Ascension

reputation among his own kind. But the quarian had assured him they'd be there.

Looks like the little bastard was right.

The quarians stepped down from their vehicle. 'We have three targets,' a voice said over the headset built into the helmet of his enviro-suit.

'Alpha squad take the one on the right,' he responded flatly. 'Beta squad take the one on the left. Leave the one in the middle to me.'

'Alpha squad — target acquired,' the voice answered back.

'Beta squad — target acquired,' a second voice confirmed, this one female.

Peering through the scope, he was confident his team could hit their targets, even from this range. But the quarians were all wearing armor, and the odds of a round penetrating the kinetic barriers of their shields before they could make it back into the safety of the vehicle were low. Golo still had to do his part if the plan was going to work.

'Hold fire until my signal,' he ordered, taking a bead on the quarian in the center.

The quarians waited patiently as their contact approached. Soon Feda could hear the whine of the rover's engine and the crunching of its tires over the rough, uneven terrain, the thin atmosphere giving everything a sharp, brittle sound.

Once the rover had come within fifty meters, Feda held up her hand, palm forward. The vehicle rolled to a stop. A few seconds later a quarian emerged and began to walk slowly toward them, hands held above his head. He stopped ten meters away, just as she had instructed when setting up the details of the meeting. Lige and Anwa had drawn their assault rifles, pointing them at the newcomer.

'Golo?' she asked, confirming the identity of the man behind the mask.

'Are you here to rob me?' he said by way of reply, nodding toward the weapons pointed at his chest. He kept his hands high. Unlike Feda and her crew, he wasn't wearing any armor.

'I'm not taking any chances,' she answered. 'Not with you.'

There were several crimes that could result in exile from the Fleet: murder, repeated violent offenses, vandalism or sabotage directed at the Liveships or the food supplies. But Golo's offense — attempting to sell quarians to the Collectors — seemed particularly heinous. Loyalty was a cornerstone of quarian culture; survival on the Migrant Fleet required every member of the community to work together. Trying to sell another quarian for personal profit was a betrayal of everything Feda believed in; an unforgivable sin.

'You came alone?' she asked.

Golo nodded. 'The parts are in the back of the truck, if you want to see.'

Feda pulled her pistol and used it to cover Golo, nodding at Lige to go check out the vehicle. He approached slowly, weapon still drawn. The rover was a simple cargo carrier, with a small two-person cab and a freight trailer on the back. The trailer was little more than a rectangular box, with a vertical sliding door for loading and unloading.

Lige pressed the panel on the side of the trailer, but instead of the door rising up the panel beeped sharply and flashed red.

'It's locked.'

'What's the access code?' Feda demanded, waving her pistol menacingly in Golo's direction.

'Seven two six nine,' he answered, and Lige punched the numbers in. Then all hell broke loose.

'Get ready,' Pel muttered into his transmitter as one of the quarians approached Golo's vehicle.

An instant later there was a bright flash as the bomb inside the back of Golo's rover exploded. The blast threw the quarian standing beside the vehicle through the air and knocked the others, including Golo, to the ground.

'Fire,' he said, his voice calm as he pulled the trigger of his sniper rifle with a smooth, even pressure.

Feda was thrown from her feet by the explosion. She hit the ground with a jarring thump, but quickly rolled to her feet and brought her pistol up to fire at Golo, who was still on the ground, cowering with his hands over his head.

She squeezed the trigger, but nothing happened. Glancing down, she saw the status indicator on her weapon flashing red — the automated targeting system had overloaded. Cursing, she slapped the manual override on the handle, knowing full well the pulse that had disabled her weapon had probably scrambled her kinetic shields as well.

A flash of agonizing fire erupted in her shoulder as a hyperaccelerated projectile no bigger than a pin sheared effortlessly through the ablative plates of her body armor before exploding in the flesh and bone underneath. The impact spun her around and sent the pistol flying from her hand. She felt her kneecap disintegrate and she collapsed to the ground, her scream rising up to meet the unmistakable zip-zip- zip of high-powered rounds slicing through the thin air.

She could see Lige's body, laying where the blast had thrown it. His mask had been shattered by the close range impact of the detonation, turning his face into a bloody mess. She could see one eye clearly; it stared at her, lifeless and unblinking. The body jerked and jumped as it was struck by enemy bullets, rounds wasted on a corpse.

Get to the vehicle! her mind screamed at her, and in response she began to crawl on her belly toward the rover. She never felt the round that entered the back of her skull and ended her life.

Pel continued firing, pumping round after round into the motionless body until he heard Golo's voice in his helmet.

'I think you can stop now. They're all dead.'

Standing up, Pel collapsed his weapon and snapped it into the quick-release clasp on his back.

'Beta squad, meet me down at the rendezvous point. Alpha squad, keep an eye out for reinforcements.'

The gravity on Shelba was.92 Earth standard, so he was able to make good time, even with the restrictions of the enviro-suit. It took him just over five minutes to get down to the scene of the massacre. Golo was there waiting for him, as were the two women from Beta squad. They were already stripping the clothes and gear from the dead quarians. The dark clothes were torn with bullet holes and stained with blood, but it was unlikely anyone would notice these details until it was too late.

Pel was too big to pass as a quarian, but the women were about the right height and build. With their faces obscured by helmets and bundled up in cloth and rags, it would be difficult to tell them apart from their victims.

'Did you locate their ship?' Golo asked him as he approached. Like the women, he was using strips of clothing from one of the bodies to obscure his identity.

'We spotted them when they touched down,' Pel told him. 'Maybe ten clicks from here.'

'Probably three or four more on board,' the quarian informed him. 'They'll most likely be armed, but they won't be wearing combat suits. Remember, you want to take one of them alive. The pilot, if possible.'

Hilo'Jaa vas Idenna, the pilot of the scout ship Cy-niad of the fleet ship Idenna, was surprised to see Feda's rover coming toward them from over the edge of the horizon.

He reached out and flicked the transmit button on the radio.

'Feda? This is Hilo. Do you read me?'

A second later the reply came through, but it was obscured by static so thick he couldn't make anything out.

'I can't hear you, Feda. Is everything okay?'

This time the answer was a piercing shriek of radio feedback that made Hilo wince as he shut off the transmitter.

'Get ready,' Hilo said over the shipboard intercom. 'Feda's on her way back.'

'Why didn't she call ahead?' a voice responded over the speaker a few seconds later.

'Sounds like the rover's got some radio trouble.'

'I just fixed it last week!' the voice objected.

'Guess you need to fix it again,' Hilo replied with a smile. 'Be alert, just in case.'

It wasn't uncommon for things to break down on the Cyniad. Like all ships, vessels, and vehicles associated with the Migrant Fleet, their rover had seen better days. Most