[IC] Mass Effect: The Face of Injustice

[Rtron]

Voira sighed in slight annoyance. She had just been about to doze off in hopes of catching a little more bits of sleep before something went horribly wrong and they all crashed or died or something ruined her chance at sleeping, Raa seeming to have placated and handled the situation, when RK decided to take matters into her own hands. Voira opened her eyes to glare at Raa's hologram. "RK, why you were never programmed with a diplomatic drive we'll never understand. Regardless, shut up whenever it seems like someone is emotionally upset. In fact, if Raa or I have already answered, be quiet. Rudeness, acidic sarcasm, and generally your two cents never really help. If they offend you, bite your cybernetic tongue. May we remind you of that time with the Krogan? The Citadel Security? The Hanar? How about those Eclipse girls?" The Asari, giving one last glare at the AI turned to the human woman.

RK raised an eyebrow, her eyes turned to Voira, and glared. "First off, you were drunk and you smacked him first. I merely told him what you said after he asked. The eclipse girls were distracting you from protecting Raa, Instead you sat there, unable to move as they drooled on you. The Hanar was well known smuggler... enough said."

Voira rolled her eyes, ignoring the slight blush at the mention of what the Eclipse girls were doing. "Sorry. She's a bit...bitchy. We'll try to keep her less vocal. If we can find a mute button." She paused for a moment, considering telling the woman about the massacre on the station. She'd learn soon enough however, and their group had already made things as worse as they could be. "We're sure your brother is fine."

At Avatar's announcement, Voira raised an eyebrow. "Well, that's good. We need some help." She hoped at least. Not much they could all do in this ship.

[EliteCommander]

The Human woman was still angry, and overall distressed, but Voira’s response had at least served to validate her anger towards the AI enough that she was content seething in silence. For most of the passengers on the shuttle, any stress created by the brief shouting match was eclipsed by worry over the approaching craft, even more so when the entirety of their convoy on the ground and in the air suddenly stopped. Fortunately, when the gunships came into what would have been attack range, they did not fire, nor show other signs of hostility. Instead, half of the gunships, which seemed to have been outfitted for cargo transport, landed next to their ground vehicles. Turian soldiers emerged from the transports and, from what Avatar could gather through the external cameras, seemed to be moving the supplies and people from the ground transports onto the gunships. It was a process that took half an hour to complete, during which time no information was given to any of the civilians aboard the other shuttles.

After the gunships were loaded, the shuttles and their gunship escort took off at as high of a speed and as low of an altitude as they could sustain, leaving all of the now-empty ground transports behind. Presumably, they were evacuating to safety, but Avatar could not any prediction with reasonable certainty as to their destination. There were no official allied military bases on record on the planet, and indeed, no settlements at all along their current bearing. They had two full hours of low altitude flight above largely unexplored sections of the planet before their aerial convoy finally slowed its pace to an approach velocity over a thick, tropical jungle.

For those that could see of the windows, their destination finally became clear. The Turian cruiser Intrepid was before them, sitting atop the fallen trees it had crushed in its emergency landing. However, even a cursory visual observation revealed that its structural integrity was nothing short of critical. On just the side of the ship facing the shuttle, Avatar counted fourteen hull breaches of sufficient size to cause the loss of pressurization in multiple compartments, and an indeterminate number of smaller breaches. If the other side of the ship possessed a similar level of damage, then the ship’s energy shielding system would not have been sufficient to completely retain atmosphere. The largest of the breaches which were visible cut the lettering of the word Intrepid written across the side of the vessel in half, and stretched across multiple decks. Avatar could not accurately estimate the extent of the ship’s internal damage, but the probability of the vessel still being capable of operation within a vacuum was less than 0.5%.

On their approach, their shuttle’s pilot finally spoke up over the shuttle’s speakers to address his passengers. “Okay…I’m being told that we’re going to land in the ship’s hanger, but that we should all stay put in the shuttle until one of their people can get to us and take us where we need to go.”