While Tali was just fine with being in tight enclosed spaces, she now realized that she really hated yawning chasms. Especially when they were right below her. Tali's heart pounded as she dangled over a space that must have been kilometers deep. There were no lights in the black expanse below her; the base was still recovering from the pulse of the carrier's drive core explosion. But she wasn't falling, not yet. Somehow her foot had caught in the edge of the hole. Very carefully, Tali twisted her head up and looked towards her feet.

Her foot wasn't caught on the edge. Legion had his arm out of the hole and had a firm grasp on her boot. The geth's single eye-lamp glared at her while she hung over nothingness. In that moment, Tali realized that Legion could drop her. It could let her fall into that abyss below her, and then make up some story for Shepard at the end of it all.

Tali's panic became a full-fledged freakout. That was exactly what was going to happen. Legion was going to drop her and let her die as revenge for her father's horrible experiments. The synthetic would tell the Commander that the Collectors had killed her. Shepard would mourn her, and never realize that she'd been murdered...

Legion's hood tilted. "Creator-Tali'Zorah, please get ready to grip the far edge of the hole," it said. Then it gently swung her back. Tali could feel that its hold upon her ankle never faltered. Legion swung her back up and she forgot her fears as her entire world narrowed to the view of the hole's edge. She saw her hands reach up and out, then grip that edge. It was almost as if she was seeing somebody else do the grab. But her gloves found good purchase, and she pulled herself up and into the far side of the conduit.

Tali didn't trust her voice just yet, so she nodded at Legion to let it know she was okay. The geth obligingly let go of her foot. The quarian wedged herself into the tube on the far side of the hole. She waited a bit for her heart rate to get back to normal. "So I guess we have to watch out for the white sections," she finally said.

"Agreed," said Legion. Tali held out a hand and helped the geth work its way over the hole.

"Do you wish this platform to lead?" it asked her.

She knew sometime in the future she would have a lovely little nervous breakdown about how close to death she'd just come. But Tali was now on a mission, and so she shook her head. "I'm okay to keep in front for now. Besides, if the same thing happens to you I might not be able to catch you. You're faster than me."

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Zaeed's rifle took off the head of one of the attacking husks. Everything seemed to be moving in slow motion as he saw the other humanoid forms swarm around Miranda. Samara charged at the group as well, but she also seemed to be moving far too slow. There were too many of them, and now they were too close to her for Zaeed or even Thane to shoot at. It was too big of a risk of hitting Miranda, even though she was in danger.

The big mercenary vaulted himself up onto one of the hexagonal floor tiles and ran forwards. Miranda shot two husks quick as lightning, but four more rose to take their place. A biotic throw from her shoved a few back, but there were just too many around her. She had nowhere to go. She was fast, but she was also doomed unless the other team members could get there in time. In spite of her abilities, she was just one human...

Faster than he could see, Miranda tore the other gun from her hip and began firing both guns in two different directions. She danced around the moaning abominations as they flailed and swung at her. With every move of hers she fired again, both guns at once, each shot hitting a different target. Zaeed wouldn't have believed it if he hadn't seen it for himself.

Miranda gestured upward with one gun, and one of the husks rose in the air surrounded by a blue glow. The creature then slammed back down into the ground, crushing another of its brethren below it and scattering the others around it. She charged into the resulting gap, firing both pistols in front of her and killing any that were in in her path before finally rolling clear of the mass of husks.

"Light 'em up, folks!" yelled Zaeed. His rifle chattered as he swept his muzzle across the horde. Samara grabbed one of them in long-range biotic field and then used it like a bowling ball to scatter those around it. Miranda added her fire as well, along with the repeated crack of Thane's sniping.

The horde seemed to melt away, glowing blue forms slumping to the ground as the concentrated attack tore into them. Zaeed had a moment of fearsome joy. This was his life, this was everything he ever was or ever wanted to be.

And still more forms pulled themselves up over the edge. These new husks glowed red.

"Careful!" called Miranda. "The red ones explode!"

Zaeed switched to concussive shot and began blowing them clear off the edge of the platform. He laughed, feeling almost like he was in a shooting gallery. Samara began following his example and using biotic pushes to drive them back over the edge.

After a very short and one-sided battle, it was all quiet again.

"Damn me, Miranda," said Zaeed. "I've seen guys tryin' to use two guns at once, but they usually wind up shootin' their own dick off. I never thought I'd see it really done."

Miranda stood, breathing just a little more heavily than usual. "I was made to be perfect, Zaeed," she replied, then gave a small smile. "And at least in some ways I am."

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Tali opened the next valve and immediately began to sweat. "Keelah," she muttered. "How are you handling the heat, Legion?"

"This platform's internal cooling mechanisms are losing effectiveness," admitted the geth. "We are close to the antechamber, suggest we sacrifice stealth for speed."

She could feel the sweat pooling against her knees as she began worming forward more quickly. "I second that motion," she said. "Based on how the valves are spaced, we shouldn't have anything between us and the outlet anyway...oh, I just had to open my mouth, didn't I?"

Another mottled wall stretched across the ventilation shaft. Tali shook her head and felt a little trickle of sweat get into one of her eyes as she opened her omni-tool and began scanning. She blinked in a particular pattern, and an ultrafine manipulator inside her visor reached down and wiped the sweat away from her eyes.

She regarded the result of her scan with puzzlement. "There's no control mechanism around here. Maybe I messed up. Legion, can you do a scan?"

"Have already done so. Appears this valve controlled remotely. Only linkage appears to go towards path currently being cleared by Normandy Alpha-Team."

Tali knew they had to keep moving, or they would both cook. Radio silence had to go by the wayside. She opened her comm. "John? Can you hear me?"

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"Look for a control panel of some sort!" yelled Shepard from behind him. The Commander sounded a little frantic, and Garrus couldn't blame him. Tali's voice hadn't sounded very steady; the heat must be starting to get to her. The turian risked a peep around the corner and scanned the smaller room in front of them. It was narrow, and both sides of the room were lined with the orange and green holographic consoles used by the Collectors.

"There's lots of controls in the next room, John," he said. "But it's really tight quarters. I hope we don't have to do any shooting in there."

"Understood." Shepard's voice was back to icy calm again, but Garrus knew his friend well enough to be able to hear the little edge in it that indicated his inner worry. "Garrus, do you see any doors around the entrance?"

He looked around the edge of the square hole into the next room. It was all smooth, organic-looking material that reminded Garrus of a cast resin. "Nothing visible, Commander."

"Okay, there's no doors to close and separate us. So Garrus holds position outside the room and watches our ass. Grunt, switch to fists. Jack, no shotgun while we're in there. Mordin, you're with Garrus."

The other three flowed around Garrus and into the control room, while Mordin took up position behind Garrus. Jack and Grunt faced forward while Shepard scanned the controls intently. He got back on his comm. "Tali, can you tell me what I should look for?"

"It should be a green hexagon," said Tali's strained voice. "I can't believe how hot it's getting in here. Legion, can you trace the control linkage and give Shepard a better idea of where to look?"

"Affirmative. Shepard-Commander, please look on upper right panel."

Shepard scanned the indicated console, and Garrus could tell he was getting seriously freaked out. "I don't see it!"

"Should be green six-sided button, as Creator-Tali'Zorah said. Temperature now reaching dangerous levels."

"Not. Helping," grated Shepard. "Really, guys, I can't see it."

"Oh, no," said Legion.

"What?! What happened? Tali?" Shepard looked like he was about to go punching through the walls to get to the ventilation shaft.

"I'm here, John," said Tali faintly.

"Apologies," replied the geth. "Forgot orientation of Shepard-Comamnder to this platform. Should be on upper console to your left, which is this platform's right."

Shepard spun. "Got it!" He all but put his fist through the button.

"Obstruction removed," replied Legion. "We are progressing. I am taking lead, Creator-Tali'Zorah,"

"Fine by me." The quarian sounded almost unconscious.

Garrus heard a familiar buzz of wings from behind them. "We've got company coming up behind us," he said aloud, turned, and readied his rifle. The first Collector around the corner got one of Mordin's fireballs in its face, and its pained flailing disorganized the others enough for Garrus to pick off a couple more of them before the Collectors could return fire.

A round went past his head and pinged off of the doorway behind him. And the Collectors just kept coming.

"We've got a lot of company," added the turian.

"Fall back," said Shepard. "we're almost at the blast doors anyway."

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Donnelly's strength wasn't returning as much as he'd hoped. His arms still felt limp and lifeless. He could push feebly at the translucent material in front of him, but nowhere near hard enough to do any good. His good leg felt equally weak.

Wait a minute. What about his other leg? He glanced down and saw that the Collectors had stripped him naked before shoving him into his little tubular cell. However, for whatever reason they had left his prosthetic in place. On further reflection, he supposed that made sense. The artificial limb was grafted into his remaining leg bone, after all. It would have been a bother to remove, and it wasn't like he could kick the Collectors to death anyway.

He flexed the leg and saw it move much more forcefully than its flesh-and-blood counterpart. Whatever was affecting him was probably just weakening his muscles, not his nervous system.

So right now he had just one strong leg, his brain, and nothing else. Donnelly broke it down into an engineering exercise and visualized options in his head. If he braced himself against the back wall of the tube, placed his his bent artificial leg against the tube, and then straightened out the prosthetic...yes, that might work. He should be able to apply most of the motorized leg's force to the tube. Maybe even enough to open it.

It was worth a shot. He looked outside, and as before he couldn't see a damn thing. Oh well, if there were any Collectors outside he'd just have to deal with it once he got out. Donnelly drifted back against the rear of the tube and placed his synthetic foot against the front.

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Tali dimly felt Legion lower her gently out of the ventilation shaft. The contact with the floor outside and the sudden coolness snapped her awake. "Oh. Did I pass out?"

"Almost," replied Legion. "Not difficult to drag you, we had almost reached the room anyway."

"Not my most graceful entrance," she muttered. "But at least we made it." Tali stood and took stock of their surroundings. The antechamber was circular and about thirty meters across, with one large closed set of doors on the wall opposite them. To the right and left were two huge slablike doors. Each door was so tightly closed that she couldn't even see the seam where their halves met.

She activated her comm again. "A and B teams, we are in the antechamber. We will unlock the doors and wait for your signal to open them." She jogged towards the console for one of the massive blast doors while Legion moved silently towards the other.

"The A team is almost there, Tali," said Shepard. He sounded a little out of breath, as if he was running.

"Ditto fer us," growled Zaeed.

Her fingers danced over the console, calling up the necessary access controls for the door. She paused before pressing the last control, waiting for Shepard's call.

"Now, Tali!"

She touched the panel and readied her shotgun as a seam appeared in the huge door. Its two halves slid apart with a rumble. A-team dashed through the opening gap, pouring fire back through the gap as they entered. Mordin was first, followed closely by Garrus and Shepard. Grunt and Jack were the last. The biotic was throwing shockwaves with abandon behind her, her face stretched in a gleeful grin. Grunt had a similarly pleased expression, and the smaller room echoed with the BOOM of his OMFG.

She heard a similar commotion behind her, and knew that the B-team had arrived as well through the other blast door.

As soon as the last of the A-team was through, Tali touched the control again and the door slammed shut, again appearing like a seamless wall. She scrambled the door's code and then put a shotgun round into the control console for good measure.

"Now they'll have to burn through the door," she said with satisfaction. Across the room from them, Legion was smashing his console apart as well.

Shepard gripped her shoulder. "Are you okay?"

Tali patted his hand. "I'm fine, although I'm smelling pretty funky in here from all of my sweating. I'll need to get properly clean after the mission. I may need some help." She gave him a wink, and he gave a happy smile in response.

Shepard moved off and made the rounds to check on the others on the ground team. Tali sat down next to the wall and drank some water from a straw attached to her suit's internal canteen.

Jack sat next to her and took off her helmet. The biotic began to devour a nutrient bar. "Squishing bugs is hungry-makin' work, Buckethead."

You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.

"So is crawling through a hot and shoulder-width tunnel for five kilometers," replied Tali as she stretched her back. "Keelah, I'm glad that's over."

Jack shook her head. "No matter what you say, Buckethead, you definitely got a pair. So does Scrappy over there."

Tali laughed. "I appreciate the sentiment, Jack. But I am really sure that Legion does not, in fact, have testicles."

Samara came up. "You are uninjured, Jack?"

The biotic grinned at her. "Not a scratch, Blue. You wanna snack?"

The asari nodded, and Jack tossed a nutrient bar up to her. The ex-justicar took a bite, but her face was troubled. "I must confess," she said finally, "that I lost control for a few moments during the recent fighting. I can now understand why you can be so effective. Rage is an excellent motivator."

Jack shrugged. "Yeah, some of us don't have the advantage of hundreds of years of training." She gave Samara a lopsided smile. "We pesky humans gotta cheat."

Shepard spoke up from next to the large door out of the antechamber. "Listen up, people. Good work so far. We all got here, and with no injuries. But we've got a long ways to go yet." He opened his comm. "EDI, what's the status on the repairs?"

"All fuses replaced," said EDI's voice. "We're in the process of powering up. Estimate twenty minutes before we can begin moving."

"Good. Joker, be advised that we're not going to be able to backtrack to your position after the rescue. It's way too hot. You'll have to come up towards the top of the base, after we get up there."

"Got it, Commander. I guess if we need to, we can always make another hole, right?"

"You said it. EDI, has there been any cyber-attacks so far?"

"None yet, Shepard. I am still keeping a watch out."

Garrus had his omni-tool open and was looking over his miniature map of the base, based on EDI's initial scans. "The path up to the main chamber is pretty long, about six or seven hundred meters. There's a lot of possible ambush points in there."

Shepard was also looking over his own map. "At least it's wide enough for us to move through safely. Hmm. EDI, do you have any idea if there are Collectors on the other side of this outlet door?"

"No Collector drones detected," said EDI. "But I am detecting an unusual amount of thermal energy along the path up to the main chamber. I saw similar thermal activity during the Collector assault on Imorkan Station."

Thane looked up "That thermal energy must be massed seeker swarms. That was the main weapon the Collectors used during the Imorkan attack."

"Shit." Shepard looked pissed. "And we know that Mordin's countermeasure isn't effective when the swarms are that dense." He shook his head. "I guess they must be getting desperate. There must not be many Collectors ahead of us."

"So let's block out the seekers," said Garrus. "If we suit up and seal off all of our armor's external ports, then we can maybe just run through them."

Mordin shook his head. "Unlikely. Seeker units have significant strength, can work their way into armor joints and pierce though flexible composites." He paused and thought. "Not to mention that these seekers have most likely been reprogrammed to sting any intruders, not just humans."

"And they only need to get that one sting in," said Shepard glumly. "We need something to keep them from ever getting near us." He perked up. "Jack, Samara, front and center."

The pair of them walked forward, and Tali got up as well. The brief rest and water made the quarian feel a little rejuvenated as she joined the others.

"Jack, remember that barrier you showed me during sparring?" asked Shepard.

Jack nodded, but her face was troubled. "Yeah, but I don't know how big I can make it, Boss. Bigger is harder. You need something that will cover the whole ground team. I can maybe cover two or three other people."

"It is the same with me, Commander," added Samara. "There are eleven of us, and we can cover perhaps eight at best. I fear we cannot take everyone."

"Shit on toast," growled Shepard. "We sure as hell can't leave anyone here. The blast doors are sealed, and anyway there's nothing on the other side of them but a bunch of pissed-off Collectors."

Zaeed spoke up. "We could have Samara 'n Jack cover the more, ah, squishy folks while those of us with better armor do the run and take our chances. I've got my flamethrower, after all. I can clear a pretty good path through 'em."

"Low probability of success," said Mordin. "Seeker swarms not particularly flammable. Or inflammable"

Samara looked up. "There is a possibility. If Jack and I synchronize our efforts, we should be able to make a single large barrier, one big enough to cover everyone."

Jack looked a little panicked. "Blue, we haven't practiced that at all. And I don't wanna, whaddycall, improvise this shit at the last minute."

The asari nodded. "I know, dear. It would require us to join nervous systems in order to facilitate such a feat."

"Can you do that and move around as well?" asked Shepard.

Samara shrugged. "We are about to find out, I suppose."

"So it looks like we're improvising anyway," said Jack. She shook her head and looked around at the rest of the ground team. "Fuck, I guess it's either that or we start drawin' straws." Jack took the final bite of her nutrient bar and tossed the wrapper aside. She took a deep breath and faced the asari. "Lay it on me, Blue. Just be gentle, okay? It's my first time."

Tali's comm made a buzz. "Bosh'tets!" she cursed.

"Problem?" asked Shepard.

The quarian shrugged. "Possibly. I had a program set up to detect when the Collector's computer network got back online. It just did. EDI will be seeing an attack pretty soon."

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EDI's golden-arrow avatar circled like a sparrowhawk around the point in information space that was the Normandy. She could feel the ship and herself coming back to life, almost as if EDI was an organic being with blood flowing back into paralyzed limbs. She had received the warning from Tali, as well as several other bits of information that told her to expect danger.

Her constant scanning soon revealed the imminent attack. Larger glowing insectoid shapes scuttled over the hull of the collector base, moving in a crisscrossing pattern towards her. If those seeker programs reached the Normandy behind her, then the Collectors would have the ship's physical location and be able to launch a real-world attack. She had to keep them looking elsewhere, keep them at a distance. EDI's arrow-form darted off to do some serious mischief. A synchronization of processes began to build within her as she flew. Were she organic, EDI would call such an alignment joy.

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Shepard watched as Jack and Samara stared at each other. Samara placed her hands on Jack's shoulders. The young human was clearly getting second thoughts about this, and Samara smiled. "Don't fear, Jack. After all, you once did this with me on Illium."

"Oh, yeah, I guess I did." Jack looked a little more certain.

Samara's eyes dilated, and kept dilating. It reminded Shepard uncomfortably of his face-off with Morinth, and he looked away from Samara...only to see that Jack's eyes were also undergoing the same extreme dilation. He had one brief moment of puzzlement; surely human eyes couldn't dilate that wide, right?

"Embrace eternity," whispered Samara. The two biotics jerked as if they'd received electric shocks, and both tumbled towards the floor.

"Damn it!" Shepard lunged forward and caught Samara. The ex-justicar was as tall as he was, and her substantial weight staggered him a little. Garrus, meanwhile, had easily caught Jack.

"Samara?" The asari didn't respond. She just stared up at the ceiling with featureless black eyes. "Shit. How is Jack?" He looked over and saw that the human's eyes were just as black as Samara's. "Jack? Samara? Come on, somebody talk to me..."

"We are well, Commander."

The voice came in unison from both Jack and Samara. They both blinked in time with each other, and then they rose as one. They walked in perfect, synchronized movements to the center of the antechamber. The effect was almost as if they were two black-eyed puppets being manipulated by the same unseen hand.

"Okay, now that is really damn creepy," said Zaeed.

The composite being of Samara-Jack turned as one and gave the mercenary a dual smirk. "Really, Zaeed?," they said in unison. "Have you ever looked in a mirror?"

The mercenary gave a graveyard laugh. "Well, you're definitely part Jack."

The two biotics gestured around, still speaking in unison. "Please, everyone, gather around us. We will get as close to the exit door as possible, set up the barrier, and then open the door."

Shepard shook off his feeling of unease and began setting his people in place. "Mordin, you stick to the center by Samara and Jack. I want Garrus and Thane in the center as well, you two are taller anyway and can shoot over our heads."

Thane just nodded, but Garrus definitely had a reluctant expression on his face. "All right. But I want Zaeed in front with his flamethrower ready, just in case this doesn't work."

Zaeed gave a grin that twisted his scarred face. "Don't worry, I'll be ready."

"We must hurry," said Samara-Jack. "This joining is a strain for us, even before we start the barrier."

They situated themselves, and Samara-Jack reached up two pairs of hands. Blue light cascaded down and formed a dome around the group, and then the pair nodded.

"Zaeed, get the door," said Shepard, and got his rifle ready. He'd placed himself at the rear, to keep an eye on everyone.

A huge black cloud began pouring into the room as soon as the doors began to slide open. The air was filled with the sound of chittering and tiny screeching as the swarm of seekers battered themselves against the biotic barrier.

But none of them got through. The plan was working, at least for now. "Move, people!" barked Shepard. Like a blue-shelled tortoise, the group began shuffling into the corridor ahead while the seekers flittered and chirped with frustrated hunger.

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EDI darted herself through the center of one of the seeker programs and watched it blow apart into glowing sparks around her. If she had a face, it would be sporting a huge smile. This was what she was built for. It was just as she had told Marcus in the shuttle, back when she was still nothing but a Cerberus tool. There was a kind of ecstasy in being able to do exactly what you were made to do. She now knew why organics pursued sex with such single-minded abandon.

Other seeker programs closed in on their fallen comrade, and she made sure they caught 'sight' of her. They charged and she sped away, almost laughing in delight. Now to lead them away from the Normandy...

Her glee was interrupted by Oriana's voice from 'behind' her. "Joker and EDI, we're done with the initial engine power up."

"Sweet!" replied the pilot. "Should we move yet?"

"We should wait for Shepard to contact us with the best coordinates." said EDI. "Hang on, folks, I'm a little busy right now." EDI dodged a 'swipe' by one of the seeker programs and led it away while continuing to look around.

There was something else in the base.

EDI couldn't 'see' it directly, but some of her scans seemed to 'bounce' off of and around something massive inside the control center. It puzzled her. Was it an avatar of Harbinger? It was unlikely, since that entity's avatars had always been 'visible' to her. Whatever this thing was, it was there but inactive, almost as if it was...asleep.

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The swarm fluttered itself impotently against the blue hemispherical barrier. Samara-Jack walked forward deliberately in the center of it, with the other ground team members making sure to keep pace with them and not get too close to the barrier's edge. Any light from the corridor outside was nonexistent inside the bubble, what with the almost solid mass of insectoid bodies pressing down against the barrier. The only light inside came from the glow in Samara-Jack's upstretched hands.

"Movement," said Garrus. "Thirty degrees right."

Shepard couldn't see anything, but he trusted his friend's eyesight. "Stay sharp, people. We won't get much warning before..."

There followed a harsh moan, and Shepard caught a glimpse of several red-tinted husks charging at the moving barrier. "Keep them at distance!" he shouted, before beginning to shoot at the charging enemies.

One of the red husks actually made it up to the barrier's edge before Grunt got off a shot with the OMFG that flipped it back into one of its brethren. The resulting explosion rocked them all, and Shepard actually felt his boot slip back outside the barrier. He had a brief panicked moment where he could feel the seekers scraping their stingers over his boot before he jerked it back inside the safety of the barrier. His breathing slowed, but the adrenaline still coursed through his veins.

They kept moving, although Shepard couldn't help but notice that the dual biotics seemed to be moving more slowly.

"How are you two doing?" he asked Samara-Jack. He felt more panic. What would happen to them all if the barrier suddenly went away?

"Very hard...we need to get to the other end soon," came the dual whispered reply. Both women were staggering as if holding up the weight of the world.

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Donnelly felt as if his artificial leg was going to just drive itself back out through his arse. He couldn't take a deep breath with the thick fluid filling his lungs, so he just gritted his teeth and kept pushing in spite of the pain. And then, just as he was about to give up, he felt the front of the tube move ever so slightly. There was a gurgle of escaping liquid, and he felt the liquid around his head begin to drain. He kept pushing, and felt the tube's door creak open more. The slow drain became a outgoing rush. Donnelly suddenly collapsed to the floor of his cell, no longer supported by the clear goo which had filled it.

His first attempt to take a breath of air made him gag, and he rolled over and threw up the rest of the liquid that was still in his lungs. The first breath of air after that felt like he was breathing fire. Donnelly just lay in the bottom of the tube and coughed, a hacking cough which kept bringing up little bits of liquid. Every breath just made him cough more. Finally, though, his coughing slowed. He sat up and once more braced his prosthetic against the bottom of the tube's door. A few more pushes and he had just enough of a gap to get out.

Donnelly crawled out of his cell and through the large puddle of clear slime in front of the tube. The floor was amber-colored and oddly warm to the touch, as if it was made from something partly alive. Here and there dark tubes as big around as his forearm ran across the floor. He crawled over the tubes as he encountered them. He managed to make it about ten meters before another coughing fit hit him. He collapsed onto that strange warm floor. The air, however, was colder, and he shivered as he continued to make little hacking noises.

The engineer suddenly realized he was looking at a pair of clawed feet, about ten meters away. Donnelly looked up and saw a Collector tilt its blunt head curiously as it regarded the escaped human. He weakly scrambled back and managed to get his feet under him, but he couldn't summon the strength to stand. He fell back with his legs sprawled out in front of him as he kept his eyes locked on the Collector.

The insectoid alien's head tilted back upright. It unslung a rifle from its back and began striding forward with purpose. The organic-looking weapon in its hands had a very big muzzle, and it was centered right at Donnelly's head.

The engineer smiled and gestured in a beckoning motion with one hand. "Right," he rasped. "Come on then, if yer hard enough."

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The other door was in sight. "Now how do we get these fucking bugs off of us?" mused Zaeed. The outside of the barrier still seemed to be a solid dark mass of squirming insects, many of which were between them and the exit.

"Get to door," said Samara-Jack through two pairs of clenched teeth. "Will create pulse at last moment."

Shepard didn't like their color. Both of the biotics seemed very pale. The last ten meters or so to reach the door seemed to take forever while husks moaned behind them. Shepard took shots when he could see any targets of opportunity. But not being able to see where the enemy was grated on his nerves.

They finally reached the exit. Samara-Jack drew themselves up. "NOW!" they called out simultaneously, and the black carpet of seekers pressing in on them exploded outward. Shepard caught a glimpse of some of the pursuing husks also being bowled over by the blast. The team ran through the door, with Shepard taking up the rear.

"All in!" yelled Garrus, and Shepard touched the control beside the door. It slammed shut without any of the seekers managing to get back through. He panted and slumped against the door, then put a few rounds through the console. That walk had not been physically demanding, but it had been one of the most mentally damn stressful things he'd ever done.

"Sound off," he croaked. "Anyone hurt?" There was no reply. He pushed himself off of the door and took a look at the two biotics. They sat slumped with their shoulders pressed together as they faced in opposite directions. The other team members surrounded them.

He could see Jack's face and see that her eyes were back to normal again. She was breathing heavily at first, but then it slowed. She gave Samara's shoulder a quick pat and then hauled herself upright. "Good job, Blue. No offense, but it's nice to be the only one in my skull again."

"Likewise...Jack," breathed Samara.

"How are you doing?" Shepard asked the younger woman.

Jack gave a tired, one-shoulder shrug. "I feel like I just ran two miles in a dead sprint. And I had the easy part of the job, too. I was just the copilot. Samara was doing the driving, so to speak." Her face got a distant look. "I've never felt such a strength of will."

Samara patted Jack's leg in response, but didn't get up or say anything. Shepard felt a spark of alarm. "Samara? Are you okay?"

She nodded. "I will survive, Shepard," she whispered. "I just need some time to recuperate."

Shepard looked around. They had come out on a ledge that circled a huge open space. It had to be at least a kilometer across, but it was hard to tell in the hazy yellow atmosphere that filled the chamber. The walls around the ledge were lined with hundreds upon hundreds of translucent cylinders, and out of the bottom of each cylinder snaked a dark metal tube. The carpet of tubes then led out over the ledge and into the open space in the center. The smaller tubes merged together to form larger ones that seemed to hang haphazardly in the space in front of them. It looked almost like a carelessly placed spider web made of metal. The center of the space had a bundle of huge vertical tubes that the metal spiderweb ran into. The central bundle stretched to the top of the chamber and passed out of sight into the mist near the chamber's top. Shepard walked to the edge and took a peek down.

There were at least fifteen other floors below this one, all filled with the same arrangement of cylinders-and-tubes. All of the tubes came together and led into the central bundle. There might have been more floors below those, but if so he couldn't see them in the fog.

"I'm guessing these cylinders are where the prisoners are kept," said Miranda.

"I agree. Fan out and search," said Shepard. Most of the ground team moved out along the ledge; Samara was still sprawled on the ground and breathing heavily. Mordin stayed behind as well while he checked the asari's vitals. Shepard looked a question at him and the salarian nodded a positive response. It looked like Samara really was just exhausted.

He noted that Jack was dragging her feet as she walked. The biotic plodded along instead of doing her usual bouncy walk.

Shepard turned away and called the Normandy. "EDI, are you seeing our video?"

"Yes, Shepard," replied the AI's voice.

"We don't have the time to physically search this whole area for our people. The Collectors are regrouping. Can you suggest where to start looking?"

"It is difficult to ascertain the most likely location of the Collector's most recent captures. Can you please do another visual scan of the floors?"

Shepard looked back out and complied, letting EDI get a really good look at the place through his suit's cameras. He saw that Jack, in spite of her apparent exhaustion, had actually taken the lead of the search party. She was almost invisible in the mist already.

"The three floors below this one appear totally filled," said EDI at last. "The ones below those appear empty. I surmise that the Collectors fill each floor with their captives, then move up to the next once the level is full. There are many un-filled tubes on this level, but I can see forms in some of them. This is probably the floor currently being used to house the Collectors' most recent captives, and thus our crew are most likely on your present level."

"Thank God for small favors," muttered Shepard. He activated the general comm channel. "Listen up, our people should be on this floor-"

He was cut short by a scream from Jack.