused look from Shepard as they started forward again. "Apparently she's not as organized, or as good, at keeping secrets as her sister, and she left out some old dirty comedy vid they came across. If I ever get my hands on the guy that came up with the idea for American Pie, I'll kill him."

"That guy is long dead, Ash." James reminded her gently.

"Wouldn't stop me from trying when I find him." Ashley grumbled, a menacing growl in her voice as she continued to trail after James's much wider stride.

Shepard was just amazed the incident in question had happened in the first place and could only shake her head at the whole affair, but she couldn't help the ear splitting grin on her face as she led the way. It was just like old times.

And that was when she heard the growl, the sound that made her blood freeze, the sound she awoke to in her nightmares. It wasn't the growl of an animal, it was the growl of a person, or of a thing that used to be a person. Her mind immediately flashed back to the soulless abominations that had been nicknamed husks, a person that had been transformed into a machine like zombie, used as shock troops by the Reapers in the early days of their invasion, but what came stumbling around a tree was no machine. In a way, she'd have preferred a husk to what her green eyes fell upon, because a husk was far more machine than flesh and bone, thus making it far easier to kill them since there was nothing left of the person they used to be. The creature in front of them though was much more human, yet the smell radiating off of it, let alone the bloody gashes and bite marks along its torn flesh, said it shouldn't have been able to walk around as it turned its glowing red eyes upon the trio of marines.

They took one look at each other before Shepard raised her combat shotgun and pulled the trigger. The mass accelerated round, punctuated by blue, sand sized particles moving near the speed of light, ripped right through the undead beast's chest, but it didn't take long for the upper half, with its right arm scrabbling about in the dirt, to start pulling itself towards them, its teeth gnashing and drool flying from its torn, bloody lips. The bottom half fell limp and lifeless on the blood soaked ground, but they hardly noticed as James started to circle around without needing to be told as he closed in on the still moving upper portion of the abomination before them.

"Okay that's just disgusting." James said as he stepped on the zombie's back and pinned it down in the dirt, keeping it immobilized while he pulled his heavy pistol and put two more rounds into its skull. What was left of its head hit the dirt while the upper half of its body finally stopped moving altogether.

"It's human, how is that possible?" Ashley muttered and kept her weapon trained on the still corpse, having gotten more than enough of a look at it to know it'd been a person.

"No idea, but whatever is going on, it certainly isn't as easy as we thought it would be." Shepard said slowly, her fingers slowly relaxing, no longer keeping her weapon in a death grip.

"Cortez, everything alright on your end? We just encountered some kind of… biological husk. If you encounter one of them, make sure to shoot them in the head." James told his friend over the radio.

"Biological husk? You mean a zombie? A real zombie? You sure you aren't losing your mind out there Vega?" Steve questioned incredulously.

"You want to see this thing? I can drag it back to the shuttle for you, pretty boy." The burly marine shot back and shook his head in disbelief of the whole situation.

"Commander?" Steve hesitantly asked, rarely having heard Vega so shaken up in his life.

"He's telling the truth Cortez. Get your repairs done and get outta here. I don't want this, whatever it is, getting back to the ship. EDI? I want you to quarantine the hangar, when we get back I want to make sure that there isn't anything down here that might have infected us or the crew in one way or another."

"Already on it Commander." EDI reassured them.

Just as she was about to cut the line, Shepard heard a tree branch snap before another, inhuman growl reached her ears. "Contact! Defensive positions now!" It wasn't necessary since James and Ashley were already on the move as another six 'living' husks shambled out of the darkness of the trees around them.

With a practiced motion, Shepard threw a Singularity between the ones that stood closest together. A dark blue orb of swirling dark energy appeared several feet away before it exploded outward, and a vortex erupted among a group of the shambling husks. Three of them left the ground and began levitating around aimlessly, but Shepard wasn't about to give them a chance to recover as she shot at each of them. Two of their heads exploded in a mess of gray matter and bone, the third took enough tungsten into its body it didn't get back up by the time the vortex of dark energy had dissipated. Not that there was a lot left to pull itself about by the time it hit the ground in a bloody pile of broken body parts.

To her right, Ashley fired a controlled burst from her assault rifle into another one's head before switching her target to a particularly fat one. While slower than the rest, this one seemed more resistant than his brethren as he continued to advance despite the amount of firepower unleashed upon him. As it continued its slow, waddling advance, Shepard could make out more details, and from what her green eyes could discern of its makeup, it seemed as if the whole being's body was unnaturally bloated, and some parts seemed to have been stitched together. That told her one thing, someone was behind this, and had unleashed these horrors for whatever reason, and it was becoming abundantly clear that they didn't care who got caught in the crossfire.

As soon as Vega had dealt with his own undead, he too joined their fight and added his own firepower to the mix. Still the reanimated corpse advanced until it suddenly began to swell before it exploded in a gory fountain of sickly looking blood and intestines. But if they thought it was over, they were sorely mistaken when a dozen long, pale gray worm like creatures exploded out of the mass of flesh and wriggled rapidly across the blood soaked grass towards the trio of marines. "Oh you gotta be shittin' me!" Vega shouted as he turned his assault rifle on the parasitic worms racing towards them.

They only got ten feet before the equivalent of a biotic freight train of energy washed over them, utterly smashing the gray worms into bloody pulp. Shepard lowered her right hand just as it stopped glowing with dark energy and let out a scathing curse when she saw part of a worm was hanging off of her right armored shoulder. "Well, that was different." Jess grunted as she shook off the remains of the giant worm before promptly stomping on the remains. Grinding her black, armored combat boot into the grass, she turned to Ashley and James, concern in her gaze even though it was impossible to tell behind the confines of her helmet. "You two good?"

"All good here, just wondering what the Hell's going on is all." James grunted with as much nonchalance as he could muster as he too did his best to knock loose the few bits of gore he'd accumulated from the fight with the zombies and their giant shambling mass of worms and who knew what else.

"You and everyone else big guy. Jesus Shepard, what did we get into this time?!" Ashley growled, far more angry than frightened now that the fight was over, at least for the moment. None of them let their guard down though, or put their weapons away, keeping them out and ready as they started out once more.

"I got no idea, but let's hope we get some damn answers when we get to town." A task that would be far easier said than done, as they were about to discover. On top of the shambling corpses they had discovered already, it turned out the impact from the glowing object had hit the ground hard enough to destabilize the earth itself in some places. Ashley was the first to find this out when the ground suddenly gave out from under her, and it took both Shepard and James to keep her from falling into the pit that had opened up beneath her feet.

"Son of a bitch! I am really starting to hate this place Commander." Ashley growled out as she lay on her back after they had pulled her to far more stable ground, panting but otherwise unharmed from her nearly avoided headlong trip into the hole that was not ten feet away from them now.

"You and me both, Ash. You and me both." Shepard readily agreed, hoping they didn't run into anymore unexpected obstacles in their path, but knowing better than to say so out loud with all that had happened already.

"Me three." James chimed in darkly and cocked his assault rifle. "I don't know about you, but I would go as far as to suggest going back to the shuttle and leave as soon as possible. The Council can figure this one out for all I care."

"I'm half tempted to agree with you James, but we're here now, and you know how useless the Council is when it comes to the unknown. It's up to us, as always." Shepard said as she held out her hand, which Ashley gladly took before she pulled her fellow marine to her feet.

"Besides, if the people here need help, by the time they're done debating in circles, everyone down here will be dead or will have solved the situation by themselves." Ash muttered angrily. "If you don't give them a kick, they're happy to watch everyone else burn. Remember what we had to do to get their help in retaking earth?"

"Well, they did have their own problems to worry about since the Reapers were hitting everyone at the same time, but I get what you're sayin' Ash." James was quick to say before nodding towards the dirt path he had spotted in the distance. "No point beating a dead horse, we got our job to do and we might as well get it over with. Looks like there's a road up ahead, if you can call a dirt track a road, but guess it's better than trudging through this zombie infested forest."

"Yeah, instead we get a zombie infested country road." Jess muttered dryly in response. "Well, no time like the present folks. Let's move."

"Country roads, take me home. To the place I belong. West Virgina, mountain mama-" James softly sang before he noticed the looks he was getting. "What? I like that song."

"Heh, never expected you to sing. Gotta say, you got talent James." Shepard told him with a small smile.

"Dunno if its good, but it helps me relax." James replied modestly and shrugged uncomfortably.

"Yeah… I think we could use that now." Ashley said quietly and scanned their surroundings with her eyes. "At least this whole first contact thing just got a whole lot easier. I mean if there are human corpses then there have to be humans that are still alive, right?"

"Probably." Shepard agreed, her hands holding the shotgun with a familiarity that could only be attained through years of combat. The sad part was that had been exactly what had happened with all of them, even before the Reapers decided to drop in on the Milky Way galaxy. Eden Prime might had been the start of their long, arduous journey to save their galaxy and its assorted peoples from total extinction, but each of the crew had experienced combat and worse before in one way or another.

But those thoughts were for another time as they soon heard the screams of terrified civilians running for their lives as more undead started to pull their way out of the ground, clawing and grasping at anything that moved. "This is starting to look like something out of a bad horror vid." James grunted, rifle in hand about the same time Jess and Ashley did the same, taking aim the closest of the undead horrors that had since started to shamble after those that were trying to flee.

"Yeah, I'm more worried about civilians though. Check your fire." Shepard ordered, falling back into 'commander' mode without even the slightest hint of hesitation. It wasn't necessary though since her team knew from countless battles at her side how she operated and what her priorities were. They didn't disappoint now as they moved to flank Jess as she led their simple wedge formation, gun leading as blast after blast of kinetic rounds shredded apart everything in their path. "Go! Get to safety! We're hold them off as long as we can!" Jess shouted to the closest of the terrified civilians, that were just as Ashley had predicted, human.

"Bless you strangers! Come on, New Tristram's not far!" An older man shouted as he herded his companions further down the road at a brisk run, not about to wait around for anymore undead to catch up.

"We must rally the militia!" Another shouted and ran back towards town as fast as his feet would carry him.

"New Tristram? What happened to the old one?" James asked idly, but didn't expect a response as he turned and hit a zombie square in the jaw with his rifle's stock when it got just a little too close for comfort. It fell in a heap at his feet, only to fall still when his giant armored boot fell on its neck with a sickening crunch.

"Given our experience? It was probably destroyed. If the locals tell me it was done by a horde of murderous undead, I'm not even going to question them." Ashley shouted back and shot into a group of shuffling corpses until her rifle just started to edge into the red zone on its heat meter. Taking cover, she let the excess heat release itself before going back to firing into the approaching horde of undead.

It turned out the 'genius' who had come up with heatsink technology, glorified 'ammo clips' meant to ensure a weapon's optimum operating capacity, had been a Reaper thrall, and had been under orders to level the playing field in favor of his machine masters. By enforcing the heatsink tech into their hardware, ammo capacity was drastically reduced since the weapon wouldn't fire without a disposable heatsink. After the truth was discovered, it didn't take long for the heat vent systems to be reinstated without the bullshit 'ammo clips' that had replaced it. It was depressingly easy to make sure one's gun didn't overheat in the first place though if the user remembered not to spray and pray continuously, thus letting the built up heat vent safely without locking up the weapon in question to ensure catastrophic failure didn't occur.

"Well, someone's happy that they scrapped the heatsinks." Shepard deadpanned and fired her own weapon into the flood of undead bodies as they turned their undivided attention on the marines.

"Always hated those things." Ashley said simply and continued firing.

"Not to interrupt this wonderful conversation, but I don't think we can keep this up for much longer. These guys just keep coming." James warned and nodded towards the crawling bodies on the ground. Their crowd control tactics meant that they lost a lot of accuracy in the process, and without headshots, these things would just get back up again until they were literally shredded into bloody piles of flesh.

"Then we step up our game." Jess stated, and activated her omni-tool on her right arm with a practiced flick of her wrist. James and Ashley knew what she was doing as they moved to protect her while she quickly flipped through her bookmarked ammo settings, the sophisticated piece of hardware linked to the rest of her gear. In this case, she was changing what her ammunition was capable of, and when she had everything set a few seconds later, the next rounds she unloaded from her shotgun froze the first zombie she fired upon. The undead creature didn't know what hit it when it was flash frozen with such force that it shattered seconds later, showering its companions in chunks of razor sharp ice and bone. "I really need to thank Tali, again, for bookmarking my ammo mods way back when."

"Yeah, we all have to." James agreed and fired a burst of fiery death into the approaching horde. Unfortunately they didn't seem too bothered by it and kept walking until the fire had consumed too much of their body mass to keep going. "Okay, learn something new everyday. Fire doesn't work so well in slowin' these things down."

"But they still burn, so that's something big guy." Ashley stated as she followed suit, except she had her own preferred ammo modification, which shortly manifested itself in the form of electrical arcs of energy. A short burst later had several grouped up zombies twitching and spasming on the spot as bolts of high yield electricity raced through their pale flesh, stopping them on the spot as their flesh burned and melted away at the same time. "I don't know if I should be grossed out by that or not. Never thought I'd see twitching zombies."

"I'll be going with both, and for the record, I never thought that I would see zombies period." Jess shouted in their direction, and fired another shot into the mass of pale flesh in front of them. "Or husks, or reapers for that matter." Each word was punctuated by another thunderous boom of her shotgun before she tossed it aside when it started flashing a heat warning in her helmet's HUD. Raising her right hand, the biotic unleashed another devastating attack in the same direction, levitating three more of the undead beasts only to slam them into the ground with concussive force. What was left was a couple of bloody smears on the ground at her feet, but Shepard didn't give them a second glance as she kicked up her shotgun into her waiting hands and moved a little further down the dirt road. "Looks like that was it." Shepard stated when she didn't see any more zombies coming their way after flattening the ones in front of her.

"Clear on this end ma'am." James stated, and breathed a sigh of relief when his eyes saw nothing among the ruined carcasses of the zombies they had put down.

"Same on this side Commander." Ashley agreed after doing her own scan of the immediate area, and saw nothing among the few houses that were situated on either side of the dirt road they had come across before they were besieged by the walking dead.

"Steven, how does it look on your end?"

"Everything's fixed, Commander. We're ready to go at your command."

Jess was silent for a moment, obviously in deep thought. When she did speak, it wasn't with her earlier jovial tone. The idle, friendly banter and the mood that had accompanied had long since flown. "Steve, I want you to return to the Normandy. Get checked out and make sure everything is alright with you. I want to make sure the civilians down here are safe. We'll call you when we're ready."

Knowing better than to argue with Shepard of all people, Steve didn't even try. Besides, he trusted her as everyone on her crew did, so beyond expressing understandable worry, he kept his reply short and to the point. "Aye aye ma'am, be careful down there, and get back safe."

"Don't worry, we'll keep the crew updated as much as possible. There's a lot of strange stuff going on down here and I want to get to the bottom of it." Shepard stated, making it clear she wasn't about to take no for an answer from anyone.

"What should we do if the Council is making a fuss?" Garrus, thanks to EDI patching him into the open line, asked.

"Tell them that it's a lost human colony and to stay out of my fucking way… On second thought, better let Chakwas tell them, she's better than I am in kindly telling people to fuck off." Any other time she might have been more diplomatic, but that was before she and her team had run up against zombies and goddess knew what else on the surface, hunting down innocent people wherever they went. Shepard had seen enough people die to last her several lifetimes, and she was in no mood or frame of mind to be the voice of reason in a time like this.

"Got it, good luck down there Shepard." Garrus grimly stated, not about to distract her or those on the ground further than was absolutely necessary.

"Alright, boots on the ground, we're gonna head to the local settlement. New Tristram they called it right?" James nodded as he and Ashley filed in behind Shepard before they started in the same direction as the villagers they had saved not so long ago. "Right, we better get a move on then. If these things hit this small hamlet, chances are they aren't gonna be shy about attacking New Tristram either."

"So expect another horde of undead eh? How come we can't go anywhere nice?" James asked, but didn't complain further.

"Nice? Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, James. For a krogan this would be the best vacation ever." Ashley shot back as they crested a small hill, a small stone wall on their left separating the dirt road from the last of the houses on that side of the path.

"Oh god, I can practically hear Grunt's laugh. Wrex would have a blast as well. Would probably challenge me to a contest to see who could kill more of these bastards in a single fight." James chuckled despite the fact it was quite possible that exact scenario would come to pass if those two krogan were with them.

"You do realize that I'd win that contest right?" Shepard asked, chuckling when she felt James give her a dirty look directed at her back. She didn't say it, but she was grateful for the return of their earlier banter after the horrors they had seen since landing on this backwater rock. "They don't call me a battlemaster for nothing you know."

"Grunt calls you that, Wrex would just laugh and slap you on the back hard enough to dislocate your shoulder."

"Meh, probably. We'd have fun though." Shepard said with a small smile gracing her lips. "I miss the times we were all fighting together. Not the war, but just that all of my friends were in one place and knowing that I could trust them with my life, no questions asked. I kinda wish they were here now."

"If we tell them what's going on, they would hijack the first ship they came across and make a run for this place. You know they're gonna get jealous with you hogging all the kills for yourself as it is Commander." Ashley replied, unable to keep the grim smirk off of her face even if she tried, even as she said a silent prayer for the few people they hadn't been able to save once they had left the destroyed hamlet behind them.

"I wonder who'd get here first? Jack and Miranda, Grunt and Wrex, or Liara with a small group of asari commandos?" Shepard asked idly, even as her own thoughts turned to the small village they had just left behind and the people they hadn't been able to save. Unlike Ashley though, she knew, in her gut somehow she knew, the worst was yet to come.

"Probably Liara, the moment someone hears about this she'll know. After that, Jack and Miranda will be hot on her heels, and last but certainly not least, Wrex and Grunt with a whole company of angry krogans and heavy weapons to blow everything up." James supplied and stepped over the burnt body of a man, whether it was undead or not was impossible to say. As much as it sickened him to do, he made it a point to stomp on the man's neck, just in case he decided to get back up and shamble after them. "Hell, I wouldn't be surprised if they brought in those giant tanks we saw on Tuchanka during our run to that atmospheric processing thing the salarians had set up to blanket the planet with the genophage way back then."

"That'd be a sight to see." Ashley chuckled softly, senses alert for anything more dangerous than the occasional squirrel she'd seen running into the underbrush.

"Yeah, the locals wouldn't freak out at all." Shepard deadpanned, although her overactive imagination couldn't help but conjure up an image of Grunt and Wrex gleefully running over a small army of undead while shooting anything that wasn't in their immediate path. It was a welcome distraction with the grim situation they found themselves in.

"Who knows? They got shuffling undead, perhaps they also have Godzilla around here somewhere." James threw in with a shrug. "Hell at this point I wouldn't be surprised."

As tempting as it might have been to add in her two credits onto that loaded comment, Shepard didn't have it in her to keep that line of thought going, especially when her emerald eyes fell on a lone zombie stumbling up the road towards them. "Eyes up front. We got more company." Wasting no time, she was the first into the fight.

Unbeknownst to them, they were being watched. A shadow trailed their every step, watching with keen interest as the three strangers moved with such certainty as they dispatched everything that so much as looked at them funny. They were well coordinated, hardened warriors, moving with a skill and grace that belied their vast experiences. Even as their heavily armored, black clad leader shouted out orders, her two subordinates were already moving to obey before she had a chance to finish, anticipating her effortlessly. It was an inspiring sight, to say the least. The hunter hadn't seen their like before, but any ally against the encroaching darkness was a welcome sight, no matter who they were or where they originally came from.

For now she would remain in the shadows, undetected. She had her own business to attend to, and as long as these strangers helped the village she was free to continue her own investigation. She was certain that this sudden appearance of the risen dead was linked to the fallen star. The timing was too coincidental, and she had already been heading towards New Tristram anyway since even before the star's appearance, there had been news of demonic attacks and worse, increasing without warning across the land. Something was coming, and she was determined to find the source of the ominous signs on the horizon, and utterly destroy those responsible. Her hatred and need for vengeance would not be satisfied if she were to sit on the side of the road, doing nothing.

She would find whoever was responsible for these occurrences and make them pay for what they had done and what they no doubt planned to do. For someone like the shadowy being stalking those that had already engaged the risen dead, there were only two choices available to her. Hunted, or hunter, and she had been the hunted years ago. She would never be their prey again, never!

Taking a calming, steadying breath to calm her darker impulses before they could gain a firm foothold over her rational mind, the shadowy woman pressed onward, keeping the trio of strange warriors ever on her right flank. Even from the shadows of the forest however, there were a few zombies for her to engage personally, but they were nothing more than fleshy targets for her twin crossbows and the bolts they spat out in rapid succession. They proved no danger to her, but every enemy slain now was one less to worry about later.

And her crossbows were silent enough not to be noticed by the strangers, unlike their undisputedly powerful but loud weaponry. But, to each their own, and she had seen many different tactics and styles of fighting during her initial training as a demon hunter. Wizards and their spells weren't much quieter, and while monks with their flurry of strikes born of their hands and feet could attack quietly, there was little point in asking them to do so. And witch doctors, those strange practitioners of magic that required a link with nature and the spirits of the world, were just as flashy and loud in their own way, but they were exceedingly deadly in their own right. Whatever the case, she wasn't about to argue against the results as the trio she followed left nothing but shattered remnants of the undead in their wake wherever they went.

No, as she had stated before, any ally was a welcome sight indeed, especially if the whispered, dark rumors of something far worse stirring in the world were to be believed. They would need all the help they could get if even half of those whispers were true. Ancient horrors were about to be unleashed, the remaining Prime Evils were preparing their forces, and their human cultists were on the move. All of these things were happening if the rumors were to be believed. And the Horadrim, the ancient order of mages and warriors that had once stood against the forces of the Burning Hells, were all but extinct, and their lore was either scattered or destroyed. To top it off, the angels were nowhere to be seen, not that she could blame them. If she had the chance, she would probably stay out of Sanctuary as well. She just hoped that they were busy slaughtering demons on some distant world. The alternative was not something she wanted to consider….

Ending Notes: Nomad-117: How we came up with this idea? No idea, but it certainly has been fun. So, I hope you had as much fun reading this as we had writing this. And please, give us your reviews, we feast upon them.

Vergil1989: 'We feast upon them?' Lord of Gluttony much there Nomad? Lol in all seriousness though, we will do our best to actually FINISH this one unlike our previous attempts of doing so, so expect a lot of these to come. The plan, at least on paper, is to do a 'book' for each Act of Diablo, and with the expansion, there's gonna be four more after this one. So, enjoy the ride folks, and since this is fanfiction, we're going to be changing things up as we deem appropriate. At any rate, see ya guys!