Chapter One Hundred And Thirty-Four

Horizon Colony. Lera System.

The shuttle settled into place and as soon as the door opened Miranda Lawson heard the somewhat familiar noise of bolter weapons firing and chainswords doing their grizzly work. She'd only seen the Deathwatch marines as they trained so as to prepare for this mission, but if they were anything like the stories she'd heard then she was glad that they were so far as not only would she be spared some gruesome sights the powered armoured warriors would draw the attention of the Collectors to them making it safer for the others.

As a group they then began to move forward, with Miranda getting just a little bit ahead of the others in order to take point. From the outside Miranda was the picture of calm collected professionalism, on the inside however she was a mite peeved because the team she'd been given command over was only made up a few of Lord Thrax's bodyguards who were to help her secure only a small part of the colony, a part that those Imperial skull probes had located many pods in. The Rogue Trader didn't want the Collectors to retreat with too much of their living loot.

In her view she should be part of the main team that was meant to be securing the main power plant a part of the colony with a heavy Collector presence, however she was not, for some reason Subject Zero and a few other members of Thrax's battle harem had been sent there while other teams had lesser targets.

In time the Imperial Guard would be able to deploy in force to secure the whole colony and the surrounding farms.

Given that she'd not worked much with the Imperials it was easy for Miranda to understand why Thrax had not given the former Ceberus operative a big team with an important goal as she needed to prove her worth, but to let Subject Zero lead an important team really didn't sit well with Miranda.

Jack was unstable at the very best of times. She was as much a danger to her allies as she was to her opponents. If it had been up to her, Jack would have been sent to hit the Collectors directly. She was best used when solving a problem was done best by simply using force. Miranda was better in every way and she'd have to prove that to Lord Thrax.

Miranda was smart enough to understand that she needed to remain focused, she was getting distracted, and while this was understandable given how down right insane her life had become recently, what with making contact with the Imperials and leaving Cerberus, well as attempting to stop the Collectors, the distractions could get her killed. She had to focus on the here and now.

Ahead of her the colony was eerily still. Nothing moved, but for some reason that didn't assure her, she felt as if she was being watched. Miranda rounded the corner of a prefabricated building and almost ran head first into a colonist. She reacted by bringing up her plasma rifle, a weapon she'd been well trained to use during the days the cruiser had spent making its way to this colony, and she was prepared to fire.

This proved to be unnecessary because her target wasn't in any way a threat. The body, that of a human make, was frozen in a posture of abject terror, one armed raised up as if to shield his face from something. But from what? The Seeker Swarms? If so then she hoped that counter measures provided by the Ad-Mech who had been working with the Inquisition to counter the alien technology worked as hoped. Her carapace armour alone would not protect her.

She eased her weapon down and leaned in to inspect the colonist as best she could. The man, a human male. His eyes seemed to follow her movements, like some eyes in paintings could. Then Miranda realised that eyes were actually tracking her. This man was frozen in place, but he was fully aware of what was going on around him.

"Lord Captain, we found one of the colonists" she reported.

The only reply was a very faint hiss of static. She tried again.

"Thrax this is Miranda, do you read?"she asked.

The Rogue Trader was supposed to be heading down the colony himself or to still be on the cruiser, which was well within range of her comm device.

"I think our communications are being jammed" Miranda informed the team "Come on we need to find our objective".

That was when she saw them. There were twelve of them flying in a loose V formation about twenty meters above the prefab buildings. Humanoid in shape but distinctly insectoid in appearance, with dragonfly-like wings sprouting from their backs and two sets of strange eyes; eyes which quickly locked on her.

"Oh bloody hell," she muttered.

Four of them detached from the group, angling in for a landing that should put them down behind a group of crates that were just ahead of her rather than fire above. Perhaps they intended to capture her and the team rather than simply kill them?

Two of the aliens had taken up shooting positions and they were covering the other two as they advanced. Miranda lined up a shot which was aimed at the closer of the two incoming aliens and fired at it until the alien dropped to the ground.

As hoped their defences were not optimised against plasma weapons. The kinetic energy of the super heated matter when fired could be dealt with, but the sheer amount of heat energy was more than the Collectors could handle. This made since they'd be expecting to deal with locally made weapons not tech from another universe.

She aimed her weapon and took a moment to catch her breath as the battle harem members with her used laser weapons to deal with two more of the Collectors who didn't seem to care about finding proper cover. Then she gritted her teeth and called upon her biotics. The remaining Collector had decided to take cover and she removed that, allowing the battle harem members to finish off the last alien.

Moments later the team moved on, intending to reach their objective soon only they came across something odd. A frozen colonist who was wearing armour, she'd been placed in a pod. Her identity was easy to discover once Miranda scanned the woman with her omni-tool.

"Lt Williams. Alliance Navy" she told the others.

Miranda knew that name.

"She served on the old Normandy. What's she doing here?".

The new Normandy was already in system and would be in orbit soon. Had the Collectors not been in a rush Shepard would have likely arrived during the abductions.

As for the marine, she was sealed in a pod, and it took some effort but the former Cerberus Operatives and Thrax's bodyguards were able to free her. Soon the marine sat up in the pod, her eyes darting left and right as hands instinctively reached for a weapon that was long gone. Her gaze then locked on Miranda and she seemed to relax a little realising that she was with her other humans.

"Who are you people?" she asked.

"I'm Miranda Lawson '' she said "I'm with the Imperial expedition I used to work for Cerberus".

Not this would endear her to the Operation Chief, but lying about her identity wouldn't earn any trust either.

"Is Cerberus behind this?" the Alliance soldier demanded to know.

That wasn't the case even if one of their agents had weakened the colonies defences to help lure the Collectors in.

"The Collectors are behind the abductions. We just saved your life" Miranda said.

Williams quickly got out of the pod.

"I don't know what kinda trick you are playing here, but it won't work" Ash stated.

Miranda then decided to hand over her sidearm, this gesture very much confused the Alliance Navy marine. The weapon was a Fallout style laser pistol that Miranda had also learned to use as would many humans in this galaxy. Imperial models were better, but the Imperials had a surplus of the Fallout weapons and by not using them there was less chance of the more advanced Imperial tech falling into the wrong hands.

"The Collectors are here" he said "So you're gonna need this. It's a laser so there's no recall or thermal clips, but you will need my spare power cells".

The Alliance officer shot her a suspicious look, but she took the weapon and the power cells before moving away.