“I still think you’re insane for wanting to talk to one of those things!” Tali exclaimed over the roar of fire as husks were splattered over the ground.
“Hey, I know you’re not fond of them but don’t pretend as if you’re not curious at all,” Shepard called back towards the quarian as he slammed his omni-blade into a husk’s head.
“Just know that if it goes wrong I reserve the right to tell you that I told you so!” Tali replied as she sent her combat drone out to occupy a group of the husks.
“Scion!” Fluttershy called out, an ear-deafening rapport from her rifle taking a chunk off the larger monster. Rainbow followed up by lighting her wings in a biotic aura and charging straight into the thing, sending it flying.
“I’ll take the ridicule when it comes to it,” Shepard smirked. “Let’s actually find a way to get out of here first though.”
The five proceeded through the Cerberus built facility, increasingly understanding how there could be so many husks due to the size of the base. A couple more of the heavier scions stood in their way, along with hoards of regular husks, but the group soon fell into a routine on how to defeat the waves of them. The complete lack of tactical control of the monsters made them easy prey.
At the end of the walkways, another door towards an internal lab opened up for the group. After searching the tables they soon found a reaper object which EDI told them was the IFF tag according to the base’s files. Letting Luna clear the object from indoctrination effects, Shepard took the device and stashed it away. “Now we just find the core, destroy it, and make a run out of here.”
“That’s going to be a blast,” Fluttershy sighed, a smirk forming right after. “Pun not intended.”
“Of course you didn’t,” Garrus called in over the radio with a groan.
“Oh shush you. And be a dear and leave the radio channel clear,” Fluttershy giggled.
“As you command, my lady,” Garrus teasingly replied. Rainbow stood next to Fluttershy making fake gagging motions, earning a slap on the back of the head with a wing from the yellow pegasus.
“If you two love birds are ready then I’d like to get off this mind-altering, genocidal, starship please,” Luna pointed out bluntly though smirking as well. Rainbow meanwhile was hiding a blush and glanced at Tali, catching the quarian as she was glancing in her direction as well. If one of the other three noticed they didn’t say anything as they took a door at the back of the lab to where EDI had detected the heat spike, soon finding the chamber it lay in only to be blocked by a barrier.
Once again they caught sight of the strange geth as it stood at the console in the core’s room, typing on the console with one hand while firing at husks. The barrier blocking the group came down as the geth finished typing on the console but right as it finished and turned it was hit by a husk and dropped to the floor motionlessly.
“Well, shit,” Shepard cursed as he fired a burst into the husks that had downed the geth. “Guess we’ll figure the geth mystery out later. Focus fire on the core when it opens!” The core hung a the end of the platform and periodically opened up to vent heat. Simultaneously though what was likely every remaining husk decided to come up and tried to stop them from succeeding.
Luna quickly got annoyed with the fact that every time the core opened they barely could afford to damage it as they were too busy fending off husks, lighting her horn and wrapping her aura around the core’s doors. She grit her teeth and grunted as the doors groaned, the light from her horn getting brighter and brighter as she poured her everything into ripping the doors open. “Cannot… Hold… long...”
The doors had only opened slightly but it was enough for everyone to turn and fire into the mass of swirling Eezo, destroying vital parts of the reaper’s energy production.
“Nice work Luna, now let’s get that geth and book it!” Shepard called out, as the reaper shuddered.
“What? You can’t be serious, Shepard! Who know what would happen if it got into the Normandy’s computers!” Tali exclaimed, still very opposed to the idea of doing anything other than blow the thing to pieces.
“She’s making a good point, we’ve seen what they’re capable of on the Citadel!” Fluttershy agreed, she might have been curious but she’d seen too much from the machines two years prior.
“Good thing this isn’t a democratic decision, we’re taking it for interrogation at the least,” Shepard bluntly pointed out as he picked the machine up with the help from a grumbling Tali. “Now let’s get out of here before the atmospheric pressure crushes this reaper like a tin can!”
Fluttershy, Rainbow, and Luna provided cover fire as Shepard and Tali dragged the geth along. “Open the portside airlock, Joker!”
“Done!” the pilot called out as he brought the Normandy alongside the reaper. Shepard and Tali tossed over the deactivated geth, Tali jumping after it while Shepard first let the ponies jump across before jumping himself.
“We’re in, go!” Shepard called out to Joker who closed the airlock and shot off away from the reaper. The five squad members in the airlock were all panting slightly as they looked between each other, starting to laugh as the tension that had built up.
“Not to be rude but I’m going to find a bed to lay down in,” Luna chuckled as the laughter died down a bit. “Negating that dark magic and prying those doors open took more out of me than I realized.”
“Go ahead, you deserve the rest,” Shepard chuckled as he grabbed the geth and pulled it up with some help from Tali. “I’m going to get this thing somewhere safe, you know, just in case.”
“If I see it walking around the ship I’m going to shoot it,” Tali bluntly pointed out.
“I’ll pass on that information after we’ve woken it up,” Shepard chuckled as Fluttershy used her biotics to make carrying the machine easier for the commander, walking along with him to wherever he was going to store the machine.
“Sooo… I take you have some stuff to do down in engineering?” Dash awkwardly said now she was alone with Tali in the airlock.
“Yes… I assume you have, uhh, things to do too?” Tali awkwardly replied, quietly looking down at the pony.
“Yeah, stuff to do...” Rainbow equally silent as the hum of the Normandy was the only thing breaking the silence.
“I better go then,” Tali said, walking out of the airlock and heading to the elevator. Rainbow stepped out after her but just watched her go, a cough coming from behind her. Turning around, the pegasus found Joker turned around in his seat with the biggest predatory grin on his face.
“I-”
“Wait! Don’t say it, I got this.” Joker cleared his throat. “Rainbow and Tali, sitting in a tree. K-I-S-S-I-N-G.”
“I hate you,” Dash said as she felt like sinking through the floor, turning and walking off to the elevator too as she could hear Joker laughing behind her.
Ughh, FUCK! The worst thing is that he’s right...
Rainbow pressed the button to go down to the crew quarters, walking straight into the showers and turning on the cold water to douse her head.
I need to talk to someone before this seriously spirals out of control… I mean, I’m a pony and she’s a quarian! That can’t work, right?
Rainbow then imagined Fluttershy and Garrus…
Together…
She smashed her head multiple times against the wall as she saw images of her with Tali flash through her mind next.
What the buck is wrong with you! I need to talk to someone…
1. Go to Tali directly, this can’t go on.
2. Go find someone to talk to. I need to figure this out...
3. [You know what? Buck it!]