Khosin spent most of the trip towards Virmire on his room on the Borealis, only going out of it for meals, checking on the ship's engine, or if someone requested his help, or presence, for something. He couldn’t pinpoint the precise reason but something about the mission put him on edge, especially how generous captain Donnelly had been towards their crew; he wasn’t about to complain about the equipment -he had managed to snatch one or two mods for his Mattock after all, and they had gotten an assault vehicle and a shuttle for the whole crew as well- but the attitude of the human captain had set him off somehow.

But, despite his misgivings, there was no point going around the crew and spewing his doubts regarding the job and their employer. In the end he decided that if something did went wrong they could handle it, and if nothing happened all the better for them. As such, by the time that they had arrived to Virmire his mood -if not his feelings towards the mission- had improved vastly, even volunteering to help loading the gun crates into the vehicle that the infiltration team would take to the smuggler’s base. Once that was done he spent the remaining time with the infiltration team, doing some small talk with them to pass the time as the Borealis entered atmosphere.

Once that was done, he entered the Yolac with the rest of the infiltrations group and went silent as he tried to come up with a plausible fake identity. By the time Tonka asked them if they had come up with a cover story he had managed to come up with, what he believed, would be a plausible one “My name is Idethe Dodnovran, former member of the Special Intervention Unit of the Hegemony.” He began to recite “I was officially ‘discharged’ from the Hegemony’s military and took part in the Blitz, leading a crew of pirates on the attack on Elysium and other cities, charged with wanton slaughter and use of weapons that breached the Citadel Convention.” He finished, looking down as his omni-tool beeped and a ‘Wanted’ poster materialized digitally “Thanks Dex.” He said as he turned to look at the Turian woman, nodding thankfully in her direction before focusing on the task at hand.

Once they were at the base he followed Drono, or ‘Tenrom’ as he was supposed to call him now, along with Kasyra as the Drell broke away from the group and as he tried to bluff past a guard. It wasn’t difficult for him to pretend the muscle, he had mostly to stay quiet and look threatening -something which came easy to him as a Batarian, not to mention that he had, more than once, played the role of “dumb muscle” for the Blue Suns- occasionally making the motion to reach for his Executioner when someone looked at ‘Tenrom’ the wrong way which usually served as a good enough deterrent. What had surprised him most however was the way Kasyra carried herself, sure he had heard her when she said that the Migrant Fleet marine’s didn’t spend all time poking the Geth but the way she carried herself made it seem like she had previous experience doing this “Hmm, where did she get this experience. It’s not something like a typical marine does.” He thought to himself for a split second before refocusing on the present, if his curiosity got the better of him he could always ask their resident Quarian where she had gotten that kind of experience. What mattered most now was the current mission, he couldn’t afford any distractions.

Serena merely smiled as Tanya debriefed them. Not the Captain type hmmm? She thought, giggling slightly to herself. She raised her hands defensively as she was accused of being the on to give them their names, mock indignation covering her face. "Not true! It's because we don't plan we just kinda throw things together and pray. And my droids don't blow spectacularly in my face all the time! I repaired Del without any problems!" She huffed, gesturing towards the newly repaired drone behind her.

She grinned as Tanya dismissed them, giving a salute and mouthing 'Aye, aye Captain' as she turned and left with the rest of the group. She'd already sent Tanya her reply.

You'll have to pry me from your side. After this job and Drono's back is fixed, which shouldn't take more than a day or so, we'll go, though I suspect I won't be the only one with you. Unless you want to do it by yourself without an annoying drone mechanic running along with you.-SM

Drono, as soon as Serena returned to her quarters in the hangar, Got his own personal message as well.

We would never imply that our explosives obsessed, swaggering, cocky, sneaky Drell is mentally unstable! One mission, and we'll all be ready to fix you up good as new. Are you sure you don't want me to just replace your feebl-I mean, weakened, spine with robotics?-SM.

Hazan was the last set of her messages.

Given the rather unbending time constraints of Drono and Tanya's requests, lethally in Drono's case, I think you'll have to wait a while before we can break into Bounty Hunting systems. Fear not! We shall and will break into the systems and erase every bit of your existence from their hardware, software, and minds! Not literally of course...unless you want me to start lobotomizing some key people? -SM

-----

Serena gave a brief perusal of the shipyard with much disappointment. It was just a bunch of ships with no mechs. Useless, useless, extra useless. She sighed, returning to the main area. There was nothing for her here. Drono, Iosif, and Dex were doubtlessly going to have a ball running through the ships and checking all of them. Alone. I swear to God, if Dex and one of them comes back with that damn 'I just had sex' look. I'm going to have them both sprayed in the face with water. She knew they were going to anyways, but there as a small chance they wouldn't and she'd be pleasantly surprised. I'd love to be pleasantly surprised, just once. She wandered off to the med bay. Weapons weren't her forte, and they didn't have any mechs for her to use. Besides. She had seen Vellios and Hazan making their way over to the location and she wanted to extract a promise from Vellios. This whole mission was giving her bad vibes. Not in the least because they were overarming them. Too many guns for a simple infiltration and observation.

Something was going to go terribly wrong. And their employers knew it. Regardless, it was a job and a mission. They could only go through with it.

She practically squealed as she was handed a box of old drone parts that the base couldn't use. Even if it was old an ancient and damn near useless. She could make it work. Thus, Serena passed her time on the Borealis repairing what she could and scrapping what she couldn't. She tossed everything into the box when it was time to leave, boarding the shuttle with the rest of the observation crew.

Serena merely smiled at Iosif's commentary and rolled her eyes at Vellios' sulking. He always got like this when he was forced to recuperate. He'd start feeling better when it was time for him to do something productive. Until then he'd merely sulk and feel useless. As they landed and Serena picked up her load, she examined the jungle. She had never been much of an outdoorsy person, and had had only a few encounters of wilderness her missions with the Alliance. "It can't be that bad, can it?"

Serena was beginning to regret her decisions. Here she was, tramping through a damn jungle, going to observe some damn smugglers, when she could just call in a damn airstrike and have them all blown to damn hell. But nooooo, they had to play it by the books. I should have taken those acting classes. Would've been on the smuggling team, nice and comfortable and chatty, instead of stomping through this damned jungle. But no, I had to want to tinker with some damn robots. Said robots were floating behind her, colors clear like glass so that they were almost invisible if you didn't stare at them for too long. She glanced occasionally behind, her smiling at the sight of Vellios covering their tracks extensively. Whatever made him feel better. A sulky Vellios was an annoying Vellios.

Now if only I could get in air conditioning and a cool drink of water.

They arrived upon Hazan's location a few short moments agonizing days hellish years hours later, quickly establishing a base camp, hidden from prying eyes. Or, at the very least, any eyes that happened to glance up at the cliffside. Serena sat down, crossed her legs, and began handing out all her equipment with instructions (or threats, depending on who she was handing it too) not to break them.

"Right. Can we just have the others pull out, call in an airstrike, and call it a day? No? Of course not. Why would this be a simple mission through the abysmal jungle."

Compared to the cool temperatures of Elysium, Virmire was positively roasting. In the thick foliage of the jungle, the cooling breeze of the bay and open sea were utterly consumed by the vegetation around the group, and it was muggy and hot going. Tanya was glad they packed extra water for the observation post, but to get there, they had to lug around a shitload of equipment. In addition to her own rucksack, she carried the two grenade turrets on her back, toting nearly three-quarters of her weight across her body, an exhausting endeavor she’d forgotten how much sucked spiny lizard dick since forced marches in the marines. Still, she didn’t bitch, nor particularly mind that she was carrying a heavier load than even most of the guys; she was tough, and Hazan’s bullshit dibs on being “pointman” was probably just a ruse to get out of doing any substantial lifting.

When Vellios had asked her if she was going to break her spine in the process, she’d explained that it was simply the bare necessities, the simple bare necessities. Further explaining, she said that they wouldn’t want something that couldn’t be found when they needed it, and that they couldn’t live without it. There as a melodically inclined infliction to the whole idea.

And so, sweating her ass off in the muggy-ass underbrush in a single-file column just ahead of Vellios, who in turn was disguising Hazan’s stupid little tree X’s. The fact they were walking down a somewhat beaten trail as it was, either from others who had make the walk before or animals, didn’t leave much confidence that the markings wouldn’t be seen in their duration in on the operation. A big inviting X was hardly natural, and Tanya caught Vellios’ eye when he finished scratching one of the markings to look like claw marks approvingly. It might be wild country, but it was no place to let one’s guard down. It would be stupid to assume no one else was combing the jungle. These were, after all, paranoid criminals on a border world that wasn’t unfamiliar with skirmishes between rival factions were hardly the kind to take things at face value. The only difference between here and Omega was the scenery was nicer and batarian preachers didn’t draw crowds over their pious opinion that humans are a blight on galactic civilization.

Bunch of wankers.

After what was around two hours, fifteen minutes based on the clicks her omni-tool gave off every quarter hour, Tanya and the others arrived in the designated observation post. Happy to take the weight off of her shoulders, Tanya couldn’t help but admire the view below, which had a surprisingly commanding view of the smuggling camp below while remaining hidden behind foliage. There’d be no fires, and food would have to be cooked with water pouches and thermal cooking strips, just like the good old days in the marines. Tanya’s first order of business was positioning the automatic grenade launchers, which deployed a small tripod and had a programmable console off to the side. Each member of the team had an IFF tag somewhere on their person, and the launcher was programmed to engage man-shaped targets only, and within 20 meters… there was a chance that patrols would miss them entirely if they concealed their operations well enough.

Both turrets activated and in position, Tanya pulled off her hammock tent from the bottom of her rucksack, and using the net weave across the surface, began to weave foliage and deadfall through, concealing its profile. Finding a length of trees she hung it half a meter from the ground, securing both ends with ratchet straps. A side pocket had a square piece of fabric that she pulled a chord and tossed into the tent. It quickly inflated and took shape of a pillow. The whole process took ten minutes, if that.

“So, we should probably plan some scouting missions down to the camp, figure out a path in case we need to get down there, or need to give the others an escape route. The launchers should be able to hit the camp from this range if the fit hits the shan and we need to bug out and cause a bit of chaos.” She said to the others, taking a water bottle from her pack and drinking from it. It was already piss warm.

“So, how’s your body holding together, Vellios?” she asked, knowing the march must have been brutal with his injuries. Damn turian was too stubborn to stay on the ship, that was for damned sure.

Observation team- Vellios, Virmire Jungle

"Right. Can we just have the others pull out, call in an airstrike, and call it a day? No? Of course not. Why would this be a simple mission through the abysmal jungle."

Vellios smirked when he heard Serena complain. She wasn’t an outdoors type of individual and so it wasn’t hard to see why she was whining over the small hike across the wilderness. Casually he strolled over, his arm reached for his pack then started to discard, as he leaned down at her side and spoke. “That wouldn’t be any fun, now would it Serena?”

Finishing teasing her, the turian raised himself upright then turned toward the nearest tree. His arm pull away his pack then tossed it softly to the ground, the splinters in his hands stained his palms from where had carved away at Haze’s markings. He had decided to use his own talons as the knife felt too...clean and perfect when it created marks. It wasn’t the best idea but it was effective. Plopping down beside his pack, he wiped what little blood he had away on his pants then retrieved his knife to pick the splinters out. Sitting there, he heard Tanya speak causing him to lift his head to listen closely.

“So, we should probably plan some scouting missions down to the camp, figure out a path in case we need to get down there, or need to give the others an escape route. The launchers should be able to hit the camp from this range if the fit hits the shan and we need to bug out and cause a bit of chaos.” Tanya stated then leaned down to snatch up a water bottle and drink it. She then turned to him, Vellios’ eyes lifted to note her shift and placed his knife away for a moment.

“So, how’s your body holding together, Vellios?”

“Still hurts like hell but I’ve been through much worse. I might consider setting up a position in one of these trees and taking the whole night shift as I’m not going to get any sleep tonight. I spotted some damn vermin tracks while we were tracking through the jungle.” His knife gestured behind him as he the continued. “By the way, the answer to your request is yes. I’ve got a few friends I lost in the Incident 314 and this is a good time to say goodbye officially as some of them were kind to me.”

((@Dervish & @Deartrickster Collab))

"If you insist... Mufausta." Tonka grumbled, setting down one of the crates of tracker chip impregnated rifles in a neat row with the other arms and armour. Brushing his hands off of the dust and wood particles from the crate (seriously, what self-respecting organization didn't pack their shit in water sealed composite containers these days?), the krogan turned to the turian, looking down at her arm.

"You might want to consider long sleeves. If this all goes ass up like a thresher maw, you're one of the ones with a very defining visual trait that everyone's going to notice." 'Kiv' pointed out, gazing out at the camp. If it weren't for all the heavy armament, tough looking men and women with scars and one-thousand-yard stares, and numerous surveillance equipment about the perimeter, it would have been very reminiscent of a local flea market.

Actually, it looked exactly like a local flea market.

"My advice is to just look, get people familiar with seeing us, and then do the sneaky sabotage shit when we figure out a plan of attack. We have time, no need to shit buckets and risk blowing our cover. We're kind of outgunned." The krogan mused, carrying his Revenant one-handed.

"I had no intention of rushing this. But...Fair point about the arm." Dex rolled down the sleeve on her jacket stuffing her fists deeply into her pockets. "While Tenrom is off making new friends we've got our own shit to do."

Beckoning Kiv she lead the way through past stalls and make shift tables of crates showcasing weapons, ammunition and tech. Looking as if she was browsing the wares when really she was looking for telltale signs of network boxes. The wires she was looking for were more than likely buried for security and convenience. However stalls that had hardware set up like a kiosk would the place to start. Wondering over to an ammunition dealer, a shop front being tended by a lone asari. Scars lined her lips and she was missing a few pieces in her head crest. Looked busy enough to barely acknowledge the turian.

Dex eyed the kiosk not allowing her stare to linger, "Hey, what have you got in stock?"

The asari spoke like she had spent most of her maiden years chain smoking, "Some warp ammo and inferno. Nothin' special."

"I'll take a look." She replied stepping up to the terminal. Browsing through the inventory casually, noticing the wires leading behind it around a corner.

Closing down the kiosk shrugging, "Your prices are shit, trying to rob us?"

The asari paused for a second glaring at Dex then broke into a chuckle, "Ha! Fuck off, my ammunition is the best you'll find in this market."

"Damn right it's nothing special. This is basic mods, I could find the same wares from a dozen other crews on this rock for a quarter of the price. What else you got?" Tonka replied pointedly, not having to put on an act. It basically was highway robbery. There wasn't much in the way of security consoles or any sort of wiring here; it was pretty much a lemonade stand.

The asari scoffed minimzing her omnitool, "Hold on to your fuckin' quad, I've got some ammo I promised this asshole from Sur'kesh, but he hasn't come back 'round. Give me second." The asari turned her back rummaging in some crates.

Dex took the opportunity to access the kiosk on her omnitool planting a very small bug. The security was minimal on the terminal a firewall and password. Dex broke through with ease in a few seconds the bug was planted while the asari still going on about how great her stash of ammo was none the wiser.

Slamming a box of explosive ammo on the table/crate with a single look it was just about as average as the rest of her stock.

Giving the asari a look of undisguised contempt, "Good luck selling this shit. Let's go, Kiv. We're wasting our time." Dex said walking on.

Tonka raised a hand to stop his companion. "Tell you what. One hundred for the explosive rounds and I'll spread the word that your gear is uncommonly high quality." the krogan pressed, staring hard at the asari.

"Two hundred and I'll throw in the warp for fifty percent off." The asari said placing the warp ammo on the table beside the explosive. "Deal?"

Not even glancing at Dex, Tonka nodded once. Pulling out a handful of credit chits, Tonka slapped them down on the table, pulling the mods off the table when the vendor inspected the currency. "Thanks." he said, turning to walk off, he handed the warp ammo off to Dex.

"Ever shoot a pyjak with explosive rounds before?" he asked chuckling as they continued their way through the stalls.

She threw the ammo into her pack not giving it much of a second look. "Nah, probably doesn't take much to imagine what happens." She drawled.

Tonka didn't elaborate further, only emitting a low, heh heh heeeh. with an unnerving grin. The two continued on, getting a lay of the land. One guy was even selling model ships, leather belts, and other completely out of place junk for an arms meet. Another man, a salarian, was demonstrating the shields he was selling by having his assistants actually shoot him with a number of arms. The pitch worked; more than a few people were milling around, some even waving down the proprietors. Coming up to another stall, this one selling remote drones, Tonka stopped to have a look.

"What's the deal here?" he asked.

"Small omni-tool controlled drones, some military, some repurposed civilian. Mostly for recon purposes, others can be fit with small weapons, like this one with a conceal-carry pistol." The turian said, eyes locked mainly on Dex. Tonka rolled his eyes. What was with everyone and wanting to fuck her brains out lately?

"Okay, so anything that's an omni-tool program, or will I be out a few hundred credits if some pyjak gets a lucky shot off?"

"Well..." The shopkeep said.

"Try harder. I have a list of fuckheads that would pay a pretty credit or several thousand to have my crest mounted to their wall. I want assurances." Tonka demanded, looking to Dex. "You see anything interesting?" he said, implying security bypasses she could exploit.

Noticing the shopkeeper's apparent interest her eyes tracked down then up seemingly checking out the shopkeep but catching sight of networking router hooked up to the drone. "I certainly do." She said flirtatiously smiling at the shopkeep, picking up what Tonka was implying.

"Kiv, your ass will need more than a couple small drones to cover." Dex commented not breaking eye contact with the shopkeep, "Can I test it?"

Following where Dex was gesturing to, the vendor pulled a beater-omnitool from a box, sliding it and the drone over. "Knock yourself out, just don't fly too high or outside of the camp, because the automated defenses will absolutely kill my gear and that's out of your pocket, and don't buzz anyone, I'd rather not have goons come to visit." he said, his face wrenched into one of those goofy smiles that made turians look like they all had mental conditions. Tonka decided to watch the salarian getting blasted with a shotgun for a while longer, instead.

"You got it." She winked taking a seat on the edge of the table taking the drone for a quick spin around the line of stalls. Catching glimpses through the view finder of several more stalls with various weak-looking access points much like the kiosk the asari had. She was looking for something more hardlined, substaintial. Then as the drone looped back around she was meaning to end her little test drive when she spotted some engineers heading toward a small building at the base of one guard towers. A guard was stationed at the door checking for identification when they were satisfied the engineers entered the building.

That looks like our ticket.

The drone returned and Dex handed the omnitool back to the shopkeep. "Thank you, it's got a decent picture and the controls are responsive. What was your name, handsome?"

"It's, uh, Parvius." he replied, shifting uncomfortably. "So, does that suit your needs, miss...?"

Dex straightened her shoulders stuffing her hands back into her pockets noting his uncomfortable shift, he probably wasn't expecting her to flirt. "It's a handy bit of tech but not for me, Parvius." Pulling away to rejoin Tonka she paused for effect quickly scribbling a phony number down then slipping it inside Parvius' collar. Dex was enjoying the game immensely.

"Instead of a drone we could do drinks?"

Parvius suppressed a choked cough, clearly not expecting this turn of events. "Uh, yeah, that would be great... what's your name?" he asked, head spinning. Tonka snorted, carrying on away from the turians.

"Fausta. I'm not a light drinker but I do expect you to keep up. Don't disappoint me." Dex winked then shortly caught up to Tonka leaving behind Parvius.

"I forgot how fun these things were." Dex laughed. "Take a right up at the next stall here."

Dex was meaning to loop back around to wonder by guard tower to take a good look with her own eyes. "I think I found our way in." She whispered.

"I hope you're talking about the grid and not that pyjak's pants." Tonka replied dryly. "What do you got?"

"Of course I'm talking about the grid. Engineers ID'd at the little shack of building at the base of the guard tower. Toting some tools. Let's check it out."

They wondered past, Dex saw the same engineers reappear from the building then quickly noted, "Be right back." Hurrying her step then accidently crashing into the salarian engineer.

"Why don't you fuckin' watch where you're going!" She snapped her hand pulling out the lanyard with the ID, tucking it behind her back into her waist band.

The engineer snapped back, "You ran into me!"

"Keep walking, asshole." She snarled towering over the shorter salarian.

About to retort he sucked back what he was about to say then carried on with a scoff.

"Shame, I was hoping to punch somebody. He's going to notice that his badge is missing pretty soon." Tonka observed, watching the salarian saunter off with a huff.

"That's fine we just need to make a copy and ditch the original. Unless you're suddenly feeling like you can pull off Salarian." Dex replied pulling off to a shady spot behind a stall away from the eyes of the guard tower.

"Shut up and smile." She pointed the camera on her omnitool at Tonka snapping a quick image.

She scanned the ID card then ran a quick program generating numbers for the barcode, replacing the salarian's face with her own and Tonka's. Filtering out the backgrounds for a basic white. Within a couple minutes of messing around on her omnitool she was printing two official site ids.

"There we go. Easy." She said handing over the crisp plastic.

The krogan turned it over in his hands, grunting appreciatively. It was impossible to tell from the original, quality wise. "It kind of scares me you do that kind of shit so effortlessly. What else are you hiding on that omni-tool?" he said, slipping the card in a storage compartment on his armour. "You said you saw where the engineers were heading?"

"Outdoor and low level access ID's are really easy to fake. The higher you go the more work you have to do." Dex said tossing the original in a roaming trashcan, the flap of the can swished satisfyingly. "We're going to be heading into the building they just came out of." Throwing a thumb in its general direction.

"Joy." Tonka replied simply, walking off towards the indicated structure, Dex tagging along. When he arrived to the building, he was surprised to see the conspicuous lack of any keypad or access port. It was just a door with a simple holopad. Trying his luck, Tonka pressed his palm to the holographic green interface and was even more surprised when the door slid open with a satisfying woosh. The sudden sound of rushing water greeted them... and the smell.

It was immediately clear this was not a secured data center or monitoring facility. They'd found the latrine.

"So, that answers one of life's great mysteries. Salarians go to the washroom in groups. Think they hold each other's units or what?" He asked evenly. It was hard to tell if he was joking or not.

The turian pulled a face at the smell, disgust humming through her sub vocals. "Damn it. I was sure I saw a guard checking their ID's." Dex said folding her arms. "If we're quick we can probably follow them."

Pushing on the way they came in Dex scanned around the area walking in the direction the salarian engineers looking for any sign of them.

It didn't take long to catch sight of the trio; they weren't exactly in a hurry. Maintaining a discreet distance, Tonka and Dex pursued the engineers and watched as they entered a medium-sized prefabricated building with obvious sentry turrets and guards patrolling the ground; it wouldn't be a simple matter of waltzing in like they belonged.

"The bathroom was easier to enter..." Dex held up the ID, "These won't hold up for shit against legit security. We'll keep them, they might come in handy if we need a distraction."

Looking to Tonka she gave the Krogan a cocky smile, "Then again... I don't plan on getting caught."

"Uh-huh. No one ever does. And then they do." The krogan replied bluntly. "Probably best if we make a plan and wait until darkness. Even tactical cloaks are visible to some degree in daylight."

"We'll see how Tenrom, Idethe, and Zela’Yaerah are going with their sales pitch. Probably better than the fucking bathroom." Dex agreed.

Meanwhile...

Jean Volegnar sat in the latrine enjoying her precious few minutes to take a dump. The stress in the past few weeks had been surmounting, defending the smuggler's camp against local raids. She took her breaks where she could gratefully. She heard the Salarians she checked IDs for leave. In truth she had seen their faces before but the Captain was cracking down on doing the ID checks and wouldn't be impressed by her low count.

Messing around on her omnitool she looked up when she heard another pair of feet enter, when they spoke their voices distinctly turian and krogan. Their conversation was highly suspicious, why would strangers be interested in following salarians to the bathroom?

The curious pair left as quick as they came, Jean waited a beat before quickly fumbling with her pants. She followed them as discreetly as they had been following the engineers. Taking cover behind a wall Jean peeked out from the side to observe them. They were eyeing up the communications center, too far away to hear their conversation. Their apparent interest set the young guard on edge.

There is a saying among smugglers, muscles for brains is better then brains caved in by muscle. The idea is that while being cunning is king, a man with a crowbar, a little will and a lot of muscle might just usurp you. After all, what is a king to a one man mob with a crowbar? Drono had lived this life since he was but a young, impressionable, adventurous idiot with a gift for words. And here he had muscle. Two crewmembers who's mean-looking faces, or in the quarian's case, mean visor, that made people stare down to polish and tinker with near religious zeal. All to avoid eye contact with the Quarian and the Batarian bodyguards.

Now Drono swaggered. Normal men and women merely walked with confidence and some may have thought they swaggered, but nobody could hold a candle to Drono. He swaggered like nobody else, he moved with a purpose and more importantly with the confidence of a lion. Each step was a statement: 'Come get some shitheads, and my muscle will make you into so many little pieces your dear ol' mum will have stew for dinner.' He tossed out his hands in a grand gesture a he decided to chew the scenary a bit.

"Smell that? That is the smell of a multi-billion underground industry." He said, fully prepared to talk like he already owned the place. His grandstanding was cut short as a man came half jogging, half tripping towards them. He was a bit on the fat side, and with a face that would make a bulldog proud. Those jowels would scare children of all ages and it told Drono all he needed to know. The game was afoot.

Khosin chuckled a little bit at Drono's words "You got that right boss." He said in response to what the Drell had said. He had opened his mouth to say something more when the door that lead to the room in which they were in was flung open, causing Khosin to turn around to look at the man that had entered.

"Ahhh. If it aint the man of the hour! And here I thought I would be stuck waiting all day." Drono said, in that perfectly confident, snarky and sardonic cadence of mastercriminals everywhere. Tenrom was in full blast and Drono was in his elements playing as the scoundrel.

"You. What is this ruckus about?" The man who was obviusly quartermaster asked bewildered. "Yestin sent you? I heard he was legit these days." This earned a chuckle from Drono.

"Legit? Yestin? He is so crooked you could use him for a fish hook. He is just richer now." Drono said, keeping his voice level. So his old pal decided to go into the safer sector. No doubt thinking all the ties to his criminal past was forgotten. Drono could not help himself.

"These fellows behind me are my two most trusted lieutenants. The quarian is 'Zela’Yaerah Nar Shaehala'. ” He watched the name scramble the mans brain trying to figure out how you spelled it. Then he continued. "Her names a handfull, but if you piss her off you'll likely not have any hands left to have full. If you catch my drift." Again he paused, let it sink in and continued. "And to the right of me is Dodnovran, he is a batarian kicked out for being too ruthless. So you can imagine how badly he will treat you if you get stuffy with me." he paused, reading the flickers of emotion running across the fat mans face. From fear, to anger, to puzzlement, to confidence.

Under her visor, Kasyra smiled. She liked the way Drono described her alter ego - he might be mad but he certainly had style.

"I don't scare easily. So you have two nasties with you, what of it?"

"What of it? You think I bring Murder and Slaughter around for small deals?" He said, expertly shifting sardonic, cynical threat to cynical anger at the slowness of others. The drell motioned back to where they came from. "Back there I have enough Alliance issued guns that would give any pirate a hardon." He said acidly. Leaning in, as it were, to stare the man in the eye. "Hot, in need of a buyer. Guns."

The man blinked. "Oh aye?" He said, suddenly with the program. If there was anything these people knew, it was the talk of deals and good, desperate sellers. He had taken the bait. Now it was time for quicktalking.

"Zela, Dodnovran, why don't you two make yourself useful. Take mr... I am so sorry. I never got your name?"

"Halbert to you. " The man said, clearly being talked into circle and sold his own gravestone at twice the price.

"One of you, take Halbert to see the goods. The other, with me. Lets see what else we can find."

Khosin let Drono speak to the man, introducing both him and Kasy but when the expression of, who he guessed was, the quartermaster Khosin shifted ever so slightly into a more threatening pose, staying like that -his four eyes focused on the man- until Drono finally managed to convince the man.

"I'll stay with you Tenrom, you know I don't get along with humans very well, to say the least." He finally spoke when Drono said that one of them should take Halbert to see the goods they had brought.

"Ah yes. It is more they who do not get along with you." Drono said, giving his "Minion" the benefit of the doubt as it were. The Quartermaster looked from one to the other. Not sure what to think.

"Alright boss." Was all 'Zela' said by way of reply, before motioning to the human quartermaster to follow her. The less she talked the better, as far as she was concerned. But she didn't need to talk to look menacing. She would take the quartermaster to see the guns, and, if needed, talk about them. One thing she did know was guns, and no lying was necessary there.

Tanya walked over to where Vellios had seated himself and picked a tree nearby, setting herself down and suppressing a relieved grunt for getting off her feet after carrying the gear. "I appreciate you saying that. I'd be honoured if you accompanied me to something that important... and I think having you there as a turian will definitely show we've come a long way. Your friends never got a memorial?" she asked, leaning her rifle against the tree beside her.

"No. I doubt anyone really did during that fight as the scene was confusing and many of us simply followed orders to subdue the hostiles." Vellios said, his attention turned from his talons to Tanya. There was no lust, for the time being, behind his icy colored eyes while he watched her sit down. His head leaned back against the bark and thought back to the friends he had lost during the attack, partly wondering how he managed to survive it. "Many of my old crew were about a few decades older than me and had more experience in war than I ever had. Survival and war are too different thing when you sit down to look at them. One bloody for no reason while the other is strictly just to make it to the next day, no matter who you kill to do that."

"I'm sorry about your friends, truly, I am. I was still a kid when my dad went to war with the turians, but I remember him like I'd just seen him a few months ago." Tanya said, leaning her head against the bark and looking up at the blue sky through the foliage. "Doesn't mean I never found out what it's like, losing friends in combat. I guess the circumstances don't matter, or shouldn't anyways, but it just felt wrong. You know someone for months, years... suddenly they're not there anymore, and there's no warning, no ceremony. One second you're talking, the next they're looking at you with lifeless eyes. At some point, war and survival aren't so different after all. What you wouldn't do to see another day, especially after seeing what the alternative is." turning her gaze back to Vellios, she asked, "So your people really don't look at the First Contact War as that big of a deal, do they? Just some minor skirmish over some new aliens not following the rules that was resolved before it got serious?"

Vellios leaned back and chose his words carefully, namely because he couldn't speak for all Turians. In addition, his connection to the culture he should've called his own was a bit fractured at best. All thanks to the bastard that called himself Syberus and the ship Haides. "Depends on the Turian you ask. For me, personally it was another event in my life that required me to make it to the end. For Arentos Rusnos' widow, it's the last battle of her mate and the lost of her children's father. I was the one who personally volunteered to deliver the message and the medal. She blamed me for surviving and not keeping her mate alive, which I merely stood there and took it."

He inhaled, thinking about the scene a moment then added. "Many Turians accept their duty to the Heirarchy to follow the rules, even at the cost of their lives. So yes it would be in that case. Others are raised to break them and so for those, it was just another even they had to overcome to see tomorrow. For me, it was something I grew up on and thrived in. I could kill without being judged."

That was a different side to things than Tanya had understood about turians; typically, they considered no cost too great for victory, and if you had to sacrifice nearly every man in your unit to win a battle, then it was worth it without reservation. They embodied the concept of total war; the stories she'd read about the krogan rebellions and how utterly the turians threw themselves into destroying their enemy actually made her choke on her water when she was studying the tactics during basic training. It was inconceivable that an entire colony being destroyed by krogan smashing a moon into it would just make them throw themselves and their resources into the war three times as hard. Humans would at some point think of suing for peace.

And so, it was amazing that the First Contact War didn't end up worse for humanity. The turians would have, from what she'd come to know, throw away half of the population of Palaven to take Earth and considered the cost just. It was horrifying to think of, but yet, here Vellios was saying how one woman carried very understandable sentiment at the horror of the loss of her family. It was so very much like Tanya's own mother, Belle Carson. For a moment, it was impossible to think of them as different people.

It was just another powerful reminder that she could not ever afford to think of an entire species with a single brush stroke. Like her paintings, there were layers and so many different shades and gradients, and all of them made art in the end. Culture was no different.

"You make it sound like you've always wanted to kill; the military just happened to be a vessel that encouraged it." she observed cautiously. "I apologize if I overstep any boundaries with that observation, but I always had the impression that you were damaged goods, so to speak. The way Serena talks about what it was like when it was just the two of you, well, let's just say I know trauma when I see it."

"Your observations aren't wrong... fully, hun. I don't want to kill, but I haven't any issues doing so and I won't lose sleep over it. Been like that since I was ten years old when a pirate ship boarded the vessel we were currently living on, my mother bouncing from ship to ship to make ends meet and give me a happy childhood. She wasn't fully accepting of the Turian's Hierarchy lifestyle."

He took a moment to consider if Tanya actually wanted to know the full details or not. Part of him suspected she rather just have the skimmed version, unlike Dex who was digging for answers, and so he watered down the experience to be polite. "Need less to say, I was tossed into a violent, bloody environment. After a year, which I spent about more than four within, I became a bit numb to killing. This made normal, casual living rather... hard for me to adjust to as you can imagine."

Vellios studied her expression from the corner of his vision. If she showed any issue or concerning reaction, he was ready to alter the topic completely and focus on her quickly. It wasn't the best defense but it was better than letting the awkward situation stand for too long.

Tanya blinked quickly a couple of times. Killing since he was ten? Pirates? What the hell had Vellios gone through? She wasn't exactly keen on prying for anyone's personal information, largely because she knew that some wounds weren't meant to be reopened, but the way Vellios spoke about it was just so matter of fact; nothing in his face or voice suggested he was recalling anything more unpleasant than the weather the day before.

"Well, not where I was expecting that to go. Ten? Forget trying to give you a childhood; you didn't really have one. It's hard to reconcile the fact that you lost your mother and had to kill to survive around the same age I lost my father. I think I understand where you're coming from a lot more, and... well, there's nothing to say that'll change anything other than I wish things were different for you. No one should ever get to the point where killing means nothing."

Vellios chuckled at her sediment. His eyes twinkled with teasing and fell back into the loving flirt he always was, his posture relaxing after the words past.

Tanya caught herself, smacking herself on the forehead. "Fuck, okay, that came out wrong. I don't mean that as a slight against you, just that shit forced you to get that way. I'm not the best around people, I never know what to say and I run my mouth before thinking sometimes. All I'm trying to say is, I accept what happened to you and it doesn't change a thing between us. I'm here, whenever you need a friend, or whatever we are."

"It's alright. I know what you mean, and agree. When you get numb to killing, it seems to make you less alive and more indifferent to others. Armis helped fix that by making me care and we had two beautiful children because of it." His voice became quiet suddenly at the topic that rose up.


"Children?!" Tanya blurted out, surprised. Immediately she covered her mouth, immediately ashamed at her reaction. "Oh, fuck, I... I should leave you to whatever it was you were doing as I go hang myself off some fucking palm tree or something. I'm sorry. I... Fuck." she stammered, beginning to rise up from the tree to walk away. She probably not only picked at an old wound; she went in full fisted and tore it asunder. It was not at all what she intended to do, but the revelation that Vellios was once a father was legitimately shocking, something that was rarely a thing in Tanya's world, not after all the things she'd come across in the past few years.

She tried to get to know her crew members, and still was awkwardly tripping over anything resembling social grace in the process. What the hell was wrong with her?

Vellios lifted his arm then gently gripped Tanya's forearm before she could go into full out flight mode. His figure was risen a bit from the ground and then slowly tried to lower her down with him. "Easy there tech girl, you're getting a little skittish and jumping over board because of it. I had children... a son, Tiberian, and a daughter Killia..."

He inhaled, his heart growing heave with the conversation. However, he teased her slightly to hid it. "You didn't know, and yes you're not the only one that reacted like that. Serena did too. It seems everyone doesn't think I'm father material and I can't blame them."

Tanya allowed herself to slump back down against the tree, her face flush. "No, no... it's not that I don't think you couldn't be a good father or any such rubbish, it's just... well, the way you carry yourself just seems like you've always been living for yourself and trying to make things work. Even on Omega, you never spared a second glance at the children there. It just never occured to me that you ever found enough peace to settle down, and I realized right as I blurted out that you no lo... I can't even say it." Tanya said quietly, her skin turning red.

"Lowlife? Loser? There's many Lo words there Tanya that could fit there and many I've heard before." Vellios stated, offering what he thought were more mild words in the place of her original one. ""Life isn't fair and those kids know it better than anyone. While it does hurt, I'm able to brush it off better than most because I've been where those kids are. However, I'm also bias and cold hearted. That I won't deny."

His expression softened and continued. "When it comes to my own, allies and family, I will do whatever is in my power to save them because they matter more to me then those kids. That's why I consider myself cold hearted."

"I thought I largely had you figured out as a loner who suffered a traumatic experience that you never quite got over and been looking out for just you and Serena this whole time, I should have never just been satisfied with my assumptions. You deserve better than that, from someone who may or may not be a friend to you. It just makes me realize how little I know about everyone, and... I need to do better."

"Perfectionist doesn't suit you, sweetheart, so stop being so hard on yourself. You're alive and imperfect, so mistakes are expected." Vellios remarked then nudged the machinist's cheek with his fisted talon, smiling at her. "As I've told Dex, my past is pretty much open. You merely need to ask and I will tell you as much as I can. I had a really great and sexy asari therapist that helped me with that. Speaking of her, she might be at the memorial service. She did work with many Turian military vets, civilians, and others over their traumatic experiences."

"What the hell's a turian military therapist doing on Terra Nova?" Tanya asked, leaning back into the tree behind her. "And yeah, I'm not perfect, never tried to be. I mainly aim for and miss 'don't be an insensitive asshole'." she shrugged. She didn't really believe he was 100% comfortable talking about everything in his past; some things just weren't supposed to be talked about, and she certainly wasn't going to pry.

"Cause some of her former patients will be there and like some humans, a few of us are too proud to come out and say we need someone to relate to our pain.It's better to be there and not needed, then be missing and wanted in a time of high emotion." Vellios pointed out, showing surprising logic in his reasoning. He blinked and frowned, actually aware of the words coming out his mouth before shrugging off the 'rare' nugget of wisdom as likely never to happen again. "A lot of them likely still suffer through nightmares and don't have a cooping method. As for insensitive asshole,I've known worse if that makes you feel better?"

Tanya rolled her jaw, unconvinced. "Y'know, you and I might be fine with each other's species and all that despite the war, but some of those veterans might take turians being there as a slight. Old scars not healing or whatever. I get where those vets are coming from... it's like me and the batarians." she replied, letting out a long sigh. It felt like such a shitty thing to admit out loud. "And honestly; not really. It's pretty much the worst feeling when you come across someone or something that makes you look like a saint in comparison. Galaxy's a big, nasty place that has trillions of people, and a good chunk of them could be classified as 'classically evil.'"

"I'm pretty sure I fall into 'classically evil'." Vellios said without missing a beat. "Though I wouldn't say humans were the only that held a grudge though. As for how you feel, I can relate. Been there myself a long time ago so I have little right to judge you like I could any human, turian or other alien that nearly killed my ass."

Tanya snorted, amused. "Oh, come off it. You're a big softy. Rough around the edges, you can be pretty ruthless, but you have empathy and you seem to genuinely care about people. You're basically like a brother to Serena and Dex doesn't seem to think you tie up ladies and put them on railroad tracks in your spare time. Hell, I think you're alright." she said, crossing her arms and regarding the turian fondly. "I barely get on our Jalopy, wondering what kind of wankers I've signed on with after finding out our captain died like a total idiot, and right away, you went out of your way to try and be kind and friendly. Not exactly inspiring fear and loathing, Vellios."

Vellios shrugged, brushing off the comment as it was normal for him. His back leaned more against the tree and smirked at her adding in a cheeky reply. "Well, I only tie ladies up when they ask me to. As for being friendly, someone had to. Can you imagine what Drono might've said to break the ice?"

The turian chuckled as he joked, knowing the Drell would've likely tried to come up with a lame comeback and ended up tripping over himself in the process. It was a part of what Vellios actually enjoyed about his fellow crazy and brighten up a gloomy day.

Tanya groaned. "Okay, I walked into that one. Remind me not to let you spend our budget on ropes and gags and shit." She grinned at the mention of Drono. "Drono's the kind of guy who would probably ask a girl if she wanted to see a dead body without thinking it's weird or inappropriate; he just sees fucked up things and wants to share it with the world the same way someone would be drinking all night, puke up a rainbow, and drag their buddy to see the evidence."

Vellios smiled at that. "Though you got to admit, he's the first alien you want on your side in a fight. He's about as crazy as I am and that's before I totally lose my shit. Though I think I came out better during that fight back at the smuggler's mine. Too bad," He hissed when he moved causing his cast to press at his torso and immediately made him shift to the side in order to ease it. His eyes checked down to ensure he hadn't caused more damage or Kasy would likely deny him a taste of her cooking for the second time and he wasn't about to let that happen again. When he was satisfied he hadn't caused any more damage, he leaned back to resume the conversation. " I can't say he was stupid enough to get hurt worse the second time."

"You really should have stayed on the ship, or partner up with Iosif... not that I don't think you're capable of fighting through the pain, but you got pretty mangled." Tanya said, her expression growing terse with worry. "I don't think Tonka would be happy having to come all the way up here to drag you up because you blew out your spine or some shit. Honestly, you have nothing to prove. Everyone would understand if you needed time to recouperate before we can get you patched up properly."

"After merely walking around looking scary, it gives him some useful to do. After all, what good is that muscle if he's taking the easy job?" Vellios joked then added. "Serious though, I've been worse. Had to climb into a ship's upper levels with a broken arm just to get away from a pack of hungry varren before and compared to that experience, this is easy. A lot easier. Though if we meet any varren in this jungle, then I'll make your prejudice with Batarian look mild. Trust me."

She chuckled, running a hand through her hair, only to find it coming back damp from sweat. Fuck the jungle. "Don't let him hear you say that; he'll poke you where it hurts. He's cuthroat like that." she teased. She shook her head. "You know, I've seen a couple videos with guys like you who are literally falling apart or are broken in like six different places, and it's played up for comedy since they're acting like their eye totally isn't dangling from their sockets or razorfish aren't chewing on their thighs or whatever. It's all, 'oh yeah, I've never felt better, why'd ya ask?'. Point is, I don't care that this is easy in comparison to getting chewed on by alien salamander dogs, what I care about is we all get home in one piece. Although..." she trailed off, an impish grin crossing her face.

Vellios was curious now. His head tilted and studied the sly look Tanya gave, trying to determine the reason until he was left asking. "What is that impish mind of yours thinking? In the name of the spirits, do I even want to ask or know?"

"Well, for one, I've always wanted to paint a full body cast. And two, the ship would be much quieter at the dead of night without hearing the creaking of a medical bed and the trill of an irritated anti-PDA drone." She brought her hands up, making a box with her fingers over Vellios' seated frame. "I'm thinking fish, or a farm pasture with sheep-varren and little krogan farmers. Maybe I'll make it look like a thresher maw tried to swallow your leg whole..."

The Turian lost it as his voice box made a sound between a snort and a caw, both sounds muffled by his amusement. His hand had raised to his mandibles in order to help stifle the sound while he shook his head. The other arm was holding his side which shook from his sudden jerk and immediately forced him to tilt away from the tree, no longer enabling it to support his back. He feel to the side laughing rather hard from her statement. "If I didn't know better, I would've almost considered that as your way of flirting. Though the thresher maw was a nice touch."

Letting his laughter die down, his breath was heavy and slightly wheezing from the breath lost. He managed to rise to all fours but getting upright on his feet was another story. A hiss of irritation was out when he turned to Tanya with a light smirk then made a request. "Little help darling? It was your joke that made me fall and now unable to get up..."

"Oh, I don't offer to vandalize just anyone. Just the people I know can't move away when inspiration hits, or know better. Besides, I have a book of pranks I've been waiting to try on those who evoke my displeasure." she smiled devilishly, setting her wrists down on her raised knees. She regarded the prone Vellios with well-practiced skepticism. "Oh, so now you're too crippled to move. You really just want to be looking at wool-covered varren for the next few weeks, don't you? I sense a trap if I go over there."

"I'm not the prankster, remember? I just get hurt enough thanks to my own stupid and brush it off." Vellios said then managed to roll over back to his seat. He breathed deeply then gestured for his pack. "Since you're not into helping a wounded turian, can you at least pass me my pack? My meds should be in there somewhere though I don't know if Selena refilled the pack I grabbed or not. If not, I'm going to be miserable for the night sitting in that tree."

The pack was just out of her reach, so Tanya slid down the tree to hook the strap with her boot, pulling it towards her carefully. She stood up and carried the pack to the aching turian and set it down beside him, taking a seat next to the pack. "If I open this, I'm not going to find a bunch of lewd pictures of the girls on the crew from social media, am I?" she asked, deadpan.

"I prefer the real thing so unless they are flesh and blood, there's no pictures. Besides, I tend to keep them closer than my pack." Vellios winked and hinted toward his omnitool. "The best Serena repellant I've found to date."

He held his talons for the pack, offering to take it from Tanya.

Tanya visibly picked herself up by her hands and feet and shifted over half a foot away from Vellios in reply. She undid the straps on the bag and handed it over to him, raising an eyebrow. [color=cyan]"Uh huh. I'm pretty sure all you guys have to do is moan and talk all seductively whenever she's around and she'd find a way to get outside the ship just to get away from the icky grown-up fluid swap meet. So, your meds. Do you need a hand, or is this a journey you take on your own?" she asked.

"Nay, I've been doing this off and on for years so I got my own tricks on doing this." Vellios stated, his hand dugging into the pack and shuffling things about. After several moments, he pulled a small container from it then set it aside so he could secure his pack in place. Nothing was more bothersome than having the contents spilling out and being forced to pick it up item by item, then hope he had everything after it was all said and done. The turian then turned to the container and popped it open, expecting to see the syringes but instead viewed an empty box. He frowned.

"I think Serena forgot to replenish my reserves." He leaned against the truck and quietly cursed his luck. He turned toward Tanya then decided to risk asking. "Don't suppose you would be willing to go back to the ship, would you?

"I think these boys can look after themselves for an hour or two." She said, standing up and offering a hand to help Vellios. She couldn't shake the feeling that Serena deliberately forgot the medication to force his hand. "Besides, I don't mind getting to stretch my legs. I've been cooped up for too long."

Vellios smiled then took her hand, rising back to his feet. His torso flinched with pain as he did causing him to inhale sharply then release in relief. He felt his bones crack and pop on the way up causing him to flinch a bit while he tossed his container back into the pack roughly. Tossing the strap over his shoulder, mindful the bulk didn't smack him in the cast, he looked at Tanya and then trotted back to the ship, backtracking along the way they had came.

Time passed slow, back on the Borealis; Iosif had found it to be quite peaceful, yet at the same time there was something strange... it was one thing to be sitting within the tight, confined spaces of a shuttle or a gunship that he knew every inch of, but a whole different matter in a ship of this size, on some frontier world with no civilization for light years in all directions.

Well, unless you counted the presence of pirates and slavers to be "civilization". Iosif hadn't forgotten that last fact and had made a point of keeping an eye on the ship's external cameras, just in case some of the aforementioned scumbags stumbled upon the ship and decided to try and take a peak inside. Otherwise, he had little else to do beyond keeping minimal power levels to ensure its concealment, which gave him plenty of time to start fishing through the navigation data he'd obtained from the quarian, back on Omega.

That is, until he picked up on a couple of familiar faces returning home and went down to meet them.

"Knock knock, any wanker home?" Tanya called out into the hold as they entered, holding Vellios' arm over her shoulders as she helped him walk the distance. If he was hurting before heading back to the Borealis, he was probably ready to collapse after the hard jungle hike. Finding him her painter stool to sit on, Tanya found Iosif waiting for them at the shuttle, apparently rearing to go. "So, our feisty turian friend needs his medicine. Keep an eye on him and keep him from moving around too much, will you? I'm pretty sure he'd still insist on going it alone even if he were missing both his arms and legs." she said, rolling her eyes before stepping back to address Vellios. "What am I looking for, exactly? I don't want to mix up your life saving shit with estrogen pills or whatever."

Vellios was in terrible shape. He thought the trek to the observation point was bad but going back was worse and it took a lot to convience Tanya he wasn't just copping a feel. His arm reached to cup where the pain was harsh enough he could barely breath then pressed in, relieving some pressure from his thin frame. He leaned back when his ass touched the seat as he leaned to the side, easing his pain before he perked up at what Tanya said.

His head turned toward her. "In my quarters, there's a suitcase with a lock. Pressed 15-24-01-31. When it hisses open, you should spy a case under a small and slightly beaten up model starship, and a few quarian toy soldiers. It's pure black with a red strip down the length of it. It's not hard to miss, hun."

"That why you brought him back?" Iosif asked, raising an eyebrow.

"No, I forgot my trailmix and I was feeling peckish." Tanya replied drly.

The slavic pilot snorted at the remark. "I trust the others haven't forgotten theirs?"

"Not to break up your flirting, but please hurry." Vellios insisted as he let the cool of the metal press against his carapace.

Tanya was taken aback by how forthcoming Vellios' was with giving access to his personal belongings, he was one of the most secretive people she knew. While she understood he was in agony, nothing drove home the point that he was in dire need of his medication more than that. "I'll be back as fast as possible, I promise.", she said softly, turning to run up the ladder and to the crew quarters, leaving Vellios and Iosif in each other's company.

Iosif folded his arms and looked on at the turian with a quizical expression. "Personal supply?" There was something familiar that struck him about Vellios' condition.

"Long story that would require a lot of personal story to explain." Vellios admitted, his body starting to shake. His eyes closed as he inhaled, trying to stop his body from crumbling from the withdrawl. He regretted not taking a larger dose earlier before they left as he leaned against the metal harder.

Iosif shrugged, then frowned as he picked up on the turian's shaking. "Your business, I guess. Hold up a second." He glanced over his shoulder, back towards the shuttle and headed over to it for a moment, digging through the open cockpit for something before finally returning with an open canteen, which he held close to Vellios' mouth. "Drink."

Vellios didn't argue and instead, sipped whatever was offered to him. His head tilted back while he coughed from drinking a bit too fast. The turian smirked in gratitude back while he tried to stop the shaking, his muscles twitching uncontrollably causing him some concern.

Within a few short minutes, which must have been agonizingly long for Vellios, Tanya was back with the container in hand. With well-practiced agility, she threw herself on the otherside of the ladder, smalls of her boots and hand on the outer rim of the ladder as she slid down with a squeak. Touching the deck of the cargo bay, she hurried over to Vellios, taking a knee. "Direct me." she stated.

"Inside is several vials filled with it and an injector," Vellios said though gritting his teeth. The substance was a common street drug called Zofloxi, one both Tanya and Iosif should be able to recogonize right off the bat because it was pale green and gave off a slight illumination within three glass vials. It numbed pain and commonly used as calming agent, at the cost of being addictive. There was a gun like device strapped to the inside, nestled beside the vials.

The turian continued in a breathless voice, his figure's temors getting worse by the moment. "Push the first vial into the back, there's a little opening for it then press it to my arm and pull the trigger. Hold it there until the liquid is half way gone then place it back into the case. It will take a few moments to fully take effect."

Tanya followed the directions, pausing only for a moment to take in what exactly Vellios was taking. It sure as shit wasn't medication; Vellios was an addict. Still, she didn't dwell on it, long ago accepting that her team would have more than a few sketchy details about them, and drug use was hardly as bad as she feared. Handling the vial with care, Tanya loaded the injector, pressed it against what looked like a soft spot between carapace plates, and injected it half way, removing the device and setting it down into its case. She shook her head. "How long, and why?" she asked.

"Well, after what I told you... I'm surprised you would ask that." Vellios let a bitter chuckle escape his mandibles, then continued. His tremors starting to cease, the sweat still clinging to his carapace and making him slightly cold.

"I've had nightmares since I was ten thanks to that pirate ship. I wasn't the only that hated the Haides, but I was one of the luckier ones to come out still sane. I had to learn to deal with it, even when my counselor disapproved of it."

"I tried to get off them when my children were born with some success... then after they were murdered, I naturally went downhill and gave up. His talons scratched at his neck, digging at his scars. "I've been slowly trying to get off them again when I met Serena, she's not a fan of me being on them. However, being hurt isn't something I want to tolerate right now. So it's primarily to numb the pain."

It explained a few things; why the turian had seemed as careless as he did, getting into that fight back on Omega, why he'd come across with a lack of concern for self-preservation. Iosif saw something in Vellios. Pity, maybe? He'd almost been down that road before, with only a certain hatred, stubbornness and spite keeping him from fully passing the threshhold that led to alcoholism and substance abuse. Only the turian had arguably been broken far more than him. Iosif's childhood memories were bitter, but they were far from nightmarish.. and losing children?

Iosif had never been a father, but he recognised the pain of it all too well. Even an addict deserved some measure of sympathy.

"It's difficult to understand," Iosif finally said, "Not unless you've been under those circumstances."

"The understatement of the year really." Vellios tried to joke, feebly, as he looked at Tanya's moving figure.

Tanya slumped down into a sitting position, resting her wrists on her knees. "You misunderstand. I know why you're using a mind-altering and body numbing substance to cope, hell, I pound back enough whiskey to keep Sampson Distillery in business on my own, but it's more..." she didn't really have the words to say it tactfully, so she simply gestured towards the case.

Vellios' brow raised, indicating he didn't fully understand. It wasn't a surprise as Turians, even himself, were far more straighter in their meaning when it came to a few subjects. His mind was lost at what she was meaning and thought he just answered her, but she didn't hear. However, he didn't unterrupt her while he let the drugs seep into his system and numb his pain.

"That shit. Steet drugs are not what you want in your system. You get an impure dose, or something that was cut with some other shit, and it could really fuck you up." her eyes darted to Iosif before returning back to Vellios. She was distinctly uncomfortable with the conversation at hand, and did not want to be having this conversation, dragging up people's skeletons like this.

"I'm not too worried. I'm not looking to die, but it if it happens... I won't exactly stop it." Vellios stated clearly, trying to brush off the statement casually.

"Look, all I'm trying to say is, well... I've lost enough friends. We've all been through shit, Vellios, I get it, Iosif gets it. He was a fucking slave. I watched a young girl get gutted by a batarian and I was helpless to do anything about it, and shortly after had my best friend's brains blown across my face. That's not exactly something you sleep off. I feel like an asshole for even talking about this, and I hate throwing shit when I can barely take my own, but this ship and the idiots that live on it are all I have, alright? We'll find something that can help you, but... let's fucking stop with this crap."

Vellios sighed, feeling a bit like shit for causing the issue. "It's not as easy as it-"

Tip tapping suddenly erupted and interrupted him, the sounds of something scurrying within the copit with the three of them. Vellios' eyes looked at Tanya with confusing as he mouthed a few words: "Did you hear that?" It was close. Suddenly, it darted from just under Iosif's seat then scrambled across the floor deeper into the ship and was gone into the darkness, running over the pilot's feet in the process. Whatever it was, the thing was fast.

"I heard somethin-.. cyka!" Iosif's hand quickly snapped for his holstered pistol as he jolted forward, caught off guard by the creature's sudden presence.. "Where'd it go?" He asked, with a certain urgency in his tone, stepping forth with his weapon at the ready. "Quick, before we lose it!"

Storm Front
Hazan and Serena
Virmire

Serena gave a nod, looking around miserably. She hated the jungle. It was like someone rang a dinner bell and every insect in a five hundred mile radius descended upon her and tried to eat her. Her biotic shield helped some, but somehow they seemed to wiggle past her defenses. The beste she could do was focus on fiddling with the equipment they had gotten and hope that they got the mission with over quickly. With an abject sigh she stood up. "Del, Sarah, patrol protocols." The drones flew off, going on their set patrols.

Serena herself began connecting to the turrets that had been set up. "There we go. Now I have two more pairs of eyes!" *Smack!* Serena glared at the crushed bug on her hand. "If only I could manage to make myself less attractive to bugs. That'd be great."

She glared up at the sky, as the rain begin to lash against the trees in the distance. "Thank you Hazan. I couldn't tell from the raging storm not five feet away. Come on. We'd better secure everything not bolted down."

"On my way."

Hazan quicked his pace. He didn't want to leave Serena hanging, after all. A few minutes later and he was back at base camp, soaking wet but still in one piece. He gave Serena a weary and sheepish smile as he started tying down the turrets into the dirt, which was rapidly turning into mud.

"Jungle ops are fun, huh?"

"Oh yes. They're 'fun'." Serena grunted as she put the final piece of equipment down and had it tied into the earth. "I love being eaten alive by bugs, stuck here for probably days on end as we wait for the sabotage team to do their job or we find out they're caught." She paused. "Well, I suppose we'd know if they got caught. It'd be a spectacularly loud affair. In anycase, it's really unlikely that they're even suspicious beyond the normal 'you're new around her' paranoia...I hope. Everyone we sent down there is smart enough to not talk about the actual mission in a public place like a bathroom, right?"

She shook her head. "Regardless, the only good thing about this mission is that we haven't been attacked by local wildlife. And I give us two days, tops, before that happens. The turrets are relatively silenced, right? I don't want them going off and attracting the attention of an entire base of smugglers because they saw a squirrel and panicked."

"Yeah, and besides, even if they fired a shot, the people down there wouldn't hear it cause of the storm. I don't think a squirrel would set 'em off though. Don't think they have squirrels on Virmire."

"Every planet has squirrels. They may look a little different than Earth squirrels, but they all have them. Annoying little bastards."

He chuckled and sighed as he helped her tie down their last equipment case into the mud. The downpour was turning into a waterfall from the sky. Rivers of muddy water swirled around his feet and down the slope as he slogged back up to the observation point and sat down with a splash. He had his viewfinder out, studying the myriad of blips through the torrential rain. Visibility was pretty much zero, so he only had the moving blips to keep track of. A moment of silence later and he put down his scope, shaking his head with a chuckle.

"Heh... This feels way too much like home. Or, well, training. Foraging in the forests of Palaven for scraps while trying to find one measly landmark in the middle of a fucking storm. Yup, definitely feels like home."

Hazan turned to Serena.

"Do you ever get homesick, Serena?"

Serena snorted mock glaring at Haze through the rain.. "So it's the Turians I have to blame for that particular piece of training hell! I knew it had to be from some alien race we stole those ideas from. I hated those storms. 'Gotta be able to find your way no matter the weather!' I hated that phrase." She paused, smiling softly into the rain.

"Every time I have a moment to think about it. Omega was the closest thing I've had to home in years." She glanced out of the corner of her eye at him.

Weird, huh. It was the most crime infested place on Earth, but it was home. I even had friends among the gangsters that protected our shop for a fee." She chuckled. "These giant, hardened, scarred, life long criminals would just sit with a little girl and play tea with her and her make shift robots. Hide and seek, patty cake, the works. I was too young to realize who they really were, and when I found out I didn't care. They were my family, and everyone had to do hard things in that town. Even if they did scare off any potential suitors until I signed up with the Alliance." She eyed Haze. "What about you? Ever miss Palavan? Or are you from a different world?"

Hazan nodded. "Palaven, born and raised. But Omega's also been my home for several years. After I finished my scout training on Palaven, I tried being a goody two shoes C-Sec officer for a while. Too much paperwork for my liking. So I upped stakes and went to Omega. Did my own solo work for a few years. Built up rep. Made people hate me. It's why I've got a bounty on me. People who got fed up with my work. Mainly the Blue Suns. Hehe, bastards."

Serena rolled her eyes. "You and Kasy I swear to God. 'Gotta kill the Blue Suns!' I get that you hate them but come on, we're not assassins...most of us at any rate."

He chuckled and smiled. The happier memories of the station bubbled to the surface past the bad.

"I miss home, sometimes. The one thing I had back then was stability. And a family who loved me for who I was. Not who I was trying to be. On Omega... Everyone I've known to date has either gone missing or ended up in the morgue. Honestly this crew's been the closest to a real... Thing for the first time in years."

Serena rubbed the back of her neck, pushing back flashes of memories. "Yeah, I know what you mean. Before Vellios...before Vellios was rough."

The slender turian stood and picked up his soggy camouflage cloak, shaking water off it before he folded it into a square.

"Nowadays I try to see what's happening back home. But seeing since home's so far away... Y'know, it's hard to catch up. But I try, y'know? Better to try."

Hazan sat back down and sighed into the rain.

"Last I heard, my folks were considering signing me off as dead. I haven't been able to drop a line to them in the past two years. Being on the run and all that hasn't helped much. When I joined up with you guys, I managed to get through once. But I don't think they got my mail packet."

Serena looked over at Hazan, slight confusion on her face. "Mail packet? Why would you send a mail packet? Why don't you send them an email or a call? If you're worried about it being traced to them, Dex and I could make it untraceable. Besides, after Drono's back and Tanya's memorial, we're going to delete your files at the Bounty Hunter base, remember? Dex and I are good at making files never have existed."

"Yes, I didn't want them finding out I was...a bounty hunter. My family were bodyguards, private security on the Citadel. I didn't want to follow in their footsteps, plus they'd probably set straight off to the Terminus Systems to find me. And yeah, maybe once that's done, I'll get something back to them."

Serena's confusion didn't faze him. But as much as he hated to admit it, she was right. If he was this homesick, a short call home wouldn't hurt.

It had to wait though. Not until he was sure he was clean. No more lives had to end because of his stupidity.

"Who knows. We could even change up your dating profile. Attract some females with...large crests? Is that what Turians go for?"

The tension broke like a bubble, and he laughed as she wiggled her eyebrows.

"Maybe? I don't quite know. Dex should have a better answer for that, she's bedded way more people than I can count, plus she's your required gender."

"Oh come on. What do you drool over when you look at a Turian female. Or male, whatever tickles your fancy. Do you go 'Spirits above, look at the crest size on her!' or 'Dear Lord, I'd like to cop a feel of that carpace.' Maybe 'Daaamn, look at how she handles that carbine! I'd like to be the calibrations she's in the middle of.'

Serena snorted. "I could ask Dex. But then I'd get to much information and what she looks for in a partner, which I'm beginning to suspect is a very short list."

"Hehe, that would be one: male, and two: has the equipment to match."

He chuckled and smiled. This was getting silly.

"Well, I, um, I just look for...uh... The crests, I guess. If they're elegant, I kinda get real wobbly inside."

Hazan tried to hide his embarrassment, though he wasn't sure if Serena could see through the downpour.

"And, um, what about you? What do you look for in a potential partner, Serena?"

"Ooooh I seee. So you get wobbly whenever you see a finely groomed female Turian's crest. I'll have to tell Vellios he has some competition. You all are gonna tucker poor Dex out." Serena teased, keeping an eye on her readings around camp. She didn't want any nasty surprises while they were shooting shit.

"Hmm. Not sure. Haven't had any time or interest in a long time, so my tastes, requirements, wobble-initatiors, or whatever you want to call them are relatively unknown. I appreciate pretty or handsome things, but haven't really drooled over someone yet. Make sense?"

"Yup, makes sense."

Hazan leaned back and tried to get a clearer picture through his viewfinder, but the storm made it like looking through a metal bulkhead. He sighed and sat back down next to Serena.

"Well so much for the rest of our surveillance. Storm's thicker than a vorcha brain on creeper. Can't see anything through it."

The slender turian crossed his legs and draped his camo cloak over himself.

"I wonder how the rest are doing down there. Thankfully there's no time limit on this mission. Sad for us, not so much for them."

"Don't think it's good for them too. You can only bullshit about why you're sticking around for so long before they start getting suspicous." Serena replied. She briefly examined the thick wall of rain between them and the smuggler's base camp, trying to see anything that would indicate the state of affairs, before giving up with a shrug.

"Yeah, true. Hope they're doing fine down there though. Not much we can do from up here except high powered rifles and rockets."

Hazan sighed again and drew his cloak tighter around himself and looked up.

The rain wasn't going to let up any time soon. And a burst of thunder only reinforced that notion.

"Not yet, you blood thirsty maniac. We have to be sublte and can only go loud when the shit hits the fa-" Serena's teasing reprimand was cut of by a loud crack of lighting smashing into the forest behind them. Serena whirled around to see a tree shifting in the wind, groaning as it eventually went down with a thunderous crash.

Both turrets went dark.

"Fuck!" Serena spat. "I think the damn tree fell on the turrets! Come on. We have to see if there's at least one we can salvage." She cursed as she made her way over to the downed tree, a useless hand held up against the rain.

"Fucking Jungle Ops."

(((Collabing @Sundered Echo & @DearTrickster)))

Dex and Tonka had made their way back to the truck and found Kasy speaking with a human showing him the guns. Dex cracked her knuckles and elbowed Tonka saying, "Looks like Tenrom found us some buyers. Now it's my turn to finish the sale. Try not to be too impressed."

She sauntered over to Halbert and 'Zela' chatting about the guns. She was already well into upselling the specs or the specs were honestly that good to talk about, it really didn't matter. Regardless 'Zela' had his attention.

Dex pulled up the inspection report swiping into over to Halbert, giving him no doubts about the merchandise legitimacy. His omnitool pinged and he had stopped to check it out giving Dex her way into the conversation.

Walking up beside Kasy making eye contact with the quartermaster, "Good grade average afforded by not only the onsite inspectors but the original owners. Hello, name's Fausta. Tenrom's partner." Dex said coolly. "Good job Zela, keeping Mister..."

"Halbert." He replied still reading through the inspection report. "Quartermaster."

Dex finished giving Kasy a smile, "Keeping Mister Halbert company." Returning her attention to Halbert she noted, "I take it you are interested in our goods?"

"Zela was giving me the run down on what you have." The human minimized the inspection report turning back to the Quarian, not entirely sure what sort of read he was getting from Fausta. If she was Tenrom's partner she was already giving off a more reasonable vibe. He kept his guard up regardless, between Fausta and Tenrom they were slicker than oil. He had been working at this current site for too long to be so easily swindled nor did he have time for their games. "Although I've only found a couple crates worthwhile in buying. I'm not interested in the whole shipment."

Halbert touched his hand to his earpiece calling for help to cart away the crates.

Dex scoffed, "The deal is for the entire shipment not just a couple crates."

"I'm a very busy man, I don't have time to be playing games with you and Tenrom. You sell to me what I want or you don't sell at all." He said glaring at the turian. Two large humans pushing antigrav carts appeared starting to move the crates. One had his long chestnut brown hair tied back into a ponytail while the other had close shaven red hair.

Dex's hand slammed down on the crate with a snarl earning a glare from the two grunts, "You have one chance not to fuck with us Halbert."

"Or what? You'll sic your Quarian attack dog on me? Please, my men don't need another punching bag. Joe, Curt keep going. Ignore the Turian." He waved off her threat.

Kasyra had observed the situation carefully to that point. The human had been impressed enough by her knowledge of the guns, but he clearly underestimated her. Quarians were not known for being powerhouses of muscle. When the conversation turned the way it did though, she knew the time had come to educate him on exactly why you don't buy too closely into all the stereotypes.

She stepped in close behind the man with the pony-tail, whom she decidedly to label 'Joe' on her HUD, whether it was actually him or not. Her foot went behind his. One hand grabbed onto the lock of hair and yanked while the other swung around to impact his chest and keep going. Since he hadn't been paying her as much attention as he should've, the take down went quite flawlessly. He fell back with a yelp of surprise, having the wind knocked out of him when he hit the ground.

But 'Zela' had already moved on to the other man 'Curt.' Curt had had more time to react, and would not be taken down so easily. He feinted a blow towards her helmet before swinging at her gut with his other fist. He still wasn't fast enough though. She dodged to the right, placing a checking hand on his arm while her other hand delivered a sharp, quick punch under the same arm. She knew that was a particularly soft and painful spot for a human. By this time Jow was beginning to get to his feet, slowly and groggily. She would've finished him if not for being stuck dealing with Curt.

Giving Kasy plenty room to work Dex stepped away watching her lay into the grunts. Halbert joined her and muttered, "She's quick but she doesn't stand a chance against both of them."

Dex laughed in his face playing up her confidence to unnerve Halbert. In truth she wasn't really aware of what Kasyra was truly capable of. She had taken on 3 Eyed Zallak back on Omega while challenging Tonka directly in the mines. It was one thing to hear about her exploits but another thing to see her action.

"Just remember I gave you a chance to back down." Dex said then muttered, "Fuckin' idiot."

Curt wasn't out yet though. He tried to twist around, simultaneously attempting to free the closer hand while swinging with the arm on the opposite side of his body to 'Zela.' Her checking hand swiftly turned to a grasping hand however, sliding down the arm and taking hold of his wrist, she twisted the arm so the elbow was facing the ground and brought her other hand up just behind it. The man grunted in pain as she forced his arm up, the tortured joint refusing to bend the way 'Zela' was holding it. He was unable to carry through with his attack, and was now at her mercy - unable to move to escape her grip without causing a lot more pain, and with his center of gravity dangerously heightened.

She took advantage of that, hooking her foot around his and sweeping it out from under him. Normally she might not be able to execute such a move against such a comparatively muscular opponent, but off-balanced as he was it was easy. He went down hard, unable to use the arm she still held to break his fall. Just to make sure he was out of it, she stomped with moderate force on his stomach. Not nearly as hard as she could've that might kill the man, but hard enough that he certainly wasn't getting up for a while.

Meanwhile, 'Joe' had risen from his sudden and no doubt painful fall, having found a second wind with which to battle 'Zela'. His fist struck the back of her helmet hard - perhaps not the best place to attack for the sake of his hand, but still knocking her reeling for a moment. She scrambled forward and away before turning around, not wanting to give him another opportunity to hit her.

Halbert watched on, his frown deepening at Zela's brutal efficiency fighting Joe and Curt. He didn't dare to spare a look at the turian pirate, knowing full well a smug smile was waiting for him.

She supplied the smug comment without prompt, "I'd bet on who will win but I feel like I would cheating. Since... it's painfully obvious who will be walking away from this."

Squaring off against him, 'Zela' waited for him to attack again, her guard held up but low. She was baiting another swing at her head - and as soon as Joe had stepped over Curts fallen form, he did just that, swinging a left handed roundhouse punch towards her. She responded quickly, stepping inside his guard and under the strike. Her left hand gripped his right wrist to prevent an attack from that angle while her right knee rose into his groin. She knew human men were quite vulnerable to groin attacks, and right on que his face turned into a grimace. She stepped back while he crumpled over, but she was not done yet. As soon as he began to rise, her right fist came up to meet the point of his jaw, sending him sprawling backwards.

He did not try to rise again, simply crumpling into a ball and moaning quietly in pain. "Should've stayed down." She said in his direction before turning towards Halbert, her omni tools now glowing. "You want to see what the 'Quarian attack dog' can do with omni blades as well as fist?" She said threateningly to Halbert. The message was clear. Don't underestimate her.

Clapping Halbert's shoulder and squeezing with her mechanical hand Dex spoke up next, "I am certain you don't want to see that." Halbert's jaw was a hard line as he glared at Zela.

"Isn't that right?"

Halbert remained silent.

Dex's grip tightened on his shoulder forcing a pained grunt from Halbert. "Fine! I'll buy everything you have."

Releasing his shoulder she gave a good-natured clap on the back making Halbert cough with the impact. "Good, we have an accord then."

Halbert sighed making the phone call. Within about five minutes more of his employees arrived, some to haul the guns and another to drag away Joe and Curt to the infirmary. Whispering fearfully of Zela, not making direct eye contact. While Dex and Halbert negotiated the sale reasonably, Halbert not pushing for anything lower than what was offered. He passed over the credit chits laying them out in the palm of Dex's hand.

Her hand still held out expectantly and Halbert wore an expression of exhaustion, he sighed "What other charges have I incurred in this transaction?"

"It is unofficially referred to as a good services tip, but also known as we-kicked-your-ass tax. Pay up." Dex said flicking her mandibles impatiently.

Halbert rolled his eyes and placed a couple more chits on her hand bitterly noting, "Pleasure doing business with you."

Turning to leave Dex stopped him before he left, "Out of curiosity, where are my goods being distributed?"

Halbert shrugged, "We needed more weapons at some of our other bases. They'll go where they're needed." With that he left with the crates.

Dex turned to Kasy humming pleasantly flipping the chit like a coin into Kasy's hands, "Well earned tip I think. Good work, 'Zela'."

Lowering her voice she added, "Guns out of our hands we can focus on sabatoge. We'll be infiltrating the comm's center tonight."

Kasyra smiled inside her helmet - Dex may not have been the slick fast talker that Drono was, but she certainly still knew what she was doing when it came to shaking down thugs.

"Thanks boss." Was all she said as she caught the credit chit, proceeding to secret it away amidst the many folds and pockets of her suit - just as it began to rain. She didn't really notice the rain. It had a slight effect on her visiblity as drops rolled down her visor, but that was all.

Dex blinked away the rain, squinting up at the sky a slow grin spreading her mandibles. "This will be perfect cover. The weather will give us an excuse for extra time." Thunder clapped and the wind began to pick up. All manner of patrons began retreating inside, closing shop and finishing sales. The rapid change in weather wouldn't bode well for the observation team but it was just the thing the infiltration team could take advantage of.

"I don't know about you, but I'm in the mood for hijacking their communications network."

First recorded contact between Raik Barat, mercenary for hire, and Serena Mathews, Alliance Specialist.

Phone call.

Date,location, and time unknown.

RB: You know the location?

SM: By the noodle shop, yeah.

RB: Good. Don't do anything stupid. You do what I say, when I say it and exactly how I say it. I don't want to end up like your previous partners.

SM: That wasn't my fa-!

RB: Yes it was. They died because you did something outside of mission bounds to be a good person. Meet me there on time or do this mission yourself.

Phone call ends.

Email to Raik Barat's (deceased) account, from Serena Mathews. Three days before Virmire mission.

Hey Barat. Sorry I wasn't able to give you an update sooner, the new crew, Vellios, and I have been busy bees making sure we have a working ship. The new crew is an even more varied and 'interesting' bunch than before. Though, I suppose I shouldn't be surprised, given the job offer. The ship is a complete piece of shit. You'd be smacking me upside the head if you saw the state it was in, cursing me as a fool for taking it. You know me. Naive and stupidly hopeful to the end. This crew seems better than the last. Actual bonds have aleady began forming, and we've only been together about a week. There's even another Krogan! And he's kinda like you. He thinks more than a normal Krogan, and keeps his range in check, like you. However, unlike you, he doesn't act like a normal Krogan to throw people off (and I think I can get him to play chess with me! He might even have the patience you didn't have for it.).

I think I'm going to end up regretting these bonds soon though. I made a bet with another mechanic that I could beat her in chess. Easy enough, she's barely played before. But I recently noticed Vellios sending her tips and tricks to beat me, the bastard. So I might end up getting regrettably drunk and making a fool out of myself (again.) Wish me luck!

Requiescat in pace,

-SM

Vellios' head was pinned against the floor and eyes peered into the darkness underneath the console, his sight trying to find the creature that he knew scampered there. It was difficult purely because the gap was so narrow compared to his head. So any chance of him fitting through to have a closer look was impossible unless he managed to break his skull into pieces and squish it through. Not something pleasant in the least for his thoughts.

Finding little success in his current attempt, Velios lifted upright on his knees then looked at Tanya and Iosif. "Any luck yet? I think I got one cornered but it's dark as hell and I can't be sure."

"Whatever you do, just be cautious." Iosif said as he made his own search of the ship, kneeling down to take a peek under the shuttle before going on to make yet another check of the cockpit's interior. Nothing. "No idea what we're dealing with, but they're not pyjaks." He said, then followed it up with a discontented grunt.

From Tanya's wrist emitted an omni-blade, surging with electrical sparks. "I am not shooting holes in my fuckin' hanger," Tanya growled, eyes darting back and forth, looking for the shape of the lizard-bird things that had infiltrated the Borealis. She was without armour, and the portable shielding she wore on her fatigues was meant to stop small arms fire; it would be rubbish against something as slow moving and ridiculous as an animal bite. "If either you wankers puts holes in my work space, there won't be anywhere in this galaxy that will spare you from a very pissed off Terra Novan."

Vellios chuckled then lifted upright briefly, showing her the razor sharp blade in his talons. He seemed to be purring almost when he spoke. "Don't get your suit in a knot or someone will have to untwist them. I got a knife and if Iosif needs another, he can use the other one I got stowed away on my leg."

His eyes caught something dart across behind Tanya as it disappeared into another shadow. He twitched, almost tossing his blade when he realized the chances of hitting the engineer were to high. He hissed under his breath then mumbled. "Though, I might just make a pair of gloves out of them..."

He had just risen to his feet when a sound broke out.

Suddenly, sharp claws dug into Tanya's back and she shouted in surprise, pissed off at the sudden pain and the audacity of the fucking thing that should have been packaged nicely at the grocer. Reaching back with her right hand, Tanya grabbed at the thing, finding a wing and pulling it off, tearing holes in the fabric on her back. "Fuckin' cunt!" she bellowed, slamming the bird-thing into the hanger deck and driving her blade through its back. Two more caught her eye from the side, cautiously circling around the group. She put her back towards the others, gritting her teeth aggressively and wanting to personally skin every one of the little shits alive.

Vellios was right at her side in moments and observing the damage. His figure twisted at his side and his talon touched where the bird like creature had actually torn through her fabric, creating six little bloody markings into the skin. It was only skin deep but the scent of blood already made his stomach turn, not liking the scent ever sense he was young. Vellios jerked one of his blades off his thigh then jerked it up into throwing position between his thumb and talon.

Meanwhile, Iosif had already made a hasty retreat to the confines of the shuttle again and was seen rummaging through the cockpit when a low chirp caught him off-guard. As the slavic pilot tilted his head to see what the hell was going on, he grunted and brought up his forearm to shield himself from the avian creature's barbed tail's swipe before it started scratching at his arm.

By sheer luck it was his cybernetic prosthetic which bore the brunt of the blow, but the avian's onslaught made a god-awful screeching noise as the claws scraped against the artificial material. In desperation, Iosif grabbed for the welding tool he'd retrieved during his search of the cockpit, hit the trigger and drove the point of it into the creature's mass in a blinding array of blue sparks. It let off a screech as the heat seared and barbecued its flesh, frantically flapped its wings as best as it could and desperately pulled away, retreating into one of the dim corners of the hangar.

"Tools, use them on these things!" Iosif called out to the others as he climbed free of the cockpit, the odor of burning alien meat permeating the air.

Vellios' turian head jerked to the direction, noting the struggle between the two. The smell of cooked flesh rose in his nose causing him to smell what humans described to be chicken. It wasn't bad to him causing him to chuckle a bit at the creature's misfortune because it messed with the co-pilot and lost.

"Like bloody hell I'm using my goddamn tools on these things! Shit's expensive!" Tanya snarled back, swinging her blade to deter another one of the creatures that was creeping up on her flank.

"Personally, I don't care how we kill them... just that they die before they start nesting in the wiring!" Vellios said just when his talon shoved Tanya's head down when a steel panel came crashing down, nearly missing her as one of the beasties were tangled in the wires and hovered just inches from biting his face.

When her head was forced down, Tanya's first instinct was that one of the creatures had leaped on her head, but the crashing of steel and Vellios' voice immediately reassured her that it was only him moving her out of the line of fire. The gnashing fangs close to the turian's face were too close to comfort, and she reacted, shoving her blade forward into the beast's abdomen. It soon fell silent and twitched one final time as she withdrew the orange weapon from its molted green body.

"People wanted to colonize this planet, why?" she demanded irritably, holding her omni-blade outwards and working her fingers in a sequence. A moment later, Shithead materialized, the combat drone floating in the dark hanger like an ominous demonic eye. It soon set to work chasing down the creatures, forcing them into hiding out of its line of sight, although some that broke cover were quickly dosed in a torrent of flame.

"Be thankful there's no wildlife protester among our group or we'll never hear the end of it." Vellios joked when a sharp pain latched onto his leg causing him to feel something wet along his calf. His mandibles gritted then his knife went down and sliced through something, one of the creatures yelped in pain. A small trail of blood was left in its wake as it darted toward Iosif's direction. "Iosif, watch your flank! Incoming wounded bastard on your rear!"

The Slav circled around to catch the sight of one of the avians desperately darted at him, flapping its wings in an aggressive gesture that knocked him off his feet and caused him to drop his welding torch.

Before he had a chance to regain his bearings, the creature was on him, flapping its wings and scratching away at him until, without thinking on it, Iosif backhanded it as hard as he could with his cybernetic hand, hard enough that the creature hit the deck of the hangar with an awkward organic-metallic thunk.

The beast landed, his neck at an awkward angle and clearly dead. Vellios smirked then commented Iosif on his job well done. "Nice kill there, Iosif.Though anyone got an idea of how to round these fuckers up and roast their asses? At this rate, our spring cleaning could take days."

His eyes examined his leg noting the deep chunk it took out of the surface. He was bleeding well, but not enough to be in any danger since it was a flesh wound.

"Oh, we can just leave them around. Tonka's a walking rubbish disposal for shit like this." Tanya chimed in, keeping her stance nimble and not focusing on a single threat at a time. They liked to rush when your back was turned, she found.

The animals seemed to have altered tactics as attacking one of the Borealis' crew one at a time wasn't working.

Three male Tauvav darted toward Vellios and Tanya, their wings rustled the air and their flapping gave them way in their approach. It seemed they were as fast in the air as they were on the ground when the first one dove at Tanya's face. Vellios, still being back to back with her, strike out his blade to the beast's side. The reptilian fluttered back and narrowly missed the hit. Another darted into at Tanya from the other side where it had flew to, then repeated the prior's actions. They seemed to be teasing and taunting the pair with attacks barely dodged to prevent themselves from becoming killed. Any scratches they scored were only skin deep, leaving tiny little lacerations without any serious damage.

Vellios found this odd while he sliced his blade toward the first male attacking, his attack making it back off almost instantly. While they were distracted, on the ground creeping closer was another female. She darted her head as she moved from one hiding spot to the next, trying not to be spotted.

It didn't stay hidden for long. When Tanya managed to catch one of the little shit's by its tail with her boot, pinning it to the deck, she stuck down to finish the job, burning a hole through the creature. It was enough of an opening for the female Tauvav darted in with one of the males, which managed to bite the back of Tanya's calf, causing her to cry out in pain from the sudden laceration and the female drove her tail barb into the wound, injecting Tanya with its toxin. The effects didn't take long to be felt, and Tanya was forced to take a knee, reaching back, she pried the male beast free, likely tearing more flesh in the process and grabbed it around the neck. She cursed at it with venom to match that which was starting to work its way through her bloodstream as she snapped the creature's neck in her hands, tossing it away from her with less effort than she felt she could have mustered. Her eyes felt somewhat heavy and her skin tingled with numbness. She knew that she'd been poisoned, but she found herself caring less than she should have.

Another of the bird-creatures jumped at her arm, but was swatted away, disemboweling it with the tip of her blade as it couldn't change momentum in the air. "I'm... uh..." she managed, not quite realizing she trailed off what she wanted to say. Why was she trying to talk again? Did she? Her head was swimming, and when her finger came back from her calf with blood, she giggled. "Oh, that's... weird."

The high-pitched electrical buzz and the sudden aroma of charred meat gave the others a signal that Iosif had managed another kill in their pest control exercise; this time with the welding tool, which gave off a dull, blue glow in the wake of its owner forcing it into the chest cavity of one of the Tauvavs. It was only when the Slavic pilot turned towards Tanya and picked up on her rather... erratic behaviour and slurring of words that he realized something was wrong. Very wrong. It prompted him to jog across the hangar to where she had knelt when he realized she'd taken a share of wounds from the avian creatures.

Vellios caught Tanya's bizarre behavior as he stepped closer. His free arm reached out, his ribs numb thanks to the drugs, then wrapped about the Engineer's thin waist to help her balance. His crested head looked to spot Iosif rushing toward them, then passed her off to the man.

"Tanya?" He asked with a straight face as he knelt beside her, keeping up that calm and collected demeanor of his. "What happened?" Iosif was quick to check her for any signs of major bleeding, just in case one of them had caught too deep, but things seemed fine in that respect. It certainly wasn't blood loss and he doubted that it was head trauma, either. The only possible cause that came to mind was....

Shit, Iosif thought.

"One of the fuckers clipped her on the calf." Vellios stated as he noticed the expression on Tanya's face. He frowned at her causing him to study her and realized she reminded him of an over dosed druggie he might find on Omega. "I think she's a bit...high?'

Before either of them could consider the result, another female erupted from the rafters above then attempted to tear into Iosif's neck. Another two males went for Vellios' right calf and his neck as well, hoping to distract him. On impulse, the turian whipped his blade about then let it fly. It pinned the first male against the ship's far wall where it struggled to get free, ripping its wing into pieces in the process. The other managed to rip into his calf only to be skewered on the end of Vellios' other blade. The blood oozing out of the small, crumbling corpse.

As those two distractions were dealt with, the turian caught sight of Iosif still wrestling with the same female, claw marks gouged into his shoulder from where she'd tried to tear out his throat, but this time the Slavic pilot had barely managed to get the upper hand and was seen roughly shoving the avian creature's mass to the ground with a firm blow from his prosthetic hand, before spearing it with the other. Yet another sizzling crack resonated throughout the hangar as the point of the welder made contact with her central mass and the shock of the injury was enough to incapacitate the creature, if not outright killing her.

Things were getting harder to focus on as Tanya struggled to her feet, her limbs numb, like she'd fallen asleep on them and the blood was forced out. "Tox...in. I think... yeah." she replied to someone. Who was it? Right, the accent. Iosif. Flames erupted to their right as Shithead engaged a group of three that tried to skirt towards them, catching one of the females and males in a hellish torrent of flame and the other skirted off, avoiding death. Knowing she didn't have the strength to use her blade, she pulled the Predator pistol from her leg and took aim at the retreating creature. The crosshairs simply bounced too much to be of use. Stumbling back, her back hit a wall and her legs started to collapse, making her slide back down against the wall with a thunk. "Tell th..ese things to fuck... off. I'm... tired." she slurred with a yawn, trying to stay awake but finding less and less of a reason to fight it.

Muttering a few curses beneath his breath, Iosif had come to nurse his superficial wounds and was rubbing at his neck with a free hand, when he turned his sights back towards where he'd last seen Tanya, only to realize she was now slumped against the wall, her drone having already made short work of a group of the avian bastards. But the woman herself looked like some tourist on Omega who'd downed a shot of ryncol, which was enough cause for alarm that he hastily moved in on her position. "How many left?!" He shouted back to the turian as he surveyed his surroundings, wary of just how many of the bastards were nesting in the ship.

"One, but I think the little bugger escaped back into the jungle." Vellios stated as he drew closer, noting the eerie quiet in the avian's wake.

The cockpit area looked like a bloody massacre or some ill suited butcher shop, his eyes looked from corpse to the next before settling on Tanya's fallen image. His hand replaced his first blade back into its sheath then dislodge his one that pinned a currently dead male to the wall. It took a moment or two to free the point as he caught the corpse in his talons. His head noted a nearby female and bent down, collecting it next. "Iosif, can you bring her to the medical bay? We'll get the toxin from one of these things examined then determine if we have an antivenom in our stock."

When Iosif picked up Tanya, Vellios turned on his heel and headed toward their makeshift clinic. He didn't waste much time tearing and literally gutting the bodies while holding them along the way.

ACCESS IDENTIFICATION: AG385-zpR3
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>> PERSONAL HISTORY
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>> PSYCHOLOGICAL PROFILE


Subject: Khosin Grathe Sedgoroh

Date of Birth: 25/07/2143 CE

Place of Birth: Nalkesh*, Khar’shan.
*Agent’s Addendum: Based on information relayed to the network by one of our agents in Hegemony Space, Nalkesh was one of the first Batarian nations that would go on to form the Hegemony once the Batarian people discovered FTL travel from the nearby Prothean ruins.

Personal History: Serviceman Khosin was born during the year 2143 CE, as part of the Sedgoroh family, one of the noble families that comprise the upper caste that rules Nalkesh. According to governmental records serviceman Sedgoroh had an uneventful life for the first two and a half decades of his life and, like many other noble-born children, was pampered according to the whims of his parents, the only noteworthy thing to mention being his inclusion into a board school, usually reserved for upper caste children, that focused on students with biotic abilities.

During the year 2165 CE the Sedgoroh, following a bad colonial investment, family lost most, if not all, of their wealth, consequently losing most of its assets -along with their privileged position within society- as they were seized by the government to repay the Sedgoroh’s considerable debt to the estate and, before the end of the year*, future-serviceman Khosin had enlisted in the Hegemony’s military corps.
*Agent’s Addendum: Although never confirmed by the Hegemony we have information that, in the months prior to his enlistment, subject Khosin took part in a series of petty robberies and other assorted criminal activities.

Service History: Enlisting during the year 2165 CE, serviceman Khosin distinguished himself during training for his single-minded purpose and determination to rise to the top in his group of trainees. Following his graduation from boot camp, serviceman Sedgoroh found himself allocated within the Batarian Internal Forces*.
*Agent’s Addendum: The Batarian Internal Force work closely with the Special Intervention Units in matters relating to the Hegemony’s security. While the SIU focuses on threats such as insurrectionist or otherwise subversive groups the BIF focuses on more ‘general’ threats such as crushing any would-be slave uprisings or escape attempts along with any pirate attacks that would somehow infiltrate Hegemony space

During the year 2166 CE serviceman Khosin distinguished himself in battle during the quelling of a slave uprising in the planet Logasiri. Albeit the battle was won thanks to Sedgoroh’s attack he was reprimanded for failing to heed his CO’s order to retreat and for “excessive destruction of ‘recuperable’* assets” and was put on probation for his insubordinate -and wasteful- actions.
*Agent’s Addendum: According to our contacts within the Hegemony said ‘recuperable’ assets consisted of a group of 5 or 6 armed human slaves that had surrendered. It is unknown why subject Sedgoroh did this although -based on his psychological profile- we theorize that it was done in an effort to set an example for the price of defiance to the other surviving slaves.

In the year following the uprising on Logasiri serviceman Khosin got multiple reprobation for his conduct on, and outside, the battlefield and was subject to many punishments for his unruly actions. Following a particular incident that resulted in the hospitalization of a fellow soldier, serviceman Khosin was sentenced to a military court but, before the court could convene to decide his punishment, he was recruited by Colonel Dholya Dagkaros of the External forces for Operation: Redacted

Psychological Profile: Serviceman Sedgoroh shows clear signs of repressed anger and shows a clear disdain towards both the Alliance and the Citadel Council. Along with this there are signs that the subject is prone to irrational decisions and rapid mood changes at the slightest insult or provocation. Accordingly, I recommend that the subject be placed in a unit that allows him to make use of said repressed anger but would caution that he be observed at all time for potential signs of insubordination against the chain of command and/or disloyal thoughts against the Hegemony.

FURTHER INSIDE THE COMPOUND

Drono felt a prickle go up his neck as he stopped mid step. Slowly, he turned. He knew before he saw her, what was going to happen. A'Lotza was a tall, curvy, powerfully built asari. With eyes that would stop a cruiser and smile that never left her face. Her body was decked out in the typical outfit of a woman who was more home inside a ships internals then a club. Drono cursed. Two years ago, he would have melted at the sight of her. Things were different now. Much, much different. He shot his Bartarian bodyguard a quick look. "I'll be right back."

"Dr-" She began but he headed her off. Taking her by the elbow and leading her aside. Her face said it all. Anger, betrayal, annoyance, confusion. Luckily there were nobody else about. Drono felt like his world was spinning. This was not happening. Not now, not ever.

"Not here. Not now" He spoke silently and with a harshness to him that clearly took the Asari back. She pursed her lips and put a hand to her hips. Holding her torch usually meant for welding 20 inch plate under his chin. He was suddenly very aware of how dead he would be if she wanted to.

"Oh?" Her eyes narrowed. "Working a angle are you?" She said, lighting the pilot flame. He swallowed hard.

"Something like that." Drono shot back, backing away slightly.

"And what is in it for me?" She shot. Business like, but to angry to be calculating. She wasn't a hustler. She worked for chop shops but she never cared much for the scam and the con. She had been their designated mechanic back in the day, not someone he brought onto the jobs.

"I... What?!" Drono exclaimed, eyed wide. He was caught of guard.

"You heard me. Two years and not a goddamn word Drono. You are lucky I don't just drag you out and let them do to you and your crew whatever they do posers. Although Yestin might object to that." Yestin's name made Drono sour instantly. Did she know? She didn't seem to. So that meant he kept his mouth shut. Made sense, you didn't want whoever Drono actually got along with to ruin your new future if you were Yestin.

"I was shot." He said softly, trying to calm her.

"You've been shot before." She growled. Clearly he needed a silver tongue to get out of this.

"This time it was worse. Different." He said, his voice dropping. As did his eyes.

"Oh. And that is a excuse to let me fret. We may not be bumpin' uglies anymore. But you were my friend. I am your FRIEND. And friends don't disappear the second they strike big. First you, then Yestin. God dammnit!"

"Yeah about that. Friends are not all they are cut out to be." Drono stared at her. His voice was hollow. The look in his eyes matching the voice. But there was white hot anger burning deep in that hollow.

"...No." She stepped back. A sudden realization hitting her like a truck. "Yestin."

"Yeah. Yeah. That." His voice came back in a snarl. His entire body tense. "A slug right to the fucking spine." He stepped up to her now. Not letting her eyes go. Nobody cornered him, not even his friends.

"But. He always looked after you." She protested. He could see the heartbreak in her eyes. The desperate need for it to not be true. She had loved them both once. They had both failed her in various ways. But this. This was far worse. He figured he'd just tear the knife out so she could bleed and heal.

"Guess he got tired keeping my back clear. So he shot me in it. Dropped his vile little concoction in the wound. I cannot sleep on my back. I cannot go more then three months without taking industrial grade painkillers. That, is what friends get you. That is what trust GET YOU."

"Son of a bitch... He said you absconded with part of the haul.." She slumped back. Tears in her eyes. "He made it sound like you abandoned us both. Abandoned me." He knelt down to her level where she sat. Tilting his head.

"I did not abandon you. And I am getting him back." He said. Feeling a little shitty for slapping her down like that.

]"He is rich Drono. He got in with Salarian weapon makers. Really heavy shit." She bagan to argue. The despair thick in her voice. Clearly, she knew more then he did. But that gave him an idea and he cut her off.

"You still got an in?" A calm, calculating edge to his voice. A'lotza stared at him. Tilting her head in turn. She had seen him like this before.

"...Yes?" She said, a bit hesistant. It was clear Drono was working some sort of angle in his head to get back at their old friend. ANd she wanted in. She was seething with anger.

"Good. Remember. I didn't abandon you. And I won't abandon you. I am actually rolling with some legit crew now. You'd like 'em." He said, easing her back from the pits of anger. He didn't need her angry. He needed her on his side, he needed her onboard.

"...You totally got a new piece on the side." She shot back at hims suddenly. A cheeky, shit eating grin on her face. Drono stared for a solid minute. Mouth agape. Trying to to find the words.

"...What. How?" He finally asked, still gaping.

"You don't function properly without someone kicking your ass and distracting that adhd brain of yours." She said so matter of factly that Drono was seriusly reconsidering his entire past for a second.

"...I feel oddly exposed." He said, scratching his head. "Anything else you can tell."

"You are gonna scam someone big time." She said as he she crossed her arms. It made her.. bigger in a way. Drono coughed.

"...Well that one don't count. You know who I am. When am I not working a scam or a hustle?" He said matter of factly, getting slowly up to his feet proper again.

"Your crew." She said as he reached out to offer her a hand up.

"Huh?" Drono was once more caught a little off guard. Honest people were so hard to wrap their head around. He had met hammers less blunt.

"They aren't a hustle right." She prodded him in the chest.

"... Well no."

"So who are you scamming?"

"I can't really tell you. But You should get out before it goes off."

"Ohhhhhh." She got up. "Well I did just fix my buggy. I should probably get going then." He was amused by her sudden urgency. He still got it. She was not only in, but she was taking his word as truth. Despite the fact he was a the biggest conartist she had ever met. That was one crisis taken care of.

"You still got the same Com-Handle?" He asked.

"Yeah. Call me when you are ready to get that Slimebag." She shot back. The venom in her voice made think of the jungle he was thankfully not trekking trough.

"Will do." He assured her.

"Or if you need help understanding the opposite sex." She smirked. He once more stood staring. Once he finally spoke it was far less dignified.

"....Uncalled for." He muttered.

"Not really no." She said with a laugh like a windturbine.

"Fuck you. I was good." He mumbled.

"You can talk a iron rod into a knot. But faced with good honest interest? Your silver turns to lead." She smirked. "Its kinda cute."

"You..." He began before he suddenly had an idea. "Before you... buggy out." The pun got a groan. "Could you part with your mechanics badge and clearence?"

"Yeah? Oh. Shit. Your planning something real bad."

"Not me. My crew gives me a run for my money you know."

"...Matriach help me. A whole ship full of Drono-scale disasters." She said as she handed him her credentials. "That will get you into any hanger I've worked in. And the tools storage. Possibly some of the other places."

"Thanks Doll."

"..."

"No Doll. Got it."

"Good. Be seeing you. And soon or I will find you."

"Right." He watched her go. He idly weighed the passcard in his hand. Biting his lip he turned to head back.

Whilst Vellios was pre-occupied with his dissection of the creatures that had attacked them, Iosif had hastily carried Tanya on his shoulders over to the medbay, narrowly ducking more than a couple of times along the way so as to avoid bashing the Terra Novan's unconscious frame against the low-hanging entrance-ways that had been cut out to accomodate for previous occupants who weren't the size of a volus.

He was no field medic, but with the things he'd seen it was always handy to have a rough idea of what to do in this kind of situation.

Tanya begun to rouse from her unconscious stupour, the world out of focus and her entire body numb, almost as if she were weightless. "Am I flying?" she asked, almost as if she were sleep talking.

"Not in my shuttle, at least." Iosif muttered with a half-hearted snort.

Vellios found what he was looking for. A small, venom sack was near the base of the tail and looked like it still contained a good portion of the dangerous liquid. Seeing a nearby scanner, he quickly slit open the flesh then poured the liquid into the container before hitting a few buttons. It was lucky he had watched Serena meddle with this contraption or he wouldn't know what buttons to press and time was important in this matter. He merely needed information over the poison's toxicity levels and if they needed a makeshift anti-vemon.

While the machine did its work, Vellios turned to Iosif and helped him settle Tanya into the nearest bed. He pulled off the covers, leaving just the sheet over the leather for her to be laid across. Next, the Turian went for supplies he figured would do in a pinch. Bandages, medi-gel (though it wouldn't help the venom pulsing through her veins), needles, syringes and any anti-vemon serums they had presently, though he doubted they would work.

Meanwhile, Iosif had opted to bring up the medical module installed on his Omni-Tool and ran a scan on Tanya's vital signs, hoping to keep an eye on things just in case her heart rate dropped to dangerous levels. "Vellios, whatever you're doing, I know better than to rush things such as this but... I'd rather we deal with this toxin in her system sooner than later. We don't know if it'll continue shutting her down till her hearts stops or if it'll work its way out, I'd rather not find out."

"That's what I'm trying to do. Sadly, the medical stuff is so outdated... we don't have much choice but to wait. My main concern is if it's fatal, do we have the anti-venom." Vellios stated with a steady tone. His eyes studied and literally willed the damn machine to speed up its analyzing of the substance, finally concluding with a list of the venom's elements. He paused then blinked in surprised, wondering if he was reading it clearly. "Well, the positive thing... it's not killing her or will do permament damage. However, the bad news is she has to wait for it to leave her system."

"Define 'permanent'. Days? Weeks?" The slavic pilot asked with a raised brow. Machines could be vague.

"She's going to be loopy, so if she ends up doing something stupid and get hurt... she'll feel it in the morning. However, any damage from our little friend's venom here won't be to blame. When it gets out of her system, she'll be fine." Vellios stated, his mandibles smirking at the knowledge and sighing in relief. His talons started to collect the anti-venoms, needles and other supplies for injection to put away. "So, got any suggestions for how to keep her safe while she rides this out? I'm half tempted to get a camera and tape it to tease her later about it."

That managed to prompt an amused snort from Iosif. "Somehow I get the feeling you'll be getting a Terra Novan boot wedged up that exoskeleton of yours if you try that. Anyway... I'd advocate restraining her whilst this thing's in her system, just to be sure."

"I'll go get my cuffs then. They are made with safety in mind and don't cut off circulation but you're putting them on her." Vellios chirped almost in a cheery tone. His figure disappeared into the ship and headed to his quarters, seeking out his toys.

Iosif gave him an approving nod and stood there waiting, arms folded whilst the turian headed off to grab the restraints. Part of him felt a little guilty for pushing forward the suggestion to restrain her, but whilst this toxin was in her system and they were on some shitheap world in pirate territory, the last thing they needed was her putting herself or the ship at risk. It was a lesser evil.

Vellios returned, in his talons were two sets of soft, leather cuffs which appeared to allow the subject to struggle without putting them at further risk of self-injury. After handing them to Iosif, the slavic pilot paused for a moment, then shot another question at the turian. "You sure the ship's clear of the birds? I don't want to return to find them picking apart what's left of her."

The turian paused, then thought, his attention was taken when Tanya's Shithead rolled into view and seemed on the hunt. "I think it's safe to say so but I'll go double check the ship's little hiding holes just in case."

Iosif glanced towards Tanya's drone, then finally nodded to affirm him. "Shithead here should keep an eye on her. If anything does happen I get the feeling we'll be able to hear it from across the ship."

"Or smell BBQ bird."

"Should please our resident krogan, at least." Iosif remarked, before he took the cuffs off Vellios and fastened one end around one of Tanya's wrists, then fastened the other end to the frame of the cot she was resting on. Better to give her some freedom of mobility so she didn't fall off and injure herself.

"You realize something? She's never going to live this down." Vellios stated, then without warning clicked his omnitool then snapped a picture. He then gestured at it with a smirk, explaining why he took it. "Insurance for another time."

Iosif gave off a grunt which almost sounded like a chuckle. "Can't say I didn't warn you."

"What I can say? I enjoy punishment." Vellios countered then placed the image somewhere safe in his omnitool, then gestured for them to check each deck. Gradually working themselves throughout the ship, both males found no trace of the critters allowing them a breath of relief. Checking on Tanya again on their way back to the cockpit, Vellios slipped into a back seat and laid back whilst Iosif took his usual space, the two of them relaxing until the infiltration team were ready to request a ride back home.

Vimire, Smuggler Camp...

The rain pounded down on the roof of the Yolak like thousands of hammers for how loud and intense it was, and inside, 'Kiv', 'Fausta', and 'Tenrom' were preparing their equipment for their planned raid against the comm center. There was enough information to go off of, they decided, to act. Tonka decided to leave his big gun behind for the purpose of this assignment, although he was having some hard time deciding exactly how to do this unseen; an invisible krogan was still going to have a hard time sneaking around through a fence and in tight quarters.

"So... those cameras. Should I just shoot one out when there's a thunder crack?" he asked, charging his pistol and checking the indicator lights to make sure its eezo core was operational. "I can knock people out, but I'm a bit big to be squeezing through holes in the fence." he stated simply.

Dex was loading up her hacking algorithms on her omnitool, deciding like Tonka to leave her Viper behind. Visibility was shot as it was with the rain. She responded to Tonka's suggestion with a shrug, "Yes, I think that would be best. As for the fence... depending on how far those guards scurried back inside to escape the rain we may only have to worry about one or two. We could take both at the same time, get it done nice and quick."

"Keep the fighting to a minimum for Drono and his back." Dex said nodding at the blue drell.

"Oh. Listen to that. You people actually care." Drono snorted softly. "But yes. Less biotic bodyslams this time, please." He said as he adjusted his gear for the fiftieth time. "Alright then, my little addition to this shindig will be to keep them on their toes once this goes down..." There seemed to be a sudden flash of inspiration running through Drono, who for all intents and purposes loved a good half-assed plan as much as the next guy. "Actually... Tonka. Have you ever done the drunk routine?" He turned to their Krogan ally, whom he reasoned would be a mean drunk.

"What a shocker, we don't want to drag a paraplegic drell around for kicks." Dex commented with a laugh. "Play into those stereotypes, scare the shit out of the guards with a drunk krogan. We sneak in and get rid of those cameras."

Pulling up her sabotage, "If I get close enough the sabatoge will work its magic."

"Heh 'routine'." Tonka replied, his impressive rows of teeth flashing mischievously. "Does a thresher maw eat Tomkahs? Won't be much of an act for me, I can handle a small disturbance." he said, knowing full well the word "small" in krogan vocabulary was still rather substantial to literally anyone else. Something was going to get broken.

With the deadpan of the century, Drono said dryly. "I don't know Mr Big scary landshark. Does it?" He then turned to the Turian, grinning at Dex. "While our friend the Krogan reennact a one man pub brawl, I will slip in with you and head towards engineering. Gotta make sure they can't follow on wheels when it is time to make tracks."

Her omnitool went to sleep as she cracked her organic knuckles, then a smirk pulled at her mandibles, she hummed with amusement. "You can slip in with me later, Drono."

She stood up laughing all the while at the sight of Drono's expression. "Let's get moving."

"Right. Right." he said.

'I am going to have to make those calls way earlier then expected.' Drono thought to himself as he rose with a slight wince as his back let itself be known as the ticking time bomb as it was. He shook his arm, trying to will his feeling back into it.

"Alright. Tonka. Knock 'em... well not dead. They will grab guns if you do that. At least not until after Dex works her magic."

Tonka snorted as he hopped out of the vehicle into the rain, water detonating in large drops across his crest and broad shoulders. "'Slip in'? Really gotta watch the word usage there, or people are going to think you two are going to be busy scouting out where the nearest mattress is instead of doing your job. And yeah, don't mind me. You'll know when the show starts." He said, only carrying his pistol on his hip. It wasn't going to get used, but one didn't wander around a smuggler camp without preparing for unfortunate run ins.

Leaving his two partners behind, Tonka headed off in the direction of the comm center, but first, he needed to make a quick stop to the makeshift liqour store that popped up like an oasis in a sea of grim hardware.

Drono was next in going out into the rain. The water crashing down on him was a feeling he didn't care for. His people liked the arid, biting heat of warmer planets. Not this Keppler inducing storm nonsense. He was a little more armed then Tonka, but then again. He was not the one who was gonna pick a fight. If he got into a fight, he planned on using a lot of firepower very quickly. No such thing as 'fair fights' after all. He fidgeted with the badge as he began to walk slowly.

Dex followed up behind them closing up the Yolak behind her, locking the keypad. She had her pistol and shotgun on her mag plates with no real intention to use them. Her taser was fully charged and her omnitool prepped. The rain rolled off her facial plates and sent a chill down her spine past her fringe.

She beckoned to Drono showing him the way to the comms tower. "In and out like bandits." She offered up her fist to bump.

"Like bandits" He nodded as he bumped her fist and stared at the tower. "They won't know what hit them." He said as he rolled his shoulders. He picked up his steps as he moved towards their target.

Dex and Drono walked along the fence, she was right about a good chunk of the guards retreating inside to escape the rain. Only a few left out in the nasty weather, the poor bastards probably lost a bet. Dex checked over her shoulder then peered through the links of the fence noting the camera perched above the main entrance. Her omnitool glowed orange she waited for Tonka to start the show.

Drono made his way opposite before crouching down by a pile of rocks he head spotted earlier. "Ready." He said, waiting for tonka to start his 'little' distraction.

The distraction showed up a few minutes later, heavy footed and slightly stumbling with half of a bottle of rye in hand. While it was true that it took quite a lot of liquor to get something as large as a krogan drunk, he definitely was feeling it enough to be convincing at the part. Coming into the clearing around the communication compound, Tonka was definitely on the warpath.

"WHERE'S SALADIN? HE OWES ME MY CREDITS!" he shouted at no one in particular, drinking back more of the bottle in a single drag. "You crossed me you worthless runt! I'm gonna break your spine when-" he continued to rant, stopping when he made eye contact with guard closest to him by the fence, who was already tense from a several hundred kilo alien screaming into the storm. Tonka squared off at him, pointing accusingly. "YOU!"

The guard tried to raise his gun, "Hey, back off, I'm not-" the man protested, when suddenly a flying bottle of liquor smashed into his helmet, shattering with expert precision. It was enough time for Tonka to close the distance with a defiant, bestial roar. The gun went off as Tonka bowled into him pinning him down in a tackle against the fence, which bent worryingly against the weight. "You owe me credits, Saladin, where are they!" he demanded, smashing he crest into the helmet. Suddenly, a butt stock smacked him across the head, which given krogan physiology, was more of a rude gesture than anything damaging. Tonka's head turned and he stared down the guard that had tried to get him off of his partner. "Oh, shit."

He tried to step back, but Tonka was surprisingly quick for his size and managed to grab the second guard by the utility belt and pulled him face first into the fence. Within moments, a three way brawl was breaking out as the guards tried to put a stop to the drunk and irate krogan who kept bellowing about his damn credits, and occasionally tossed a defender around like a toddler abusing his toys. They bashed their weapons into him, but the armour and his bulk absorbed them, and other guards stood by, unclear if they had the orders to take down the krogan, given that he wasn't using a weapon and starting a gunfight in the camp could bring about some unwanted consequences, given nearly everyone in attendance was a jumpy criminal who expected betrayal at any moment.

A turian jumped on Tonka's back, trying to choke him out with his shotgun, but that simply gave the krogan a chance to grab him by the arms and hurl him into another pair of guards. The rampage continued fruitlessly until Tonka was slammed into and knocked over by another krogan, who came prepared for this situation with a pair of crudely cast iron knuckles.

Suffice to say, the distraction was going rather smoothly.

Drono was not one to waste a masterpiece like Tonka's distraction. He did however, take some time to watch from his place of hiding, wincing audibly as that bottle went sailing in a perfect arch and smashing against one guards helmet. A great many thoughts ran trough the Drell's mind as he watched the Krogan do battle. But foremost was the distinct notion that he was never ever getting on Tonkas bad side, nor get him to drunk.

As his ally decided that two was not enough and drew a small crew around him, Drono set to work. He scaled the fence like it was nothing, showcasing agility he tried to do exhibit sparingly due to his bad back. Once over, he landed softly on his feet and padded trough the rain. His eyes scanned for extra trouble and he kept expertly within the blind spot of each camera. Only slipping through vision as he flickered out of sight with his cloak. A guard might have spotted him in the rain, but the cameras could not spot a damn thing due to the storm. He pressed against the wall for the last bit and sneaked towards the entrance. A single guard stood with his back to him, watching awkwardly as his buddies got trashed by angry alien muscle.

"Hey." He said as he tapped the man's shoulder. "Are they gonna be alright?" He spoke as if he had always been going there, and as if he belonged inside the tower. It was a trick to confusing people, you always had to be honest sounding.

"Ye-yeah. I think so." The man said, turning slowly. "God, I hate Krogan."

"Good, I'd hate for you to lose friends over some credits. Oh, and it is a shame about your balls." Drono spoke as he waited for the man to turn around slowly.

"W-" The guard was interrupted in a manner no man deserve. And then there was a noise no man ever wanted to hear as Drono kneed the man solidly between the legs and smacked his head again the wall.

"Should have that looked at..." Drono said as he quickly stashed the downed guard in a nook in the wall he has spotted earlier.

"Fuck, we should have caught that on vid..." Dex said quietly to herself flicking at her omnitool watching the fight from her peripherial. The fist-shaped omniblade appeared and she cut through the fence. Squeezing through the hole she cut she activated her cloak as well. Crossing the yard quickly, the only indication of her being there was the footprints left in the soft sand, filling with water. As she came in range of the camera's signals they appeared on her omnitool. She keyed up her sabotage taking careful aim of the camera just above where Drono incapacitated the sole guard that hung back. Holding her left arm up the sabotage shot out like a subdued orange light from her hand, the hacking program attacked the camera's security and granted Dex control of its visuals. With a few swipes she erased footage of the fight and the shimmery thermals of Dex and Drono's approach.

With the footage deleted, save for a screenshot of the guard at the door, she inserted a static image.

"Drono, grab the guard's pass and let's move in."

Drono snatched the pass from the unfortunate guard and held it against the reader. A little bleeping noise later and the door slid open. He was inside as quick as he possibly could get.

"Alright. Now lets get you access."

"Getting in was the easy part."

Dex and Drono snuck through the hallways, reactivating their cloaks when crossing doorways. Keeping their wits about them following signage toward engineering, slowly deactivating cameras as they went following the same sabotage routine. Steadily they went through the motions of taking out the comm center's security blocks. When the thunder boomed through the flimsy building, the power flicked moments later casting them into darkness momentarily before the generators ran emergency lighting and power. Even then the lights flicked occasionally, the generators struggling to stay operational. To the staff inside, many complained loudly over the storm's interference.

When they approached the entrance for engineering, the pair took cover behind a wall peeking out to spy two more guards standing sentry at the door. One was Asari while the other was Human. They were armed with Katana shotguns.

Dex tsked then quietly pulled back, crouching. She whispered to Drono, "Two more guards, we wait on another power failure then take them out. Sound good?"

"Sounds like a good move. I rather not run at shotguns in good view. Tend to turn out badly." Drono said as he crouched next to her. "I take the one on the Right."

The minutes slid by as they waited quietly willing for another clap of thunder from the storm still raging on. The rain felt as close as it did when they were outside. A loud clap of thunder came finally rattling the walls and making their ears ring with the noise. The lights went out and the guards audibly sighed with irritation.

Dex took off like a shot the only light registered from the orange glow of her omniblade, using the momentum of her running start to put more force behind her fist she made direct contact with the Asari's jaw cracking the helmet. She went down with a muffled yelp head smashing against the wall. Knocked out cold.

Drono went low. The guards eyes flickered to the orange glow of Dex weapon before he could see the dark, smaller shape surge up on him. The metal blade of decidedly less high tech jammed into the mans throat. He would not wake up like his colleague.

"Vellios is right. Knives are very.... personal."

Dex plucked the new badge from the downed guard she waited a few seconds and the power returned the door's keypad lighting back up. She used the badge to open the door to engineering. Tossing a comment Drono's way, pulling a face, "Messy is what I would say. You've got blood all up your arm now."

"Oh. Damn. Just scrubbed it to." Drono waved his arm around, getting blood all over the floor.

She hefted the body of the Asari over her shoulder, meaning to bring the body in with them. Waiting for the power to return she used her badge to open the doors. Thankfully no one was in the room at the moment. "I mean the blood is everywhere. The bodies are one thing but the blood will make anyone passing by come in with guns blazing."

"Oh gee. I am sorry." He said as he hefted the heavy man with some difficulty. "Maybe I should leave a blood trail the opposite direction then? I think I saw a storage closet."

"That's a good idea. Stuff that body in a closet and lead away anyone who comes sniffing about." Dex dumped the asari unceremoniously against the wall.

Drono for his part, dragged the body by the shoulder, and shoved him into a storage locked on the far end of the room. He also jury rigged a small wire and a grenade in case someone opened the locker. "All done here."

She walked in spotting the huge terminal at the far end of the room linking directly with the comm tower. Several screens displaying signals, internal connections and lines upon lines of code rapidly moving being processed. Dex's eyes shined looking at the terminal as if it was a playground. She blinked when another clap of thunder rang through the building and the terminal blinked off then veered back to life a few moments later.

Her expression tightened at that, "Fuck. The power outages are going to be a problem..."

Dex went to work on the terminal first, opening up the panel below it laying her back on the floor and activating her shoulder light. She said to Drono, "Mind doing me a huge favour?"

"Yes? Does it involve me climbing the generator? Please tell me it doesn't involve me climbing the generator..."

Dex picked at a wire squinting at where it connected and answered pointedly, "I'd be more than happy to switch with you if you can hack past their security, set up secure connections with the Borealis while disabling their internal communications." She peaked out from under the terminal and winked at him, "Would sex work as an incentive?"

"Point taken, oh great and mighty hacker god." He said dryly as he looked up at where the a mess of really thick cables ran along a steel tower then down on the outside. He knew where the generator was. He was going that direction to sabotage the land vehicles. He rubbed his temples. "I hope our dear Krogan is doing fine..." he mumbled as he set off.

The dear krogan was not doing so fine as a heavy fist of iron, fitted over heavy combat armour, plowed into Tonka's face and set him reeling, his mouth filling with blood and his skin swelling from the contusion. The other guards, and a number of onlookers, had taken to making a circle around Tonka and this other krogan in battered and well-worn black and yellow armour with notable dents and chipped and cracked finish.

"Call that fighting?" The other krogan challenged. "You're a pathetic excuse for a krogan. Should have gone the other way, but you aren't that smart. Maybe there'll be enough left of you to get treated when I get bored of this... don't count on it." Tonka could practically hear the idiot grinning through his helmet. Time to sober up.

It wasn't hard to keep up the impression he was barely standing as is, so when his opponent made to charge him to take him off his feet one last time, Tonka activated his tactical cloak; his sudden disappearance masked his sidestep and subsequent stomp on the back of his foe's ankle, buckling him down to his one knee. Before the enemy krogan could find his footing again, Tonka punched him upside the head, activating the ballistic blades in his omnitool; at that range and velocity, the blades effortlessly punctured through his adversary's shields and through his vulnerable flesh, burying deep into the skull.

The enemy krogan died on the spot, but Tonka didn't have time to reflect on his dirty tactics as gunfire immediately opened up, his shields depleting quick as rounds impacted him like dozens of angry hornets. Slipping around his dead opponent, Tonka picked him up under the arm and put the dead body between him and most of the gunmen with one arm while the other went for his Predator pistol and he began to take shots at those behind him, waiting for the beep that would let him know his cloak was recharged.

And things were going so well, too.

Drono Engineering/Main Generator Complex.

Drono was not a happy camper by nature. A bit of a lose canon, yes. Easy to crack jokes and act blase yes. But deep inside, there was the sour, slowly withering part of him that only lived to see his old friend Yestin dead and everything came second to that. Mostly, he just hated rain. So it was a resigned, grumpy Drono who stood staring at the spire like construction in front of him. The generators, bless their creators soul, was on base level. But, in order to get them to stop spazzing, he would have climb and decouple a bunch of wires. An actual engineer stood at the base of the structure, squinting.

"That looks mighty bad. You should do something." Brono said conversly to the man. The man looked over at Drono, raising a eyebrow.

"Who are you? How did you even get in here."

"I have an engineering pass. Don't worry." Drono shot back, in the kind of calm 'I belong here' tone that was half the con.

The man accepted it with a shrug. "I won't do shit with thunder and rain about. That'd be fucking suicide."

"We kinda need the generators to stop spazzing out."

"Why? The only systems that really messes up are the terminals. And they are fitted with resets to not corrupt the data or risk shortcircuiting."

"Yeah...." Drono said as he slid his knife out of its sheathe. "Sorry about this man. Really am." Drono smashed the butt of the knife in the back of the engineers head. And then again to keep him down. Looking up at the spire, he swore under his breath and began climbing.

Luckily for Drono, he was a natural climber. He had loved climbing things as a kid, and his new profession had given him plenty of practice as an adult. Unluckily, it was slick metal with sharp edges in every groove. The little ladder they fastened to the side was hardly a ladder at all. Just rounder, lesser abrasives groves in the construction. He climbed slowly but doggedly, flinching every time lightning struck. By the time he was all the way up to the point where the couplers were knocked lose. he actually prayed briefly. It turned out that the repair was the easier part. Getting down however, proved a even slower process. As he got all the way down, he noticed the engineer was starting to move again. He punted the poor bastard to put him down to sleep again.

"Done here. Please tell me you can get it fixed now. I don't like water. I can feel the bloody keppler syndrome already." He said into the com. That's when he accidentally bumped into a wayward patrol. He had forgotten about them.

"Who are you?"

"Uh."

"Show us your Id now, or you are dead Drell." The man lifted his gun. Drono did the thing he always did. He smiled.

"Why certeinly!!" he said, producing the borrowed badge. The man took it. In the split second it took him to look at the badge and the second it took for him to deduce it wasn't dronos, drew his executor into a hip shot. Punching a hole in the mans thigh and sending him screaming to the ground. Another bullet put a stop to the screaming but now all pretense of stealth was gone for the Drell. He winced as he heard shouting of other coming to look up the commotion. Breaking out to a sprint, he headed for where their resident Krogan should be.

"I really hope you got your shit working Dex." He yelled trough the come, ducking behind a buggy as he entered the vehicle bay. He got to work imminently, loosening tires and all but totaling the engines of every vehicle that he could access.

Storm Front
Hazan and Serena
Virmire

Serena slowly made her way over to the fallen turrets, bitching the entire way.
"Stupid fucking jungle. Stupid fucking storm. Stupid fucking crappy machinery that we should've had insured." She continued like this till she reached the first turret, complete crushed under the tree.
"Damn it. Haze, one turret is completely destroyed. I don't know the status of the other one...wait. It's coming back online. Seems to be functional enough. Detecting and assigning targets now. Thank God for small victories ri-OH SHIT!"

Serena dove to the side, smacking into the ground behind the tree as bullets screamed in the air above her, fired from the turret.
"Haze! Don't approach! It thinks everything is it's enemy! Do not approach it will shoot at you!"

She glanced at her readings.
"Fucking piece of shit. Knew I should've looked it over first."

"Oh spirits."

Hazan trudged up the hill behind Serena. Through the torrent of rain, he saw the sparking, crushed metal of the turret underneath the tree. But just as she rattled off its functional status, it was broken by the second turret. Damaged and malfunctioning, it fired at first her, then him. Bullets screamed through the air as he hit the dirt right next to Serena. Dimly, he was aware of the downpour on top of him as he scooted up against the tree.

"Well fuck us sideways, huh? Fucking storm!"

"Kinky Haze. Very kinky." Serena couldn't help but chuckle, even as she scowled at her readouts.

He reached down and grabbed for his pistol. The Predator unfolded and beeped to life as he slapped a mod cartridge onto its side. Its lights flared a bright blue as a lightning bolt appeared in hold above the grip.

"I could disrupt the damn thing so we can take it down without damaging it too much! Swing right, I'll distract it on your count!"

"Oh so I'm the bait. How chivalrous of you." Serena grumbled, a barrier and her sentinel armor coming to life around her.
"On one. 3...2......1!" She leapt out from behind trunk, cursing her luck as the turret whirred to life again and began to open fire. In a few seconds she was behind another tree, getting away with only a few pings off her armor and shield.

As soon as Serena left the safety of their log, Hazan rolled out from behind it and aimed right at the sentry. It beeped and swung towards him as he pulled the trigger twice. Two bright blue sparking bolts shot straight towards it and impacted its frontal armour. Bright bolts arced over its armour as the Disruptor rounds shorted its circuits.

The turret stiffened, giving a metallic shriek as gears seized up and ground against one another, before it finally collapsed and shut down.
"There we go!" Serena called out from behind her tree. "I don't know what we can salvage, but it's definitely shut down." Nonetheless, she cautiously poked her head around first, awaiting the first sign of it starting to come back to life.

Not seeing any, she quickly made her way over to the turret, her omi-tool taking on the form of a screw driver.
"Can't work in this fucking rain." A barrier swelled around her, stopping the heavy pitter patter of rain from hitting her, and muting the storms fury.
"Better." With that, she undid the turrets back plate to begin fixing the insides.

"Hopefully those bolts didn't do too much damage. I'll try to set up a place with my tarp to get us some shelter from the rain. See if that helps."

Hazan stowed his Disruptor mod and returned his handgun to his hip. The turret being tended to by Serena lent him some calm. But he hoped that the gunshots hadn't traveled over the torrential downpour and alerted someone down below.

That said, he scrabbled around in the dirt for a second before locating his camoflage tarp. While Serena worked on the turret, he fixed up a makeshift tent out of the nearby trees and fallen branches. By the time the two were finished, the Turian had strung up his tarp over some tall branches and on the few trees nearby. The rain pattered noisily on the canvas and flowed in torrents off the fabric, but underneath it was mostly dry.

Back at the Smuggler Camp.

"Hey, didja hear that?"

The gunfire was a whole lot louder than the pouring rain that pattered across the base. Of course, muffled shots coming from a cliffside was extremely suspicious, which attracted the attention of a couple of smugglers relaxing in the nearby shed.

'Yeah I did. Sounded like gunfire."

"On the cliff?"

"Yeah man."

"Shit, you think it might be those other guys?"

"What, our competition?"

"Competition, Alliance, Turians, Asari Commandos, doesn't matter. Whoever it is isn't supposed to be there."

"I'll call it in."

The smuggler pulled a radio out. "Hey, command? This is Steve. We've got a problem. Yeah, we heard gunfire on the Happy Cliffs. Yeah, those cliffs. A patrol squad is already nearby? Sweet! I mean, sucks for them in this rain, but that's good for us! Thanks command."

His companion gave him a confused look. "Happy Cliffs?"

"Right, right, you weren't here for that. Some damn junkie Turian would always say he was going to his Happy Place, then run up there and shoot up. Went up there so often we started calling it Happy Cliffs. After he got so high he fell off to his death the name stuck." He took another drag on his cigarette . "People like to die on those cliffs."

..........

Serena slammed the back plate shut with satisfaction, activating the turret once more. It beeped and resumed it's scanning, recognizing Serena and Haze as friendlies now. "There! Fixed it!" She shut down her barrier, quickly scrambling over to where the turian was.

"This works. Not a five star hotel, but this works. Thank you, oh jungle survival expert." She grinned mischeviously at Haze. "You know, to pass the time, I do have a holographic chess set..." Her omni-tool suddenly beeped again, before Haze could reply. "What now." She complained, bringing up the view. Serena froze, eyes widening in surprise and slight panic at the two readings on it.

"Uh...Haze? We've got incoming. Too big a group to be Iosif, Tanya, and Vellios coming back. Fuck. I think they heard the gunfire. In addition to that problem, I think Tonka is compromised. His readouts are all sorts of adrenaline fueled and his shields are too low. We need to deal with these people and then see what we can do for him. Luckily I don't think they know where we-" Her speculation was suddenly cut off as the turret exploded. "Are." She finished miserably, drawing her pistol.

Storm Front
Hazan and Serena
Virmire

"Well colour our position fucked then. I'm gonna draw them away from our pos, you get in contact with the other three."

That said, Hazan vanished, his hands whipping out his shotgun from his back harness.

He'd be back.

"What do you mean 'draw them away' they can barely see us as is. We should just- Haze!"Serena hissed, angry and helpless, as the turian disappeared into the rainstorm. "Fucking bastard." She wanted to, very badly, activate her shields and retreat backwards, putting distance between herself and the enemy. But the shields would put a beacon on her, even in this rain, and she had no idea when she'd suddenly stumble upon a cliff. So she simply crouched low and watched the approaching smugglers, about five if she was picking out the correct shapes, and trying to control her shaking as bits and pieces of their conversation made it's way to her.

"Why..fuck...here?"

"Are....turret!"

"So? Nothing.....it's....."

"Bullshit it is....New..."

Serena didn't dare make contact, not yet, not while they were close enough to hear her.

And if they were close enough to be audible, they were close enough to be seen.

Truth was, Hazan hadn't gone far. Just far enough to get up in a tree to make it seem like Serena was all alone.

He waited in the pouring rain, silent as he watched the dark blobs of the smugglers approach their camp. His visor and electronics were off, and he watched with his shotgun in one hand.

In his other he held a frag grenade.

As the group of smugglers advanced towards their makeshift camp and poked around, he clicked down the activation button on his grenade. It glowed red in his hand as he threw it in the opposite direction. Then he hunkered down in the branches and waited until the grenade went off, which it did with a thunderous explosion that drew the full attention of the other smugglers.

Past the rain he couldn't hear much of their surprised comments, and immediately after the air was filled with gunfire.

Serena eased carefully backwards as the smugglers drew closer, barely daring to breathe despite the downpour. [color=hoptink]"Del,"[/color] she whispered eyes on the smugglers. "activate Tres Amigos. Wait for Haze's signal, then open fire. Lure them away." A thought occured to her as Del moved into position. "Sarah, voice scan and copy. We'll need it."

They didn't have to wait long for Haze's signal. A grenade exploded in the distance behind the smugglers. They immediately dropped into crouches and took what cover they could find. They were close enough that Serena could clearly make out their alarm.

"What the fuck was that? A bad throw?"

"How the hell should I know? Think it's a trap?"

"How could it be a trap? They didn't know we were coming."

"We did blow up their turret rather publicly."

"And what would you have done? Made friends with it? It was going to-"

Their conversation was cut short as Del opened fire. Bullets pinged off of shields and the smugglers cursed, hitting the ground or pressing against boulders.

"How many of them are there?!"

"Three I think! All behind us!"

"How the fuck did they do that?"

"We probably walked by them in the storm!"

Serena edged farther backwards, waiting until the shapes of the smugglers were barely noticeable, and their words completely drowned out by the storm, before contacting the other three members of their group.

"Guys? Guys, can you hear me? We've been compromised. A fucking tree landed one of our turrets and damaged the other. It fired on us. We managed to disable and then repair it, but the gunfire it caused drew a squad on our position. Five smugglers, from what I can see. Haze is attempting to draw them away. My readouts on Tonka say that he's being fired upon, his shields are low. And-" She stopped talking as a gun went off behind her, and her shields suddenly frizzled out. "FUCK!"

Serena dove to the ground, more bullets whizzing past her. Disrupter Rounds? Really? Fucking smugglers. She turned around, throwing a sabotage and an overload programs at her assailant in quick succession. At the same time, her assailant stabbed her in the shoulder with his omni-blade. Serena screamed in pain, instinctively gathering her biotics to throw him off. He flew a couple feet back and Serena scrambled to her feet. Then it hit her.

God she was tired. She could only barely do that much heavy lifting with her biotics on a good day, and now she just felt empty. Her head pounded with a headache. Her pistol was gone, lost when she threw him off of her. Her left arm hung for a moment, burning pain through the shoulder. She thought she could use it, but didn't have time to find out.

The piercing scream cut through the storm front, drawing Haze's attention. Only one person could've screamed that high pitched.

"Serena? Shit."

Hazan leaped off his tree perch and landed in the mud. The drones' gunfire masked his approach towards the rear of the smugglers' group. With shotgun cocked, he snuck up behind one of the unaware smugglers and dropped him with a sharp butt stroke to the back of his head. The man fell, unconscious, as the slender Turian caught his limp body and dragged him into the bushes, binding his wrists with gel from his omnitool.

The man was already on his feet, coming back at her with the omni-blade in seconds. Desperately Serena drew her own omni-blade. She was a bad fighter to begin with, and now she was crippled. She managed to deflect or block his first few slices, but then his knee slammed into her gut and she was only saved from being stabbed through the neck by lurching to one side, and he still cut her. She scrambled backwards, bleeding heavily from her neck wound, praying it missed an artery, as the man advanced on her.

His omni-blade glowed an ominous yellow as he approached. Isn't everything ominous when you're about to die? Oh the things that pop into your mind when you're about to die.Serena thought she could see him smiling through the rain, read to take an easy kill.

"Fuck you." She spat, bringing up her omni-blade, it shifting into a bow to kill-

Crack! Her nose broke as his boot connected with the front of it, and his hand slapped the bow out of the way and down, quickly pinning it to the ground with his other boot.

Serena screamed again as the omni-blade lifted. Not from fear, but from pain as she willed her damaged shoulder to move, aiming the second omni-bow at him and firing. It punched into his chest.[color=hoptink] Oh god I hope that wasn't an explosive bolt.[/color] She thought, somewhat dazedly, drawing a feeble shield around her as she sat up and tried to scoot away. The man stumbled backwards, looking somewhat surprised.

It was.

The bolt exploded, showering Serena with gore as it broke her shield and sent her stumbling along the ground and collapsing in a heap. Her ears were ringing, breathing (along with literally all of her body) hurt, she wasn't sure if her good shoulder wasn't dislocated, she bit her tongue to all hell, and she could feel unconsciousness approaching.

azan heard the second scream and his head lifted. He bolted forwards and threw a concussion shot at a nearby Batarian. The blast lifted him high in the air and against a nearby tree. Unconscious, but not dead. He handled the last smuggler, a scrawny looking Salarian, as he turned around. A quick smack across the face with his shotgun dropped the last man, but still he wasn't finished.

He dashed across to Serena's still form, covered in gore from the explosion. As the downpour washed the blood away he hoped that most of the remnants weren't hers. Thankfully she was alright, her shields had taken the brunt, but when he made a cursory examination he found her shoulder and neck oozing blood.

Stab wounds. They weren't pretty.

He caught her eyes as they panned up to him, seconds before she lost consciousness.

"H-hey Haze? I'm gonna pass out now. Just got my ass-" And then she was out.

"Handed to you, yeah I got it, thanks!"

He keyed his mic while pressing his omnitool to her shoulder. The omnigel within burst from his palm and sealed the wound as he tried to hail their ship.

"Borealis? It's Haze. Serena's unconscious and bleeding out. I'm stabilising her but we're compromised pretty badly out here. We got made by about three, four smugglers from the camp. I KOed them all but I can't move Serena on my own without risking her life. We need help, ASAP."