Chapter I: Single in the Field (Chloe) - Monday

AN:

Hey there, Fan-fic-folks!

I'm back! Mostly. Still busy with uni. Christ on a bicycle, this shit is far more time-consuming than it has any damn right to be. Plus, I made the truly terrible decision to go to a uni 2+ hours away from where I live, a journey that requires taking a bus that literally hasn't been on time in two years. Bloody timetable is pretty much theoretical at this point. Anyways, just wanted to update y'all, make sure you know I'm not dead or anything. Plus, I actually got to write something that wasn't a multi-thousand word essay, which was hella nice. Admittedly I'm still too busy to work on the main stories and these two were mostly complete already so it was only editing and writing final scenes for both, but still. Writing! Egad, I have missed it. Anyway, I'm cutting this overly enthusiastic ramble short with the news that I'm getting ahead on my uni work, so I should be able to start reupdating regularly sometime in December/January. And Scene!

This one is based on a video game series called Mass Effect. Even if you're not a gamer, you've probably heard of/run into Mass Effect online somewhere. Just in case you haven't, here's the low down. It's a Space Opera sci-fi series revolving around a War Hero (/Colonist/Spacer :D) called Commander WhateverYouWantButIt'llNeverActuallyBeMentionedOnceEvenByYourLoveInterests Shepard wandering around the galaxy, adopting hamsters and punching Batarians and getting involved in random passers-by's problems. Oh, there's also supposed to be a big plot about 'Reapers' or something, but we've dismissed that claim. :)

The actual idea for writing this came from a sudden and very vivid mental image of Chloe meeting up with Jack and them both heckling the shit out of Max. Too amusing an idea to pass up, so here we are. Hopefully I'll get to have that happen at some point.

Oh, and this won't be following the storyline anywhere close to exactly. All I'm really taking from Mass Effect is the world, a few of the characters, and Max's 'backstory'. Or at least thus far, anyway. I've not gotten much of a plan of where this story is going, so I might decide to follow along with one of the plotlines for at least a little while. Oh, and I'm using the Normandy SR-2/SSV Normandy SR-2 rather than the SSV Normandy SR-1, mostly because I wanted shuttle scenes. Shuttles are cool.

Thanks for reading and, as always, please review.

"Ugh. I'm soooo bored." I roll over on Rach's bed and flash her my best forlorn please-play-with-me puppy stare.

"You're always bored, Chloe. And I didn't invite you, you know. You can leave whenever you want." Rach doesn't even look up from whatever she's working on at her desk.

"I know I can, and I'm gonna. Only if you come with me though?" I grin nervously at her, hoping to fuck I don't piss her off. Again. "Please?"

She sighs. "I really can't right now, Chloe. I've got to get this done, or Mark's going to have my head."

She still doesn't look up at me, doesn't even stop typing, for fucks sake.

I take a deep breath and pull myself up from the bed. "Okay, fine. I'll fuck off then. Pretty sure Kate's gonna be back soon, anyway." I get outta there before Rach can say anything else. I didn't wanna hear another fucking apology.

My and Kate's apartment was on the opposite side of town from Rach's, and I didn't want to walk down the main streets and risk running into anyone I'd fucked over, or who'd fucked me over, so I head out of town and go through the fields and farms around the outside. I walk through the idyllic, pretty-af, boring-as-shit landscape, grumbling and kicking at the ground as I walked. Fucking Rachel and her Fucking Job keeping her Fucking Busy and-

I barely manage to stop before I walk into the floating blue-purple sac. Eurgh. Gross fucking things. Another thing I hated about this planet. Eden Prime was filled with them, and some asshole on the colony commission board had decided that made them worth moving over here too.

Idiot.

I'd punched one once, when I was a kid. Bad mistake. It popped and covered me with the worst smelling shit. The smell hadn't gone for weeks afterwards, like I'd stepped in the Bog of Eternal Stench. Even when I was as pissed off as I was, I didn't want to deal with that shit again, so I step warily around the Gasbag and keep walking.

The only people I ran into out there were farmers, so they just ignore me. Which was fine by me. I didn't wanna talk to anyone right now.

I make it into the apartment and flop down onto our crappy couch just in time to see Kate walk in. She beams happily when she sees me. "Hi Chloe!"

Kate and I had been roommates since we left Blackwell. We weren't really friends at school, we just sort of... ended up living together. Hella weird, right? I thought it was, anyway. Literally no idea how it happened. Worked out pretty well though. Kate was kinda quiet, hella cool, and a hella talented artist. Most of our walls were covered in her sketches. So, yeah. Best roommate ever.

I smile back. "Hey Kate."

She immediately stops walking and frowns at me, her eyebrows furrowing in well-meaning concern. And that was the one thing that I didn't like about her. She was almost as nosy as M-om. Damnit. "Chloe? Are you okay? Did something happen?"

I shrug. "I'm fine. Just hella bored. Sucks being the only gainfully unemployed one of us."

Kate tilts her head. "It's not just you. Dana isn't in work either right now."

I roll my eyes. "She doesn't count. She's still living on hella royalties from that self-help shit she wrote."

Kate shrugs, dropping her bag by the door and heading into the kitchen. I hear a glass clink, then the tap start going. "Have you tried talking to Cam? He called yesterday, asking if you'd reconsidered his offer."

I roll my eyes again. "Yeah, not happening, Kate. It's a hella shitty option." Camestis was the one Turian in Arcadia Bay, hell, he was probably the only one on the entire planet, and the proud owner of a barely-making-even tattoo parlour. Barely anyone would go to him, for the obvious reason (racist assholes), so getting a job with him would be career-fucking-suicide.

"Well, then there's always-"

The entire house suddenly shakes as the familiar thunk-clap of a ship arriving in orbit echoes across the entire area, but way louder, and way heavier than usual. I hear a smashing noise from downstairs and someone swearing hella loudly.

There's a couple of seconds of quiet after the shaking stops, until we hear another familiar sound.

Gunfire.

I pull myself up from the couch and hurry over to the window. "What the fuck? Who's shooting shit aroun-"

I pull back away from the window again as a ship swoops over us. I blink at it in confusion. I didn't recognise the design, and I'd seen a hella lot of ships. It looked kind of like a wasp. A weird, purple wasp. As it flew over the town, a bunch of blobs dropped from it, smashing into buildings and squares. Every time one hit the ground, our whole building shook again.

"Enkindlers..." Oh yeah, I forgot to mention. Kate was a devout member of the Hanar religion. She'd been part of the church/group/Jello-gogue/whatever for longer than I'd known her. It didn't bother me or anything, whatever made her happy, right? Did mean that she couldn't swear for shit though. "What's happening?"

I breath out heavily, quickly coming to the conclusion I know Kate's gonna take a second more to get to. "Someone's attacking us."

"Attacking us? Is it Batarians again?"

I shake my head, watching another ship go over. "No fucking way. I don't know who these assholes are, but they're not Batarians."

"By the light... We need to get out of here."

I nod. "Exactly what I was gonna say. I'm pretty sure I've still got my codes for the train, so we just gotta get there." I worked there for, like, three months and they never got around to deleting my codes. Morons. Doubt they'd even heard of network security. "Then we can get to the port and get on whatever fucking transport will take us. " I thought for a sec about going to get Rach, but she'd be with Jefferson by now, so the dude'd get her to a transport himself. He was rich and important enough to get preferential seats.

She takes a breath, muttering to herself "Okay, okay. We can do this, we can do this. It's just to the train." and wringing her hands.

I smirk, and she looks up quickly when she realises I heard her. "Hell yeah we fucking can. You know me, Kate, I know this place like the back of my..." I frown at my hand. "Huh. That's new." I say, voice full of mock surprise.

It takes her three full seconds and another deep breath before she looks up at me again and smiles, her voice sounding steady. "Thanks, Chloe. So, what do we do? How are we going to get there?"

I shrug. "If we stay off the streets, we should be good. One sec." I sprint back into my room and yank open the bottom drawer, then I pull out the fake bottom. The gun was right where I left it, and I quickly grab it, give it a quick once-over to check it still works, and run back to Kate's side. "Right. Now we can go."

She glances nervously at the gun, but doesn't say anything. Even Kate's gotta realise it's better safe than sorry. Neither of us wanted to get caught and taken. If these people were Batarians, we'd be sold into slavery in a fucking heartbeat.

I ease open the door and look through it, keeping the gun down and to my side. I still hated Step-douche, but I was ready to admit some of the shit he taught me was kinda handy.

The street below us was clear, but people around us were starting to scream as whatever dropped from that ship started to cause shit.

"Come on." Kate and I hurried down the steps from our apartment and sprinted to an alley across the road.

We'd been walking, sneaking, running wildly, and hiding for, like, thirty minutes without any problems. Whoever these assholes were, they were blind as fuck. Also, I was totally a badass ninja.

Don't think we were lucky or anything, 'cause the trip was shitty as hell. Whoever these assholes were, they weren't taking prisoners. There were bodies everywhere, just... lying in the street, full of bullets. They were the lucky ones.

Someone had put clumps of these giant... spikes, in any large open space they could find, and... speared some of the bodies on them. I tried to keep Kate from looking, but I couldn't do it. I couldn't look away either. I... recognised some of the bodies.

Poor bastards.

So, yeah. We made it to the station without any many problems. But, turns out, we weren't the only dumbasses to have the train station idea.

There were about a dozen of the fuckers, standing about in the loading docks next to the train line. Hella luckily, we spotted them before they saw us. Kate and I immediately hid in the stacks of huge storage crates and peered through whatever gaps we could find at the metallic figures just standing around.

They were tall, about my height, with shiny metal skins, and giant flashlights in their heads. Something about them seemed familiar, but I was pretty sure I hadn't seem them before. I mean, I'd worked with bots for two years and I'd seen a lot of them, but none like that.

"What are they?" Kate whispers from down next to me.

Wait. I remember... something. An old story, I guess, that one of my mom's friends told one time. She was a Quarian, on Pilgramage from the Migrant Fleet. "I think they're... I think they're Geth."

"Geth, here? But I thought the Alliance pushed them back to the Veil? What do they want with us?" Oh, of-fucking-course Kate knew the story. Nerd. I didn't buy that bullshit the Alliance tried to spin about the Geth attacking the Citadel. Everyone knew that stuff was just a cover-up for something. I had no idea what, but it was definitely a cover-up.

"Dunno. You wanna go ask?"

She shakes her head, hella emphatically.

"Thought not. Right, how do we get past the fuckers?"

"I'm an artist, Chloe, not a tactician. Maybe if we just hide until they leave?"

The second I opened my mouth to respond, a series of explosions racked the station. The stacks of crates wobbled, and for a second I thought they were gonna fall on us, but some-fucking-how they stayed up. Whoever stacked those things deserves a fucking raise.

Barely a second later, a couple of Geth spun and hit the ground as someone started shooting at them. The ones still standing (still alive? could you say that about machines?) all spun and immediately split and got into cover, shooting back.

Kate and I watched the fight with hella interest. Well, I did. Kate mostly just looked concerned for the health of whoever was involved. Too fucking nice for her own good, that one.

It barely lasted five minutes before all the Geth were sparking piles of spare parts on the ground. A tall, thin figure appeared from the same direction of the bullets and walked over to the middle of the Geth, holding a rifle.

He spotted one Geth still moving about on the ground and, with lazy efficiency, blasted its flashlight head off. After checking the rest of the bodies, he pulled off his helmet, and we got our first look at his face.

A Turian? Here? That was almost as much of a surprise as the Geth. Unless Cam had been hiding an ex-military brother in his basement, this guy had to have gotten here recently. I knew he hadn't hitched a ride with the Geth, obviously, so... there was a ship here! Fan-fucking-tastic!

"Kate, I think that guy has a ship. We've got to get him to take us with him."

She blinks. "We're leaving? The planet?"

"Hell yeah, we're leaving. Unless you wanted to stay with the Geth, but I'm pretty sure they're not the type to offer you tea and biscuits and polite shit like that."

She's still hesitating. "But, what about after they leave? What if someone's-"

"I don't think anyone's gonna survive this if they don't get offworld, Kate. We both saw what those fuckers-" I spit on the ground. "did with those spike things. They don't want anything from this shithole, they just wanna kill us all and run off back behind their fucking shithole Veil!"

Kate winces. "We're supposed to be sneaking, Chloe, aren't you being a bit-"

"Loud?" A voice interrupts from above us. We both look up to see the Turian standing over us, giving us both an amused look. "Yes. Yes, you are."

We both stumble back from him, and the asshole laughs quietly at us. "I'm not going to hurt you. Just overheard those plans of yours. You want offworld, Chloe and Kate?"

I stare at him, narrowing my eyes. "Maybe. You offering?"

He smirks. "Well, the Commander has a soft spot for helping out civilians, so the hell I'd catch for not helping you would be way worse than the hell I'd go through helping. Plus, you know, I'm kind of the heroic type." I roll my eyes as he strikes a 'heroic pose' that makes him look kind of ridiculous. Kate giggles next to me. "So, yeah, I am. You interested?"

I tilt my head. "The Commander?"

"They're... sort of my boss. We were in the area when we caught a distress call, so we came to check things out."

I narrow my eyes at the hella subtle brush-off. Dude gave me literally nothing from that whole sentence. "Who're you with? You're definitely not Hierarchy. You with the Council?"

He snorts. "Uh, no. My government and I don't really get along. The Commander is with the Council though. And the Alliance. Sort of." He frowns, and I immediately recognise the expression as one I'd seen focused on me for my entire life. Turns out exasperation looks the same on Human and Turian faces. "You're asking a lot of damn strange questions for someone whose home planet is getting attacked by Geth."

I shrug. "You could be anyone, dude. I may be from a backwater planet, but I'm not stupid."

He grins. "Touche. Well then? Any other questions for me before you'll let me mount a dashing rescue?"

I shrug. "Just one. What's your name?"

His face splits into a grin. "Garrus. Garrus Vakarian."

I nod. "You know us already, so let's just get on with it. What's the plan?"

He waves over at the train terminal. "I'm meeting the Commander at the port, so I need to reactivate the train. Either of you know how to unlock that thing? I could work it out with my omni-tool, obviously, but I'd need to do some calibrations to get it working."

"I know the codes," I offer. Shit, dude had an omnitool? Those things were expensive as fuck. I had to make do with these shitty haptic gloves to interface with computers.

He grins again. "Great! This might be easier than I thought. You go input them, and I'll cover you." He pulls out his rifle and takes up position. When I don't move, he nods encouragingly at me.

What the hell, I guess.

I sneak over to the station console, holding my breath as I wait for bullets to start flying past me. They surprisingly don't, and I make it to the console easily. It barely takes me three seconds to get the thing booted up, and to put in my old log-in. Whatever idiot was supposed to look after this shit was incompetent as fuck, seriously. I mean, who doesn't delete employee profiles when you fire their ass? But hey, don't look gift-Geth in the mouth. I quickly put in my codes and grin as the console flashes green to let me know the train was unlocked.

I look back and wave. I was gonna yell, but I stopped myself at the last second. I had no idea how good the Geth's hearing was, and I didn't wanna tempt shit like that.

A couple seconds later, Garrus appeared from the boxes and wandered over, Kate on his heels. "Not bad, Chloe. Not bad. You're quicker than some C-Sec agents."

I snort. "That's not much of a fucking compliment, Garrus. C-Sec is fuckin' useless." What? The assholes on the Citadel aren't exactly favoured fucking folks out here, for a list of damn good reasons. Pretty sure half the colony hates the Alliance just as much though. Dumbasses.

"I was a C-Sec agent." Garrus drawls.

I grin. "Exactly."

With a roll of his eyes, the Turian leads us over to the train. He taps a few keys, and his mandible-things click when he realises the lock is really gone. Not sure what that expression meant on a Turian, but I was gonna take it as a hella impressed thank you.

Kate and I quickly sit down as the train launches off. Garrus doesn't even wobble, the fucking asshole.

When we're comfortably on our way, I call out to him. "So, where are we going again?"

"Port Terminal," He calls back. "The commander'll be meeting us there." Without saying anything else, he turns back to keep peering around the sides of the train. Not sure why he bothers though, we're going fast enough that anyone who wants to fuck with us is gonna have a hell of a time doing it.

"Fuckin' A." I mutter, rubbing my hand over my head. Shit, Geth Invasions are hella noisy. Why can't they keep the damn noise down?

I gently elbow Kate, smiling reassuringly when she flinches and flicks her eyes up to meet mine. "You doin' okay?"

"I'm okay." She tries to smile back, but it's not convincing at all. Girl can't lie for shit.

"Kate..."

She shakes her head. "Would you be okay with... this?" She waves at the city around us.

I shrug. "Guess not, if I actually gave a shit about the place. Right now, I just wanna get us out of here."

She frowns at me, eyebrows scrunching together over hella watery eyes. "But Chloe, all these people..."

"-Are assholes," I interrupt. "who might not deserve this shit happening to them, and yeah it totally sucks, but I'm not gonna lose any sleep over them."

She takes a deep breath, clasps her hands together, and smiles sadly. "They're still people, Chloe, even if they have been unpleasant to us."

I snort, and look off at the shit exploding all around us. Kate is a way better person than me. Though, thinking 'bout it, that's not really hard. I'm kind of an asshole. But a fun one. That's more important, right?

Right?

Whatever.

The rest of the trip went by in total silence. Well, except for the gunshots and explosions and screaming. Other than that, totally quiet.

Yeah...

Garrus pulls on his helmet and somehow manages to hop off the train before it stops moving, pulling out his gun and moving forward into a military something-or-other. 10-4, hup. He scans the station with hella focused intent and, when he's satisfied that there are no Geth around (Like they're hard to miss... Dude, they've got flashlights for heads. Those fuckers are not subtle.), he waves us over.

Kate, bless her fuckin' soul, tries to be quiet and sneaky. She creeps over to him, trying to stay in the shadows as much as possible, barely making any noise at all.

It's actually kind of impressive.

Then, I come in and totally ruin her whole ninja vibe by traipsing over there and calling out "Hey Garrus, where to now?"

The Turian gives me a familiar, long-suffering glare, then turns his gaze up to the sky, beseeching whatever benevolent sky-things are still paying attention to his clearly cursed ass. "Spirits, why did I offer to help these two?"

I shrug. "Masochism maybe? I dunno, dude. You probably did something hella terrible in a past life." I frown. "Do Turians believe in reincarnation?"

He shakes his head. "Not really. We're more of a get born, do your duty, then die sort of people."

I nod sagely. "That's hella unsurprising. So, where the hell are we going now?"

"There's a shuttle waiting in Dock 15." He answers, rattling off the details like he's reading them from a list. "The ground teams are supposed to meet there in 30 minutes and we're damn near a mile away, so we'd better get moving. Keep an eye out for Geth." He taps something on the side of his helmet and, after waiting a couple of seconds for a beep, nods. "Right. This way."

He points off down a street, and we head into the city, sticking to the side streets and alleyways. Garrus seems to know where we're going, which is hella awesome, 'cause I don't have a clue. I only really knew the main roads around here. Step-Douche was a paranoid ass, but he was right about not going into dark alleys on my own. That shit is seriously dangerous. Which sucks, 'cause I really like dark alleys. They're the only place to get decent meth on this planet. (Or so I'm told. Ahem.)

We hit an apartment block courtyard filled with those weird spikes. Luckily, they're all empty. Guess everyone got out of this building before the Geth could turn 'em into colonist-kebabs or whatever. Garrus guides us up the stairs, through a door into a completely destroyed apartment. Furniture is smashed, windows are shattered, and there were holes in the fucking wall. Still looked better than me and Kate's first place after Blackwell. The entire place perpetually smelled like burnt Chinese food.

Garrus leads us over to one, then points to the building opposite. "We need to get in there." There's a bunch of broken scaffolding between us, resting on some busted cars and shit down on the road below us. It... does not look steady. "We should be able to climb over all this."

I stare at him like he's grown a second head. "You want us to what?"

He frowns. "We need to get over there. Don't worry so much, it's gonna be fine."

I wave over at a wide open space down to the left of us. "Dude, there's, like, a whole space over there we could go. Why are we playing at being fucking Tarzan? Let's just go round."

Garrus points to the park I'm looking at. Specifically, towards one corner of it. I almost go cross-eyed trying to stare at what he's looking for, and my mouth drops open when I finally see it. I thought it was some weird statue art at first, but... "What the fuck is that?"

"That," Garrus says, drily. "is a Colossus."

The thing is a huge four-legged walker, easily twice my height (and I'm 5'9), and made of some shiny metal that gives it a kind of stormtrooper-look. The huge headlight shines about the park as the Colossus looks at everything.

"Woah."

He smirks. "Woah is right. We really, really don't want to get up close to that damn thing, so this is our only option."

I groan, throwing out a hella scary badass glare when Kate smiles behind her hand. She giggles quietly. Huh. Maybe not so badass. Whatever. I sigh. "Fine, but if you get us killed and I end up on one of those spike things, I'm coming back and kicking your bony Turian ass all the way back to Palaven."

"Damn." Garrus grins. "Yes ma'am. I'll do my best to not get you killed. Getting you two killed would kind of ruin my whole heroic rescue thing, anyway."

I nod my head in acknowledgement. "Damn right."

Even Kate bobs her head in solidarity. "Yes, I would rather not fall to my death. It seems like an unpleasant way to go."

Those spikes flash in my head and I shudder. But not the worst way to go.

I take a breath. "Right, okay then. Let's do this shit."

I pause. "Uh, Garrus?"

"Yeah?"

"How do we do this shit?"

He chortles for a sec, then holsters his rifle. "Just follow my lead." And with that, he takes a huge leap from the wall, landing on a big flat piece of metal panelling that lay across a couple of the bigger bits of wreckage. Then, he starts climbing, going up the scaffolding like it's a fucking ladder.

Kate breaths out hella deeply. "Wow."

"Yeah... you wanna go next?"

She shakes her head, but... "Okay. Here goes." She takes a running jump, landing surprisingly gracefully on the same flat bit of metal Garrus did. I blink. Huh. Guess that teaches me. Never underestimate the quiet ones.

I wait until she climbs off the panel, then take a deep fucking breath of my own. "Right. Nothing to it. Just gotta run, jump, land. Easiest shit ever. Come on, Price, you can do this." I run forward and-

I stop right at the edge of the wall. "Nopenopenope, I can't fucking do this."

Garrus and Kate are both looking up at me at this point, but I can't really focus on them very well. All I can see is the ground underneath them, and all the spikey shit poking out of the wreckage. If I miss, I'm not even gonna have time to notice I'm dead. On a scale of sprained ankle to pancake, I'm gonna make one convincing breakfast. (An1) Or I'll actually hit one of those spikes. Not sure which'd be worse. One second I'm me, then next I'm Chlo-kab. Wouldn't that be a fuckin' sight for the Geth? Just walking up to find someone's kebab-ed themselves of their own accord. Saves them the bother of... I take a breath.

I look down again and-oh dog. Okay, okay. Come on Price, you can do this. It's fucking nothing. Just a little jump and-

I jump.

"SHIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIT!"

I make the panel.

When I manage to untangle myself, and start climbing onto the scaffolding, Garrus hisses "Don't move!"

I immediately froze. What can I say, the dude'd been pretty straight with us so far. I stopped just in time to see a hella bright light blare through the wreckage. Shit. The Colossus had gotten nosey, and the fucker had come over to check us out.

I didn't even realise I'd been holding my breath.

It peered over at us like a curious puppy, the light flickering as it blinked.

A minute went by...

Then two...

My nose itched.

Five minutes of held-breath (from Garrus), mentally repeated swearwords (from yours fuckin' truly, seriously my goddamn nose fucking itched), and frantic-prayers (those were from me too. Nah, just kidding. Kate all the way) later, we all relaxed as the Colossus stomped away.

After a quick check to make sure we're all okay (Which was kinda hard, 'cause the Colossus was still in earshot (does that thing even have ears?) so he couldn't yell and apparently Kate and I both suck at lipreading. In our defence though, it's not like he actually has lips.), Garrus keeps going, pulling himself up onto the next building. Kate follows, at a way slower pace, very carefully climbing from bar to bar.

I managed to catch up with her pretty quickly. I worked at a rock climbing gym for a couple months until I got bored and went to work on a building site instead. So, this was just like old times.

By the time we got to the building, Kate, being the adorably short lil' person she was, found that she couldn't actually climb up onto the next ledge. She gave it a disgruntled glare and turned to me. "Uh, Chloe? Would you mind helping me up, please?"

I shrug, trying not to laugh. "Sure. One sec." I plant my feet in places where I'm pretty sure I'm not gonna slip, then interlace my fingers. "Come on, short people first."

Kate rolls her eyes, but she puts her foot in my hands and I hurl her up to the ledge like a caber. Garrus manages to catch her with one hand before she falls back down, which was pretty cool.

I pull myself up with way less grace, just sorta flumpfing down onto the floor. I lie there for a second, running my hand over my face and letting out a hella long, hella deep breath. "That. Was. Fucking. Close."

Garrus snorts. "Had it all under control. Never any danger at all."

I lift my hand and stare at him, raising my eyebrow.

He shrugs, and his mandibles clack in an expression that I'm pretty sure means 'what? I totally did'.

I sigh. Damnit, I like the asshole Turian.

Before I get too long to consider my newfound affection for him, the Turian in question suddenly speaks "We should get moving." He grabs my arm and yanks me to my feet. The Turian bastard actually tried dragging me down the fucking stairs before I pushed him away and told him where he could stick his damn talons.

He grinned at me, but let go, and we got moving.

Asshole.

We head down the building stairs and out into a street coming off the Colossus' park. Garrus quickly leads us the hell the other way, and we head out into another largish square. This one is filled with the weirdest looking hedgerows. Someone cut them in the shape of... I tilt my head. Actually, what the fuck are they in the shape of?

Garrus chuckles, pointing out one of the shapes. "You Humans really like that one, don't you? You really should learn the meanings of things before you just take them from other cultures."

I follow his finger/talon to what looks kind of like a distended duck crossed with a pile of iron shavings and a lawnmower. "What... is it?"

"Fertility symbol. It's an old Turian fertility spirit. It, uh... represents a..." Garrus coughs. "certain part of the Turian anatomy."

"Wow." I pause. "That's totally quackers."

Kate groans. Garrus just gives me a confused look. Damn. Guess the pun didn't translate. I shrug. "Human joke. Don't worry about it."

He nods, still looking hella baffled. "O-ookay. Uh, I think we need to go this way." We take a sharp left and head down a wide open road. The walk was quiet again. We were all keeping an eye out for Geth.

We had to hide from several patrols and wait for them to go past, but we managed to make hella good time. Never saw any other people though and the patrols got fewer and fewer as we got closer to the spaceport. The Geth had probably started here and worked their way out.

Somehow, we ended up in another fucking square. Apparently the entire city was built on the things. Some really unimaginative architects around here. The buildings around this one were almost all damaged. One of them had a huge hole in the side, another had basically broken in half, and even the ones that were still standing were covered in plasma burns from where Geth shots had hit them. The top of the building was lying on a pile of wreckage (I think it was a shuttle that'd crashed into the building) that sat on a raised platform. From the broken tables and chairs all over the place, I was pretty sure there was a restaurant under there.

We headed across the square, picking a hella careful way through the wreckage. When we made it to the other side without anyone getting any metal stuck in themselves, I sighed in relief... just as bullets starting flying.

I immediately darted into cover (who knew that was gonna become an instinct?) and looked for the others. Kate and Garrus had dived behind an upturned garbage bin. Garrus had already started firing back at the Geth. Kate was being smart and keeping her head down. I was tempted to do the same, and let the Turian handle shit, but...

Nobody ever said I was smart.

I pulled out my own pistol, and joined him. I wasn't the best shot on the planet, but step-douche had made damn fucking sure I knew what I was doing. I managed to take down two or three of the fuckers before the shit really hit the fan.

I felt the thuds in the ground long before I heard them, and growled as I saw the Colossus coming round the corner. The other Geth all moved to flank it, using its bulk as cover.

It took up almost the entirety of the opposite entrance to the square. When it spotted us, it did something with its legs and locked into position. The Geth to either side put up mass effect fields around its legs. I swore as my bullets bounced off them.

I managed to catch Garrus' attention and yelled at him "What do we fucking do now?"

His yell back got cut off by a burst of gunfire, so I only heard the first half "Stay down when its-!"

Seriously? Stay down when its what? Is he trying to tell me not to help? I know he's a badass or whatever, but I know he can't handle one of these things on his own. We wouldn't have had to do that insane jump if he could.

That's when I realised I wasn't paying attention to the Colossus. I took a quick glance out of the corner of my eye.

Its head glowing blue was the only warning I had before a huge plasma bolt streaked through the air towards me. I felt the heat of it as it went over my head and fizzed into the bottom of a pile of wreckage behind us. It held for a couple of seconds, but then came crashing down as whatever was holding it up got melted into slag by the supercharged particles, sending dust and dirt and crap all over the place.

I tried to flip out of cover and shoot back, but three Geth fired at me when I did, forcing me to duck back behind the broken statue I'd taken cover behind.

I thought for a second, took aim and... fuck it. I emptied my pistol into one of the supports holding up the massive mound of building and wreckage and the entire thing came down on top of the Geth with a hella loud crash.

We both stop shooting, emerging from cover. I resist the urge to fistpump the air and crow about my badassitude. Very valiant of me, I know.

Garrus stared at the pile of rock and crushed Geth for a few seconds before quickly holstering his rifle. "Well." He gives me a begrudgingly respectful nod. "That solves that problem. Come on."

As fucking always with my life, once we solved one problem, we hella quickly ran into another. The Spaceport was on another square, along with the main government buildings for the planet. Saved all the poncy administrator-types having to walk too far when they came to check us out. The Square was filled with Geth, all just sorta milling about, thinking Gethy thoughts about RAM chips and murder.

The dude knelt and calmly took aim, and shot into the crowd of Geth. They immediately scattered, running for whatever cover they could find. They moved hella fast for synthetics. They weren't fast enough.

Garrus took out four more in as many seconds, muttering something my translator didn't pick up when the rest made it to cover. But, Garrus was one patient, scary motherfucker. He just waited for one to pop their head into view, then fired.

A couple of them tried to put up some kinda mass effect barrier, but Garrus just double-tapped the fuckers, blasting through their shields and then blasting through their fucking heads.

He killed every single Geth there in less than five minutes.

Kate and I both blinked at him in shock. Huh. Apparently we solve problems pretty quickly.

He turns back to us with a smug smirk. "You coming? We've still got to find the right dock."

Kate and I share a look, a shrug, a nod, and we follow him across the square and in to the Spaceport.

I'd only been to the spaceport once or twice, but holy shit it was even bigger than I remembered. All the administration and security buildings were in the middle, with a road around the outerwall. The actual docks were built in a ring around the outside of that road. There didn't seem to be any signs for Dock15, so I let Garrus take the lead.

When he didn't do shit, I threw a glare at him. "What are you waiting for, dude? Let's get a fucking move on already!"

He grimaces. "I, uh... I don't exactly know where to go from here. I'd call the commander and ask, but it's radio silence on this one."

I stare at him. "Are you serious?"

"As a damn Batarian. Do you know where..?"

I cut him off. "No idea. Kate?"

She shakes her head.

"Well, shit. Uh..." Come on, Price. Think! Where we gonna find... "There's gotta be a map in the central office, right?"

Garrus tilts his head and gives me a distinctly thankful nod. "You're right. We'll head there first." As we walk in, two giant signs above us direct us left for arrivals, and right for departures. With a shared 'why not?' shrug, we follow the departures sign and look for an office.

Ten minutes before Garrus' deadline, we managed to find the office, grab the map (it's not like the dudes there were gonna need it anymore) and head straight for dock 15.

We just made it to the door when Garrus suddenly freezes and his face hardens. "Get down!" He yells, just in time for us to avoid a blue bolt that fizzes into the door above our heads.

Garrus fires off a few shots, then grabs Kate (who's just kinda standing there, looking terrified as shit) and sprints with her for cover. I try to stay on his tail, but a bullet scrapes my leg and I trip, hitting the ground face first.

Garrus and Kate both yell and try to run back, but another burst of gunfire forces them back into cover. Every time they try, the Geth shoot at them again. I groan. Shit. My only help is pinned down and, when I try to get up, a burst of pain wrecks through me from my leg. Can't get away, can't get rescued, Ohfuckohfuck, I'm gonna die.

I cover my head and take a deep breath, preparing for my death. The door suddenly flings open with a screeching crack, I feel bullets race over my head, and the Geth falls with a whine and a shitload of sparks.

A hand grabs my shoulder, flips me over, and I looked straight up into the face of the person that saved me, ready to thank the fuck out of them. I owed them one and I... My mouth dropped open.

How. The. Fuck.

"Max?"

Max fucking Caulfield is standing over me, in full fucking Alliance armour and holding a gun like she knows exactly how to use it. A hella wide grin spreads across her hella freckled face as she looks me over. "Hey Chloe. How've you been?"

My mouth opens and closes uselessly as I stare at Max, trying to process that. "wuh buh duh uh..." In hella-shocked-Chloe-lish, that meant something like "Holy shit, she's here? She's freaking here?"

I felt like I held it together pretty well as I stared at her, slack-jawed and mumbling random bullshit.

She pulls me to my feet with a snort, looks over at Garrus and nods. "Nice shooting, Vakarian."

"Thanks, Commander." He grins. "I've been practicising. I'd say the same to you, but I think you're getting a little slow. Couple of those Geth got you pretty good. Is the great Commander Shepard losing her touch?"

Max glares. "You wanna say that to my face?"

Garrus shrugs. "I am saying it to your face. Not my fault you're too damn low down to hear it."

They glare at each other for a few seconds, then both break out in huge grins. "So, Shepard, I hear you know these two that I heroically rescued, all on my own?"

She nods, patting some of the dirt off my clothes. "Chloe's kind of... an old friend."

He smirks, and I can feel his judgey gaze on us. "Ah." He says. "Very informative."

Wait. I frown at Max. "Shepard?"

She shrugs and steps back. "Changed it after... after Mindoir."

Oh. Shit. I wince. Didn't know that was where she'd moved to, after she left. I'd heard about the attack on the vids a few years ago. Shit was fucking terrible. Slavers had massacred the entire colony... she'd nearly been... and I'd been so pissed at her for not calling... oh fuck. "I'm sorry, Max."

Her sad expression disappears, going to the polite disinterest face most Alliance officers had. She waves me off nonchalantly. "It's fine."

I blink as I run over what Garrus said in my head a few times until it finally catches up to me. "Wait. Max Shepard is you!? Saviour of the Citadel, Council Spectre, Alliance Hero, all that shit from the vids? You did that? For real?"

She grins sheepishly, rubbing nervously at the back of her neck just like she used to do when we were kids. "Um. Surprise!"

I blink again. Wow. I feel kind of like a freeze-pop, hella cold and like someone just grabbed my heart and squeezed me. Is shock something people do in situations like this? Is that a thing? Then again, my eyes were feeling kinda dry. I blink again. Yeah, just my eyes. "Wow." I drawl, trying to keep the incredulity from my voice. "And we always thought we were gonna take up piracy..."

She snorts, and her eyes crinkle in amusement just like they used to. Yeah, yeah, I know. Just give me this one. My childhood friend turned galaxy-famous war-hero just rescued me from robo-raiders after she abandoned me fifteen fucking years ago. In my defence, it's a shitload to process.

Someone calls out from behind us "Piracy, huh? Damn, Alliance. You were way more interesting when you were a kid!"

Max grins. "Yeah, but I didn't have a ship, or all those pretty, pretty guns for you to play with."

I turn to see Jack and... woah. That is a lot of tattoos. Every inch of the girl's body was covered in 'em. When she notices me looking, she leers at me. "Like what you see, village girl?"

I glare. "Village girl? I'm from an Alliance planet, not the fucking Terminus Systems. At least I wear clothes. You look like a fucking stripper." I wasn't even sure what she was wearing. It just looked like straps. Or those Brace things from History class that guys used to wear back on Earth to hold their pants up. At least she was wearing pants to hold up.

She laughs. "I like this one, Shepard. Can we keep her?" She eyes me like a piece of meat. Even I feel a little unclean from that.

Max looks at me. "If she wants. It's not like she can stay here."

Jack laughs again. "Yeah, the housing market here is probably going to shit right now."

Max sighs. "Not what I meant, Jack."

"Yeah, yeah." Jack makes a weird gesture with her hands that I've never seen. From the shit-eating grin on her face though, it's probably insulting.

Max turns back to us, and looks past me to Kate. "Hi. Who are you?"

Kate doesn't respond for a second, staring between everyone in mute shock. I amble over and gently elbow her in the side. "Hey, Kate? You still with us?"

She flinches and looks up suddenly with a "whuh?"

I frown in concern. And I thought it was all a bit much for me... what the hell is Kate thinking right now? "You okay?" I mouth.

After a second, she nods. She takes a breath, takes a second to collect her thoughts, and I can see her mentally put herself back together. "Hello. I'm sorry. What did you say?"

"Just asking for your name, miss." Jack scoffs in the background, but nobody pays her any attention. I notice a couple others (a Drell and a Quarian) have filtered in from the sidelines and are just watching the show.

"I'm Kate Marsh. I'm Chloe's roommate." She flinches again when something explodes off in the distance. I manage to keep it off my face.

Max smiles reassuringly. "It's nice to meet you, Kate."

There's another explosion, this time way closer. Way bigger, too. Probably took out at least two squares this time!

"We really need to get the fuck off this planet, Max." I take a deep breath, letting it out slowly before I say what we both know is true. "Pretty sure nobody else is coming."

Max's face hardens as she comes to a decision. It's a weird look, considering all I'd ever known her to do was grin shyly and blush like a tomato. Her face got tighter around the eyes, and her jaw set, like she'd gotten her goal in her sights and locked on. "You're right, we should go." She taps a comm on her ear. "Joker, I need the shuttle."

There's a quick back and forth over the comm, and Jack interjects with a groan and a "Hurry it up, wouldya, I wanna get off this fucking rock already."

I guess Joker could talk through her comm too, 'cause she growls and says "Shut the hell up, flyboy. I can break those creaky bones of yours with a sneeze."

Max holds up a metal-gloved hand. "Now isn't the time for this. Joker, shuttle. Jack, take Thane and secure the perimeter."

"But-"

"Now." Max's voice is hard, uncompromising. This is the way the world is gonna be, and she's gonna make it happen.

Jack growls, but backs down. "Fine. Let's get this shit over with." She storms off and, after a second of hesitation, the Drell (Thane, I guess.) follows.

I smirk at Max. "She's nice. I like her."

Garrus snorts and Max rolls her eyes. "You get used to her... abrasiveness."

"How'd she get involved in your thing anyway? She is definitely not Alliance material."

Max shrugs. "We broke her out of prison after the Warden tried to sell me on the extranet."

I blink at Max's nonchalant tone. "Okay." I look at Garrus, hoping he'll be able to tell me if she's fucking with me or not, 'cause I haven't a clue.

Garrus nods slowly. "Yeah. That happened."

"Huh." I blink again. Okay. Wow. "Catching up is gonna be fucking weird, Max."

She smiles. "You have no idea." Her head tilts, and her smile grows. "Finally." She says, just as the shuttle swoops in over our heads and lands in the dock. Max taps her ear. "Jack, Thane, get back here. The shuttle arrived, and we should go."

The door opens as she approaches, and a human and an asari (both in full armour) hop out. "Hey Skipper. The other ground teams are all back on the ship."

Garrus leans over and mutters. "Ashley. Liara."

I nod gratefully at him. Lucky I'm so good with names. Liara smiles, her hand dropping down to the gun at her hip. "Several dozen ships have left the planet, and are heading for the nearest relay. Joker also found several reports of survivors in fortified installations across the planet. Most of the Geth Warships have been destroyed, and the rest are preparing to leave. It seems this world will survive beyond the Geth."

I grin, feeling a swell of pride in my home planet. Sure, the people 'round here were mostly assholes and fuckwits who'd been shitty to me my entire life, but we'd beaten the fucking Geth!

It's not like there are many planets that can say something like that.

Max nods. "Good to hear. There's not much we can do now. We're not equipped for relief efforts. Let the Council know and tell them to send help." Jack and Thane reappear, wandering over to the Quarian, Tali, as Garrus had helpfully filled in when he noticed me watching them.

Ashley snorts. "Sure. And I bet they'll just jump to help out a human planet on the edge of the Terminus."

Max smiles. "They will if we ask nicely."

I take one look at her smile and know there'll be nothing nice about it. "Right. Come on then. We've spent too long loitering around." She straightens her back and heads for the shuttle. Her crew shrugs before following along and climbing into the shuttle beside her. We all strap ourselves in and settle in for the trip.

After a second of waiting and a quick conversation between Max and the Pilots, the shuttle launches off into the sky, heading straight for Max's ship. The one that had probably been in the nightmares of nearly every bad guy in the Galaxy.

The Normandy.