8. All your base are belong to us

It was a normal office day.

And by that, Garrus Vakarian meant that it was boring, filled with paperwork, and lasted for far longer than it had any right to. Garrus grunted as he grabbed his cup of caf from the counter and wandered back to his desk, taking careful sips along the way. Before, the idea of protecting the Citadel had filled him with motivation, but lately he was starting to wonder what that duty even meant.

You had your black market deals in stims, weapons, and information, the occasional murder or firefight, and, of course, corrupt businesses trying to hide illegal research or side deals with the scum of the galaxy. C-Sec caught the dumb criminals, the ones who didn't think, who acted impulsively or drunkenly. Then you had the ones like Fist, who you know is up to no good, that he's got connections to the Blue Suns but for some reason or another is never taken down, never brought in on anything more than a DUI. Lastly, the ones like Barla Von, the smart ones that choose when and where to get their hands dirty, so that you never see the smug barefaced bastards with anything but sparkling digits.

It was like one of those furry Earth animals running on their little wheel. So much effort and time, just to go nowhere.

Hmph, listen to me moan, he thought. The whole business with the Geth and Spectres must have bit him bad today. Then again, paperwork never really brought out the best in him anyway.

Garrus sat at his desk and turned on the computer, checking his omni-tool for new messages as he did. There was only one, from that quarian, Tali. She was out investigating the Geth with the Council Spectres and going through hell, only to discover that the Council decided to take direct action right when she couldn't be there. He knew what that felt like.

He typed back a sympathetic response and checked his computer. It was still loading. Odd.

He stood up and leaned over the smooth opaque white wall blocking off his cubicle. "Hey, Patrus, is something wrong with the network today?"

His fellow Turian was also on his omni-tool, an extranet page open but blank with a little progress icon on his desk computer. Patrus was a good guy fresh from the military, a little dim but he meant well. "I don't know, everything just slowed down all of the sudden."

"Exasperation," Zos declared down the aisle, sticking his head out of his cubicle slowly. The elcor couldn't exactly look annoyed, but they were infamous for their inability to rush anything. If Zos was complaining, then it was pretty bad. "Someone is downloading contraband on the mainframes again."

"Thought we got rid of Harkin," Patrus said with a snigger.

"Not always the human's fault," Garrus reminded him mildly. He let it go though, Harkin had been a bit of a pain in the ass that way. "Anyone get in contact with tech?"

A blue hand popped up on the opposite side, digits wiggling. "Two hours ago," Arina grunted. The Asari had just gotten off probation for breaking regulations, so she'd probably been stuck at the desk all day. "They don't know what's causing it, it got elevated. Pallin's down there now."

"Huh." Garrus tried very hard not to smile. "Guess that means no paperwork."

The lights flickered. There was three simultaneous loud clunks and the head piercing shriek of three elevator alarms going off at once. People were starting to stand up, when the lights flickered again, then died completely, and confused mutterings filled the office. Garrus' computer screen lit up, a black background with scrolling green text and his communication bud crackled with mechanical screech and warble that made his blood run cold. He'd heard something like it before, from Tali's omni-tool.

"By the spirits," Patrus muttered. He was pounding at his keyboard as if that would fix it. Lit omni-tools were breaking out all over the room. "What's happening?"

Garrus's mind whirled. Massive network slow down, it was so obvious in hindsight. At the base level, Geth weren't machines and shouldn't be fought like they were. They were programs.

"Patrus, Arina! We've got to check if we can get into the armory," Garrus barked out, already missing the comforting feel of his rifle on his back. Officers not on duty had to check their weapons in to an armory and he was already cursing that rule. He manually shut down his computer and nearly snarled when it booted back up over the network. He yanked out the power.

"Which one we headed for?" Arina asked. He saw the Asari had her pistol on her and he felt a twinge of amusement. Breaking regs already? But he wasn't going to say a word about that.

Patrus was slower on the uptake. "The armory? Why?"

"We're under attack, tula brains," Arina snapped back. She checked over her pistol. Some of the other officers were taking the initiative, a small crowd of officers by the elevators and others trying to get in contact with units out in the field. "What do we need, heavy weaponry, mechs, what?"

"No mechs," Garrus answered almost immediately. No mechs. What kind of weaponry couldn't the Geth get into? Vintage human weapons, his mind answered immediately. Well, that wasn't really an option. Maybe Spectre-grade equipment, but even if that wasn't locked down, none of them had the clearance. Tali had this strange shotgun –

Tali.

Going for his omni-tool was almost pure reflex, and he watched in dismay as its screen was dominated by the same scrolling text.

"The warehouse armory," he said quickly. Can't hesitate now, step up to the task, figure out your battle plan, and then carry though. "We should be able to use the maintenance tunnels to get to it."

"But that's all the outdated weaponry," Patrus complained. The omni-tool lighting was making his yellow face markings nearly luminous, but Garrus could see by how wide his pupils were that he was this close to panicking outright.

"Right, outdated," Garrus repeated slowly. "The stuff that's blocked from getting on our compromised network?"

Old firmware or just incompatible operating systems, Garrus was hoping that was enough of a buffer to make the equipment useable against machine intelligences.

"Inquiry: What about Executor Pallin?" Zos lumbered up to them, his omni-tool's haptic interface banded across his eyes like a visor.

"What about him?" Garrus shrugged his shoulders. "He's not here and who knows when he'll get here. The way I see it, we get some guns that won't be overheating pieces of tachk, and then we see about the Executor."

Arina nodded at Garrus's words. "Vakarian has a point."

Garrus smiled grimly. "Turn communicators to channel 8, we'll use the short range function. Patrus, keep an eye on what goes on here and try to get everyone on the same channel. Anything on the computer changes, say something, alright?"

Patrus nodded jerkily and sat back down at his desk.

Poor kid.

"Zos, get in touch with the cyber-crime unit. Let's see if we can't get our omni-tools back."

"Affirmative."

Garrus quickly ran through his most recent cases. He couldn't get in touch with Tali, but there were more than one Quarian on the Citadel. "Arina, there's a quarian in the Presidium, Bachjret Ward, goes by the name Kel'Gen, weapons specialist and knows more than we do about the Geth."

"Geth," the Asari repeated. Her eye ridges moved up shortly before she shook her head. "You sure it isn't the Blue Suns? Eclipse? Shadow Broker? Blood Pack?" Every one of her guesses was wilder than the one before. He just stared at her and she threw up her hands. "Of course, it's Geth. Two hundred years and now is when everything goes to shit."

"Sorry." Garrus said unapologetically. He tapped his communicator. "That sound that came over the buds? Heard it before from the quarian I mentioned."

"Garrus!" Patrus called. "Look."

Everyone crowded into the cubicle. The lettering had changed slightly, now forming abstract lettering in Turian. Garrus read it out loud.

"All your base…are belong to us?"

Arina snorted. "Think we'd get anywhere if we offered them grammar lessons?"

He didn't bother dignifying that with a response.

A thought came to Garrus' mind. "Is it in Turian on your computer as well?" He asked Arina.

The Asari hesitated before walking back to her workstation. She leaned over the smooth white separators and then pulled back, shaking her head. "Asari. Says the same exact thing, mistakes and all."

Personalized messages? It was like the Geth thought up a message and then ran it through the shoddiest translation software available, and you had to really search the depths of Batarian bootleg programs to get one that bad. It made him consider the possibility that the translation was terrible on purpose and that made no sense at all. What was the point? To mock them?

There was a loud clunking sound from the other end of the main room followed by cheers. One of the elevators was open. Officers and civilians alike were being carefully extracted, one of the females openly weeping as a C-Sec officer helped her down.

Garrus smiled. The first victory.

The comm crackled. "- ina Ves of C-Sec, is the- crack pop- on this ch – phssss - ome in!"

Garrus and Arina did the 'who's gonna get this one' dance with aborted hand gestures and meaningful stares. He won and answered the call. "Garrus Vakarian of C-Sec, I didn't quite catch your name. Can you repeat?"

There was a whining shriek of feedback. "Ta -shhh - Ves of C-Sec. I'm on the firs -screech - lock down of the offices. Can anyo -fshhh - to me?"

"Determined," Zos said. "I will see that we are back online soon."

Arina smirked as Zos took off at a brisk pace. For an elcor. "You do that, big guy."

"I'm on my way, Ves." Garrus said into the channel. The first floor offices were on the way, and the more people they had available, the better.

His palms were itching. He thought about shouting for a spare gun but he swallowed it back down. You don't take unreliable gear with you out in the field. He felt his pockets and belt for anything that would be of use. He had an emergency pass key, but he didn't know if it would work. Restraints, a couple of flash grenades and shock baton. Garrus held the rod up and sighed.

This against hostile machine intelligences.

Great.

Here's to hoping the lockdown was preventing the Geth from getting their platforms inside.

"Wish me luck," he muttered.

"Good luck, sir!" Patrus half-shouted from his seat. He was staring into his computer screen as if it held vast secrets and clutching the mouse like it was trying to escape.

Arina gave it to him straight. "Don't die."

"I'll try not to." He retorted dryly. "Thanks for the encouragement. Really."

Now he was just stalling. Garrus checked himself over one last time and then picked his way to the far doors, weaving in between the white cubicle walls and abandoned office chairs with only the low emergency lights and his useless omni-tool to guide him. It didn't stop him from stubbing his toe on the invisible jutting lip of a potted plant, but it did keep him from falling over something and breaking his neck.

The network icon on the doors were red, signifying locked and the windows all had closed metal shutters. Garrus took a moment to press his ear canal up against a window and listen for the telltale sound of ship engines, explosions or close gun fire.

Quiet.

Frowning, he swiped his pass key. All members had basic emergency override clearance to the main doors in and out of the building. He was just a level above and able to get into the tunnels because he often pulled night shifts when contractors or tech were usually running maintenance. The icon blinked green, then turned red again. He swore under his breath. Then it turned green again.

Huh?

Garrus hurriedly opened it and jogged through. It shut behind him and the icon was once again red. He didn't understand what had just happened there but he filed it away. Maybe manual overrides interfered with whatever programs the Geth were running on the network? He glanced around and saw one of the hallway cameras fixated on him.

He made a rude gesture, wishing he had a gun to shoot the lens out and ducked underneath it.

The halls were empty and dark. It really didn't seem right for C-Sec to look so empty and abandoned during work hours.

He used his pass key again on the small, in descript side door that was the entrance to the catacombs of the maintenance tunnels. That time it gave him no trouble and he suppressed the shiver trying to dart down his spine as the camera he left behind whirred, following him.

He opened the channel again once the door closed and locked behind him. The air was stale and the emergency lights were spaced further apart leaving large patches of pitch dark in between.

"This is Vakarian. In the maintenance tunnels heading for the first floor. ETA, five minutes Ves. Sit tight."

"Ackno - kkkk" The woman answered immediately.

He descended the stairs quickly. He made sure to keep his breath even and his omni-tool low to help light up the floor. The tunnels ran behind the wall of C-Sec in most cases, but at times they branched off to hatches that led to the outside of the building or merged with the Keeper tunnels that had been on the Citadel since the Asari first found it.

Garrus rounded a landing, and then flinched back to flatten himself against the wall. He'd heard –

A Keeper scuttled past below him. He could see the shadow of it through the stair rails. It was an insectoid species with a few hints of cybernetic implants glowing blue underneath its exoskeleton. They 'kept' the Citadel and the popular theory was that they were a client species the Protheans uplifted for the sole purpose of keeping the massive space station functional. Its head was bobbing and jerking, it paused and double backed on itself before continuing on with halting movements, as if confused.

Spirits, those things always creeped him out.

He waited until he was sure it was gone to keep going.

Garrus slowly opened the door and peeked around it. Hallway clear. He darted out, already keying his comm. "What section are you in, Ves?"

"Citad-crackle Control."

Customs. He mentally mapped the building out. That was…north from where he was, wasn't it? He was starting to wish they had wall mounted maps like the Human Embassy. It was still freakishly quiet but he supposed that was a lot better than having firefights in the corridors.

"Close to breakthrough!" His comm screamed, and Garrus nearly jumped out of his suit. The Salarian on the channel kept talking. "Cyclical purging of network underway. Data package, compiled, deployed. On five count, reset omni-tools."

Garrus breathed a small sigh of relief.

"Five. Four. Three. Two! One!"

His omni-tool reset with a beep. The familiar welcome screen flashed before it ran diagnostics. Come on, come on. For an uncomfortable few seconds, the screen was blank. Then Garrus' apps and personalized desktop came into being. The comm exploded with cheering and feedback from overlapping calls.

"Will continue to monitor network," the Salarian said smugly. "Purging sequence will interrupt functions, will not last long. Officer Marik, out."

Another call came onto the channel shortly after.

"This is Executor Pallin." Garrus unconsciously straightened. "I'm sure you are already aware, but we under a cyber-attack. What you may not know is that the target is the entire Citadel." Way ahead of you, boss, Garrus thought. "Squads One to Four, I need you out on the streets securing the Presidium. Once long-range communication becomes available again, we will be coordinating the defense of the Wards. Squad Five and Six, secure the Council Tower and Counselors. Exercise extreme caution. Mechs have been compromised, I repeat, mechs have been compromised."

More feedback until Pallin snarled, "One at a time!"

"Sir. What about our equipment?"

Garrus took the opportunity. "I'm on my way to the warehouse armory via maintenance tunnels."

Pallin grunted. "Good thinking. Unassigned officers, equipment distribution. Keep up the good work. Pallin out."

Garrus brought up his map.

Customs was south-west. He scowled.

The door opened reluctantly. Garrus took a step in and froze at the barrel of a pistol in his face. It wavered then fell away to reveal the relieved face of an Asari.

"Sorry."

Garrus coughed lightly. "Ves?"

"Tarina Ves." She stepped around him to scan the hallway. She held her gun like a professional soldier, not a desk worker. "I'll make this quick: less than an hour before the network slowdown and three hours before this attack, the Citadel Control got an asylum offer in exchange for an intact Prothean database."

Garrus choked. "What?"

"The ship was damaged and distinctly of Prothean design. It matched the patterns off previously excavated defunct ships on Thessia and Mars."

Garrus' mind went back to the Eden Prime press release.

"The ship's owner goes by the name Zulaika Sareem." She gestured for him to follow and moved quickly down the hallway.

"An Asari?"

"No," Ves said quietly. "Human." She peeked around the potted plant at the corner and sucked in a breath. She took off and he had to break into a jog just to keep up. Her destination was one of the holding rooms. The door was wide open and making clicking sounds as it jerked minutely back and forth, trying to close. Ves grunted in frustration as she walked in. "Empty!"

Garrus bent down by the door frame. There was a small hole bored into the wall beside it. He shined his omni-tool's flashlight in. The hole went straight into the cabling sheath.

"It was broken into from the outside." He stood up, clicking his teeth. It was possible she was taken then. Someone took advantage of the lockdown to snatch a valuable target when they were still reeling. Communication down, omni-tools offline. It couldn't be the Geth, could it? Why bother sieging the entire Citadel when just shutting down C-Sec would have done the job?

Why get in to grab Sareem, and leave the rest of them untouched. They should be buried in Geth by now if they could just get in whenever they felt like it.

Or they could get in, but couldn't get out? Garrus thought. Or it wasn't the Geth at all and they were already inside when C-Sec went into lockdown. They'd be looking for a way out then.

The tunnels.

He was really missing his rifle right about now.

"Could she have had an accomplice?" Tarina was thinking out loud, prowling the corners of the vacant holding room. She moved the wireframe bed and there in the wall was an identical bored hole. "Or another faction made their move." She sighed, shaking her head. "We need to find her."

"I was on my way to the warehouse armory for weapons," Garrus admitted. He displayed his empty hands. The shock baton really didn't count. "I can keep an eye out, but that's all I can promise right now."

And didn't that just burn. The situation was expertly set up, everyone had something more important to worry about than a missing person. It would be just their luck if it turned out that nothing was more important than Sareem and her Prothean database. He found himself wishing a Council Spectre saw fit to visit C-Sec and pick up the trail, not Saren Arterius, but the human maybe. Shepard.

"I've got to get going," Garrus muttered. "Got a description?

"About my height, blue eyes." Tarina sighed. "An infiltrator of some kind, likely mercenary. If she's wearing her helmet, she'll likely look identical to an Asari to you. If not, black hair and pale skinned. Black armor." He committed it to memory. "She was asking specific questions about the fleet and defenses against the Geth."

Garrus frowned. And she arrived not even five hours before. That was too on point. "Was she, now…"

Tarina nodded tersely. "I'll try to locate the source of the comm interference on this floor, then join you at the armory if I can. Good luck."

He found and freed four officers from the break room before returning to the tunnels. This time, he kept his shock baton on hand as he wound his way deeper. He strained his ears for any sound.

Zulaika Sareem, he thought. What's your secret?

He was trying to withhold judgment. He had to, he was an investigator, not an Arbiter. It was his job to follow the trail, dig up the clues and turn in the evidence. You had to be good at asking the questions, in order to get the answers you needed. Geth attacked Eden Prime for an excavated Prothean cache. Woman in Prothean ship shows up on the Citadel with a Prothean database, hours later Geth attacks the Citadel.

What were they looking for? Why?

Garrus stopped and sniffed the air. It was less stale here. The tunnels were supposed to be sealed at all times. He stuck his tongue out and went still. Air flow. He shifted the grip on his shock baton and made an effort to move quietly. He was kind of wishing the lighting was better so he wouldn't feel like the protagonist of a horror movie, but he'd take what he could get.

He crouched down low and peeked around a corner.

In the distance was a spot of white light among the emergency orange. Seeing nothing else, he sighed and straightened.

"I think I found how our target left the building." Habit had him sending that over the open channel. He winced as soon as the last word left his mouth.

"Target? What target?" Executor Pallin was on the line immediately, apparently having nothing better to do. "What are you talking about Vakarian!"

Damn.

Ves came to his rescue. "We had a visitor claiming not only to have witnessed a Geth attack, but that she had a Prothean database."

"Why is this the first time I'm hearing of this?"

"The report was sent, Pallin," Ves countered calmly. "No one could get anything done with the slowdown afterwards and you were in a meeting, remember?"

Someone else broke in meekly, "remember, open channel, sir."

Pallin stopped responding and Garrus winced again. The Executor was going to take this out on him, he just knew it. If he got out of this alive, he could look forward to desk jobs and paperwork from now to retirement.

His omni-tool bleeped with an incoming message. He opened it.

How?

Ves

He approached the light. The rushing of wind became really noticeable as he got close, and the air quality skyrocketed. It was an open exit hatch, the same kind of small hole bored into the mechanism. It led out into the underside of the Citadel where it was just pipes and cabling and Keepers; the gravity and atmospheric engines were here and who knows what else.

Underside of Citadel, he typed back. There was no finding anyone in this mess. Interfering with the Keepers was off limits and half the machines down here no one could make heads or tails of. They'd given up centuries ago trying.

He pulled his head back in and kept moving.

The warehouse entrance was a small, easily missed hatch on the ceiling with the tiniest ladder rungs in existence leading up to it. The hatch itself was locked, requiring both pass key and access code. He swiped his, balancing precariously on a rung that really felt like it shouldn't be able to hold his weight, and put in his personal access code. The lock turned green and the hatch popped open just enough for the hiss of escaping air. He pushed it the rest of the way and climbed up. The lights came on with electric clicks, one row at a time.

The warehouse was aptly named. There was nothing but large shelves towering over twelve feet full of crates and cases of guns and custom ammunition from wall to wall. An automated trolley and elevator had been installed for ease of storage and indexing. Garrus crossed over to a small box on the wall. He flipped open the casing and punched the big red button. The garage doors rumbled as they yawned wide.

"I'm in. Come get your presents!"

"Roger that, Vakarian!" Feedback screeching and jubilant laughter. "On our way!"

And he called dibs on the good rifles.

On the way back Trask, one of the officers (and a hypocritical racist ass at that) gave him the heads up. "The Executor wants to have a word with you, Vakarian!"

"Really?" Garrus yelled back over the rumble of the transports engines. He wasn't quite hugging his rifle, just keeping it on hand and there was nothing wrong with being prepared for anything, right? Nothing could compare to his current rifle sitting unloved in the official armory, until he got a better one anyway, but the Rosenkov Materials rifle line never ceased to impress him a little. "That's nice."

He had a feeling the Executor found something else to yell at him for.

He was right.

"I heard you sent Officer Arina Zel out there, Vakarian. Care to explain that?"

The command room was an impressive showcase of how big their budget was. Top of the line monitoring systems, real time strategic simulators and maps for dispatches and big ops, every emergency call went through their servers and under the hood were massive databases containing intel, identities and registration records. The room was a large oval with a holograph of the Citadel at the center. Hotspots were lit up in red making the station look like it had come down some kind of disease.

The Executor himself was standing, leaving his chair untouched, as the chaos of communicators, errand runners and upper level officers weaved about the room. Garrus made sure he was standing at perfect attention.

"It was to search for a quarian for more information about the Geth, sir."

Pallin just looked at him. Garrus hated it when he did that, like he was an idiot grunt going through basic and had to be told which end of the gun shot the bad stuff. "Your reasoning."

"When the attack started, communication picked up Geth chatter, sir. I have heard it before from Tali'Zorah nar Rayya, a Quarian who assisted Spectre-Candidate –"

"Commander Shepard, yes, yes I'm aware of this." Pallin clasped his hands behind his back. "And you did not think this odd that there was Geth communication on our frequency?"

"Yes, sir," Garrus responded and his brain acted too late to stop his mouth. "As far as I'm aware, we don't have Geth in C-Sec, sir."

One of the human officers behind Pallin bit his lip.

"Do you think this is a joke, Vakarian? Do you know what's going on out there?" He gestured towards the camera feed screens which obligingly enlarged. Mechs of all shapes and sizes, some military, others were personal household machines, were herding people into buildings. Others were exchanging gunfire with holed up defenders as an unflinching, advancing line of unfeeling metal. "We've only had a few casualties so far, far lower than it would be if they were going for the kill," Pallin said, almost to himself. "For the most part they, whoever it is, seems happy to just corral citizens, to what purpose no one knows. I've got the Blue Suns, Blue Suns on the line offering assistance and trying to hold out pockets of resistance out there."

"Arina is a good officer, sir." Garrus said.

"She's a loose cannon with no respect for policy, and lucks her way into solved cases more often than not." Pallin's mandibles were flaring in irritation. "And she's out there in this with no backup, because you're treating this like a case instead of an invasion!"

Garrus stared at a spot on the wall. The metal grains kind of looked like a kra didn't it? One with severe birth defects, but he thought he could pick out the distinctive spine pattern on a hump back.

"You're going out there to get her back to base."

Garrus started in surprise. "Sir?"

"You're a good officer," Pallin ground out. "You've got what it takes and so far there has been no sign of air support. Take a squad car, get Arina and your quarian, and then get your ass back here. Am I understood?"

"Yes, sir!" He hesitated. "About the target, sir…"

Pallin waved a hand. "I've already assigned some people. Go."

He went.

"Take a left now."

Garrus obediently followed the squad car's guidance system. He could to try to navigate the maze of the Citadel's residential areas but he needed to get there ASAP and his sense of direction was terrible. Lucky for him everyone else in the galaxy was either sympathetic or just as directionally challenged, and most things from corporate buildings to smuggler dens had linear paths. He'd get lost in a paper bag given half the chance.

Bullets slammed into the window.

"Ah, shit!" Garrus flinched, jerking the car into a hard right around the corner of a building. A hail of bullets followed him, pinging off the underbelly of the vehicle and cracking the back windshield. "Shit, shit, shit."

No air support didn't mean the mechs couldn't shoot up.

"Vakarian here! I'm coming under fire at the Bachjret Ward, Block 3!"

"Copy that, Vakarian. We've got a lot of activity north of you in the industrial center, recommend staying out of that area."

Kel'Gen was a weapons specialist. He lived in the industrial center.

Garrus circled higher and sped up. This was going to get a bit tricky from here on out. "Can't do that, going in on foot."

"Still no communication from Officer Arina Zel. Don't get in over your head!"

He found a small private garage with an open roof landing pad. You never wanted to land on a residential roof, no guarantee the structure could hold the weight without damage. He set down and marked the spot with his omni-tool. Rifle, good, kinetic shield, good, optics, good. He peered into the scope and used it to scout the streets. Clear.

Time to be a big damn hero.

He climbed down from the roof to street level. Still nothing. Literally nothing, no mechs but also no people. Everyone had either been evacuated or herded off by the Geth. Nothing was left. He typed out a quick message on his omni-tool.

"Answer me, Arina, where are you, damn it." The sending icon spun uselessly for several seconds.

Contact not available.

Garrus growled and hefted his rifle.

The downtown area of Bachjret was characterized by its warehouses, shipping lanes and thin spires glinting silver. A few hours ago, he imagined the place looked a bit like Palaven with its silver buildings and people in the streets browsing wares and wandering the massive superstores. Now it was crawling with not only security mechs, but anything with a network connection: cleaning bots, personal assistants, even toys. It was like the Geth had just grabbed everything indiscriminate thing they had access to.

He pulled back behind the building and let the spaceship replicas zoom past. He zipped across the street and crouched in cover at the back of a warehouse behind a median wall. The building was filled with the sounds of moving machinery.

So far, so good.

That was when a couple security mechs rounded the corner right behind him and saw his crouching ass hanging out.

"EX-TER-MIN-ATE."

Shit.

He vaulted over the median, internally swearing with each flare of his kinetic shield. He needed cover. His eyes landed on an abandoned car with its front crunched into a pole. Perfect. His long strides ate ground as he moved, jumping over fixtures and darting with zigzagging patterns. Security mechs were cheap, scary and followed simple commands. What they didn't do, was shoot worth a damn.

Garrus rolled over the car's trunk, bullet impacts pinging off the vehicle. He glanced behind him. Clear. He counted the shots the car was tanking for him – 11, 12 – he leaned out in the slight lapse, eye already to scope and finger tensing on the trigger.

The two mechs were still adjusting their aim when the left one's head exploded into scrap metal and sparking wires.

Boom. Headshot.

He was forced back, kinetic shield flickering with bullet impacts. He scooted to the other end of the car, breathed in, sharp, and popped up.

"EX-TER-MIN-ATE." The mech screeched.

Garrus pulled the trigger. The mech jerked, shots going wild. He fired again straight into the chest piece and it went down. A quick scope check told him that more mechs were pouring into the street, drawn to the action.

Not going for the kill, my ass, he thought.

Time to go.

Garrus picked a random direction and started running.

"Whoa, whoa!" A shuttle car, empty, swooped down at the end of the alley, headlights on maximum and blinding. He took another street. The next few minutes were filled with shuttle cars coming out of nowhere to form mobile barricades. He knew he wasn't that fast on foot, the cars could easily run him down with little effort.

He was being boxed in.

Crackle "This is Arina Zel of C-Sec, anyone there?"

Garrus' heart leapt.

"Arina!" He yelled into the comm, taking a sharp turn left from the familiar rectangular shadow approaching. He nearly skidded on the pavement, trying to throw himself behind a support beam as mechs turned onto the street.

"By the goddess, you trying to make me deaf Garrus?"

No time for pleasantries. He was breathing hard, his lungs burned. He leaned out of cover. Scoped. Dropped. "Where are you?"

"SCSDS warehouse district."

He had no idea what that acronym stood for. "SC-"

"Stupid ass human weapons company!" Arina snarled. "Snap, Crackle and Shock! Big silver and blue spire!"

Garrus tried to look around in between taking pot shots at the mechs. He couldn't see it, he couldn't see it, wait, wait. He shot out someone's wandering vacuum cleaner. Silver and blue spire. "I see it."

"We're moving north from there. Call back in five. Turn off your omni-tool, this thing tracks through op – kkkksssshhhhh"

"Arina!" Nothing. He gritted his teeth and shut his omni-tool off. Silver and blue spire. Garrus took a few fast breaths to hyper-oxygenate, then buckled down and started running.

Snap, Crackle and Shock Defense Solutions' warehouse district was a field of containers stacked upon each other at varying heights making it look like an imitation of a city skyline with thick skyscrapers and squat buildings. It was just as abandoned as the rest of the place and eye-searing with brightly colored crates: yellows, oranges, greens and stained white.

It was also a maze.

"Oh, that's not good," Garrus muttered. He hid himself behind a yellow packing crate, holding his breath and watching mechs wander by. He crawled out after they were gone and snuck through. Last he heard from Arina, she was trying to wait for him, but had to keep on the move to avoid being caught. He groaned quietly.

Had five minutes passed yet?

His comm came alive. "Here yet?"

"Yes. How're we doing this?"

Arina's reply was concise. "About to make noise, be quick."

An explosion of screeching metal south of him. Garrus looked and saw a tall stack of shipping containers shift and slowly begin to topple. He grinned wide.

"On my way."

He wasn't the only one.

He first caught sight of Arina and their quarian barreling down towards him, beyond frantic, arms waving all over the place. Garrus happily waved back.

A gigantic loader mech, large grasping forks and glowing yellow headlights roared into sight behind them. It lunged for a singular crate, spearing it with screaming metal and lifted it high. Garrus' mouth dropped open.

His waving became just as frantic as theirs were. "It's throwing! IT'S THROWING!"

The container speared through the air, spilling its insides out of the gutted holes as it flew. Garrus' breath caught in his chest like a clamp over his windpipe. Arina spun on the ball of her foot, biotic blue enveloping her and flung out her hands. The container was caught in moving lift, not enough, not enough – just enough to turn it to the side, smashing into a stack, the weaker crates imploded with the weight.

"EX-TER-MIN-ATE!" Called from behind.

Garrus ran towards the others, bullets on his heels. The loader was the biggest threat, he never thought he'd actually be able to say that, the mechs went down easily and they didn't have nearly the same splash damage potential. Garrus' eyes were already roaming the large machine as it rocked back on its treads. If they could catch it in the middle of throw, it would tip over. But the only one who could actually do that was needed to stop the container it was throwing from squashing them.

"Can we counter hack it?"/"Kee'lah, we're gonna die, we're gonna die!"/"Garrus, if you've got an idea I'd love to hear it!" Everyone was screaming at once as soon as he got in earshot.

The quarian, Kel, looked past Garrus at the approaching security mechs. His shoulders visibly slumped. "Worst day ever."

"Counter ha- don't you think we've been trying?" Arina threw a sloppy Warp into the mechs, flinging them around into crates. Her barrier was shimmering with barely contained energy and that gave him another idea.

"How good are you at a Singularity?" The loader rumbled closer, its forks roved searching out another container. Garrus couldn't contain the wince at the sound of tearing metal. Kel was rapid-fire typing on his omni-tool, muttering to himself.

"Not very!" Arina yelled.

"Do it anyway! Aim for the side!"

He picked off the mechs as they were getting up, not aiming for shutdown, he'd take limb shots as long as it put them out of the fight. Legless mechs were still attempting to crawl towards them on their hands like space monsters from vids, eyes burning red as they repeated their call for extermination.

Arina lit up, brighter than he'd ever seen her and blasted an anticlimactically tiny dark blue ball.

That little ball nearly pulled the loader off its treads completely, it tried to back away and extract its fork from the container before its added weight could tip it over the edge. The pulsing Singularity kept pulling at it, and its treads crunched into the ground.

"Warp it! NOW!"

She was moving before he got the first word out. The Warp curved a beautiful arc and slammed into the raised lip of the loader's base.

It toppled with a groan and resounding crash.

Kel's omni-tool flared. The remaining mechs short-circuited, spasming and sparking with electricity as they collapsed.

"EX-TER- "

Inert.

Silence.

Garrus breathed a deep sigh of relief.

Arina slapped the quarian upside the head. "You said you couldn't counter-hack those bastards!"

"Not immediately!" He defended. "Didn't you see that? Multi-target Overload! I'm a goddamn genius, you ungrateful bosh'tet!"

Garrus couldn't help it. He started chuckling. "He's got a point."

The Asari rolled her eyes. "Make sure big ugly doesn't get back up, yeah?" The loader was uselessly spinning its treads, only achieving a slight rocking back and forth like a tipped elcor. Arina tried to hide the slight wince as she rolled her shoulders, but he saw it. Pulling off a singularity like that and a Warp back to back couldn't have been easy.

"Are you alright?"

"Pfft," she waved his concern off. "I'm fine. So, nice gun you got there."

Garrus clutched his rifle protectively. "Mine. You've got your own."

Arina shrugged. "Overheated in the first shootout, ditched it somewhere."

Kel snorted as Arina waved a lazy hand. "This is what happens when you network your guns! I keep telling you people - you're idiots! Crazy! But nooo, fix my gun, Kel, fix my omni-tool, Kel, fix my toothbrush." He clutched the sides of his faceplate and adopted a falsetto. "Oh, no, this AI is using my networked toothbrush to kill me!" Kel dropped the act abruptly, giving the impression of a heated glare. "I can't fix stupid."

"This is why we don't tolerate AIs," Arina retorted.

Kel looked at her. "Your toothbrush that important to you, huh?"

Garrus decided to cut in. "We'd appreciate any insight you have on taking the Citadel back from the Geth, Kel'Gen."

"Geth?" Kel asked incredulously. "Geth aren't doing this."

Garrus blinked. "They…aren't?"

Kel shrugged. "They could, I suppose, but they have their own terminals, their own ships. And they are a collective, to be even remotely intelligent, the Geth must be around a lot of other Geth. They can't act independently, not like this."

"So," Garrus began slowly. "All of the sabotaged mechs…"

"Wait, wait," Arina held up her hands. "Are you saying we've got another AI running around doing this shit?"

"I'm just saying I don't think this is Geth."

A shadow fell over them all. Garrus looked up slowly. A fleet of oblong silhouettes silently drifted across Bachjret Ward. He watched as tiny dots began to offload from the ships in force, and in the distance a massive black ship with a pointed top and reaching limbs approached.

Kel squeaked.

"That's Geth."