9 Ch7 Railjack Melee

—pov Shepard—-

Exiting the jump into the Knossos system, the Normandy picked up something on their sensors. Getting a ping on her omnitool, Shepard walked over to Joker to ask what he found.

"Commander, we're picking up a distress call coming from Theorum. We're also picking up unknown signals from several ships in orbit. I think it's the Geth." Joker said.

"Play the message." Shepard said.

"Hello, is anyone there? This is Doctor Liara T'Soni of the Prothean Archaeological Research Division. Our group was attacked by an unknown synthetic force led by a krogan. They… they impaled everyone who tried to fight back or weren't asari on these metal spikes and captured the rest. I gathered a group of survivors and we're retreating into the ruins. If anyone is there, please send help! *gunshots* Please hurry!"

"Guess we found the doctor." Joker said.

"Locate the source of the signal and get ready to drop us off." Shepard said, bringing up her omnitool and calling the rest of the ground crew. "Everyone, suit up. This retrieval mission has turned into a rescue. Geth have been spotted in orbit and on the ground killing non-asari and capturing the rest. I'm splitting you guys up into two teams, one to rescue any captured researchers on the surface and another will follow me into the ruins to retrieve Dr. T'Soni."

"That's a good plan, but we only have one Mako and the Normandy is not built to face the lava lakes surrounding the camp and ruin." Joker said.

"Maybe we could use Eitri's ghost ship." Shepard said, calling Eitri on her omnitool. "Eitri, can you report to the bridge?"

"Eitri has a ship? Where is it? And why are you calling it a ghost ship?" Joker asked.

"In the pocket dimension I control. As for why it's a ghost ship, it spent 1000 years stuck in a spacial storm being piloted by the shadow of its captain's warframe looking for the rest of itself. The Tenno who controlled the warframe gave it to me after I restored his warframe. After that, I started upgrading and altering it so people could live on it and it could be used for more than just a heavily armed strike ship." Eitri said walking up. "Since you guys are talking about my Tempestarii, I'm guessing you're thinking of using it, Shepard?"

"Yes. I'm planning on having the surface team take the Mako while we provide aerial support and clean up the Geth on the way to the ruin." Shepard said. "Can your ship withstand extreme temperatures well?"

"It's able to shrug off giant, ship-killing plasma beams, so I think it should be fine. I'll go take it out. Umm Joker, is it? Does this ship have a docking tube for ship/ship transfers?"

"Yeah, but I don't know if it's compatible with your ship…"

"Don't worry, just let me into the airlock and extend it." Eitri said.

"Hope you know what you're doing."

Eitri walked into the airlock and transferred into Limbo. The atmosphere was sucked out and the airlock door opened into space. He jumped into space and entered the Rift once he reached a suitable distance.

"He just disappeared!" Joker exclaimed, looking at the sensors.

"He can do that. Dimensional travel or something. He has a pocket dimension where he keeps all his stuff, which includes space stations, destroyed ships, an armory, and a ton of other stuff. He'll be back soon." Shepard said, looking out of the window towards where Eitri disappeared.

"What are you guys talking about?" Garrus said, walking up.

"Our Tenno friend just launched himself out of the airlock and disappeared. Something about getting his ship. Why are you here anyway? Shouldn't you be preparing for the rescue mission?" Joker said.

"I was talking to Eitri when Shepard called him. If he's saying he's getting the ship, that means…" Garrus trailed off, turning towards the window as a giant portal opened and a ghostly ship twice the size of the Normandy seemed to phase into existence out of it.

"What. The. Fuck." Joker said, looking at the strangely shaped ship.

The ship reminded Shepard of a beetle and a shark at the same time somehow. A giant, metallic teal 4-legged horned beetle- shark with giant engines on each side instead of wings and a long tail. There was a large empty tube on top of the ship, with a long, slanted extrusion that had turrets and a barrel on it. There were five other turret emplacements that she could see, each one looking different from the next.

"That's a lot of cannons. Why are there so many different types?" Garrus asked.

"You can ask him when we get on the ship. Joker, can you extend the docking tube?" Shepard said.

"On it Commander. The walkway is relatively adaptive so it should be fine for boarding through the port on the bottom there. Let me see if I can connect to Eitri." Joker said, sending a signal to the Tempestarii.

There was a slight pause before the line connected. "Hello? Sorry, not used to responding on this system since I only really use it to hijack enemy communications, accept surrenders, or receive the rare distress call." Eitri's voice came out over the call.

"We wanted to know where we should dock." Shepard said.

"Any of the doors at the bottom of the ship would be fine. Be careful, the way you enter may be a bit disorienting to first-timers."

Joker connected the two ships and turned to Shepard. "Better figure out who's going with you fast. Sensing some Geth breaking off, probably to investigate the anomaly caused by the Tempestarii appearing."

"Garrus, you coming?" Shepard said.

"Do you think I'd pass up the chance to fire those guns? Of course I'm coming." Garrus said.

"Good. I'll call Tali over. Her knowledge of the Geth may be needed if we end up in an altercation with their ships." Shepard said, bringing up her omnitool. "Tali, you're with us on the recovery team. Report to the bridge immediately. Kaiden, Ashley, Wrex, and Jenkins will take the Mako to rescue any surviving researchers on the surface."

"""""Got it/On it/Yes Ma'am/Finally, some action/Good, I was wanting to try out my new gun."""""

The door opened and Tali ran up to Shepard and saw her looking out of the window. Turning to see what Shepard was looking at and saw the Tempestarii. "That is one strange looking ship."

"Hey, I resent that statement! I spent 3 years making the modifications to this ship. I know it's not the prettiest ship in the galaxy. 1000 years inside a Void storm will do that to a ship, but she makes up for it in her defenses, mobility, and firepower." Eitri said over the intercom.

"Geez, sorry. Not like I can judge, a lot of the Migrant Fleet's ships are basically scrap heaps with Eezo drives." Tali apologized.

"It's fine. Sorry for being so defensive. It's just, she's my baby, you know? My gigantic, nightmare-inducing superweapon baby." Eitri said.

"I know the feeling. I feel the same way with my guns sometimes." Garrus said.

"Thanks for understanding. For that, you get to man the secondary artillery." Eitri said.

"Secondary artillery? How many weapons are on this thing?" Shepard asked?

"A lot. Railjacks weren't really used for long distance, several million kilometer skirmishes, but up close and personal 'melees' and boarding missions, not that they couldn't fight long range. It's technically classified an interceptor where I'm from. We just found it more efficient to sneak up on their flank, disable their defenses, and either infiltrate and take over the ship, sabotage it from inside, or detonate its power core with artillery. With a good Tenno railjack squad, we could probably hijack a ship the size of the Destiny Ascension in the time it takes for one of the shells from its main cannon to reach the Mass Relay near the Citadel. And that's not accounting for the upgrades my Tempestarii has gone through." Eitri said with pride. "You'll see what I mean soon. Anyway, let's get going. Be careful, the transfer might be a little disorienting to those who aren't used to it."

The railjack squad walked into the airlock of the Tempestarii. It looked like an empty room with a door on the ceiling.

"How are we supposed to- whoa!" Tali started as they were launched upwards into the ship proper.

The team looked around and saw the interior of the ship. It looked different from any other ship they'd seen before. It felt empty, lacking the rows of computers they were used to seeing. Instead, they saw several strange devices connected to tubes going in various directions. The doors on one side opened, prompting the group to move through it. They saw Eitri attached to a strange device that looked like it would come out of a mecha movie.

"They've boarded. Disengaging from airlock." Eitri said.

"Got it. Good luck. Heading for the drop point." Joker's voice came out from the device Eitri was on.

"Hope you guys don't get motion sick too easily. This ship dampens the inertia of the maneuvers, but not feeling the sudden changes in acceleration you see can be a bit nauseating. This is an omnidirectional craft, so don't be surprised if I start doing maneuvers that seem impossible on other ships." Eitri said, detaching from the Normandy.

"What that thing you're attached to? I understand you're controlling the ship with it, but how does it work?" Tali asked as they flew towards the planet.

"It's a Neural Harness. It communicates directly with your mind, connecting it to all systems on the ship. It allows users to 'see' whatever the sensors detect, fire the weapons, and pilot the ship-" Eitri started, then cut himself off. "Huh, I didn't think about that. Sorry Garrus and Tali, I can't let you use the harnesses since the ship isn't calibrated for anything other than humans and warframes. Once I can access data on how your brains work, I should be able to calibrate the harness to work for nonhumans."

"If you control it with your mind, why are you like that?" Shepard asked.

"You ever played a traditional racing game? You know, the ones with a steering wheel?"

"Yeah, back when I was a kid. The wheel was projected with an Omnitool and kept falling over because I kept forgetting it was a game and leaning into the turns." Shepard said nostalgically.

"The Harness doesn't cut off any movement when controlling the ship for security reasons and just like the racing game, piloting the ship makes you instinctively move in the direction of the ship. It also keeps you in a position where you can easily get off if you need to defend against boarders or join the infiltration team."

"Did you get boarded often?" Shepard asked.

"With my old railjack, we would sometimes get hit with ramsleds, which were basically rockets with soldiers in them. There were also void storms which created rifts that occasionally teleport enemies or other objects from derelicts of the Orokin Era. The Tempestarii is a lot sturdier than my other railjack, so unless our enemies can teleport, we should be fine."

"Sorry to interrupt, but we're approaching several Geth ship signatures, one cruiser, two lightly armed corvettes, and several fighters in orbit above the ruin the signal came from." Ordis said, his voice coming from the Harness.

"Is Ordis acting like a ship VI?" Tali asked.

"Essentially. It was actually the job he was assigned when he became a Cephalon. He also fills in for any other manned role that is missing from the crew other than that of internal security and artillerist. Shepard, can you go to the Harness behind me? I'll give you access to the secondary artillery. Just stand with your back facing the harness and jump while thinking about connecting to it." Eitri said.

Shepard hesitantly did so, and the Harness attached itself to her, bringing her below the deck and closing a hatch above her.

"Whoa! You didn't tell us it would do that! What is the secondary artillery anyway?" Garrus exclaimed.

"You'll see in a bit. Ordis, prepare to fire on the Geth ship on my cue. Tali, do you think you can point out major system centers on the Geth ship for me to target? You know, like the Mass Effect core or the power core?"

"It's been hundreds of years since our people fought the Geth and they obviously have advanced since then, but I'll try my best." Tali said.

"Good. Activating full stealth and entering the Rift." Eitri said, Banishing the Tempestarii to the Border and activating the ship's stealth field. About a minute later, they came face to face with the Geth ships. The fighters resembled three- segmented wasps, while the larger resembled a long beetle of some kind. "Ordis, scan the ships and display emissions and structural layout."

Transparent 3-dimensional images of the geth ships appeared on the screen in front of Eitri with certain sections of the ships glowing in different colors and streams of color running throughout the images.

"Okay, the big one is definitely a command station or communications hub of some kind and the corvettes seem to be drop ships, considering the independent spots with an even distribution. Those must be the main power generators since it branches throughout the ships and those should be the propulsion engines and those should be shield generators, but what are those on the big ones? One of them looks like data, but it's moving constantly into various points from the 'head', and the other one runs the length of the ship and into the thrusters."

"The data is the Geth themselves, as they were designed to perform better in larger concentrations. Think of a networked data cloud where each computer in the network boosts the capabilities of the others slightly. Not a true hivemind, but a community of AIs. The other one is the mass effect core that allows it to pass through the Relays and achieve FTL travel…" Tali said, gushing about the functions of the ships. "Umm… by the way, can I get a copy of those scans? It would really help with my Pilgrimage."

"Sure, but for now we need to find our asari. Ordis, prepare a Blackout Swarm. Shepard can pick off the transport once it's disabled. Leaving the Rift in 3…2…1… Now!"

The ship lurched forward, entering regular space inside the Geth formation. The Geth fighters, detecting the sudden anomaly amongst them, scrambled to aim at the railjack. Just before they started firing, the railjack sprung into action. Dozens of silvery-blue projectiles flew from the ship and towards the Geth ships. The Geth attempted to evade, but the effort proved futile as the projectiles detonated several hundred meters away from the ships, exploding into enormous shockwaves of silvery blue energy. The waves seemed to cascade over one another, amplifying each other and smashing into the Geth ships repeatedly. The cruiser and drop ships at the center of the formation got the worst of it, getting struck from all sides.

When the blasts finally cleared, the scene before the Railjack crew unnerved some of them. The fighters were glowing hot and starting to melt, the drop ships appeared to have experienced several explosions from within, based on the outward-splaying holes in their hulls. The cruiser seemed the most intact, though it too suffered extensive damage and was floating dead in place.

"Well damn, guess two dozen at max power was overkill." Eitri chuckled awkwardly. "Wasn't sure about the ship shielding situation here, but it looks like it's primarily kinetic barriers with some sacrificial armor plating to ward off and diffuse stuff like lasers. Probably should tone it down next time."

"I'm sorry, but what the hell was that?" Garrus asked.

Just as Eitri was about to say something, Joker's voice sounded out from the Harness.

"Hey, are you guys okay? We just picked up a massive energy spike above the ruin. All our sensors are going haywire and I'm getting alerts I haven't seen since my 'frigate emergency response' class in flight academy."

"It's fine. Just testing out one of my ship's weapons on a Geth cruiser and its escorts. Turned out to be overkill." Eitri said.

"What kind of weapon would do that?!" Joker said.

"I would like to know as well." Garrus said.

"I call it the Blackout Swarm. Basically a swarm of target-seeking multi-spectrum EMP charges that have a multiplicative effect when detonated within a certain radius of other charges. It was supposed to just fry the shields and disable the power to the ships, but I guess I severely overestimated their shielding and armor technology. Sorry Shepard. You could still shoot the cruiser's 'head' so we can salvage the ship on the way back."

"Why not, I wanted to see what it does anyway. Firing now." Shepard replied, willing the artillery to fire on the cruiser. A semicircle of green lasers converged into a point, then a thicker beam was fired directly through that point and into the head of the Geth cruiser. Time seemed to lag for a bit before a massive hole appeared on the ship where most of the head and neck of the ship used to be.

"We'll salvage that on the way out. Heading to the ruins now." Eitri said, guiding the railjack towards the planet below.

(AN: sorry for the wait. Combination AuDHD, college, novels, video games, and lack of morale due to my first negative reviews made writing very sporadic and slow. Not an excuse, but an explanation. Remember this is a pleasure piece started with a hyper fixation as well as my first attempt at writing a story. School is about to start again, hopefully the last semester before my BS in Sociology, so don't expect another chapter soon.

Also, is Joey really that bad of an MC name? If you guys really don't like it, I could change it. I'm thinking Eitri, after one of the two brothers that made Mjolnir in Norse Mythology.

Sorry not a new chapter. Just decided finding and replace all on google docs is easier than finding the 150+ times I wrote the MC's name)