and lodging themselves in the merc’s stomach.
The batarian dropped his rifle in surprise, stumbling back and instinctively clutching at the holes in his gut. He hit the wall and slowly slid down to the floor, blood seeping out and welling up from the fingers he had pressed over the wounds.
His partner looked up in confusion; because of the silencer the pistol’s shots had been muffled to a faint zip-zip that he probably hadn’t even heard. It took him a second to realize what had happened. With an expression of dawning horror he went for his own weapon. Anderson whipped the pistol out of his pocket and fired two shots point-blank into the second guard’s chest. He slouched down to the side, fell off the chair, and was still.
Anderson whipped the pistol back toward the first guard, still sitting motionless on the floor with his back to the wall. “Please,” the mercenary begged, finally figuring out who Anderson was with. “Skarr’s the one who gave the order to execute those Alliance soldiers. I didn’t even want to kill them.”
“But you did,” Anderson answered, then fired a single shot right between the batarian’s eyes.
He stripped off the coveralls, snapped the pistol back onto his hip and unwrapped the assault rifle, unfolding it so it was ready to go. Then he kicked open the door.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Like Anderson before him, Saren entered the refinery through an emergency door in one of the
refinery’s small, two-story annexes. But while the lieutenant had gone through the maintenance building on the westernmost side of the refinery, Saren entered through the shipping warehouse on the east. And unlike his human counterpart, he didn’t bother with a disguise.
A pair of dockworkers saw him come in, their faces registering surprise and then fear at the sight of an armored turian carrying a heavy assault rifle. A quick burst from Saren’s weapon ended their lives before they had a chance to cry out for help.
The Spectre moved quickly through the warehouse and into the main building. Again, unlike Anderson, he knew exactly where he was going. He made his way down to the lowest levels of the refinery, where deposits of rock and ore rich in element zero were melted down and the bulk impurities skimmed off the boiling surface. The molten liquid was then piped to an enormous centrifuge to separate out the precious eezo. He killed three more employees along the way.
He knew he was getting close to his destination when he passed signs on the wall reading “Restricted Access.” He rounded a corner and yanked open a door with “Authorized Personnel Only” painted across it. A wall of hot, hazy air rolled out, stinging his eyes and lungs. Inside, half a dozen engineers were scattered on walkways built around and above the colossal melting vats and the massive generator core used to heat them. They were monitoring the refining process, keeping an eye on the equipment to
ensure it operated at peak efficiency and didn’t experience a potentially deadly malfunction.
The employees were wearing headsets to protect their ears from the constant rumble of the turbines feeding the generator. One of them saw Saren and tried to shout out a warning. His words were swallowed up by the thunder of the turbines, as were the sounds of gunfire as the turian mowed them all down.
The slaughter lasted less than a minute; the Spectre was nothing if not brutally efficient. As soon as the last engineer died, tumbling from the catwalk into the vat of molten ore twenty meters below, Saren began the next phase of his plan.
There were too many hiding places here inside the refinery. Too many places Edan could bunker down
behind a wall of armed mercs. Saren needed something to flush him out. A few strategically placed explosive charges would trigger a catastrophic series of explosions in the refinery core, setting off a general evacuation alarm for the entire facility.
Saren finished rigging the last of the munitions, then headed for the upper levels. He wanted to be well out of the blast radius when the charges detonated.
Kahlee was hungry, thirsty, and tired. But above all else she was scared. The krogan had told her Qian would be coming to see her in a few days, but that was all he’d said. Then he’d dragged her into a storage room and locked her inside the small, dark closet at the back. She hadn’t seen or spoken to anybody since.
She was smart enough to understand what they were doing. She didn’t know what Qian wanted, but it was obvious they were trying to break her will before the meeting. They’d left her for almost a full day in the cramped closet, in complete darkness with no food or water. There wasn’t even a bucket so she could go to the bathroom; she’d had to relieve herself in the corner.
After two or three days of this Qian would come to her with his offer. If she accepted, they’d feed her and give her something to drink. If she refused, they’d throw her back into the makeshift cell and come for her again in another three days.
If she refused them a second time, things would most likely get really nasty. Instead of starvation and mental abuse, they’d move on to actual physical torture. Kahlee had no intention of helping Dr. Qian in any way, but she was terrified of what was to come. Worst of all was the knowledge that in the end they’d win anyway. It might take days, maybe even weeks, but eventually the endless torture and abuse would break her and they’d get whatever they wanted.
During the first few hours of her imprisonment she’d sought some way to free herself, only to realize it was hopeless. She had fumbled in the darkness with the door of the closet, but it was locked from the outside and the interior handle had been removed. Plus, even if she did get out of the closet there were almost certainly guards waiting on the other side.
She couldn’t even escape by killing herself. Not that she was at that point yet, but the room she was in was completely empty: no pipes to hang herself from, nothing to use to cut or wound herself. She briefly considered the option of slamming her head over and over into the wall, but she would only succeed in knocking herself out and inflicting a lot of unnecessary pain — something she suspected there was
already more than enough of in her future.
The situation was hopeless, but Kahlee hadn’t given in to total despair quite yet. And then she heard a noise; a sound sweeter than the singing of angels. The sound of salvation: automatic gunfire on the other side of the door.
Anderson kicked open the door that the two mercs had been guarding. Beyond it was a large storage room. All the equipment inside had been dragged out; it was empty except for a small table and several chairs. Four more batarian Blue Suns were sitting around the table playing some type of card game. And standing off alone in the corner was Skarr. Like the men outside, none of them were wearing body armor.
The krogan was his first target — a stream of bullets hit the krogan square in the chest. Skarr’s arms flew up and out as he was blown backwards, sending his gun sailing across the room. He struck the wall behind him, spun off it, and fell facedown on the floor, bleeding from too many wounds to count.
The mercs reacted to the sudden attack by flipping the table and scattering. Seeing Kahlee wasn’t in the room, Anderson simply sprayed the entire place with bullets. He took the whole lot of them out before they ever had a chance to fire back. It wasn’t a fair or honorable fight; it was a massacre. Considering the victims, Anderson didn’t even feel bad.
After the shooting stopped, he noticed a small door in the back wall. It probably just led into a closet, but it was reinforced with metal plating and sealed with a heavy lock.
“Kahlee?” he shouted, running over to bang on the door. “Kahlee, are you in there? Can you hear me?” From the other side he heard her muffled voice calling back to him. “David? David! Please, get me out