Shots rang out.
Sloane hit the ground even before the noise really registered. An instinct honed over years. She crawled forward to take cover behind a long low decorative planter as rapid bursts from an assault rifle hissed through the air and sparked against the walkway beside her.
There was a pause in the gunfire, and she chanced a look over the wall. All she saw were dark storefronts. Her team had become spread out as they’d made their way here. Only a few of them were with her, the rest still just silhouettes down the long hallway she’d just come through.
“Anyone see them?” she asked.
No one had.
“Spread out,” Sloane ordered. She motioned toward the rest of her officers, now at the mouth of the tunnel, advising them to stay back. Of the four out here with her, three shuffled or crawled farther away from her, taking positions as best they could.
One hadn’t moved since she’d given the order. Sloane felt an all-too-familiar knot of dread in her gut at the motionless, curled body.
A burst of fire clattered against the wall around the tunnel opening, sending her team there scrambling back into the shadows.
“In ten seconds I want covering fire,” she said, just loud enough for the three near her to understand. “Disruptor rounds, for effect, understand? Overhead. Pin them.”
On her belly she crawled to the other end of the planter and brought her own weapon around. Careful to keep her back low—the planter wall stood only a half-meter high or so—Sloane brought one foot up and under her, readying herself to spring.
Exactly ten seconds after her order the three officers began to fire on the row of storefronts. Sloane turned and shouted back at the hallway.
“Medic! Come now! One down, immobile!”
Without waiting for a reply, she pushed to her feet and ran, eyes on the ground to avoid the dazzling flashes that flickered all across the signage above the row of stores. She angled herself for the nearest shop and shouldered her way through the entrance, into shadow.
With any luck the enemy had not seen her cross. The gunplay continued, and it yielded one benefit—intel. She’d counted four of them. One in an adjacent business, three more farther down the row.
Moving through the empty aisles of the dark store, keeping her light off so her eyes could adjust, she swung her weapon at each corner. No one inside. No reason anyone would be, though. The place was empty.
No one at the back of the store, either. In fact the whole row was empty, as far as she knew.
So why were there armed thugs stationed there?
A maintenance door at the back let her into a labyrinthine tunnel system that allowed shop workers to come and go, deliveries to be made without bothering the flow of customers. Activity ahead gave her pause. Low voices and the sounds of gear being moved or assembled.
“You got too greedy,” someone said.
“Shut up and help,” another replied.
She glanced behind her, only to confirm what she already knew. She was alone here. Sloane crept forward in the darkness. The gunfire behind her dwindled into the background, sounding more like distant thunder. Ahead someone swore, then the sound of something crashing to the ground. Sensing her chance, Sloane rushed forward. She entered a small storeroom, empty save for a pair of human men in the uniforms of life support. Together they were trying to load a sack of something onto a lev-cart.
“Step away, hands where I can see them,” Sloane said.
They dropped the bag. Tens of thousands of tiny pale objects skittered and bounced across the floor.
Seeds, Sloane realized.
Neither of the men surrendered. As their loot showered the floor, both turned and ran for the door opposite the one through which Sloane had entered. She stepped forward and let off a few rounds in their direction, aiming low in the hopes of hitting a thigh or knee, and ending their escape. But her foot landed on the carpet of small hard shells and she slipped. Not much, but enough.
Her aim went high and her first shot slapped into the back of the nearest of the two. The man went down, limp before he hit the ground. His companion rounded the next corner and vanished into the store beyond.
Sloane ignored the spilled seeds, aware of their value to the Nexus’s survival but unable to do anything about it now. She paid them only enough attention to keep from losing her footing again. In seconds she crossed the room and stepped over the dead body.
More bloodshed. Sloane feared this was only the beginning.
The hallway split. She could go forward, or up a flight of narrow stairs, probably to some kind of office. Surprise no longer on her side, she flicked on her tactical light and studied the floor. There, on the steps, were the remnants of crushed seeds. She went up, two steps at a time, using only her toes to minimize sound.
When she was two steps from the top the space before her erupted in light and deafening sound. A flash round. She staggered back, blinded, deaf. Almost fell, somehow managed to keep her feet. She could see nothing, hear nothing, but the narrow space made the direction obvious.
Sloane fired blind toward the room at the top of the stairs, full auto now, her weapon set to alternate between armor-piercing and incendiary rounds. Her ears withered under the continued assault of noise, but her vision returned. Not much, but enough. She kept climbing, firing all the way, offering no gap through which the enemy could regain their footing and return fire.
At the top of the stairs she pushed on into the office, still shooting. Tables and chairs erupted into chunks of metal and splintered faux wood. A window at the far end, overlooking the promenade where her team had first come under fire, was suddenly riddled with a line of bullet holes, every other one ringed with black charring.
The window farthest to her right, though, was open, and Sloane just barely caught a glimpse of her prey’s leg as he climbed out onto the signage and disappeared behind the wall.
She leaned into a full sprint, ready to pursue, but some instinct told her no, danger. She pulled up. Too late. A blow to her shins sent her sprawling. Her gun clattered away to vanish under one of the ruined tables. She twisted, ignoring the searing pain across her legs as she leapt back to her feet.
A fist. Sloane ducked, the blow grazing the top her head. She threw a punch of her own. Solid contact with the man’s stomach. He grunted, doubled over in time to become acquainted with her knee to his jaw.
Her vision began to return in time to watch blood fountain from his mouth. He backpedaled. Sloane went after him, then paused when she saw his hand. He’d been fumbling for a pistol, had it now. She turned and dove toward the table that had claimed her own weapon. Rolling over it, she landed hard on her back as his shots slammed into the metal surface.
“It’s over for you,” the man said, only somewhat intelligible with a mouth full of blood. “Calix has a plan, and he’s ten steps ahead of you. Give up now and you can live—”
A terrible shriek cut his words short.
Sloane heard him crumple to the ground, and behind that, the low crackling of dissipating biotic power. She took a tentative glance over the top of the table. Talini stood there, her blue skin almost iridescent in the dim light.
“You okay?” the asari asked.
“Yeah,” Sloane said. “Yeah, though if you’d been a second later… What did you do to him?”
“Reave,” she answered.
“Not fooling around,” Sloane observed.
Talini raised her chin slightly. “I think we’re past that stage now, don’t you?”
Ten minutes later Sloane Kelly reached the door to Operations. It was sealed, a good sign. The one barrier that even Calix couldn’t override. She pinged Tann and Addison on their private channel and announced herself. A few seconds later the door opened from within.