Dawn had been hours ago but the sky turned red as if the sun had decided to rise in the west. The blanket of clouds above glowed a deep amber orange color, battling with the blue skies around the true sun in the east. The sight was completely unseen before, and everyone who was outside stopped to take out their cell phones or cameras to snap a picture of the bizarre sky. And as they pulled out their devices, they found them off and reluctant to turn on again. Around them cars of all sizes and ships ground to a halt in the road and all the traffic lights went dark.

Then small motes of blue light began to fall like snowflakes blown in from over the Pacific Ocean. They flared briefly when they landed on something, and left a brief warm feeling on skin.

He watched the panic begin to start. People had been warned, but like any message, some just weren't interested in listening. Those that hadn't seen the TV reports, the newspapers, the internet articles, they numbered in the millions, and they were starting to cause a riot. Maybe if there was a way to get a broadcast out to everyone, the government could try to institute control, calm people down a little.

But that wasn't possible. The entire western seaboard had gone just dark all at once. Electro-Magnetic Pulse is what the experts had called it; the opening salvo in a battle that was already not going in their favor if they needed it at all. The Alliance hadn't tried to cause a blackout, it was just the side effect of over a dozen nuclear weapons detonating in orbit all at once.

That meant the triage had to be word of mouth. There was a lot of work to be done.

"Alright," yelled the Sergeant in front his unit of the 40th Infantry Division of the National Guard. "Our charge is crowd control! You have your individual orders. We need to keep the people calm, safe, and informed. Division outposts are stationed in each city and emergency bunker locations have been distributed."

The sergeant shook his head. "This is going to be a long, long, battle. We need endurance, not sprints. Keep the people calm, and may find our way through this with minimal casualties. Does everyone understand their orders?"

Kaidan Alenko shouted loudly. "Sir, yes, sir!"

"Then move out!"

*** [ KP / ME ]

What If We Don't Graduate?

(A Kim Possible / Mass Effect Crossover)

Chapter 9: Spiraling

*** [ KP / ME ]

Grissom let go of his vice-like grip on the chair in front of him and looked around the bridge. A few of his people had fallen to the floor but were climbing back up and the others were shaken but otherwise alright. He leaned over the chair of the pilot and checked to make sure she wasn't concussed.

"Admiral," said a voice behind him and he turned to see one of his squad leaders, the one named Sanders, talking to him. She was looking at one of the two additional multipurpose displays on the small bridge. It was tactical map with a huge black section on it.

"What's our status?" asked Grissom.

"We're off course but diagnostics report we're mostly functional," said Sanders. "Integrity field holding, radiation levels normal, and no hull breaches. We lost one of our maneuvering thrusters and it looks like the comm-sats are not available. We may not be able to talk with Alliance Command for a while."

"Give me a direction and I'll get us back on target," said the pilot, wearily.

"We may want to hold off on that," said Sanders. She pointed at the map. "There is debris everywhere, we may get caught up in it and take damage, or start the Kessler effect if it hasn't already."

"Kessler effect?" asked Grissom.

"It's a theory," explained Sanders. "Because there's so many objects in orbit of Earth there is the possibility that an explosion could cause a chain reaction of collisions that would nearly cover LEO with debris, making it impossible to launch ships without crashing into part of it. Given the relative velocities involved, even small pieces of waste could be catastrophic to a launched ship or even our existing satellites. Unless they have deflectors like the ExoSims and the Normandy."

Grissom looked at the woman skeptically. "Where did you say you were from?"

Sanders smiled. "Royal Australian Air Force, sir."

Grissom nodded appreciatively. "So we're okay?" he asked. "Because of the deflectors?"

"From debris we are, but if the Kessler effect has triggered, we're not going to get much surface support," said Sanders.

Grissom shook his head. "We can't do anything about that now. Did we damage the capital ship?"

"Possibly," said Sanders. "The Ascendant is still on tactical, but one of the two escort ships is gone. Either she's going down into the atmosphere, was destroyed by the nukes, or she's somewhere in there." She pointed at the large black hole in tactical display.

"What is that?" asked Grissom.

"Radiation and fallout, I think," said Sanders. "The very basic sensor package built into this ship is going bonkers trying to penetrate it."

"Shouldn't it be disbursing?" asked Grissom as he frowned. "Why is it staying there?"

Sanders shrugged. "Something is influencing it. It's partially overlapping with the Ascendant, maybe that has something to do with it."

Grissom looked back at the helmsman. "Turn the ship towards the Ascendant again. Let's just use our eyes, shall we?"

The pilot pulled the controls gently to the side as the stars in the forward windows moved, slowing changing the angle the ExoSim was pointed in. Eventually the large Lorwardian capital ship came into view.

A small chunk of the ship was simply missing. The corner of the rectangular vessel closest to the Earth had a jagged edge where a roughly hemispherical portion had been destroyed, exposing some of the deck layout within. The exposed edge shimmered with a blue light that flared up as small pieces of the debris that had broken away bumped against it.

A short distance away from the broken nose of the ship was a fairly large chunk of one of the destroyers that was previously flanking the capital ship. Less than half probably remained, and what was there was dark and drifting in orbit, slowly moving away from the perceived center of the blast and falling towards the Earth. Distantly, the trail of the other destroyer could be seen still chasing the Normandy in a northerly direction.

"That's better than I hoped," said Grissom. "But probably not good enough to stop a counter-attack."

"Where is that piece of the enemy ship going to fall?" asked the pilot, staring wide-eyed through the windows. "In fact, where is the rest of the ship?"

"I can't tell with the sensors overloaded," said Sanders. "We didn't bother installing backups given how quickly these ExoSims were created." She walked up to the windows and squinted. "Given how high up we are, I'd say maybe somewhere in... the North Atlantic? Close to Europe?"

"Will it burn up in reentry?" asked Grissom.

"Depends on what it's made of," said Sanders. "Even that piece that remains is larger than ISS. I'd say it'll probably still be quite big when it lands."

Grissom turned. "Is there any way to get a message back to Command?"

"Something optical, maybe," said Sanders with a shrug. "If we can cut through the atmosphere, but if they could see our signal they could see the enemy ship."

Grissom sighed. "I guess we just need to hope they're watching and carry on with our mission. Is there a clear route to the ship?"

"With how fast everything is moving out there? I couldn't guarantee you a path," said Sanders, walking back to the tactical display.

"I'll get us through," said the pilot. "It just won't be as quiet as you wanted."

Grissom sighed and crossed his arms. "Let's hope their sensors are just as screwed up as ours. Lieutenant? Give our helmsman the course."

Sanders pressed her fingers into the tactical display and drew a line. Then she walked over to the pilot's chair and leaned over. "Alright, let's see how well this works out." She called up the map on the console. "Can you do that?"

The pilot grinned. "You betcha."

"Is there going to be a 'sir' attached to that, JG?" asked Sanders.

The pilot cleared her throat. "Uh, sorry, sir," she said. She was still smiling.

Sanders patted the pilot on the shoulder. "Get it done." She turned and looked at Admiral Grissom expectantly.

"Go," said Grissom.

*** [ KP / ME ]

~Mag Clamps Engaged.~

Kim put a hand to the small radio in her ear and replied. "Got it, Wade. Opening airlock." She looked to Shego, who nodded and pulled open the latch and revealed the short connecting tunnel and the surface of the Lorwardian ship below. There was the barest outline of a door and a keypad, similar to the one they found on the outside of the Normandy two weeks ago.

"You're up, slugger," said Shego as she looked to Legion.

The Geth touched the keypad beside the outline of a door on the Lorwardian ship and began cracking the door code. His mechanical fingers incessantly tapped on the glowing grid like a woodpecker on an aluminum siding. After a few seconds the ticking sound stopped and the keypad flashed twice before releasing the lock on the door.

Kim swallowed and grabbed the handle. With a tug, she slide it to the side and down and the door opened with a hiss of rushing air as the two environments equalized. The sound was almost a whistle it was so loud and she winced, hoping nobody was walking past. As the pressure stabilized she slid the door fully open and jumped inside. Just then the whole ship shook.

With a hand to her ear, Kim spoke quietly and urgently. "What was that, Wade?"

~The Normandy is firing back at the ship you're on. We may have to detach to avoid getting shot.~

Kim looked back as Professor Dementor and Motor Ed leapt onto the deck, followed by Bonnie. "We're aboard now if you need to leave."

~I'll hold off until the last minute.~

"Be safe," said Kim as she dropped her hand from her ear. "Close the airlock, just in case."

Motor Ed grabbed the handle and flung it closed. The door quietly settled into place and became flush with the walls.

"It is highly probably the opening of the airlock was reported at the ship's command center," stated Legion.

Shego nodded. "Let's scram." She waved her dimly glowing hand and the team of seven quickly walked down the corridor.

The ship's interior was very similar to the Normandy before they had modified it and suggested a consistent design in Lorwardian ships. The signs on the walls were still in what Legion called 'Lorwardian Rix', which meant only the Geth could read them on their team, but they implied they were on the same level as the crew quarters and engineering.

"We should avoid the crew," suggested Bonnie, looking a little pale.

"I'm surprised we haven't seen them yet," said Shego. "Didn't you say there were over fifty of them?"

"Standard deployment is fifty-seven," said Legion. "Given the size of this ship and estimates on livable space, there is one person for every one hundred and seventy three square feet of accessible decking."

"Wow," said Professor Dementor. "'Zis means much of 'za ship is empty."

"And probably monitored," said Kim. "Quickly. Let's see if they have the same power switch in main engineering as the Normandy did."

The team made it only a dozen more steps before the sounds of heavy footfalls began coming from behind them. They broke into a run to try and stay ahead of the sounds and succeeded in coming around a corner to find a group of four Lorwardian's holding extendible spears pointing in their direction and protecting the corridor leading towards engineering.

Shego just grinned and cracked her knuckles. "Finally, some action."

Behind her, Bonnie lifted her hands in a defensive posture. "I could have done without it." Beside Bonnie, Hirotaka pulled out a sword and held it parallel to the ground, braced by two fingers along the blunt edge of the blade.

Legion pulled a modular rifle from his back which extended its barrel as he rose it to his head. Beside him, Motor Ed clenched his fists and Professor Dementor pulled out a large pistol that looked like it had glowing vacuum tubes on either side of the barrel.

Kim gripped a recovered Lorwardian battle spear that she kept from her fight with Warhok and pressed the button on the side that extended it to full size. She twirled it behind her back and held her other arm to the side.

"Let's make this quick," she said, looking over her shoulder. "Before more company arrives." She slightly bowed her head and charged towards the nearest Lowardian. "Go!"

*** [ KP / ME ]

The giant capital ship Ascendant loomed ominously in the forward windows of the ExoSim ship. It was so massive they were a rounding error compared it to. Grissom had faced a few bad situations in his career, battles where he was trapped in a bad situation and had no support. Times he had to choose between two terrible options and live with the consequences later. But never had he faced something that could utterly wipe him out without even noticing.

Still, he was a leader and now an Admiral, so he kept himself composed.

"Still no movement from the enemy?" Grissom asked.

"None that we can see," said Sanders. She and most of the three squads on the ship were now crowding around the windows trying to get every possible angle on their approach. With the sensors effectively dead thanks to the radiation and whatever it was that had left the blue balls of light scattered among the debris, they had to use the most basic sensors available to them: their eyes.

"What about our other ships?"

An ensign named Williams spoke up from the other side of the bridge. "They're still keeping pace, sir."

The pilot spoke up again. "I'm getting an alert from the shields," she said. "They're deteriorating."

"What?" said Sanders as she rushed over to look at the pilot's console. "Is it because of the radiation?"

"Sir," yet another ensign called out from the very front of the bridge. "There's some strange glowing out front."

"That's where the shields are failing," said the pilot.

Sanders walked over and stepped in beside the ensign. She watched the crackling energy form a circle that was expanding outwards and away from the ExoSim. She cocked her head to the side. "I think we're passing through the enemy's shields," she said. "Must be causing a reaction."

"Will they be able to detect that?" asked Grissom.

"We did, and I can't imagine they have anything more primitive than what Legion designed into these ExoSims," said Sanders. "On the other hand, the amount of crap flying around here and hitting their shields, they might not notice."

Grissom considered this. "We have to push ahead. We won't get another opportunity like this for a while." He addressed the rest of the crew. "Everyone gear up, get ready to disembark."

The soldiers all saluted and slowly exited the bridge to where the equipment was stowed.

"Not you," Grissom stopped Sanders. "I still need you here."

Sanders nodded in understanding. "We need someplace to disembark to, don't we?"

"You got it," said Grissom. "We need to find an access hatch or a—"

"Sir!" yelled the pilot. "Enemy drones!"

Grissom and Sanders ran to the windows at the alert and looked out. Along the closest side of the ship to them, eight oblong sections of the hull slide aside and black four-legged drones climbed out and began stalking along the surface of the Ascendant.

"Should I back off?" asked the pilot.

"Hold on," said Grissom. His brow furrowed. "Be ready, but don't change our course yet."

The drones walked to the forward corner of the ship where the missing section of hull began. Then two of the drones began reaching out to grab passing debris and welding the pieces onto the edge of the hole. The remaining four drones launched off the edge of the ship and flew into the debris field, passing the edge of the ship's shield with a blue-white flash. Another four drones flew out from the opposite side of the ship and similarly began tracking large pieces of floating metal and collecting.

"They're repairing the ship," said Sanders.

"Or patching it," said Grissom, watching the patchwork slowly form. "It looks like they're not being picky what they're using to seal up the gap."

Then four more drones crawled out of the holes and immediately launched themselves away from the ship and flew dangerously close to the ExoSim ship before flying down towards Earth. Another four from the opposite end of the ship appeared and joined them in their descent.

"That's not good," said the pilot.

Sanders watched the work with fascination, then her eyes drifted back down the side of the Ascendant. "There's our way in," she said, pointing at one of the black oval holes the drones emerged from. "No telling if there's atmosphere, but it's large enough and they must have some form of maintenance access."

"It's worth a shot," agreed Grissom. "Take towards the middle hole, helmsman."

"Aye, sir," said the pilot.

The ship slowly changed its course to head down the length of the Ascendant, sticking as close to the hull as possible to avoid shield contact. With controlled bursts they flew along to the third opening and slowed to guide the angular ship in. As they turned their nose towards the gap, Sanders looked back the way they came. She blinked.

"One of the ships is gone," she said. She walked over to the side portholes and looked through each one at an angle to try and catch a glimpse of the missing ExoSim. "I don't see it anywhere."

"Maybe it's behind us," said the pilot. She quickly pulled on the maneuvering thruster control and spun the ship around slowly to take in the area round them. They found the one ExoSim lining up an entry into the black oval next to them, but the other ship was gone. The nose of their ship pointed back around toward the opening.

"Where did it end up?" asked Sanders.

Grissom shook his head. "Proceed with dock," he said. "Either they'll catch up or there's nothing we can do. Take us in."

The pilot grimaced as she pushed the ship forward again and everything turned dim as she entered the poorly lit opening. She activated some flood lamps that had been attached to the hull back before launch. The opening was cavernous and the lights showed racks of drones lined up on either side going eight deep. Only one of the racks was empty in this hole from the drone they saw depart earlier.

To the port side of their ship small lights came on shining between the racks. It appeared to be the flood lamps from the other ExoSim ship that was still with them. From the gaps in the light projecting from the other hole, it looked like each of the holes the drones emerged from were similarly equipped.

"Six holes on this side, eight drones in each one," said Sanders. She shook her head. "If the ship is symmetrical, that's at least ninety drones. If there are more holes than just the six we saw and the six I presume are on the other side..." she trailed off.

"Given the initial invasion was just two soldiers to twenty drones, it's clear they emphasize the use of drones in combat," said Grissom.

"If they launch these at the planet," started Sanders.

"You can be assured they will if we don't stop them," Grissom cut her off. "Helmsman, see anything?"

The pilot raised a hand and pointed out the forward windows. "It looks like there some sort of a stalk out there, might be a docking tube, or a clamp. I'm taking us closer to look."

Sanders looked back and forth from the windows on either side of the bridge. "There's quite a bit of space here. We should be safe from collision even if they deploy half these drones."

The light from their lamps and the ones of the other ExoSim cast giant jagged shadows across everything, making the blackness between drone racks seem abyssal and menacing.

"This ship is gigantic," said Sanders. "We have little more than sixty troops between the two ships. I don't know how we're going to effectively take control of a ship larger than the sears tower with so few people."

"Legion said these ships are highly automated," said Grissom. "Our target is the bridge, as discussed in the briefing before we launched."

"And if they have a backup bridge?" asked Sanders. "Or an override in engineering? You've seen Star Trek, right?"

Grissom grinned sympathetically. "The time for those sorts of objections would have been yesterday, Lieutenant."

"Sorry, sir," said Sanders. She cleared her throat and pointed at the thick metal beams arcing above the long outcropping they were approaching. "It looks like a rail system to perform maintenance on the drones. They must use this gangway to board them after they've been transferred here to the back. We can use the same feature to get onto the ship."

Grissom nodded. "See if you can our magnetic hatch to line up, helmsman."

"Yes, sir," said the pilot.

Grissom looked at Sanders. "Alright, now we go gear up."

Sanders blinked. "You too... sir?"

"You think I was going to let you have all the fun?" smiled Grissom. He turned and headed out of the bridge as Sanders followed.

Alone in the room, the pilot slumped.

"Alright, I'll just hang out here, then!" she called out. Then added, "Sir!"

*** [ KP / ME ]

Kim jumped over the spear of her attacker, flipping once in the air and landed with a twist to kick the Lorwardian behind the knees. Beside her, Bonnie then launched off Kim's shoulders and latched onto the giant's neck, pulling his chin to the left while yanking on the short ponytail he had to the right. The flurry of activity was clearly bothering the soldier, but he only faltered from the kick instead of falling, and then snapped his head sharply to the side causing Bonnie to fall. Fortunately, Kim helped her land and the two of them rolled away from the follow-up spear strike from the soldier.

"This isn't going well," said Bonnie, keeping her eyes trained on the man with the large weapon. She could hear the sounds of combat around her. Shego was single handedly fighting a burly female Lorwardian that made Warmonga look emaciated while Legion and Professor Dementor were trading shots with another male. Hirotaka was proving to be too fast for one Lorwardian to handle, so the remaining two were concentrating on him, which he was using to his advantage by causing them to stumble over their own efforts to land a blow.

Which should have left Motor Ed free to help out but instead he was tearing up loose pieces of decking and wall panels and flinging them at the five approaching Lorwardians from the crew quarters. They were advancing despite the thrown debris until Ed hit an exposed conduit and nearly electrocuted everyone on the deck. Now they were trying to be more cautious in their approach, but their hesitance wasn't going to last forever.

Shego got a lucky strike in her Lorwardian's gut and then roundhouse kicked her face into the ground. It wouldn't take out the beast but it was at least give her a second to breathe.

"We need to split up," she said after that breath had been taken.

"No way, bad idea," Kim said instinctively. "We're barely managing as it is."

"We've lost this battle, pumpkin!" shouted Shego over the objections. Then she stomped on the spine of the downed Lorwardian and leapt over to triple-team the one Kim and Bonnie were facing. She charged up her fists and laid down a continuous blast of green plasma into the chest of the enemy, forcing him to raise his arms to try to deflect some of the energy. Kim and Bonnie took advantage of the distraction to both kick him in the back and then the two of them swept his legs with the spear held between them. He fell hard into his upper back and received a stomp on the nose from Bonnie.

Shego brushed her hair away from her face where it had become slightly slick with sweat. Bonnie and Kim looked little better, both with hair too long to be easily managed in a battle. She let out a breath and glared at Kim.

"Take one of the brainiacs and go find a way to shut down the reactors," Shego said pointedly. "We'll stay here and buy you time until we gotta retreat too."

"There could be soldiers in engineering too," pointed out Kim.

Shego kicked the woman Lorwardian she was originally fighting, causing her to let out a grunt and fall onto her back. "Then take the big brainiac!" she said, pointed at Motor Ed. "Get out of here before we lose too much ground!"

Kim hesitated and opened her mouth as if to protest, then she frowned and turned without a word. She ran over to Ed and grabbed him by the collar before dragging him down the hall towards engineering. Shego watched them go for a few moment before setting her sights on the two Lorwardians attacking Hirotaka. She charged in while flinging several balls of plasma.

Bonnie swallowed, wondering again what she was getting herself into. There was a reason for her involvement, but it seemed like more and more of an idiotic move as time wore on. Still, there was no time to doubt it now.

She turned and pulled the spears from the two downed Lowardians at her feet then ran over to the center of the corridor where Motor Ed had previously been standing. She quickly twisted each spear to put them into fire mode and then hooked them under each arm. With a breath, she pressed the buttons on both spears, laying down fire down the hall at the gathered Lorwardian troops, forcing them behind cover once more.

She spared one glance back over her shoulder and caught a glimpse of Kim and Motor Ed disappearing around a distant corner and found herself in the new situation of hoping that Kim does everything right.

*** [ KP / ME ]

The tall drones landed with a colossal crash into the bay and a deafening sound. The back discs then extended their long legs to loom a hundred feet above the surface. Two had landed along the California coastline but only one headed inwards while the other tracked out into the Pacific Ocean.

Kaidan was still shuffling people into shelters when the shockwave from the crash buffeted them, causing many people to lose their footing as they ran, running the risk of small children and the slower people getting trampled. He ran out from the tunnel doors and into the crowd to start helping people up again while the others in his unit shouted at him to return. He ignored them. He was here to help and he wasn't going to watch children get crushed to death by scared citizens.

He heard the screams and shouts as the nearby drone stepped out of the waters and onto the streets. Even at the distance they were at, the sound of each footfall was hideously loud. He helped a series of children up as their parents grabbed them up and continued running into the tunnels. Setting his sights on an older couple, he pushed through the people to try and get to them before they were trampled.

With a crash, the drone burst through a nearby building as it was heading towards the edge of the city, flinging debris and shards of broken glass everywhere. People screamed in terror as it rained down on them, but Kaidan could only see the huge section of falling concrete coming directly towards the running civilians.

Kaidan let out a scream even knowing it was too late for them to run clear and raised his arms instinctively to motion for the people to get clear.

Then he felt a strange tingling all along his skin that trailed up to the base of his spine and bloomed into a shockingly intense pain. He winced as the edges of his vision darkened and then his arms flared up into a dazzlingly blue light. He felt the force explode forward from his palms, knocking people aside and flinging a dozen or so people clear of the falling debris in front of him.

Then glow immediately dissipated while the pain remained and he felt himself fall to his knees before the darkness in his vision enveloped his sight entirely.

*** [ KP / ME ]

A/N: Sorry for the delay. A combination of real life work with some struggle on whose story I should be focusing on here. There are at least nine separate groups of people that are all impacted by the invasion but I can't just go round-robin style on them or that would get quickly confusing. So, given the nature of this crossover, I'll be putting most of my focus on Kim's group wherever possible, just so I retain my sanity.

I should note that with the appearance of Kaidan, I'm officially screwing with everyone's birth dates from Mass Effect to better align with the Kim Possible timeline. It was either that, or we never see any of the ME characters. This does create a bunch of confusion, but I'll do my best to resolve it.

Also, you may be wondering how the hell Kaidan just became a biotic. And the answer is Artistic License - Biology. Also, the explosion of a ship with a massive Eezo core in the atmosphere causing bits of it to fall onto the surface and its inhabitants. He won't be able to control it without an amp, though. We'll get to that later. Much later, I guess...